4HB Diet...Day #3

BREAKFAST:
Same as before

LUNCH:

My lunch was a little experiment. I took two hard boiled eggs mixed it with tuna and salsa. I must say it wasn't that bad. I actually liked it. 

The aftermath of mixing

DINNER:

This had to be my favorite meal so far. I decided to get a little crafty in the cooking department for this one. The meat is pork tenderloin and I added some peas. The "Mashed Potatoes" are just some white beans that mashed while I cooked them on the stove top. I added a few spices and it was awesome.

4 Hour Body Day 2 Meals

BREAKFAST:

More Protein 

LUNCH:

Spinach with egg, chicken, and salsa

DINNER:

Two pieces of chicken breast with broccoli and a salad. (From Bob Evans)

I forgot to mention that I take one of these a day. I take the calcium with my dinners and I take the magnesium right before bed. 

Four Hour Body....Body Hack by Savesthesilence

I am in the process of trying a new diet. This diet is named the "Slow Carb Diet" from the book "4 Hour Body" By Tim Ferriss. I figured the best way for me to keep on track is to blog about it. There are a few basics in this diet.

1) No white carbs...I am basically ruling out all bread for this one.

2) Eat the same few meals over and over again. The diet should consist of Proteins, Legumes (Beans), and Vegetables.

3) Don't Drink your calories. No beer...FFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUU. I need to stick to Coffee (I drink it black anyways), Tea (Unsweetened), and Water (LOTS OF WATER!!).

4)No Fruit. There is some technical data that Tim comes up with. I didn't understand most of it. I am his subject and I will abide by his rules!

5) I call this "My Favorite Rule". Eat like a maniac for one day. Yup, you heard it here. Eat and drink anything you want once a week. I chose Saturday as my "Soon to be in a food coma" day.

Now there is much much more to this diet. I highly suggest you pick up the book. There are plenty of other "body hacks" in there like how to hold your breath for 5 minutes. But enough of the back story here were my meals for Monday.


BREAKFAST:
I didn't have much for breakfast. Tim says that you need to eat within the first hour of waking up. Preferably within 30 minutes. He also suggest that you have 30 grams of protein. My solution is this shake for breakfast with a hardboiled egg.

LUNCH:

I made my lunch the night before. This consisted of Spinach, Steak, Hard Boiled Egg, Kidney Beans, and Oil/Vinaigrette Dressing.

DINNER:

My dinner consisted of Chicken Breast, Peas, Salsa, and Lentils. 

So far, the food I have been eating tasted great. The shake is a little thick but the taste is tolerable. Now, some of you may be asking why is this in a tech blog. The answer would be because I am compiling some technical data for you guys/gals to take a look at. I am documenting weight and measurements. I hope you enjoy and post any questions in the comments. Thanks!

What.

So, I don't know what to expect of this. A little background to the whole project. I will be picking up the server tomorrow and probably just fooling around with it for a little bit to see what I can do without teh internetz and all that surrounding it. Someone I know was given a server from someone else. The original owner was just going to throw it out (I am seriously doubting logic here but it gets worse) but gave it to someone else to use. The person who was giving it away was changing their office computers all over to macs instead of using pc's (I know, why!?!?!) and they also handed over three pretty new (within the year) ibm pc's. I will also be getting one of those computers as well and maybe two because none of the people who have had possession of them need them or have any idea what to do with them. Being a computer science major, I can hardly hold in joy.

Holy fucking shit I can't wait. Going to pick up this bad boy tomorrow and was told that I could possibly get a hernia the thing is so big. I am so fucking excited to get it.

Okay, now back to professionalism here. I can go more into detail as to what the complete background story is for this, but I won't because it is a little detailed and contains some personal information about the people involved that I want to figure out how to remove without taking out the description needed in the story. If you would like me to, just ask here or on teh other site.

Basically, I have two ideas. The first being a temporary thing. I may want to create a "Watson" computer. You may have seen the new contestant on jeopardy recently which is a super-computer created by IBM that is able to interpret the human language and answer questions based on words and sentences. This will only be temporary as I wish to do other things with it and don't want to restrict it to my own personal use.

