Photo: Just a bag of nuts by Lisa Brewster.

Coming off of Canadian Environment Week (June 5-11th) and World Environment Day (June 5th) I thought I would share one of our latest environmental discoveries.

I often find myself a bit under-whelmed with some of ‘natural’ or environmentally friendly solutions I read about or test out. I suppose this makes sense, as some chemical cocktail designed for a specific cleaning purpose will probably beat something which just kind of works in that regard. If these solutions do work, they often require more work and elbow-grease. Both of these trade-offs are worth it, though, in many cases to lessen our environmental impact.

My wife discovered these things called ‘soap nuts’ and decided to order a sample kit to give them a try. I was fairly skeptical, but figured why not give it a try. Was I ever wrong in my skepticism on this one!

Soap nuts (or Sapindus) are a kind of berry or fruit which grow on trees and are in the Lychee family. I think the variety we received grow in India. Apparently, they have been used for thousands of years for washing things.

Wash things they do! Since our son was born, we have switched to scent-free types of laundry detergents. Some work better than others, but often they don’t completely remove every scent from the clothing. Since they lack the perfumes to mask what they do leave behind, the clothes never smell 100% fresh and clean. The soap nuts, on the other hand, leave our laundry smelling about as fresh and neutral as anything we have ever used. The results are astonishing!

Even better, they are less work than using laundry detergent. You simply put 4 or 5 of the nuts in a cloth bag with a draw string, and toss it in the washing machine. You can do approximately 1 load per nut, so you just run this bag in 4-5 loads of laundry, and then simply discard the nuts and put some fresh ones in. The soap nuts are even compostable. No sticky cups of detergent to pour in or sticky puddles of detergent on the washer top to clean up. Super simple, super results!

You can also buy these things in bulk if you search around the Internet a bit, which actually brings the cost per load under what one typical pays for descent laundry detergent. It is a win-win-win in every way I can see. Check them out!

Also, as some of you know, I write for my Christian apologetics ministry over at TilledSoil.org. Since we are Christians, we want to care for creation and this fits well into that goal. I will be posting a more general article on Christianity and Environmentalism in the next day or two. Please keep an eye out for that.

Photo: Ubuntu 6.06 LTS + Gizmo Project 0.8aplha(v6) by Nano Taboada.

Ok, this is a bit of a rant, but might also help out some stranded Gizmo5 clients.

A couple weeks back, I received an e-mail that Gizmo5 services were being shut-down, and that I would have to transition my account to Google Voice, or get a refund on any remaining credit. I was expecting this to happen eventually after Gizmo5 was bought-out by Google, but was a bit surprised at the quick time-frame once announced (about a month). I’m pretty busy right now finishing up my graduate degree, so I really didn’t want this on my plate as well. However, I really had no choice, or we would have lost our phone numbers and been out of business on our phone service.

I’ve been using VoIP phone service since around 2005 when Gizmo Project first got going. We’ve been pretty happy with it in general. It has been flexible for us, as well as saving us money. For example, we’ve been able to keep the same phone numbers for several years, even across several moves. When we got to the ‘new place,’ we only needed Internet service, and everything was up and running again. It allowed us to capture voice-mail as audio files and e-mail them to members of the family. We’ve been getting our calls for around $0.019 per minute or less (sometimes free). About the only down-side is either no-911 service or e911 service, but we always have a cell phone or two around for emergency anyway.

I was a little sad to see Gizmo5 go after all these years. Their support was OK. It took a bunch of monkeying around to get it going initially. We have used an ATA hardware device, which allowed normal phones to be plugged in and used. Once setup and configured properly, though, it has been little different than using a traditional phone. We’ve even been able to have a US and Canada phone number that ring the same phone, which is handy since we now live in Canada but have lots of friends and relatives in the US.

Moving to Google Voice is a WHOLE different story! First, Google seems to have just shut down Gizmo5 support. This is kind of inconsiderate, given that people might need some help with the transition or porting numbers to other services. To make matters worse, it seems Google Voice support is also nearly non-existent. I’m guessing you can get a kind of ‘self-help’ support through their forums, if you can get to them.

First, I had trouble even figuring out what the heck Google Voice is. I have a friend who has used it and told me a bit about it, or I’d certainly be lost by looking at Google’s web site. It just seems to be this Internet calling thingy that may or may not be connected to calling phone numbers, etc. They use a lot of terms for the ‘features’ that make it sound impressive, but I haven’t really figured out anything it can do that most VoIP providers do not.

