Rhythm and Gravy

SARFWIS No. 248

Jake — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 05:12:24 +0000

A pretty reasonable-sounding discussion (YouTube link) of the problem of global warming, framed a risk analysis – i.e. nobody can say for certain if global warming is real, so either outcome (one, nothing happens, or two, death on a stick) is possible, so for each outcome let’s take the probability that it’ll happen times how much it’d suck, and take action based on the winner . Plus, the guy is a sports racer. He’s probably made an earth sandwich, which means he knows his stuff.

But, however reasonable this makes it all sound, I’m still pissed off at Al Gore for inventing global warming.

Nerdcore & Pop

Jake — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 15:58:49 +0000

A couple of new songs:

The first is “Death or Radio” by Zolof the Rock & Roll Destroyer. I’ve been getting into Indie Pop music since a couple of years ago when I happened on a Fountains of Wayne album at a used CD shop in Pittsburgh. Subsequently, my cousin Brady introduced me to The New Pornographers. I realize I’m way behind the curve on this, but I’d been previously self-confined to jazz, soul, and hip-hop, so suck it.

I found this track on JWZ’s latest mixtape 074 (JWZ is the proprietor of the DNA Lounge in San Francisco and he’s got some wacky musical taste, but his mixtapes are always interesting and often really fun). I’m a sucker for a good hook, and “Let’s hold hands and listen to sh*tty bands” is right up there with the best. Really, that line is pretty much how I feel about pop music in general – I don’t like it because it’s necessarily good (although a lot of it is), but because it tricks me into liking it.

The same goes for “nerdcore” hip-hop. I guess I’ve known about it for a while, starting back in the day with MC Stephen Hawking and more recently, MC Frontalot. I heard MC Chris’s “Fette’s Vette” while watching “Zack And Miri Make a Porno” last week (decent movie, by the way).

WWE Zen

Jake — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 18:57:32 +0000

Overheard at the Home Depot on N. Aurora Saturday morning:

Woman: “They told me I needed to pick up ten gallons of odorless kerosene, is this the right thing?”

Saleslady: “Possibly. Can you tell me what it’s going to be used for?”

Woman: “I’m not allowed to say. But it’s for the WWE.”

This is the way I find out that the WWE is in town. Gee, I wonder what the kerosene was for?

I Love Pittsburgh.

Jake — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:50:36 +0000

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I love Pittsburgh lately. After moving to Seattle two years ago, I’ve reconnected with a bunch of friends via Facebook, and the Steelers have rescued football for me. But this… this really sums up my feelings for the place. Really. I shed a single tear.

I Can’t Use iPhone Ringtones In My App?

Jake — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 06:50:53 +0000

Dear Lazyweb,

When running in the foreground, my iPhone app occasionally uses an alert to get the user’s attention. If the Ring/Silent switch is set to silent mode, the phone will vibrate (kSystemSoundID_Vibrate); otherwise a sound is played.

It appears as though the iPhone SDK limits me to playing audio supplied by my application only:

I was unable to find any explanation for this limitation of the AudioToolbox Framework on the google. Does anyone out there know what the justification might be? Note that Apple’s applications seem to be able to use system sounds (presumably using the same AudioServicesPlaySystemSound or AudioServicesPlayAlertSound API calls exposed to us), as shown in this screenshot of the Alarm Clock application.

Update:

It looks like I’m able to use an NSDirectoryEnumerator to get the contents of /Library/Ringtones/ on the phone, but if I try to load one of these files using AudioServicesCreateSystemSoundID() it fails with OSErr -1500 (Operation could not be completed). Sandboxing… Thanks to Steve Makofsky for his help.

Comments re-enabled

Jake — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 02:24:44 +0000

You shouldn’t have to register to leave comments now. I think I’ve got it figured out so that the comment spam isn’t a problem for me.

Today so far…

Jake — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 21:53:59 +0000

At my follow-up appointment this morning, Doc said my vision is 20/25 and he expects me to be down to 20/20 within two weeks.
While walking to work from the appointment, I saw a chalkboard marquee outside of Bank of America advertising a 5.25% MORTGAGE, NO FEE’S. So I wet my thumb and fixed it. I blame my mother for the self-righteousness I felt.
It took me eight minutes to donate a pint of blood. That’s a record for me!

