Macaw web design tool: not quite ready

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If you have any interest in creating beautiful looking websites on a Mac or PC, you should check out Macaw, a new web tool that was just launched on March 31, 2014. I do not recall how I became aware of this tool a few weeks ago, but after watching a sneak preview video, it had my interest.

Macaw allows the easy creation of beautiful looking websites with very clean CSS, HTML and JavaScript code. As a Dreamweaver user (an older version), I have constantly been frustrated with how difficult it was to create a modern looking website. Apple’s iWeb made elegant sites with simple drag and drop, so why couldn’t a professional tool do the same? (iWeb made notoriously ugly code, and lacked the ability to customize templates or create library objects to use on multiple pages.)

Unfortunately, the 1.0 release of Macaw has a long way to go. While it does create beautiful code, there are so many bugs in the initial release that I have so-far found it practically unusable, spending hours trying to create a simple two page website. I have ran both the PC and Mac version, and each has its own quirks. (The PC version, for instance, can’t seem to remember my password and always launches with garbage characters in the login field. The Mac version has a nasty habit of going to a black screen and requiring a force-quit and restart.)

These bugs will no doubt be fixed in upcoming releases — it is version 1.0, after all.

But currently, the biggest issue is the complete lack of any kind of site templates. Every page you make is effectively an independent page. If you set up a page to be 800 pixels wide, and get it all perfect, then make a second page, that page is black and goes back to the default 1200 pixel width. (You can duplicate a page to work around this.)

If you create a perfect header and/or footer, then duplicate it on several other pages and decide you want to make a change to it (updating a copyright date or address), you have to manually go in and edit every page.

You can’t even make a simple list, numbered or otherwise.

There are currently huge items missing from Macaw that make it rather impractical for anything other than a very basic (but beautiful and elegantly coded) website. I might use it to replace all my one-off iWeb sites, but there is no way I can use it for anything large at this point.

My hope is I can use Macaw to create a beautiful single page, then open that page in Dreamweaver and convert it in to a template.

And if I can make that work, Macaw is going to be worth every penny.

Check out the trial. It has some mind blowing potential, but right now there are enough missing features that it’s not quite ready.

MacBook (late 2009) fan problem – solved!

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For some time, my 4+ year old MacBook (late 2009 model) has had an issue with the fan spinning up and being really noisy. For awhile, I thought it was just newer software (like the current GarageBand) being more CPU intensive, but Activity Monitor seldom showed anything agressing going on.

I used things like smcFanControl to show the temperature and RMPs of the fan, and only last night did I do some further searching and realize my fan was running much faster, and the temperature was much higher, than it should be.

I did some searching and found various people reporting the same issue, and also some claims that Apple started using smarter hard drive firmware that the Macs could talk to and detect temperature. I had swapped out my hard drive twice, and wondered if I was just running an incompatible hard drive that was confusing the MacBook…

…turn out, it was far simpler. I ran across this post:

http://nofilmschool.com/2009/02/how-to-fix-a-noisy-macbook-pro-fan/

…and he suggested just cleaning the fan. I took my MacBook apart (eight screws on the bottom, then one micro tiny fan plug and another larger plug – be careful with the small one – VERY careful, tiny pins), and then took three screws out to release the fan and one more tiny screw to open it up. I used a can of compressed air from Radio Shack (which I bet I’ve had for 15 years) and cleaned it all out. The rear air vent (inside) was also clogged.

After reassembly, the MacBook is quiet like it used to be.

Excellent.

UltraProjector (v1) and Mac and ffmpeg

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I have previously been able to convert video files to work with the UltraProjector using an old (2006) copy of “mencoder”. I now have been able to do it using the standard “ffmpeg” command. Here are the options, and I will try to clean them up and explain later:

I downloaded the “ffmpeg” command line utility from here:

http://www.evermeet.cx/ffmpeg/

And these are the options I was using to convert an MPEG4 video file to an AVI file that plays on the UltraProjector:

ffmpeg -i creepy.mp4 -c:v libxvid -vtag XVID -r 24 -b:a 128K -ar 44100 -acodec mp2 -b:v 512k -s qvga creepy.avi

  • -c:v libxvid … use the xvid video converter
  • -vtag XVID … put “XVID” as the video tag inside the file (not sure if this is necessary)
  • -r 24 … 24 fps (higher frame rate may work for simple videos, but may play slower)
  • -b:a 128k … audio quality 128kbits
  • -ar 44100 … audio sample rate 44khz
  • -acodec mp2 … audio codec MP2 (not sure if it handles other formats or not)
  • -b:v 512K … max video bitrate. Experiment with larger numbers for better video, but at some point it will break.
  • -s qvga … output size to 320×240

Moving the Arduino stuff to a new site…

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I have decided to move all the Arduino/programming related posts over to a different website. All of the existing posts have been moved to:

www.subethasoftware.com

This is the web page for my software company, Sub-Etha Software, that I co-founded back in 1990. It seemed to be a more appropriate place for discussing Arduino than on this Apple-inspired research site.