Second, since I’m in Canada, I couldn’t even get into the Google Voice forums or create an account to see what the heck was going on. I decided to get a refund on my credits, and attempt a port of one of my numbers, but it was a blind move. No support, and no way I could see to get support. I spent an hour one day just trying to see if I could get into their support (I’ve got several ‘Google Accounts’ now, but all failed). I think they must be blocking by IP. In other words, if you’re not in the US, you can’t get anywhere in their support system!

As an aside, if Google support is this horrible (and I’m not the only one who has complained about it… Google doesn’t seem to be known for their customer service), how well does this bode for Android users? Maybe ponder that a bit before you make your decision against getting an iPad or iPhone!

Enter Callcentric! Luckily, I had been experimenting a bit with Callcentric previously on my iPod Touch. I had purchased a Canadian dial-in number for it and was making calls from school and such with it. My experience with them was excellent. Their support was extremely responsive (within minutes sometimes)! Their documentation was very good for setup. Their on-line system for settings, call routing, phone books, reporting, etc. was all excellent! About my only complaint about them, is that their voice-mail system seems a bit outdated, however, it still allows me to route my voice-mail messages to e-mail and deliver them as MP3 files. I’m happy!

So, I was able to port my Gizmo5 number (Canadian) to Callcentric, and decided it wasn’t worth my time or money to try and get our US number out. Callcentric was also running a special on US dial-in numbers, so I just picked one of those up. The experience has been very good, other than maybe wasting about 1/2 to 1 day messing with Google Voice and porting the numbers. It only took me a few hours to get everything going and setup on Callcentric. Interestingly, even Callcentric tech support had to come to my rescue on porting the number, as Gizmo5 didn’t provide me with the docs I needed to authorize the port. Since Callcentric had helped other Gizmo5 people, they were able to point me in the right places to get the info I needed.

So, many thanks to Gizmo5 for getting me into VoIP and years of service. Shame on you Google for doing such a horrible job on the transition and for such cruddy support. And, many thanks to Callcentric for being so supportive in the transition.

Also, if you are wondering why I didn’t mention Skype, it is because Skype doesn’t offer numbers in Canada. Also, Skype is a proprietary VoIP service which isn’t based on the SIP standard. You really want to be SIP based if you want to work with regular software VoIP clients, or standard VoIP hardware. I have nothing against Skype, and use it quite a bit, but IMO, it is a different kind of thing. One thing Skype is really good at, is punching its way out of networks to get a call through. I use both SIP clients and Skype on my iPod Touch when mobile. If I can’t get a call out with the SIP software, I usually can with Skype.

Photo: Colorful Old Oil Barrels by L.C.Nøttaasen.

I have yet to get used to thinking in Liters/100km for gas mileage here in Canada. Miles per Gallon (MPG) is simply engrained in my head. Part of the problem is just the difference in units of liters and gallons. But, there is also the issue of one measuring distance on 1 gallon, while the other is measuring the quantity of fuel over a distance. To top it off, they run inverse of each other. (ex: a car that gets MORE MPG is better, but a car that uses LESS liters/100km is better.) Anyway, it threw my brain for a loop while I was car shopping several months back, so I looked around the Internet for a conversion calculator or chart. I could only find one for UK gallons (which I didn’t catch for a while, which REALLY confused me for a bit). Calculators weren’t very convenient while car shopping, so I decided to make a nice chart to take along.

If you are also struggling with this one way or the other, enjoy!

Liters/100km to MPG (US) Conversion Chart

Photo: Light Graffiti – PS3 Controller by artwork_rebel.

A friend of mine has been using a Plantronics .Audio 770 headset with his Playstation3 and has been quite pleased with it. I was not only unable to find one locally, but the cost on what I did find was more than I wanted to spend. My friend and I schemed a bit and came up with the following solution (cost ~$29):

Plantronics .Audio 370 (Link to Plantroics site…)

These seem to range from $10 to $40ish. I picked mine up from FutureShop here in Canada for $19 on a Boxing Day special… but many retailers seem to have them for about that amount as their regular price.

