Morning Cup O’ Joe

June 24, 2008

The Dark Knight

Filed under: Movies — morhall @ 1:26 pm

I’m surprised that I can’t find a post on MCOJ about this movie. I’ll admit to not having seen the last batman film. I think I gave up on them due to Val Kilmer or George Clooney. Take your pick. In any event, through some work connections my dad got to see The Dark Knight last night.

He said it was fantastic and not at all like the old style that came across as hokey. Very good, very dark and apparently the Joker is extraordinarily creepy and sinister. I may actually have to plunk down the 8 bucks for this one.

June 21, 2008

Lego Digital Designer

Filed under: How-To, Legos, Mac, Software, Windows — Mike @ 9:11 pm

Assets Resources 2008 06 Lego-Designer
I know a couple of guys who take LEGOs pretty seriously so this might be old news to them. You can download Lego Digital Designer, a freeware app available in both Windows and OS X, and design your next LEGO-tastic creation in a AutoCAD-like fashion.

via Lifehacker

June 20, 2008

How To Make a Time Lapse Video

Filed under: How-To, Photography, Video — Mike @ 4:55 pm


There’s a great post at digital-photography-school.com on how to make a time lapse video using your dSLR. The above video is my first attempt. Here are my stats:

  • Manual Mode: 2 second exposure @ F13 in 30-second intervals
  • 490 shots total
  • Rendered video @ 10fps

via digital Photography School

June 18, 2008

View PDFs Inline with Firefox 3 on a Mac

Filed under: Mac, Software — Mike @ 2:47 pm

Assets Resources 2008 06 Quartz-Pdf
I just tested out this Firefox add-on and I must say that it’s lightning fast. This sure beats the cumbersome method of downloading a PDF directly into Preview.app.

Unfortunately, this only works with Firefox 3 on a Mac. I’m guessing it’s because of the integrated PDF support in Mac OS X.

via Lifehacker

Google Command Line

Filed under: Geeks and Gadgetry, Linux, Software — Mike @ 2:14 pm

Assets Resources 2008 06 Goosh-Help
Keyboard jockeys, rejoice!

Being able to do google searches via a Linux-like shell interface appeals to my mouse-hating inner-self.

via Lifehacker

June 17, 2008

Guide to better napping

Filed under: General — Dave Cumberland @ 9:42 am

How to take a nap

The Boston Globe has published a how-to guide for those of us that have forgotten how to take a nap. I saw this over at the 43folders blog and realized that sleep is a popular topic this week. Are any of you out there in the habit of taking naps?

June 15, 2008

Bee Swarm

Filed under: Photography — Mike @ 7:16 pm

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A swarm of bees decided to make a rest stop out of one of the trees in front of my house. I have an unnatural fear of bees, but for the love of photography, I snapped these shots.

Enjoy!

Oh, and Happy Father’s Day!

June 14, 2008

Python code swarm

Filed under: Software, Video — Tags: , , — Dave Cumberland @ 7:23 pm

I know there are several of you out there actively using Python. I recently came across this video, which visualizes the activity on the Python codebase over time. It looks like it has been a very long road for Guido van Rossum (started solo in 1991). If you watch the video to the end, you’ll see where he’s hired by Google and the language development really takes off


code_swarm - Python from Michael Ogawa on Vimeo.

The video was created by a UC Davis research group.

June 11, 2008

How Much Do You Sleep?

Filed under: News, Science and Technology — Mike @ 3:35 pm

Time Daily 2008 0806 Sleep 0606
Personally, I average about 5 to 6.5 hours of sleep each night. I don’t feel compelled to go to bed until I feel sleepy. I see no reason to just lie in bed waiting for sleep to drop-kick me in the throat when I’m not looking.

It turns out that might just be all the sleep I need. A study at Scripps Clinic Sleep Center in La Jolla, CA produced some interesting results.

From Time.com:

Studies show that people who sleep between 6.5 hr. and 7.5 hr. a night, as they report, live the longest. And people who sleep 8 hr. or more, or less than 6.5 hr., they don’t live quite as long. There is just as much risk associated with sleeping too long as with sleeping too short. The big surprise is that long sleep seems to start at 8 hr. Sleeping 8.5 hr. might really be a little worse than sleeping 5 hr.

How much do you sleep do you feel you need to function during the day?

Thanks for the link, AG!

via Time.com

BMW GINA Light Visionary Model; Fabric-skinned Concept Car

Filed under: Oddities, Science and Technology — Mike @ 10:39 am

Motor Wp-Content Uploads 2008 06 Bmw-Gina-Light-Visionary-6
I can imagine driving a car built out of wire mesh, carbon fiber and fabric skin. The idea of being able to control the shape of my vehicle via electro-hydraulic devices that manipulate the frame is sexy. I just don’t want to imagine getting into an accident with an SUV in this car.

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