Sunday, March 7, 2010 - Store Nabber Launched, Beta Testers Wanted

Need to go the grocery store but not have a clue what you already have and what you need? Are you ever on the way home from work and ready to stop at the grocery store, but you left your shopping list at home? Do you have recipes that you make regularly but no clue which ingredients you already have and which ones you need to buy?

Store Nabber makes it easy for you to make a shopping list and 'nab' extactly what you need at the store. It supports UPC codes and it compatible with most barcode scanners (including CueCat!). Optional features include inventory management.

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Wednesday, March 3, 2010 - Missing Hydrant

Category: Photo Gallery

It looks like someone backed over the fire hydrant in my apartment complex, turning the ally into a river. San Diego, CA. March 3, 2010.

Saturday, February 13, 2010 - Veronica Mars Filming Locations

I put together a collection of all of the San Diego filming locations for Veronica Mars, the TV show that aired from 2004-2007 on UPN and The CW.

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Saturday, February 13, 2010 - Youtube Podcast Generator Launched

I added a new Podcast Generator tool to the Projects section. This tool can create a video podcast of any YouTube channel or search suitable for use with iTunes. It can also attempt to create podcasts from arbitrary webpages that have multimedia links on it.

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Thursday, February 4, 2010 - Hoover Dam

Category: Photo Gallery

Hoover Dam, Nevada-Arizona border. July 20, 2009.

Tuesday, January 26, 2010 - Pinning Down Accidents Caused by Cell Phones

Category: Public Policy

The National Safety Council (NSC) estimates that 25% of all crashes are caused by cell phones. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) estimates that driver distraction from all sources (including cell phones) contributes to 19 percent of all crashes (2008). Even then, this is not necessarily the cause of the crash.

Both cannot be true, someone here is wrong. The NSC report is merely a statistical extrapolation of what might have happened, heavily based on averages. More real world data to corroborate their numbers is needed. The NHTSA has the opposite problem. Their numbers are based on real world reports. These suffer from reporting errors, often because those involved in a crash might not report being distracted while driving.

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Wednesday, January 20, 2010 - Almost Flooded

Category: Photo Gallery

My apartment nearly flooded once the downpour started. Its a good thing that I was able to improvise and put my phone books to use for once and fill in the cracks with dirt and mulch from nearby (and the rain slowed). Minor flooding isn't unusual for this apartment since it is low lying, but it usually doesn't go much past the stairs or porch. Today was different. The combination of over an hour of heavy downpour and a new landscaping job left my apartment especially vulnerable, turning my staircase into a river. I called the office, they said they would send maintenance but I lost hope of that since its already past 5 PM here. The video and first few photos are from before my handywork, the remainder are of the aftermath. San Diego, CA. January 18, 2010.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010 - JavaOne

Category: Photo Gallery

Moscone Center, San Francisco, CA. Taken June 1-5, 2009.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010 - Mackinac Island

Category: Photo Gallery

Mackinac Island, MI. August 14, 2009.

Monday, December 7, 2009 - IPv6 Quirks

Category: Computing Technology

After playing with IPv6 extensively over the weekend, I discovered a number of oddities about the protocol.

First, autoconfiguration only works with /64 subnets. Anything more or less, even if the router advertises the prefix, clients will not add the prefix to its own interface. This seems like it can problematic as users cannot easily break down these prefixes into smaller subnets. This could be a key area for using DHCPv6 as a replacement.

Second, autoconfiguration will not work if the computer is configured as a router for IP forwarding. This means that additional work for defining routes needs to be done even if you only plan on using the default gateway on a network. This can either be in the form of static routes or a full blown routing protocol.

Third, 2002::/16 (IPv4 transition addresses) doesn't count as a real IPv6 address when source address selection occurs. Instead it is considered a separate scope, similar to an IPv4 address. This means when websites have both a 2001::/16 IPv6 address and a IPv4 address, the IPv4 address is used by default. If the website has a 2002::/16 IPv6 address and a IPv4 address the 2002::/16 IPv6 address is used to connect. This seems very odd and inconsistent and can lead to confusion.

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