So, the G5 is FUBAR. Oops.

The good news is that, after swapping out the logic board and the hard drive, it’s like I have a whole new computer. The bad news is that it’s like I have a whole new computer, one without my 20,000 songs, 5,000 pictures and 20 months of email archives; one without my software customizations; one without all my Quicken data. I’m not looking forward to pulling the system back together again. At least I have been using .Mac for all my current work, so I have live versions of my current documents, address book and calendar. I also was good about burning CDs of all the business stuff, so that’s covered.

This is just not a whole lot of fun.

On a more positive note: Three cheers for the guys at the Genius Bar at the CambridgeSide Galleria Apple Store. They’ve done a fabulous job doing everything they can to save the machine, and keeping me informed about what’s going on. Good on them.

A. and I went to see March of the Penguins last night, watching the brave struggle of the little birds — the very cute little birds. They waddle, slide, swim, cavort.

They have a tough life, though, braving the storms, the cold, the leopard seals and the vengeful gulls. Today’s helpful hint: Never take a woman entering her third trimester to a movie where the babies get eaten.

My G5 is refusing to boot. I came down on Saturday morning to a frozen screen. I rebooted it and it just spun. I tried safe mode, I tried rebooting from the install disk. Nothing. I’m not panicking yet, but I think I have to take it to the Apple Store at the Galleria tonight.

It’ll be interesting to see how good their service is. I’ve spent about $20,000 in hardware and software at that store since 2001. I wonder if they’ll take that into account when trying to make me happy today.

A. and I braved the baby-industrial complex yesterday, taking the day-long Prepared Childbirth class at Isis Maternity in Needham.

We saw two childbirth videos: one featured pain intervention, the other, screaming.

Actually, it wasn’t that bad. We talked a lot about how the moms are feeling now, when to call the doctor, when to go to the hospital. They allayed our fears that we would have the baby on the way to the hospital — apparently that only happens in movies. We learned what happens in the delivery room. We learned all sorts of scary new acronyms. We learned that the external fetal monitor does not actually have a siren on it.

One of the better parts was the childless friend stepping in for the out-of-town dad. She made the best comment of the day, describing the videos as “the best form of birth control.” She also asked the first epidural question. I’m convinced she was an audience plant, put there to make sure that the rest of the group kept engaged.

We have three more classes scheduled: Infant CPR, Newborn Essentials, and (…)Feeding Basics, a class I need not attend, and dare not write out for fear of Internet filters miscategorizing the site. I’m sure at this rate we’ll have this whole parenthood thing down pat, before it even starts.

One of my original goals for Life Times Voice was to provide community software for Americans abroad. It may still happen.

In the meantime, here’s an example of the type of work that’s important for us to read: Sleepless in Sudan, the blog of an aid worker in Darfur I found through Global Voices Online.

I’m working on a couple of projects for which I’m thinking through the best way to incorporate wikis.

Does anyone have any examples of a site where the main articles are controlled, but there’s a shadow wiki on the topic where people can collaboratively edit a scratchpad version of the article? I could imagine that an editor would periodically update the main article with the best of what’s happening on the wiki.

If you know of any examples of this, or of other interesting uses of wikis, please drop me a line.

Thanks!

This is a quick Terminal command that makes Safari appear faster by reducing the built-in rendering lag.

To try this (after backing-up, etc.) go to the terminal after Safari has quit and type:

defaults write com.apple.Safari WebKitInitialTimedLayoutDelay 0.25

The default time in the Safari preference time is 1.0. Now go ahead and launch Safari.

I just did this on the G5, and it seems to be making a big difference. Of course, it could also be all in my head.

A. and I aren’t really allowed on the airplanes anymore. Apparently the airlines aren’t thrilled with the concept of our little girl potentially joining us unexpectedly at 30,000 feet.

It’s a little sad, because I’d love to go on this Habitat for Humanity Global Village trip to Downpatrick, Northern Ireland, from August 27th to September 10th. Jennie Long, the fabulous co-leader of my trips to New Zealand and Guatemala, and her husband Matt are leading the team, and they still have a couple of spaces open.

Come with us to experience Northern Ireland beyond the guidebooks—by working with local people and learning firsthand about the country’s culture. The trip leaders hope to assemble a team of twelve flexible, open-minded, fun-loving and diverse individuals for an unforgettable fourteen-day adventure to build homes, friendships, and lifelong memories.

Itinerary

Sat. August 27: Depart for Northern Ireland

Sun. August 28: arrive at Belfast airport and travel to Downpatrick; orientation

Mon. August 29 & Tues. August 29: Build

Wed. August 30: Local sightseeing

Thurs. August 31 & Fri. September 1: Build

Sat. Sept. 2 to Mon. Sept. 4: Side trip to North Coast

Tues. Sept. 5 to Fri. Sept. 9: Build

Sat. September 10: Say goodbye; back to the Belfast airport

This Global Village trip to Northern Ireland will be for 14 days, and includes group activities on days of R&R.

