Last year I used Google Video to host the video I shot of the sessions I attended at BlogcampSwitzerland. It's mostly worked pretty well. However, I did have a bit of trouble uploading one of the videos.
This year's Blogcamp videos aren't getting along so well with Google Video. Google Video requires that you use this uploading client. The support for this client seems pretty low. At first I couldn't seem to get any of the video uploaded at all, then I noticed that the program had been updated. So, I downloaded the update, and then tried uploading the video. One of the presentations has uploaded okay, but the other I tried uploading hasn't been as lucky. As such, I'm now looking at alternatives to Google Video. YouTube isn't an option, as they limit you to videos of 10 minutes or less.
I'll probably end up hosting the video on another server someplace.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Noisy neighbor and I don't mind...
Our little apartment building isn't always the quietest place. Especially as I type this. But I really can't complain. You see, the guy who's causing the "racket" is a really amazing pianist. He just started up with one of the "Well-tempered Clavier" Bach pieces and is now playing all sorts of other stuff. It's all quite pleasant.
When we moved in, and I met him, I commented on the piano and asked if he could play it a bit louder as we really enjoyed listening to the music.
When we moved in, and I met him, I commented on the piano and asked if he could play it a bit louder as we really enjoyed listening to the music.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Quick Thoughts on Blogcampswitzerland 2.0
Back on October 20th, I attended Blogcampswitzerland 2.0 held here in Zurich at ETH. I had attended the conference last year and found it quite interesting.
This year was a bit different. To start out with, nearly all of the presentations, with the exception of the start-up segments, were in German. Dannie Jost's presentation on "The Swiss Myth", a nice play on "Swiss Miss" - the chocolate drink, was probably the only exception and was in English. Well, most of Dannie's presentation was in English. As you will see when I finally post the videos, the discussion did branch out into a bit of German. I suppose this isn't surprising given that this is in a German speaking part of the country. Fortunately, my German has progressed to the point that I could understand most of what was going on. Dannie's presentation was quite interesting and I'll comment more on it when I post the video.
The other really good talk was Michael Gisinger's talk on copyright and it's history. Michael did me the great service and presented in that mythical language 'High German', as so I could understand it better. And, users that speak a non-Swiss German will also be able to understand the presentation when I post the video. As for you anglophones, well, perhaps someone will add appropriate subtitles. You can't really run audio through babelfish at this point...
It was mostly a good conference, but not as good as last year. I wonder if a conference on blogging is a bit limited at this point. Perhaps a more general technical (while still having a track on blogging) Barcamp is in order for Zurich?
Many thanks to the BlogcampSwitzerland 2.0 Organizing Committee for all the hard work putting everything together!
This year was a bit different. To start out with, nearly all of the presentations, with the exception of the start-up segments, were in German. Dannie Jost's presentation on "The Swiss Myth", a nice play on "Swiss Miss" - the chocolate drink, was probably the only exception and was in English. Well, most of Dannie's presentation was in English. As you will see when I finally post the videos, the discussion did branch out into a bit of German. I suppose this isn't surprising given that this is in a German speaking part of the country. Fortunately, my German has progressed to the point that I could understand most of what was going on. Dannie's presentation was quite interesting and I'll comment more on it when I post the video.
The other really good talk was Michael Gisinger's talk on copyright and it's history. Michael did me the great service and presented in that mythical language 'High German', as so I could understand it better. And, users that speak a non-Swiss German will also be able to understand the presentation when I post the video. As for you anglophones, well, perhaps someone will add appropriate subtitles. You can't really run audio through babelfish at this point...
It was mostly a good conference, but not as good as last year. I wonder if a conference on blogging is a bit limited at this point. Perhaps a more general technical (while still having a track on blogging) Barcamp is in order for Zurich?
Many thanks to the BlogcampSwitzerland 2.0 Organizing Committee for all the hard work putting everything together!
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Rockin' in the House
I went to go see Neil Finn and Crowded House Friday night for the second time in just over a month. It's certainly good to see that they're mixing the shows up quite a bit, and I got a bit different of a concert than I experienced back in Seattle on the first of September. It was a great concert, and a great crowd.
It was interesting that they handed out earplugs before the concert. These were handy for the opening band, which did indeed play a bit loud. Crowded House wasn't overamped, but there were a few fans that screamed loud enough to almost entirely drown out the band. Ouch! It was my first experience with a show in the Volkshaus, which wasn't a bad venue. Though Neil did mention that the place had some interesting harmonics, that I also noticed.
I was scanning a few photos in, two of which are very appropriate to this post, but it looks like I'll have to put them up a bit later. I don't even have a photo of the Domain scanned...so, here's a picture of Mitre Peak.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Scanning old photos...
So, I've got around to scanning a bunch of old slides that I have with me. I've got this big old box of slides, and a Canon CanoScan 8600F scanner to scan them in with.
I started out awhile back by using the CanoScan bundled software to scan them in with. Then I decided to give SilverFast a try. SilverFast lets you change all sorts of scanning parameters, and you can do multiple exposures. However, I decided that the CanoScan plugin for Photoshop (Elements, in my case) just works better for me.
Here are a few of the scans, the picture of Chrome Island was a lot of work, as it was horribly underexposed.
I started out awhile back by using the CanoScan bundled software to scan them in with. Then I decided to give SilverFast a try. SilverFast lets you change all sorts of scanning parameters, and you can do multiple exposures. However, I decided that the CanoScan plugin for Photoshop (Elements, in my case) just works better for me.
Here are a few of the scans, the picture of Chrome Island was a lot of work, as it was horribly underexposed.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
Sitting at the foot of the Cascades....