The second idea is to create a private site for Team_Awesome that can be accesses by anyone who wishes to join and post content. It may be along the lines of a private tracker. This, of course, would bring in the issue of security. While I have the utmost respect and trust with all of you, it isn't you guys who are the problem (well, most of you anyways). Several things would need to be put into play here. How much content it can hold, how you will be able to access the site (password, ranking process) and who will be able to access it (been in TA for x months, dedicated contributors to the subreddit/other places) and what type of security measure should be put into place to keep it safe for all who want to access it and all who wish to gather data.

Yeah, I know that this is still an idea, I really want to go ahead with it. These are my thoughts so far on it.

Storage:
I don't know exactly how much space it holds. Knowing the person who bought it, it definitely wasn't a cheap purchase (which makes me question why it was almost trashed). I am positive that I will put money into expanding the space if I have to. This aspect should not be much of a problem.

Access:
I want to put into place some kind of heirarchy. Look, this isn't because I want to exclude people. That is the last thing on my mind, it is simply to make it so it functions properly as a community. Rankings will hold no true power abilites, but will allow you to do certain things (i.e. access certain uploads or information or whatnot). I don't want to exclude people, but I also don't want to put people at risk so if it happens as planned, you will need some sort of permission or invite or something to gain access initally. I want to point out again, I DO NOT want to exclude people, that isn't what TA is about and I definitely don't view myself as that type of person either. Anything that restricts a users access to certain areas will be purely for security.

Securtiy:
I have a lot of researching to do in this part. I literally have no clue what to do with this as I just found out I was getting it within the past few days. I have printed out a few things, but if anyone could suggest ideas to implement or places to look, they would be graciously appreciated and responded with a heart-felt "thank you".

That is the end of my part, now I need some input from anyone who has some ideas or experience in anything with this. I need to know what needs to be done and how far I could possibly take this (or how short for that matter).

Splicing audio wire to create a longer cable

This is a simple guide to creating longer audio cables to go from your receiver to your speakers. Keep in mind, these are very low quality cables that I am using and should (probably) not be used for higher end equipment. Also note that this is only if you want to splice two wires together and not waste cable you already have. If you want to just make a completely new wire, just cut the ends as I have instructed later and input them into the proper spots.

To show you what I am dealing with, here is my receiver:



And here is one of the speakers I am connecting to: (as you can tell my room is a mess)



You will need a few things for this process (some obvious, some less obvious, some optional)

-The two wires you will be connecting (Make sure you have the correct length to reach from your speaker to your receiver, Measure twice, cut once! And always give yourself some extra wire to work with)
-Make sure that both of your wires are red and black (or whatever color your speaker/receiver have). One set of mine is flat grey and the other is red and black which will make it difficult setting up which side goes to which but I will show you a method that will help a tiny bit
-Electrical tape (Very heavily recommended although not completely required, basically if you don't have it you will most likely get heavy interference)
-Special wire-cutter with different slot for different sizes (Optional but makes the job a heck of a lot easier than using your fingers to pry off the outside of the wire)
-Receiver and Speakers (Pretty obvious, not shown)



(It is pretty obvious that I am writing this while I am in the process of doing it. This is simply because I wanted to listen to music but someone had sucked up my wire and I needed to completely redo it. Instead of getting it done in two seconds, I figured I would make a tutorial.)



Now that you have all of your items together, separate the wire ends and cut the plastic off of the tips of all of your wire. Set up the wire on your cutter as shown in the picture above, clench the handles, and pull. When you remove the outer lining, twist the copper so that all the strands make one strong piece. Your wires should look like those pointed out in the picture.



The three wires shown here are 1) the original wire uncut 2) the wire I cut (greyish) 3) the factory made wire (red and black).

Some points on your wires:
-You can cut off the outer layer twice as much and then fold in half what you have revealed to make a more dense looking wire connection, but this will not do much aside from give you a sense of a secure connection
-Make sure you twist your wire ends, this will provide a more solid connection as the current will run through the whole thing all at once instead of hitting each spliced end


When you get here, wrap the wires around each other (red to red, black to black) of the wires you wish to connect it to. Do this as you would a wire-tire. After you have done so, wrap each one in electrical tape hitting the plastic part first so that the tape stays secure while you wrap the rest otherwise it will slip off the wire end. Here is a picture of both the twisting and wrapping steps. (It is easier to twist with a needlenose plier if you have one of those lying around)



What I noticed during this process was that one of my grey cable wires was silver and the other copper. I used this to my advantage and made the silver connect to black and copper connect to red. This will help me locate which one to use at the speaker end of the cable.

