vincelee.net

Just a quick post about working with git ignore files not seemingly not being recognised by git.

Having followed everything in the manual, my git was still picking up the files I set to ignore. After muchos trawling, I found this post, detailing the command to clear your cache, and sorting out my woes.

The commands:

git rm -r --cached .
git add .
git commit -m ".gitignore is now working"

Having been fiddling with an augmented reality tutorial for the last few evenings, I have finally got it working!

I was following the video tutorial at gotoandlearn.com, but ran into a few snags – solutions for which I’m posting here to help anyone else struggling with it!

I used Flex Builder 3 to write the source (free trial here) and got the code libraries via Subversion, as described in the video.

Vector class not found – This is down to Flex exporting to Flash Player 9 by default. Fix this by following these articles: article 1 and article 2.

FLARRgbRaster_BitmapData expects 2 int parameters – Importing the FLARToolkit library from the trunk folder has the wrong class. I used the one from /FLARToolKit/branches/ver1_x_x/src.

Once those little problems are taken care of, you’re on your way!

After January’s snow, and a week away on a Euro Tour beano, the IO ID has finally been taken out for its maiden voyage. Chipping over to Llandegla, I hit the red and black routes as per usual. With snow and ice still on parts of the trail, some parts were a bit tricky, including the first set of black jumps, and my personal nemesis, the last knobbly northshore.

General impressions of the bike are certainly positive – the bike felt nicely balanced and responsive, giving me more confidence than before to hit berms and jumps with more speed (probably a bit too much, as I ended up stacking it on the big double in the middle of JJ’s Jumps…).

Having only V-brakes (albeit poorly set-up ones) on my old Rockhopper, I found the Deore disc brakes a lot better, braking consistently and reliably for the whole ride. The RockShox Recon forks weren’t really tested at Llandegla – with the trail being relatively smooth – but I’m sure they ironed out my mistakes throughout the ride.

The Shimano Alfine internally-geared hub worked well, with little noticeable effect on the ride. Shifting was smooth for the most part, apart from an annoying clicking when in 2nd (hopefully remedied on its 6 week service), and having to really ease up when shifting down to 1st under load. Probably down to having done little to no exercise for the last two months, and the indulgences of the last week’s holiday, the climbing was more of a struggle than previous outings. This may be down to the additional weight ( I found myself having to shift my weight further forward on climbs), or the gear range being a little off. 1st gear was probably 3 or 4 gears off the 1st gear of a normal 27-speed setup, and left me struggling more than usual up the longer climbs. I’m sure this is nothing a bit of fitness work won’t fix!

Overall, I am really pleased with the IO ID – once I improve my fitness, and perhaps get some wider handlebars, I’m really looking forward to riding it again.

After having my bikes stolen just before Christmas, I have treated myself to a new mountain bike this week. I loved the classic, slimline look of my old Rockhopper’s steel frame, and so was on the lookout for something similar. I’d spent many an evening, scouring the Internet for suitable steeds. After considering frames from Cotic, and Charge, I’ve finally plumped with the Io ID, from Genesis, nabbing the ‘09 model for a sprightly £800 from Edinburgh Bicycle Co-operative.

The Io ID’s main features are the singlespeed steel frame, and the Shimano Alfine hub-gear.

The Alfine is an 8-speed internally geared hub, which does away with the usual rear derailleur, and stuffs all the gears inside the hub. The result is quite a large rear hub, with some extra weight, and the number of gears available greatly reduced (there is no front derailleur, either!). In return, I you benefit from less maintenance required, and the ability to shift when not pedalling. I’ve had it fitted with a 20 tooth sprocket which should help with the lack of a granny ring.

I’ll be posting updates on how the bike is performing as and when it gets ridden/breaks down, including its maiden thrash tomorrow, at Llandegla!

***EDIT*** Llandegla is still snowed under! Coupled with fallen trees lying across the trail, it won’t be ridable for a bit…

A new working week looms, cheering up required!

Ray Charles

Feist

Robert de Niro; an excellent source of riboflabbin

These are just brilliant

time, dance and blogs – from around the world

Check out the beautiful ‘Kuroshio Sea’ tank at Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium – like how the little kid is more interested in playing with the barrier, than the amazing spectacle behind him!

Whack it on HD, fullscreen and chill out.

I’ve been introduced to the magic that is last.fm, a music streaming site that lets you listen to your favourite choons, and helps you discover other artists you might like. I’ve used spotify previously, but got sick of the repetitive, irrelevant adverts, thankfully, last.fm doesn’t have them. Check out what I’ve been listening to here – cheers, Chris!

Over the past week or so, I had been experiencing a very poor internet connection on my main machine. Having just renewed my ISP contract with *ahem* AOL (it was cheap!), I was all ready to go postal on their useless support staff.

However, after a quick check with my laptop and newly acquired g1, I found the internet and wireless was working fine. Yesterday, any Internet connected applications were just failing completely, giving me the ‘xxx has stopped working’ dialog box. A quick search on the g1 came up with the following fix:

1. Open up command prompt (start menu > search ‘cmd’)
2. type in ‘netsh winsock reset’

Restart the machine, and everything was back to normal!