Brain Occupied Elsewhere, Mac Video Capture, Serious Man Alert

I guess I should be posting something today, but I'm mentally engaged with other projects. I've got a manuscript I'm reviewing for a journal. It's the second time round and I was the only negative reviewer the first time.  They have tried to address issues I raised, and it is much better, but I still have problems and I'm trying to figure out

1. whether it's worth pursuing further or is their key issue really a non-issue and 
2. if it could lead to something useful, how do I articulate my problems and make constructive suggestions?

Having been the recipient of plenty of reviewers comments on my own papers, I know what it feels like to get negative comments.  Negative doesn't mean abusive.  It means that the reviewer doesn't think it's ready for publication.  And for negative comments I feel an extra obligation to give lots of reasons and examples, but it's never an easy process.  So I'm struggling with how to express my reservations in as constructive a way as possible.   That's probably about all I can say on that.

Then I got notice recently that a proposal I submitted for a paper at a conference in May was accepted. So now I have to work on that. I probably will be able to share some of that process, but since I have a co-author, it gets a little more tricky.

We got a call back about an apartment in Juneau - that would make moot the ethics issues. The price and location are right and a friend down there has promised to take a look.

I went to the dermatologist this morning to check on some spots.  That's a cost of growing up near the beach in Southern California.  Nothing alarming. 


Snow Leopard Tip

Here's a gizmodo page that tells you what's new in Snow Leopard. The function I found most interesting is the ability in the new Quicktime to do VIDEO CAPTURE. From my initial experiment, you record the whole screen, so I can use this to record video, but I get everything else on the screen as well, including curser movements.  But there wasn't any audio.  I'll check it out a bit more, but even so, it's a potentially useful function and comes included in Snow Leopard.

In the new Quick Time Player, in FILE, there's an option for 'new screen recording.'  Play around from there.


And a last note:  A Serious Man is at Bear Tooth tonigh 5:30 and 8pm.  A friend in the Chicago area has assigned me that so we can discuss it.  I'm not a fan of the Coen brothers love of blood, but the violence in this movie is apparently all mental.   

Snow Leopard Black Screen Disease Cure (Maybe)

So far it's looking good. My computer is hooked up with the adapter cord and I don't touch the keyboard for five minutes and the screen doesn't go black. If you can't wait to find out what it is you can skip down to the solution at the bottom.

In hindsight it's 'obvious' but as previous posts show, I've been in contact with an Apple Help expert for over two weeks, we've tried all sorts of things, and nothing solved the problem, including a new power cord.

But two hours with an Apple Genius (I think using that word as a job title tends to diminish the word itself) named Hannah, and it appears we solved the problem. That two hours doesn't count the hour it took for them to see me when, for some reason, my appointment was lost. Fortunately, David who made my appointment yesterday was there and confirmed I had a 6pm appointment. David's sitting in the blue t-shirt on the left.





There was one more clue that emerged tonight. Up til now I haven't actually timed how long it took for the screen to go black. I knew it was around five minutes. But since we kept doing things and then turning off the computer and then waiting to see if it went black again, I was timing it over and over and it was always exactly five minutes after I stopped touching the keyboard.



They finally connected me with Hannah who tried a few things. One thing she did to see if it was my hard drive or something in the software I had on my hard drive, was load Snow Leopard from a separate hard drive onto my computer to see whether it would still shut down. At this point I don't remember what happened. I think it still shut down, but I'm not certain.

She set up a test identity to see if we logged on as another user. It didn't have the problem as the other user.

Then she checked for applications that loaded when I - as the user - turned on my computer. She took them out of the startup. That didn't fix it.

She did some other stuff with other things plugged into the computer.

I wondered why it was always five minutes. And she said, "hmmmm, what is set to happen in five minutes?" She checked my screen saver. That was set for five minutes and when she tried to change it the round rainbow came on and the screen locked.

THE SOLUTION

I had as my screensaver a slide show set up in an older iPhoto, maybe iPhoto 06 or 08. It was set to start in five minutes after I didn't touch the keyboard. She took one of the generic Apple screensavers and set it up instead. After five minutes instead of going black, it went to the screensaver and I could still use the computer.

