Ruby in the rough

As discussed in an earlier blog I've been doing some work with ruby recently and have been reasonable happy with the ease of generating results. That was up until yesterday when I finally published the web page to our outward facing server. The page actually loaded just fine, it just was stripped of all of it's formatting, ok no big deal right? Yea... this problem managed to generate a days worth of rabbit hole endeavors to fix it.

The actual solution to the problem was trivial if a bit of a hack. What necessitated the hack is a bit of an annoyance however and slightly disappointing considering the nature of ruby on rails and the mongrel server system trumpeted as one of the best ways to run a rails application.

The main problem was that you can't properly deliver public asset items thru a proxy server (the recommended way to deliver ruby pages thru apache). Thus making those site resources effectively invisible. This is because by default ruby on rails uses direct addressing of resources instead of a form of relative addressing. This can however be worked around in a variety of ways, in my case I decided to solve it by using an asset server. More accurately I decided to treat the apache servers public area as an asset server for the ruby instance. This unfortunately is a bit of a double edged sword as it breaks the everything in one area solution presented by ruby on rails because now the /public area has to bet moved to the public areas of your apache build. On the other hand you still have your insulated ruby site (that actually runs pretty quick) which still allows you to use the proxy load balancer features of apache if your feeling so inclined.

The Red Pill:

Ruby isn't always the way to go, but you can program some pretty powerful sites using it however the mongrel server that's trumpeted as being wonderful hits a wall pretty quick. Since starting this post I have actually replaced it with a newer server named 'thin', it's even faster; o it's also STABLE. This sadly isn't a claim that mongrel can make. The hacks above are still required and indeed are probably required for many of the more nonstandard configurations you can setup for servers (I actually don't address my server at root, my virtual servers access at 127.0.0.1:<port number>/<appname> which contributes to the delivering my public asset issues but also insulates my management code from direct execution).

The Blue Pill:

If you aren't trying to build the next massively integrated services system (google, yahoo, msn for example) and aren't expecting to be hit by thousands of a users a minute ruby will get you there and you'll probably enjoy the development gradient along the way. For the majority of people (read, those with English grammar skills) will find the use find the language to be a breeze and for serious developers there's solid IDE systems on Windows, Linux and Mac OSX so you can develop on any or all of the systems simultaneously and have a fairly even development experience wherever you are. As an added bonus RoR lends it self very well to agile development for those coding maniacs out there.

Building Renovation, STALLED

I figure this would happen eventually but completely failed to predict the 'why' behind it.

In this case it was two things. The easier given being the weather. It's been a rainy mess over the last week only providing a few really good days for doing house work. The odd thing is that the workers for as professional as they appear to be don't seem to come in on days where it showers in the morning and is clear by noon. I guess this is because they'd be wasting too much time setting up and doing tear down each day thou.

The second reason is because the new front doors for our units are back order. :: awesome :: So apparently nobody thought of the fact that we are using fancy 6-panel doors in our units now, made out of steel and that's not exactly the easiest thing on earth to order in bulk. So yea, we are now waiting on that to finish the modifications and updates to the interior of the homes.

Building Renovation Diary, Day 2

I have to say, today has turned out to be much drier than the previous day. There hasn't been nearly as much loud noises going on around the house, which is good I guess I can at least think.

The good news is I appear to be getting at least 3 of my new installation items today which is fantastic. New sliding glass door, and two out of three new windows. Also got to do some painting of objects I took down when painting my interior areas earlier.

The bad news is I'm starting to notice the nail pops from them beating the hell out of the exterior of the building, there's in some ways more and in some ways less pops that I thought I would wind up with. Which means two of the walls I just put the 'done' stamp on will need to be patched up. Not a prospect I'm looking forward to but there's no way to avoid it so I'll have to live with it. The main killer there is going to be just how much work is going to have to go into repairing the large wall space above my stairs. That segment of walling is exceedingly difficult to paint let alone finesse a putty knife around on.

Renovation Diary, Day 1

I'll be trying to get a blog out a day during the time that my home is under renovation documenting the more interesting things that have happened on a given day. The red/blue comparisons aren't particularly appropriate for these posts and I'll be dropping the scheme for them as such, just a warning.

As of today the renovations on my buildings exterior have officially begun. In fact I'm currently watching someone standing on my balcony ripping apart the exterior walls of the building. It's somewhat odd watching people beet the hell out of the exterior of your house w/o even talking to you about it. But that's disingenuous this project has been developed steadily for over two years of planning before anything was ever implemented. But it's still weird watching a window of your house get pulled out without any warning.

