wrighters.net

Well, my paphiopedilum is in bloom. Pretty exciting, this is the second orchid that has bloomed since I took custody of a nice collection from a friend.

paphiopedilum in bloom

In my quest to get back on the GTD wagon, I decided to spring for a copy of OmniFocus for both the Mac and the iPhone.   One neat feature is the ability of the app to use WebDAV to store the database on a web server and then sync between the two versions remotely.  I will probably always have my phone with me when I am using my laptop, so I don’t know how critical this feature will be for me.  However it does provide for a remote backup of the data, plus allows me to pull the data down when I want it instead of having to remember to sync “one more thing” on the phone before heading out the door.  You can use a MobileMe account to do this, but since I’m a cheapskate I had to figure out how to do this with the servers I already pay for.  A quick google search showed some nice blog posts on getting this setup using Mac OS X Leopard, but I wanted to run this on my Ubuntu server. So here’s basically what’s needed. First, make sure you have apache2 installed. I won’t cover that here. You need to enable mod_dav and mod_dav_fs.

sudo /usr/sbin/a2enmod dav
sudo /usr/sbin/a2enmod dav_fs


I also wanted ssl enabled so I wasn’t sending credentials in the clear. Turns out that the ssl certificate script (apache2-ssl-certificate) that most tutorials mention is not included with apache anymore. But you can do basically the same with the ssl-cert package, so install that as well as openssl if it’s not installed already. One problem is the cert is only good for one month, so if ignoring the warning you get from OmniFocus bothers you, you can fix that later by generating a cert with a longer expiration, or getting a real one.

sudo aptitude install openssl
sudo aptitude install ssl-cert


This should create a certificate and put it in /etc/ssl/private/localhost.pem. Then enable the ssl module and the ssl configuration on apache.

sudo a2ensite ssl
sudo a2enmod ssl


Then, create an htpasswd file that will be used to authenticate for your directory. I put mine in /etc/apache2.


sudo htpasswd -cs webdav.passwd username

Then follow the prompts.

You need to setup your config for the ssl part of your server, it will be in /etc/apache2/sites-enabled.   You need to pick a location on your server to host the data.   Whereever you put it, make sure it’s owned by the user that apache runs as:

sudo chown -R www-data:www-data data/


Here’s a sample config:

<VirtualHost *:443>
SSLEngine On
SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/private/localhost.pem
Alias /data "/opt/data/"
<Directory "/opt/data">
Dav On
Order Allow,Deny
Allow from all
AuthType Basic
AuthName WebDAV-Realm
AuthUserFile "/etc/apache2/webdav.passwd"
require valid-user
</Directory>
</VirtualHost>

Just restart your server and hopefully everything is setup.

sudo apache2ctl graceful

You can check it from a browser by navigating to https://yourdomain.com/data, assuming no other apache strangeness has been configured.

I received a new credit card and ATM card in the last few weeks as my old ones had expired.  In the past, when I needed to activate them I was able to just do this via an IVR (Interactive Voice Response) system in about 15 seconds.  Done and done!  This time, for the credit card I was connected with a live person who proceeded to tell me all about a credit monitoring service that I should use.  I managed to talk my way out of that one, but for the ATM card I was forced to listen to an automated message for the same service.  It must have droned on for about a full minute, and then when I didn’t press “1″ to buy the service, it said something to the effect of “while you are waiting for us to activate your card, don’t miss this great opportunity, blah, blah”.  Do they really think we don’t know how long it takes to activate a card?  I guess they have to make up their billions of losses somewhere…

I got an interesting survey this week from ESPN.  The survey asked about ESPN360, ESPN’s online video site.  I first used it during the last world cup (2006?  it’s been that long?) to watch a few games at work.  ESPN has decided that instead of using a pure ad supported model, they would go to the ISPs just like they go to the cable companies and demand payment for carrying their ‘network’.  Since I use Comcast I am currently out of luck since Comcast and ESPN have not been able to agree on whatever this payment is, so ESPN360 is not available for me.  There have been hacks in the past that have worked, such as signing up for a free Verizon business account, but that doesn’t appear to work anymore.  ESPN wants you to do what all those new cable network  ads say - “To get the new Knitting channel, call your cable provider right away and ask for us by name”.  That seems a little ridiculous to me, they need to provide a better mechanism for this, maybe some kind of voting site or petition process.

This really stinks the few times a year when there is a game I really want to watch that is not available elsewhere.  Also, since I have the $9 cable from Comcast, I don’t even get ESPN.  ESPN360 would be perfect for the few games a year that I really want to watch.  I’d even pay per game if it was available.  I think if ESPN would jump on board with an ad supported model, they could do very well.  Just look at Hulu as an example, people will pay much more attention to ads in smaller doses online in exchange for good content.  I think ESPN360 could deliver the demographic that advertisers would pay premium dollars for.  Should be interesting to see what happens over the next year or two.

This article from the New York Times was interesting.  Turns out that by being very frugal, the Japanese have possibly made their economy worse.

