Steampunk Opera

Okay I'll say it. I do not like Abney Park. Yeah I know I know, and I'm sorry. It's okay with me that you like them, if it makes you happy I'm for it, but it's just not my cup of tea. I'm more of a Orpheum Bell kind of guy. That being said it's a big world and there's plenty of room in it for all kinds of things.

Which brings us to the Steampunk Opera a bit of which I present to you now.

Act 1 S2 New Albion 1 (demo) by mocha lab">Act 1 S2 New Albion 1 (demo) by mocha lab

I am not knowledgeable about this style of music, so I can't say if it's good or not. I can say that I kinda like it.

The Mysterious Explorations of Jasper Morello

I was chatting on IM with a friend of mine today and the subject of The Secrete Adventures of Jules Vern came up. For those of you who never had a chance to see it, SAJV was a steampunk TV show that aired on the SiFi Channel about ten years ago. Sadly it's not on DVD. But I thought it might be on youtube.

Alas, it is not. There are however many other steampunk videos that are on youtube. So it is my pleasure to present to you The Mysterious Explorations of Jasper Morello.

Yes, it's almost 30 minutes long. Yes, it's animated, and no, there are no busty girls wearing their corsets on the outside. But it's pretty darn cool.

Broadening My Scope

I've decided to make better use of the space by branching out a bit. It's not like I had a stellar track record for regular updates anyway. So I'm going to loosen up things a bit, actually quite a bit. At least until I wonder off again.

Markdown May Be the Death of Me

Markdown May Be the Death of Me

This is where we find out. I've spent the last several hours on a little quest. Like most quests it didn't start out as a quest, it started out as a question. That question was what is Markdown and why should I care?


Markdown is a simple syntax for formatting content for the web without typing full on html as you go. For example, if I wanted to add a link to this I could type

<a href="http://www.cnn.com">CNN</a>

which is just too much. Using Markdown I can type

<http://www.cnn.com>

and that's okay, if you don't mind messy links in your text. But I do mind messy links in my text. I want things to look neat.
I tried WriteMonkey, I tried Sublime. They, like most windows software, ok, but they are no going to light you on fire with their brilliance.


Finially (at 5:30 in the morning) I found Gonzo. Maybe I'm just tired, but I have to say I love this program. It has passed all the test that left WriteMonkey and Sublime face down in the dirt. More than that, its actually does things in a reasonable, efficient, dare I say graceful way.


For example, did you notice the inline link in the paragraph above? Gonzo did that, all I did was give it the text and the link.
I'm very pleased. I think I'll go to sleep now.

Home Inventory with QR Codes and Smart Phone Access

If you're like me you own a lot more stuff than you think you do. It's in a box somewhere. The box is in the garage, or in a closet, and it looks like all the other boxes. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to see what was in the box without opening it and sorting though all that stuff?

I decided I needed a better solution. Actually that's not true, I decided a needed a solution, and this is the one I settled on. It's delightfully complex, and after using it for a few months I still haven't decided if it is in any measurable way better than a pencil and a piece of paper. But I do know this, it's very geeky.

Start by going to Google Docs and setting up a new spread sheet. Before you enter any information you going to want to change a few settings.

The first thing to do is change the permissions to "Anyone who has the link can edit".  To do this click the "Change" button. I've already done this in the example below.

Under Visibility options select "Anyone with the link" and under Edit access do the same. This will allow you to view and edit your document from your smart phone.

Click save, and in the next screen copy the URL.

Now all that's left to do is past the URL into your favorite QR Code generator.

Once the code is generated save it as a .jpeg or .png file. Print your file, stick it on a box and start filling out your inventory. Make an entry, drop the item in the box, make the next entry. Keep going until the box is full or you run out of stuff to put in it. Take your box to the garage, stick it on a shelf and forget about it. Next time you want to know what's in the box scan the code.

I've since expanded on this idea. Now when I set up a new box I name it "Thomas_Software_001" which means that the box is mine, it's software, and it's the first box of software. The next one will be called "Thomas_Software_002". I print those names on the label with the QR Code.

Now when I go to Google Docs I just pick the category of thing I'm looking for (software, cables, books etc.) and search the docs until I find what I want. If I'm in the garage and I want to know what's in the box I pull out my iPhone, snap the QR Code and I get a list. No opening required.

Try it out for yourself. Here's a QR Code that links to the Google Doc I set up for this post. Try it out, think about how you might put this technology together in a different way. If you think of something cool let me know.

More on QR Codes

My favorite QR Code Reader

QR Code Readers for Other Smart Phones