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Stuff that doesn’t fit in any other category

Revisiting ripping Blu-ray discs

A couple years back, I explained how I rip Blu-ray discs. A lot of time has passed, and I now use a slightly different procedure that results in much faster rips—with the caveat that the resulting file will be larger than the "slow" method, and is technically of slightly lower quality, though I can't visually distinguish the two.

The new method uses Don Melton's amazing video transcoding tools, a set of Unix programs that optimize video conversion in ways you cannot do (or easily do) in the Handbrake GUI. If you're new to Unix, but would still like to try these tools, I wrote a detailed set of instructions that should help get you up and running.

Using these Unix programs, you can rip a disc with various parameters, including one to optimize for speed (with good image quality) and another that tries to minimize the file size.

Here's a quick comparison of all three methods, as tested with the three-hour Hamlet Blu-ray. The 'Handbrake GUI' rip was done using, well, the Handbrake GUI as described in my original article. The second and third rows use Don's tools set to quick and veryquick modes, and the final row uses Don's tools set to optimize the file size.

MethodData CopiedConvert (hrs:mins)File Size
Handbrake GUI47.5GB3:526.8GB
transcode - quick40.1GB2:209.2GB
transcode - small40.1GB3:126.5GB

Tested on a late 2014 27" iMac with a 4GHz Core i7 and 24GB of RAM.

Using Don's tools in "quick" mode, you save time two ways: 7GB (15%) less data is copied to the hard drive, and the conversion process is over 90 minutes (38%) faster. The downside is that the final file size is 2.4GB (35%) larger. And that's what they call a tradeoff.

Using the "small" mode in Don's tools, you still save the 7GB (15%) of data copy, and still save 40 minutes (17%) over the original method. In addition, the file size is smaller than the Handbrake GUI version.

To summarize, regardless of whether you care more about file size or ripping speed, Don's tools provide an advantage over the Handbrake GUI: Either method is notably faster, and the small option generates smaller (or probably at worst, very similar) file sizes. (There's also a "big" option, if you don't mind somewhat larger files at a higher quality level.)

Keep reading to see some examples of the image quality of each method, and information on how to install and use Don's video transcoding tools.

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I have completed my first—and last—marathon

Last weekend, I ran (along with about 7,000 other entrants) the Portland Marathon. This was my first ever marathon, and also my last-ever marathon. I finished, in 4:12:53 (1,365th place, of 4,295 finishers), which is about how long I thought it'd take me. What follows is a brief look back at how I got to the point where I willingly chose to run 26.2 miles; you may find the information useful if you're contemplating running a marathon yourself someday.

About the race

The Portland Marathon is a great race, now in its 45th year. It's actually two races in one, as there's a half-marathon with the same start and finish points. As seen on the course map (caution: 2.8MB PDF), the two races share the same course until the 11 mile mark. At that point, the half marathon returns downtown for the finish, while the marathon heads into Northwest Portland, then loops up and over the St. John's Bridge, which would typically provide some amazing views. Of course, it was pouring rain and cloudy all day, so the views weren't quite so good for us.

The course then follows along a bluff (again, typically scenic) overlooking Portland before descending down into the east side industrial area (running right along the rail yard), then returning to downtown (over the much less scenic Broadway Bridge) and on to the finish.

Why did I decide to run a marathon?

When this year started, I had no thought of running a marathon. I have thought about it in years past, when I was running regularly—and my dad had run them when I was younger, so they intrigued me. (My dad was quite fast; his best was a 2:40, which is an insane 6:08 a mile for 26.2 miles!) But as of the start of the year, it'd been roughly four years since I was running on a regular basis, so running even one mile seemed ludicrous.

To force myself to get in shape this year, I set a pretty ridiculous goal: I decided I'd walk or run 2,016 miles in 2016. This meant averaging 5.5 miles a day, every day, for the entire year. From someone who had probably ran a total of five miles in 2015. Yea, it's a pretty insane goal.

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Plex and I do not get along

After hearing my The Committed podcast cohosts rave about Plex (a free media server), I thought I'd give it another shot: I'd tried a few months back, but because of the way I store my personal videos (using our own Usher app), it was going to be a big migration project, and I just never got into it. So today, I resolved to try again.

