One of the things I enjoy about my Mac is stumbling across different applications (or uses for applications) that I never knew it had. Some of these are legacies of earlier versions of the OS, introduced before being supplanted by some later software, while others are simply obscure, lurking in the corners of your Applications … Read more
It’s been awfully quiet around here the last week or so, and I thought I’d post a note before folks wonder if I’d crawled off to a cave for information detox.
If only.
I work at a college as a web applications developer. And the thing about working in higher education (or hell, any form of education) is you tend to move through life somewhat perpendicular to the real world. My year starts in July, and ends in June, because that’s how our academic calendar rolls. My life gets crazy in late August and late January, because that’s when the Fall and Spring semesters begin.
The pace hits an even more frantic note in January and July/August because that’s when the faculty and students aren’t on campus (or most of them aren’t at least) so we conduct this biannual mad dash to get all of our critical upgrades and new programs in place so things will be nice and shiny when everyone hits campus.
The lulls (and yes, there are lulls) come about two weeks into the semester and last until about two weeks after it ends. Which isn’t to say we’re sitting around playing cards all day, but it is a more relaxed, less frantic state of being.
But now is not that time. Now is the crazy time, and thus, the profound lack of posts around here.
The Geek Tree is back. There are no major upgrades this year; same white lights, same Buck Rogers-style lights, same Santa Yoda tree topper, same blue rockets-and-planets tree skirt. There’s a new ornament — Hallmark’s 2007 three-warp-nacelled, alternative-future Enterprise-D — but that’s about it. Not that I didn’t try. I found some cool pulsing LED … Read more
I’ve been experimenting with analytics on Nuketown for the last few months, setting Google Analytics to watch the site’s web traffic and Feedburner to keep an eye on the RSS feeds. Over all, things are going about as well as they usually do, with no huge spikes up or down. The top referrers — the … Read more
I recently did a full restore of my my Mac from Time Machine, Apple’s built-in backup utility for OS 10.5 (Leopard). I had to undertake this radical step because Boot Camp refused to create a Windows partition, complaining about “unmovable files” that could only be eradicated by reformatting the drive and reinstalling Leopard. Overall, I … Read more
Updated 12/27/2022 – Way back in 2005, I bought an HP 1020 LaserJet printer. It’s a solid, dependable printer that’s been my family’s printing workhorse for over 17 years. The only problem is that while the printer works great with Windows computers, it’s always been challenging to install on macOS computers. The key problem is that … Read more
Given the dearth of posts around Nuketown last week, I thought I’d borrow a page from Uncle Bear’s Sunday Brunch and give an update on the ol’thermonuclear burg. The day job has settled back down to its normal routine, but as Doc Brown once said “It’s your kids … something has got to be done about your … Read more
In addition to being National Novel Writing Month, November is How Not to Grow a Beard Month, spearheaded by my friends Chris Miller and Kris Johnson (no doubt in a clever attempt to cover up a freak laser cannon malfunction in The Secret Lair. I attempted something last year during my own NaNoWriMo attempt; I … Read more
For the second time in two years, I have a dead Xbox 360. The machine gave me the Red Ring of Death on Sunday after crashing while running DeadSpace. The machine simply froze, and when I powered it down and powered it back again, I was greated with the ominous glowing red rings.
Normally, this would be inconvenient by manageable: Microsoft extended the manufacturer’s warranty on the 360 to three years, and my Xbox is still covered. Unfortunately, this month isn’t anything resembling normal. I’ve got three game reviews looming between late October and late November, and don’t have time to wait for Microsoft to fix my box.
The first thing I tried was stopping by Best Buy; I got the extended warranty for my first Xbox 360, and when it died I was able to walk into their store and get a replacement. Unfortunately, the warranty was from the original date of purchase and wasn’t extended when I got the replacement.
No, I’m not talking about those Space Balls. NASA will be landing the truck-sized Mars Research Laboratory on Mars in Fall 2009. If the Swedes have their way, the gigantic rover will be accompanied by a number of ball-shaped probes that will roll around the larger probe. The idea is that the balls can go … Read more