that’sfit: What is Parkour?)

Awesome! Sounds like word about Parkour is making its way into the mainstream…

In the most recent James Bond film, Casino Royale, viewers are treated to an amazing demonstration of agility and physical prowess — and no, ladies, I’m not referring to actor Daniel Craig’s formidable physique. Rather, early in the film an extended, nail-biting action sequence takes place, showcasing the acrobatic and almost gravity-defying abilities possessed by practitioners of the physical art form known as Parkour.

Founded by David Belle in France, Parkour (which means “the art of displacement” in English) is an activity with the aim of moving from one point to another as efficiently and quickly as possible, principally using the abilities of the human body. It is meant to help a person overcome obstacles found in their surrounding environment — from tree branches and large rocks to metal railings and concrete walls.

(via that’sfit: What is Parkour?)

Lifehacker: Sysinternals Live is One-Stop Shop for Launching Must-Have Utilities

Another awesome post from Lifehacker…maybe I should just add their RSS feed as a widget on the sidebar. 😉

sysinternals-live.pngIf you’ve ever done any serious Windows troubleshooting, you’ve no doubt come across a freeware utility or two by Sysinternals—like the excellent, previously mentioned Process Explorer. You may also know that Microsoft eventually bought up every Sysinternals utility and bundled it into a single suite of apps. Now Sysinternals has launched a new way to access their library of must-have utilities quickly and easily from any internet-connected PC.

First, you can point your browser to http://live.sysinternals.com/ for no-nonsense access to any Sysinternals tool. Even better, though, you can open up Windows Explorer and point it to \\live.sysinternals.com\ to browse and launch any Sysinternals app as though you’ve already downloaded and installed it on your computer. That means next time you’re doing tech support for friends and you forgot your PC Rescue Kit, you can quickly get to any Sysinternals tool for help. At the very least, though, it’s a quicker way to start the BlueScreen screen saver on a friends computer.

(via Sysinternals Live is One-Stop Shop for Launching Must-Have Utilities)

DPS: 5 Quick Tips To Keep You Motivated

Great post from digital Photography School about how to keep yourself motivated in your photographic endeavors:

We all have those days. Days where you know you want to do something with your camera or photographs, but the motivation tank is on Empty. I’ve been having some of those days recently and came up with a list to help pop me out of the rut and back to being productive. This list is by no means exhaustive and I’d appreciate any additions that work for you, in the comments section.

TIP #1 – Go for a walk
Copyright marta the good oneI know, I know. It’s one of the hardest things to do when you’re not feeling motivated. Even worse if it’s raining outside. But getting your bum off the chair or sofa and out the door is a great first step. It is a lot easier to just keep staring at the computer screen and letting your analytical mind wander, sometimes feeling like you’re accomplishing something, but getting your blood pumping and elevating your heart rate will help activate your creative mind. It doesn’t need to be a long or fast walk. Just 15 minutes will be enough to get the juices flowing.

It also helps because it removes you from an environment that is obviously not helping you become creative at the moment. I like this method because it requires no special equipment, clothes or location. Everyone has ‘outside’ out their front door. Just lace up some shoes or boots and get your heart going!

(via 5 Quick Tips To Keep You Motivated)

digital Photography School: HDR Photography – What Do You Think About It?

Great article from digital Photography School about HDR photography:

Hdr-Image

There are numerous discussion on HOW to make HDR images in our forums but one recurring discussion that I’m seeing around the web is over whether it’s a form of photography that people like. Some people love the effect and others hate it. Some say it’s not ‘pure’ photography others ask what pure photography really is? Some call it ‘fake’ and others see it as a thing of beauty.

I thought it’d make an interesting discussion. Do you like HDR images? What do you like or dislike about them?

(via digital Photography School: HDR Photography – What Do You Think About It?)

Lifehacker: Learn to Play an Instrument Online

Another wonderful Lifehacker post, about how to learn to play an instrument online

…might be a chance for me to finally learn how to play that guitar… 😉

Chances are at one point or another, you’ve either purchased an instrument or considered doing so with the intention of learning to play it; most of us, however, never get around the learning part. The internet is a glorious fount of freely available information, and it’s slowly filling up with excellent tutorials for getting good at just about anything—including playing a new instrument. Hit the jump for a handful of great resources for getting started with a new instrument online for the low, low price of free.

(via Learn to Play an Instrument Online)

Slashdot: F/OSS Flat-File Database

Good question, actually. See the link for some answers from the /. community:

Leemeng writes “I’m looking for a simple, free, and F/OSS flat-file database program. I’m storing info about Wi-Fi access points that I come across, maybe 8-9 fields per entry. I’ve outgrown Notepad. This info is for my own reference only; it is not going on a Web server. Googling was unhelpful, with results skewed towards SQL, Access (MS), and Oracle, all of which would be overkill for my purposes. My criteria are: it must be simple, F/OSS, must work in Windows Vista, preferably use a portable format, must not be an online app, and must not require Java. Does such a beast exist?”