After you have twisted and wrapped each pair of wire, wrap both of them together with some electrical tape, but not too much if you want to remove it later on. Put your wires in correctly on both ends (receiver and speaker) but don't worry if you don't hear sound initially, just mix and match the wires, you most likely put the wrong one in the wrong spot.



As a final note, you are able to piggy back multiple speakers from one output but I would not recommend it on this size gauge wire. Instead, if you want to do this, get a different gauge wire that supports more current and wrap two (or more) around the connection point as you would have done with just one wire. Viola, you now have extended speaker wire.

Streaming Media on Linux to your Xbox 360 with Ushare

I want to apologize, first off, for my tutorials being so long. I seem to get very detailed and long-winded in my writing. I hope you don't mind.

(Note: if by chance you are not having success with this, you may need to provide an exception in your firewall for Ushare)

Our goal is to end up with a simple non-intrusive operation that streams movies and music to our xbox. Currently, High Definition Movies are not supported, but if you already know how to change them to mp4's then go ahead and do so. Here is some information on what the xbox currently supports:

Your Xbox 360 supports a variety of video formats, with playback quality dependent on the type of video you are attempting to play. Read through these specifications and tips to understand the capabilities of streaming media from your PC to your Xbox 360

Supported File Types
The Xbox 360 supports AVI, WMV, MPEG-4 Part 2, H.264 and QuickTime movie formats. The file extensions included are as follows: .avi, .divx, .wmv, .mp4, .m4v, .mp4v, and .mov.

Video Playback
For video files with the WMV container, playback occurs at 15 Mbps (Mega-Bytes Per Second) with a resolution of 1920 x 1080. Files with the H.264 container have the same resolution, but are played back at 10 Mbps. For AVI and MPEG-4 Part 2 video files, playback is 5 Mbps at 1280 x 720 resolution.

Audio Playback
The Xbox 360 supports WMA 7-9 and Lossless audio profiles for WMV video formats.Dolby Digital and MP3 profiles are supported in AVI formats. For MPEG-4 Part 2 and H.264 encoded videos, the console supports only two-channel AAC audio encoding.

Streaming Video
With Zune software, the Xbox 360 can stream unprotected AVI, MPEG-4 Part 2, H.264, and WMV video formats. Through Windows Media Player, protected and unprotected WMV videos can be streamed.

Streaming Tips
Download a third-party video codec package to expand the amount of video formats you can stream using the Windows Media Player. For better playback, convert video files into the more Mircosoft user-friendly WMV format using a third-party video conversion program.
Source: Video Playback & Audio Streaming FAQ for the Xbox 360
Source: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100413121045AALfcHy
Step One (easy way): Using synaptic package manager
Go into System → Administration → Synaptic Package Manager and search ushare. There are two packages that need to be installed, ushare and libdlna0. As you can see, they have a green box next to them showing that I have them installed already. Install both of these and wait for the installer to complete.



Step Two: Edit your configurations
After you install these two, you should be up and ready to edit you configuration to share with your xbox. (If for some reason you get an error by trying to edit this file or when the file pops up it is blank, type into terminal, “sudo apt-get install ushare” and if you still have problems after that, feel free to contact me) Open up a terminal session and type in:
sudo gedit /etc/ushare.conf

The reason I use gedit is because I don't have to use the arrows to move up and down constantly, I can use my mouse. Any text editor works, so if you want to try something new then replace “gedit” with “nano”, “vi”, or any other text editor that you are aware of.



