Ranchero Software: MarsEdit 1.0 Beta
Today I realized that both Faughnan's Notes and Faughnan Tech blogs were formatted incorrectly. This happens often when I don't close a blockquote. Surprisingly, it's not easy to find the malformed post, but it wrecks the page display. I spent about 30 minutes slicing and dicing. It was 30+ posts back in one blog.
I need a real editor.
Fortunately there are several great OS X editors, like this one's predecessor. One of them should do the job. Oddly enough, there are few if any mature editors for XP.
Wednesday, November 24, 2004
EyeTV: Issues with analog VHS digitization
EyeTV Reviews and Owner Comments
iMac G4 800Mhz, 356MB Ramand
- OSX 10.35
- eyeTV 200, vers 1.5
- formac FW ext drive 250 GB (for recording)
- Grundig GV 470 S S-VHS video recorder attached to eyeTV via S-VHS and audio cinch cables
Hi Mike, in addition to my earlier reports on eyeTV 200 I performed more tests, again only transferring VHS tapes to mpeg2. I did not record any live TV, neither did I use the programming features for TV shows. Alas, the results of my testings were again sobering.
My findings are as follows:
Converting 1st generation VHS (good to perfect quality) was not working flawlessly. In half of my recordings heavy block artefacts would occur on any given moment, which would last for minutes if left unstopped. Most of the time this only happened in recording mode.
On 2nd generation VHS (ie, copies from VHS to VHS) the results were almost always wasted due to artifacts.
It seems that eyeTV needs very bright and sharp feeds to render correctly. Since I was converting my music video collection lightning conditions were admittedly extreme: dark spots on stage, brightly lit artists, camera flashlights etc.
BTW: Research in discussion groups on the internet revealed that direct-to-mepg2 video rendering applications in the PC world are sensitive to this problem as well. Only digital video (DV) feeds seem to bring good quality results. Big drawback is the time needed to render DV to mpeg2 for burning DVDs. Here PCs (and probably G5s) are in advantage of my (slow) G4 system. I never tested Miglia or Formac products which offer analogue video to DV rendering, neither do I own a digital video cam to verify rendering time. But since I don't have to edit a lot in my recordings (titles, cuts, advertisements etc)--which is the DV advantage over mpeg2 video--this option never interested me anyway.
ElGato Tips for EyeTV 200 VHS Encoding ProblemsHmm. Looks like some serious technical issues here. EyeTV has a money back guarantee, so I'd have to be ready to test and return. Pass-through on a digital camera seems to give the best results as near as I can tell.
To fix the VHS encoding problems with EyeTV 200:
1) Using EyeTV 1.5, go to EyeTV > Preferences > Devices... > Encoding > Custom > Edit...
2) Change GOP Structure to "I, P Frames" or "I Frames Only"
This should minimize or completely remove such encoding problems, by allow EyeTV to recover from glitches in the signal gracefully.
By the way, "I Frames Only" allows for frame-by-frame editing, a much requested feature.
Nick F.
Technical Support Specialist "
YouSendIt | Email large files quickly, securely, and easily!
YouSendIt | Email large files quickly, securely, and easily!
Ok, interesting. Maybe a good way to send someone a batch of digital images. "Free" (for now!) for non-corporate use, so you have to wonder about how they make money. Here's part of their privacy policy:
Update: Wow, they are SLOW. I'd guess their service just started and has been hammered. You have to upload via a browser interface, so it can really tie up the browser cycles. I'll give them a few more tries. This seems like something Google would have the infrastructure for.
Benefits: YouSendIt FileLink allows you to receive files up to 1GB in size for free on your website. Use FileLink to accept any document submissions from your customers, users, and visitors to your website. Common usages include receiving print, image, and multimedia documents normally too big for email securely and easily. Let YouSendIt help you do business on the internet.
Ok, interesting. Maybe a good way to send someone a batch of digital images. "Free" (for now!) for non-corporate use, so you have to wonder about how they make money. Here's part of their privacy policy:
Collecting Email AddressesI'll give them a try. I wouldn't send anything via them that I wanted to be secret -- no matter what their privacy policy might say.
We collect the e-mail addresses of YouSendIt Delivery recipients solely for the purpose of logging and measuring usage. Personal user information we collect is not shared with other organizations for any reason.