From what I can tell my building no longer has a roof, or at least no longer has shingles and paneling. This would be evidenced by the massive amount of material sitting on the ground around my house and large amount of banging I've been hearing for the last few hours.

Earlier today I got to do the chicken little routine as I had no idea they were simply going to pull my sky light out and all of a sudden i had a few pieces of ceiling tile sitting in my house. I've since placed tarps on the ground but that seems superfluous now as I think they've already replaced the window they ripped out.

Currently what appears to be receiving the brunt of the punishment is the exterior walls, the removal and replacement of which constitute a significant amount of the work on the units. Hopefully the new thermal envelope will work better than the old one did as these houses leaked heat like a siv.

More updates bound to be made latter.

Ah today is the day of getting what you want, and what you don't want all in one. A little while back I decided to run a full networking solution in my house so that all my rooms were connected in a way that I thought would be the most useful. The main problem with the network so far had been that i had decided to store the switch in an upstairs closet along with the router, all well and good except that there was no way to get the cable modem up there. So I had to have a 'wan' port setup on my patch panel for the cable modem line. This isn't necessarily a problem but when all the cable is the same color it's a pain trying to differentiate one from the rest requiring me to go out of my way to ensure I had the right cable at all times.

As of today I'll have a second option for future projects. Part of the renovations stipulated that a new conduit system be installed in the building on a unit by unit basis. Being home I got to ask them to place it in the closet upstairs instead of the loft area of the same floor. Now if/when i get fios I'll be able to place the modem, cabling, switch and router all in one place and have a series of generic connections end to end instead of special use connections. This is for lack of a better word, awesome.

On the downside I currently have no sliding glass door and all of my windows are covered in dupont tyvex paper and lack actually windows.

Owner of the coolest toys ever, Tony Stark

This past weekend I got to sit down and watch Iron Man. Overall I thought the movie was pretty good if a bit light on the action side. Oddly I found my self attract more to the technology that surrounds Stark's everyday life than I was drawn to the Iron Man suit. Which isn't to say the suit is in anyway shabby, it's the most stylish and slick piece of equipment you could expect in the field of robotics enhanced powered armor. However there are other suits in the sci-fi fiction realm that I happen to like much more aesthetically (the Juggernaut armor from star wars fiction comes to mind: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Juggernaut_510_Combat_Power_Armor). However this post isn't about powered armor, it's about the cool toys that Stark used to build said power armor.

Anyone who has seen the movie and was paying any sort of attention will notice that Stark's house and life had a million and one different items of different intriguing qualities.

Most notable among the stock being the fact that his house talked to him. Sadly this is still a long way off, especially for one that makes coy remarks about trying to use a suit of body armor to make interplanetary flights. However some of the technologies do exist in the smart homes of today (just not quite a cool looking as his stuff was).

The site Smarthome.com offers a number of powerful devices for creating a more tied together home life. Offering more fantastic devices like electronic keypad locks for the front door to directly practical devices like water sensing shut offs for use on hot water heaters, washing machines and other water based devices. Their keypads aren't as stylish as Starks all glass doors with the biometric knob and holographic keypads but they get the job done and aren't trying to secure a door easily bypassed with a sufficiently large rock (or in Tony's case, a repulsion cannon). Smart home also provides equipment to do everything from remotely controlling all the electronics in your home and network enabling your electrical outlets and wall switches (who needs a clapper when you can have a computer programmed light show throughout the day?) to integrated security solutions complete with status web server systems.

Something I've been waiting to see in the main stream building world but haven't are the self dimming windows. These windows eliminate the need to even worry about a set of blinds (for light control at least) by being able to select their opacity dynamically and on demand. The NREL has a nice article on the topic for any who are curious.

A few somewhat passed over items in the movie jumped out at me as well 'pretty damn cool' I think captures it well. One that we haven't reached just yet but we've started scratching the surface of was his holographic display for designing new projects. While nothing on this physical scale or technical level exists yet people have started construction 360 degree viewable holographic devices. ICT Graphics lab has created a standing 3D image that can display both animation and colored items. ICT's 3D image isn't quite as interactive as Starks but it's certainly a leap in the right direction (not to mention just being pretty damn cool). Unfortunately ICT's display doesn't meet the requirements of a consumer public at this point, but a do it yourselfer with enough determination could probably construct something like this; assuming they possess infinite patience and determination.