See you over there!

Fix a 1998 Furby that won’t wake up or start up (without disassembly)

162 Replies
  • 12/2014 Update: I keep planning to take some pics of the “screw thing” to post with this, but keep forgetting. Sorry about that.
  • 11/2015 Update: This is the most viewed article on my site. Who knew there were so many folks out there with bad Furbys!
  • 12/2016 Update: A year later, and folks are still finding this article. There were about 300 views of it on Christmas day. Retro presents, I guess?
  • 01/24/2017 Update: Commenter Samuel submitted a photo of the gear. It doesn’t look like the spiral gear I remember, so either there is another gear I missed, or there was a variation of the Furby

If your old Furby won’t wake up or won’t start up and appears dead, you may be able to fix it in a few seconds without having to take it apart.

I recently tried to get my original 1998 Furby to work, and found that it was dead. I spent some time doing unsuccessful web searches, with none of the tips (“try new batteries”, “press the reset button”) helping. A second Furby has the same issue, and it looked like it might be related to a jammed motor, per this tutorial:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Push-Start-a-Comatose-Furby/

This procedure involved all kinds of disassembly, sewing things back together and hot glue. A similar YouTube video shed more light on the problem off the stuck motor:

http://youtu.be/fNaNM4_fKTo

I suspected you could just get to the motor using a small screwdriver and going in around the eye or beak, and indeed, it works. I was able to use a tiny flathead screwdriver, inserted above the beak and in to the left to gently rotate the corkscrew spiral connected to the motor a few times and within seconds, the Furby was alive again. Both units were fixed this easy, with no disassembly required.

Update: Thanks to Samuel (http://twitter.com/samsearight), we now have a photo. On my Furby, there is a corkscrew spiral gear I moved, and not this normal gear. I don’t know if the gear is also in mine or if this is a different revision. It looks easier to work with than the gear I found in mine. Thanks, Samuel!

Apple Maps: Your milage may vary.

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I just read a reference to Apple’s “struggling” map software. Like many things that get “reported” in the blogosphere, they are often repeating the echo chamber of things observed or researched by others, or they are sharing one tiny sliver of experience as fact as if everyone experiences it the same way.

When it comes to Apple Maps on iOS 6, I must say, I am quite impressed. You see, there is a small connecting road on the East side of Des Moines that my 2005 Toyota Prius navigation system never knew about. It would always route many blocks out of the way to go around it.

My 2007 navigation system, likewise, also did not know about. And neither did an additional map update I purchased for it at great cost.

My 2010 3rd generation Prius navigation system also does not seem to think it exists, nor did a map update for it.

Two TomTom models, years apart, do not know it exists, even after being reported with the community “suggest corrections” feature TomTom brags about.

I believe I even tested a Magellan navigation unit to find it also did not know about this road.

Surprisingly, to me, the one map that did have it was OpenStreetMaps – the open source wikipedia of maps. Amazing that they knew about this road, while Google, Navtec, TomTom, etc. did not seem to believe that it existed — even though it had been there for ages.

Google, today, does show this section of the road, but I believe that was not the case a few years ago.

And Apple Maps also shows it. Not only that, but Apple Maps can correctly navigate me from my housing area to the Main Street without jumping me through the forest nearby like everything else does. None of the systems I have used had the connecting driveway that links my area with the road, so they often jump to the closest pavement they can find, which is over the river and through the woods.

Apple Maps is the first map software I have used that correctly pinpoints where I live, and knows how to get there without just getting close.

So from my perspective, it’s a huge improvement over many other maps I have used and reviewed over the years.

But your milage may vary.

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Stay tuned…

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Greetings. All the old content from my former Applause site, including the postings on FireWIre/SATA and UltraProjector, will be migrated to this WordPress blog shortly.

Until then, enjoy the blandness of a generic install.

2012: The Year of 3-D

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RAR (Random Apple Rumor, see 2007 post) of the day…

Apple will announce its 3-D imitative. “3-D is big in the movie industry right now, but it hasn’t made it successfully to the home. Other companies have been trying 3-D for years, but we think we can do it better.”

1. The Apple TV that is an actual TV will be a 3-D TV. Since 3-D TVs already carry a premium price, having one that also does Apple TV stuff won’t seem to have too much of an “Apple tax” associated with it. Killer industrial design AND “Apple Eye” glasses that will be better and cheaper than existing ones will be the feature that makes them better.
2. The iTunes 3-D Movie Store will provide content.
3. The new iPhone 3D and iPod Touch 3D will allow consumers an easy way to record their own 3-D movies.
4. iMovie 3-D will allow easy 3-D processing, including adding 3-D titles (user selectable depth).
5. Output to red/blue anaglyph (or direct uploading to YouTube, since they support 3-D) will be part of it.
6. 2012 will be the year of 3-D.

