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Archive for February, 2009
Not so Humerus
3 years ago
by manfred
in Life in South Africa
So my second foray into the surgery turned out to be somewhat more than the promised quick visit. I spent the night and watched umpteen containers of painkillers and such-like drip-drip into my right vein. I also received another titanium augmentation: a radial extension with an internal fixation. Basically a replacement of the ball joint.
My left arm will remain in the splint for about two weeks before it’s checked and released. Some physiotherapy is unavoidable. Suddenly, having only one arm that functions and one strapped motionless to my chest makes me realize how much I actually use these appendages…
I have yet to ascertain whether or not my funnybone has been removed.
iLife ’09 arrived
I finally got my hands on the new iLife ’09 today. I’m typing one-handed, but am nevertheless excited to check out iPhoto‘s face recognition and geotagging features.
The 1.5GB install also includes a much-needed update to iMovie and an interesting set of lessons in GarageBand.
Sidewinder crash: an analysis
On Thursday, I had a slight mishap whilst enjoying a short outing on the tracks of the MTN Cycle Park. It was to be one last lap. My choice of The Sidewinder ended up in a rather bad fall.
Of course one signs an indemnity, but let me warn you nonetheless: do not assume that any track you’re on won’t cough up a nasty surprise. In this case, a roughly 0.5m high jump hides a wide gully bordered by a concrete bar. I wasn’t fast enough to clear it and not slow enough to stop in time.
My bike flew over my head, landing some distance ahead of me. The part of my body that absorbed all impact: my left elbow. Point of impact? Naturally, the concrete bar. It was painful and very swollen and limp. Immediately indicative of a broken something.
Telemetry data retrieved from the Edge 705 indicates an impact speed of about 30km/h.
My heartrate? Low. Indicative of that sinking feeling when you just know that’s it. Thanks to Pieter for getting me to casualty and assisting with communications.
X-ray plates showed a rather badly damaged elbow. Not broken – shattered is a better description. A CT scan prior to surgery late yesterday shows the damage in wonderful 3D.
A titanium plate and a couple of screws will fix almost anything…
Upon waking up, I was pleased to notice that moving the arm didn’t result in that hideous feeling of bone fragments shifting around.
Finally, I’ll be able to check in at airport security and have something other than my belt buckle trigger an alarm. I’m not quite done yet: the surgeon gets to open me up once more to place a titanium disk to prevent constant dislocation of the elbow joint. That’s scheduled for Monday morning. Should be a great start to the week!
For your own safety: watch The Sidewinder!
The Sidewinder did it!
3 years ago
by manfred
in Moblogging
All the time I’m thinking I’ll be Space Junk. In the end, it was The Sidewinder that did it. Shattered elbow. It hurts quite a bit and requires surgery. Screws and metal plates to be inserted tomorrow.
Friday the 13th. It’s gonna be one hell of a day!
Lego NXT 2.0 and The Battle of Endor
In my grubby paws I hold a copy of the 2009 Lego Trade Catalogue, provided by my friendly neighbourhood Lego dealer. There are a couple of nice sets destined to be released over the course of the coming year, two of which stand out.
The new Mindstorms NXT 2.0 kit is designated article #8547. Not much is different when compared to the existing NXT kit, though a colour sensor is included in the box and native Windows and Mac support is guaranteed.
Bluetooth and USB connectivity are standard for the NXT brain and the kit provides a few new models to build, including an updated version of Alpha Rex. The colour sensor should make the construction of an M&M‘s sorting robot child’s play. NXT 2.0 should be available sometime in August of this year.
For fans and collectors of the original Lego Star Wars sets, the new Battle of Endor diorama will be a welcome addition. Set #8038 contains a few annoying Ewok minifigs amongst its 890 piece complement, the only possible excuse for Star Wars fans not to add this set to their collection.
The force will be stronger in July when #8038 is due for release.
Too many books, too little time
I’ve noticed, with considerable alarm, that I’ve made absolutely no headway with any of the reading matter displayed in the sidebar. For completeness sake, I list them here and have removed them. Their status has changed from being read to shelved…
Exhibit A: Mr Stephenson‘s Anathem. On my reading list since October of 2008.
A long-winded account of an avout in the mathic world, exiled and currently in space. That’s sort of where I left Fraa Erasmus, somewhere near page 650 or so. My emergency strategy of employing a refresher by audio book has failed dismally. I sadly relegate Anathem to the pile of Stephenson tomes I intend to start or re-read.
Exhibit B: Andrew Lycett‘s detailed account of Ian Fleming‘s life.
Can you believe I started reading this in August of 2008? Neither can I. Only the bookmark at chapter four gives me any clue as to my progress.
I can’t remember much of anything, bar the fact that Fleming wasn’t really like James Bond at all, but had a rather vivid imagination.
Lycett will have to be restarted from page one.
And finally, exhibit C. Bryson‘s short history of nearly everything, compacted into a smallish paperback.
Start date unknown, but given the fact that I can’t recall even a single, minute factoid I’m assuming it was quite some time ago.
Sigh.
