i think every time i have a list of three things, my natural tendency is to end it with “oh my!”. damn you l. frank baum! 

we have a few macs at work to support a few different projects, and most of our projects are java-based. this year marks the end of life of java 5 (we’ll miss you!) and my introduction in to mac and java woes. it turns out steve jobs made some disparaging remarks against java, and now sun and java aren’t playing nice together. so much for cross platform, although at this points it is more an inconvenience than doom and gloom.

there are two basic problems. first, there is no 32-bit version of java 6 for the mac, so we had to install the 64-bit version. that normally wouldn’t be a big deal, except that for jni to work, the platform libraries need to be compiled to match the jvm, so all of our 32-bit libraries we built for one of our projects for which we leverage jni need to be recompiled for 64-bit support.

the second problem is eclipse, our development environment. evidently, it does not like the the mac java 6 implementation. good news! you can install java 6, but you can’t use your development environment in java 6! woot!

we did some searching around and came up with (mostly) a solution. here is what we did:

1. first, bite the bullet and install the 64-bit (and only) version of java on the mac.

2. next, make it your default JVM. To do this, use “Applications > Utilities > Java > Java Preferences”. drag the java 6 item to the top of both the applet and application lists. viola! default.

3. reboot.

4. to get eclipse to work, you’ll need to modify the plist file. mine was located in /Applications/eclipse/Eclipse.app/Contents/Info.plist. open it in an editor.

5.  the default Info.plist file has a section near the top that shows you how to use a specific jvm for eclipse. i uncommented out the section for the 1.5 jvm.

6. launch eclipse. it should use the java 5 jvm and come up.

7. one last thing worth doing in eclipse is making sure you have both the 1.5 and 1.6 jres installed. to do this, in eclipse open th eclipse properties and navagate to “Java > Installed JREs”.  click the add button and follow the prompts to add the path for any missing jres. you can also set the default jre here, and you should set the compiler compliance level under “Java > Compiler”.

the kicker is the jni side. for this to work, a few things need to happen.

first, you’ll need to recompile any libraries that you compiled to use with jni for 64-bit, if it isn’t already. in our case, we need the jpcap libraries. to do this, i had to modify the Makefile and specify the “-arch x86_64″ argument to the compiler.  the other piece i had to check was to make sure that my jni references were pointing to the jni.h inside of the java 6 installation. it looks like that’s the bit that really counts for the whole jni thing.

of course, that didn’t work. well, it sort of worked. the jre isn’t complaining about the unsatisfiedlinkerror, but there is something still missing from the jpcap recompile so that some of the calls are not working. but we’ll get there.

ain’t technology fun?

i love joshua radin

one of my new year resolutions (which has turned in to an obsession) is eating healthier. even though i haven’t read the michael pollan books yet, i did buy them and the ideas in his books (and others like them) have gotten a lot of attention lately. the big concepts i picked up on are: not eating anything that i don’t know what went in to it, not eating anything pre-packaged with more than 5 ingredients, and not eating anything that “doesn’t rot”.

all of this seems reasonable. if it doesn’t spoil, then its likely so saturated with chemicals and all sorts of nasty stuff. if it’s got more than 5 ingredients, it probably has a lot of additives and things i can’t pronounce or, worse, something that is so complicated they only refer to it as a acronym. and, with some exceptions, if i’m eating something and i don’t know what went in to it, then i probably don’t want to know what went in to it and shouldn’t be eating it.

so, now we’re almost a month in to it, and i have some observations:

1. it’s hard to find food that passes the filter. doing the grocery shopping, i look at the ingredients of everything now. this actually started last year, but i’m getting progressively more picky. and not only about the chemicals in the food, but about things like the salt content. it’s crazy how much stuff has added salt. canned vegetables? salt. and sugar? if its low sugar, then it’s got some chemical substitute. awesome! 

