Saturday 11 June 2005

Mount Pleasant

The modem arrived and the mount got built and the modem got plugged in and it didn't work.

The old modem got plugged in and it sort of worked, but the BOC sent me logs showing lots of reboots. So limping along we're waiting for the stuff to be sorted out and the paper work to be completed and all to be resolved and life to go back to "the day before the storm hit".

Meanwhile, Google Maps released a world-wide view of their BETA service and I started playing with the software. A whole lot of hacks had appeared, almost over night, that showed off many and varied ways that Google Maps could be used on your own web-site. With a little tweaking I came up with a quick and dirty hack.

About 48 hours after I made my first hacked up version, Google announced the Google Maps API which allows you to make official Google Maps on your site. I signed up, did the work made a nice little map and have spent the past four days banging my head against a wall trying to give it the same functionality as I already had, but using the official API. This involves me relearning JavaScript, learning XML and XSLT all meaningful subjects, just not really all that exciting when all you want to do is show a map, but you get that :)

VoIP is coming, a bigger transmitter should allow for a smaller dish, the World Solar Challenge, 2005 is nearing, there's a project with one of my colleagues in Alaska in the wind, I'm writing some nifty code to sit as a pipe between irmp3 and mpg321 to make the play list on our mp3 player no-longer repeat itself ad-nauseum and I've got cattle to feed, tractors to drive, dogs to pat and fish to treat with WheatBix meal. Frances is off picking olives after her long running transcription gig for the Australians at War Film (http://www.australiansatwarfilmarchive.gov.au/) Archive finally got completed.