My personal handheld history

Casio Pocket Organizer
When I was in elementary school I acquired a small Casio pocket organizer that was probably more calculator than organizer. That was my introduction to pocket handheld devices. It had a little 12 character alpha-numeric LCD display and could store names, phone numbers, birthdays and little else. It also had a password protection feature (very important). I'll have to have my folks dig around in my old room to see if this thing is still lying around. I would love to find out an official model number and get a picture of it.

Palm IIIe (abt 2000-2001)

This is what I would consider my first real handheld. At one point I rigged up the serial sync dock to a 56k dial-up modem and ran AOL Instant Messenger on it. Yes, I chatted using a stylus and graffiti. This poor device was dropped and even in it's Body Glove neoprene case, managed to land right on its corner and the screen shattered. I believe my dad replaced the screen on it, but I had moved onward and upward to the next newest low-end Palm, the m100.


Palm m100 (abt 2001-2003)
I don't recall much about this device other than that its screen seemed significantly smaller than the IIIe. It was slightly faster and had a newer version of Palm OS. I don't think I had this one for very long before I sold it and upgraded to the m505.






Palm m505 (abt 2003-2008)

Back-lit. Color. Screen. The holy grail of handhelds. I purchased this device used and probably a year old, but it was fantastic. It had an SD card slot and a rechargeable battery. I sold this in 2005 right before I left for my 2 year mission for my church. It survived my freshman year in college though.








Nokia N800

Apple iPod Touch 2nd Gen 8GB (2008-present)

After returning home from my mission I needed something to replace the m505 that I had previously. I considered the Palm Tungsten T since I was still anti-Apple from my religious upbringing in an Intel household. After trying out an iPod Touch, though, the decision was easy. At some point in 2010 or early 2011 I dropped my iPod and the lower left corner of the screen cracked. By this time the sleep button at the top had stopped working as well. I decided to keep it, though and now let my 2-year-old son use it to play games.







Amazon Kindle 3G Keyboard (2010-present)
The 3rd generation Kindle finally came down low enough in price and added unlimited 3G with a decent enough web browser that I could justify using this as my first cell-network web device. As a poor college student I couldn't possibly afford a smartphone with a data plan. I still use this device today to do all of my reading. Since this device has a (albeit robotty) text-to-speech feature that can be sped up, I use it quite a bit to listen to my books while driving to and from work.
I am very picky about my devices being flawless. I had this particular device replaced by Amazon under warranty 3 separate times because of defects. The first time, the device locked up and couldn't be recovered. The second device formed some weird, visible bubbles underneath the screen. The third had battery issues. Finally the fourth one was just right and has worked great ever since.

HTC Thunderbolt (2011-2012)

This was my graduation present when I got my Bachelor's Degree. I had it for all of a year before it met its demise as I dropped it while riding my bike and it got run over by a car before I could rescue it. The screen protector kept the screen together and the digitizer was in tact, but none of the wireless modules would work anymore. I was able to power it up and back everything up to the SD card which was still intact.





HTC Rezound (2012-present)
This is my current phone and is about 9 months old. I haven't destroyed it yet.











Nexus 7 8GB (2012-present)

Ever since the iPad made tablets popular I had been waiting for a sub-$200 tablet to be released that had a very specific set of features. It needed a front-facing cam for video chat and bluetooth. A friend of mine brought the announcement of this gem to my attention in June of this year and I pre-ordered one almost immediately. I currently use this for 75% of the computer-related things I need to do at home.







I can't see myself staying with Verizon much longer after the spring of 2014 when my current contract is up. Until then, hopefully, this will remain unchanged.

RootsMagic 6 on Mac OS X

For those of you that would like to run RootsMagic 6 Essentials on your Mac without having to pay for a license for CrossOver or a Windows license to run it in Parallels, VMware Fusion or Virtualbox, here is a how-to for installing RootsMagic 5 on Mac OS using wineskin.

System Requirements
Mac OS X 10.6+

Download necessary packages

1. Download wineskin winery 1.7
2. Download RootsMagic 6 Essentials

Create the wineskin .app

1. Run the downloaded wineskin zip to extract the application
2. Move Wineskin Winery to your Applications folder
3. Run Wineskin Winery
4. Click Update to update the wineskin wrapper to 2.5.8
5. Click the + to add the 'WS9Wine1.5.18' Engine
6. Select the WS9Wine1.5.18 Engine and click Create New Blank Wrapper
7. Choose a name for the wrapper without spaces, ie "RootsMagic6"
8. Click OK
9. If prompted, to allow "WineskinX11" to accept incoming network connections, click Allow
10. When prompted to install Mono, click Cancel
11. When prompted to install Gecko, click Install
12. Click View Wrapper in Finder
13. Run the RootsMagic6 app by double-clicking RootsMagic6

Install RootsMagic 6

1. Click Install Software
2. Click Choose Setup Executable
3. Select the RootsMagic install (usually RM6Setup.exe)
4. Complete the install using the default settings and, at the end, uncheck Launch RootsMagic before clicking Finish
5. Select RootsMagic.exe as the main executable from the dropdown
6. Click OK

