Countdown to the New Year

Take a look at this: http://www.timeanddate.com/counters/newyear.html?p0=224

We only have so much time left before it's 2010 in the Pacific Time Zone.  Also, take note that according to a KCBS news broadcast, the proper pronunciation of "2010" is "twenty ten."  That will take some time to get used to.

<img src=" " alt="" style="display: none;" height="1" width="1" /><div>Created by OnePlusYou</div>

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Hard drive replacement and installation of Ubuntu

Here we have my new hard drive placed in the laptop, and Ubuntu as my choice of OS for the time being, since I don't have a Windows install disk.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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Ubuntu 9.10

I don't really like the default theme for Ubuntu 9.10.  At least they didn't change the start up music.

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Flight Gear

I am extremely impressed with the rendering capability of Flight Gear with only the Intel GMA.  I'll make a quick flight video later, assuming the program is able to produce good frame rates with Fraps.

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Dell Inspiron 1525 Laptop - Hard Drive failure

Here we are, the hard drive that is not functional anymore.

The story: this morning I managed woke up and saw that the laptop said "Windows cannot find boot disk" and I was thought to myself, "Uh."  Thinking a quick switch off with the power button would solve the problem, the computer booted normally, and then I got to the welcome screen.  I signed in, and thinking the computer was simply being slow and not responding, I just turned it off, since I was in a hurry to leave for San Francisco.  When I got to my aunt's house in San Francisco, I turned on the computer and heard clicking sounds. I knew I was doomed.  But getting very bored, I went ahead and booted windows normally.  Amazingly, I was able to sign in, and my wallpaper displayed, and then it stopped responding, with only the stupid click of death.

And what was the size of the computer's hard drive...250 GB.  It had two partitions - one for Windows 6 and the other for Windows 7.  But either way, I basically lost about 230 GB of data, since there was about 9 GB of free space on one partion and 2 GB of free space on the other partition. 

And here is a list of some programs I need to re-install when I get my replacement:

• Microsoft Flight Simulator X*^
• Microsoft Office^
• Firefox*^
  
• Sibelius 5^
• Google Earth
• Google Talk*
  
• iTunes and QuickTime*
  
• Adobe Premiere Elements 7.0
• CamStudio
• Fraps (Demo)
  
• Any Video Converter
• Avira Antivir

*these programs are used daily
^these programs are unnecessarily hard to install

As for a replacements:
http://www.frys.com/search?search_type=regular&sqxts=1&query_string=notebook+hard+drive&cat=48938&submit.x=0&submit.y=0

This is just one untimely incident, since this winter break was supposed to be my time to BACKUP and ORGANIZE my files - and I just got started not too long ago too............

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FSX Southwest Airlines San Francisco to Denver

Here is my much labored project for creating a flight video in FSX.  As far as I'm concerned, I think I really need a better graphics card, since that scenery in Denver is well...nothing.  All I see are mountains in the distance, and the runway.  Auto-generated scenery should do the trick, and if not, I can always try to search for add on scenery.

As for the music, I found Kevin MacLeod's Sunshine, which he released under a Creative Commons Attribution License 3.0, meaning I don't have to use my own music (which doesn't really fit) or deal with the issues of using copyrighted music.

One little trick I managed to discover in making transitions is to slow down the fading.  Basically I never thought about the possibility of a transition that takes 3-4 seconds to fade in a new image, that has shifted a bit from it's starting position.  This is seen at 3:06-3:09 in this video.

Happy Birthday to You

Happy Birthday to Christian,

Yeah, here's a recap of things that you may remember for the years we've known each other, much like the one we did for the other person.