However, I’m not sure if “underconsuming” is really that bad of a thing, even if it causes some economic pain.  I love the quote from a 20 year old Japanese woman, ““I’m not interested in big spending,  I just want a humble life.”

Maybe this is where we are headed, and it might do us some good.  If we had all lived more simply sooner, the current financial crisis would probably have been avoided from the beginning.

I saw the WordPress iPhone app come up on the iPhone applications unofficial feed. I grabbed it right away and started this post. Setting up a new blog is easy, you just add the URL and username and password. Once setup, you can see the last 30 posts (configurable), or create a new one. Each post has tags, categories, the title, and the content. All HTML had to be entered manually, so you definitely won’t be doing anything too complicated. Maybe there are plans for some tag shortcuts in the future. And with no cut an paste on the iPhone, you will be doing all the typing in your post.

The preview function works great. I also tried the picture link and took a new picture using the built in camera. The app then crashed, but the post was still intact in the drafts folder. Of course I’ve had lots of apps crashing with the new 2.0 firmware, so who knows whose fault that is.

The big benefit over using your browser is the fact you can now create posts offline, which should encourage more writing. You do this by saving it as a local draft. Once it is moved to draft, it shows up in your blog interface.

This app is also a quicker way to do a quick edit of an existing post because of the simple interface and lower data transfer needed. Best of all, it’s open source just like WordPress. Get it now.

Like many iPhone owners I couldn’t wait to try the new 2.0 firmware. So when macrumors reported it was available early, I downloaded and installed it against my better judgment. You have to download the file separately and then use option click on the “Check for update” button in iTunes to install the firmware.

First, I thought I bricked my iPhone when it wouldn’t install. iTunes then recognized the iPhone was in recovery mode, but a restore failed with the error “iphone could not be restored (20)”. Turns out you can also use option click on the “Restore” button to get another attempt to install the firmware. The second try worked.

The new firmware is great - the app store is nice. I put twitterific, facebook, and a few more apps on right away. Now I’m finding my first synch will not get past the “Syncing contacts” step. This may be an adventure.

I think a lot of geeks will be pretty worthless at work tomorrow.

I read Serve God, Save the Planet a number of months ago, but was prompted to write about it based on the story in the NY Times today about a change in the Southern Baptist Convention’s official stance on climate change and another story on the addition of pollution to the official list of sins in the Catholic church. Obviously, climate change, pollution, the environment, energy consumption, and similar issues are not going away any time soon.

Serve God, Save the Planet, A Christian Call to Action is written by Matthew Sleeth, a former ER doctor from the East coast. He was living the good life, with a big house, nice cars, and a good career. Then he began to notice how many of his patients were coming into the ER with sicknesses related to environmental issues, from asthma to breast cancer. As he started to look into the issues behind these illnesses, he was convicted by his own lifestyle and how it contributed to the environmental damage that was causing these problems.

This book is an easy read with lots of practical advice. He backs up his viewpoints with scripture, and shares some fascinating stories. Most of us have heard “tree huggers” telling us how to live, but this book really prompted me to action. After reading it, I immediately made a couple of changes that I have stuck with since:

• I have stopped taking my lunch in plastic bags to work that I threw out - I’m now recycling all plastic bags
• I am not going to put pesticides or herbicides on my lawn - I still have a bag of Scotts in the garage from last spring
• I am turning off lights like crazy around the house
• I turned the thermostat down one degree this winter

One thing I like about this book is that it doesn’t spend time debating whether climate change is real or not - it concentrates on the real measurable impact of our consumption on the world’s resources. It really is an environmentalist primer for Christians, with scripture to back it up. This would make a great book for discussion in a small group or among friends.

I got a new iPhone today, and thought I would try to activate it with a prepaid plan - known as a GoPhone with AT&T.  This would allow me to not have to sign a contract and since I use almost no minutes anyway, it would be $5/month cheaper than the lowest postpaid plan.  I quick google search shows that there used to be a nice hole in the activation process where you could send in a garbage SSN like all 9’s, fail the credit check, and then get an option to go with a prepaid “pick your plan” option. It looks like that hole has been closed by Apple or AT&T. This looks like a server side fix - since it allows you to submit the form before telling you the SSN is no good.

There’s really no other apparent way to activate prepaid without having terrible credit. I guess that’s the punishment I get for good credit - no choice. Now I get a 2-year relationship with AT&T - a company I had managed to get rid of for a few year.

After a regular activation, the phone has been pretty good. We’ll see if the number ports over from prepaid T-mobile ok. I bet it won’t be ported into AT&T for at least 24 hours.

Yay!  Apple has apparently announced a fix for the keyboard freezing problem on MacBooks and MacBook Pros that I was noticing.  The software update notice says:

This update addresses a responsiveness issue on MacBook and MacBook Pro notebook computers. Some MacBook and MacBook Pro systems may occasionally experience a temporary suspension of keyboard input which can last a minute or longer. The Mac OS X 10.5.1 update is required before installing the MacBook, MacBook Pro Software Update 1.1.

We’ll see how this goes.  I had not noticed as much of this since updating to 10.5.1, but it was still happening occasionally.