David's Blog

Files that don't have an extension (like "makefile") do not work well in Windows.

• In Vista, these files are not even searched! If you see a file called "makefile" in a directory and type "make" in the search box, Vista will report no files are found! NOTE: Windows 7 doesn't have this problem.
• Also, these files are not indexed, so searching for the contents of an extension-less file will return zero hits. I expect this works in Windows 7, but I haven't tested.
• If you try to open a file without an extension, you will always be asked which application should open this file. The "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file" checkbox is disabled, so you are constantly asked the same question, even when you open the same file over and over. This happens on Vista and Windows 7.

There is an easy fix for all of this:

Tell Windows that files that do not have an extension are the same as text files.

Here's how:

1. Start->Search->regedit
2. Go to Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.txt
3. File->Export->txt.reg
4. Open txt.reg in notepad
5. Replace every ".txt" with "."
6. Save the file
7. Open the new txt.reg to import the settings into the registry

The extension-less updated txt.reg should look similar (depending on what you have installed on your OS) to this...

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.]
"PerceivedType"="text"
@="Notepad++_file"
"Content Type"="text/plain"
"Notepad++_backup"="txtfile"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.\OpenWithList]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.\PersistentHandler]
@="{5e941d80-bf96-11cd-b579-08002b30bfeb}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.\ShellNew]
"ItemName"=hex(2):40,00,25,00,53,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,52,00,6f,00,\  6f,00,74,00,25,00,5c,00,73,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,33,00,32,00,5c,\  00,6e,00,6f,00,74,00,65,00,70,00,61,00,64,00,2e,00,65,00,78,00,65,00,2c,00,\
2d,00,34,00,37,00,30,00,00,00
"NullFile"=""

With this fix, files without an extension...

• Have filenames that are searchable
• Have contents that are searchable
• Are associated with the application that opens your text files

P.S.: If you are using Notepad/Wordpad for text editing, please checkout Notepad++...I *love* it and you will too.

Posted on June 28, 2009 10:30 PM | Permalink| Comments (0)

This stuff cracks me up. You *have* to check out the ManBabies website.

ManBabies inspired me this weekend.

Here is my first attempt, from the movie "The Hangover"...

Next up, I dug through some family photos...

I submitted both of these to ManBabies...we'll see if they get picked up.

I used Photoshop CS3 to do these.

Posted on June 28, 2009 5:18 PM | Permalink| Comments (1)

Every year ILM takes out a two page ad in Cinefex magazine to thank its employees.

This is my third time to be in the credit list. Here are my first and second.

I'm on page 2, 1st column, 32nd down.

Page 1...

Page 2...

Posted on June 20, 2009 5:46 PM | Permalink| Comments (0)

Saturday, I biked the bridge with Delia and family. Sunday, we did a GoCar tour of San Francisco.

The cars are 3-wheeled, gas-powered (1 gallon tank for 70 miles, they say) 2-seaters. The only way to go backwards is to get out and push the car.

They come with a “GPS,” which is a bit misleading. As long as you follow the route map (which is attached to the dashboard), you get an audio tour of your surroundings via a CD in the CD player. The tour gives you directions, but it is easy to miss a turn. Once you make a wrong turn, the “GPS” won’t give you any instructions again until you get back on the route.

Lesson learned: study the map before venturing out…you can’t rely on the GPS to keep you on the path.

The cars are considered motorcycles and thus can park easily almost anywhere in SF.

The maximum speed of a GoCar is 30 Mph…so they can’t go on any highways (and the GPS will bark at you if you try).

Here are some pics I took along the way.

I saw a lot of things I had never seen before on this tour. It is a fun way to see the city in an unusual vehicle. Highly recommended.

Posted on June 20, 2009 3:47 PM | Permalink| Comments (0)

Delia Flores Salazar and her husband John and daughter Sydney came to SF last weekend. I went to high school with Delia and haven’t seen her in 20 years. We’ve actually become better friends than we ever were in high school because of Facebook…weird!

There is a ton of stuff to do in SF. I’ve done a lot of it, but there is a surprising amount I haven’t…including riding a bike across the Golden Gate Bridge. Delia and Co. wanted to bike the bridge, so I tagged along.

We rented our bikes from Blazing Saddles in Fisherman’s Wharf at the Hyde St. location. We rode along the bay to Fort Point, crossed the bridge, and stopped in Sausalito for lunch. We took the ferry from Sausalito back to the Ferry Building in SF, and the rode back to the Hyde St. location where we started. Total trip was about 8 miles.

Here are some photos I took along the way.

If you get the chance…you *must* do this…it is an amazing way to see the sights and get some exercise as well. *Definitely* bring sunscreen (I didn’t and my arms got fried).

Posted on June 20, 2009 3:11 PM | Permalink| Comments (1)

I was impressed with the Palm Pre when it was announced to the world at CES back in January.