1. If I remember correctly, we first met in 1st grade in Ohlone.  Our moms introduced us to each other.
2. You later introduced me to Chelsea late in 3rd grade out of boredom.
3. Sometime between 2nd and 3rd grade we managed to go to your house to play, along with Chelsea, since both Chelsea's mom and my mom were busy after school.
4. We unofficially formed the "KND," with you being 3, since you were the "goofy" one.
5. I have no idea if you managed to work on that newsletter and/or newspaper that I unofficially published out of boredom for a while.
6. Fifth grade promotion ceremony...I don't remember I we have pictures together.  I just remember that my dad rushed me out of there before I got a chance to say bye to everyone.
7. We had no classes together in 6th grade, and I still clearly remember your voice as you told me your math teacher was Mr. Harbour, accounting for the separation between you and me in general.
8. Arg, we didn't see each other enough in 7th grade for me to remember anything.  I account this to my weird schedule with Algebra I.
9. "U R Hella SMRT... get DUMMER!  You make me feel hella stupid. J/K - CHRIS TIAN :)" - You wrote that in my yearbook in 8th grade.
10. We had Ms. Headington in 9th grade and I remember your little seminar on transgenders faintly.  I don't know, but you acted very professional for that presentation as far as I remember.
    
11. In 10th grade, we again didn't see each other enough.  But I do remember one moment as you were walking to the middle school side with me (and possibly Ellango), when Hudson canceled the AP Bio study session.  Or something like that.  All I remember is that you told me you like bio.
12. Here's where the fun begins, for junior year.  Day 1, all of us crazy juniors walked into Litvin for AP Lang, and Chelsea told me to sit by behind her and Mendoza, so I jumped on top of the seats and took a seat there.  Incidentally you also sat next to her.
13. You started complaining about AP Chem and how it's a difficult class in AP Lang, right after I was complaining about how AP Physics is such an American class.  I wonder why I found this moment amusing.
14. There is no point 14, since that's what I did last time.
15. I got you to go to my birthday party in September, along with a bunch of other people.  You guys all took turns being co-pilots and screwed up the plane and/or helicopter that you guys were playing with.  Then we watched a bunch of YouTube videos.  Too bad you couldn't go to the dinner.  And of course, thanks for the T-shirt you got me. My mom basically put it somewhere safe where I can't find anymore.
    
16. Sometime in APUSH, you managed to be very American, and called rude people by "butt hole," and complained that people told you to "shut up."  And after that, everyone started laughing and/or getting really annoyed with you, telling you to get yourself under control.
17. Today in AP Lang, everyone sang a "Happy Birthday" to you, and I called you old.

Yeah, a list of 17 moments and/or memories for you 17 years of age.  Since you are a Christian as well, you're "supposed to forgive" me for any insults that may have been enumerated here.  Regardless, enjoy the holidays ahead of us, and I can safely and wish you a "Merry Christmas."  Or the politically correct "happy holidays," your choice.

Sincerely,

Montgomery Zzyzx

*And I kinda forgot about Darlena's and Julian's birthdays, for two days earlier.  I'll make a post for you two next year...I promise. And also, all people who can, please comment on the post.

Blog Birthday and 100th Post

I remember one year ago, I started blogging on Blogger because I wanted to actually have a blog that would be public, unlike this informal one I kept on Windows Live Space.  Basically, I think I have come a long way from my first blog post on Blogger.  Since then, I've played around quite a bit, and I'm going to have a quick history of my online presence of "mzzyzx."

Here is my absolute first blog post ever, written in Windows Live Spaces:

Windows Live Spaces would have been a pretty good service, since it covers all the areas of social networking quiet well. However, I use Gmail much, much more, so I decided to play around in Blogger for a while.

Prior to playing around with Blogger, I managed to screw up stuff in my Google Sites wiki. Basically, this is the places where I categorize all of my school assignments into somewhat reasonable pages.  I haven't done that in a while, and I'll get working on that over winter break.

Sometime in January, I figured it would be worth my time taking a look at Posterous, since my AP World History teacher, and now Journalism II teacher, Ms. Wojo, suggested it to her students for their field trip project in her blog post and our class website: "Want really simple? Try Posterous. Just upload your photos or videos there. In a jiffy." That sounded encouraging, so I went ahead and gave it a try.