Third Party Advertising
We use third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our Web site. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address or telephone number) about your visits to this and other Web sites in order to provide advertisements on this site and other sites about goods and services that may be of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, please click here...
Update: Wow, they are SLOW. I'd guess their service just started and has been hammered. You have to upload via a browser interface, so it can really tie up the browser cycles. I'll give them a few more tries. This seems like something Google would have the infrastructure for.
Sound Recording for OS X
MacInTouch Home Page: "We've also been trying to identify a simple and reliable Mac recording application. SoundEdit was a great option for Mac OS 9, but it's not available for Mac OS X. We discovered that Rogue Amoeba's inexpensive Audio Hijack combines a great interface with strong features for recording live audio, quite apart from its other special capabilities.
Audio Recorder is a super-simple, freeware option we're currently exploring. Amadeus II, which is also inexpensive, has proved to be reliable and capable in our experience, with advanced capabilities for audio analysis and processing, but we find its interface a bit confusing. Audiocorder might be another good option. There's more discussion on the topic in our Audio Recording report. -MacInTouch"
Dave Dahlberg notes an expansio"
Audio Recorder is a super-simple, freeware option we're currently exploring. Amadeus II, which is also inexpensive, has proved to be reliable and capable in our experience, with advanced capabilities for audio analysis and processing, but we find its interface a bit confusing. Audiocorder might be another good option. There's more discussion on the topic in our Audio Recording report. -MacInTouch"
Dave Dahlberg notes an expansio"
Waiting for OS X 10.3.7
MacInTouch Home Page
I've seen both bugs, neither consistently. Both are very annoying. I can wait for 10.3.7, but no-one should update to 10.3.6. (BTW, the truncation bug is worse with 10.3.6, but apparently it's longstanding.)
I just wanted to let you know that 10.3.7 fixes two of the major current problems users complain about. One is the file name truncation issue. I did not personally test this but it is mentioned in the latest pdf file accompanying 10.3.7S206.
The other is the problem with DNS lookup and sites not found. Of this I have direct experience. With Pacifist I extracted and installed the binary of the files that are related to the lookup process: mDNS, libresolv.9.dylib and mDNSresponder. Since then I did not have a single instance of 'site not found' at first attempt.
I've seen both bugs, neither consistently. Both are very annoying. I can wait for 10.3.7, but no-one should update to 10.3.6. (BTW, the truncation bug is worse with 10.3.6, but apparently it's longstanding.)
NovaMind Mind Mapping for OS X
NovaMind Mind Mapping Features
Imports Mind Manager mind maps, more or less -- if save with .xml extension.
Imports Mind Manager mind maps, more or less -- if save with .xml extension.
Rebranding Quick Notes - Faughnan's Tech
Faughnan's Tech
Rebranding time. I first started using Blogger when my brother Brian was lost -- as a way to communicate readily to friends and family. After Google bought Blogger I started a blog for which I hurriedly assigned a somewhat silly url: http://googlefaughnan.blogspot.com/. I called it Quick Notes, or something like that. It included purely technical notes with commentary on technology and science.
A bit later I started blogging in the classic sense -- around news, events, etc. That got the URL http://jfaughnan.blogspot.com and the name Faughnan's Notes.
The two have evolved, even as other blogs of mine have waxed and waned. For now, two main blogs seems about right.
Faughnan's Notes continues with the same name. Most of the science and technology commentary has moved to that forum.
Quick Notes has become more purely tech, and really more of a notebook for my own use. It's not just quick jottings about things -- it's really notes for my benefit about OS X and tech in general. Hence I've renamed it Faughan's Tech -- without changing the URL (I hate breaking links).
Rebranding time. I first started using Blogger when my brother Brian was lost -- as a way to communicate readily to friends and family. After Google bought Blogger I started a blog for which I hurriedly assigned a somewhat silly url: http://googlefaughnan.blogspot.com/. I called it Quick Notes, or something like that. It included purely technical notes with commentary on technology and science.
A bit later I started blogging in the classic sense -- around news, events, etc. That got the URL http://jfaughnan.blogspot.com and the name Faughnan's Notes.
The two have evolved, even as other blogs of mine have waxed and waned. For now, two main blogs seems about right.
Faughnan's Notes continues with the same name. Most of the science and technology commentary has moved to that forum.
