Second Thoughts on Leather Saddles

Killed my first Brooks saddle (a Team Pro) last night when I was caught in the rain. It only required 20 wet miles (with no fenders) to complete the task. The B-17 on my grocery-getter is still fine after a winter of riding, but requires more attention and planning than any other bicycle component I’ve ever owned (e.g. planning where to park, whether to ride, and how many plastic bags to bring).

FreeNAS as Digital Shoebox

FreeNAS is nearly what I want (for now). In addition to consolidating my files I want to run an IMAP server (dovecot) for my decade of archived email on my wildly over-powered “storage appliance” (sporting GBs of underutilized RAM and storage).

Embedded Asterisk for home PBX

Tried AsteriskNOW 1.2 in VMWare today. I like the AsteriskNOW GUI and approach to configuration file management (i.e. does not make a mess). Imagine lots of users would like to install AsteriskNOW on Soekris or PC Engines ALIX SBC style systems.

Garmin Connect compared with MotionBased

Hopefully Garmin Connect (”Connect”) is under heavy development. MotionBased (”MB”), it’s predecessor, was acquired by Garmin and will be replaced with Connect sometime soon. MB has always had poor performance, but offers many useful and interesting features to analyze GPS and workout data, so much so that I happily paid $10+/month for MB before Garmin bought it.

Eliminate Music on Hold from Askozia

Music on hold is something I avoid, so I was embarrassed to discover my own PBX (Askozia) forcing it on my own callers.

Legibility and the Garmin Edge 705

This product has amazing specifications. It measures (or is capable of measuring) just about all the data I possibly want for a ride, and works very well as an instrument.

I’ve done a few fitness rides with it and I am very disappointed with its usability.

pfSense 1.2 on ALIX

Want pfSense 1.2 installed on PC Engines ALIX.2c3 platform to for home router duty and provisioning of a Polycom IP430 phone. The former is trivial, the latter requires some minor abuse.

Install XPe EWF

Use Windows XP Embedded “Enhanced Write Filter” to prolong the life of flash disks

AIM on TMO BlackBerry

Instructions are involved: must “restore” the Service Book and install the clients for AIM, ICQ, and MSN (can select which to install).

After all this, it doesn’t actually work because TMO has elected to block the clients from connecting (and is not providing their own service books). Probably to preserve “per message” (SMS) revenue stream.

Enable all Blackberry Pearl vendor themes

The Pearl firmware contains interesting themes for a variety of wireless operators. Some simple XML config file hacking will reveal them