nano's blog

Internet Birth Party

a few years ago i noticed a sad sign that indicated the forgotten place of the birth of the internet.

now it's been restored & there is a proper party ! 

even better it's just a few doors down from one of the labs i work in when out here. 

concatenate video files into single video file

this script merges multiple video files into a single file, while preserving quality and maintaining audio synch.

requires ffmpeg and libfaac & libx264

Download ConcatN

wrote it for use on osx but should work fine on linux. note hardcoded params / etc. but usage is easy:

./concatN.sh outputfile.mov infile1.mov ... infileN.mov

Korg MX 1 repair

fixing MX1's step LEDs that have been nonfunctional ever since I got it.

That is, every *other* light works... so it's rather difficult to use without a computer, which is the whole reason I got it...

thanks to a friend I got the service manual & am able to locate part... a few weeks and this'll be back & as good as new.

 

back up remote drive while mounted (without dd)

ha !

this actually worked to back up a remote machine's drive while mounted

just copied & works locally, perfectly

;)

cat /dev/mmcblk0 | ssh user@wherever.com "cat > ~/disk_image.img"

Oligodendrocyte Precursor Immortalized Cell Line - 20k

crowdsourced commercial biotech (!)

 

 (not to be mistaken with free biotech)

1982 movies

Last night when seeing Tron Legacy, i thought that ET, Star Trek, Empire Strikes Back, and Tron came out in the same year.

i was only 62% correct.

Blade Runner, ET, Tron came out in 1982.

so did Fast Times at Ridgemont High, First Blood, Poltergeist, Annie, The Dark Crystal, Pink Floyd's The Wall, Airplane 2, Secret of NIMH, etc...

But Empire was 1980, and Star Trek Wrath of Kahn was 82.

Star Trek: The Motion picture is fantastic with it's near-barbarella psychedelia, and it's rather fascinating how cool that a motion picture happens so soon after a NASA probe is launched that is the core of it's plot (Voyager was launched in 1977).

How to make a 'Light Cycle'

This is a cocktail we invented & served just before seeing Tron: Legacy

and it happened to look exactly like the same glowing blue liquid they serve in the film.

2 oz blue vodka
2 oz lime juice
1 oz orange liquor

(basically a kamikaze with blue raspberry vodka) 

We also served sidecars (to match the lightcycle) a 'Gibsoneque' martini, with starburst on the skewer instead of onions.

alas, the Mobeus cocktail didn't turn out so well, nor did the glowing LED throwies for the drinks. next time ! 

Shanghai -> Chi

shanghai was a blast.

happy to be home.

pix:

shanghai 2010

vid:

Inside the Seed Cathedral from nanodust on Vimeo.

2003 in a box

need an IDE drive to upgrade OSX so i can get new SDK working on ipod

so... dig thru the bin... and look what i find !

a HD backup of the men's bathroom mirror from Rodan in 2003

It ran mandrake... 

I didn't know linux so well yet, and i couldn't get the webcams working in slackware or redhat. 

tThank you effectv... Was a good run!

 

(video of it in effect)

 

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mt palomar

after growing up with many an image in astronomy textbooks credited Palomar... i finally got to see it ! 

thanks to oceanside photo & telescope for putting together an amazing outreach program w/ palomar... nothing like a palomar tour, day of lectures & bbq to prepare you for a star party... 

i saw m4, m5, m31, m51, saturn, venus, and so many others. really truly amazing. 

(also thanks to Celestron, they rotated the barrel of my binoculars - very happy to see the collomation problem was in the instrument, and not my own eyes ;)

mt palomar was the biggest telescope for almost 50 years - designed in 30s, mirror built & sat unused for 11 years during WWII... finally finished in 51 or so... reigning champ until 1995. amazing ! 

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