What's New

March 31, 2012

Spam reduction measures:
<rave>You just can't escape from this scourge of the internet era - Or can you?. It's a good thing that I own my own domains. I can create and delete email addresses at my whim. I do so in order to control who has my email address, what those email addresses are used for, and to track spam that shows up on specifically assigned addresses. Recently (during the month of Dec, 2011), I moved all my domains (robsworld.org, vaessen.name, vaessen.net, vaessen.ws, tollgatecrossing.org, and one other) to a new hosting service (the reasons are varied, but this is not the time to tell that story). The new hosting service offers numerous ways to cut down on the amount of spam I've been receiving: Account and user level filtering, SpamAssassin block/black list filtering, domain keys, SPF filtering, BoxTrapper (not turned on) and other methods. In the few days that I've been with the new service (since approximately the 12th of Dec), I've reduced my spam by more than 75%. In the past (during 2011) I would typically receive approximately 35 spam messages per day. This is extremely good news. Reducing the amount of spam is awesome, but the excellent spam control measures at my disposal is even better!</rave>

This month (March, 2012), I managed to implement another measure to reduce spam. I originally thought this particular method would be difficult, but I managed to implement it without the help of anyone at my web hosting company. Even if they offer numerous outstanding services and options, their help desk isn't particularly helpful or knowledgeable. Thankfully, the internet offered some helpful advice on setting up my SPF records. What the heck is SPF? Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is an extension to the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). SPF allows software/email servers to identify and reject email which contains forged addresses in the From (Return-Path) portion of an email message. SPF allows the owner of a domain to specify their mail sending policy, e.g. which mail servers they use to send mail from their domain name. The technology requires two sides to work in tandem: The domain owner publishes this information in publicly available SPF records, and when someone else's email server receives a message claiming to come from that domain, then the receiving server can check whether the message complies with the domain's stated policy. If, for example, the message comes from an unknown server, it can be considered a fake. Along with pgp signatures and Domain Keys, this measure should help reduce incidences where spammers pretend to be me (forgeries), and reduce the amount of spam I receive which claims to come From: me! Configuring the SPF records wasn't as difficult as I imagined it would be, and so far I haven't had any problems based on this new spam reduction measure.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sender_Policy_Framework>
<https://www.robsworld.org/index2.html#fightingspam>
<https://www.robsworld.org/whybother.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/forgery.html>

Big time tax relief:
Thanks to some ill advice from a tax preparer, Kim and I were shocked when we went to pay our taxes for 2007, 2008 and 2009. For three years running, we ended up owing large sums of money. We were not happy. We're not talking a small amount of taxes. We're talking about large amounts (large for us). Approximately $3,000.00 in 2007, $3,600.00 in 2008 and more than $2,000.00 in 2009. Somehow - A combination of poor advice, a lack of vigilance on our part, and some inaction on behalf of my employer, resulted in very little taxes being withheld during those years. Our first year in our new house (2006) we got a big pile of money back. So, not wanting a repeat of that, we changed our withholding - At our tax preparer's advice. For three years in a row we changed our W4s to withhold varying amounts of money. No matter what we did, we ended up owing money! In 2008 my employer didn't implement the withholding changes that I requested! So they ended up withholding even less. My employer withheld so little in federal taxes, that I actually had to pay a fine in 2008.

We finally changed our tax preparer in 2010. Unfortunately, it was too late to avoid a third strike. That year (taxes for year 2009) we ended up owing again. Thankfully, based on the advice of our new tax preparer we actually got our W4 withholding set high enough to avoid a fourth catastrophe. In 2011 our 2010 returns resulted in the a net return in the positive numbers. We ended up getting something like $500.00 back. In 2011 I changed employers so that screwed up our taxes again. My income was split between two different companies and I was dreading the damage that could mean in terms of taxes. Thankfully, I set my withholding as high as I could on my new W4. This year (taxes for 2011), like last, the government owes us a refund. Nearly $5,000.00! That's way better than owing the government a big pile of money! Getting money back is better than owing money, but $5k is a bit much. Ideally, I'd like to owe a little bit, or nothing at all. Unfortunately, with last year's income being mixed between two employers, I should probably wait a year before I make any changes to my withholding.

Return of the Chinese Domain Name Scam:
My first encounter with this particular scam occurred back in January of 2010. Back then, as now (29th of Mar, 2012) I received a curious email. Something that piqued my interest and caused some concern. This email indicated that someone is trying to register "robsworld" as Internet Keyword? That concerns me. I own the domain name, and this could cause problems in the future. This company (the one that sent me the unsolicited email) wants me to contact them regarding the matter. The use of English in the email certainly indicates that the originator isn't an English speaker. They claim to be a 'Domain Name Registration Center' in China. At the same time, some of the language felt out of place. The author used terms that are not applicable to the medium and or technical genre, and the tone of the email almost felt like extortion or some implied threat of intellectual property infringement. I got the feeling that something wasn't quite 'right' about the email. Being a skeptic, I started doing a little research (Isn't the Internet great!?).

The research/searches yielded a great deal of information regarding this domain (apidnr.hk in Jan of 2010, and yiguangroup.com in Mar of 2012), similar emails, and the 'Scam' that these companies are engaging in. It's a scare tactic an extortion racket. The fact that this email, and many like it, have gone out to several other domain name owners (as indicated by searches) indicates that it is a mass mailing email campaign (just like spam). They're not targeting me specifically, just targeting domain name registrants. I found numerous examples that were nearly identical to mine. Their email indicates that someone is trying to register my domain name 'robsworld' as a an 'internet keyword'. I wasn't sure what that was to begin with (back in 2010), but I soon figured it out. They also insinuate that someone may be attempting to register the 'robsworld' domain with a .cn or .hk TLD (Top Level Domain). They also indicate that 'robsworld' refers to my 'company name or trademark'. This isn't true. I don't trade on the domain name. I don't have a trade mark, and I haven't incorporated anything under the domain name. Clearly they're trying to frighten me to scare me into action. If I had a 'trade mark' or 'company name' I would likely be concerned in a legal sense. This entire solicitation seems designed to make me call/contact them in order to prevent this 'third party' from using my 'trade mark' or 'company name'. As documented by other 'victims', once you email them back, the 'third party' gets involved in a further attempt to convince you that your domain/property is in jeopardy; unless you follow through with the only way to protect your property/domain name. You'll need to pay for the 'legitimate' domain/keyword registration.

Domain name registration, trade marks and internet keywords are all different. This company is playing on fear and confusion in the hopes that I/others will become so concerned that we'll buy into their scam. Whatever it happens to be. One might speculate that they want me to register my domain with a Chinese TLD. Perhaps they want me to register my 'internet keyword' (something initiated by CNNIC (China Internet Network Information Center), the state run network information center of China), so that Chinese users will be directed to my website as opposed to a web site run by this mythical 'third party'. I'm not interested in registering any 'Internet Keywords' with a Chinese NIC; as these keywords are used as a means of internet censorship in China. The registration of 'Internet Keywords' is a costly proposition, that simply creates a second tier of domain name registration as a way of generating revenue for the Chinese state/corporations, and facilitating internet censorship. The only 'domain names' I'm interested in are the ones I've registered. If I ever wanted a Chinese TLD (or internet keyword), I certainly wouldn't go through a company that sends me unsolicited email, full of unfounded, unproven, insinuations and speech designed to frighten me.

If you ever need any help hunting down a spammer, don't hesitate to ask for my help. I'm willing and eager to help. Just drop me an email. I'd put the email address here, but this email message is also posted online, where spammers could scrape the email off the web page. Damn those spammers!
<https://www.robsworld.org/domainscam.png>
<http://alfidicapitalblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/alfidi-capital-exposes-chinese-domain.html>
<http://www.joewein.net/blog/2008/12/08/domain-registration-scam-in-china/>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_censorship>
<https://www.robsworld.org/index2.html#fightingspam>
<https://www.robsworld.org/whybother.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/domainscam.png>

Software favorites:
More releases for some of my favorite software applications. GraphicConverter moves ever forward. As usual, developer has been busy updating this application. Here's another update for the product that's always getting better. All the updates are free for those who own a license. If you need a powerhouse converter, editor and browser for your graphics, grab a copy of GraphicConverter - You won't be disappointed. Finally, with the recent OS X update, Apple released another new version of Safari, my favorite web browser.