Why Snow Leopard can't handle this old iPhoto slide show screensaver I don't know nor does Hannah. But once we turned it off and put on another screensaver, it stopped going to black.

But why only when the power adapter cord was on? We went into the sleep preferences. I had changed to sleep preference for the power adapter to an hour after it came back from the MacHaus and they'd both been reset for one minute. (I'm not exactly sure what I did at this time, but I know at some point I put it at an hour hoping that would stop it, but it didn't.) At that time we thought it was related to going to sleep. I didn't want it to go to sleep for longer so it wouldn't shut down. But I hadn't changed it for battery so it still went to sleep in one minute. So it would go to sleep before the screensaver was set to go on (which was five minutes.)

As I say, in hindsight the answer was 'obvious.'

This doesn't guarantee that the rest of you getting here searching "Snow Leopard Black Screen" or "Snow Leopard Blank Screen" (between 10 and 20 people a day) have exactly the same problem. Something in Snow Leopard is getting screwed up - on my computer - with something on the old iPhoto slideshow I was using as a screen saver. So if you have an old iPhoto slideshow for a screensaver, I'd change that first thing. If you don't have an old slide show as a screensaver, is there some possibility it is related to an old slide show or just even to an old photo shop picture coming up?

So far I've tested this about three times and it's worked fine. It never worked fine before this. One good part of this for others with the problem is that the software that is messing it up for me is an Apple product - iPhoto. So it is Apple's responsibility to figure out why this is happening and fix it. Not some other company's responsibility.

Good luck. And if this turns out to be your problem too, leave a comment.

LA's Hot

It feels really hot, though the car thermometer says it's only 77˚F.

I'm in the Santa Monica Apple store having them look at my MacBook checking out my Snow Leopard black screen. I'm for changing the name to Black Leopard. I guess they retired panther. Anyway, my trip photos are on my computer which I can't use it right now. And my mom's internet isn't working so I couldn't post last night. I'll put some up of the trip from Anchorage to LA. We did get to have a two hour lunch with our daughter at Seatac.

My mom is doing quite well, walking around with a cane.

[Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for what the problem was for me. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]

Snow Leopard Black Screen Disease Update

[Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for the solution to my problem. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]

This video will show you the ongoing problem I've had with my MacBook since installing Snow Leopard. You can see all the posts tracking this for the last couple of weeks.

In short, Stephen at the Apple Help and I have been talking back and forth trying to work this out. We reset the SMC and the parameter ram (no, I don't know exactly what that meas either, just that he walked me through doing that), I took it to the local MacHaus for a hardware diagnostic and nothing was wrong there. We reinstalled Snow Leopard. Still got a black screen. I finally noticed the problem only happened when I left the computer or stopped using the keyboard AND the adapter cord was plugged in. When it was only on battery (or when it was at the shop and they used a different power cord) the problem didn't happen. Over the weekend I tested this hypothesis and on battery no problem. The three times I used the cord, it went black when I stopped typing a few minutes. I left Stephen a confirmation message.



So yesterday Stephen called to say he'd gotten my phone message and he was FedExing the new adapter.


This is what I found this morning. We thought he wouldn't be able to ship it out until today since it was 5pm in Dallas when we talked and that it would get here Friday. But I saw it was already on a truck in Anchorage at 8:30 this morning!






Here's the old adapter cord. Can this really be the problem? It only began when I installed Snow Leopard. How do the adapter and the software interact to equal black screen?






And here's the Fed Ex truck pulling up in front of the house. It's 11:30am Anchorage Time. (All this is happening as I'm doing this post.)


And here's the new adapter.

It's plugged in. I'll go eat something now and leave it to turn black. Or, hopefully, not. Then I'll finish this post.



20 minutes later: Sorry to report: I still have black screen disease.