I highly recommend these trips. I’ve done three — most recently Thailand — and each has changed me. If you ever thought about traveling, and helping the world, you should definitely consider doing a Habitat trip. If you have any questions, please drop me a line; I love to talk about these trips.

Wait! Oh yes, wait a minute Mr. Postman

Tomorrow, our postman will bring the new Harry Potter book. And silence will rule Alden Road for the next 36 hours or so.

To ease the wait, check out this Harry Potter pronunciation key, which will speak the correct way to pronounce many of the names and words in the series. Her-MY-o-nee.

Software rave corner.

Tea Timer is a great little Mac program for setting simple alarms. You can set it to go off at a specific time (like an alarm clock) or after a specific interval (like a kitchen timer). While it’s running, it displays the time remaining in the dock. Tea Timer does one thing, and it does it well.

I use it all the time to force myself to stop what I’m doing. I’ll give myself 15 minutes to flip through NetNewsWire, or five minutes to write this email. Or even, “5 minutes to write this blog post on Tea Timer.” It’s a fabulous little feedback device.

He came through in the playoffs last year, and now he’s taking the stage: The man, the myth, the legend — Bronson Arroyo.

I may have to buy his record…

Of course, the funniest thing on that page is the “Customers who bought this title also bought” section.

1. Tessie, by Dropkick Murphys

2. Fever Pitch - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

3. The Best of the Standells

You think we Sox fans buy as a pack? We are *so* being profiled.

I’m working on a couple of projects that will include text-ad components. So, to play with it, I’ve added Google ads to a couple of sections of JPButler.com. Check out the Tanzania travelogue and let me know what you think.

I’m working on a couple of projects that will include text-ad components. So, to play with it, I’ve added Google ads to a couple of sections of JPButler.com. Check out the Tanzania travelogue and let me know what you think.

Previous generations of geeks sat in the garage with their ham radios, talking to people around the world, expanding their horizons, understanding new cultures, making new friends. Today, I just surf the blogs.

Global Voices Online is the place I start, an excellent sampling of the best from around the world. You should definitely check it out.

Wired Magazine editor Chris Anderson shows how to handle a PR problem. He doesn’t shuck and jive; he actually acknowledges the problem and takes responsibility.

On Friday, the SF Chronicle’s consumer-rights columnist ran a piece about complaints from Wired subscribers that they were getting threatening letters from a collection agency when they let their subscription lapse.

    The reason turned out to be that they were among the small fraction of our subscribers who signed up for an automatically-renewing subscription under the bill-me option, rather than the usual credit card option, and then didn’t send in a $12 check at the end of their billing cycle. They thought, quite reasonably, they were just letting their subscription lapse and were not aware that they had signed up for the auto-renew plan, probably because the details of the subscription plans are not marked as clearly as they could be.

    This was really distressing to hear for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which is that sending letters from a collection agency for $12 is a poor way to treat customers. But the good news is that it has clarified a problem that we can fix, and for that we’re grateful to the Chronicle.

Route 16 in Wellesley is a disaster right now. If you have any choice in the matter, you should avoid it.

They’ve been ripping up the road around Wellesley College, leaving miles of uneven gravel, a half a foot below the normal road height. This has been fine, if a bit annoying to drive; you slow down to 20 or so, and the road noise is deafening.

Unfortunately, the pounding rain of the past few days has destroyed the road, creating a tortoiseshell minefield of craters several inches deep. We had to drive at three miles per hour, steering to avoid the biggest holes, bouncing up and down in rapid jerks. My poor little car was not happy.

I don’t know how long it will take them to repave this, but I think we need to change our commute to go to the Pike, unpleasant though that is.

On a separate note, the Wellesley town website is useless. Keeping us up-to-date on the status of the construction would be an excellent use of the town’s website (and an outstanding use of RSS.) Anyone know of any services that already do this?

Wow, this is a neat little del.icio.us hack.

Within del.icio.us, you can tag links for a specific person by using the for:{username} tag. So, if you want to send me something to read, tag it as for:jpbutler. This is a private tag that only that person can see. Very elegant solution.

This is really useful. (via Brad Feld’s weblog)

I shut down the Life Times Voice application last weekend.

With our baby (whom I will refrain from calling by name, at least until she’s actually here) on the way, I need to get a full-time job (or a nice series of consulting gigs.) Baby needs a new pair of shoes.

The Life Times Voice application took a decent amount of time to administer and support, so I couldn’t juggle it and a 40hr/week gig at the same time. Rather than overcommit, I pulled the plug.

Is it gone forever? Maybe not. I still have all the code, so it may return, perhaps embedded in other applications. Life Times Voice LLC is still up and running — even thriving, thanks to a couple of recent consulting gigs — so the next incarnation may be bigger and better. I plan on writing a series of “lessons learned” posts over the next few weeks.

In the meantime, I want to thank everyone who helped me beta-test it. Your help and support was invaluable. I will not forget it.

Onward and upward.