Blog of Leigh & Donna McCulloch

Happy New Year 2012!!!

2012-01-01T14:22:00.000+11:00

“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do.." (John 14:12)

As I enter 2012 I am inspired by these words Jesus spoke. In the context of evangelism, teaching, mercy and compassion, so much is possible. If we let the Holy Spirit, He will drive us to impact and transform the people, cultures, and societies of the world.

Life Insurance for Non-Smokers

2011-09-15T19:56:00.002+10:00

A large number of employees in Australia have Life Insurance. You may have it and not realise it as many superannuation packages include a life insurance plan and the cost of this plan is automatically deducted from your Superannuation balance.

What you also might not know is that your insurance may have been setup with all the default parameters, especially if your super was setup for you by your employer. These parameters ultimately play a part in defining the premium charged to you each month and one of these parameters is whether you are a smoker. Non-smokers are likely to live longer and as such life insurance for non-smokers can be cheaper.

If you are a non-smoker with life insurance, check with your insurer if they know you are a non-smoker. You could be saving some of your super.

Insert Key on a Mac Keyboard

2011-09-14T14:54:00.001+10:00

While the Insert key is a rarely used key on most keyboards it is far from obsolete and still used in many specialist applications. Try using most hex editors without one. However, the Mac keyboards whether they be external or built-in on a Macbook Air or Pro, don't make it easy to find the Insert key.

It is easy though.

Just press: Fn + Return.

iOS Dev: Strip HTML tags from an NSString

2011-09-08T10:30:00.002+10:00

As it turns out there is no single one liner for striping HTML tags from an NSString in the iOS SDK. So I've written the following NSString category that adds a stripHtml method to all NSStrings. To use this include the .h and .m file into your project and:

Import the header:
#import "NSString_stripHtml.h"

And then call stripHtml:

NSString* mystring = @"<b>Hello</b> World!!";

NSString* stripped = [mystring stripHtml];

// stripped will be = Hello World!!

Assassins Creed 2: Can't Pickup Box

2011-08-29T19:02:00.000+10:00

I am playing Assassins Creed 2 at the moment and I ran into an odd bug early in the game. I am required to pickup a box of paintings that are on the ground by pressing SHIFT.

I've picked up many other objects and opened boxes in the game by pressing SHIFT without any trouble, but when I press SHIFT my character responds by waving his hand in front of him.

The solution is to tap SHIFT very quickly until the box is picked up.

Setting environment variables on a Mac

2011-08-22T16:40:00.003+10:00

I always read a lot about setting something in ~/.bash_profile or ~/.bashrc or ~/.profile and I never really understand all the technical differences or the files aren't there already and creating the files doesn't seem to make a difference and I'm just left confused.

The way to set environment variables for a user on a Mac as per Apple:

http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#qa/qa1067/_index.html

AND THEN re-login! :)

To create the environment.plist file Open Xcode -> File -> New File -> Resource -> Property List. When saying where the file should be saved, navigate to the users home directory and create a new folder named ".MacOSX". Then save the file as environment.plist. Right click in the file to "Add Row". I have found that the environment variable being set gets appended (at least in the case of PATH). Save the file, quit, and then re-login to have the changes take effect. In terminal you can check the environment variables that are set by running the set command. Or if you want to check a specific variable instead of scrolling through the list, run echo $KEY (i.e. echo $PATH).

Bluetooth discoverable disabled and magic mouse and bluetooth keyboard won't Pair

2011-08-18T15:07:00.003+10:00

After receiving a brand spanking new 27" iMac at work I noticed a few oddities with my bluetooth. In the bluetooth preferences, even though the On tickbox was checked there was a message saying that the bluetooth was turned off. Also the discoverable tickbox was disabled and wouldn't let me turn it on. The MAIN problem I was having was that even though my mouse and keyboard were connected, they wouldn't PAIR. So in the bluetooth preferences under devices it showed 2 devices, but it didn't know that they were a mouse and keyboard. In the more information section on the right they were listed as Type Unknown, Connected: Yes, Paired: No.