(via http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/20/2150246)

Mister Parkour

This guy (Adam Dunlap) teaches a Parkour class in Portland, which I’ve been taking for the past two weeks. The class is really fun, and he’s really good at Parkour:

Lifehacker: Set Firefox 3 to Launch Gmail for mailto: Links

gmailhandler-header-win

Another great post from Lifehacker (of course) about how to set Gmail as your default mail handler in Firefox 3:

In today’s earlier list of five extensions you won’t need in Firefox 3, we said you won’t need any special toolbars, third-party apps, Greasemonkey scripts, or extensions to get Firefox to use webapps to open certain types of links. This means that when you click on an email address that uses the standard mailto: email protocol, Firefox 3 itself can launch Gmail instead of a desktop app. By default, the Firefox RC 1 only comes with Yahoo! Mail as a possible mailto: link handler, which leaves Gmail users out in the cold—unless you know how to set it up by hand. Here’s how to configure Firefox 3 to use Gmail as your default mailto: application handler.

Ready to set up Gmail? Roll up those sleeves.

(via Set Firefox 3 to Launch Gmail for mailto Links)

@TheKeyboard: Form Validation with jQuery

Great article about jQuery Form Validation from littlehart.net:

Now that I have to actually design interfaces for other people, I am learning the finer details of Javascript. Specifically, I’m using JQuery as my library of choice. I won’t go into why I’m using, just go to the site and see it for yourself. One of the things I’ve had to build recently is a playlist editor for the IPTV project. I decided to be user-friendly for once, and make it Ajax-powered. So this meant a lot of work creating small little actions in my Zend Framework code to accept form posts, etc. Still cleaning things up, but I wanted to share some of the coolness from using a jQuery form plugin .

So, never having really done any Javascript form validation (I know you’re shocked) I unleashed my inner “programmer” to go and hack away at it so I can figure it out, then call back my inner “developer” to make the code elegant and compact. It took me all morning but I figured it out thanks to Google and just hacking away at it. One of the neat things about Javascript is that it supports the ability to dynamically define functions in your code. With it’s extensive use of callbacks, jQuery leverages this to the hilt. I believe this is what the Ruby crowd refers to as “blocks and closures”. Please correct me if I’m wrong. Okay, so here’s some code that illustrates how I was doing validation of the form:

(continued via Form Validation with jQuery)

Lifehacker: Pack a Photography Survival Kit

Another great article from Lifehacker (AU) about how to pack a Photography Survival Kit.

Planning a long, leisurely trip through the wilderness, down the highway, or maybe around Thailand, and want to return home with some killer pictures to look through? David Hague, managing editor of Australasian Camcorder magazine, has been there, and back, many times. Hague keeps three separate backpacks for varying degrees of roughing it, but his list of potentially equipment-saving stuff is good for any on-the-go kit. Among the provisions, for still or video cameras (and yourself):

  • Sealable plastic bags as emergency camera ‘raincoats’
  • Lens cleaning kit
  • Jeweller’s screwdriver kit
  • Small table top tripod (from eBay – around $10)
  • Dry socks

(via Pack a Photography Survival Kit)

TurboTax Info: If You Used Santa Barbara Bank & Trust To Get Your 2007 Tax Refund (in regard to your Economic Stimulus check)

Info from http://turbotax.intuit.com/support/kb/tax-content/tax-tips/6255.html:

Why did it take TurboTax take awhile to explain that payment methods would affect how and when rebates arrive?

The law creating the tax rebates, the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008, was signed by President Bush on Feb. 13. As soon as details of the act emerged and could be verified, TurboTax updated customer articles about the rebates. The updates pointed out that customers using the payment method with Santa Barbara Bank & Trust could receive their rebates by mail rather than by direct deposit.

It was not until mid-March, however, that the IRS announced the rebate payment schedule. The schedule showed that rebates would be mailed in order of the last two digits of taxpayers’ Social Security numbers — BUT that direct-deposit recipients would get theirs first.

…So, if they knew about this in mid-March, why were the e-mail notices sent out MAY 16?

2008 Economic Stimulus Check Timeline (By Mail)

For those of you searching for just the timeline, here it is.

(Sorry for the picture instead of a text table, I  took a screenshot of this information from an e-mail.)

2008-05-16_131943

Please note, that if you chose to have your filing fees automatically deducted from your refund (ala TurboTax) instead of paying for them out of pocket, or filing in another manner, your check will be mailed to you on a date according to the schedule above, not direct-deposited into your bank account.

Updated: TurboTax, IRS, and the late Stimulus Check Issue…

Edit: Bob Meighan, the VP of TurboTax left a comment on this post below, which has caused me to retract my rant about never using TurboTax again: (Link to comment.)

Bob addressed the issue of the late e-mail communication, as well as the fact that this delay affected “affected not only TurboTax customers, but all taxpayers who used a bank product to pay their fees … It would not have mattered if you used a competitor’s product, went to a franchise or a tax professional. This affected all players in this business.”

The comment above Bob’s, by “g” also listed a blog article which further clarifies this issue:

This blog, by a reputable tax lawyer, claims the IRS did not anticipate the number of people that were going to use electronic filing software, that they did not get enough notice about the package details to work it out, so the IRS became overwhelmed.
http://www.getirshelp.com/irsblog/?p=169

And, per Bob’s request, I’ve reviewed the articles he sent me in the broadcast e-mail, and I’ll post them here for you to review as well:

Other sources for current information on the rebate program are.

For more information on TurboTax and rebates, please visit http://turbotax.intuit.com/support/kb/tax-content/tax-tips/6255.html

I’m leaving the original rant below as a reference point, but please note that this issue has been addressed by TurboTax. Thanks for reading!

More

Divide By Zero

Heh. This photo I found on the Interwebs is by far the most popular photo in my photostream. I wish my own photos got this kind of attention. 😉

Edit: If this is your photo, please let me know, and I’ll give you credit for it!