Information Threshold

The easiest fix for an appliance that I've ever seen

2023-01-09T15:01:00.002-08:00

So I had a GE dishwasher that suddenly wouldn't fill up with water (after multiple power outages New Year's Eve and a garbage disposal dying, but that's another story). Before trying to call an appliance repair company, I tried the following fix suggested by GE. It worked and saved at least $100.

Q key not working in Manjaro Linux

2021-11-22T09:26:00.005-08:00

For the longest time, the lower case q key would not work for me - upper case would work, but I couldn't even have the Caps Lock key on and hold down the shift button to get q to show up. As it turns out, the Manjaro Settings Manager had my keyboard set as a generic 86 key PC. I changed it to a generic 104 key PC and the q key works again.

Google Assistant - now hearing things

2020-09-03T16:00:00.000-07:00

Over at least the past couple of months, the Google Assistant experience has been getting worse - where it once only responded when something was asked of it, now it is hearing things. Even after a notification to retrain my voice and using the lowest sensitivity setting, the Google Assistant will randomly answer to try to do things. The latest experience was just a couple of days ago - opening my garage door, I'm not talking, nobody is around me, no television or radio is playing. Suddenly, the Google Assistant thinks I want to open up YouTube. It's getting ridiculous.

Cinnamon menu and a new distro

2019-10-27T15:11:00.000-07:00

I ended up finding out about Configurable Menu as a potential solution for getting the Cinnamon menu the way I would like it, but ended up moving to a new distribution that has KDE.

I went with Manjaro - it's a rolling release, sounds like it has good stability, and hopefully I won't have configuration nightmares like I did back when I used Gentoo. I'm getting used to KDE Plasma but am not having any problems so far.

Linux Mint 19.2 and KDE

2019-08-11T15:33:00.000-07:00

I'm currently on Linux Mint 17.3, which is now out of long term support. I've been happy with Linux Mint, but use KDE, which Linux Mint has stopped using/supporting starting with Linux Mint 19. Sites out there indicate that it is still possible to use KDE, so I decided to give it a try on a laptop loaded with Linux Mint 17.3. I went with the Cinnamon edition of Linux Mint 19.2.

Other sites out there indicate that this is possible using a ppa or just using apt to install kubuntu-desktop, kde-plasma-desktop, and kscreen. Both ways just resulted in dependency errors that I could not easily resolve and I did not want to spend the time to work it out. I did find that going to kde-full in the software repository worked, though.

To a point. One item gave an error, but worst of all, something with kwin seems broken (all indications are that it is installed) - the top bar for minimizing, maximizing, and closing a window does not show up. Also as a result of this, you can't move windows around. Rebooting did not fix this.

I don't really want to go to another distribution at this time, so will try playing around with Cinnamon further. I really do not like the menu and hope that I can modify it or somehow go with another menu, but so far, just looking through settings, it does not look possible.

Usability Fail - MyDocBill

2017-10-08T15:59:00.003-07:00

Paying a medical bill online is becoming a common occurrence these days. I came across one usability issue when trying to pay a bill through MyDocBill.com. They ask for an account number, client ID, and date of birth. The client ID is already filled in. The account number field gives a watermark example of 123456, but clicking on the question mark next to the account number field gives a screenshot of an example bill, pointing to the area in the following screenshot:

Numbers, followed by a dash, followed by letters, all surrounded by a red rectangle. In a box called "ACCOUNT NO." Typing in what shows up in the bill results in a failure. Just typing in the number part works.

Interestingly enough, they use the same screenshot for the question mark next to the client ID field gives the exact same screenshot. Recommendations: Just surround the number in the account number screenshot and the letters in the client ID screenshot.

Moto X Pure Edition: One Year Later

2016-12-25T08:12:00.002-08:00

I've had the Moto X Pure Edition for a year now and wanted to share my thoughts about it. My previous phone was the original Moto X, a phone I love.

The Moto X Pure Edition is fast. It is nice to get in my phone much quicker than the Moto X.

The Moto X Pure Edition is too big. It does not fit into pockets as well (though it does fit), but I've had the phone slip out too many times, one time cracking the screen which had to be repaired, as it messed up the touch interface.

The Moto X Pure Edition is randomly rebooting for me too often, has lost a paired Bluetooth device multiple times, and is not experiencing a flaw where the screen gets white lines and whites out the screen (like increasing exposure on a photo). This is related to colder temperatures - in warmer temperatures the problem disappears.

