Devauld.ca

As I sit here, my Visine drenched eyes trying to keep focused on my LCD monitor, I'm finishing up a night of installation and configuration. Jerry and I have decided to undertake a side project, with what's left of my...

Who am I kidding? I don't have any free time.

Anyways, tonight I needed to get my Mac developer ready. The clean shiny toys that I installed when I first recieved my little dynamo were not enough for the industrial use I would need out of them.

I started off with my favorite code editor, and the required configuration file to make it the way I wanted. I know a lot of the heavyweights in the rails community have been caught using TextMate, but I wasn't about learning a new editor, as well as forking out close to forty euro for a fancy text editor. The installation was as easy as I've grown to expect from my new Apple toy. I grabbed a dmg file from the web, dragged it's contents into the Application folder, and all was done.

Next was getting to the meat of Rails, and I diligently followed these instructions to get it done. It was the first time I compiled anything on my Mac, and from the instructions I don't think the Mac community is as technically experimental as the Linux folks. All the old conforting commands like sudo and source were available right out of the box, and truth be told the most difficult part was waiting for the downloads to complete. Downloading Xcode and MySQL took the longest, Xcode because it's huge, and MySQL because I chose a terrible mirror.

After that adventure, I had to get subversion installed, as well as a snazzy front end for it.

I was just getting ready to get started and I decided to flip to my dashboard to see what time it was, and low and behold, there was only enough time left in the day to write this stuff down and head straight to bed.

In part of my digital lifestyle revolution, I made the switch. I ordered a Mac Mini from the online store about a week ago, and it finally showed up. The box was absolutely massive when I picked it up from FedEx, and when I finally got it home, I opened it up to find the bulk of the box was filled with air, to protect the small box inside. The actual packaging for my new toy was no larger than a grade school lunch box.

The mini is appropriately named. It's hard to believe when you take it out of the box that it's a dual core computer with all the bells and whistles. I plugged 'er in, turned 'er on and right away I was Mac-in.

My initial impressions are very good. Installing applications is as easy as dragging them into a folder called: Applications. If you want to 'uninstall' them, you simply drag them from that folder into the trash. It's as easy as that. It was very nice change from the Windoze Next, Next, Next, OK, Next, Accept, Next, Finish type installations.

I waded out into the internet (which I didn't need to configure, it just worked when I turned the computer on), and started grabbing some programs. Of note was Quicksilver, a program so basted in awsomeness that I don't think I'll survive without it. A context sensitive search of everything on your computer, accessible through a hotkey. It is so nice to use, and so very useful, that I'm having problems figuring out why it isn't on every operating system on the planet.

Next I had to spruce up my Dashboard with some snazzy widgets. Now, with a simple click of a button, I have access to a load of information, and portals to my e-mail and most commonly used websites.

There has been a couple of problems. Out of the box, my Mac won't play all the video formats that my Windows box does, but I'm sure the solution to that is only a google search away. The other large issue was that my mouse defaulted to the one button approach for which Apple is known. It took me longer to figure out what was going on than it took me to fix it, and it gave me a chance to try out the Spotlight functionality that is built into OS X.

I'm very glad I made the switch. I was beginning to get frustrated with Windows, and I noticed that more and more of what most consider to be hard core nerds were moving in the same direction. I found myself doing more and more to my computer, than I was doing with my computer. I find the Apple innovations like the Mighty Mouse scroll thingy to be really nice. Furthermore, their software is really, really easy to use.

I'll keep you updated on my Mac adventures

The lightning shots shots I have immediately came to mind when I read this week's Photo Friday challenge. I remember sitting on the top of Nose Hill, in the middle or a raging storm, protecting my camera from the elements as I snapped this picture. I know that sometimes all it takes is patience, and common sense to produce good photos. But, looking at these photos I can see that there is still a little something that I need to pick up in order to make my pictures extraordinary.

I've been a little busy for the last week. Between my three different sources of income, I managed to spread myself pretty thin this last week. Throughout my working towards various professional goals with varying outcomes, has loomed the thought that the city's decision is going to be coming my early next week. I should know before mid week if I'm going to have a legal basement suite, or a lot of renovations.

The rest of my weekend is packed full of two BBQs and my first participation in Calgary's Corporate Challenge. Tomorrow is the my debut as CCC caption, leading the bocce team to victory. The entire set of games will be done tomorrow. Then, on Monday, I have to start the Cribbage event. I'm sure you've noticed that I took the less athletic sports this year, as we fight for points in the White division. I really like the idea of the corporate challenge, as I see it as a great community-ish type that makes Calgary great.

Next week, I've already packed my week full of all sorts of events. Some are for pleasure, some for furthering myself, and the majority for ensuring I get a good chunk of currency to exchange for goods. I'm already shocked that it's September, and if I'm not careful, I'll blink, and be sitting at the table carving a Christmas turkey.

I've been chewing through time at a rate faster than expected. If I'm not careful, I'll zip all the way through the seven hundred thousand some-odd hours I've got left on this crusty lava ball.

Between working and sleeping I have managed to squeeze in a few hours for some fun and entertainment. Yesterday Sonja and I went out and did some climbing. The usual workout was made more difficult because my arms aren't used to doing much of anything, much less have to lift a grown man off the ground. My arms were destroyed to a point that feeding myself was proving to be difficult.

This morning, after a quick stopover at the office, I made my way down to City Hall to get my paperwork pushed into the intake of the bureaucratic money machine. After waiting for my number to be pulled in the pristine waiting lounge, I was presented with a trainer-trainee pair for my application. Things went over as well as could be hoped for, but as expected my case was a little different. After checking into most of my information, it was determined that we had to get a supervisor. I was wondering if I was going to make it through this filtering process, and after marking up 6 drawing with a pen, and some clairifications, my application was finally accepted.

Along with my application processing fee.

Upcoming, I'm going to try and let go of the past week, and Sonja and I are going to visit some relatives of hers. The weather is supposed to be perfect for a weekend road trip.