I’ll need to start from scratch with this one too…
Welcome to Macintosh
Many books have been written about the history of the Mac. Welcome to Macintosh is a short documentary that was released in December of last year. It details the history of the Macintosh and includes a host of Apple celebrities who played a part in bringing the Mac to life. Interestingly, neither Woz nor Jobs appear. They are simply referred to here and there or shown in recorded clips. One would think that they were rather instrumental in the overall development of the Mac…
Among those making an appearance on screen are Guy Kawasaki and Andy Hertzfeld. Leander Kahney, author of the book Cult of Mac, features prominently too. There is no narration. Instead, on-screen titles lead the viewer through the fascinating process of how the Apple brand has captured the imagination of many the world over.
If the Mac is your cup of tea, Welcome to Macintosh may well be of interest to you. Its running time of roughly 80 minutes is bound to keep your interest. Also, don’t neglect MacHEADS, a similar documentary about the cult of the Mac.
City infrastructure – roads
It’s always wise to keep an eye out for updates and changes to the Lego catalog. Products that are new may suddenly be hard to find, others simply no longer available. A Lego City requires roads, and I was pleased to notice that Lego has once again decided to produce its selection of road plates. The problem with these is similar to the problem one has when buying rail components: the packaging forces the purchase of two dissimilar parts instead of packaging like with like.
So, you’ll end up with an endless supply of curved track but never have sufficient straight track when buying the rail packs, or end up with endless supplies of intersections and T-junctions without really having enough straight and curved road. In any case, these are a necessary part for a City diorama. Road plates are available in two packs, namely #7280 containing one straight road section and one four-way intersection
and #7281, containing one curved piece of road and a T-junction.
On the topic of roads: roads manufactured for play are generally perfect and it is unusual to have serious consequences arising from toy cars and trucks interacting on or around them. Reality, as always, is slightly different. Living in a country not exactly renowned for its excellent road infrastructure, road maintenance is always a topic for heated discussion. In fact, maintenance of road surfaces is often neglected to the point where roads in daily use by thousands of vehicles degenerate and become hazardous and unsafe.
The picture below is of a section of road surface on the R114 in north-western Johannesburg.
![R114 potholes [Gerd Naschenweng]](http://hertenberger.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/r114potholes1.jpg "R114 potholes [Gerd Naschenweng]")
This is not the only occurrence of potholes on the R114; in fact, these are rather mild. Fellow blogger Gerd Naschenweng has launched a petition to have the road fixed to avoid further accidents, injuries and deaths. Please read his post, then perform your civic duty and sign his petition.
Garmap Africa Series 2009 announced
After a fairly lengthy wait, the latest update to Garmap‘s Africa Series has been announced. Contrary to initial expectations, the new Garmap website is still not up an running and registration for the new 2009 mapset will be handled using the existing website.
Like the latest Mapsource software available from Garmin, the Garmap software will run on both Leopard and Windows. A double-sided DVD will contain Mac content on one side and Windows content on the other. Don’t worry about which side is up – the disk will let you know.
The inclusion of Mac support is quite exciting, but numerous updates and improvements to the all-important mapsets have also been made. The following mapsets are included on the DVD:
- Southern Africa Streetmaps 2009, both standard and DEM (Digital Elevation Mode)
- Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Mozambique, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe
- Southern Africa Topographical and Recreational 2009
- topographical detail for South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe
- South African Waterways 2009
- Nigerian Streetmaps 2009
- Indian Ocean Islands Streetmaps 2009
- East African Streetmaps 2009
The South African Streetmaps boast full road coverage for six of our nine provinces, including 193000 points of interest and 300 wireless hotspots (no more driving around with that Pringles can 
).
Digital Elevation Mode is supported by specific GPS units and provides a very attractive 3D view of terrain, incorporating topographical information and street-level detail. Check your GPS‘ capabilities to decide which mapset is more appropriate and supported.
The DVD should be in stores from this week and is said to retail for ZAR 9.95. Note that this price does not include any maps, simply the media. Online activation and variable pricing for the different mapsets on the DVD applies.
For more details, see the official Garmap announcement (this is a PDF link).
Connect and partner the E220
3 years ago
by manfred
in Connectivity
The E220 is a decent USB modem to connect to 3G and HSDPA networks. Unfortunately, the management software provided by MTN is functional but hardly attractive. Since I re-installed G2S with Windows 7 64-bit, I decided to try out something that I’ve been holding off for quite some time: overwrite the default MTN connection manager with the default Huawei software. The primary reason for doing this is to install the latest firmware to the device. The second to beautify the desktop and get rid of the rather monstrous MTN dashboard.
Come to think of it, the Vodacom dashboard is not exactly that much better looking – a bit more refined, perhaps… Why they don’t simply brand a version provided by the original manufacturer, I simply don’t understand.
Before starting, I copied the content of the internal storage of the E220 to my hard drive as a backup. Next, I copied down the most important connection details to re-establish myself with the world at large. These are (for MTN):
- Number to dial = *99#
- User name = MTN with password mtn
- APN name = myMTN
Next, download the latest version of the Huawei E220 software here. Interestingly, various software archives are available there, not simply Mac and Windows versions but two entirely different dashboards. Why, I don’t know. Thankfully, however, there are two versions since I could not get the E220 to be recognized by Windows 7 without switching to the alternate dashboard software. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
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