I'll try to deal with this phone one more year and hope a new phone is out then that I'll love.

A failed, unwanted Windows 10 upgrade turns into a Linux install

2016-07-02T14:07:00.000-07:00

My mother-in-law's Windows 7 Dell desktop upgraded to Windows 10 without her giving the OK. It ended up having the "black screen" issue. Despite trying different methods to fix this, including trying to go into safe mode to try reverting to Windows 7, nothing worked. So I ended up installing Linux Mint 17.3 for her and she has been very happy with it - stating that it was faster than Windows 7.

Her Western Digital Passport external hard drive wasn't cooperating and seems to have issues, as it couldn't be opened by Linux, OS X, or Windows 8 or 10. She has the files from there on an older desktop that also had issues to cause her to buy her current desktop, so I'll try going in there at some point to grab her files off of there.

Major League Baseball blackouts in Hawaii

2016-06-21T12:25:00.001-07:00

I found out during a recent trip to Hawaii the ridiculousness of the Major League Baseball blackout rule when I learned that the San Francisco Giants are blacked out there.

It turns out that it is more ridiculous than I thought through this Sporting News article.

Really? Would MLB really lose that much by not having any blackouts in Hawaii?

More Hunter, Less Mike

2015-04-01T19:39:00.002-07:00

Too much of Mike Pence in the news lately. Hunter Pence needs to recover and play ball!

The Resurrection of my Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9

2014-07-13T18:45:00.001-07:00

While cleaning up some things on my desk, I decided to try plugging in my Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 for one last time before disposing it in some way, figuring that it would not work. It was a year ago that it would not turn on or show anything, even when plugged in. To my surprise, the screen lit up, eventually showing the charging battery. I booted up the tablet and saw that it was at a 1% battery level. I was thinking that maybe the battery would not hold a charge, but the battery level continues to go up and the tablet did not automatically power off when I unplugged it as a test. The date was reset to December 30, 2003 and I had to reset that and reboot before I could successfully re-connect to my Google account (I had suspended rights from the device when I thought it would not work ever again). It's gone through a lot of application updates. So for now, I guess this will be the back up device unless I decide to experiment with it - trying to install CyanogenMod, for example.

Accessibility/Usability Fail: Hotel Checkbox Selection

2014-06-28T07:50:00.000-07:00

While trying to get quotes for a hotel stay, this particular hotel site offered checkboxes for the room preferences. The only problem was that clicking on the checkbox itself would not set/unset the checkbox. Only clicking on the label for the checkbox worked. At least they had that working, but I've never seen clicking on the checkbox itself fail.

Does Bacon Really Make Everything Better? Here's The Math

2013-11-06T18:32:00.001-08:00

Okay, maybe bacon isn't a "miracle food", but bacon bits are the fairy dust of the food community.

Out With the Old Fitbit, In With the New Fitbit

2013-11-03T11:30:00.000-08:00

My old Fitbit, which I think they call the Fitbit Classic, but looks like the Fitbit Ultra, started being problematic at least 6 months ago. Even though it had a full charge, it would randomly and suddenly not track steps and I would have to plug it back into the charger to have it work again. Once or twice I even had to press a button on the charger to get the Fitbit to "reset" itself. Then, starting in September, the Fitbit would constantly not track steps, even though plugging it into the charger would show that the Fitbit was charged. It was becoming annoying. Plus, the holster for the Fitbit had chipped off a bit a few months before hand and had a sharp edge. It was time for a new Fitbit.

A friend of mine has the Fitbit Flex, but as I already wear a watch, I really didn't want to wear more than one thing on my wrist. I could have gone with the Fitbit Zip, but was more inclined to go with the Fitbit One, as it would also track the number of stairs that I take. The sleep tracking capability really isn't important to me. I used it once on the old Fitbit, but trying to wear something on my wrist as I sleep is too annoying.

The Fitbit One has some improvements over the Fitbit Classic that I like - the charger is a shorter dongle that is much easier to pack than the old one. The holster is more of a soft rubber sort of material - similar to the OtterBox I used on my old Samsung Droid Charge phone. It can be a bit challenging to get the Fitbit completely in there at times and I wonder if the holster will become very loose to where it does not hold the Fitbit as well as it does now. Removing and reinstalling the OtterBox on my phone caused it to become looser. So far, after a month of use, I have not seen that problem.