2. food that passes the filter is more expensive.  want the low sodium version of those canned vegetables? pay more. want something with less chemicals that’s labeled “organic”? pay more.  or…

3. it takes more work. i’m finding that if i want to know what’s in something, i have to make it. or watch it being made. that’s part of the trade-off, i think. you either pay more for the good stuff, or you make it yourself.  case in point, we bought a bread machine. even the “fresh” bread from the grocery store bakery has way too many ingredients. when i made bread, it had 2 kinds of flour, water, salt, an egg, and yeast. that’s it. and that’s all it needed. sure, it wasn’t conveniently cut in to sandwich slices, but it tasted great, will actually wind up being cheaper in the long run (once the costs of the bread machine are covered), and it really wasn’t THAT hard to make. there was an incident with the recipe i used and how big the loaf turned out to be (it reached the top…oops). but we also made a cinnamon swirl bread that required a little extra work but was worth it. see below for the giant bread…

i’m really trying to not go too overboard with any of this, but it’s in my nature to go overboard on just this sort of thing. i’ll obsess, and go to extremes. i think that’s part of the reason i haven’t read the books yet. i know what they are going to do to me, and i’m trying to prep myself and brace myself and get that tattoo of “everything is okay in moderation”, which is (mostly) true.

 i have made some exceptions to the rules. i will never read the ingredients of e.l. fudge. i don’t want to know, because i know if i did know, i know that i wouldn’t be able eat them. and as the name implies, everyone loves fudge!  

 even with the rules and the restrictions, it’s really not that bad. i’m finding new recipes that taste awesome. we’re even finding 15 minute meals that are healthy and tasty, instead of buying the skillet meals that are loaded with all kinds of garbage. i’m getting better about buying things in in larger portions and freezing leftovers.  there is a sense of accomplishment with making things from scratch. over the weekend, i made lasagna (mostly) from scratch. handmade noodles, homemade sauce. enough for lunches, and frozen leftovers for a quick meal. the effort of making that one meal turns in to providing at least 4 meals. 

i think we’ve even better so far this year than we have in a long time. we have total control over carbs, and fat, and every ingredient going in to what we eat.  my body likes it, and i like the feeling that we’re living better, and it’s providing motivation to work out and do more active things.  

sure, the vegetables we’re using were sprayed with pesticides. 2 dinosaurs were killed to provide the fuel it took for my tomato to get to the grocery store. the chicken was cruelly treated and genetically altered. the milk we’re drinking isn’t fit for a calf with all the hormones that are in it. but that is a problem to be solved by next year’s resolution.

not for me directly, but for the country. sometimes it’s not for the right reasons, but all the stars come in to alignment and something good happens. in spite of my views of our political system and of politicians in general, i think something good did happen today. regardless of political affiliations and who voted for who, i think some of our ally counties look at us a little different today, and if that helps us repair some of those relationships, we can certainly use some healing in that regard. i think people are generally sparked to want to make a difference, and if they do something because of this, we can use the push there, as well. the system is broken, and i think most of us have no faith in it.  we’re a republic, and not a democracy, and our process enables and encourages those that represent us to lie, cheat, steal, earmark, and generally corrupt themselves for their own agendas. whether the new president is any different, who knows. i’m cynical and skeptical, but cynical dave isn’t here right now. hopeful dave is in the house. i’m hopeful, not just for him, but for what this process of getting him in the office has done for myself and so many others across the country. instead of 99% of the people in the country throwing their hands up in the air and saying “what difference does it make, it’s all broken and it will always be broken”, i think there are more people that believe that change is possible. it’s not a majority, and i don’t think it’s even in double digits. but that hopeful number is bigger than it was a year ago, and i’m part of that number.  realistically, our new president has to play the same game all the previous ones did, and the next few presidents will have to play the same game. but that’s not the fatalistic dave coming out, it’s the realistic dave. every president inherits a lot of what the previous president did, and it takes time to adjust the direction the ship is heading. george left stuff for barrack to handle, just as bill left stuff for george. but if one of the things barrack leaves for hillary is a crazy level of visibility in to what actually goes on in washington, i think that’s a path that the people want and need, and that’s what is going to help fix the process…accountability. the pervasiveness of how unaccountable our society is, be in in government, or our children, or ourselves, is disgusting.  but with visibility, hopefully, comes accountability and consequences for our actions. we become  accountable. our kids become  accountable. and our politicians are held  accountable. instead of voting for the party which some crazy number of the population do, regardless of the issues, i’m hopeful that we’ll be able to vote for people for something that more resembles the right reasons and hold them accountable. 

