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Entries from October 1, 2009 - October 31, 2009

Saturday
Oct312009

TrueCrypt Bug, or Hardware Failure

For the last couple of years I've been using an offsite backup method. And today the drive I use for that failed on me. My backup program reported that it could write (or read) data to the drive.

Investigation showed that several directories in the TrueCrypt volume were gone!!!!! Thankfully, the data on my Drobo and server were still pristine condition.

Disk Utility and several other tools reported problems with the drive (or at least the TrueCrypt part/volume). So I erased the drive, and re-initialized it. No reports of trouble while I did that. After that I recreated the TrueCrypt volume and restarted the backup to the drive (which takes forever).

All I can do now is wait for the backup to finish, and pray that the house doesn't catch on fire.....

After that a new case for SpinRite.

Monday
Oct262009

Deleting Locked Files in OSX

During the migration of the data on my dad's (*cough*) Windows computer to his new iMac, we ran into lot's of locked files. Usually you get the information on a specific file (⌘ + i) and deselect the 'Locked' option in the 'General' part. It's basically impossible to remove all the locks by hand, so I needed a quicker way to remove these locks.

It seems that there's a command available in Terminal to do this. The following command removed the Locks from all the files in the current directory AND all the sub-directories.

chflags -R nouchg *

More info on the chflags command can be found in the Terminal by typing man chflags, or by visiting this page.

The cause of the locked files in my case was that we copied the data from a read-only network share (to prevent that information might get lost in copy/move actions during the migration). Reading from read-only media results in locked files (or so it seems).

Thursday
Oct222009

Additional iPhone Thoughts

Before I go into the imperfections of the iPhone, I must mention that the iPhone is one of the best (smart)phones I've had so far.....My (smartphone) references are the Nokia Communicator, Nokia E61i, Nokia N95. While the PDA experience comes from Psion (to bad that they are gone), and a boatload of crappy/unstable Windows CE/Mobile platforms over the last 10 years.

Every device had its limitations, but the iPhone clearly has the upperhand (at the moment). But there's always room for improvement :-)

Click to read more ...

Thursday
Oct222009

Panasonic Lumix LX3 Firmware v2.1 Released

Panasonic released the v2.0 firmware for the popular Lumix LX3 compact camera in September 2009, but due to some bugs, they pulled it back. Ths week, they released the v2.1 version of the firmware.

I did the update already, and it went as expected; successful.

The list of v2.1 new features are:

  1. Improved auto white balance performance.
  2. Auto Focus speed-up.
  3. Recording function with an aspect ratio of 1:1 has been added.
  4. A white balance (WB) bracket function has been added.
  5. [HIGH DYNAMIC] has been added to scene mode.
  6. [LENS RESUME] has been added to the [SETUP] menu.
  7. [MENU RESUME] has been added to the [SETUP] menu.
  8. The exposure compensation and the auto bracket compensation can now be set up to ±3EV.
  9. Position of the guide line can now be set.
  10. It is now possible to display the highlights in playback mode.
  11. It is now possible to record the user’s name in the picture.
  12. Digital red-eye removal has been modified.
  13. Items saved in the custom set have changed.

 

Sunday
Oct182009

Initial Thoughts on the iPhone Friendliness

The next morning; The initial rush of a new iPhone is gone (not that much though). So it's time to look at the thing with a more open mind. After my earlier post I had some time to think about the features I stumbled upon. Especially the tethering and syncing problems I ran into.

At first the tethering; no idea why Apple stripped that one from the 3.1.2 update (when you're not having the correct carrier). Most countries allow (by law) the users to remove the SIMLOCK from the iPhone. This opens the iPhone for other carriers. But it seems that when you switch carriers you end up with a 'crippled' phone, since the tethering gets 'disabled'. Not having the visual voicemail with other carriers is only a nice-to-have gone away. But tethering is something more basic. Something you (I) cannot live without.
Every other phone I've owned in the last 5 years was able to 'tether' through either an USB cable or through Bluetooth. It's like stepping back in time with the iPhone.

Click to read more ...

Saturday
Oct172009

Member of the iPhone Club

As of today, I'm the (proud) owner of an iPhone 3Gs 32GB (Black). Ever since the release a couple of years ago I really wanted an iPhone. The problem is that we can only get an iPhone in combination with a T-Mobile plan here in Holland, and alternatives to the T-Mobile plan are relatively expensive;

  • You need to cough up the entire amount for a SIMLOCK free iPhone in once (several hundreds of euros) or
  • Get the T-Mobile plan and let them remove the SIMLOCK (for a fee). Initially less expensive, but you're still hooked to their two year plan.

Either way, an iPhone cost around 800 euros, whether you pay it at once or spread the costs over two years. Since I didn't like to finance T-Mobile for a plan, since I already got a pretty good deal, I went out and bought an iPhone.

Click to read more ...

Thursday
Oct152009

Expensive Billingham Camerabag

Expensive is not the correct word....

Source

Wednesday
Oct142009

First Review New Nikon 70-200mm f2.8G ED VRII

It seems that Cliff Mautner is one of the (very, very) few lucky photographers who received his new Nikon 70-200mm f2.8G ED VRII a month early. His findings can be found on his blog, and I must say..... Those images are awesome (from a image quality point of view). Especially the VRII seems to rock.

/me is looking at his savings.... and cries silently

Anyway, the new 70-200 is a long overdue improvement for the 'old' 70-200mm f2.8G VR lens, since the old one performed not as wel on the FX cameras (D700, D3-range) as some would have liked.

Monday
Oct122009

Management Through SSH

SSH (Secure Shell) is a secure alternative to the ancient Telnet program/protocol. Telnet (and SSH) allows a user to connect to a remote server, and enables the users to use a command line interface to execute commands (manage the server).

Where Telnet is relatively limited in its functionality, SSH has a bunch of features which enables the user to do much more. The SSH protocol has the possibility to tunnel traffic through an SSH connection (read: tunnel). The big advantage is that everything going through the tunnel is heavily encrypted (which is good).

The tool best known to use SSH is SFTP (FTP over SSH). A secure alternative of the 'old' (in plaintext communicating) File Transfer protocol.

Click to read more ...

Saturday
Oct102009

Buma/Stemra Changes Licensing Fees 2010

The all knowing, and all wise Dutch music copyright organisation BUMA/Stemra (BS, and yes, pun intended) decides to charge €130 (for copyright infringement) euros per embedded copyrighted file (do your own math). You are allowed 6 embedding violations/files for €130,00 (original pdf).
No need to mention that this caused a massive uproar in the (worldwide) blogosphere, news and politics.

Click to read more ...