The Fitbit One is supposed to sync via the Fitbit app for various Android phones. I haven't gotten it to work yet on my Moto X or Nexus 7, but another page (which is not easy to find) listed a problem with the Bluetooth drivers on Motorola devices and that a bug was submitted for Nexus devices. I hope this gets remedied soon, as it will be nice to sync my steps if I am away from my computer for days at a time.

A Look Back - eWEEK's Look at Turbo Pascal and BASIC

2013-11-02T13:59:00.000-07:00

eWeek did a look back at Turbo Pascal and BASIC from 30 years ago.

It sure brings back memories for me - working with GW BASIC on the DOS side of things (as well as having played with BASIC on the Apple II and Atari 800). I started with Pascal on an Apple III, which was painfully slow when it came to compiling. I eventually got Borland's Turbo Pascal for my home DOS computer and wrote numerous little programs for it.

Experiencing the Nissan Leaf

2013-08-22T19:25:00.000-07:00

I was given the opportunity to use the Nissan Leaf that is in my employer's car fleet for some travel that I have to do tomorrow. Curious as to how it would drive compared to a Toyota Prius that is also in the fleet, I went ahead and got a quick training on using it and drove it from where the fleet cars are located to the electrical charging station that we have - a short drive that is maybe a tenth of a mile.

Instead of a key, the fob that also locks and unlocks the car doors is used. Unlike the Prius, where the fob is inserted into an ignition like you would insert a key, the fob just needs to be nearby (in my case, in one of the drink holders) and then press start.

I'm not too crazy about shifting into reverse, drive, the "eco" mode, and back to park. Instead of a normal stick, it's more like a flattened knob that you shift to the left and then up or down, depending on what you wanted to do, which then went back into it's original position. Setting park consists of pushing a button. The emergency break is a small latch instead of a lever that I am used to in other cars.

Otherwise, it felt like a normal drive. I'll have to see how I feel about it after a 6 mile round trip tomorrow.

A Sudden Drop in Available Hard Drive Space

2013-07-12T19:05:00.000-07:00

My Gentoo Linux desktop suddenly went from the usual 138 GB or so of free space to about 65 MB. As I had not downloaded any large files recently to explain such a big loss, I went about hunting for the culprit. A usage of du -sh in various folders eventually found that a Plex log file in "/var/lib/plexmediaserver/Library/Application Support/Plex Media Server/Logs" was taking up all of that space. Apparently some Plex users found this issue with version 0.9.7.9, but I was experiencing it with 0.9.7.17 as well and that it caused some heavy CPU usage as well. I upgraded to 0.9.7.22 using the megacoffee overlay, but I am unable to connect to Plex/Web, even after re-starting Plex. I'll have to see if a reboot of the computer fixes that and if the upgrade fixed this problem.

Chineasy

2013-05-13T21:46:00.001-07:00

ShaoLan Hsueh describes the basics of Chineasy in the following TED presentation:
It reminds me of similar methods used for learning Japanese, though this one does seem a lot easier. On occasion, the Sinfest comic will feature a strip that slowly transforms people and/or objects into a word as well as a method to learn to read a foreign language.

Shamrock Shake Ice Cream Recipe

2013-03-10T17:00:00.002-07:00

Shamrock Shake Ice Cream

Published: March 10, 2013
An attempt to make an ice cream version of McDonald's Shamrock Shake. Recipe is for a 2 quart ice cream maker.
Prep time: 5 minutes
Ice cream maker time: 25 minutes
Total time: 30 minutes
Yield: About fourteen 1/2 cup servings
Serving size: 1/2 cup
Calories per serving: 255
Fat per serving: 20g
Ingredients:
Whole milk:
1 1/2 cups

Granulated sugar:
1 1/8 cups

Heavy cream (not ultra-pasteurized):
3 cups

Pure vanilla extract:
1 1/2 tablespoons

Mint extract (not peppermint extract):
1 teaspoon

Green food coloring:
16 drops
Directions:

You can substitute a lower fat milk instead of using whole milk and half and half for the heavy cream. The cream/half and half should not be ultra-pasteurized. Remove the green food coloring if you do not want the ice cream to be green in color like the Shamrock Shake.
In a mixing bowl, combine the milk and sugar until the sugar is dissolved, about 2 minutes. Stir in the heavy cream, vanilla, mint, and green food coloring. Place into your ice cream maker for 25 minutes (times for your ice cream maker may vary). Once complete, transfer the ice cream to an airtight container and place into the freezer.
The mint may seem a bit strong for the ice cream that comes from the bottom of the ice cream maker, but mellows out as you get further into the ice cream.