Quick Notes has become more purely tech, and really more of a notebook for my own use. It's not just quick jottings about things -- it's really notes for my benefit about OS X and tech in general. Hence I've renamed it Faughan's Tech -- without changing the URL (I hate breaking links).
My Firefox Extension List
Mozilla Update :: Extensions - Add Features to Mozilla Software
1. DOM Inspector
2. Sage
3. Copy Plain Text
4. BlogThis!
5. A9 Toolbar
6. BugMeNot
7. ieview
8. Magpie
9. Named anchors
10. Tabbrowser preferences
11. FoxyTunes
-- I'll update this post as I discover new extensions. I'm looking for an extension that will list all tabs across all Firefox windows.
1. DOM Inspector
2. Sage
3. Copy Plain Text
4. BlogThis!
5. A9 Toolbar
6. BugMeNot
7. ieview
8. Magpie
9. Named anchors
10. Tabbrowser preferences
11. FoxyTunes
-- I'll update this post as I discover new extensions. I'm looking for an extension that will list all tabs across all Firefox windows.
The problem with tabbed browsing: where's my window?
Mozilla Firefox - Tabbed Browsing
Safari and Firefox have the same problem with tabbed browsing. There's no view that of all open tabs across all containers. So one can flip from container frame to frame and searching tabs within each.
They need a drop down that lists all windows. Ideally the view would be an expanded hierarchy, as in:
container: Name of first tab within the container
- second tab name
- third tab name
container 2
- second tab name
- third tab name
container 3
- second tab name
- third tab name
Maybe this could be a Firefox extension?
Safari and Firefox have the same problem with tabbed browsing. There's no view that of all open tabs across all containers. So one can flip from container frame to frame and searching tabs within each.
They need a drop down that lists all windows. Ideally the view would be an expanded hierarchy, as in:
container: Name of first tab within the container
- second tab name
- third tab name
container 2
- second tab name
- third tab name
container 3
- second tab name
- third tab name
Maybe this could be a Firefox extension?
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
Preserving analog video tapes
Slashdot | Preserving VHS Recordings For Another 20 Years?
This May 2003 Slashdot thread was cited in a more recent thread on the death of VHS. Interesting comments about digitizing analog material. I'm waiting for my G5 iMac to take this one. I frankly hate to throw out our very reliable and robust analog SONY camcorder.
This May 2003 Slashdot thread was cited in a more recent thread on the death of VHS. Interesting comments about digitizing analog material. I'm waiting for my G5 iMac to take this one. I frankly hate to throw out our very reliable and robust analog SONY camcorder.
WPA Wireless Security Update in Windows XP: SP2 includes WPA
Overview of the WPA Wireless Security Update in Windows XP
I'd been wondering if I could switch my home WLAN from WEP to WPA. The clients are iBooks, but occasionally I need to add a Windows portable to the mix. Looks like that may be possible now, at least with SP2.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/826942 instructs how to download the WPA client for XP SP1.
I'd been wondering if I could switch my home WLAN from WEP to WPA. The clients are iBooks, but occasionally I need to add a Windows portable to the mix. Looks like that may be possible now, at least with SP2.
For wireless clients that are running Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) or Windows Server 2003 and that are using a wireless network adapter that supports the Wireless Zero Configuration service, you must obtain and install the Windows WPA Client. For wireless clients that are running Windows XP service pack 2 (SP2) and that are using a wireless network adapter that supports the Wireless Zero Configuration service, the Windows WPA Client is included in Windows XP SP2.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/826942 instructs how to download the WPA client for XP SP1.
iKey 2 with an Adam Engst authored manual too
TidBITS#756/22-Nov-04: "Take Control Expands with iKey 2 Manual"
iKey 2 is an OS X automation tool. I'd not have considered testing it, but now I see it comes with a manual authored by Adam Engst. That puts it in a whole new light. I love manuals (I know, it's a perversion). So now I'll try the software.
Software who's primary sale point is the manual?
What a revolutionary idea.
iKey 2 is an OS X automation tool. I'd not have considered testing it, but now I see it comes with a manual authored by Adam Engst. That puts it in a whole new light. I love manuals (I know, it's a perversion). So now I'll try the software.
Software who's primary sale point is the manual?
What a revolutionary idea.
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