GraphicConverter:
Thorsten Lemke (of Lemkesoft) completed work on at least three updates over the past few week. I recently saw/downloaded the following update: 8 (b804). GraphicConverter is an image converter and editor. A fantastic piece of shareware that is well worth the price (~$40.00). I use it to convert image formats into web standard formats, to create and edit image maps and other graphics. I've been singing GC's praises for many years now, and I'm not sure I would do without it. The best part about GC is it's author. Thorsten Lemke is completely committed to his customer base. Constantly and Continuously responding to customer recommendations and bug reports. GC is a dynamic, evolving, application. Always on the cutting edge, an absolute must in any web developers tool box. At a fraction of PhotoShop's cost, this photo editor puts a huge wrench in your toolbox.

The 8.0 release (currently in beta) is a new full release. A completely new version re-written as a 64 bit application (can be launched as 32 bit/defaults to 64 bit). Sandboxing support was added, several bugs were fixed, and support for large images (16,000x16,000 pixels) was added. The version 8 beta expires May 1st, 2012. The new version will be a free update for all registered customers of version 7.
<http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/162/new-functions-and-versions.html>

Safari:
Apple's default web browser for OS X (also available for Windows!), is way ahead of the pack. Apple's browser contains a plethora of incredibly powerful features, and this release moves the browser forward for everyone (there's even a Windows version! - Microsoft stops developing IE for Mac, and Apple makes a Windows version of Safari?). I'm currently running Version 5.1.5 (7534.55.3).

Battle of the browsers. Internet Explorer vs FireFox. Those are your choices right? Wrong! Think different! Think Mac! Choose Safari, the new kid on the block. A fast (The fastest available for Mac) but full featured browser, which performs like a pro. The full release version is a powerful workhorse - Featuring tabbed browsing, URL snap-back, a powerful but elegant bookmark implementation (with built-in import capability), Google, Yahoo and Bing search integration, built-in pop-up blocker, multiple standards (HTML 4.01, HTML 5, XML, XPath, XSLT, XHTML, DOM, CSS, RSS, ECMA Script, Proxy Support, SSL, TLS, JavaScript, Java, plus QuickTime, Flash and Shockwave plug-ins), Top sites - A visual representation of your top visited sites. Cover Flow - A fantastic new way to visualize your bookmarks. Safari Reader mode - banish all those annoying sidebars and adds. Expanded support for HTML 5. Nitro Engine - Makes Safari the fastest in the pack.

Some of the newest features include: The Reading List - A way to store URLs for late, Multi-Touch Gestures (under Lion) - more ways to navigate within Safari; Full-Screen Browsing (under Lion) - With a 30" monitor, I don't really need this; New privacy and security features; Resume - Opens windows and tabs right where you left off; Downloads popover (under Lion); Find option (updated); Better graphics (Under Lion - using HTML5 canvas capabilities); Internet account setups; New processing architecture - to keep your computer from slowing down when the browser starts choking on some pesky video or other heavy duty processing. Safari 5.1.1 includes support for iCloud, a breakthrough set of free cloud services. iCloud stores your Safari bookmarks and Safari Reading List and automatically pushes them to all your devices. Safari 5.1.2 fixes some excessive memory usage issues. 5.1.3 fixes numerous wireless connectivity issues and adds some additional language support. The 5.1.4 update patches numerous security flaws, squashes multiple bugs, corrects more memory errors, improves JavaScript performance and corrects PDF rendering issues. The 5.1.5 update fixes a 32 bit usability issue.

By the way, Safari is fully compliant (it was the first Browser to meet that bench mark) with the advanced Acid 3.0 test. So, if you're concerned about standards and compliance, you've nothing to worry about. Develop your web site using the Safari webkit and you won't have to worry about rendering problems or sticky browser compatibility issues. Check out the website for more info. Safari is just one more reason to Switch! It's won a place as my default browser, give it a chance and it'll soon be yours.
<http://www.apple.com/safari/>
<http://www.apple.com/safari/features.html>
<http://www.webstandards.org/action/acid3>

With these software updates, I've updated my Software Favorites page. It's primarily dedicated to web publishing for the Mac user. Not meant for the professional, It's my hope that home users and hobbyists will find it useful. It's a listing of applications that I find useful in publishing my web pages.
<https://www.robsworld.org/myfavs.html>

March 25, 2012

Rob's World! - Newsletter:
Each month I send out a monthly newsletter to the avid fans of Rob's World! (Imagine that?) If you're interested in reading about happenings at Rob's World! you can forego the daily/weekly chore of logging in to check out the latest nuggets. The newsletter is a more convenient way to keep up to date on the comings and going in the life and times of Robert & Kim Vaessen and my crazy little web site. I can't imagine why anyone wouldn't want a copy emailed directly to them every month! The mailing list management method includes a built in double confirmation mechanism, a web based list management interface, and a fairly efficient way to control the addresses and characteristics associated with the mailing list.

This month I had to update many of the links to my mailing lists. When I changed hosting providers (in Nov, 2011) I had to rebuild all my mailing lists. That was no easy chore. I had to manually rebuild the lists (appx 12 lists with more than a thousand subscribers) and resubscribe all the users by hand. Unfortunately, the new hosting provider doesn't manage my domains in the same manner, and the links to the mailing lists are all different now. I can't use the 'www' prefix with my mailing lists, and the hosting provider refuses to fix the problem, so I've had to manually update all mailing list URLs/references. If you're interested in receiving the newsletter, all you have to do is send an email to: Check out the web page for more details.
<http://robsworld.org/mailman/listinfo/rwnewsletter_robsworld.org>
<https://www.robsworld.org/newsletter.html>

Springtime Sprinkler Start-up:
It'll take a while, but eventually I'll become a handy man. Owning a new home (Kim and I purchased our first/current home in March of 2005, but it still feels 'New' to us) brings all kinds of new responsibilities to the first time home owner, and I'm no exception. As the years go by, I'm learning how to conquer new challenges in the home owner arena. This year it's installing a garbage disposal, getting electrical outlets installed in the basement, getting a washing machine fixed and setting up a refrigerator in the basement. Most of that didn't involve a lot of hands on, but it's springtime (First day of Spring was 21 March), so let's talk about the sprinkler start-up. I think I may have finally conquered that outdoor plumbing system that lays buried under my lawn.

It's spring, and it's time to start watering the lawn. Last year I started watering in April, and that worked out o.k. So far (March of 2012) it looks like we're going to have an early Spring thaw - Temperatures have been very warm lately, so I figured I better get some water on the lawn (last week of March). This year, I once again bested the sprinkler system. It took a few years (we moved into this house (our first) back in 2005), but I think I've finally figured it out (The mechanical aptitude portion of my ASVAB test was the only portion where I scored below 99).

Once again, I was armed with a series of photos and notes on how to turn the sprinklers on. This time, when I turned the water on (in the basement), there weren't any spurting surprises, broken water lines or gushing lawn geysers. I only noticed one sprinkler head that needed replacing. This year's battle goes to me. I've completed the turn-on and an initial inspection. Kim still needs to program the sprinkler zones, and I'll call our 'actual' handyman to check it out and fix some other stuff later this month. Here's the photos and notes I use. Who knows, maybe they'll prove useful to another new home owner.
<https://www.robsworld.org/iphoto/sprinklerturnon/index.html>

Death to spammers!
<rave>Here's some good news regarding my continual battle against spammers. Something that doesn't happen very often. I actually got an email reply to a SpamCop report. Some Dutch Football club (not the team itself, a club (based in the Netherlands) dedicated to soccer teams) decided they could sign me up without my permission. O.k. my name is Dutch, but I'm not. They probably took a chance on my name since there's a considerable history of Vaessen's involved in European Soccer. They started sending me their club newsletter without my permission, and that's considered spam in most books. I reported the newsletter (which I couldn't read very easily / it was in Dutch) as spam. After receiving a second one, I reported that as spam as well. After two reports I actually received a response to my SpamCop report. The person/organization responsible for sending out the newsletter apologized and 'unsubscribed' me. Of course they had to mention the fact that there was an 'Unsubscribe' link at the bottom of the email. As if I didn't know that. Spammers consider it 'Rude' when you don't use their 'Unsubscribe' links. Regardless of whether they work or not. They think they have a right to send you unsolicited messages, and it's your responsibility to request an unsubscribe. They think they're in charge of determining whether you receive their messages. After all - they paid good money for your email address! So, SpamCop works on some spammers. The ones who still have some ethics. This company should probably review their mailing practices. I never asked to receive their newsletter, and they might end up in legal trouble if they continue sending unsolicited messages to unsuspecting netizens.</rave>

If you ever need any help figuring out a problem involving unsolicited email, or help hunting down a spammer, don't hesitate to ask for my help. I'm willing and eager to help. Just drop me an email. I'd put the email address here, but this email message is also posted online, where spammers could scrape the email off the web page. Damn those spammers!
<https://www.robsworld.org/index2.html#fightingspam>
<https://www.robsworld.org/whybother.html>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpamCop>

Southeast Aurora Neighborhood Watch website:
I participate in some community focused events, but haven't found the time to serve on any boards, so I do what I can to help the people who live in my neighborhood. Volunteering with our local neighborhood watch, maintaining the Southeast Aurora Neighborhood Watch website and mailing lists. The South East Aurora Neighborhood Watch serves the residents of South East Aurora by providing information and close ties with the local Police Department in order to help keep the residents safe and neighborhoods crime free. Over the last couple of weeks I took some time to update some of the web pages.