Based on nothing. (Well, except a supposed “next iPhone” case photo that shows a hole in each corner, spaced like they are spaced on the 3-D Aiptek/Viewsonic cameras… Sure, they said it was for a flash, but…)

AIPTEK 3D HD Camcorder i2 & Mac p2

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Updates:

  • 2017-01-10: Reformatted for WordPress.

Here are some things I have learned so far:

See also: Part 1

My camera shipped with FW Ver 1504, Jul 23 2010. HWVer 10B1.

  1. There is a firmware update (build 160) available on the European site for AIPTEK, but not on the US site. It fixes a frame rate issue that reviews seem to complain about. Why this update is not available in the US (the archive comes with English and it appears to work fine) is unknown. You can find it here.
  2. My unit had a color issue, where the right side image (right eye/camera) had a reddish tint to it. I wrote tech support and they responded within 24 hours, and we had a few e-mails back and forth during the day. They provided me with another firmware update (180, Ver 1803 Oct 11 2010) but it did not resolve the problem. They suggested I return the unit to Amazon, so I did. I requested an exchange on Friday, and Amazon shipped out the replacement “next day” (via Amazon Prime of my original order I suppose) and I picked up the replacement and shipped back my original the following Monday. (Wow, Amazon!)
  3. To install updates, you copy two files to an SD card (the instructions say to use 4GB or smaller, but it worked fine on my 16GB card — to be safe, follow their instructions). One file is an .elf (probably the standard debugger file format) and the other is AipFwUpgrade.txt, an empty file that is probably a trigger file the camera will look for. The card is inserted back in to the camera, and when you power it up and the update will proceed. Once complete, you have to remove these files from the SD card via a computer else the update will happen every time you power up. I found that you can mount the camera and copy the files over to it, directly, then let it update, but you still need to put the SD card in a card reader on a computer to remove them.
  4. There is also an update to the Windows PC software that comes on the virtual “CDImage” you see when you plug in the camera to a computer. This update can be found here too. Just like the firmware update, you copy two files over to an SD card (a .iso CD image file, and AipUpdateISO.txt trigger file) and put it back in the camera then turn it on. When done, you have to delete these files (just like with the firmware updates). This is a very decent system for doing updates.
  5. The files uploaded to YouTube (videos) are split screen squished — meaning for a 1920×720 image, you are seeing two 640×720 images squished together. YouTube can handle 3-D video if you add special keyword tags — in this case, the tags added by the AIPTEK ArcSoft software are “yt3d:enable=true”, “yt3d:swap=true” and “yt3d:aspect=16:9”. These are added by the ArcSoft software on upload, which means the software is not really doing anything special. I confirmed this by trying to upload the same .MP4 file directly to YouTube via the website, and received a “duplicate file” warning.
  6. YouTube will display the split screen file as various forms of red/blue anaglyph, interlace or checkerboard formats. This is nice, meaning you can let them do all the translations for your friends to watch however they want (even side by side or cross eye formats for viewing without glasses). BUT, viewing these files outside of a web browser (iPhone, iPad, etc.) will display only the split screen squished video as, apparently, the 3-D stuff is not handled by mobile devices (yet?).
  7. There is no Mac software, but it is quite easy to convert the video inside of Final Cut Express by layering the video on two tracks, applying the Levels filter to the top track and setting Red output tolerance to 0, then applying two instances of Level filter to the bottom copy, and setting one to Blue tolerance 0 and the other to Green tolerance 0, then setting top track to a mix so it shows through. This requires rendering and is slow, but produces good red/blue anaglyph results. Details on how to do this I found on this DVINFO.net message board years ago. Their suggestion of using “Screen” composite mode did not produce good results for me, but using Overlay worked fine.
  8. Conversion of photos on a Mac is my next project. There are quite a few programs out now for dealing with the Fuji W3 3-D camera, but I have not checked any of them yet to see if they also handle the side-by-side split screen format.
  9. There is no adjustment (seemingly) for parallax on the Aiptek. Back when I was using the NuView 3-D camcorder lens adapter (see also: Stereocam), there was a knob you turned to adjust the distance of the image. You would basically line up the two ghost images of whatever you wanted to be on the surface of the TV — anything in front of that would jump out of the TV, and anything behind it would recess in to the TV. This meant you could record something five feed away and adjust it so 4 feet popped out, and 6 feet went in. Or if you recorded something 20 feet away, you could set that as the neutral “flat” part. The Aiptek has no such adjustment (the W3 apparently does). The default distance appears to be around 10 feet, so trying to record anything too close (like something within a few feet) causes very bad ghosting — so this is best used for wide shots, and not close ups.

I will post more updates when I have time. I have to charge up the replacement camera and see if it handles color any better.