Robert Small, The blog thereof.

This seems like a good time to write another iPlayer review, after all, they’ve had some time and I have a new computer. What’s changed?

• I have a new computer, in fact, I have a considerably more powerful computer.
• The BBC have had time to get criticised (a lot) by different people (also a lot) and hopefully get their act together.
• The BBC are beta testing a ‘High Quality’ version.

So, let’s look at what we said last time.

Good

• No advertisements (other than a brief channel trailer which doesn’t really count).
• Good quality, especially for so called ’standard definition’.
• Generally fast play.
• Done with flash, pretty much universal.

Bad

• Bandwidth heavy.
• No live viewing.
• Some issues with the video.
• Only seven days of watching time.
• Awful problems with full screen play.

The thing is that I now have a computer which is almost as good as my Dad’s media machine. This means that I can experiment more, but it doesn’t mean that I have something more powerful than the box I tested it on before (although the screen is a tad smaller).

However, Auntie has had a chance to get her act together and upgrade/advance the iPlayer. This seems to have resulted in some serious interface changes and the new high definition version.

I don’t have time to write a full review at the moment but here’s my summary:

Bad to good

• With the introduction of the HD version bandwidth seems to have dropped for the non-HD media, unfortunately so has quality (see below).
• Since my last exploration I’ve found some programs and libraries which allow iPlayer downloading.
• It would seem that more and more applications are supporting the iPlayer (Boxee and XBMC).

Good to bad

• The quality before HD was very good on normal recordings. It would seem that with HD’s introduction the SD (standard definition) media is lower quality and in general more flaky.

New bad

• Over the last few weeks I’ve encountered a few video bugs, mostly involving jerks or artifacts.
• Occasionally the video decides to scramble audio and play at ten times speed, similar things happened before but this is worse.
• I’ve started to notice that very little of the audio is normalised, I have to adjust my amp a lot.
• Contrast and brightness differences, hitting ‘auto calibrate’ a lot on my screen isn’t much fun.

New good

• The HD version is very nice and the content very crisp.
• There is a growing number of devices which support the iPlayer.
• The ability to pause, then resume the next time you open your browser (it remembers where you were), a small but important improvement.
• Wider range of Programme avaliability.
• I can generally get jerk-less full screen playback on my box. I have yet to purchase a non-integrated graphics card so this is impressive (I have a NVIDIA internal at the moment).

Still good

• No advertisements. Even with things like Heroes there are no advertisements, the most you get is a channel/producer trailer.
• Audio on both SD and HD is crisp and clear.
• Generally very good avaliability.
• Generally fast play.
• Good support for most normal computers.

Still bad

• No live viewing that I can find.
• Limited time to watch.
• Strange problems with full screen, sometimes on some computers with some definitions. They’ve certainly fixed it for some situations.

I think that  covers just about everything, feel free to comment with your own opinions.

Kind regards, Robert.

Merry Christmas all, season’s greetings if you don’t go in for Christmas. I’d like to wish you all a very happy and enjoyable period of celebration and family time. I intend to start some new projects and do some new and exciting things during the next year, but I’ll leave that for a New Year post.

I’m enjoying the new Wordpress; including the Gears side of it, and the new look.

I will be uploading some photo’s on Facebook for those of you who follow that. I’ll probably be more active soon, at the moment I’m fervently searching for a new job, preferably a well paid one. Some of you may also know that my Girlfriend/Fiancee  is staying with me at the moment and we’re spending quite a bit of time out and about. So, sorry for the lack of blogs, I’ll be good in the new year, I promise! Now send me presents!

Now, for your amusement I bring you this photo.

Enjoy!

Have a great Christmas all of you, I’ll write more in the new year.

Kind regards, Robert.

I know, I haven’t posted. I’ve been really busy with all sorts of stuff. I thought I’d bring this little gem to you.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t this a grammar fail?

Kind regards, Robert.

I promised you another list of amazing things, here it is. Have fun!

“Aren’t you worried about large quantities of money entering your country from dubious sources?” (BBC interviewer)

“But of course not, I would be worried if money was leaving my country.”

Brilliant, thank you Swiss Foreign Minister! I know it’s not a stupid thing and wasn’t to me, but it’s funny.

Please note that I’m not sure it was the SFM, however it definitely was a Swiss guy who was in charge of monies.

“If a [unfortunate term for people with high levels of dark pigment in their skin] ever came to this school I’d have to leave or kill myself.”

This completely shocked me, what shocked me more was the number of people who laughed or agreed.

“I’m not racist! I have plenty of black friends!”

This was talking to one of the laughing people who seemed in agreement. It’s helped me come up with a plea for Michael Jackson:

“I’m not a paedophile, I have lots of friends who are children!”

“I don’t want to suppress people’s views, I just don’t want them here.” and a few hours later “I think there should be moderation throughout the whole network to remove swearing and views I don’t agree with.”

Slightly rephrased for readability, it was actually views which didn’t fit with the person’s religion.

“Could I have a half pound burger please.”

“You’re not in America now mate.”

