I recently moved this blog from peacefullyadrift.com to this domain. On the new domain I’m still running a Wordpress installation and I transferred most of my old posts to it. My old domain had existed for years and many links to it existed so I took special attention to how to migrate to the domain without breaking all those old links.

I eventually decided I would just redirect every peacefullyadrift.com URL to this one. The proper way to do this is a 301 Permanent Redirect and, assuming you use Apache, can be accomplished by modifying the .htaccess file in your site’s root to the following:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://yournewdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Because when I migrated all my blog information over to my new domain I used the same URL scheme this solution works flawlessly for me. Any of the old links which point to blog posts I didn’t bring with me are redirected to proper 404 pages.

When I first started developing for Palm I was a bit skeptical of the framework because it seemed thrown together and needed a lot of polish. The most annoying part was (and is) the lack of accurate documentation. Yes, I said accurate. Palm’s Developer website doesn’t offer complete documentation on everything, and even less of it is actually accurate. Often times if you copy-and-paste the sample code into your project it will not work due to either a typo in their code or the fact that the code is from a previous version of the framework and no longer works.

Palm’s own developer forums often are a frustration. If you take a look around you’ll notice a trend: most people’s posts have many more views than replies—which tells me nobody else can help them either. This isn’t to discount the webOS/Mojo ninjas out there—it just grows both aggravating and disappointing. I am currently trudging through writing a follow-up app for my last one, with progress alternating between very quick and very aggravatingly slow (as in, spending an entire day trying to figure out a problem no one has the answer to, and eventually deciding on another path that actually works).

Although this post sounds like a rant, I wouldn’t classify it as one. I haven’t lost faith in Palm. I understand it’s very early in webOS’s lifespan (indeed, the App Catalog itself is still in Beta), and being a developer I can accept that 1.x software is seldom perfect. Although being in the Palm camp this early on is a bit frustrating, seeing the ratings and feedback from your users after your app has finally shipped makes it all worth it.

I wrote a small tester webOS app for Palm Pre a while back and submitted it to Palm to be in the App Catalog. I didn’t even notice until today, but evidently my app, gChords Free, was published in the app catalog a few days ago. So far it’s managing pretty good reviews.

If you’re not new you know I’ve had a blog called Peacefully Adrift for years that I’ve posted to on and off. For a little while now I’ve owned this domain which I planned to use for my “professional” side and Peacefully Adrift would be my “personal” side.

Well, I’ve decided to do away with Peacefully Adrift altogether and migrate all of me to my namesake domain here. I’ve got a lot of further stuff I’m going to do to this site that I haven’t finished yet. This is just day one of fleshing out the new Thesis 1.5.1 and creating a new theme for my site on top of it. Expect minor things to change. This is a work in progress.

If you’ve read a single blog post on my site you know music is a huge part of my life. I’m a double musician (piano/guitar) going to school for music production technology with an emphasis in composition. However, I am (and have always been) heavily involved in technology—particularly web development. Naturally, these things all mesh together. I have music playing (or am playing it) at literally every possible second of my day. If I’m awake 16 hours in a day probably at least 13 hours of it involved music somehow. However, the type of music playing depends on what I’m doing.

Designing

Typically if I’m designing I’m listening to ‘creative’ music. Typically these are the songs that would get me the weirdest looks by people if they were around. Admittedly, a lot of this music is weird but that’s exactly why I choose to listen to it: it’s different. When I’m designing I’m obviously trying to think creatively and flowing. Metaphorically, I enjoy the creative, flowing avant-gardé nature of the music, but also appreciate the underlying structure which typically adheres to the rules of music. This is exactly the way good design is! Refreshing, flowing, and different, but while adhering to the standards of design—both social and natural laws such as line-width and -height.