We can rebuild him — we have the technology.

Jake — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 16:30:29 +0000

Or, the LASIK seems to be working.

Yesterday, I had LASIK surgery at the Swedish Hospital Eye Center from Dr. Brian McKillop.

I was on Valium for the procedure, but I clearly recall hearing the doctor say, just before the procedure was to begin: “Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world’s first bionic man. John Sprouse will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster.”

Well, better eyesight, anyway. Plus, if you can believe it I’m even more good looking than I was before (see recent photo, left)!

Highlights:

They make you wear a hairnet and shoe-cover booties. But no gown. I get the hair thing, but are shoes really that much of a contaminant?
They dope you up and then smear iodine all around your eyes.
Then you sit and wait until the dope kicks in.
Eric and Andrea, the assistants, are super nice.
They take you into the operating room and put you in a Lay-Z-Boy and give you a teddy bear. Between the Valium and the teddy bear, how could you not be relaxed?
They tape one eye closed and then tape the other eye open. Then they put anesthetic drops in your eye.
The laser machine swings into place and you’re instructed to stare at the little flashing dot.
Some sort of circular metal device is inserted in your eye, which you can’t feel at this point. It expands to stretch your eye out.
Doc uses a paintbrush to wipe more anesthetic onto your eye.
A suction-majiggy is attached to your eye. When Eric turns the suction on, everything goes black.
A slicer-majiggy is attached to the suction-majiggy.
The slicer majiggy saws through the front of your cornea, stopping before slicing it completely off. You can feel your eye vibrating when this is happening, but it’s not painful, just creepy/totally awesome.
Majiggers are removed, and you briefly can see the flashy dot again. Then doc uses a pick to lift the flap up, and the flashy dot gets really blurry.
Doc makes the dot a little less blurry and tells you to stare into the middle of it. Meanwhile, Andrea is counting backwards from twenty.
The machine starts clicking loudly. You don’t feel anything. Doc tells you you’re doing really well.
You’re trying your best to stare at the middle of the dot. It smells like hair burning. Things are starting to feel a little intense but there’s still no pain, and then…
Andrea gets to zero and the clicking stops.
A bunch of water is flushed into your eye. It feels wet.
Doc uses his little pick to put the flap back. Then he uses another little paintbrush to smooth it down.
They put a bunch of drops into your eye.
They tape is closed, and start in on the other eye.
Five minutes later, you’re up and doc does a quick eye exam to make sure everything looks good.
Things look a little fuzzy and milky as your buddy drives you home, but you can already see way better than you would be without your glasses.
When you wake up from your nap, you look out the window and realize you can make out the numbers on the bus stop sign a block away. You’re kinda psyched.
Your eyes itch. You have to wear stupid-looking protective goggles until the next morning.

I woke up this morning and things seemed even more clear. My eyes are still a bit itchy, but I can work at the computer just fine. I have my follow-up appointment in an hour, and then I’m off to work.

Also, Dylan is funny:

Turns Out, I Eat Well…

Jake — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 09:12:20 +0000

Stacy’s going all local + seasonal these days. This affects me in myriad ways, one of which is Oh damn I’ve been eating well. c.f. potato and celery root chowder with wild rice, and cabbage and blue potato gratin.

Also, it’s snowing again…

Taking an App From the iPhone Simulator to a Physical Device

jake — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 23:43:43 +0000

Note to myself on going from the simulator to getting an application running on my iPhone:

1. Select “Get Info” for the target (not the project) and go to the Build tab. Change the Code Signing Identity for Any iPhone OS Device to the provisioning profile you downloaded and installed from the Apple iPhone Developer Portal.

2. Edit the `Info.plist` for your project. Change the Bundle Identifier to the App Identifier you registered with the Portal, minus the prefix. For example, my App Identifier is `123456789A.net.jakesprouse.*`; I changed the Bundle Identifier to `net.jakesprouse.${PRODUCT_NAME:identifier}`.

3. Under the Project menu, set the active SDK to the Device entry with the desired OS.

4. Build and Go.