As you can see from the picture above, these are my settings for my ushare.conf. There are a few specific things that you need to have enabled. One thing most importantly is that you should definitely fill in any part that does not say “default is …” mainly because it needs to read it and won't perform otherwise.
USHARE_NAME= This is where you will put how you want to recognize your pc by name
USHARE_IFACE= This is what connection you want to use to connect to your network
eth0 is usually your automatic eth0 and your wired connection
eth1 is usually the wifi that you are currently connected to
If neither of these work, run in terminal “iwconfig” and “ifconfig”. This will tell you what connections you are currently attached to and in my case, eth1. (Desktops will usually be eth1 and laptops eth0)
USHARE_PORT= This is telling you what ports you should listen to. I have been recommended not to go above 49200 and have seen many times people using 49153 and it worked well for me. I would recommend using that number and seeing how it works, it most likely will.
USHARE_TELNET_PORT= This is if TELNET is enabled which shouldn't be so just put 1337
USHARE_DIR= Here you need to find the entire route to where your media is stored. As you can see in mine, it is filled with numbers. This will not be the case with yours only because I partitioned 1/3 of my 1Tb drive I forgot to name it something easy to type like DAISY which I have for the other 2/3's of the partition.
To find your path, simply go to the drive and right-click and hit properties, it will be in there. You can either copy and paste it or type it in by site.
USHARE_OVERRIDE_ICONV_ERR= I don't know exactly what this does yet but I am looking into it. I was instructed to enable this and it hasn't caused any glitches so far.
USHARE_ENABLE_WEB= This is if you want to have to enable the web interface that geexbox provides. I have no idea how to access it so I will be turning it off on mine, but if you figure it out, please tell us in the comments and I will put it in.
USHARE_ENABLE_TELNET= If you are using this to stream to the xbox only, then you don't need this and just set it to “no”
USHARE_ENABLE_XBOX= Just put yes. I think this one is obvious.
USHARE_ENABLE_DLNA= Here you can enable DLNA so that you can stream to your ps3 or other devices. If you feel the need to do so, go ahead and experiment but I am not covering that here.
Step Three: Starting ushare with xbox enabled
Ushare won't enable the ability to start xbox automatically, so when you start it, you need to manually type it in. To do this, open terminal (or use the one already open) and type in:
sudo ushare -x
The “-x” means that it makes it xbox enabled (thats it), When you first run it, you will probably get a message saying that “eth0 is down.” This is a common problem but should not interrupt your streaming. Stream as normal and sit down on your xbox and watch all of your downloaded movies straight to your television.



Step Four (optional): Creating a startup script
This shouldn't be very difficult as ubuntu provides the ability to make a startup script very easily. Simply right click anywhere on your desktop and select “create launcher.” When you click that, change it to an application in terminal and enter in the command, “sudo ushare -x”. This means that whenever you start up your computer, you will be prompted by terminal to input your password so that you can start ushare as usual. A little nuisance but provided that ushare runs in the background, it isn't much of a problem.

Creating a Disk Image of Ubuntu

So, to explain a little bit of what has been going on, I have been up to as of late. I had originally installed Ubuntu as I had been tired of using Windows 7. Originally, there was already a good two to three pages of information that I had written down for this guide, but due to my experimentation and errors in the process I lost all of it. This is for the better in all honesty because looking back, I realize I had so much important data I was missing. With all intentions of this being a two-part tutorial, I have now changed my mind and gone a different route. Right now, I intend to do three parts (and maybe one subpart); Questions to ask yourself and Downloading Ubuntu, Official Installation (Single-Boot and Dual-Boot), Common commands to use and Programs to install. This is all pending right now, because there is so much to Linux and Ubuntu that I can not cover because this is a beginner's guide and only for installation. I may do a part on maintaining and updating your Linux Box later on, but right now we are focusing on Installation.

Part 1: The first few steps

Here, I will cover various topics. We will not be diving straight into installing Linux just yet because I want to bring up a few points. I want everyone to read this paragraph because I will not repeat it again nor will I take any blame for lost data. Better yet, read this paragraph twice, maybe three times. This is the only paragraph that I am requiring you to read. I do not take any blame for lost data like I said before so if you want anything saved do it now because once you start the installation process all of your data will be gone. It is a common unwritten rule that you will get no sympathy from others if you lost your data in Linux due to you “fiddling” with the settings through root and terminal. That being said, I must warn you to be careful when you are applying settings as a root user. Root permissions are very effective and can be very dangerous to your system. To put it in “Windows” terms, if you are using root access there is a possibility you can delete “system32.” Of course there is no system32 on Linux, but deleting certain files will cause you to mess up your system and possibly make it impossible to access your files. To gain access to install commands add 'sudo' to the beginning of all of your commands. Not only will this give you access to root, but it will make your machine more secure because it asks for your password every so often. I would like to add that once you install Ubuntu on your computer you cannot return to Windows or OS X without a proper installation disc and cd-rights. Think before you install here. Thank you for reading this paragraph and I will remind you again to back up your data for your own good.