The only problem with these are that they are an analog only headset (basically missing the USB adapter of the more expensive Plantronics models). However, we found the following which works very well:

Syba SD-CM-UAUD USB Stereo Audio Adapter (Link to an example of this adapter on Newegg…) I picked one up locally at NCIX for like $10, but Newegg has them for $9. You might  find them at a local store to save the shipping, but I couldn’t believe the price. It works great with the PS3.

Headset Wiring

As you can see in the first photo (see: Headset Wiring), I have plugged the Syba adapter into a USB extension cable, and the pink plug of the Plantronics into the pink plug on the adapter.

I have plugged the other plug of the Plantronics into a simple audio extension cable. (The cord on the Plantronics headset is, IMO, a bit short).

Stereo PS3 Connection

Next (see: Stereo PS3 Connection), I plugged the USB into my PS3, and the audio cable into the headset jack on my stereo system. You might do the same or hook it to the headset jack on your TV, for example. This will give you all the audio output (voice and game sounds) through the earphones of the headset, and the USB provides the Mic input to the PS3.

PS3 Audio Settings

Now, just set the PS3 settings properly (see: PS3 Audio Settings). I put the mic level at 4 or 5. Set the input device to the Syba adapter (C-Media USB Audio Device). Set the Output device to the ‘System Default Device’. This runs the voice you’d normally get back through a headset to the same place as game sounds… which all end up coming into your Plantronics headphones.

The .Audio 370 headset sounds pretty good and works incredibly well in games, IMO. You should be able to use any PC headset with this adapter… of course sound quality and mic quality will vary.

So, I basically have $29 invested in this setup. Not bad at all for the high quality level.¹

Photo: Snow Leopard by BenedictFrancis.

Just a quick post to point out an update to Devon Technologies’ WordService. WordService has just been updated to version 2.8 if you are already using it. Download at:

http://www.devon-technologies.com/download/index.html

If you are not already using this, I really recommend that you check it out. It adds a whole number of quite useful utilities to your Services menu on Mac OSX. From their website:

“WordService provides 37 functions to convert, format or speak the currently selected text, to insert data or to show statistics of the selection within all Cocoa applications (e.g. Textedit, Pages, Mail, Stickies, Safari or Xcode) and Carbon applications supporting services.”

My favorite and most used is ‘Reformat’ which does stuff like strip extra spaces, line feeds and other junk out of text. When I copy something from the web or pretty much anywhere, I typically paste it into a blank TextEdit document set to plain-text. I then do a ‘select all’ and then ‘Reformat’. It cleans the text up really nice! I also use the insert time/date functions quite a bit. The others are really useful as well, but I don’t have keys mapped to many others.

To map a keyboard shortcut go to your Services preferences under System Preferences -> Keyboard -> Keyboard Shortcuts -> Services. By the way, the Services settings are a bit tricky until you figure it out. When it says to double-click on the shortcut and then push the key combination to set it, it actually means to double click in the area to the right of the service you want to set the keys for. If you scroll up and down, you should see some, and if you double-click there, you’ll see how it selects and gets highlighted.

Wow, is that a mouthful! (pun intended) You’re going to love this tip and recipe though.

I love popcorn as a snack. However, we have never been able to find a popcorn popper that we are happy with. We, like many I would guess, did the microwave popcorn thing. That always bothered me on several fronts. First, have you ever read the ingredient label on those packets? They put some nasty stuff in there, but even that aside, they plain aren’t very healthy for you in terms of fat and salt content. Second, they make popcorn quite expensive compared to what it costs to just pop the kernels. Third, I really hated tossing out all those bags just to get a bowl of popcorn!

So, we started to experiment. Alton Brown of Good Eats (TV show on Food Network) showed a method for making your own home-made popcorn bags. That solves problem #1, as you can control what goes into it. It somewhat solves #2 as it brings the price down a bit. However, it does little for #3. One day, I noticed that we had microwaved something that got pretty hot in our Pampered Chef Classic Batter Bowl**. It seemed to hold up fine, even the cover. I wondered if it could withstand the heat of popcorn popping with that lid on. I decided to risk it (you know, ask for forgiveness later kind of thing). It worked great! After many batches of popcorn, the lid is only slightly discolored, but in fine shape. It took a bit of time to get the timing perfected, but this makes such good popcorn and you con completely control what goes in. It is cheap and there is no waste (other than a few un-popped kernels).