Typically when I get an album that inspires me, I stick to it for a while until it doesn’t. For a while this was The White Stripes’ Get Behind Me Satan, which is still a monumental album in its rawness. For a while it was Jack White’s other band The Raconteurs and their second album. It truly depends on my mood at the time but others I’ve listened to while designing: Chevelle, Counting Crows, Dave Matthews, The Derek Trucks Band (check out their new album Already Free now), Evanescence, Five for Fighting, Hootie & the Blowfish, James Morrison, Jamie Cullum (this is a relatively new find for me), John Mayer, Kings of Leon, and even Tenacious D.

Coding

Writing code is another story. Arguably, the process of writing code is typically not as creative as designing, assuming you are coding an existing design. Coding is often simply repetitive tasks. Music I listen to during this phase of development typically reflects this. Often I’ll listen to music that, though sometimes repetitive, has a driving force that “pushes” me along. Examples include: NIN’s Ghosts albums, Blue Man Group (haha, yes), Deftones, Kasabian, The Killers, Rage Against the Machine, She Wants Revenge, and System of a Down. You’ll notice most of these are “heavier” than the ones I listen to while coding. Quite literally, I need that extra drive to fuel long, boring coding spells.

Feedback

What about you? What inspires you to creativity, or pushes you to develop your work?

A very long time ago I added Skribit to this site. Skribit is a start up by my friend Paul Stamatiou which aims to destroy writers block—for bloggers anyway. The idea is that while you’re browsing my site you can click on the “Suggestions?” tab on the right side of your screen and drop a few lines about what you’d like me to write about. It’s a pretty great idea but it seems to only gradually be growing—which is probably a good thing: it gives Paul and friends time to focus on making Skribit even better.

I’ve received a couple suggestions via Skribit but I’ve yet to act on any of them—something that will be fixed shortly. In the meantime, be sure to make some post suggestions by using the Skribit tab on the right. You don’t need an account to suggest topics.

Among the sacrifices Apple had to make to fit the Pro hardware into a 13″ unibody case was the loss of the Line-In port. All MacBook models aside the 13″ MacBook Pro have two ports–one dedicated to sound input and one for sound output. With the new MacBook Pro 13″ model, Apple combined these ports into one single “audio” port which performs both functions, albeit one at a time.

True to Apple’s nature, they’ve made switching between the functions easy to do. Simply go to the Sound pane in System Preferences and change it from the dropdown box:

Simple, but annoying. The other day I had my electric guitar and wanted to amp it through my friend’s MacBook Pro 13″ but I ran into this problem: if I plugged my guitar directly in using the audio port as Line-In I couldn’t connect his laptop to a sound system–meaning I was forced to use the Mac’s built-in speakers to hear my guitar. Lame! Obviously this could have been remedied by using an external audio interface, but that’s still inconvenient.

Sigh.

I’ve written once before about connecting an electric guitar to your computer for recording tracks, and although it’s been popular I think it was entirely too lengthy and complicated for the simple process of plugging in to your Mac.

It’s really a simple process that can be done very cheaply–most of the time. If you want to plug straight into your Mac instead of any kinds of external devices such as a Digidesign M-box 2 (which I use) you don’t really need a whole lot. Assuming you’ve got instrument cable for your guitar, you really only need one other part: an adapter.

Note: This article assumes you have an electric guitar, an acoustic-electric guitar, or at the very least a pickup for your acoustic guitar.

This article is specifically written towards Macs, which seem to have very nice sound cards built into them–even the MacBook line. The MacBooks and Mac Pros all have Line In ports which you can plug an 1/8″ connector into to pipe sound in.

Note: The new 13-inch MacBook Pro has a combined audio in/out port. I’m guessing this has to do with trying to cram so much into such a small laptop. In System Preferences you can switch between these functionalities and use it as a Line In port for your guitar. The downside to this is, if you’re using external speakers or headphones to monitor your recording…you simply can’t.

Getting the adapter

The main hurdle you have now is that instrument cable as used to connect guitar to an amplifier has 1/4″ connectors on the ends. You’ll need an adapter to convert that 1/4″ to 1/8″ so you can plug it into your Mac’s Line In port. You can find these wherever you normally look for electronic/audio components–RadioShack for me. The adapter looks something like this:

I got mine at RadioShack for $2.69. Not bad, huh? Note that this adapter is a mono adapter. You could get a stereo adapter if you wanted, but as most instrument cable is mono so you would have a wasted channel.

