welcome to spiceland.

Logging GPS in Keith’s RC Plane

We put a custom designed GPS logger in Keith’s rc plane. The cool part of the video starts 2/3 of the way in. I take the logged data and show it in Google Maps and Google Earth.

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Here are some direct links to Google Maps (click on “view in Google Earth” for the really cool version) :
Keith’s RC Stryker
Keith’s Green Plane

I started skype’ing again and I’m looking for folks to video skype with. If you have a webcam and want to skype, let us know. Tru loves it! I’ve also had a good time getting to see the where several out of town friends live that I otherwise haven’t been able to see. Since it works on wireless laptops, I’ve been able to roam all over the house while video chatting. I just have to make sure I watch out and make sure I don’t accidentally catch Erin feeding Heidi

http://skype.com/download/

I know that a few family members have Mac’s. I think they have built in cameras. If you don’t have a camera, I have had really good luck with the Logitech Communicate STX which is only $37 with free shipping from newegg. It comes with a built in microphone. It also works great in Linux with a V4L and V4L2 driver.

IM or email me and I’ll give you my skype info.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. If you are seeing this from facebook or some other site, click on the link to watch the video on our site.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. If you are seeing this from facebook or some other site, click on the link to watch the video on our site.

Get the Flash Player to see this video. If you are seeing this from facebook or some other site, click on the link to watch the video on our site.

Would anyone like a brand new *super* small (9″ x 8″ x 2.5″) cute PC for $230? At this size it would fit just about anywhere. Need a PC for the kitchen? How about next to the TV in the entertainment center? I’ve priced out one of these PC’s and I want to build it and play with it. If any of you family or friends want one, I’ll order the parts and built it for you in exhcnage for getting to play with it.

Intel MB, 1.3Ghz, 512MB ram, 60GB HD, video, usb

Help cure cancer and other terminal illnesses by allowing Stanford University to use your computer when you aren’t using it!

According to Stanford.edu, “What is protein folding and how is folding linked to disease? Proteins are biology’s workhorses — its “nanomachines.” Before proteins can carry out these important functions, they assemble themselves, or “fold.” The process of protein folding, while critical and fundamental to virtually all of biology, in many ways remains a mystery. Moreover, when proteins do not fold correctly (i.e. ‘misfold’), there can be serious consequences, including many well known diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, Mad Cow (BSE), CJD, ALS, Huntington’s, Parkinson’s disease, and many Cancers and cancer-related syndromes.”

They have develped a computer program that runs on your computer. When you’re not using your computer, the program downloads proteins, studies them, and sends the results back to Stanford. Here’s how to do it:

Windows users, download this! Still stuck with Windows 98 or ME? use this one instead! Linux users, use this program.

Download it to your desktop, or another location where you won’t forget to run it everyday! Run it. Enter 12912 as your team number and linuxChique as your username (if you don’t want to create a new one). Then agree to everything else it asks you. Let it do it’s thing! You’ll be working toward a cure for cancer and other genetic terminal illnesses!

To make this program start automatically when you boot windows, go to Start menu -> [all] Programs -> Startup submenu. Then just make a shortcut from the Folding@Home****.exe file into that menu.

Linux users, just add it to your /etc/rc.d/rc.local!

The longer the program runs, the more good you are doing! You can let it go for days at a time. This program runs on my computer constantly, and I’ve completedly 2 work units already. Thank you for listening, and please let me know if you actually do this!

Here’s my progress so far:

Home Theater PC – MythTV (revisited)

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In this video, I do a more indepth overview of using MythTV as a Tivo-like digital video recorder. This is the setup that Erin, Tru, and I use to manage all of our tv recordings. Unlike my previous video on MythTV, this one goes a little more in depth and goes over the $80 MediaMVP boxes that you can connect to any tv and stream your recordings. You will want to use the custom mvmpc firmware to be able to use it as a mythfrontend. You can have one MythTV box to do all your recordings and just get these $80 set top boxes for each of your TV’s. This allows you to use any old garage sale PC to do your recordings, reducing the overall cost.

Note; there are *2 videos* this week. Don’t forget to check out the webcam video below.

For a limited time, you can spy on us on our live webcam! You can even move the web cam to look around the room!

http://home.thespicelands.com/cgi-bin/webcam.cgi

Be nice to others and if you see that there are several people trying to control it, take turns.

I saw this posted in digg.com and thought I’d have to share! Its a funny read. To all of my family members and friends who ask me computer questions about Windows or IT related things and are confused as to how I could be a computer person and not know the answer, here is why:

I’m a Programmer, Not a Computer Guy

Michael