Any cool techs I forgot from the movie? Let me know and I'll see what I can do to add them.

This evenings red pill / blue pill brought to you by my buddy Henry for pointing out that I totally forgot to do a red/blue for this post.

The Red Pill:

Push comes to shove, all of Tony Starks equipment was green screened, green objects and clever Cg. That doesn't mean some of these technologies aren't on the horizon (in some cases the immediate horizon), and that all adds up to the next few years being pretty exciting in this area. For instance the same technology that puts a dynamic display between the layers of your window could be utilized in the near range for things like car windows. In the far range there's already a Darpa project to implant a similar technology into a contact lens. So keep an eye out over the next few years and you may get to play in Tony Starks play pen.

The Blue Pill:

Starks technology presents as many dangers as it does possibilities, the idea of a man wrapped in enough armor to take on an army is a fairly menacing prospect. The AI presented in the movie could be turned to variety of nefarious acts as well. Most notable among them being the possibility of utilizing such technology to run an army of drones willing to take and implement any order you give them (what is the cost of war when you risk nothing?). So from this standpoint we could be presenting a new level of horror at a scale the world has never seen. The good news being an AI of this grade most almost definitely require a compact quantum computer; and since nobody can even make a really really huge one work we can rule out expecting anything like that any time soon.

The never ending chore, Home Improvement

Over the past month or so I've been painting my house and doing a lot of small random home improvements. But I'm starting to work on plans for the more involved projects around the house (like painting isn't involved enough...), and my house's exterior is being renovated in two weeks which is fantastic. I had expected my house renovation to be in like a year and a half when they finished the rest of the buildings in the complex but I got put down as second on the list instead which was very surprising but hey I don't argue things like that.

Now then onto the non fluff writing of the day. One of the various home improvement projects that I've actually invested some heavy mental energies in working on is replacing my very 'dorm room' looking media centers. Functionally there isn't anything wrong with the units. They hold lots of stuff in a fairly efficient manner, even if they have over the years acquired a few bored holes to accommodate the rogue wiring here and there. However all things come to an end and I've had these units since I was a teenager so it's time to replace them. One of the below pictures is the culprit pieces of furniture.

Currently the plan is to replace them with a set of shelves that I'm planning to build. This is mostly because I can't find anything that fits my taste (or budget). I had a bunch of initial ideas bouncing around my head but I think I've settled on a design that will be much easier to implement than the more convoluted setups I had been thinking of doing. And that's usually a good thing.

Initially I had wanted to do a set of standing A-frame designs that literally formed an A with the support being the bottoms of the A and the top point resting against the wall. Shelving would be provided by placing shelves between the supporting legs, however I quickly came to suspect this design would actually gimp my ability to include some of the larger pieces of electronics this media center would have to house. Also this design is predisposed to more room than I actually have, and wastes a large amount of that room on the large A design itself.

The new design is still influenced from that original design but is much more compact and should provide a good boost in overall shelf space. What's more this version allows me to build into a corner in a manner that would have been exceedingly difficult or impossible in the original plan. This is critical do to the cramped nature of the space. The shelves can't exceed twenty four inches deep (eww.. english unit measurements...) and it's l shape legs can be of lengths 54 inches and 46 inches making the whole thing a bit complicated. The one advantage is that my height is basically unlimited at over 8 ft. tall, well above the level that would even be practical to construct a piece of this nature.

As you may have guessed the new designs are nowhere near the stage of being called 'done' however I thought I would share a few of my initial drawings of the new design. Hopefully sometime in the very near future I'll be able to post the final plans for the design (either a CAD drawing or a DIA graph, we'll see.


The Red Pill:

The reality of the situation is that I've never done anything like this before, and without the help of my ever loving father have always been terrible at wood working designs. However alot of this is related to the fact that I've spent the majority of my time taking apart electronics not building stuff to work up my ability as a wood crafter. On the other hand I'll have access to plenty of tools and some other help that will hopefully push the project forward the way I want it to go.

The Blue Pill:

Worse comes to worse I settle for something a little simpler than the plan I am currently working on but I'd rather not. It always feels like your selling yourself short when you do that and that's never good. But if this all comes to a head and I wind up not being able to build it the way I want then IKEA and I will have some talking to do.