Volume

Now’s where things get a little variable. I have a Stratocaster which has Seymour Duncan pickups in it, which provide a very strong signal. With this setup, I can go to System Preferences>Sound, select Line In as my audio in port, and then go to GarageBand, Audacity, or whatever recording program I want and record perfectly fine that way. I don’t have to turn my volume knob all the way up in order to get a good signal for recording. However, depending on your guitar you may have a really low signal or a really hot one.

If your signal is fine, then you’re done! You’ve got a basic but functional way to record your guitar into your computer. From there you can amplify the signal using software amplifiers (such as Guitar Rig or the amps built into GarageBand). Or, if you have another instrument cable you can run your audio out from your “real” amplifier into your Mac but be careful about how hot your signal is coming into your Mac–too loud can damage things.

If your signal’s not fine

In the case that your signal is so low you can barely hear it, even with the guitar’s volume knob and the volume setting in System Preferences dialed all the way up, you may need to invest in a pre-amplifier to boost your signal.

In my previous article I suggested Griffin’s iMic, which will work, but if you’re going to be setting up a personal home studio-type environment you may want to splurge and get an M-box from Digidesign or something like a PreSonus Audiobox USB. These are more than pre-amps: they are audio interfaces. Consider them a seperate, dedicated sound card for your Mac. These types of things are handy for when you need to minimize your latency by “outsourcing” the processing of your guitar signal.

A note about latency

If you notice that there seems to be a delay between when you strike a note and when you hear it come through your computer you may need to get an audio interface like mentioned before in order to free up some of your system resources. Varying factors like amount of RAM, processor usage/speed (don’t be ripping DVDs with HandBrake while trying to record something), and even hard drive speed in some applications can cause your recording to lag behind. Although you can adjust this lag in your recording afterwards, it can be annoying when trying to record tracks to a drum beat and you’re always off a few milliseconds.

Overview

Hopefully, things have gone well for you. As I said, in most cases with Macs you should be fine with just the adapter. Please note that going straight through the sound card in your Mac is not the best way to do this ‘professionally’ but for simple home projects and song demos this is definitely an effective and much cheaper way to try things out without spending hundreds in pro equipment.

Feedback

Have fun jamming and please leave your comments below if you have questions and if this article has helped you in any way.

No, studio monitor speakers don’t attach to your computer’s monitor. If you’re new to the studio/audio-recording world you may be unsure what studio monitor speakers are for. This article will teach you about studio monitors, how they’re different from regular computer speakers, and provide a suggestion for some affordable, decent quality ones.

What is a studio monitor speaker?

Studio monitor speakers are different from your average computer speakers. If you’ve even thought about getting into audio/music recording I’m sure you’ve heard of equalization or “EQ”. Typically, computer speakers are built to take the audio signal being put into them and equalize the sound, typically emphasizing certain sound frequency ranges to get a “good” sound. While for the average computer user, this sounds alright to to them, it can be a nightmare when you’re trying to work with sound. The problem arises when you’re trying to finalize everything and are ready to release your work. With your speakers “auto-equalizing” your sound what you hear isn’t exactly what your audio sounds like. You may find that on someone else’s speakers it sounds awful. This is most likely because you adjusted everything to sound good on your system, but with your speakers modifying the sound themselves, your ears are really deceived.

That’s where studio monitors come in. Studio monitor speakers, as a class, are designed to offer the sound completely flat. Because of this, what you hear is actually what is, and sounds as close to what the sound actually sounded like when it was recorded. You can then modify the sound in your program of choice and rest assured that what you hear is what everyone else will hear (assuming their own EQ settings don’t screw it up).

Because they’re designed for you to monitor audio you’re working with in order to get it perfect, you can expect a wide frequency range and the ability to handle very high quality audio signals.

