Stuff for Nerds
Nerd News
Australian Government 2.0 a Big Fat Fail
Nov 17th
Well it had to come out sooner or later. Hiding behind that thinly veiled Gov 2.0 policy is nothing more than just the head of state, head of country or head of whatever group is under you participating in social media. All other employees are completely blocked. That means, no facebook, no twitter, no myspace, hell even the Gizmodo home page is blocked. And don’t get me started on Google services.
Take note politicians, the public are fast becoming tired of these obviously two faced press releases. Time to face facts.
http://www.itwire.com/it-policy-news/government-tech-policy/43276-gartner-grades-gov-20-a-fail
Picture courtesy of Twitter: The Famous Fail Whale
Convert DTS to AC3 on Mac OSX
Sep 7th
I have been compressing my DVD’s and Blurays for years to a format that plays on my various media players. After purchasing and falling in love with the Apple TV interface I decided to use it as my primary media playback device. This unfortunately led to the problem of the Apple TV being unable to playback a DTS soundtrack. Up until recently I have been running Windows in a virtual machine just to run some simple buggy applications for the conversion. This process was time consuming and very frustrating.
I decided to do a search to try a find a reasonably easy process on OSX. I found a few different methods but most out of date with broken links so I decided to compile my own howto combining information from many sources. I will try to link back where possible.
Here we go.
Step 1
Install Xcode from Apple. Signup here and register as a developer if you do not have an account.
http://developer.apple.com/programs/register/
Download Xcode when you are logged in and install the default configuration.
Step 2
Install CMake
mkdir /tempcd /tempcurl -O http://www.cmake.org/files/v2.8/cmake-2.8.2.tar.gztar xvzf cmakecd cmake-2.8.2./configuremakesudo make install
Mirror of CMake 2.8.2 here.
Step 3
Install Aften
cd /tempsvn co http://aften.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/aften Aftencd Aftenmkdir defaultcd defaultcmake /temp/Aften/makesudo make install
Step 4
Install libdca
cd /tempsvn co svn://svn.videolan.org/libdca/trunk libdcacd libcdasudo ./bootstrapsudo ./configuresudo makesudo make install
Step 5
Install MKVToolNix
The easiest way to do this is as per the MKVToolnix site and to install MacPorts
Download MacPorts from here
Install the package and restart Terminal.
Now install MKVToolnix using
sudo port install mkvtoolnix
Mine took about 15 minutes to install the dependencies required and to install MKVToolnix.
Step 6
Install the final mkvdts2ac3 script.
You can get it from here.
I also have a local copy here.
Remove the .txt extension if you use my local copy.
Place the script in your /usr/local/bin folder.
cd to the download location of the mkvdts2ac3.sh scriptchmod 755 mkvdts2ac3.shcp mkvdts2ac3.sh /usr/local/bin
All done.
Now you should be able to convert your mkv files with a DTS soundtrack to AC3.
In the terminal, cd to a folder where your mkv file is and run
mkvdts2ac3.sh yourfile.mkv
If you do not want to keep the DTS file use the -n flag.
Good luck.
The iAbbott Launches
Aug 16th
Just happened to stumble upon this golden video on YouTube.
I had a laugh anyway.
Australia Post Delivers Again
Jul 23rd
Express Air Freight at your Front Door
I have installed a couple Vivotek IP7330 IP CCTV cameras at home due to a friends car being broken into (more on that later).
Now that these cameras are installed I get to see all the goings on at home when I am not there. I was lucky enough to capture this today showing the great care that Australia Post takes with your parcels. Not only was he too lazy to bend over to put the parcel on the matt but he also decided to throw it at the ground from a distance.
I find it amusing that the goal of Australia Post is “To offer responsible and valued products and services”. I wonder when they will start.
Blog Update
Jul 23rd
Wow, has it really been that long since an update???
I have decided to give my personal blog a makeover and update the WordPress software to the current version. Two hours later and a little re-organisation we have lift off. Hopefully I will keep it up to date this time around.
I have selected a new theme and decided that I will add some of my thoughts on the goings on in telecommunications and security around the place, well mainly Australia anyway.
Enjoy