And today, I'm giving up again. I've spent the last few hours fighting Plex, and despite the awesomeness of the streaming (it *is* awesome), it's just not worth the aggravation in configuration and setup—to me, of course. Plenty of others find it works just fine.

But for me, it doesn't work at all, basically. Here's a short list of some of the things that bother me about Plex…

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Do-it-yourself RAV4 cargo area covers

  • Auto

Note: This post will only (possibly) be of interest to buyers of the 2016 RAV4; if you're not one of what I assume is a handful of people (at most), move along—there's really nothing to see here! Posting mainly so I remember what I did.

We recently bought a 2016 RAV4, and (so far) love it. However, there's one thing that bothered us: the front of the rear cargo area is visible to anyone who glances in. Toyota sells a cover for the cargo area, but unlike those for past RAV4s, it doesn't attach to the rear setbacks, leaving the front area uncovered. This means that a good sized chunk of the cargo area is still visible, even with the cargo cover in place.

I didn't want to wait for Toyota to release something, so I set out to MacGyver a solution. I had a few requirements for my homemade fix:

  • Absolutely no added rattles/noise
  • Very light
  • Very cheap
  • No bright reflections in back window
  • Move when the seats' recline angle changes
  • Easily installed/removed

I had a lot of different thoughts, but wound up using foam core covered by felt, attached with some flat black nylon string. Note: These covers require the cargo cover, as they use its crossbar for support.

They may not be the loveliest things in the world, but they work perfectly and meet every one of my original objectives.

If you'd like to create your own covers, here's how I made ours…

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The (lack of) economics in most hybrid SUVs

Recently, we were in the market for a new car, well, not car but SUV. My wife really likes small to mid-size all wheel drive SUVs, so we started looking for one to replace the car she's been driving.

But she also prefers hybrids, both for the environmental and economic benefits (using less gas, spending less money) and for the "not having to wait in Oregon's ever-present gas lines" (because we're too stupid to pump our own gas) benefit. Having now done lots of research, I have to say that looking for a SUV that's also a hybrid greatly reduces the choices available.

The environmental question This analysis completely ignores the environmental side of hybrids: Using less gas means emitting less pollutants, which is good for the environment. However, producing batteries can be a dirty business, and batteries consume rare metals. So are they an environmental net loss or gain?

On the question of plug-in hybrids, which recharge from the power grid, it gets even messier: How is the electricity used to recharge created? In the northwest, much of the power comes from hydro and wind, which are cleaner than the coal used in other areas of the country.

In short, I've completely ignored the environmental issue here because it's very complicated. If someone's aware of a good "green impact" metric that works across hybrids, please let me know.

After doing a lot of reading and searching, and not really worrying about budget just yet, we only found a handful of options (excluding some super-high-end vehicles):

There's also the BMW X5 xDrive40e, but (a) it's not out yet, (b) it's a plug-in hybrid not a straight hybrid, and (c) it's going to be really wacko expensive when it comes out. So I'm ignoring that one, too.

What I found as I started to analyze the various hybrid SUVs is that—with one amazing exception—they don't make any economic sense even for the most long-distance of drivers.

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When good eyeballs go bad

This week I learned yet another one of those things they don't tell you when you're younger. In this case, it's that your eyeballs may spontaneously decide to stop working one day, without any prior warning or causation on your part. So if you're still young, remember this, so you're not overly startled if it happens!

Executive summary version

A new "floater" in my right eye on Monday morning turned into near blindness in that eye by Monday evening. A night in the ER and a diagnosis by an ophthalmologist indicated I'd had a hemorrhage and partial ripping of my retina.

But that wasn't the scary part. The scary part was that this isn't rare or unusual, and is part of the aging process. It can happen to anyone, at any time. To make a long story short, my eye should eventually be fine (though it'll take it 30 to 90 days to get back to normal).

Ah, the joys of aging…read on if you'd like the (really) long version.

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Images replace content in USA Today’s iOS app

Yesterday, I noticed that USA Today had a new iPad app out—they released it as a separate app, so it didn't replace the old version. After trying the new app, I'm incredibly glad they chose to release the new version as a new app, because it sucks. Absolutely, positively, sucks.

Like the recent CNN redesign, USA Today has chosen to focus on pretty pictures instead of information. In other words, it's become another news app that has decided not to show any news.