Rage of Bahamut Review

2013-01-13T16:25:00.001-08:00

Rage of Bahamut
Reviewed by Steve Fisher on January 13, 2013.

Rage of Bahamut is a game for Android and iOS devices that works like a combination of a role-playing game and an electronic Magic: The Gathering. My experience with Magic: The Gathering was limited to a few games during college. It was interesting, but did not really grab me. I was not sure what my reaction to Rage of Bahamut would be. It turned out to be more addicting that I would have expected.

In Rage of Bahamut, you build up a deck of cards that consist of monsters, mythological figures, and the like, each with a cost of how many points it takes to use the card, an attack rating, a defense rating, and a realm (Man, God, or Demon). You create an attack deck and a defense deck, each consisting up to 5 cards, plus a leader card. Cards can be evolved a limited number of times to change form into a more powerful version of that card. Cards can also be enhanced to gain levels, which increases their attack and defense power. It is recommended to enhance cards to their highest level before evolving them. Evolving increases a card's attack and defense by 5% of the attack and defense of each card. If the cards are enhanced to the maximum level, that increases to 10%. Each card has a rarity, ranging from normal to legendary. Each day you get a free card. You can also spend real money to get a special card draw which has a chance to get a card of a high rarity. Those cards can also be gained from logging in daily or as prizes, so I would not recommend spending your money on them.

When you start the game, you choose a realm (which gives you a bonus to all cards of that realm) and assign points to stamina, attack, and defense. As you get experience, you gain levels and the ability to add friends, which gives you points to contribute to stamina, attack, and defense. Stamina affects how long you can go a quest, which consists of killing monsters that get you money (for evolving and enhancing cards), other cards, or treasures (when you collect all colors of a particular treasure, you get a special card). After you complete 5 "chapters" of quests, you face a boss monster, which uses your leader card to attack it. Attack and defense determine how many total points of cards you can have in your attack and defense decks as well as how many times you can attack monsters/players and defend from other players' attacks.

You also have the opportunity to join or start an order, which allows you to group with other players. This can be helpful if you need help getting particular treasures, particular cards as a gift or via trade (which can also be done via the Bazaar), and get prizes during special events. Donated money and treasures helps grow the order for more players to join, buy buildings to give realm cards attack/defense bonuses, and build walls during Holy Wars (an event where orders battle each other). Special positions within the order get attack and/or defense bonuses.

As there are a limited number of quests, the game would get old quickly if not for the special events. Special events usually introduce new cards and special prizes for individual and order rankings. These can range from the order vs. order Holy Wars to events where you go on special quests and fight boss monsters to collect the most of a particular collection item for a ranking, to events where you try to collect special treasures for special cards. These happen about each month and can range from a few days to a couple of weeks.

The thing I probably do not like about this game is the heavy player vs. player focus. You just lose defense points (which are regained over time, just like stamina and attack) and money if you lose. Winning battles (or losing if you attack) get you honor points, which can get you gems each week which can be traded for items to regain stamina or attack/defense points, protect treasures from attacks, special enhancement cards, or a special card draws of a particular rarity or higher.

If the idea of this game interests you, use referral code osn12222 once you complete the training quest and you'll get a special card.

Mozilla's Popcorn Maker

2012-10-19T20:16:00.000-07:00

Mozilla is working on Popcorn Maker, an editor that allows you to enhance video by adding things such as Google Maps, Twitter feeds, and more.

Mozilla Foundation COO Ryan Merkley gives a TED Talk with a quick demo of Popcorn Maker.

It looks like fun and I can imagine some good uses for this. I look forward to seeing it released in November 2012.

Why I'm Considering Dumping NoScript in Firefox

2012-09-16T18:02:00.000-07:00

Don't get me wrong - I love the idea of NoScript. Not having to run Javascript code I do not need to run a page, potentially making it faster, is a grand idea. Plus, it potentially adds some security by not having every script run.

