Ups and Downs and Everything In Between

I’m going to interupt your regularly scheduled broadcasting to publish this general service announcement about my schedule: I’m going to California (in fact, by the time you read this, I’ve probably already left) and I won’t be returning to New York until after February 11^th. This means I’ll be (somewhat) incommunicado, and I’m not going to be able to answer any emails, respond to any comments, or otherwise be easily contacted for the duration of my trip.

In the mean time, have a healthy and happy start of February in 2006. :)

There’s a new book out today. It’s called Wireless Networking in the Developing World, and it’s available for free downloads online. I’ve already snatched my copy.

Even though it was written with the intention of making wireless telecommunications infrastructure more readily accessible to developing nations by means of educating implementors, I’ve already found it to be a useful reference and excellent learning tool to get a strong grounding on the considerations of setting up any wireless network. It starts you off with a grounding in radio physics, and then quickly goes through the stages of network design: the physical network infrastructure and the logical collision domains. It even has good advice on how to secure the network you create.

This book will be useful for everyone who wants to build their own wireless network that is more complicated than a simple home router. I can also see this guide being extremely handy for those managing and planning community wireless “hotspots” since its focus is on low-cost, yet effective, infrastructure. With the U.S. severely lagging behind the rest of the developed world in terms of broadband internet access, community wireless projects can breathe new life into local economies just as effectively in America as they can overseas.

Books like this that make it easy for individuals and other organizations to inexpensively maintain wireless telecommunications infrastructure is a welcome addition to the fight for better Internet access across the globe.

I’ve made a brilliant revelation. I’ve discovered the one secret every tech whore yearns to learn. I’ve unearthed the secret to cable management. (Until Bluetooth and WiMAX take over the realm of inter-networking and peripheral interconnections.)

The secret is: get the cables off the ground.

Sara and I spent most of the day cleaning our apartment in preparation for hosting our monthly pot luck. When cleaning the living room, around where all my computers are stacked under my desk, I noticed that I had a surprisingly easy time cleaning the floor because, you guessed it, I’d managed to get all my wires (save the power strip) off the floor. Needless to say, this was quite a pleasant surprise.

Equally pleasant though not as surprising (if I do say so myself) was how well the pot luck tonight went over. Fewer people arrived than we were expecting but we still have a ton of leftover food and everyone seemed to have a good time. It was good to get to see so many of my friends in the same place at one time hanging out and enjoying each others’ company ’til the wee hours of the morning.

Additionally, I think everyone met at least one or two people whom they didn’t know before (myself included), which is a lovely added treat.

There’s a bit of cleaning that must be done now, (clean all day, throw a party, clean some more, go figure) but it’s well worth it. Sweetheart that he is, Mike even scrubbed down the kitchen table before he left. So tomorrow morning, I’m getting that front door doorknob fixed, and later I’m hoping to catch the intro to GarageBand workshop at the Apple store in the afternoon.

Ah, life progresses. I’m still not sure I’m prepared for what changes lie ahead. Training in Cupertino and then a new corporate (retail!) job. Yeah, I may not be fully prepared, but at least I’m off the ground.

Took a stroll around my old neighborhood, the West Village, earlier today. Actually, I should be saying yesterday since it’ll soon be sunny outside. (I actually got to bed at a decent hour tonight, but now I can’t sleep. Cried a bit when I got out of bed.) I miss that neighborhood a lot; you can just walk around there, day or night. You can’t really do that in Washington Heights, where I live now. And I miss walking like that.

As I walked around downtown I saw a lot of noteworthy things; shops I used to go to, restaurants, some closed, some renovated, some replaced by new ones, that old couple who always goes to the Bus Stop Café on Thursday evenings was there, thought about getting a cupcake at Magnolia Bakery. I saw another couple carrying their respective pet cats on their shoulders and heads. Took a few pictures (unfortunately none of the cat couple, though). I didn’t stay too long.

I walked to the Apple Store afterwards for their Aperture presentation. Only made the second half, but it was interesting. Kind of didn’t want to go home so I milled about eavesdropping on the Geniuses at the Genius Bar—thought maybe I could learn a thing or two. Didn’t really.

Tonight’s not been a complete loss. I’ve finished editting the flyers for my Web design tutoring attempts, and since tomorrow Sara and I have plans to meet friends downtown, I’m thinking of printing these out and putting them up where I can.

I do wish I could get some sleep, though. And that I’d stop being so…whatever this is.

I’ve noticed that I’ve been unusually irritable for the past few days. I can’t yet pinpoint when it started, but it was sometime earlier this week. It’s been an on-and-off thing, usually following mood cycles and with very defineable triggers.

This past trigger was looking at my bank balance and seeing that I couldn’t cover the charge for the electric bill that just came through. So I am now officially flat broke. As in, I have no money, not a single cent available.

I feel like I’m in limbo waiting for the next set of details that will arrive from Apple. I don’t like waiting. So maybe that’s what’s causing it.

On a related note, a woman who mailed me about a project of her’s involving bipolar disorder called today. She’s doing interviews. This is old stuff for me (interviews, that is; I’ve lost track of how many research papers and special projects and newspaper articles and whatnot I’ve been interviewed for over the years about a range of things), but perhaps it will be good to bring the topic to the forefront again.

There’s no denying it; Apple is cool. This has gotten a lot of people asking Mac users what the big differences are between using a Windows-based PC compared to using an Apple Macintosh. It’s a fair question. No one wants to spend their hard-earned money on a product they don’t know will be good for them.

