Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Camouflage extreme.

!
How can the octopus do this when colour blind?
How is it tricking us?
And so quick.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Cleaning the Mac Mighty Mouse

They do get clogged up. That's the only pain with them - they weren't designed to be cleaned and Apple didn't expected them to get clogged with gunk.
Years of scrolling down and not able to scroll up ensued.

How to Clean - attempt ONE.
  1. turn the mouse upside down
  2. Put the ball on a sheet of white paper and quickly move the mouse around for a minute or so making sure the ball is being exercised.
This sort of works sometimes. Though often just as a brief respite.

How to Clean - attempt TWO.
When it's all got too much and attempt one isn't enough then:

Tools needed are few, I used the screwdriver of a Swiss Army knife and a tiny phillips screw driver and glue to put it back together.

There are 4 tiny rollers in the ball device. When you take the device apart make a note of their orientation. You can review it in the video.

How to do it, see this helpful Video.

Friday, September 16, 2011

The Elephant test. It's difficult to describe but you know it when you see it.

I think it's an Indian story but probably our most famous version was by John Godfrey Saxe.


It was six men of Indostan
To learning much inclined,
Who went to see the Elephant
(Though all of them were blind),
That each by observation
Might satisfy his mind

The First approached the Elephant,
And happening to fall
Against his broad and sturdy side,
At once began to bawl:
"God bless me! but the Elephant
Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk,
Cried, "Ho! what have we here
So very round and smooth and sharp?
To me 'tis mighty clear
This wonder of an Elephant
Is very like a spear!"

The Third approached the animal,
And happening to take
The squirming trunk within his hands,
Thus boldly up and spake:
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant
Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,
And felt about the knee.
"What most this wondrous beast is like
Is mighty plain," quoth he;
" 'Tis clear enough the Elephant
Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,
Said: "E'en the blindest man
Can tell what this resembles most;
Deny the fact who can
This marvel of an Elephant
Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun
About the beast to grope,
Than, seizing on the swinging tail
That fell within his scope,
"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant
Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right,
And all were in the wrong!

Moral: 

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!

Eric Evans gave a good lecture on legacy systems which started by using this 

Safari's accidental zoom with Lion and Magic mouse

I've finally twigged why Safari on Mac OS Lion was zooming in for no apparent reason. It only started happening when I started using my Magic mouse which I decided to move from the family iMac.
It wasn't a multi-figure expansion type gesture or a combination of tapping and Command key.
It was of course, the iPhone & iPad smart zoom gesture.

You double-tap a web page for it to intelligently zoom to the main text area of the page. It's not that useful on my large screen so it can be turned off by de-selecting Smart zoom in the Mouse System Preferences.