Current: A web page dedicated to the most recent news, announcements and information.
- I posted an announcement about our next Neighborhood Watch meeting. Our last meeting was held on the 2nd of Feb, 2012. Our next meeting will be held on the 5th of April, 2012. As usual, our meetings are held at the Fox Ridge Middle School. Everyone's invited, and in an effort to boost attendance, we may distribute some flyers for this meeting. Please consider participating in your Neighborhood Watch. It's free, helps you and your community and helps everyone stay safe.
- I posted a copy and announcement about the most recent Neighborhood Watch Newsletter. Produced by the Aurora Police Department the newsletter contains plenty of information designed to help you stay safe and secure in South East Aurora.
Events: A listing of upcoming and recurring events in you Southeast Aurora Neighborhood. Events sponsored by or relevant to our Neighborhood Watch.
- I updated the paragraph about our NW meetings. Our next meeting will be held April 5th. The meeting will be held at Fox Ridge Middle School. If you have an idea about topics to cover, please let our Head Area Coordinator (Judy Van Meter) know. See the Neighborhood Watch website for more details.
eMail lists: A web page containing details about our mailing lists. The Neighborhood Watch runs numerous email mailing lists, and this page contains details regarding all of those lists. Due to my change of hosting providers in Nov of 2011, many of my webpage URLs changed (they shouldn't have, but that's another issue altogether).
- I updated the page to correct numerous broken links. I don't know if anyone other than me noticed, and that's a little bit depressing.

If you are a resident of Southeast Aurora, you might want to check out our Southeast Aurora Neighborhood Watch website (Serving the following communities: Tollgate Crossing, Sorrel Ranch, Wheatlands, Beacon Point, Southshore, Tallyn’s Reach, Saddle Rock - North, Serenity Ridge, Black Stone and Heritage Eagle Bend). If you're concerned about the safety and security of your community, you might want to join our group, or subscribe to one of our mailing lists to receive periodic alerts, updates and information.
<http://www.southeastaurora-neighborhoodwatch.org/Welcome.html>

Updates to the Tollgate Crossing website:
I participate in some community focused events, but haven't found the time to serve on any boards, so I do what I can to help the people who live in my neighborhood. Volunteering with our local neighborhood watch, and supporting our community by maintaining the Tollgate Crossing website, mailing lists and online bulletin boards. The Tollgate Crossing website is focused on the Tollgate Crossing community, with a few links to the Neighborhood Watch website. I recently made a few updates to the community website:

Bulletin Boards: A new feature / website - It's not linked directly through a header link, but I recently created a new website / feature for the residents of Tollgate Crossing. The new website is a series of online bulletin boards. A place where residents can discuss community related issues, share ideas, buy or sell items, etc. This bulletin board software is new to me, but I'll do my best to set up some categories and manage the forums.
- Bulletin board rules: As with the new Bulletin Boards, this new page isn't linked directly to the rest of the 'Tollgate Crossing' website. An essential feature. A precaution if you will. Just a reminder that everyone should act in a civilized manner. Hopefully I won't need to reference the 'rules' any time soon. Made some minor updates to the rules.
- Bulletin Board site icon: I got tired of the 'phpbb' icon on my Bulletin Board's header, so I created and uploaded a new one. One that's specific to the community.
Welcome: The website's opener. A page containing an introduction to our community website. Here you'll find all the latest news and announcements. I rearranged the banners a bit - It's something I do to indicate a change in the content.
- I updated the banner for our next HOA (10 Apr, 2012) meeting. Our next MD meeting will be held 27 Mar, 2012.
- I posted a banner announcing a change of HOA management companies. Our HOA management has decided to switch management companies. They're going to switch our HOA management to the same company that handles our MD management (Clifton, Larson, Allen). They've been managing our MD now for several years, and they've been doing a pretty good job. We haven't had such luck with HOA management companies, we keeping picking poorly performing companies. The new HOA manager will be Mathew Mendisco, the same person managing our MD now. This change takes effect on the 1st of Apr. I'll update more pages at that time.
eMail lists: A web page containing details about our mailing lists. I run/manage a few community related email mailing lists, and this page contains details regarding all of those lists. Descriptions of the lists, a few rules, how to sign up, etc.
- I updated the page to correct numerous broken links. I don't know if anyone other than me noticed, and that's a little bit depressing.
Events: A detailed listing of upcoming and recurring events in and around Tollgate Crossing. Here is more detailed information regarding some of the events you may have read about on the 'Welcome' page. It's also a place to look for long term/recurring events.
- I updated the information regarding our next HOA (10 Apr, 2012) meeting.
- I updated a posting regarding Metro District elections. There will not be any elections this year. See the posting for more info.
Info: A page of links, phone numbers, email addresses and other information pertinent to the residents/community of Tollgate Crossing.
- I posted another month of meeting minutes from our monthly Metro District meetings. They're available going back to May of 2011. If you want to see an older one, please contact me.

If you are a resident of 'Tollgate Crossing' (in Aurora, Colorado), you might want to check out the website, mailing lists or bulletin boards. They're loaded with information about our community, provide multiple venues for communications, community interaction and interactive ways to stay connected in Tollgate Crossing. If you'd like to help out by being a moderator, provide feedback, or help me with my coding efforts, please let me know. I'm open to your suggestions.
<http://www.tollgatecrossing.org/Welcome.html>

Happy St. Patrick's Day!
I'm part Irish (on my mother's side - going back many generations), and my Irish roots look forward to this day all year long. It's one of those holidays where there's very little pressure to do much of anything. People don't get the day off (well, it was Saturday, so plenty of people had the day off anyway), there's no big expectations like cards to everyone you know (I sent a card to my mom), or presents. If your Catholic you might be expected to attend mass on St. Patrick's Day, but it's become more of a cultural heritage day than anything else. If you're Irish, or of Irish descent, wear some green. Go out to eat and have a pint of beer. Kim and I went out to eat at one of favorite restaurants. McCabe's Bistro & Pub. Kim had Bangers & Mash and I had a Reuben sandwich. Kim had a soda, be I tipped back a Guinness in the middle of the day. We like St. Patrick's day!