Now why did I give it a try?  It was because I was trying to find a place to hold mp3 files for a podcast, and to just embed mp3 files to play back.  In my post about Podbean.com, I managed to embed one of the mp3 files from SibeliusMusic.com, where I publish my music.  In general, I find that the flash player Posterous uses for playing files looks more elegant than the Podbean player.  Plus, Posterous' RSS feed also doubles as an iTunes podcast, so that's why I never got around to actually using Podbean.com.

Sometime after my summer at UCI, I had a good deal of pictures to send back to my friends via Flickr.  I was thinking that I got a yearly subscription as a pro user, so it would be worth my time sending that stuff to people under a more memorable URL.  Therefore I changed my default photostream URL to http://www.flickr.com/photos/mzzyzx, instead of that weird address with letters and numbers.

As a journalist for Hercules High School, I figured it would be worth my time playing around WordPress, so I made a blog there as well.  I tried making a layout for a possible journalism website, which is at this blog. There is only one post so far, and it was an auto-publish post from Google Docs, where I was working on a commentary on UCI.

Finally, the last thing left over is YouTube.  I have posted stuff on this blog under the YouTube username doctorknockers204.  Basically I decided I want to make one single identity online, so I created a new channel for mzzyzx, on Oct. 20.

So that is a partial history of my online presence.  It honestly isn't that important, since I really don't get many visitors to this blog, my wiki, or any of my other blogs.  However, one last thing worth looking at is this web search.

Recap of my Summer at UCI

As I am approaching my 100th blog post, I wanted to make a link to all of the posts I made over the summer at COSMOS.  I'll go ahead and begin with some posts I made a few days prior to the program, since that was part of my experience as well.

Sunday, June 28  

Introduction to the the watered down life of a college student

Monday, June 29

UC Irvine Pictures - Dorm Room and Bookstore

Landing at Princess Juliana Airport - Air Canada Boeing 777

Here we are, my third Microsoft Flight Simulator X video, and second landing video.  I did a much smoother landing with the Bombardier CRJ700, since I've been playing around with that plane for a lot longer than this Boeing 777 I got.

I was actually looking at Air Canada's website, and they actually use a Boeing 767 for a flight from Toronto to St. Marteen.  Either way, I really want to visit that airport when I am older.

Physics Problem

I was working on my physics homework and I saw this problem:

The answer is definitely number 9.

Chimes through the Mist

Here is the piece I am playing for my recital this Saturday.  I find the piece to be very calming, and it sounds like winter.  However, my friend pointed out that the title is interesting, since one hears chimes, and not sees them.  Therefore, he reasoned, "mist" is relatively unimportant in how the music sounds like, since no one cares about how the mists look like.

Either way, I made a recording of the piece for my enjoyment, and after producing the music, it just made me realize how much I miss Logic Express from COSMOS.  I probably forgot some of the skills I learned since I haven't played around with it in so long.

Boeing 787

Photo by Yasobara

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/16/us/16flight.html

Yay, the plane is finally here...

Fitness Training at CCC

View Larger Map

Today I am happy to say that I finished my 1 unit course of fitness training.  Now that I can't take PE at CCC anymore, I have to head over to DVC now, and take a year of PE at school.  I'll see how this turns out.

Pictures from Mr. Brown's Classroom

I was rummaging through a memory card I haven't touched since June, and I happened to find some pictures I took of Mr. Brown's (my Journalism teacher for 2008-2009) classroom.  I miss his cluttered and highly decorated room.

Looking at the Classroom from the Door

Classroom from Rear Right

His Blue Chair

The Man Next to His Board

His Sink

Pictures Near His Cabinet

(Mr. Brown, if you see this, congratulations for finding me on the Internet!)

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Hercules Christmas Tree Lighting

The Hercules Tree Lighting was held on Friday, Dec. 7, and I feel it is my duty as a journalist to share the stuff I managed to get for this year.  I linked to the photo I uploaded on Flickr and the YouTube video I have of the countdown to the lighting.  The picture was taken two days after the event in the day time, but it's basically the same as it looked on Friday.  As for the video, I apologize that the Flip Mino I used to record the countdown isn't of the best quality.

Christmas Tree at Day Time

Countdown to Lighting

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