Here is a quick guideline to what I will be covering. You can skip through whatever parts you want and avoid things you won't need. This will apply to all of the parts in this tutorial.

1. Asking why you need Linux and what it will do for you

2. Finding the proper version of *buntu for you

3. Ordering a disk, creating a boot-cd, creating a boot-flashdrive

Step One:

First comes first, why do you want to install Linux/Ubuntu and is it the correct time do so? I have outlined a few questions you may want to ask yourself before you start this endeavor. Most likely you will be fine with all of these, but these are safety questions and may bring something to mind which you hadn't thought of already. If you are already dead-set on installing Linux/Ubuntu feel free to skip this part, but I think you should at least skim through it to get the idea. Just remember that you can not revert back to Windows so easily without an installation disc.

1. What are your main reasons for installing. Do you want to explore another facet of computers or create a new challenge for yourself?

   • These are both great reasons to install Linux. There is no harm in trying new things, it expands the mind and broadens your knowledge base. There is really no bad reason to install here. You can not go wrong with this OS. If you want to return to Windows, that will be a little bit harder because you need a full-installation disc.

2. Do you have a full copy of Windows or OS X available in case you change your mind in the end?

   • While you won't be able to recover your data unless you backed it up, it is always a good idea to have an install disc nearby just if you decide you don't want to use Linux or feel like you want to return to your old settings.

3. Do you need your computer anytime soon?

   • If the answer to this is yes, DON”T install Linux just yet. This comes along the lines of writing a paper for class or submitting a TPS Report for work. Anything that is urgent and needs things such as word or an editing program that you have on your other OS's should prevent you from installing Linux. You should only do so when you have time and/or are comfortable with the programs in Linux. While not all programs are available in Linux, many copies or variations are. In addition, you can install Wine to run your Windows programs to some degree.

4. Do you have your data backed up?

   • This should be an automatic yes unless it is a new machine or you don't have anything important on your computer. Back up your Data!! You will lose all programs and data even when you try to re-install Windows or OS X.

So, that just about covers it with questions. There are many more you could possibly ask yourself, but I felt that these were the most important. We are now on to the second step of the process which is downloading the Distro.

Step Two:

Yes, you can order a CD for Ubuntu so it is relatively simple to install. No, it does not come any quicker than the turn of the century. I would recommend going ahead with these steps while you wait for the CD to come in the mail. Oh, and order as many as they allow. It is fun just having random CD's lying around the house.

This shouldn't be too difficult for you from this point as the steps to installing Ubuntu are very self-explanatory. The motto, so to say, for Ubuntu is “Linux for Human Beings.” I would say that this is very good motto as it is very easy to install and add components. To Download the driver for your new Operating System, simply go to the Ubuntu Website. www.Ubuntu.com Here you can see download Ubuntu, learn how to upgrade your system, and find out that it is the Chinese New Year? On this page there is a button that says “Download Ubuntu.” Pretty self-explanatory, eh? Once you click it, you will be led to a page that has options of what you want to do. My best advice would be to download it and put it to a USB or CD and order a CD as well. The reason why I say this is because the CD takes a while to get to you and in that time you may lose interest, time, whatever. It is also good because you will have a CD for later use if for whatever reason you decide to go back to Windows or OS X or want to install Linux on another computer.

Now at this point you should not have downloaded anything yet. You will **change** the option FROM Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) TO Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid Lynx). Lucid is a Long-Term Support Distro and is finally becoming completely stable. This means that you don't have to update for three years. Meerkat has some issues with Graphics Drivers so I highly advise against using it as you will end up losing everything. At the same time do not update from 10.04 to 10.10 after you have installed 10.04. It will have the same effect and you will literally end up with a terminal that you cannot use. If you know the possible repercussions of downloading and installing 10.10, then go right ahead, the steps are all the same.

Once you have downloaded the image of the Operating System move on to the next step in the process. From here on I will tell you how to burn the image to a cd or USB thumb-drive.