Xfinity/Comcast internet outage:
It happened again. I've been quite lucky with my Internet Service. The Comcast service (now known as Xfinity) has been quite good over the past several years. With no notable outages for nearly an entire year. Now all of a sudden I'm starting to experience issues. The last problem occurred just last month (7 Feb, 2012). That outage was quite brief and would have likely gone unnoticed if I wasn't on the computer 'All the Frickin' Time!' (according to the beautiful person who lives with me). If one watches very closely, they might find that many minor, unexplained, inexplicable connectivity issues might be attributable to a poor internet connection. On the morning of 17 Mar, 2012, I was working on the computer when all of a sudden I started having all sorts of connectivity problems. Kim even complained that the Netflix cut out on her. After a few minutes of troubleshooting I realized it wasn't a problem with my Intranet or computer. It had to be a Comcast problem. I called the 1-888 number, and sure enough... According to the announcement; My area was experiencing an outage, and Comcast technicians are working to restore service. They even offered to call me when connectivity was restored. Sweet; I jumped on that offer and set off to do other things. I did some work around the house, in the yard, and then I went to the store. Had to get some groceries and such. Comcast called back at 0925 to announce that service had been fully restored. When I got back from the store everything was back in working order. What was the real cause of this problem? Who knows? No one will never know. Here are some of the modem's log entries from that incident:

2012-03-17 07:27:48 3-Critical D003.0 DHCP WARNING - Non-critical field invalid in response. 2012-03-17 07:27:20 3-Critical R002.0 No Ranging Response received - T3 time-out 2012-03-17 07:26:45 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:39 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:34 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:34 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:31 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:30 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:30 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:29 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:27 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:27 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:24 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:24 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:23 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:23 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:23 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:23 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:22 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:22 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:19 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:18 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:16 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:02 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing 2012-03-17 07:26:01 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:26:00 3-Critical R004.0 Received Response to Broadcast Maintenance Request, But no Unicast Maintenance opportunities received - T4 timeout 2012-03-17 07:26:00 3-Critical T001.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire QAM/QPSK symbol timing 2012-03-17 07:25:58 3-Critical T002.0 SYNC Timing Synchronization failure - Failed to acquire FEC framing

No 'Critical' errors, but plenty of T3 timeouts and DHCP failures. Usually, when I call Comcast, they do a bunch of useless tests, and then they try to blame the problem on my Modem, my Router, my Computer, the wiring in my House. Anything except their service or their equipment. The truth is that most of these disconnects are caused by unacceptable SNRs or power levels on the cable line. With an SNR out of spec, the modem can't connect or maintain a connection to the cable service. The biggest problem? The modem doesn't keep track of SNR/line levels. So, unless I happen to be continuously refreshing the modem's 'signal' page, I won't see any changes to the upstream and downstream power levels. I live in a technological age where the technology is so complex that no one really knows how it works, or what it takes to fix things. It's 'F'ing magic!

Apple updates iPhoto RAW compatibility:
Slowly but surely, Apple's been updating iPhoto to be compatible with numerous proprietary Raw photo formats. Raw image files are the digital equivalents of negatives. They're minimally processed files that can be edited to affect the image's color, white balance, gamma and various other characteristics. Combined together the

constitute the processed 'positive' image in formats such as TIFF or JPEG for storage, printing or further manipulation. Originally, iPhoto had no ability to handle Raw formats, but over the years, Apple has been adding Raw format compatibility to it's consumer level photo storage and manipulation application. Due to the fact that there's a lot of different Raw formats out there (It seems as if every camera has it's own particular flavor of 'Raw' format), it's taken Apple a long time to catch up to my favorite camera.

For Christmas of 2009, I bought a Panasonic Lumix model DMC-FZ35. It's a 12.1 Mega Pixel digital camera with 18x optical zoom and 4x digital zoom (combined for max 72-148x). The FZ35 records HD video with 1280 x 720-pixel resolution (720p HD) using AVCHD Lite format (MPEG-4/H.264)). It's a great camera (released in August of 2009), but it's a little bit bulky. Carrying it around requires planning. I don't take it everywhere (I did for awhile), but I take it with me when I want really good quality photos. I've often wished that iPhoto would allow me to manipulate the Raw images. Well, now it does. As of 14 Mar, 2012, Apple has finally caught up with this particular Panasonic Raw format. They released another Raw format update for OS 10.6 or later. That update (Digital Camera RAW Compatibility Update 3.10) included eight additional Raw formats. Now I can use iPhoto to manipulate the Raw images from my FZ35. iPhoto '11 currently (as of 24 Mar, 2012) supports 263 different Raw formats. Chances are it supports the Raw format used by your digital camera.
<http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3825>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/PH2417>

GraphicConverter:
Thorsten Lemke (of Lemkesoft) completed work on at least ten updates over the past few week. I recently saw/downloaded the following updates: 8 (b800), 8 (b801). GraphicConverter is an image converter and editor. A fantastic piece of shareware that is well worth the price (~$40.00). I use it to convert image formats into web standard formats, to create and edit image maps and other graphics. I've been singing GC's praises for many years now, and I'm not sure I would do without it. The best part about GC is it's author. Thorsten Lemke is completely committed to his customer base. Constantly and Continuously responding to customer recommendations and bug reports. GC is a dynamic, evolving, application. Always on the cutting edge, an absolute must in any web developers tool box. At a fraction of PhotoShop's cost, this photo editor puts a huge wrench in your toolbox.

The 8.0 release (currently in beta) is a new full release. A completely new version re-written as a 64 bit application (can be launched as 32 bit/defaults to 64 bit). Sandboxing support was added, several bugs were fixed, and support for large images (16,000x16,000 pixels) was added. The version 8 beta expires May 1st, 2012. The new version will be a free update for all registered customers of version 7.
<http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/162/new-functions-and-versions.html>

Safari:
Apple's default web browser for OS X (also available for Windows!), is way ahead of the pack. Apple's browser contains a plethora of incredibly powerful features, and this release moves the browser forward for everyone (there's even a Windows version! - Microsoft stops developing IE for Mac, and Apple makes a Windows version of Safari?). I'm currently running Version 5.1.4 (7534.54.16).

Battle of the browsers. Internet Explorer vs FireFox. Those are your choices right? Wrong! Think different! Think Mac! Choose Safari, the new kid on the block. A fast (The fastest available for Mac) but full featured browser, which performs like a pro. The full release version is a powerful workhorse - Featuring tabbed browsing, URL snap-back, a powerful but elegant bookmark implementation (with built-in import capability), Google, Yahoo and Bing search integration, built-in pop-up blocker, multiple standards (HTML 4.01, HTML 5, XML, XPath, XSLT, XHTML, DOM, CSS, RSS, ECMA Script, Proxy Support, SSL, TLS, JavaScript, Java, plus QuickTime, Flash and Shockwave plug-ins), Top sites - A visual representation of your top visited sites. Cover Flow - A fantastic new way to visualize your bookmarks. Safari Reader mode - banish all those annoying sidebars and adds. Expanded support for HTML 5. Nitro Engine - Makes Safari the fastest in the pack.

Some of the newest features include: The Reading List - A way to store URLs for late, Multi-Touch Gestures (under Lion) - more ways to navigate within Safari; Full-Screen Browsing (under Lion) - With a 30" monitor, I don't really need this; New privacy and security features; Resume - Opens windows and tabs right where you left off; Downloads popover (under Lion); Find option (updated); Better graphics (Under Lion - using HTML5 canvas capabilities); Internet account setups; New processing architecture - to keep your computer from slowing down when the browser starts choking on some pesky video or other heavy duty processing. Safari 5.1.1 includes support for iCloud, a breakthrough set of free cloud services. iCloud stores your Safari bookmarks and Safari Reading List and automatically pushes them to all your devices. Safari 5.1.2 fixes some excessive memory usage issues. 5.1.3 fixes numerous wireless connectivity issues and adds some additional language support. The 5.1.4 update patches numerous security flaws, squashes multiple bugs, corrects more memory errors, improves JavaScript performance and corrects PDF rendering issues.

By the way, Safari is fully compliant (it was the first Browser to meet that bench mark) with the advanced Acid 3.0 test. So, if you're concerned about standards and compliance, you've nothing to worry about. Develop your web site using the Safari webkit and you won't have to worry about rendering problems or sticky browser compatibility issues. Check out the website for more info. Safari is just one more reason to Switch! It's won a place as my default browser, give it a chance and it'll soon be yours.
<http://www.apple.com/safari/>
<http://www.apple.com/safari/features.html>
<http://www.webstandards.org/action/acid3>

March 11, 2012

Announcement about iWork.com:
<rant>The announcements this week (2nd week of Mar, 2012) weren't all good (see below). In Apple's move to consolidate all it's cloud storage and services, they've decided to eliminate a service I found very useful. Apple's curt letter to all registered iWork.com users was rather brief and to the point. "As of July 31, 2012, you will no longer be able to access your documents on the iWork.com site or view them on the web." Apple's reasoning? "With a new way to share iWork documents between your devices using iCloud, the iWork.com public beta service will no longer be available."

Oddly, iWork.com wasn't about sharing the documents between your devices, it was more about sharing the documents with others. Creating a collaborative work space where others could view, download and comment on shared documents. That collaborative, sharing capability disappears with the elimination of iWork.com, and there doesn't appear to be any replacement for it. Just another victim of the iCloud. Another feature/capability eliminated for the sake of uniformity.

