Steel Beast Rides Again
by Garry on Feb.19, 2012, under commuting, Cycling
Well, pretty soon the truck is going back, and I’ll be making the daily work commute using different forms of transportation. It will either be the bus, or by bike. I’ve made a few test runs on the bus and it seems like it will be quite acceptable. The only thing is I’m not all that crazy about keeping to a strict schedule that is required by the bus, I like to be a little more free flowing. Fortunately, the bus schedule at both ends of my route has buses arriving quite frequently so last minute departure changes should not be too bad to deal with.
My other option is to up by cycle commuting game to more of a year round endeavour. Several folks at work are hard core, right through the winter, every day cycle commuters, that put my casual “if it’s not raining” three season cycling to shame. So, here is the new strategy, as yet unproven, but I’m now ready to go.
I’ve brought back the “Steel Beast” now tricked out with a new seat, fenders and panniers. Who know that the 30+ year old Norco Sasquach would get this kind of use? Cromoly steel at it’s finest, nearly indestructible, a little on the heavy side, but that just makes for a better workout.
The Sasquach was my 1st mountain bike from way back in the day and it’s hard to believe that I traded in a Honda 550F for a bicycle. Ah, the sacrifices you make for children, but that’s another story.
My new work location is not quite as convenient as my prior location as I don’t yet have access to a full time locker. With the panniers I think I’ll be able to transport and store the extra gear during the day until a locker becomes available.
So that’s it. The old bike has been given a new life was as hard core year round commuter ride. Now lets see if I can become the hard core year round rider!
Bus Rider
by Garry on Jan.24, 2012, under Travel
I know a lot of people ride the bus, but not me, not until yesterday that is.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the cost of operating a vehicle lately and when you add up the payments, insurance, parking, and repairs it’s an amazing amount per month. So, yesterday was the start of my bus adventures for commuting to work.
I needed to take the truck in to have the windshield replaced, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to start riding. Armed with bus tickets and an app to find my rides I set out on the #57 Express from Southdale to downtown. Nice ride, not crowded, as fast or faster than driving and strangely relaxing. Perhaps it’s just the 1st time novelty.
Going home was equally good. The stop is a block from my office and the bus was exactly on time.
Today I’m on the #19, not an express but moving well. Oops, spoke too soon! We’re jammed up on Archibald with all those darn cars!
Giving up the truck and going to a one vehicle family will be a big change for me. Bussing in the winter seems like it will be OK, and way less expensive. From early spring to late fall I can be on the bike so that will be excellent. I think I’ll turn the mountain bike into more of a commuter bike with fenders and skinny tires and perhaps the reward for my new transportation style will be a new full suspension 29er.
IBM to Launch IBM Docs with a Collaborative Service Similar to Google Apps
by garry.c.stewart on Jan.16, 2012, under Grab Bag
IBM to Launch IBM Docs with a Collaborative Service Similar to Google Apps | ServicesANGLE
IBM is set to launch IBM Docs as part a collaborative service similar to Google Apps that it is calling the IBM SmartCloud for Social Business. As part of the effort, IBM is placing its LotusLive services under the SmartCloud name, which now encompasses IBM’s “smarter commerce,” brand, analytics and industry specific solutions such as its Smarter Cities efforts.
Melt Down
by Garry on Jan.04, 2012, under Grab Bag, Nature
What’s going on? It’s January and there is virtually no snow in Winnipeg and tomorrow the forecast is for +7. Thought these ice candles would be fine until late March, but at this rate they will just be a puddle of water by tomorrow night.
Geotagging photographs with gps4cam
by garry.c.stewart on Jan.02, 2012, under Grab Bag
I’ve spent a good part of the last day of Christmas holidays playing around with the computer. Well, not so much playing as learning some new stuff in Lightroom 3, which triggered exploring a whole bunch of other stuff, mainly around GPS, geotagging and the iPhone. You see, Lightroom exposes the GPS metadata of a picture and there is a small little arrow next to the GPS coordinates that launches a Google Map of where that photograph was taken. Similarly, geotagged photos sent to photo sharing sites like Flickr use this GPS info to put your photo on the map.
While iPhone photographs are self-geotagging (GPS coordinates can be automatically associated with the picture when it’s taken) my other cameras, like the Canon 7D, can’t do this on their own. It is possible to geotag photos from DLSRs like the Canon 7D and store that information as part of the image but there are quite a few different approaches and hardware/software options to get the job done.
After a little googling around and reviewing a number of approaches, I settled on gps4cam, an iPhone app, to help me get the job done. Primary criteria were low cost, after all this is the post-Christams period, it had to be easy to use, preferably self contained, not requiring yet another online service and be easy to use in my Lightroom workflow.