Here's a side-by-side comparison of the old (left) and new (right) apps:

As you can see, the new app is dominated by one massive image, and very little of anything else. Here's a quick comparison of just how bad things are in the new app:

Data points…Old AppNew App
Stories visible63
Words shown14843
Weather visibleYesNo
Navigation visibleYesNo
Ads visible01
Largest image on page386x2201024x475
% of page covered by image10.70%61.80%

If you're scoring at home, which I am, the new app has a 50% reduction in the number of visible stories, and a 71% reduction in the number of words. And that insanely-huge 'hero image' covers nearly 62% of the page!

In addition, there's no visible weather, and navigation between sections is now hiding in a hamburger menu. Overall, the usability of the app has gone from very good to basically worthless.

This is progress? I don't think so. I'm staying with the old app, and giving the new one a one-star review on the App Store. Bad move, USA Today!



The odd story of the single-country multi-country airport

I have traveled through a fair number of airports in my lifetime, but the EuroAirport is the strangest one I've ever been in. (I was there because it's the closest major airport to Freiburg, Germany, where I was working with Peter, my Many Tricks business partner).

The EuroAirport isn't strange due to layout or location or weird weather or anything. It's strange because the airport itself is split between two countries, even though it doesn't straddle a country border—it's 100% within the territory of France, but a portion of the airport "lies in" Switzerland.

This oddness is a result of the airport's development history: Basel, Switzerland wanted an airport, but lacked the space. France had the space near the town of Mulhouse, but lacked the money.

The two countries agreed to a joint development effort, starting just after World War II. The end result is an airport in France, paid for by Switzerland, and with portions of the airport physically being in Switzerland, despite the airport's location completely within France.

You can actually see this in Apple Maps, as seen in the above-right screenshot. Search on EuroAirport and you can see there's a set of country borders drawn on the airport itself; the outlined region belongs to Switzerland, even though the entirety of the airport lies in France. (Not shown is that the road leading from the airport to Basel is also Swiss property.)

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Review: Canmore G-Porter GP-102+ data logger

I recently bought a new big-size camera, bucking the trend of simply using one's iPhone for photographs. That's not to say I don't use my iPhone; it is my main picture taking device. But I wanted a camera that could capture native retina iMac images (at least 5120x2880), and the iPhone can't do that.

After much looking and sweating over the costs, I chose a Nikon D5500, mainly because I already had a Nikon and didn't really want to replace all my lenses. While this is an excellent camera, it was a bit of a budget compromise—it didn't have all the features I really wanted. In particular, it lacks a built-in GPS to geocode all the pictures I take.

As a workaround, I decided to buy a GPS data logger, which is just a small GPS receiver that records GPS coordinates at some interval. Toss the logger in your pocket (make sure it's on and receiving the GPS signals first!), then go take pictures as you normally do. When you return, you can use an app like HoudahGeo to sync the recorded GPS track with the timestamps on each photo. (I'll have more to say about this whole sync process in a future post.) Presto, instant geocoded images!

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Semi-Review: Bruce Springsteen The River concert

First off, I'm calling this a semi-review, as I am not a big concertgoer, so I'm hardly qualified to be posting an actual concert review. This is especially true for big acts in larger venues, and even more so since the kids arrived (in 2003 and 2006).

In fact, before last night's Portland stop on Bruce Springsteen's The River tour, the last big show I saw was Bruce Springsteen on the E Street Band Reunion tour, back in the spring of 2000 (at this same venue, though in the Eucker seats). So yea, it'd been a while.

I am a long-time Springsteen fan, coming aboard with Born to Run, which was released when I was 11 years old (egads). While I own most of Springsteen's albums, I'd only seen him perform live three times prior to last night. But it was the memory of those performances that had us forking out $339.50 (plus the hassle/cost of finding a sitter for the kids) for two reasonably-decent seats to The River tour stop in Portland.

My memories of his prior concerts are of an eminent performer, able to connect with the audience even in a massive 75,000 seat football stadium, with boundless energy and the ability to make songs he'd played thousands of times seem fresh and new.

However, with Bruce now 66 years old, I wasn't really sure what to expect of last night—would it be the Bruce I remembered from years past, or would it be someone just trying to cash a paycheck by phoning it in?
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