Lets skip to the thing that actually did work after being on Apple's Customer Support phone line for over an hour. In Macintosh Hd/Library/Preferences there should be a file called com.apple.Bluetooth.plist and com.apple.Bluetooth.plist.lockfile. Instead I had a folder named com.apple.Bluetooth.plist which contained a file called com.apple.Bluetooth.plist and also in the Preferences folder I had the lockfile and another folder com.apple.Bluetooth.plist~orig. I copied the two folders and the lock file to my desktop, and then dragged the ones in the Preferences folder to the Trash and restarted. Everything wokred! I could pair my bluetooth devices and also turn my bluetooth onto discoverable. Even though it took Apple Customer Support a good hour to get to this, I am very very grateful as after an hour on the phone my handset had died and I thought that I had just wasted an hour! The supervisor called me back on my mobile nearly straightaway and was able to pick up where I had left off! Yay!

Exclude Aperture Library Thumbnails from CrashPlan+ Backups

2011-07-28T23:33:00.000+10:00

One thing that Time Machine backup does is it excludes the thumbnails that Aperture generates. This is handy, for a smallish library that will save you about 4-5GB in backups space, and when you restore from a Time Machine backup Aperture sees the thumbnails missing and auto-regenerates them.

CrashPlan+, as great as it is, by default will backup Aperture thumbnails. To exclude them from your CrashPlan+ backup and save some internet upload time and space just add the following regular expression to the Filename Exclusions setting.

(.+).aplibrary/Thumbnails(.*)

The thumbnails are stored in a single directory immediately inside the library, so this will exclude the thumbnail directory and it's files of any Aperture library.

Note: Make sure you tick the "Regular Expression" tick box when adding it to the filename exclusion list otherwise it won't work properly.

Relinking referenced files in an Aperture library after doing a Time Machine Restore

2011-07-17T01:06:00.004+10:00

I've just performed my first time machine restore. As an avid user ever since Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard came out I've still never actually performed a restore. I was very impressed to see all my files where they should be. Settings as they were before, and so on.

All was good until I opened Aperture and for a second I was in shock to see all my photos missing. They were there, in the library but not there, with the thumbnails all blank and missing reference icons on them. I quickly checked that the photos were indeed there on the hard disk and they were.

This was pretty frustrating but at least it was easy to relink the photos. All I needed to do was select all the photos, click File -> Locate Referenced Files. I then showed Aperture where the first photo was and then clicked Reconnect All and away it went reconnecting all the remaining photos.

Recipe: Spicy Quinoa Soup

2011-05-22T21:47:00.001+10:00

Tonight we cooked a vegetable soup with quinoa seeds thanks to Donna's Nannie and inspired by Show Me the Curry. It tastes quite nice, and the chilli is a key ingredient, so don't skip it!

Ingredients:

Quinoa Seeds, 1/2 cup washed
Chia Seeds, 1 teaspoon per serve
Carrots, 1 1/2 sliced
Frozen Beans, a couple of handfuls
Frozen Peas, a couple of handfuls
Frozen Corn, a couple of handfuls
1 Onion, diced
1 Chilli, diced finely with the seeds left in
1 Litre of Vegetable Stock

Steps:

Put a medium sized pot on high.
Add the litre of vegetable stock, the quinoa seeds and all the vegetables.
Cook for 25 minutes with the lid on.
Serve in bowls and sprinkle a teaspoon of chia seeds over the top.

Vegetable Stir Fry

2011-05-20T20:43:00.000+10:00

Tonight I cooked a vegetable stir fry inspired by Justine Schofield, the chef of Everyday Gourmet.

Ingredients:

Udon Noodles
Capsicum, sliced
Beans, whole
Snow Peas, whole but remove the strings
Carrot, sliced length ways about 4mm and then diced across 1cm
Asparagus, broken into 2cm pieces
Soy Sauce
Sesame Seeds
Extra Virgin Grapeseed Oil (or your favourite cooking oil)

Steps:

Pre-heat your pan, add oil.
Add all the vegetables and stir fry for 2 minutes.
Meanwhile, prepare your udon noodles according to their instructions.
Add the udon noodles to the pan along with soy sauce and some sesame seeds.
Cook until half of the soy sauce has evaporated.
Serve.

Facebook iPhone App: "Your photo cannot be uploaded at this time..."