Equipment:

• Pampered Chef Classic Batter Bowl
• Microwave Oven

Recipe:

• 1/4 cup popcorn
• 1 ~ 2 Tbsp Olive oil (and/or butter, etc., optional)
• 1/4 tsp popcorn salt (or to taste, optional)

Cold bowl: 3 min 40 sec

Hot bowl:  3 min

Put the popcorn in the bowl, then drizzle oil over it and salt.

Microwave on high for 3:40 minutes*** when the bowl is cold (there will be a few more un-popped kernels in the first ‘cold bowl’ batch). Microwave on high for 3 minutes*** when the bowl is hot (ie: making second batch)

Salt to taste, but it does seem to help to put salt in before popping if you are using some kind of oil. If you are popping dry, then you will want to wait and salt after popping.

Enjoy!

—

** I guess ours probably wasn’t ‘classic’ when we got it; we’ve had it for years. We simply love this thing. It is probably near the most used dish in our kitchen. You need to get one if you don’t have one. It is good for much more than popcorn.

http://www.pamperedchef.com/ordering/prod_details.tpc?prodId=211&words=batter%20bowl

*** (our microwave: Panasonic Inverter NN-SD698S – 1200W …. times vary here… you will need to experiment. We basically picked a time that seemed reasonable, then increased / decreased by 15 second increments until the popcorn was perfect. Be careful not to start a fire by going too far the first run. If you underestimate and get a lot of un-popped kernels, you could increase 15 seconds and see if you get more popped, but no burnt flavor.)

Well, as an aside, when I got my stereo, I started to browse the manual, and I made some interesting discoveries. My stereo reads v1.x ID3 tags, and my titles weren’t showing up. I soon learned that iTunes defaults to v2.2. Interesting… I didn’t even know what a ID3 tag was, let alone the differences between versions. I was about to find out.

ID3 tags are the embedded information in your MP3 files which give various information, such as the track title, artist, album, genre, etc. I knew this info was there, but not much about it. Basically, v1.x tags are put at the end of the MP3 data, and are delimited by the number of characters per field. The fields are also very limited in length, most to 30 characters (not enough for even all your track titles, let alone other information.) Also, there are a lot less fields available. The advantage to putting them at the end, is they are easy to change. The disadvantage is that you have to read in the entire file to see them.

Well, v2.x came along an fixed much of this. They are prepended to the front of the file, and are stored in 256 byte ‘frames’. Apple smartly pads this area of the MP3, so they can change information without re-writing the whole file. This kind of takes the best advantage of v1.x, but at the beginning of the file, so they are quickly accessed when browsing files.

If you want to see the tags… you can actually open an MP3 in your text editor… look at the start or end, and you should see some familiar info. You can read all the gooey details about this at:

http://www.dougscripts.com/itunes/itinfo/id3tags00.php

I started to wonder, sweat, and worry…. will my newly purchased stereo even be able to show the track names now? I found information out there about ID3 tag editors, so I guess I could go through thousands of songs and edit them to v1.x… ekk! Then I found that iTunes has this nice feature under Advanced – - Convert ID3 Tags…. YAY! The only problem with this is that in many of my MP3s I have a lot more information stored in them (I record a lot of Internet radio programs, and often store notes about the show content in the notes field… also a lot of my tracks have long titles.) If I converted them to v1.x, my data got chopped off, or erased.

Then I started wondering…. what happens if BOTH tags are present? Since an MP3 file seems to work equally well with the appended info, or prepended info…. why couldn’t their be both? I searched and searched… and really couldn’t find info on this. One article said something about append/prepend when talking about the specs… so I started to DL tag editors, hoping I’d find a way.

I stuck gold!!! I found two pretty nice apps, which actually do a lot more. But both can be set to go through your libraries of MP3s and convert versions of tags, as well as put BOTH! Whoo hoo!

MP3 ID3X
http://www.three-2-one.de/321apps/main/global/index1.htm

MP3 Rage
http://www.chaoticsoftware.com/ProductPages/MP3Rage.html

I picked the later one… not because of its ‘totally awesome’ skull logo (not sure what is up with that… maybe I need to read about its history or something), but because it does SO many other things too.

It seems to work quite well… it went through my entire music collection in about 10 minutes or so, and now I have v2.3 AND v1.1 ID3 tags on my MP3s.

Problem solved for now! Now back to lamenting and resting from my VERY involved stereo install process…