The recent release of Apple's iPhoto for iOS provides a slight glimmer of hope. That application now incorporates a 'sharing' capability that provides others with a URL where they can view your 'Photo Journals'. Perhaps the iWork applications will be updated to provide a similar iCloud sharing experience? If it doesn't, I'll have to create my own sharing solution. I'll have to make several documents available on my website for ftp download. It's not an ideal solution, and it's not something everyone can do. Unfortunately, Apple seems to think that no one would want to share their documents with the public at large. That no one would want to work in a collaborative way, using shared online resources. Come on Apple, you're smarter than that. Wise up, stop making everything so simple that it lacks usability and versatility, don't settle for mediocrity!</rant>
<http://9to5mac.com/2012/03/09/apple-to-close-iwork-com-service-on-july-31st-tells-users-to-use-icloud-instead/>
<https://www.robsworld.org/iworkdotcombeta.png>

Avalanche of Apple Updates:
Over the last week (2nd week of March, 2012), Apple hosted a keynote address and released several software updates. With the recent press release regarding Apple's next operating system (OS X Mountain Lion - Announced 16 Feb, 2012), it looks like we're in for a year of updates and improvements in Apple's products. Apple kicked off all these updates with a Keynote on the 7th of February. On that day they held a scheduled event to announce some new products. Attended by members of the media and tech industry, Apple made the following announcements:

The new iPad - Blowing us away with improvements, the new iPad will feature a 'Retina' display with an insanely dense pixel layout of 2,048 x 1,536 resolution. Nothing compares. It's better than HD, it's better than most expected. Controlling all those pixels led Apple to integrate a quad-core graphics processor as well as a newly designed A5X cpu chip for the iPad. The improvements didn't end with the display. There's also 4G (LTE) networking and other enhanced GSM modes.
iLife updates - Updating the iOS version to 5.1, Apple updated numerous applications in preparation for the new iPad.
- iPhoto - New for iOS. Now available on iPad and the iPhone. This newly designed app has a lot of new features. New tools, new effects, new touch based controls, enhanced iCloud sharing capabilities. Create 'galleries' now named 'Photo Journals'; this new photo journal capability seems to be a move to provide a 'gallery' like feature that Apple has indicated will be discontinued once iCloud is fully up and running (in June of 2012). The new photo journals (in a collage format) can be shared with others (public) via iCloud and a URL link. Looks like Apple has taken the hint and they're working on more file sharing features that they pulled when they decided to discontinue MobileMe. Apple released new iOS and desktop version of the iPhoto app. The new desktop version still doesn't have the sharing features which make the iOS version so compelling. Another iPhoto change (in both versions) is the ability to delete specific photos from you 'photo stream'.
- GarageBand - The new iOS version of GarageBand gives iPad users the ability to collaborate (up to four musicians) on a work. The four devices connect wirelessly and combine GarageBand outputs to create a single Jam Session. It also improves playback issues, allows you to edit notes, adds a new strings category and four new instruments.
- iMovie - The new iOS version of iMovie brings the trailers features (from the Desktop version) to the iOS version. The storyboarding helper and layout works rather well with the touch interface. It also incorporates new iCloud sharing features.
iWork updates - Updates to the iOS versions of Keynote, Pages and Numbers. Apple updated these apps in preparation for the new iPad.
- All three iWork apps saw the addition of new 3D charts and graphs. Keynote got some new animations and transitions. Mostly the updates take advantage of the iPad's new retina display.
New AppleTV - Apple announced a new (3rd gen) AppleTV. The new Apple TV has the same form factor as the current (2nd gen) AppleTV, but the new AppleTV brings full 1080p HD content to your entertainment center. Now capable of streaming HD movies and TV shows; at the same price ($99.00). The new device also features an improved processor (A4 replaced with A5 cpu) in order to drive that higher resolution video. Along with the new AppleTV comes a new user interface (also rolled out to current (2nd gen) AppleTV users). The new interface is very iOS like. With candy colored square icons replacing the previous column based layout. This new interface makes it easier to operate from across the room, as the icons create a more identifiable icon based way to navigate the menus.
iTunes updates - Apple updated the desktop version of iTunes in order to accommodate some changes coming with the new iPad and AppleTV. Notably, iTunes 10.6 now has the ability to play 1080p HD movies and TV shows. The store now offers 1080p content. iTunes match improved it's song matching capabilities. Improved album artwork handling, downloading, and display. This update also addresses an issue where songs may skip when playing from iCloud.
iOS 5.1 updates - Purely OS updates. The new iOS update is available for iPad 2 and iPhone 4S. I don't know whether iPhone 4 or iPod touch will get all these updates.
- This update contains improvements and bug fixes, including:
  - Japanese language support for Siri.
  - Photos can now be deleted from Photo Stream.
  - The camera shortcut now always visible on Lock Screen for iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS and iPod touch (4th generation).
  - Camera face detection now highlights all detected faces.
  - A redesigned Camera app for the iPad.
  - Genius Mixes and Genius playlists for iTunes Match subscribers (excellent).
  - Audio for TV shows and movies on iPad optimized to sound louder and clearer.
  - Podcast controls for playback speed and a 30 second rewind for iPad. It's about time.
  - Updated AT&T network indicator (iPad will have LTE/4G capability).
  - Addresses bugs affecting battery life.
  - Fixes an issue that occasionally caused audio to drop for outgoing calls.

Like I said. It's an Avalanche of Apple updates. So many updates, I probably missed a few. In addition to these product and software updates, Apple also included numerous security updates bundled into the various product and OS updates. With all these updates, I found I had to update some of the versions listed on my Software Favorites page.
<http://www.apple.com/ipad/from-the-app-store/apps-by-apple/>
<http://www.apple.com/apps/numbers/>
<http://www.apple.com/apps/keynote/>
<http://www.apple.com/apps/pages/>
<http://www.apple.com/appletv/>
<http://www.apple.com/itunes/>
<http://www.apple.com/ipad/>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1508>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1507>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1504>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1426>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5191>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5192>
<http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5193>
<https://www.robsworld.org/myfavs.html>

Winter won't last much longer?
Over the last couple of weeks (End of Feb/Beginning of March, 2012) our weather has begun to turn wonky. With extremely varied temperature swings, we're starting to see the end of Winter in these parts. We've had a few really crappy days, where it snowed, I shoveled, it melted, it snowed again, I shoveled again, then the temps rose and it melted, then the temps dropped and there was a freezing rain, fog, rain? Freezing cold, temps in the 30s then the 70s, and a lot of wind. Yup, around this time of year our temperatures fluctuate quite wildly, and we get a lot of wind. It's a clear signal that winter is coming to an end. We definitely had a very snowy winter season, and it isn't over quite yet. By the end of February (2012), we were already recording our 4th snowiest season ever (since records were kept (1900s). With appx 4 more inches, this will be our snowiest winter ever recorded, and March is our snowiest month. I better keep that shovel close at hand.

Software favorites:
Another batch of beta updates for my favorite Graphics editor. GraphicConverter moves ever forward. As usual, developer has been busy updating this application. All the updates are free for those who own a license (for the most recent version). If you need a powerhouse converter, editor and browser for your graphics, grab a copy of GraphicConverter - You won't be disappointed.

GraphicConverter:
Thorsten Lemke (of Lemkesoft) completed work on at least five updates over the past few week. I recently saw/downloaded the following updates: 7.6.3 (b449), 7.6.3 (b450), 7.6.3 (b451). GraphicConverter is an image converter and editor. A fantastic piece of shareware that is well worth the price (~$40.00). I use it to convert image formats into web standard formats, to create and edit image maps and other graphics. I've been singing GC's praises for many years now, and I'm not sure I would do without it. The best part about GC is it's author. Thorsten Lemke is completely committed to his customer base. Constantly and Continuously responding to customer recommendations and bug reports. GC is a dynamic, evolving, application. Always on the cutting edge, an absolute must in any web developers tool box. At a fraction of PhotoShop's cost, this photo editor puts a huge wrench in your toolbox.
<http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/162/new-functions-and-versions.html>

With this software update, I've updated my Software Favorites page. It's primarily dedicated to web publishing for the Mac user. Not meant for the professional, It's my hope that home users and hobbyists will find it useful. It's a listing of applications that I find useful in publishing my web pages.
<https://www.robsworld.org/myfavs.html>

March 04, 2012

Netflix News - Subtitles on Watch Instantly:
Back in June of 2009, Neil Hunt, Chief Product Officer at Netflix, blogged about their efforts to bring closed captions to Netflix 'Watch Instantly' titles. Neil explained how much work was needed in order to bring subtitles to the Watch Instantly library. It was a rather detailed and technical explanation, but it really provided some insight into this complex and enormous task. Thankfully, Netflix hasn't shuffled this daunting task off to the 'back burners'. They've been hard at work on the problem, and just recently (Feb 28th, 2012) they provided an update on their progress. As of mid-December, 2011, more than 80% of the hours streamed in the US were of content with captions or subtitles available.