Install GDI+

1. Using a web browser, download this update
2. Save the file in /Users/<username>/Library/Caches/winetricks/gdiplus
3. Back in the wineskin window, click the Advanced button
4. Select the Tools tab at the top
5. Click Winetricks
6. Search for 'GDI+'
7. Expand dlls
8. Check the box next to gdiplus
9. Click Run
10. Click Run
11. When installation is finished, click Close
12. Exit wineskin Advanced

Run RootsMagic 6

1. Run RootsMagic6 from the Applications->Wineskin folder that resides in your User directory

Notes:

• If RootsMagic6 fails to open with a GDI+ error, there was likely an issue when you ran the "Install GDI+" steps. Pay close attention to any messages that winetricks produces when executing step 10.
• Copy and paste functions are done using the Ctrl+c and Ctrl+v key combinations like you would in Windows. Not using the command button like you are used to.
• These instructions can be applied to the full version of RootsMagic, but the websearch capability may not function properly unless you replace Gecko with Internet Explorer 7.

Known Issues:

• When setting the default file locations using Tools > Program Options > Folders, you may not be able to select locations on the Z: drive. When I did this I received errors. I was able to get around this by selecting the same location using the / directory in the browser instead.

Please post a comment if you find this how-to useful or if you have a comment or question.

How I got all of my favorite channels for free with XBMC (Raspbmc on Raspberry Pi)

I recently purchased a Raspberry Pi and installed Raspbmc in an attempt to duplicate and even augment the functionality that I currently have on my Roku 2. I was successful and wanted to share what I found for my own future reference and for the benefit of others.

Hardware

I purchased a Raspberry Pi Model B Rev 2 with 512MB of RAM from Amazon.com while it was selling for $50 including shipping and out of stock at every official distributor. If you are willing to wait a couple of weeks you can order from Newark.com or MCMElectronics.com and probably get it for about $40-$45 shipped.

I was able to fabricate a case for it using a 3D printer that I had access to, but many can be found for sale for $15 or less. Mine is based on this one by Adafruit. I already had a spare USB adapter, 8GB SD card and HDMI cable lying around. I also had a spare USB hub, mouse and keyboard, but ended up not needing them in the long run because of CEC which is supported by the Rpi and my LG tv (under the name SimpLink).

For those not familiar with CEC (I wasn't), more can be found on the Wikipedia article. Basically it allows you to remote control XBMC on your Rpi using your TV's remote control

I also purchased an Edimax EW-7811un USB wifi adapter which is supported out of the box in Raspbmc.

Software

I am using the latest Raspbmc image with Speed profile set to Fast and UI Res Limit disabled.

Wifi Setup

Wired and TV available

If you have access to a wired ethernet connection and your TV at the same time, then all you have to do to get this working is install the NetworkManager add-on in XBMC and setup your wifi.

Wired and TV not available

If, like me, your TV and router are in separate rooms you can do the following:

1. Setup the SD card in Windows using the Raspbmc installer
2. Plug the Rpi into the router and into the wall and allow it to setup for about 20 minutes
3. Figure out your Rpi's IP address
4. SSH in and setup a connection file in /etc/NetworkManager/system-connections/ per the following post. If you are using the Edimax wifi adapter I mentioned above, you can skip the apt-get steps. Those steps will likely need to be adapted to your particular adapter.
5. Reboot and make sure that you can now SSH in on the Wifi IP address.
6. Power down and move to TV

Add-ons

Now for the best part. Here are the specific channel add-ons I have setup.

The best part about the Hulu add-on is it allows you to watch even if you do not subscribe to Hulu Plus. It also allows you to skip advertisements if properly configured.

1. Install BlueCop Repository
2. Search Hulu and install
3. Configure the following settings:
• Disable Network Preroll
• Lower all ad numbers to '0'

1. Install BlueCop Repository
2. Search Amazon and install

1. Download and install from zip.

This one was a little bit trickier, but following the instructions found here, I was able to get it working.

1. Install BlueCop Repository
2. Search ESPN and install
3. Configure following these instructions

Free Cable 

This add-on gives you access to episodes of TV shows from dozens of networks that make their shows available for viewing online for a limited time. I primarily use this for PBS Kids shows for my kids as well as CBS Primetime Shows like NCIS that can't be found on Hulu.

1. Install BlueCop Repository
2. Search Free Cable and install

The Pandora add-on is not currently maintained in a working form in any central location at the moment. I had to download one of the latest offerings from this forum to get it to work.

1. Install BlueCop Repository
2. Search Youtube and install

Issues

• (12/3/12) The BYUtv add-on doesn't properly downgrade the quality when the connection (either client or server) isn't fast enough and tends to quit after a few times buffering.
• (12/3/12) The YouTube add-on fails to load subscriptions
• (12/3/12) The Free Cable add-on sometimes causes a reset of XBMC while trying to load the menus.

This post is sort of a work in progress. Please feel free to ask questions and give comments and suggestions.

Adding Facebook comments to blogs

http://jensontaylor.blogspot.com/2012/03/integrate-facebook-comments-for-blogger.html

LVM with SD card on Debian Wheezy on EeePC 701 4g

Add the following to the boot parameters in /etc/default/grub

lvmwait=/dev/vg0/root rootdelay=3