Jason's Blog

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Cool Rockets

rocket

These look very, very sweet. For Gabe or Zack. Sure, for the boys.

http://www.coolrockets.com/

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Repackaged Google Gears For XP

Rather annoyingly to use Google Gears (Google's offline feature) in XP, you have to have admin privledges. This is because the installer, an .msi package, has a registry tweak so that it works in IE in addition to Firefox.

I don't have admin access but I want gears, so I downloaded GG onto a machine that I do have admin access to, grabbed the files that get deployed, zipped them up, and renamed it to an .xpi (Firefox installer file). And it works!

Here it is: google gears for xp .xpi

http://mitchellfamily.ca/blogimages/gears.xpi

Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Convert Any Video File To DVD

I wrote this quick shell script that will convert any video file that will play on your linux box to a NTSC-DVD that will play on your dvd player.

Save this to a file "convert.sh", stick a dvd into your burner, shell out, and type "sh convert.sh

rm -f dvd.mpg
rm -f DVD/VIDEO_TS/*.*
ffmpeg -i $1 -target ntsc-dvd -sameq dvd.mpg
dvdauthor --title -f dvd.mpg -o DVD
dvdauthor -T -o DVD
growisofs -Z /dev/dvd0 -dvd-video DVD
eject /dev/dvd0

Requirements: the codex for the video file you are trying to convert, ffmpeg, dvdauthor, and growisofs.

Working From Home Today

Hiyat is very sick today -- Gabe and Zack kept her up all night last night so I decided to stay at home and work today. Luckily I only have one meeting today, and that one is with IBM so it can be done over the phone no problem. I've been spending my time working on process and governance documentation anyway, so doing it from home is in many ways more efficient and productive anyway.

Plust it gives me time at home with the family and hopefully Hiyat can catch some Zs. I feel really bad for her.

Legend Of Zelda: A Link To The Past

Downloaded this on the Wii Virtual Console the other day. What a great game. Gabe and I can sit for a long time solving the puzzles and beating the bosses in this game. Truly one of the best RPGs ever made... In total 2-D 16-bit graphics. Great stuff.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_Zelda:_A_Link_to_the_Past

Six Million Dollar Man Season 1

I thank thee, o gods of bittorrent for delivering unto me Six Million Dollar Man Season One.

Most shows I loved as a kid -- like Knight Rider, The Hulk, Chips, etc are unwatchable by a non eight year old. But this one is better.

They actually took the time to develop character back in the 70's and this show is really, really, underrated. It's totally watchable even 20+ years later. The pace is almost relaxing. The plot lines are as full of holes as ever, but the imagination and characterization is great.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071054/

Stardust

This one was Hiyat's pick but it was actually pretty good. Was nice to watch a fantasy movie that didn't take it self so... seriously. It reminded me of watching stuff like Time Bandits and Willow which was really, really, fun. You listening, Peter Jackson? Lighten up and make a movie that's fun and under 6 hours to watch.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0486655/