2011-05-06T07:03:00.002+10:00

For some months I have been unable to upload photos to Facebook on my iPhone. Turns out this is a bug, but there is a work around. Do the following and it somehow resets something in the phone that is blocking the iPhone from uploading.

Go to your Settings and:

General
Reset
Reset Location Warnings

Then open Facebook back up and you'll be able to upload your photos!

You go down the road you go down when you're younger...

2011-04-04T21:27:00.000+10:00

"You go down the road you go down when you're younger.
You learn what you learn from watching.
Imitating what you see what's right in front of you.
But when you grow up, you get to make your own choices. Choices that are going to define who you are. Your morals. What you stand for. What you fall for. Who you want to be."

-- Alex (Michael B. Jordan)
from Parenthood Season 2 Episode 11: Damage Control

Discovery

2010-12-23T10:32:00.000+11:00

"The act of discovery is often surprising; sometimes embarrassing."
-- David Thomas, ref.

Today I am in one of those fearless moods. The above just excites me and makes me say "bring it on!!"

Recipe: Chick Pea Patties

2010-11-23T21:53:00.000+11:00

We are saving money at the moment, and tonight I decided to make dinner with ingredients that were already in our kitchen instead of doing the shopping.

These are the ingredients I used:

400g can of chick peas (drained and mashed)
2 carrots (grated)
1 cup of frozen peas
4 eggs (lightly whisked)
2/3 cup of tasty cheese (grated)
3/4 cup of plain flour
2 cloves of garlic
4 iceberg lettuce leafs

Servings: 4

Steps:

Mix all the ingredients together. It'll become a thick mixture.
Heat a frying pan with some olive oil.
Heap the mixture into lumps and flatten into patties.
Cook until the centres are no longer runny (1-3 minutes each side).
Serve a-top a full lettuce leaf.

It doesn't have meat in it, and won't be the tastiest meal I eat this week, but it is elegant and has a "Mum" feel to it that is satisfying. Enjoy!

We've got a Blue Star!

2010-11-13T14:27:00.000+11:00

I received a Mario-like email from eBay this morning. Yay!

Cynacism

2010-10-15T10:46:00.000+11:00

I've been working in different industries of software development for about five years and one thing has been constant: cynicism. It's pretty hard to escape and it's very easy to buy into. It feels good at first, but ultimately it will only drag a company, and me, down.

The key isn't to resist cynicism, but to see that it doesn't server any purpose other than to make me right.

I am better off putting my hopes and dreams on the line and be wrong and disappointed, than I am to settle with cynicism.

Christmas Cards

2010-09-25T15:59:00.001+10:00

Many times have I written on Christmas cards. I can't say I'm the creative type, but I do more than just write my name. Just enough to be socially acceptable, but not enough to really communicate anything of significance other than, "I remembered you."

As I sit today staring at a blank card, I'm stumped. I can't write Merry Christmas, or Happy New Year. That just won't do. The card is to a sponsored child in El Salvador whose life I barely know or understand. Besides being more than a few years younger than me, this child lives in a society not consumed with, well, consumerism. I can't write hoping he gets many toys, or even the toy he wants. I can't make any of the cliche references commonly found on any card I've ever received.

What I write must be authentic, to the core of who he is, and from the core of who I am. There is only one thing we have in common. We are children of God.

And with our Saviour in mind, and our God watching, I penned a sentence that I don't know if he'll understand. I don't know if he'll get it. I don't know if it will create a smile, or cause a tilted head. But I pray that through my words he will know that I remembered him.

iPhone Dev: Playing audio in the background.

2010-08-21T16:39:00.001+10:00

I recently released a new version of the Hope Media application that brought a lot of new challenges to it's development. Apple released iOS4 that supported background applications and I set out to make my application continue to play radio after the application was minimized.

It was actually extremely easy. At the most basic level all I needed to do was add the UIBackgroundModes field to the Info.plist file for the application. I soon discovered though, that even though this part was easy, the rest would not be so easy.

My problems hit when handling interruptions. If I received an audio interruption from the OS, I would stop playing the music as I should. When the interruption ceased I received the "end interruption" indicator from the OS, and was even informed by the OS that I could resume playing. But alas, I could not resume. This is a bug in iOS4 it turns out. The OS is telling the application to resume, when the application is actually not allowed to resume as my application is not the "now playing" application. To become the "now playing" application I have to register for remote audio events.