Ongoing Mac Problems

[Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for what the Snow Leopard problem was for me. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]

My relationship with Stephen at the Apple Help Desk is growing much closer. It's all due to installing Snow Leopard. I have his direct line and his email. My black screen continues to show up. When it was at the MacHaus, they never saw the problem and their hardware diagnostic was negative. After a day at home, it came back.

So, what could it be? I've been trying to isolate factors.
1. It happened after I installed Snow Leopard. It seemed to go fine after Stephen walked me through resetting the parameter ram and the SMC.
2. But after I added Rosetta (I'd left it off when I installed Snow Leopard) it started again.
There's one other factor that I'm pretty sure of:
3. It only seems to go black when I'm plugged into my Mac adapter. I don't think it has gone black when I've worked on battery only. And at the MacHaus, they didn't have my adapter and they never had the problem.
4. It doesn't happen while I'm working on the computer, it happens when I stop for a while - go to get a phone call or do some other errand away from the computer. A few minutes away is enough.

It went black a couple of times yesterday and after I rebooted twice, I decided to leave the cord unplugged except when I needed to recharge the battery, but if I was going to get up I unplugged the cord. Stephen had me reset the SMC and parallel ram again yesterday afternoon, but it went black again. I left a message. (He's in Dallas and it was after he left work.) But I didn't plug it in again and it was good overnight and today. When Stephen called today about 1pm, we reloaded Snow Leopard, but he had me plug into another outlet to see if the outlet was a problem. I went to pick up J and when I got back it was finished installing, and the screen was black and unresponsive.

So I'm battery again now and we'll see. He said if it went down again, he'd send a new power adapter.

Meanwhile I did find out my friend does NOT have lung cancer. Now, that is very good news. And J's back. Also good news.

Making salads for Rosh Hashona dinner with friends.

University of Alaska Anchorage Confucius Institute Opening Celebration

Thursday night I walked over to the Wendy Williamson Auditorium at UAA to see the performances celebrating the opening of the Confucius Institute. I've been busy with a number of things today - including computer problems following the installation of Snow Leopard which I think may now finally be over - so I had trouble getting the video completed. [Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for what the Snow Leopard problem was for me. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]

I'll try to do another post or two - one on Confucius and one on Confucius Institutes - but in the meantime here's a glimpse of the celebration. There were entertainers from Anchorage, other parts of the US, and some brought over from China.

This really did have a Chinese feel to it. I was particularly interested in seeing the 'change of face' act. This is a particularly Chinese art form handed down from generation to generation. There's a great film about such an artist who is looking for an apprentice to teach his art to. And as part of the Opening Week celebration, the Confucius Institute will show the movie Saturday night. This is an amazing skill and Thursday night was the first time I saw it in person. It's at the end of the video.




The following is what UAA's website had about Thursday's show (there's a bit of all of the acts on the video)

A Celebration of Chinese Performing Arts

Thursday, Sept. 10, 7 p.m. at the Wendy Williamson Auditorium

• Dr. J.D. Zhang, Sichuan Opera “Change of Face” artist and master of traditional Chinese magic [top picture]
  
• Guoming Sun, Asia International Martial Arts Champion performing double Chain-whip and Drunk Sword [right]
  
• Weiguang Dang, Famous Chinese Baritone
• Dr. Yuxiang Wu, Classical Chinese Flute
• There will be choral singers, dancers and other performances by members of the Alaska Chinese Association.

There was also some formal stuff. The Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences [left] spoke as did the director of the Institute and the the Vice Consul General from the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco [picture above.]

All the events are free. Friday night there was a talk on "Overcoming the Global Economic Crisis: The Chinese Gamble" which I missed because our (originally from Taiwan) guests got back from their trip to Kennecott Mine this evening.

Here's the Saturday schedule from the Institute website. I expect this too will be pretty genuine and worth attending. And it should be good for kids and it's free. This is not your every day fare, the Chinese government is using these Institutes to put a good face forward in the world, so this is probably as close to being in China as it gets at a public event in Alaska.