Well, when I’m asked this question (and I’m asked this a lot) here’s a few key points I bring up when discussing the benefits of using a Mac.

• Increased shelf-life. I’ve had my personal computer (an iMac) for over 5 years and it still runs the latest applications without much trouble at all. Can’t do that on a Windows-based PC because after five years they get painfully slow. Not Macs; they stay relatievly speedy.
• Hugely improved security. Comparitively speaking, Windows and Windows-based applications are easy to compromise. An attacker of any and every kind will have a lot more trouble breaking into the average Mac configuration than the average Windows configuration.
• And speaking of security, viruses are a major concern in the Windows world. Not so with Apple Macs. Macroviruses do exist on Mac, because they infect applications, so it’s not true to say that there are no viruses (an oft-repeated myth). It is true, however, to say that at this time and probably for the near future, there will be no virus that can affect the Mac OS like there are in Windows.
• A multittude of free features unavailable on Windows. The standard Mac these days ship with industrial server-quality software out-of-the-box for things like Web sharing (hosting your own web site right from your computer), accessibility (new Macs come with a screen reader, for instance), and a ton more stuff. Just peek at the OS X overview.
• These past two points dovetail nicely into this one: Mac OS X is based on BSD UNIX and continues the UNIX tradition, which embodies the philosophy of good, simple, reliable, elegant software. The newest Macs are actually built on a foundation over 30 years old and as you know, the only things that ever last in the computer world are the reliable things. Compare that with Windows XP, which was based on Windows NT and is not even half that old. Remember, in computer speak old equals reliable, and as far as I’m concerned reliable equals good.
• Finally, Macs have an elegant usability that increases your productivty. This one is hotly debated among computer enthusiasts because people often work differently from each other, and your workflow is not like my workflow. Beacuse of this, switching to a Mac means that you’ll have to re-learn some of the things you know to work with Macs, but I maintain that this transition time is short and that the benefits are great. As an example, installing a new program on a Mac is a drag-and-drop operation, whereas doing the same on Windows is often a multi-step process requiring an Installation wizard and even a computer restart sometimes.

As always, your mileage may vary and there’s only one ultimate reason for you to switch to Macs: because you want to. Why you want to, whether it’s because Apple is the new black or because you’re addicted to the iMac’s iSight and Photobooth, is completely up to you. And if you’re still not sure, there’re plenty more reasons to switch.

Earlier today I mentioned to Sara that it seemed to me as if so much had changed in our lives in the past eight months. Ten months ago I was just getting out of a painful relationship, and she was a college student. Then for four months we were living out of the back of a car while we travelled across 14,000 miles of North America. Now we’re living in a very New York apartment with concerns like finding jobs and making money.

And in a few more weeks, my life will change drastically yet again; the other day I was informed that I had been officially hired for a new job in (what else?) tech support for Macs.

Even though I am very excited, and internally I feel like jumping for joy and throwing boxes of confetti everywhere, other people’s reactions to this news have been so animated that it feels more appropriate if I just smile and nod. Someone’s got to keep a level head about it. There’s a lot of paperwork to fill out and all sorts of dates and times and things to confirm. It’s certainly helpful that I’ve recently gotten myself so much more organized.

Sometime near the end of this month I’ll be starting training, a several week process that—I believe—requires that I get ACDT and ACPT certified. I’ll be taking these courses at the Apple campus in California, so this is also a heads-up that I’m going to be out of town for a few weeks soon. (I wonder if the classes will incorporate any information on the new Intel iMacs and MacBooks)

In between all of this preparation regarding new employment, I’ve been doing several web design projects, as well as my usual bouts of tinkering and researching. I’ve had quite a full plate and been enjoying successes in all these areas. As an added bonus, I finally got my new cell phone today which means that I can now be reached at the cell number you have for me. I’m thinking of getting the black swivel holster for it as well.

Unfortunately, Sara’s not been as happy as I have lately, though this contrast between our respective mood baselines has been enlightening. It’s sad that I seem to need to see someone else depressed to notice the fact that I haven’t been depressed in a long time, but it sure does highlight that fact. It also indirectly highlights quite a few others that have shown me just how far along I’ve come from my not-so-distant and very depressed past.

1. I’m able to self-motivate a lot better than I used to be able to do.
2. I’m able to keep timed committments a lot more reliably than I used to be able to.
3. I’m far more able to foresee, manage, and generate financial income than I used to be able to, even if most of my sources of income still rely heavily on connections from family and friends. (That is, I’m able to perform more money-making actions.)

In any event, I’m looking forward to the rest of 2006 with a little more confidence than I faced 2005 with.

I recently discovered (and devoured) this excellent essay on Internet Explorer’s hasLayout property, which every web designer who struggles to understand IE needs to read. It’s probably the clearest an most complete article out there on why certain bugs affect IE the way they do. A definite must read that should cut down on your bug-hunting time and make you a better cross-browser web designer.

Save for this entry, hopefully nothing has seemed to change here. I wanted to upgrade to the latest WordPress release, so after backing up my WordPress databases, I dove right in. Fastforward fifteen minutes, and here I am writing this entry. All my plugins work, and save for a few minor UI problems on the backend (RunPHP’s “eval() content” option isn’t properly hidden in the Discussion box on the post.php page), everything seems to be working just fine.

Once again, please do let me know if something went wonky and I haven’t found it. Other than that, though, it’s business as usual since I’m happy to say the upgrade procedure from WordPress 1.5 to WordPress 2 was easy as one, two, done.