But NoScript has a problem. It will block scripts but not show them in the NoScript menu for me to enable - and I need them for some pages to run. I have verified this by running a similar add-on in Chromium (Chrome) which shows more scripts to unblock, which NoScript does not even show. At this time, I have no desire to move to Chromium, mainly because I like having a menu bar, and it appears the only way to have one is to use Chrome on OS X, whose UI forces a menu bar at the top.

The Hell that is Changing Planes at the San Diego International Airport

2012-09-16T17:49:00.000-07:00

I had a recent Southwest Airlines flight that required me to change planes at the San Diego International Airport. I was reluctant about this particular flight since it was 30 minutes between when my flight arrived and my next flight departed, but I felt pretty safe, as I had flown into San Diego on Southwest twice in the past year and Southwest flights were contained in a small circle. It wouldn't be a big deal to quickly walk to the next gate as long as there were no delays, which I have not had happen with Southwest at my airport of origin.

What I didn't realize, however, was that Southwest also had gates 1 and 2, which are separate from gates 3 through 10, and require going through security. This was a difficult enough chore for me, just carrying one bag and experienced enough to get through security relatively easily and quickly. Still, I had to run to get to my flight on-time, though it is not a far distance from security to the gates. I can only imagine the difficulties older travelers, inexperienced travelers, families, and anyone further back in the plane would have.

Still, I got lucky. When I was leaving San Diego back in August 2012, the security line curved all the way back to about midway down the baggage claim area. If it was like that with my recent flight, I would not have made it in time.

If you have a Southwest flight where you will need to change planes in San Diego, make sure there is at least an hour between flights to be on the relatively safe side. If all of your flights are at gates 3 through 10, you'll be able to take it easy. If not, you should hopefully have time to spare after going through security again.

You May Have an Update Available for Your Samsung Galaxy Tab

2012-09-08T12:39:00.000-07:00

You may have an update available for your Samsung Galaxy Tab, but you may not know about it.

The Wait for Ice Cream Sandwich

Ever since hearing about the Ice Cream Sandwich release of Android, I checked to see if my wi-fi version of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 would get the upgrade. The information I found suggested that I would get the update, but when it would come out was uncertain, and the release date changed over time. The last update suggested late August or early September, but I hadn't seen anything, so I did another search this morning to see if the date had changed. As it turned out, Ice Cream Sandwich was finally rolling out to some people.

A Surprise Update

I did not see any notification on my Galaxy Tab about an update, figured that it might be a gradual roll-out, so decided to manually check for an update under Settings.

I was surprised to find an agreement clause for updates. So I went through it, agreed, and was then presented with a screen to sign in with my Samsung account or register for one. This leads me to a couple of questions:

Why do I need an account to get updates?
Why wasn't I asked to set this up when initially activating my Galaxy Tab? (Or did it not come up due to the issues I had initially activating my Galaxy Tab?)
Why isn't checking for updates enabled by default? This is a big concern if there is a security update.

As it turned out, this was a Honeycomb update that took me from 3.1 to 3.2. This made me wonder why I didn't get an email notification from Samsung, considering that I already had an account with them set up and had registered the Galaxy Tab. That install took a while, and once complete and back on my main screen, was presented with a message about an update that needed to be done by August 28 or I might not be able to use the Samsung Media Center. Not a big deal for me, as I don't use Samsung Media Center, but went ahead and started the 300+ MB download of the update.

Ice Cream Sandwich at Last!

This big update, which took longer to download but was faster to install than the Honeycomb update, ended up being the Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade! Everything appears to have gone smoothly, but I haven't gone in to explore Ice Cream Sandwich yet and try out my downloaded apps.

So if you own a Samsung Galaxy Tab, you may want to manually check for an update in case you have the same situation that I did. You may find a tasty ice cream treat waiting for you!

Android Foursquare App Glitch

2012-06-20T18:34:00.000-07:00

I started receiving a message of api.foursquare.com (or something similar) when getting to the initial screen of the Android Foursquare app. When trying to check in to a location, I would receive a message that indicated a problem with the network. I thought there were just problems on Foursquare's end, so thought nothing of it.

It happened again today, though. Knowing that others had checked in, I figured the first thing to try would be to uninstall Foursquare then reinstall it. After I logged back in, things were working fine again - no messages.