“How would that change things? If you think about it we used the imperial measuring system before they did, and we adjusted it after they broke away. Also the whole concept of a half pounder being an American thing is ironic as the measurement system is called ‘Imperial’. In other words, could I have an imperial half pound burger please. Incidentally, being at a traditional country fair, shouldn’t we use traditional weights and measures?”

“Huh?”

It would have only complicated things to mention that metric was pretty much invented by John Wilkins in 1668 who was English.

This one is shorter, fewer laughs, but I thought I’d bring it to you now before I forget!

Kind regards, Robert.

This is just a quick post to tell you about a few new features on the website. They should make it easier for you to use.

ShareThis

This is a useful little button just after the main post which allows you pass it on to as many people as you want. If you click ‘ShareThis’ then it brings up a small box which allows you to select a service to send it to. The three most popular so far have been Facebook, Myspace, and Stumbleuppon. Please help both me and the site by posting all content that you like to any social service you use. More people might like you if they think you’re friends with me!

For your interest my Facebook profile is: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=604575290

If you want to add me as a friend please send me a message telling me who you are first (just mention that you read my blog).

Wordpress Wall

This is a feature a little like Facebook’s wall. You can make quick posts to me at the side of the front page. It’ll be interesting to see how this goes and if anyone wants to make use of it to say something shorter than a full blown comment.

Wordbook

I also have installed a little plugin that automatically posts new posts to my Facebook profile. This will be a good way for some of you who know me to keep up with what I’ve posted.

PDA Viewing

This feature should let you view this blog on your PDA or iPhone, not too sure about smaller phones capable of html browsing. Do send me some comments if you try this.

Well, that’s everything, I hope people like what I’ve done and if you have any comments or suggestions then please pass them on to me - commenting here will do.

Kind regards, Robert.

PS: I’m writing another list of comments. It will arive within the next few days. RJS.

I’m going to compile a list of some absolutely shocking things people have said to me. Here it is.

“Do you have eggs in England?”

We don’t by the way, hens lay chickens without the egg.

“This is English Fish and Chips, the sign said it was, what you have must not be proper English.”

This was after discribing fish and chips as scampi and tortilla chips. I protested that this was not true English fish and chips, I was corrected.

“Mayo isn’t Mayonnase.”

Even I can’t comment on this.

“Do you have the Internet there?”

“No, I phone my friend and he types things for me.” (me)

“Oh, you have phones?”

This was on IRC. I’m serious. PS: It was a WebTV user.

“Well I have the Bible in English, and that’ll be more right”

Silly me, the Greek version of the New Testament must be wrong in comparison to your translation of it…

“I don’t like coffee, I only like lattes, cappuccinos and espressos. Oh, and those flavoured ones with coffee in them.”

Quite! I forgot that those weren’t coffee.

“I can’t call you on skype, my phone company won’t let me call long distance.”

Those phone companies, always getting at you!

“What’s your USA area code?”

“I don’t have one, I’m not in the USA, you call my international number, start with +44…” (me)

“OK, what’s your USA area code.”

“Because I’m not in the USA you don’t need to call one.”

“Oh, OK!” …thirty seconds… “OK, so before I put in your number, what USA area code do I use?”

Try 911…

“I’m from Africa, I’m African.”

“Um, you live in France, your parents were born in France, surely that makes you French?” (me)

“NO! My grandfather was from India and my grandmother came from Brazil!”

My geography is really not good any more… I always used to think Brazil was in South America.

“King Arthur must have been real, there was a film about it!”

Not the best I’ve heard, but the one I can remember.

“Being male, girls often confuse me entirely…” (me)

“That’s sexy coming from a lady”

“I’m male…”

“Oh, sorry, I thought you liked girls.”

This still doesn’t make any sense to me.

“Deodorant makes you not sweat.”

“Actually that’s antiperspirant, deodorant is meant to prevent smell, often deodorants are antiperspirant but that’s not their main job.” (me)

“No, DUH! Deodorant makes you not sweat, why do you think it’s called deodorant”

“De-odour? Like remove odour, as in smell.”

“Yeah! See!”

“Where did that explanation mention sweat?”

“Nowhere.”

“My point, deodorant removes odour, as in smell, not sweat.”

“NO! It removes sweat.”

Didn’t they admit to me being right then claim that I was wrong?

“Police need guns in case they need to shoot someone who’s like shop lifting. If the police have guns and the shop lifter doesn’t then it’ll be ok”

I see. Your reasoning is full of logic.

PS: Incidentally, I don’t object to armed officers carrying guns, I just like to see logic in an argument.

“You do know what happened in Vietnam, don’t you?” (me)

“Well, I get loads of my clothes there.”

“I mean the military stuff, you must know about it.”

“No. I don’t watch the news.”

This guy claimed to have a High School Diploma (for those who don’t know, this is a generic diploma issued by USA high schools at about the age of 18) in which he’d taken US history and ‘World’ history.

I’ve come to the end of my first edition of this. I’m sure I will write more, and I’m sure people will say more amazing things to me. I will be back!

Kind regards, Robert.

My hypothesis is such: the ‘bad’ side of human nature is in place purely to limit and counteract the natural aspiring nature of man and the upwards curve of social evolution. Included in this is the theory that the natural curve of social evolution will always be upwards or progressive; also included is that `man’s` natural or normal nature is to move forward in a progressive way and create new things.