A recommendation

I’ve been using a pretty cheap but high quality (for my purposes) set of Behringer MS40 studio monitors. Behringer is a pretty well-known company in the audio industry as they produce all sorts of products, including MIDI sequencers, microphones, and studio monitors. We’ll focus on the latter for right now, but it is possible to combine their various products into an affordable, more than decent quality home studio.

You can find them pretty cheaply online. Unlike most studio monitors, they are actually sold in a set and include a built-in amplifier–meaning you don’t necessarily plug them into a big amplifier stack. You should check Google for prices. Typically they range between $100-200, which is dirt cheap for the quality these speakers can give you if setup right.

Let me be clear: these aren’t the absolute best sounding studio monitor speakers you can buy, but they are most definitely one of the best sounding studio monitor speakers you can buy for under $200.

Setup is pretty easy. These are active speakers, meaning they must be powered by the provided power supply. It accepts two types of input: analog and digital, two at the the time. This means it can mix together sound from either two analog inputs, or one analog and one digital. For you being a beginner you’ll probably be using the analog RCA inputs (the red and white cables you plug things into your TV with, most likely) or the 1/8″ (3.5 mm) input, which is similar to what you’re used to with normal speaker signal wire and things like consumer earphones. You’ll need to purchase a cable for whichever one you choose.

A note about connecting straight from your computer or iPod: you’re probably going to notice some extra fuzz or hum in your sound. Generally these devices do not output as high of quality audio as these speakers are capable of producing. Because of this, you’re probably going to want to connect them from an external device. I’m using a small, affordable mixer which I’ll post about sometime soon. However, if you’ve no need for such a setup but still want high quality sound you might look into USB-powered external sound processors. These devices connect to your computer via USB and are essentially an extra, dedicated sound card.

There are a number of ways you can go here. If you’d like to further build your studio using professional, industry-standard Pro Tools software/equipment you have reached a crossroads. In order to use Pro Tools you need some form of Digidesign (the company who makes Pro Tools) interface–which just happens to do exactly what we need here. I am using an M-box 2 Pro, which allows me to use Pro Tools on my workstation, but also serves as this needed dedicated, external sound card. Unfortunately this carries a large pricetag. If you’re not ready to go the Pro Tools route (yet) you might consider the PreSonus Audiobox USB, which Paul Stamatiou mentions on his studio monitor speakers article. Either of these options also includes MIDI capability, which will come in handy in your home studio, no doubt. I’ll post more about using MIDI in the future.

Overview

There you have it. Studio monitor speakers are just one piece to the home studio puzzle but they’re a pretty big piece. Not only do they help you refine your sound while you’re recording your work, but they make almost anything else sound great. They’re a great place to start on a home studio or even just to enrich your everyday audio experience.

Feedback

This is the first in my series of home studio articles. Any kind of feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Okay, I’ve finally figured it out. I know this site has kinda gone by the wayside several times in its life. I’ve flirted with it, posting a lot for a week or so before eventually going away for a while. Most of those attempts were experiments, and I largely got disinterested because I hadn’t found anything that I could write a lot about for several articles and people actually care about. Because of that I posted about whatever was cool for me at the time, and now from looking at the statistics I can see what ended up gaining the most attention.

Some things are going to change around here.

For one, there will be some design changes, but that’s just typical for me to change a perfectly fine design for another for no reason. Don’t expect anything too drastic–just some minor realigments.

Second, and most importantly, content shift. Next month I start my Music Production Technology program. Obviously music and technology interest me—both things separately, and in all places where they intersect. In the past I’ve written about different music I was listening to and about things such as how to plug an electric guitar into a computer, and from the statistics these topics have spurred the most attention. I tend to get at least 10 hits from Google a day from the guitar article. There’s obviously interest in this area, and it is my area.

Because of this, starting soon this blog will become, although still my personal blog, largely covering technology, music, and the spaces they intertwine. I don’t know if I’ll ever come up with a new name and move those posts to a site more accurately named or not. For the meantime I’ll just do all of that writing here. We’ll see what happens.