Well, we're back on our yearly trip to the wonderful Pacific Northwest again. Out visiting a few folks, and specifically my parents.
The trip out was pretty good. I didn't sleep at all, though Alice got in some sleep. We were on Air France this time, as they added non-stop from Paris CDG to Sea-Tac. The flight from Zurich to Paris was a bit bumpy, and the plane was a bit cramped as it was a BAE-146 with 6 across seating. But the service was pretty good, and with a Pain au Chocolat as the breakfast, I was pretty happy. We were nervous about the connection and having to take a bus across the airport, after having nightmares with the same sort of setup in Heathrow, but the connection was fast and efficient. We were in the last row of the aircraft, but that was nice as we didn't have to worry about how far we leaned the seats back, we leaned them all the way back. The food was pretty good, the best we'd had on any flight in many, many years. Also, being in the back meant that I could drink as much water as I wanted, and I'm pretty much recovered from the Jet Lag. As for in-flight entertainment, "Blades of Glory" is a movie that is amazingly funny. There were quite a number of folks staring at those of us watching it as we laughed throughout the flight. I did only watch it three times though....
After a couple of days with the folks, we went up and hung out with some friends and saw Crowded House at Bumbershoot with them. The show was great, and they played a lot of the new songs, which were quite interesting and enjoyable. Neil Finn mentioned that they had a limited time to play, so they packed in as many songs as they could. He apologized for not chatting to the crowd a bit more, though he and Nick Seymore had some pretty funny comments. It will be interesting to see how their show in Zurich will differ from the one we saw here in Seattle.
After the show, we were off to visit some more friends for a couple days. And after that we're off with my parents for a couple of nights on the Oregon Coast.
The trip out was pretty good. I didn't sleep at all, though Alice got in some sleep. We were on Air France this time, as they added non-stop from Paris CDG to Sea-Tac. The flight from Zurich to Paris was a bit bumpy, and the plane was a bit cramped as it was a BAE-146 with 6 across seating. But the service was pretty good, and with a Pain au Chocolat as the breakfast, I was pretty happy. We were nervous about the connection and having to take a bus across the airport, after having nightmares with the same sort of setup in Heathrow, but the connection was fast and efficient. We were in the last row of the aircraft, but that was nice as we didn't have to worry about how far we leaned the seats back, we leaned them all the way back. The food was pretty good, the best we'd had on any flight in many, many years. Also, being in the back meant that I could drink as much water as I wanted, and I'm pretty much recovered from the Jet Lag. As for in-flight entertainment, "Blades of Glory" is a movie that is amazingly funny. There were quite a number of folks staring at those of us watching it as we laughed throughout the flight. I did only watch it three times though....
After a couple of days with the folks, we went up and hung out with some friends and saw Crowded House at Bumbershoot with them. The show was great, and they played a lot of the new songs, which were quite interesting and enjoyable. Neil Finn mentioned that they had a limited time to play, so they packed in as many songs as they could. He apologized for not chatting to the crowd a bit more, though he and Nick Seymore had some pretty funny comments. It will be interesting to see how their show in Zurich will differ from the one we saw here in Seattle.
After the show, we were off to visit some more friends for a couple days. And after that we're off with my parents for a couple of nights on the Oregon Coast.
Saturday, August 4, 2007
A late Swiss-National-Day post
We spent Swiss National Day this year by first climbing the local church's tower. The tower is only open to visitors a few times each year. Swiss National Day is one of those days. I figured it would be a good chance to get a good view of our new town. And I figured it'd be cool to look back to our balcony and see what our place looks like from the tower.
I took this picture from just in front of the church. The tower looks much smaller than it actually is at this angle. But, you can see the person in the corner of the railing hanging out. It was over 200 steps to where the railing is.
The view to the south was very nice, with Lake Zurich in the forground and the Alps in the background.
To the North is Thalwil in the foreground. The Uetliberg is in the center rear, and Zurich is in the right background.
We live somewhere to the West.
Speaking of the West.... After going up the church tower, we then headed to Felsenegg for a short hike up to the top, followed by a aerial tramway trip back down. There's a restaurant on top of the Felsenegg, and it was getting ready to celebrate in the evening.
We finished the day with a dinner of barbecued bratwurst and then watched a few of the evening's firework shows.
There is a website with the information on when the church tower is next open. Which is September 21st from 7-9 in the evening, and on Sunday September 23rd from 11am to 12 noon. It's only open when the weather is good. There's also a better picture of the tower on their website.
I took this picture from just in front of the church. The tower looks much smaller than it actually is at this angle. But, you can see the person in the corner of the railing hanging out. It was over 200 steps to where the railing is.
 |
| From Cinque Terre/... |
The view to the south was very nice, with Lake Zurich in the forground and the Alps in the background.
 |
| From Cinque Terre/... |
To the North is Thalwil in the foreground. The Uetliberg is in the center rear, and Zurich is in the right background.
We live somewhere to the West.
 |
| From Cinque Terre/... |
Speaking of the West.... After going up the church tower, we then headed to Felsenegg for a short hike up to the top, followed by a aerial tramway trip back down. There's a restaurant on top of the Felsenegg, and it was getting ready to celebrate in the evening.
 |
| From Cinque Terre/... |
We finished the day with a dinner of barbecued bratwurst and then watched a few of the evening's firework shows.
There is a website with the information on when the church tower is next open. Which is September 21st from 7-9 in the evening, and on Sunday September 23rd from 11am to 12 noon. It's only open when the weather is good. There's also a better picture of the tower on their website.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