Netflix requires captions or subtitles for all new content when it is available, and they continue to author captions or subtitles for significant new content when it is missing. Their goal is to provide more and more content with captions. Viewers should expect the gap on the last 20% to narrow more slowly than it did in 2011. In the US, almost 90% of streaming viewing is done using a player that is capable of displaying captions or subtitles (some older BD players, TVs, and set-top boxes are not capable, and unfortunately their firmware cannot be upgraded). Almost all Netflix-ready devices in distribution today (including all the game consoles, phone apps, tablet apps, TVs, BD players, AppleTV, and the Roku set-top box) are capable of rendering captions. For users without caption capability, the inexpensive Roku set-top box makes a great upgrade.

A full list of captioned and English subtitled content is available: <http://movies1.netflix.com/Subtitles?st=rt&so=1&sub=l207.n&ftr=false&vt=tl>. This listing can also be accessed from a link at the bottom of each page on the Netflix website, or by entering "subtitles" in the search box.

<rave>This is good news for everyone. Not just the hearing impaired. I like to watch everything with subtitles on. I find it provides another channel of information while I'm watching a movie. One never knows when the background noise is going to wash out the dialog, or the script calls for whispering, or the mic is badly positioned, or the accent (Try watching 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley' without subtitles!) is difficult for this mid-western raised American. Adding subtitles to their streaming line-up is just another example of how Netflix keeps improving it's service to make it better. Netflix is awesome!</rave>
<http://blog.netflix.com/2009/06/closed-captions-and-subtitles.html>
<http://blog.netflix.com/2011/02/30-of-netflix-streaming-content-has.html>
<http://blog.netflix.com/2012/02/update-on-captioning-for-our-members.html>
<http://movies.netflix.com/Subtitles>
<http://www.netflix.com>

Software favorites:
Another batch of updates for my favorite software applications. GraphicConverter moves ever forward. As usual, developer has been busy updating this application. Here's another batch of updates for a product that's always getting better. All the updates are free for those who own a license (for the most recent version). If you need a powerhouse converter, editor and browser for your graphics, grab a copy of GraphicConverter - You won't be disappointed. In addition to the GC update, I also downloaded updates for three of my favorite cataloging applications.

GraphicConverter:
Thorsten Lemke (of Lemkesoft) completed work on at least eight additional updates over the past week. I recently saw/downloaded the following updates: 7.6.2 (b441), 7.6.2 (b443), 7.6.2 (b445), 7.6.2 (b447). GraphicConverter is an image converter and editor. A fantastic piece of shareware that is well worth the price (~$40.00). I use it to convert image formats into web standard formats, to create and edit image maps and other graphics. I've been singing GC's praises for many years now, and I'm not sure I would do without it. The best part about GC is it's author. Thorsten Lemke is completely committed to his customer base. Constantly and Continuously responding to customer recommendations and bug reports. GC is a dynamic, evolving, application. Always on the cutting edge, an absolute must in any web developers tool box. At a fraction of PhotoShop's cost, this photo editor puts a huge wrench in your toolbox.
<http://www.lemkesoft.com/content/162/new-functions-and-versions.html>

DVDPedia:
DVDPedia is a great little application for cataloging and displaying your movie collection, and I'm running version 5.0.3 It's list of features is impressive, and it keeps getting better with every update. The database is capable of generating statistics, you can keep track of multiple collections, you can easily add titles by typing the name of the movie or you can scan the barcode (using your iSight camera or a barcode reader) right off the movie box (it then searches the internet, and displays choices). It has customizable HTML export capabilities, a 'borrowed' feature with address book integration, the ability to play movies in full screen mode, and many more features which make an awesome addition to your software library. I use DVDpedia to generate HTML listings of my movies and movie reviews.

The 5.0 upgrade was a paid upgrade/new version of the software (The new version only runs on Intel architecture machines and it requires Leopard or better as an OS). This version has been over a year in the making with lots of changes big and small to make the programs even better. What's new? Lots of new search sites including Wikipedia, Freebase and Doghouse, the Pedias' own media server built by and for Pedia users. New custom fields for broader cataloging options: TV series for DVDpedia, comics for Bookpedia and board games for Gamepedia (I may have to buy a copy now) as well as new custom fields including dedicated date fields, check boxes and multi-value fields. A 10-star rating system with half-stars; click twice on a star to make it a half. Swipe gestures for the CoverFlow and Add/Edit window to move back and forth as well as pinch-to-zoom in the Grid view. A new filter feature for the Details view and Statistics to quickly find entries with that same value. And much, much more… Below are links to some of the pages I created using this software.
<https://www.robsworld.org/iphonemoviecollection/index.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/mymovies/index.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/reviews.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/version5.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/dvdpedia/>
<http://doghouse.bruji.com/>

CDPedia:
CDPedia is a great little application for cataloging and displaying your music collection, and I'm running version 5.0.3 It's list of features is impressive, and it keeps getting better with every update. The database is capable of generating statistics, you can keep track of multiple collections, you can easily add titles by typing the name of the artist, album, or track. You can scan the barcode (using your iSight camera or a barcode reader) right off a jewel case (it then searches the internet, and displays choices), or you can import lists of music from iTunes. It has customizable HTML export capabilities, a 'borrowed' feature with address book integration, and many more features which make an awesome addition to your software library. I use CDPedia to generate HTML listings of my music.

The 5.0 upgrade was a paid upgrade/new version of the software (The new version only runs on Intel architecture machines and it requires Leopard or better as an OS). This version has been over a year in the making with lots of changes big and small to make the programs even better. What's new? Lots of new search sites including Wikipedia, Freebase and Doghouse, the Pedias' own media server built by and for Pedia users. New custom fields for broader cataloging options: TV series for DVDpedia, comics for Bookpedia and board games for Gamepedia (I may have to buy a copy now) as well as new custom fields including dedicated date fields, check boxes and multi-value fields. A 10-star rating system with half-stars; click twice on a star to make it a half. Swipe gestures for the CoverFlow and Add/Edit window to move back and forth as well as pinch-to-zoom in the Grid view. A new filter feature for the Details view and Statistics to quickly find entries with that same value. And much, much more… Below are links to some of the pages I created using this software.
<https://www.robsworld.org/iphonemusiccollection/index.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/mymusic/index.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/version5.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/cdpedia/>
<http://doghouse.bruji.com/>

Bookpedia:
Bookpedia is a great little application for cataloging and displaying your book collection(s), and I'm running version 5.0.3. It's list of features is impressive, and it keeps getting better with every update. The database is capable of generating statistics, you can keep track of multiple collections, you can easily add titles by typing the name of the author, book, or isbn number. You can scan the barcode (using your iSight camera or a barcode reader) right off the book cover (the application searches the internet, and displays choices). It has customizable HTML export capabilities, a borrowed feature with address book integration, and many more features which make an awesome addition to your software library. I use Bookpedia to generate an HTML listing of my favorite books.

