Technology

Chromebook - First Impressions

So I’m a bit of a kit whore - I do love a new shiny. I hoard things too. I’ve got all this old stuff I should probably throw/give away… It’s been a while since I’ve been in the market for new toys, and I managed to rationalise a new machine - I’m about to move overseas for 6 weeks, and I don’t want to live on the work machine. I want something quick, light, with long battery and that I can take on excursions or just for evening IRC and twitter. I thought long and hard about whether a tablet would fit this - I experimented with my Nexus 7 in a case to make it stand up and with a bluetooth keyboard - while it was promising, the workflow just didn’t feel right - A notebook it had to be. …

Musica de El Goog.

So last year, I did a video blog (vlog, I believe the kids call them) about Spotify. This year, I’m on a new service, and figured I’d share my thoughts for continuity. Plus, I get to go to bed earlier by starting earlier. (Note: I started this and it took 3 days to write. Turns out I had to do some thinking…) Here’s the old one, just FYI. What’s all this noise about? So - ‘All you can eat’ music services are great. I mean, you pay a negligible monthly fee and get access to millions of tracks to listen to. That’s great. Really great. Buying music, we all know, can get expensive if you’re not a mean bargain bin hunter at the 2 remaining record stores, so these fill the gap nicely. They also cater to, and possibly feed, the growing popular way of consuming music - randomly, all the time. Music is no longer an event - It has evolved from going to a concert to see an orchestra, going to a bar to see a singer or sharing folk music with your neighbours to being someone’s constant soundtrack. We run with headphones in, we drive with music playing, many workplaces are constantly buzzing with tunes or workers have headphones in. It’s absolutely everywhere. I’m just as guilty - I rarely have music not on ( Above and Beyond - Group Therapy now if you’re curious) - when doing all of the above and more. I use it as a mood modifier, as a background to thought, as a way to clear my head. Constant. Everywhere. Always. Don’t get me wrong - I’m not complaining, I love it. …

Making my Arms Work

Enthusiasm for hobbies waxes and wanes over time. I mean - some days, I’m real keen to go curling, some days I can’t be arsed. Some days, I blog, most days I don’t. The things that ceaselessly continue to fascinate me, however, are the inner workings of computers and radios. Of course - I work in telecomms, so radios and networks kinda keep themselves on my periphery at all times and I get to have fascinating discussions about them, like,all the time.It’s cool. So, last time on hibby’s exciting blog of joy I said that I broke my nexus 7 into the real world of linux, not the java-sandboxed-happy-appy kinda-linux world that is android. Well, I’ve been living with it and I have mixed feelings. Here are some of them for you to peruse, traveller. Ubuntu on nexus 7 is fantastic. I love the idea, I love the capability that it offers, I love my hardware and I’ve been yearning for something similar for a while. Just so happened that Ubuntu were first past the post. …

Lee Knucks Moh Byle

So, I, Um, still have this blog thing kicking around. Shiny. I should use it more. So here I go. I did this thing today, where I installed Ubuntu on my dear Nexus 7. Why? Because reasons, okay!? A couple of reasons, really - I like experimenting. Experimenting with expensive toys is great fun. Warranties are overrated. I like doing things I shouldn’t do, according to normal conventions of technology use. All the way back to buying linux cds from the internet to play with and Rockbox on ipod classic, to buying extra hard drives to experiment with new linuxes (linuces? What’s plural. Ah, yes, Distributions). I also want to see if I can do my nerdy nerdy radio things with it - the ultimate TNC in a small, convenient format… I want to compile aprsmap on it as a starter for 10. …

Audacious Scrobbling And Like Fm

It’s late, invariably I’m awake doing nerd things… Tonight, it’s getting worked up over the fact that I can’t submit to like.fm (my new favourite replacement for last.fm) from Audacious, my media player of choice on this wee machine. First port of call, checkout the code on git… After poking around, it turns out that I can transform the address that the program ‘scrobbles’ to in one line in the code (src/scrobbler/settings.h for those interested). …