Step Three:

Installing the image to a CD should be relatively simple. You obviously need a Image-burner program. Put in your Blank CD. For Windows (anything less than Win7), they recommend Infra Recorder. This is very straightforward and simple. Open the program, go to “Actions,” click “Burn image” and choose the image file of Ubuntu and when it shows up, hit “OK.” Much simpler in Win7, right click the image and choose “Burn disc image.” Pick the burner drive where the blank CD is located and click “Burn.”

For Mac's, you need to use their Disk Utility program. Put the blank CD in, drag the ISO file into the window. Both the CD and the ISO file should be in the pane. Click the ISO file and hit “Burn.” Click the checkbox next to “Verify burned data” and hit “Burn” again. Burn, baby Burn!

Now for the USB drive, you need to format your drive so that it is completely empty. This will delete EVERYTHING on it so back it up. After you have formatted it you will open whatever disk or image creator you have just like the one for making the CD. Follow the same process and burn the image to the flash-drive. You should get a confirmation that it finished and there you have it. All ready to boot into from the beginning.

Basically, from here just reboot your PC, hit 'f12' (may be different on different PC's) to boot into the different boot options where you should find either the usb or CD-Drive. Use your arrows to choose whichever you have made and hit Enter. From there, it is all up to you. Right now I am only showing you how to install Ubuntu alone. There is the ability to Dual Boot Ubuntu and your other operating system but that is for another time. If you are unsure about using Ubuntu there is an option to run it without installing and you can get to know the features that come with the Operating System. You may not be able to install anything (I am not sure) but you can poke around and see what is going on inside and if it is right for you. Well, there you have it. A fresh version of Ubuntu on your system. Stay tuned for a tutorial about how to Dual Boot and things to do after installing Ubuntu onto your computer.

Update on the kitchen rendering

Let me hear your thoughts!

Another Tasker Post

Since there have been a few comments about the Tasker post, I am going to post another Tasker profile. There was a comment about using Tasker to replace Juice Defender. I hate to keep you waiting but I need to play around for a while with the setups. Enough of the wait...Here is Sleep Mode for Tasker.

1)Set up a new profile titled "Sleep Mode" and select Context is "State" then "Power"  the source is "All"(You can choose all if you want since we will be using times to use this action)

 2)Add new Task named "Silent Mode" and select "Audio" then select "Silent Mode" be sure to change mode to "on". You will then want to add another task. Select "Variable" and then choose "Variable Set". You want to choose your Name to be "%SLEEPMODE" and your To should be "1"

3)You are now going to add an Exit Task. Click on Silent Mode and add Exit Task.  You will then want to add a new Task. I named this "Normal Mode" You want to add task. Select "Audio". Select Silent Mode and set it to "Off". We then want to add another task so click the plus button. We are going to add a new "Variable". Select "Variable Clear". Type in %SLEEPMODE and click done and done again.

4) Click on where is says "Power" and select "Add". You want to choose time and select your times then press done ( I am pretty sure you want the "repeat" off. So don't select it.)

**Here Come The Tricky Part**


If there is some sort of emergency you need certain people to call you. Here is where we add exceptions.

5)We want to add a new profile Select "New". I named this Emergency Calls.. Here we want to add an "Event" We want to select "Phone" and then " Phone Ringing". I think we can leave the priority to normal. If you select the magnifying glass here is where you can add your contacts. Select done.

6) We now want to select "Phone Ringing" and add a task. Select "Tasker" then select "If". We want " %SLEEPMODE = 1 " make sure the middle is "Maths: Equals".

7) Add a new Task. Select "Audio"  Select "Silent Mode" Silent Mode should be set to "Off". Select Done


8) Add New Task. Select Tasker and choose "Wait". This is going to be set to "5 minutes".

9) Add a new Task. Select "Audio"  Select "Silent Mode" Silent Mode should be set to "On". Here we are going to want to add a "IF". So this should be "%SLEEPMODE = 1" Select Done

10) Last but not least we want to add "Task" then select  "Tasker"  and select "End If". At this point don't check anything just select done.

Here is what your setup should look like.

I did not have a chance to test this out. Hopefully tonight I will do some testing and I will post all results. I am just showing you how to set-up a profile and if something goes wrong I am not liable. Thanks for reading