The 5.0 upgrade was a paid upgrade/new version of the software (The new version only runs on Intel architecture machines and it requires Leopard or better as an OS). This version has been over a year in the making with lots of changes big and small to make the programs even better. What's new? Lots of new search sites including Wikipedia, Freebase and Doghouse, the Pedias' own media server built by and for Pedia users. New custom fields for broader cataloging options: TV series for DVDpedia, comics for Bookpedia and board games for Gamepedia (I may have to buy a copy now) as well as new custom fields including dedicated date fields, check boxes and multi-value fields. A 10-star rating system with half-stars; click twice on a star to make it a half. Swipe gestures for the CoverFlow and Add/Edit window to move back and forth as well as pinch-to-zoom in the Grid view. A new filter feature for the Details view and Statistics to quickly find entries with that same value. And much, much more… Below are links to some of the pages I created using this software.
<https://www.robsworld.org/books.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/version5.html>
<http://www.bruji.com/bookpedia/>
<http://doghouse.bruji.com/>

Bulletin Boards: A new feature / website - It's not linked directly through a header link, but I recently created a new website / feature for the residents of Tollgate Crossing. The new website is a series of online bulletin boards. A place where residents can discuss community related issues, share ideas, buy or sell items, etc. This bulletin board software is new to me, but I'll do my best to set up some categories and manage the forums.
- Bulletin board rules: As with the new Bulletin Boards, this new page isn't linked directly to the rest of the 'Tollgate Crossing' website. An essential feature. A precaution if you will. Just a reminder that everyone should act in a civilized manner. Hopefully I won't need to reference the 'rules' any time soon. Made some minor updates to the rules.
- Bulletin Board site icon: I got tired of the 'phpbb' icon on my Bulletin Board's header, so I created and uploaded a new one. One that's specific to the community.
Welcome: The website's opener. A page containing an introduction to our community website. Here you'll find all the latest news and announcements. I rearranged the banners a bit - It's something I do to indicate a change in the content.
- I updated the banner for our next Metro District (27 Mar, 2012) meeting. Our next HOA meeting will be held 13 Mar, 2012.
eMail lists: A web page containing details about our mailing lists. I run/manage a few community related email mailing lists, and this page contains details regarding all of those lists. Descriptions of the lists, a few rules, how to sign up, etc.
- I updated this page to include information about the new 'Bulletin Boards' (see above).
- I added a new paragraph/listing specifically for the new 'Bulletin Boards'.
- I removed some extraneous historical code. No one could see it, but I doubt we're ever going to have an 'HOA' mailing list, so I removed that historical data.
Events: A detailed listing of upcoming and recurring events in and around Tollgate Crossing. Here is more detailed information regarding some of the events you may have read about on the 'Welcome' page. It's also a place to look for long term/recurring events.
- I updated the information regarding our next Metro District (27 Mar, 2012) meeting.
- Posted some information about the upcoming/tentative Metro District elections - There may not be one. See the Events page for details.
- I updated some hyperlinks that point/pointed to the Tollgate Crossing Bulletin Boards. The links were broken/not pointing to the correct URL/page.
- I also posted information about our last HOA meeting on the 14th of Feb, 2012. The one where residents were supposed to show up or forward their proxies. Unfortunately, now we'll have to reschedule the annual meeting, and that will cost us some additional money that our HOA didn't budget for.
Info: A page of links, phone numbers, email addresses and other information pertinent to the residents/community of Tollgate Crossing.
- I made numerous changes to this webpage. Changed references to our Metro District management company. They've changed names three times in the year? The name (as of today) is CliftonLarsonAllen. From the merger of CliftonGunderson and LarsonAllen which occurred early this year (Jan 2012).
- I updated numerous City of Aurora links. The city recently updated it's website. A complete overhaul, which broke many of my links. Hopefully I found all the old links. If you notice any broken links, please let me know.
- Our Metro District has hired a new landscaping company (I don't know when that happened, but it's been a couple months). The new company is 'Terracare Associates'. I posted some contact information for the new landscapers.
Policy: A page which includes all the administrative 'gotchas'. Some details regarding what the 'Tollgate Crossing' website is all about. What's permitted, what isn't
- I updated numerous paragraphs to include reference to the 'Bulletin Board'.
- I updated paragraphs which referred to 'commercial solicitations'. Community focused/relevant solicitations are permitted in the Bulletin Boards.
- Updated many email addresses and hyperlinks.
Site-wide changes: During the months of Nov - Jan, I conducted a spam/harvesting test against a couple of my websites. It seems that two of my websites are somewhat resistant to scraping, or it could be that the spam mitigation efforts of my new hosting provider are simply so much stronger that I'm defeating the spammers in the battle for my inbox. In either case the positive results led to some changes in the way I post email addresses on the two affected websites.
- I updated numerous contact email addresses across the website. I am no longer using the 'widget and java script' solution to post email addresses. I'm simply allowing iWeb to encode them and post them. Although they appear to be in the open, a three month test yielded no hits on my spam trap addresses.

Southeast Aurora Neighborhood Watch website:
I participate in some community focused events, but haven't found the time to serve on any boards, so I do what I can to help the people who live in my neighborhood. Volunteering with our local neighborhood watch, maintaining the Southeast Aurora Neighborhood Watch website and mailing lists. The South East Aurora Neighborhood Watch serves the residents of South East Aurora by providing information and close ties with the local Police Department in order to help keep the residents safe and neighborhoods crime free. Over the last month we had a NW meeting and I took some time to update some of the web pages.

Current: A web page dedicated to the most recent news, announcements and information.
- I removed the announcement for our last Neighborhood Watch meeting. We had a meeting on the 2nd of Feb, 2012, and everyone was invited. Mary Bonnell from Colorado's Department of Wildlife gave an outstanding presentation regarding the wildlife living in and around our communities.
Alert Me: A web page where residents can learn about and link to Aurora's 'Emergency Alert Program'. It's a type of reverse 911 mechanism.
- The city has changed the subscription/management mechanism for this service. They used to use the 'govdelivery' service, but now they've switched to a different service provider. As a result, I updated our 'Alert Me' page. The old links have been removed from the City's web pages. You can still get to the old 'govdelivery' pages in order to manage your existing subscription, but I don't think that service is receiving or delivering alerts for the city of Aurora.
Events: A listing of upcoming and recurring events in you Southeast Aurora Neighborhood. Events sponsored by or relevant to our Neighborhood Watch.
- I updated the paragraph about our NW meetings. Our next meeting will be held April 5th. The meeting will be held at Fox Ridge Middle School. If you have an idea about topics to cover, please let our Head Area Coordinator (Judy Van Meter) know. See the Neighborhood Watch website for more details.
Info: A page of links and information pertinent to the safety and security of communities in Southeast Aurora, Colorado.
- I updated numerous City of Aurora links. The city recently updated it's website. A complete overhaul, which broke many of my links. Hopefully I found all the old links. If you notice any broken links, please let me know.
Site-wide changes: During the months of Nov - Jan, I conducted a spam/harvesting test against a couple of my websites. It seems that two of my websites are somewhat resistant to scraping, or it could be that the spam mitigation efforts of my new hosting provider are simply so much stronger that I'm defeating the spammers in the battle for my inbox. In either case the positive results led to some changes in the way I post email addresses on the two affected websites.
- I updated numerous contact email addresses across the website. I am no longer using the 'widget and java script' solution to post email addresses. I'm simply allowing iWeb to encode them and post them. Although they appear to be in the open, a three month test yielded no hits on my spam trap addresses.

Elgato video capture VHS Conversion Project - Update:
Back in October of 2010, I started a new project. An ambitious project to convert all my VHS videos to digital format. I thought/dreamt about it for several years, and I finally made it happen in 2010. The inspiration came from a previous success. Back in 2007 I managed to digitize my entire cassette collection,. That led me to imagine a day when all my movies (VHS and DVD) could be stored digitally and watched on my television without needing to get up from the couch - How many amazing products come as couch potato inspiration?

A project to convert my VHS library to digital was a bit more ambitious than that music conversion project, this project would require the purchase of some hardware, and a rather hefty (or so it seemed in 2007!) hard drive. My VHS library currently sits on a shelf, quietly growing older, decaying, disintegrating. Those VHS tapes weren't designed to last forever, and they aren't getting any younger. Buying DVD copies of every VHS movie could prove costly, so this project should save me considerable money, and make my movie watching habit far easier to manage from my Italian Leather Sofa (actually, it's American leather), but I digress...

Back to the project requirements. Initially, I thought I'd use a 1TB Seagate NAS drive , but that piece of hardware turned out to be wholly unreliable and unusable for much of anything. I've since replaced it with a Buffalo Technology LinkStation Pro Duo 4 TB (2 x 2 TB) RAID Network Attached Storage solution. This ethernet/network attached server is configured to serve up Music, Movies, Books, Television shows and other files to users on my network (I even managed to configure the server for internet based web access). This 2TB drive should prove adequate for storage of my digitized video collection. It's media server capabilities may also prove beneficial when I want to view those movies from various network attached devices. The second component for this project was something capable of digitizing and encoding my video collection. I purchased an 'Elgato Video Capture' device from Amazon for $80.00, and I've been using this little piece of hardware to digitize my rapidly aging VHS collection.