but any progress we make can be wiped away in one election, as soon as we forget what we learn and vote for the next guy or gal that drapes the shroud over washington, and we’re right back to where we are today. the attitudes of “it can’t change” gave up already or never really believed in the first place, and they are going to try to infect the rest of us and try to make us give up hope, too. 

that, incase you missed it, is cynical dave.  but the good news is that hopeful dave just took him out back to educate him on the possibilities of a future where people think beyond themselves.

and then he signed up for volunteer match.

today’s word is almost. as in,  i posted something on the website almost every day. today was almost a waste of a day.  vancouver almost won tonight. i almost put pictures up that i took yesterday. almost, almost, almost.

i actually had grander plans today, but my motivation level was lacking. kerri gets home tomorrow.  not a moment too soon. i almost didn’t make it.

poor rich franklin. but lucky for me, our friends kept me company while kerri is out of town. just getting in, the dog was let out, the cat got his medicine, and it’s time to sleep. i had an idea for a different post tonight, but got in too late so i’ll make up for it tomorrow.

ok, i didn’t say it was good music. evidently this guy was an ex-army guy who stayed in germany when he left the military and joined the band “Captain Jack”. the reason i’m posting this isn’t because of the scantily clad women (well, it sort of is, indirectly). i woke up this morning with this song in my head, which made me think of an article i read a few weeks back. bear with me a few moments and this will all make sense! well, one more distraction. did you know it’s “bear with me” not “bare with me”? the second one would mean “let’s get nekkid together”, which i guess sort of ties in with the girls in the video, but that’s a total coincidence.

back to the article… it was talking about earworms, and why you can’t get some songs out of your head. the article theorized that it seems to happen more often when you only get a part of your sing stuck in your head, and that a way to get the song out of your head faster would be to listen to the complete song. to me, it makes sense. when a song is stuck in my head, i seem to only repeat a piece of it, like the chorus or a verse; it’s not like the whole song replays in my head. so my attack plan was to find the song online, listen to it, and be done. 

now, if it worked, why feel the need to write a post about it, you may be wondering. ah, good question!

so if you watch the video (or at least the first part of it), you’ll see that it takes place on a generic “army barracks”.  well, it’s not so generic. it’s actually turley barracks in mannheim, germany. the next logical question is “um, how the heck do you know that?” because i know everything! ok, not really. well, maybe. but that’s not why. the answer is because that’s where i was stationed when i was in the army. no foolin! and, i happened to see them filming the video! so did 99% of the males stationed on that kaserne. for obvious reasons. we liked to march. 

it turns out turley barracks was closed in 2008. i found some pictures on flickr.

and one final thought, dane cook has 3 albumns in the top 100 albumns on itunes. frat boy comedy coming from a guy thats 50. sweet.

my wandering from the captain jack video on youtube brought me to this. i apologize in advance: 

Thanks, webMD.

http://www.webmd.com/cancer/bone-marrow-transplantation-peripheral-blood-stem-cell-transplantation

i never really appreciated the grateful dead. i have a few friends and acquaintances that are in to them, but only recently did i really listen to them and appreciate that it is they could do. most of that, for sure, comes from learning the guitar and having a deadhead teacher who can explain the what’s and the why’s of their music and their guitar-work. being the young (in practice, not in age) student of the guitar, music theory,  and composition, i can certainly recognize their gift. i’d like to see any of the more popular bands carry a song for 30 minutes and keep it interesting and moving forward in to the next song. 

one of the songs i’m using to play along with is actually a merle haggard song titled “sing me back home”, redone by the dead. pretty cool stuff.

The warden led a prisoner down the hallway to his doom
I stood up to say good-bye like all the rest 
And I heard him tell the warden just before he reached my cell
‘Let my guitar playing friend do my request.’ (Let him…)

Sing me back home with a song I used to hear
Make my old memories come alive
Take me away and turn back the years
Sing Me Back Home before I die

I recall last Sunday morning a choir from ‘cross the street
Came to sing a few old gospel songs
And I heard him tell the singers ‘There’s a song my mama sang.
Can I hear once before we move along?’

Sing me back home, the song my mama sang
Make my old memories come alive
Take me away and turn back the years
Sing Me Back Home before I die

Sing Me Back Home before I die