It has the cool UI of the iPhone and the keyboard of a Blackberry…a killer combination.

I stood in line at the Van Ness Sprint store in San Francisco the past Saturday. I got there at 7:30am and I was issued ticket #17.

I was able to pickup a Pre around 10:30am, but not the cool new Touchstone “wireless” charger because they were already sold out. I ordered one and should have it by next week.

What do I think?

I love it.

What I like

1. A keyboard! It is almost identical to a Palm Treo Pro (my previous phone). Some keys were rearranged for better internet typing. For example, the @ sign can be typed without using the alt key. The keyboard is a huge deal. When you type a message, you still get the full screen, instead of just half (or less) on iPhone’s virtual keyboard.
2. Multi-tasking. I can run Pandora radio in the background, Facebook, Twitter, load multiple web pages, write an email, use Google Maps, and have multiple txt message conversations, and jump back and forth between these running apps. If you listen to Apple (I recommend you don’t…they lie…a lot), they’d have you believe phones *can’t* do multitasking…and their dumbed down “push notification” is the solution. Whatever! The iPhone is the *only* smart phone that can’t do multi-tasking. You don’t know how much you need multi-tasking until you don’t have it anymore.
3. Notifications! You can keep working while email/txt messages arrive…notifications don’t get in the way…unless you want to deal with them. See it action here.
4. Camera has a flash…night time photos now possible with cell phone. Camera is very quick to start, take pictures. It seems like good quality 3MP images, too.
5. Copy/Paste keyboard shortcuts are *fast*…works much better than using a menu to do copy/paste. To copy, select text by holding the shift key while dragging on the screen, then put one finger on the gesture area (button will light up) and press the “c” key. To paste, touch where you want to insert (or hold orange key to move cursor more precisely with your finger), and then touch the gesture area with one figure (button will light up) and press the “v” key.
6. The Touchstone charger is just slick (see end of notifications video above)
7. The Palm Pre SDK runs on PC’s (Windows, Linux, Mac). iPhone SDK only runs on Mac. Also, the Pre SDK does *not* use Objective-C (who uses that?!?!? Oh yeah, just Apple)! I’m trying to get the Pre SDK now.
8. Adobe Flash Support coming!
9. Tethering (coming soon)
10. Smaller than an iPhone…fits better in your pocket.
11. Linked contacts. I added my Facebook account to my Pre contacts and then all of my exchange contacts that have Facebook accounts suddenly have Facebook profile pics associated with them (for email, txt messages, phone calls). Very cool! Here’s a demo of contacts on the Pre.
12. Gestures. I didn’t appreciate gestures until I started using the phone…but now I’m hooked. Gestures let you quickly do various common tasks (go back, quick launch apps, switch between apps, close apps) without using any valuable screen real-estate by flicking your finger in certain ways. Here is a demo of gestures.
13. My phone hasn’t had a typical day yet since I keep showing people what it can do and I’m constantly playing with it. Currently, I’m sitting at 35% of the battery left at almost midnight…not bad!
14. I’m on Sprint now (had AT&T). At work, with AT&T I had *no* signal until I left the building. With Sprint, I get two bars consistently…my phone is now usable at work.
15. Wi-Fi on my old phone would drain the battery quickly, so I rarely used it. I’ve read the Palm Pre uses *less* battery with Wi-Fi than using the cellular network for loading data. Good to know!

What I don’t like

1. Can’t send a txt message to multiple people…or at least I haven’t found a way.
2. Can’t have more than three “launcher” pages (for starting apps)
3. No support for iCalendar events. For my previous phone, I’d forward events from my work calendar to my home email as iCalendar and I could easily add them to my home calendar via my phone. Pre doesn’t support this (yet?)

So far my Pre has been amazingly stable with few bugs…unheard of in a 1.0 product.

I expect things to get more interesting as Palm updates the software with more features and more apps are developed for the Pre.

Highly recommended!

Posted on June 10, 2009 12:14 AM | Permalink| Comments (12)

So far this year, I have three movies on my “must see” list.

I saw “The Hangover” on Friday. I *really* enjoyed this movie…it doesn’t get any funnier than this. I’ve already started quoting this movie…and you should too. Drop what you are doing and go see this now!

Last weekend, I saw “Drag Me to Hell.” The ads make it look like a cheesy horror flick…but this movie is much better than that. It is actually very funny. The last time I experienced anything like this was when I saw Evil Dead 2 for the first time. That shouldn’t be a surprise since they are both by Sam Raimi.

Star Trek has a lot to like: visual effects (by ILM!), great dialog, acting, interesting story, and hot green chicks. Yesterday, Star Trek passed Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home as the 2nd top grossing Star Trek film (in adjusted dollars). It will likely take the top position ($18 million to go) from Star Trek: The Motion Picture soon.

Posted on June 8, 2009 12:41 AM | Permalink| Comments (5)