The project has been slow going at first (due to problems with my storage solution (that Seagate drive), and various other reasons) but it seems to be moving forward at an acceptable pace now. Since I kicked off this project I've managed to digitize 79 movies (see my monthly movie reviews for titles (look for the VHS covers)), and my rate has increased considerably over the past few months. There haven't been any issues with the digitization software, and the only issues are watching the movies all the way through at 1x speed. I've also found that I need to clean the VCR's heads quite frequently and adjust the video settings every now and then. With a bit of good luck and a good dose of patience, I'll manage to digitize all those VHS tapes before the end of the decade! I'll keep you appraised of progress as the project moves forward.
<https://www.robsworld.org/whatsnew/wn2007/wn2007_jan.html#atodconversion>
<https://www.robsworld.org/reviews.html>
<https://www.robsworld.org/movies.html>

March Music Madness:
Here's a list of some of the music I recently acquired. Where do I get all this stuff? Well, I used to find/discover a lot of free (actually free) music by visiting several of the new music web sites (Pandora, 3hive.com, musicalfamilytree.org) and several other music blogs (Analog Giant, Brooklyn Vegan, Fluxblog, Gorilla vs. Bear, etc) out there, and listening to a few different music podcasts. Used to... Now? Now (As of Oct of 2010) I subscribe to an online music streaming service called MOG, and I've recently (as of Sep 2011) started using eMusic 'Radio' stations for music discovery. Combined together, these two services provide full-play access to more than 23 million tracks! (11m on MOG, 12m on eMusic (as of Sep 2011)) Two fantastic ways to discover music, and no need for illegal downloads or pirated tracks. I occasionally use a few of the other methods (music blogs and podcasts), but MOG and eMusic now serve as my primary Music Discovery sources.

Artists want you to hear their music - If you like it, you'll buy it, or maybe you'll buy some concert tickets. The major labels want you to pay for their product - letting you hear it for free is contrary to their business model. Well, guess what? I won't buy it unless I can listen to it first. The major labels are killing themselves with their restrictive distribution and dissemination policies. If you like new music, you can do a web search to find your favorite artists web site, a new music web site, or an archive of free music. Free music is available - Legally! Don't believe the major labels propaganda - Not all free music is illegal. You can legally download or listen to all sorts of music for free. I download most of my music from a couple of commercial sources (eMusic and iTunes), but I occasionally download tracks (legally) from various websites, newsgroups and blogs in order to satisfy my craving for music.

Here's a listing of some of the music I legally downloaded - and paid for!

eMusic monthly downloads:
Every month I download ~50 tracks from eMusic.com. This month (March of 2012) I managed to download 53 tracks at the low cost of $22.96. I'm paying a $19.99 monthly fee, so that makes the tracks even cheaper (~$0.38 / track). Unlike some music outlets, eMusic doesn't have any DRM and they don't insert unique track id's into the ID3 tags. Their terms of service are consumer friendly; eMusic allows you to burn as many CDs as you like and copy downloads to an unlimited number of your computers and portable MP3 players. At less than $.50 a track (I'm currently paying $19.99 for $22.99 worth of downloads per month). eMusic offers a really good value for your download dollar. iTunes and Amazon still charge more. eMusic offers more music for your money, and the variable bit rate recordings make for exceptionally high quality recordings.
* Movement (Collector's Edition) - New Order: (18 songs) A favorite band from the 80s. The first album without Ian Curtis. The transition from Joy Division to New Order was a sad and tragic one. Here we can clearly hear and sense the bands feelings as they struggle to come to terms with this 'new reality'. Although the tone is somewhat brighter than Joy Division, it's dark notes are bittersweet in reminiscence of Ian's passing.
* The Best Of - Joy Division: (14 songs) Another favorite band from the late 70s/early 80s. While Joy Division ended too early, it didn't leave without influencing the scene. Creating a post-punk sound that resonates to this day. The dark rumblings of Ian Curtis and a finely tuned MOG announced the coming of a new wave. This compilation captures the best of Joy Division, and some of my favorite songs.
* Now We Can See - The Thermals: (11 songs) Discovered through 3hive.com. It's been a while since I've downloaded any of this bands music. I put them on my list a long time ago, but there's so much new music to explore that I sometimes forget the great bands I've already discovered. Here's an entire collection of those distinctive vocals and pounding drums and bass.
* FOMO - Liam Finn: (10 songs) Discovered with iTunes New Music Tuesdays. Here's another new favorite. Liam Finn is the son of Neil Finn (of Split Enz and Crowded House). The sound is straight out of the 80s. His sound resurrects the best of Squeeze, Split Enz and the original Finn brothers work. Throw in some electronic/synthesizer work and you've got some excellent pop rock from a well established talent.

Free eMusic sampler downloads:
Aside from the extremely economical deals for eMusic monthly downloads, eMusic also features a boatload of free music downloads for it's members. This month I took advantage of that feature, downloading sixty three free tracks, it'll take me a while to listen to all these freebies, but I'm sure to find one or two artists that I like. These free downloads will most likely result in some purchased downloads, thereby benefiting the artists of the tracks. Free doesn't always mean free-loader. It's a net gain for the artist in many respects. I'll find something I like, I'll pay for an album purchase, and I'll likely blog about it, thus inducing additional purchases. These free downloads can result in a positive result for artists, provided they're managed properly, authorized by the artist, and made accessible to a discerning consumer. Here's a bunch of music samplers (and free albums) I downloaded recently:
* NAIL Winter 2012 Sampler - Various Artists: (7 songs) Distributing music from various North American Alternative, Independent labels, NAIL is an arm of the Allegro distribution outlet. Here's a sampler of the music distributed through their independent labels and artists. While this sampler lacks the polish of many other production houses, there is a feeling of independence and diversity that can't be matched.
* Now Hear This! The Independent Music Awards 10 Annual Winners - Various Artists: (56 songs) An immense download. 56 tracks for free (seems to get bigger every year). All genres, all free, all for me. Rock, Pop, Jazz, Blues, Country, R&B, Alternative and some you can't define. The Independent Music Awards are an independently operated promotional group, accepting nominations from all over the world. They compile the best of the submissions to produce this compilation. Winning artists gain promotional work/efforts to promote/sell their music.

Web site downloads:
I download music from plenty of websites (not counting commercial websites). The websites of the artists, the artists label, music festival websites, music review sites, etc, etc. Their are gobs of places where you can find free music. We're in a whole new era now. Gone are the monopolistic controls of the music industry. Music is becoming free - Free to anyone who takes the time to look for it. If you can't find free, legal, music - you're not looking very hard.
* Generation Handclap - Library Voices: (single) From the Summer of Love album. Loved it so much I added it to my eMusic queue. It certainly feels like Summer. The tune is uplifting, popping with optimism and good feelings. I loved the composition, the pacing, the production. A 3hive.com discovery.
* Television Youth - Sonic Avenues: (single) The grungy, lo-fi, rocking tune makes a good impression. Plenty of ballad inspiring energy. Some good backing vocals. Another 3hive.com discovery.
* Motor Skills, Surge Knight, Science Fiction - French Miami: (3 songs) From two different albums. Here's a band I've heard before, but never realized how much I love the sound. The synthesizer work is excellent. I may have to download one of their albums. Yet another 3hive.com discovery. <rave>I'm so glad the authors/editors (of the website) decided to bring back 3hive.com. It was on hiatus for quite some time, but now it's back. I've discovered plenty of new bands through this website, and it isn't overloaded with advertisement or irrelevant content. Kudos to the 3hive crew for keeping it real.</rave>

These are some of the items I added to my music collection during this month. Since revamping my music collection back in September of 2005, I've been slowly adding, revising and updating the collection. If you have a comment, question or correction regarding my music collection, please don't hesitate to send me an email. Please keep in mind that my collection isn't for sale, and I'm not interested in giving you any copyrighted materials. I'd rather not go to jail for music piracy. :-)
<https://www.robsworld.org/music.html>