My hypothesis will always be almost completely unprovable, I can and do accept this and I’m not trying to prove it.

My hypothesis is ‘agnostic’, it doesn’t rely on God, evolution, or aliens; any combination of these could be involved, this is for your personal beliefs to decide, not me.

I don’t completely believe this myself, nor am I sure if I should or even if it is correct. This theory or hypothetical concept has arisen from a few conversations and some recent reading.

It would be hard to deny that the actions of some humans, and other human groups, often slows down the advancement of a peaceful society. For this theory to hold it would seem that you must also believe that a truly peaceful society is the aim or attempted future, maybe even utopia. Returning to the point one can see that the manufacturers of war disturb this peaceful advancement.

For the ease of this theory, let us presume that there is a deity, and that it can be referred to as he.

Now, if we consider the general scope of humanities abilities, when organised we can move forward and change things in a ‘better’ and ‘more advanced’ way. However, it would seem that certain persons and entities hold things back due to their attitude towards peer advance. Thus human greed and other ‘bad’ emotions and tenancies hold the advance back. Now, these tendencies could well have been injected by the presumed deity to control our advance.

The reasoning for this injection could be extremely complex, it might be so simple that I cannot see or understand it. One of the concepts which we see as ‘the future’ is immortality and complete knowledge, maybe these social aspects prevent us ever reaching this for reasons we do not understand. Maybe it’s simply like the rabbit/fox population graphs which we all do at school, and so prevents us becoming more populated than the earth can handle.

I’d love to hear some of other people’s views, I think this has been a little disjointed but I’m sure someone else will have some views all the same.

PS: I wrote this a few days and now I’m posting, so my views may have changed.

Kind regards, Robert

Current configuration

AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 5000+ (2.6GHz).

ASUS M2N-CM DVI motherboard - nVidia nForce 630a chipset.

2GB RAM 800 (one module).

Seagate 360GB.

nVidia GeForce 7025 on board graphics - 256MB.

19 inch widescreen.

nVidia MCP67 High Definition Audio.

Two DVD drives, RW, dual layer, lightscribe.

Front panel with various card readers, eSATA, USB, Firewire.

All this is inside a very nice looking A+ case which is designed to look like a piece of Hi-Fi.

Debian GNU/Linux with 20GB for the OS, 20GB for another copy of Linux, and 16GB swap.

Upgrade plans

Another 2GB module.

External graphics - I have one card but I don’t trust it for general use (second hand freebe).

Upgrading the motherboard to take 8GB.

The RAM to fit the 8GB.

Other plans

Dual screen set up.

Putting (both) screens onto screen booms/swing stands for easier use.

Kind regards, Robert.

I believe the following two URL’s are exactly the same bug as I’ve experienced.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/121413
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-mozillateam-bugs/2007-June/016597.html

Symptoms: Eclipse completely dies on you when you open a web browser or one is opened for you. It also happens if you go to the web browser settings page.

Failed possible solutions: Recompiling everything. It looked like a weird linking problem to me so I went for the traditional response, recompile. This wasted a lot of CPU time but gained me nothing.

Solution: Surprisingly I’ve yet to see this anywhere else on the Internet. The problem seems to be somewhere within the ~/.mozilla/eclipse/ directory, if you remove it completely then it’s replaced and everything starts working fine again. I haven’t gone deeper into it to find out what’s actually causing this or if there’s a better solution. However, I don’t think I missed anything in that directory and Eclipse is working perfectly again.

Conclusion

I know this set me back a few hours in work figuring it out, I know that there are a lot of Eclipse developers out there who may benefit from this as well.

This must be quite a complex bug as nobody on IRC seemed to know what to do. Hopefully this guide will help other people with problems.

Comments welcome.

Kind regards, Robert.

It would logically follow that if I’ve had this problem others must also have had it or be having it on a regular basis now. Unfortunately I don’t know how to trigger the problem and so I’m unable to provide you with a picture.

Versions: Caught in 1.3.4 and 1.3.5, haven’t tested anything else.

Symptoms: CPU usage climbs to 100% and when you click ‘export’ or ’save as’ you get a standard export/save dialog box but without a path or any files/directories shown. It refuses to let you search or manually input a path.

Possible related problem: I had this problem last immediately after the same project had got stuck while loading the audio into the memory. The issues might be related but I can’t see any reason to suspect that myself.

Solution: It’s not that hard but it took me a little while to work it out. Make a small edit and save, this seems to work every time. If it doesn’t then save and restart Audacity.

What doesn’t work: I tried all the normal tricks.

• # killall audacity
• # killall -9 audacity
• Moving the files around
• Renaming them
• Manually comparing the .aup with other .aup’s and trying to fix.

Diagnosis: Bug, probably a stomach one. I honestly can’t see where the problem is, I’ve tried looking for it but don’t have the time to do full strace’s and all the rest of that fun stuff. Let’s hope the audacity team manage to find it and fix it. After all, Audacity is a brilliant tool even if it does lack a few things.

Kind regards, Robert.