a minor technicality

neil dixon’s blog, journal, and list of stuff he does

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Japanese maple bonsai – the first steps

Japanese maple bonsai – the first steps

This weekend gave me the opportunity to initiate the training of the sorely neglected Japanese maple mentioned in this very recent bonsai post.
It needed some drastic action, and several years of work, but we have to start somewhere. The picture on the left shows the initial pruning and wiring of the Japanese maple (Acer Palmatum) [...]

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Best TV ever

Best TV ever

Those programmes, which is what we see, are odd, often dark, satirical and downright, nose-squirtingly funny sketches where stop-frame animated celebrity and movie/TV character figures are used and abused.Interestingly, the chicken doesn’t appear in the above graphic, nor does he seem to appear in the show after the titles…. It doesn’t quite have the same effect without the rather unique timbre of MeatWad’s voice, but here are some MeatWad and other classic Aquateen quotes.If you don’t have access to Bravo, then you can see full episodes at the [adult swim] website.

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A Minor Technicality Podcast #17 – a big dollop of ketchup

A Minor Technicality Podcast #17 – a big dollop of ketchup

Probably the dullest, most tedious spewing in Minor Technicality’s intermittent history. Just a bit of catching up on what’s been going on since the last podcast. Well almost, since there’s far more happening than can fit into one show!
< click to download standard MP3.
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Podcaster… meet new listener

Podcaster… meet new listener

It’s official, Linked Media Ltd. was formed today.The full details are to follow once we have everything more coherently and explicitly expressed, but basically the company was born out of my initial discussions with mobile telcos and mobile content suppliers about distributing podcasts to mobile phone users…. We are looking at the bigger picture: discovering new opportunities for podcasters even well before they are technically feasible, and preparing the way for what might be around the corner.If this all seems a little vague, then it is, intentionally, as we have a lot of detail still to work out about our proposition to both podcasters and content consumers and we understandably want to be sure the message is right.

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Still-born comedy: stay in the toilet (sorry, dressing room)

Still-born comedy: stay in the toilet (sorry, dressing room)

The increasingly drunk audience had been listening to 90 minutes of knob-gags and fanny-gags (that’s front-bottom to you Americans) and there I go on with my hilarious seven-minute routine about God messing up the creation of the universe, the world being taken over by intelligent onions, and finishing up with a garlic-themed rendition of the end of Planet of the Apes…. My knowledge of the card meanings meant when I picked “The Tower”, I knew it was going to be a bad night.*Open Spot: an opportunity to stand in front of an audience and do your stuff for a few minutes without: a) any form of financial compensation; b) an ounce of understanding or respect from the less scrupulous promoter that you’ve travelled for two hours to get there; c) any real chance to get a better spot later in the season like they promise because you are actually just a means of them filling stage time for as little money as possible.

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More items for the Christmas list

More items for the Christmas list

When the opportunity of a combined coconut-shaped drink container and coin bank comes your way, how can you possibly refuse. You bet, someone has designed one (see for yourself here).patentlysilly.com : Necessity is the mother of invention.

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Other people’s computers are scary

Other people’s computers are scary

I am sat in a basement IT department waiting less than patiently for the Apple OSX Developer Tools installation to download (just another 1hr 37mins to go*) so that I can finish some server tasks.
What I need to do is install some form of image handling capability with PHP – that means either GD or [...]

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Drupal clarity

Drupal clarity

Perhaps the most important thing is that it is now clearly the right choice as a core application for the project: an internal communications intranet for Dennis Publishing Ltd.The spec, to develop a non-corporate open inter-departmental communication system, reflected a social media style structure perfectly. Drupal’s accessible API and very extensible capabilities have provided me with a challenge but the kind I relish: a need to learn something new.I can’t say I entirely agree with the way Drupal handles certain things – in particular the lack of object classes in the code – but the creation of new functionality modules are relatively straightforward once you get in there and start playing around.

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InLine OutLine II

InLine OutLine II

The unbelievably accurate guide to starting skating
by Neil Dixon

Getting the skates on your feet and plucking up the courage to make an attempt at standing up is the easy part. The much more challenging part is in locating an appropriate area to skate in the first place.

When searching for an area there are a number [...]

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Tascam and OSX now playing happily

Tascam and OSX now playing happily

Something odd happened with Mac OSX 10.4 (Tiger) system sound: everything I recorded via my Tascam US-122 USB audio interface was recorded to disk at a slightly higher pitch.I found myself post-processing a couple of podcast recordings, artificially manipulating the pitch to stop my voice sounding like I was in a room filled with helium…. So I trashed the Tascam in favour of an available M-Audio Mobile-Pre (thanks, Jen) and all was well in podcast recording land, except that the Mobile-Pre is not hot-swappable – meaning it killed the system if it was plugged-in after boot-up [humph!].Now, with OSX Tiger 10.4.3, I am pleased to be back with my Tascam and it’s hot-swappable convenience.

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