Chinese Adventure: A carnival of
activities, games, performances and prizes

Saturday, Sept. 12, Noon to 4 p.m. at the UAA Student Union on the 1st Floor [parking is free on Saturdays, and if you don't know where the student union is, this is a good time to go looking for it (it's on Providence between Providence Hospital and Lake Otis) next to the sports center].

Come witness and participate in traditional dance and martial arts performances, calligraphy, paper cutting and folding, Chinese games and more. These opportunities made possible with assistance from the Alaska Chinese Association and the UAA Chinese Language Club.

And then in the evening the movie I mentioned above. This is a really interesting movie and if I recall right, appropriate for kids. [Let me amend this thought. It's probably good for mature kids about 12 or over. It probably has subtitles, but if you are one of those anti-subtitles people, try not to pass that prejudice on to your kids. It helps them improve their reading and gives access to many great films.] One of the key characters is the kid who is being trained. The Fine Arts Building is on the far east side of the campus. The street that comes out of the Providence Hospital onto Providence Dr. goes right into campus there. Turn right at the first corner.

Film Presentation: The King of Masks (1999)
Sunday, Sept. 13, 6:30 p.m. in the Fine Arts Building 150
Directed by Wu Tian-Ming, The King of Masks is set in 1930s Sichuan Province and tells the tale of an aging master of the traditional Sichuan Opera art of Change of Face, rapid mask changes to display the emotions of varied players, and his quest to find a protégé to carry on his art. This is a simple, moving and well-acted film starring Zhang Zhigang and Xu Zhu.

Moving To Snow Leopard [UPDATE: The Black Screen of Snow Leopard]

[Update: I've joined an elite group who have their screens turn black. A Mac Forum came up with some possible work arounds, but not real fixes. People seem to think it has to do with the picture preview and I've been using iPhoto and now iMovie. I can get something back if I hit the F10 key or those around it, but the edges of the screen are black and then it all goes black.]

[Update Sept 23: for the progress of this still ongoing issue, see comments to this post and check the label (right column bottom) 'snow leopard.' As I write I'm waiting for a new adapter cord that is coming by Fedex from Apple. I've narrowed it down: the only time I get the black screen is when the adapter cord (the white cord the comes with the Macbook) is connected and I don't touch the keyboard for a few minutes. When it runs on battery and I leave, nothing bad happens.]

I bought a copy of Snow Leopard when it came out almost two weeks ago now I think. At the Apple User Group that following Wednesday I saw a copy of the ebook, Take Control: Upgrading to Snow Leopard. That seemed like something useful to look at before upgrading.

I did learn some things. I thought I had a bootable back up before, but apparently not. So I downloaded Carbon Copy Cloner at the book's recommendation. But after going through lists of all the things that can go wrong, I was less inclined to install Snow Leopard. (Snow Leopard is the operating system upgrade for Macs. It follows Leopard, Tiger, and Panther.)

Finally I realized that I was getting advice that was appropriate for going to the moon but I was just going for a bike ride. The odds were good that nothing bad was going to happen and if it did, I'd go back to the MacHaus and have them help me. So, today, I finally installed Snow Leopard. The instructions in Snow Leopard merely said to stick the disk into the computer and push the install button. (The ebook was about 80 pages of things to worry about.) Actually, it would be nice for installation material to tell people to have the 5 gb free that they told us at the meeting (the ebook said, well, you really should have 10 gb free). It took 1 hour and 25 minutes.

At the meeting, Ben, the Apple guy from Best Buy who comes to the meetings regularly and really knows his stuff, told us we'd get 7GB freed up when we had Snow Leopard installed. That's pretty cool - not only does it not take up more room, but it cleans up stuff already there and you have more room when you are done than when you started. Well I started with 7.53 GB free and when it was over I had 21.56 GB free. (Yeah, I know, it must have been a real mess in there. But at least the installation cleaned it up.)

So I still have to send in a review for the ebook. It's for people who really want to take precautions for every possible thing that could go wrong. My suggestion is to make sure you've got 5 gb free and then go for it. Well, back up all your files first, at least, on an external hard drive. The ebook is for people who want to know the details of every possible illness they could ever have.

