saturn return to sender

We use modified hosts and httpd.conf files to develop locally: we can use nice urls like http://project.dev. Here is the abbreviated tale, in stack format, of trying to get IE in Parallels to load pages served from the self-same MacBook running OS X and apache. I will be parachuting in with only a flint, a knife, and NO ADMIN PRIVILEGES on the Windows side. Let’s get going.

- set up Parallels to test web pages on Win IE
  - change /WINDOWS/system32/drivers/etc/hosts to talk to the Mac side
  - don’t have admin privileges on Windows side
    - attempt to write file from Mac side
    - can’t write to file: Tiger’s built-in NTFS driver is read-only
      - MacFUSE + a FUSE NTFS driver can do it
        - install MacFUSE
        - install Fink, configure
        - attempt to install ntfs-3g
        - Fink complains about missing files
          - fiddle with Fink for a while, get it the files it’s missing
        - Fink complains, “Can’t resolve dependency “gcc4.0 (>= 4.0.1-5363)” for package “fuse-0.4.0-3″ (no matching packages/versions found)”
          - download update to Mac Developer Tools …

Around now I think, wait … wasn’t all this just to write to one bloody file? Anyway, this part takes a while. I eat a live scorpion to maintain my energy.

          - install dev. tools
        - Fink agrees to install ntfs-3g (yay!)
      - follow rest of instructions on mounting the ntfs drive
    - edit hosts file (it works!)
  - attempt to hit the Mac’s apache from IE on Windows in Parallels …. FAIL.
    - iterate over combinations of hosts files, local IP addresses, loopback addresses, Parallels network configurations … each time:
      - shut down windows
      - wait for the Parallels VM to stop
      - mount the ntfs volume (eventually wrote a script* for this)
      - drill down to the hosts file
      - edit the file
      - unmount the ntfs volume
      - boot windows
      - (click through 20 superfluous notifications)
      - try combinations of network settings
      - NOTHING

I iterated on that about 20 times. Folks on the web who have done this have done it by hard-coding their machine’s IP address. I was being stubborn and wanted to avoid that if possible. It wasn’t. Eventually this did work, but yes, I had to hard-code my laptop’s IP address into windows’ hosts file, and ALSO add an entry for the IP in my mac’s httpd.conf file to make the nice URLs work.

This is a far from ideal solution in a world of cafés and DHCP. I hope, if you ever find yourself in this situation, you too can find your way back to civilization.

Via Daring Fireball, a quick review and analysis of the buzz surrounding “1-18-08″ (trailer here), along with some “spoilers,” if you’re playing along at home. (eg, a link to the Slusho site, which is pretty clearly related, and a link to “Ethan Haas Was Right,” which is questionably related.)

I appreciate JJ Abrams and team’s knack for revealing just and only enough to pique interest, then allowing viewers to attempt to fill in the blanks. Ignoring ABC’s inability to let them kill the show gracefully and mercifully, that is really the primary hook used in Lost. It’s kind of a perfect motif for the internet age, where people can speculate wildly on forums and what-not.

Anyway, my useless Cloverfield contribution (and surely duplicating someone else’s efforts): if you decompile the flash file at 1-18-08, I saw nothing obviously clue-ful, but poking around, you can figure out that the images in the photos are being pulled from http://1-18-08/images/pic_n.swf, where n is the pic number. The useless part is that, while snapshots are being slowly added to the main site, all the images aren’t already there to peruse. That would’ve been disappointingly easy, of course. =)

Drinking may not be so bad, say scientists.

The fun part is adding “hiccup!” at the end of every quote in the article.

Some of the world’s top neuroscientists are meeting in Cairns, in far north Queensland, to discuss ground-breaking research that shows brain cells continue to grow throughout our lifetime [, and to drink heavily].

“One of the myths was that once you were born you never had the capability of making new brain cells,” he said [, slurring only the second "you," just before "never."]

“In fact, [hiccup!], we now know that even in old people, one’s capable of making new brain cells and most recent evidence suggests that the making of brain cells is very important in maintaining good mental [hiccup! ... mental] health.”

“[It] may well help to prevent things like [uhhhhh ... ] stroke and heart disease [uh, yeah, that's it ... ] so there may be a [puhhhh] positive effect of moderate drinking on brain health,” he said [, straining to keep a straight face. Upon making eye contact with a colleague, Professor Bartlett snorted beer out of his nostrils.]

I was able to attend the first night of Startup Weekend, organized by Andrew. I was pretty impressed by how far a big group of strangers managed to progress in the 3-4 hours I was there, and through a weekend of seriously hard work by talented folks, it looks like they’ve just about pulled it off. I checked their live video stream last night around 11pm, and there they were, still working away.

A big congrats to Andrew and everyone!