The 2D bar code in the picture is my 1st test of gps4cam and it contains GPS locations sampled on a 5 minute interval of my afternoon photo shoot expedition to Whittier Park. At the end of your “photo trip” you export the GPS information from the iPhone and it produces one or more 2D bar codes, which you simple photograph and add to the photos that you’re planning to geotag. The photos are then processed with the gps4cam desktop software. It looks at your photos and finds the 2D barcode info and extracts the GPS data and then inserts the appropriate GPS data into the appropriate photo, it’s simple “magic”!. The nice part is that you don’t need to synchronize the clock on the iPhone with the clock on the camera, which is what a lot of other solutions require when using a GPX file to attach the GPS info to a photo.
So far, I’m quite pleased with the gps4cam software and I’m looking forward to testing it out on a longer photo shooting expedition.
Outdoor is better
by Garry on Dec.31, 2011, under Cycling
A couple of days ago I setup the bike on the trainer in the basement. As much as I like to ride and know this is a necessary evil to try and maintain some sort of conditioning over the winter, it sure is painful to ride indoors, going nowhere. Even with the tv or the iPod as a distraction, it is majorly boring. Spin classes are better with the company of others and a structured training program, but still outdoor is better.
I hit some trails through Wittier Park today for a nice 28km ride in a balmy +2°
Why you shouldn’t hang around railroad tracks
by Garry on Dec.30, 2011, under Activities, photography
It’s a nice sunny day and I’m out taking pictures with a friend. We’re in a very picturesque area that just happens to have a railway bridge over a river. This seems like a great subject for some interesting photographs. The bridge and track are up high so we scramble up the steep side of the railroad bed and get in position to take a few shots.
What may not be apparent from the photo on the left is that in the distance, there is a curve in the track, and you really can’s see anything coming. We’re getting serious about getting some great shots, there are tripods in play and we’re right into the bridge structure. We’re concentrating, and perhaps not paying too much attention to our situation and the potential pitfalls of our activities.
And then it happens, we hear a faint rumbling, and look up to see a locomotive coming quite quickly down the track. No warning whistle, why would there be, this is not a railroad crossing, and we’re not supposed to be there.
We scramble to pick up our camera bags, tripods etc. and hustle to get off the track. Moments later this freight train barrels past us and the engineer shoots us a less that friendly look.
Moral of the story, be aware of your location and don’t get overly involved in your pursuits. Either that or stay away from railroad tracks!
Updating to WordPress 3.3
by Garry on Dec.29, 2011, under Grab Bag
So I updated my Blog site to WordPress 3.3. I used the “automatic” approach and of course ignored all the things you are supposed to do like backing up your database, disabling all plugins etc. etc., and things didn’t go so good.
The updated didn’t complete properly. It ended in showing a blank screen shortly after initiating the update. In fact after that, the whole blog was “gone”, no errors in the browser, just a blank screen. Turns out the update process caused a crash of a lot of stuff on my hosting provider’s site, and he was not too thrilled about that.
Plan B, do a manual update, still no success, and I still can’t login to the wp-admin page. A little Googling and we decide to disable the plugins manually, and apparently, that was the money to get the site back up. So, right now I’m updating all the plugins, enabling one at a time, and hoping nothing crashes out again.
Ever since the automatic update feature was introduced in WordPress all my updates have gone flawlessly, and I guess I was lulled into a false sense of security. Lesson learned, follow the process, back everything up, and give my hosting guy a heads up that “something” might happen.
From the Updating WordPress « WordPress Codex
Consider rewarding yourself with a blog post about the update, reading that book or article you’ve been putting off, or simply sitting back for a few moments and letting the world pass you by.
Utah Trip
by garry.c.stewart on Dec.27, 2011, under Grab Bag
Have not got around to writing much (anything) about our late fall road trip to several national parks in Utah, but here is a photo from Sunset Point In Bryce Canyon National Park.
Ready for Holiday iPads and more?
by garry.c.stewart on Dec.23, 2011, under Grab Bag
InformationWeek Mobile Edition – NEWS & ANALYSIS – IBM Equips IT To Welcome Holiday iPads
After the New Year, expect employees at every level to bring iPads, Android tablets, and smartphones into work, looking to get on the corporate network.
When that happens, IBM wants to make sure its customers will be ready, Kevin Cavanaugh, VP of IBM Collaboration Solutions, said in an interview this week. Last year, the joke was that many a CEO came back from the Christmas break with a new iPad that he expected to be able to use for work. When that happened, the CIO and IT team wouldn’t “want to say no, except that they’d just been working on a policy to ban these devices,” he said.
The executive iPad is just the most visible symbol of the unstoppable trend toward the consumerization of IT and the trend toward employees bringing their own devices to work, Cavanaugh said. IBM has responded by delivering enterprise software that runs on these devices, whether they are owned by the enterprise or not. IT may not welcome the chaotic state of the mobile technology market, but mobility looms increasingly large in enterprise technology planning.