That. Simple.

For more info on implementing/handling remote audio events in your application (which makes you the now playing application) see the following Apple Developer URL.
https://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/documentation/EventHandling/Conceptual/EventHandlingiPhoneOS/RemoteControl/RemoteControl.html

The New iPad

2010-05-19T11:43:00.009+10:00

click to enlarge

This photo really doesn't do the iPad or me justice. However, this is without a doubt the geeky-est moment of this week (my wife and I are also slaying the dragon this week, but I think the iPad and the look on my face seal the deal).

Prior to that moment there is no way I'd waste my money on an iPad. And chances are I probably still won't. But holding it, flicking the pages and gazing into it's shiny smooth surface is a lot more mesmerizing than I bargained for. As I held on tight I could practically feel the words "my precious" slipping out between my lips. Eek.

Take Care of the "House" You Live In

2010-04-20T19:47:00.004+10:00

"You have to take care of yourself. Your body is the house you live in. And if you destroy it, then you have to leave!"
-- Joyce Meyer

My wife listens to Joyce Meyer a lot, and she shared that with me tonight. It's from her radio podcast from the 26th February 2010 and really hits me. I know I need to look after myself, but I feel like, now, it's a whole lot more real.

Rethinking How to Escape the Earth

2010-03-26T22:20:00.000+11:00

Rockets. Rockets are the solution at the moment. We blast as much power down and force ourselves upwards. It's a violent and disruptive approach to flying, lifting and escaping the hold Earth has on us. I am determined there is a more natural approach to getting off Earth.

Just as a bubble of air starting at the bottom of the ocean is pushed upwards, it is possible for us to launch a vessel into space using the atmosphere pressing down as our force for pushing us up. In the scenario replace the water with the air, and the bubble with some form of manned space vessel. All that is required is to make the vessel lighter than the air, so that the atmosphere pressing down will cause the vessel to rise.

With rockets, the biggest force is applied at the beginning. The furthest the shuttle gets from the ground, smaller rockets are used as less force is required. This is much the same when using the atmosphere to force the upwards climb. Air is more pressurised at ground level, and as the vessel rises, the atmosphere becomes thinner providing less force to lift the vessel, with less force being required.

There are numerous problems with this approach, such as what to do with a gust of wind, but I'm sure when NASA first considered launching man into space they had their fair share of obstacles as well. I am also not naive enough to realise that the use of the atmosphere to launch a vessel into outer space would mean no man-made force applying engines are required, but instead maybe they would only play a role of steering and propulsion.

If you have ideas, or knowledge, on how this could or would work, please feel free to share below...

Where do I find my flickr Photo ID?

2010-03-01T22:45:00.004+11:00

Whether it be your own photo you uploaded or someone else's, finding a photo ID of a photo on flickr is easy. When you visit the photo page of the photo in question, your web browsers address bar will probably contain a web address something like:

http://flickr.com/photos/leighmcculloch/4356591689/

The web address is broken up as follows:

http://flickr.com/photos/[owner]/[photo id]/

That means for our example web address, it's photo ID is 4356591689.

For some services like pin.nu/fr where you need to provide a photo ID of a photo on flickr, that is the number you enter. Head over to pin.nu/fr and give it a go, once you've done it once it will be second nature.

How to show the SCM column in Xcode

2010-01-21T10:15:00.004+11:00

I have been using Source Control Management with Xcode for the last 6 months or so. But setting up a new project I've only had to do a couple of times. And every time I always come across some kind of difficulty with showing the SCM Column on the left of Xcode in the Groups and Files view. This post is really here so that the next time I do a search I can find the info I need easily :D

After having setup SCM with XCode the SCM Smart Group wasn't showing on the left. But I couldn't figure out how to get it to show, last time I did this it showed automatically. The trick is to Right Click on the Groups & Files heading and select SCM in the list. Yay! How easy was that?

2010-01-17T22:40:00.002+11:00

During my lifetime I will strive to do some amazing things. But few things in my life will ever eclipse the joy and satisfaction from making my wife, a friend or even a complete stranger, smile.