Now I'm checking things out. It says I should have a download 'stack' but I don't see one. One of the coolest new features is the ability to draw Chinese characters on the trackpad, but I haven't tried that either. If it were Thai letters, I would have tried by now.

So now I can start plowing through all the other manuals for electronic equipment that have been pouring into my life.

[Update Oct. 3 - see this later post for what the Snow Leopard problem was for me. Doesn't mean it will work for you, but it seems to have solved my problem.]

When Did You Go to Your Last Community Council Meeting?

It's been a while for us, but J suggested that we go tonight and I was reminded of this relatively unique feature of the Anchorage Charter. All, or almost all, neighborhoods, as I understand it, are part of a community council. This is where neighborhood issues are addressed. Zoning changes, liquor licenses, new street lights, etc. need to be passed by the community council before coming into law. It doesn't mean the council has to approve, but their input needs to be part of the proposal. (I'm winging this from memory so assume this is a general accounting.)

In many cases, relatively few people go to CC meetings. Trouble in the area brings our more people. When the community council opposes something an assembly member wants, the assembly people have been known to downplay their significance by saying just a few people go to the meetings so they don't represent the neighborhood. But given the low turnouts for Assembly races, the same thing could be said for assembly members.

One of our assembly members - Elvi Gray (standing in the picture above right) - was there and talked about efforts to have public hearings before making his proposed budget cuts. She also talked about TBOP (Take Back Our Parks) a group set up by someone in our neighboring community council to address problems caused by homeless camps in park areas. It was making me realize how out of touch I've been just reading the ADN. There is also going to be a traffic light finally put in at McInnis and 36th. Something I'm not excited about. It appears that the light cycle for people on McInnis will be longer than they generally have to wait now and traffic on 36th will have one more light to deal with.



Our state legislators both had staff members at the meeting. Noah Henson was there from Rep. Berta Gardner's office and Max was there from Sen. Ellis' office. They also talked about homeless issues. I learned there is a camp somewhere around Post and Reeve called Veterans Ridge and some people have lived there for years. Some sort of task force made up of people from the police and various other departments is looking at the possibility of an urban state campground sort of place where people could legally pay for their space that would be monitored for illegal behavior. The Clitheroe Treatment Center has been reopened at Pt. Woronzov. I think Max said that they've calculated that $4 million was spent for the top 100 inebriates in the city - with all the repeat offenses, etc. That averages $40,000 each. The methadone program is so full the only people who can get in are pregnant women. Do you think there are women who get pregnant so they can get treatment for their heroin addiction?

Our CC chair Sheli Dodson reported on her trip to NUSA - Neighborhood USA - an organization of neighborhood organizations like community councils. She clearly was excited about all she learned in Spokane - four people went from Anchorage - and brought back lots of brochures and ideas. Anchorage's attendance is important because the conference will be in Anchorage in 2011. A committee is forming to do all the planning and get community sponsors to help out.

You can see a map of Anchorage Community Councils and if you're not already on your local Community Council's mailing list you can get that done at their main page.

It's late and I've been reading up on things to do before installing Snow Leopard on my Macbook. I'm following advice which means I've been getting rid of unnecessary files and backing up the disk. It's taking way more time than I probably need to take, but I know having a bootable back up is a good idea anyway. So, don't count the typos in this. One of the coolest features in Snow Leopard - at least as described to me - is the ability to draw Chinese characters with your finger on the trackpad. It would be nice if they had Thai, but there are a lot more people who write Chinese, so they get it first. Plus Thai uses an alphabet, not characters, which are much more complicated on a keyboard.

The Effect of Flowers

Some things you know work, even if you don't understand why. Flowers work.

So after getting Snow Leopard at MacHaus and a book on Anchorage place names at Title Wave, I stopped by Evalyn's Flowers before coming home. It was rainy and I knew a little color in the house would go a long way.

Men, even if you don't know why, just bring home some flowers now and then. It's in your best interest. And try to support locally owned florists like Evalyn's. They'll notice that you were there, but Fred Meyer's won't.