Tag: family
The iPhone App
You may recall that I was slightly busy from shortly before Will was born until early October. Well, my big project was finally released yesterday. The Wolfram|Alpha iPhone application is now available in the iTunes app store.
The app has generated quite a lot of buzz over the past 24 hours, mostly because the price is significantly greater than the vast majority of iPhone applications. While I was intimately involved in the development of the application, I am completely in the dark about the business and marketing side of the product. On the bright side, most of the reviews speak relatively highly of the app itself, even though many are quite critical of the price.
Since I work primarily on Mathematica, I’ve been fairly uninvolved with the Wolfram|Alpha project prior to this iPhone app. I’m still not an expert on innards of Wolfram|Alpha but I do understand the big picture a little better than I did before.
If you’ve never used Wolfram|Alpha before, go ahead and give it a try on the website. It’s kind of hard to describe what it does, simply because it’s not like any other application you’ve ever used before. Despite certain visual similarities to web search engines like Google or Yahoo, Wolfram|Alpha is not a search engine. It doesn’t find web pages that might be related to your query, it computes factual answers to your query (except when it doesn’t).
Typically this means your query must be constructed in a slightly different way (perhaps using slightly different language) than you would use for a search engine. It’s worth taking the time to experiment to see what works and what doesn’t work. Perhaps my best description of Wolfram|Alpha is that it is a combination of a calculator and an encyclopedia.
The iPhone app features optimized input and output for the interesting and useful Wolfram|Alpha computation engine.
W|A knows all sorts of interesting facts. For instance, Robert was a more popular given name than William in the U.S. for most of the 20th century (though William recently overtook Robert… a sign of things to come?).
The app provides a number of ways to share the interesting results you find. Click the “share” button in the upper-right corner, or press and hold on a result.
The app also has numerous built-in examples to help you get started.
It also contains a complete history of all your queries.
Many of the computations have parameters that can be fine tuned for more precise results.
So there you have it. The app was a lot of fun to write, even if the release schedule was a bit hectic. The next version should be even better.
The Swing-a-majig
We were lucky enough not to be the first of our generation of friends and family to have a child. As a result, we’ve been fortunate enough to receive many hand-me-downs. Will loves his little hand-me-down bouncer.
Melissa’s sister was nice enough to give us (among other things) a nifty swing. There was a slight hiccup with the swing though, when I started to assemble it I realized the entire assembly was there except for the seat… which I could not find anywhere. I searched the house high and low. Finally, Melissa asked her sister if she happened to sill have the seat. Her sister couldn’t find the seat.
Melissa started looking on Craigslist for swings. After a few days she noticed someone selling the exact same swing for a reasonable price, with the caveat that it didn’t run on AC power (battery only). Well, since it was exactly the same swing this limitation didn’t really matter because we could just take the seat off this one and attach it to the one we already had. We got the swing, swapped the seat, and Fig was good to go.
A day or two later we got a call from Melissa’s sister… she found the seat. Oh well, now there’s an extra. A day or two after that, a brand new swing (the exact same model) arrived at our house via UPS. My mom (who was well aware of our earlier dilemma) was kind enough to get the swing for us. In less than a week we went from zero functioning swings to three!
Well, I returned the new one, we’re using the pieced together swing, and we have still enough spare parts to build an entire new swing, should the need arise. We are fortunate enough to have many wonderful people who care about us enough to help us out in these stressful times, and for that we are truly grateful.
The Look
Things have been hectic these past six days, but Melissa, William, and I are managing okay (with an awful lot of help from Melissa’s mother). Fig William has settled into a routine of eating, sleeping, pooping, and making funny faces (with the last two often done in conjunction). He had some real doozies today.
He’s got the look.
One eyebrow raised? Come on, that’s my look.
Incidentally, I’ve posted a number of pictures to my Flickr stream that have not and/or will not make it to the blog. So if you really can’t get enough of William (Grandmas, I’m looking at you) you can check my Flickr stream on a regular basis… or better yet, subscribe to the RSS feed.
The Birth Day
This kid sucks. I mean that literally, of course. William is a sucker. He will suck on anything near his mouth, he will suck hard, and he will not stop sucking. His favorite thing to suck is his entire fist.
We got around 2-2.5 hours of sleep (spaced out over three naps) after William was born in the wee hours of the morning yesterday. We had a few people come to visit. We received plenty of phone calls and emails from our wonderful friends and relatives. Thank you all so much for your kind words and support. The consensus seems to be that he will go by Will (or possibly Guillermo en Español).
We will go home tomorrow morning. It will be a nice birthday present for Melissa. Until then it’s likely to be more eating, sleeping, sucking, and pooping… more for some of us than others.
The Boy
Melissa went into labor yesterday, three days before her 30th birthday, about 10 days prior to her due date. We went to the hospital mid-afternoon. At 1:19 AM this morning (August 12, 2009) William Miles “Fig” Raguet-Schofield came into this world, waterlogged and tender. Melissa and William are both doing fine.
I am utterly exhausted after merely assisting with a day-long labor. I can’t even imagine how Melissa must feel. She’s one tough cookie. I can only assume the boy will be just as tough.
The Highest Point in Tennessee
I enjoy cycling. Long time readers might recall that a long term goal of mine is to cycle to the highest point (well, highest paved road) in every U.S. state. The first one I checked off the list was Tennessee, four years ago today.
Living most of my life in flat, flat central Illinois I have a special appreciation for mountains. The first mountain I rode was Mt. Tam in California, in 2004. I rode it again in 2005, at which point I was hooked. I needed more mountains, but I had none near home. So I started looking around for places where I could take trips to ride mountains.
Having spent every summer during college working in central Appalachia I was somewhat familiar with this mountain range, plus it’s an easy day’s drive to get there. But where to go. If I was going to take a special trip I wanted some big, big mountains. The two biggest are Mt. Mitchell (6,684 feet, the highest point in North Carolina, near Asheville, also the highest point east of the Mississippi river), and nearby Clingman’s Dome (6,643 feet, on the TN/NC border, the highest point in Tennessee).
What started out as kind of pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking quickly turned into a week-long family vacation in August 2005 (i.e. best vacation ever®). We packed the Insight full of camping gear, food, clothes, and two (yes, two) bikes and headed to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
We camped in the park (just outside of Gatlinburg, TN) the first night and woke up bright and early, ready to tackle Clingman’s Dome: me on the bike, my wonderful wife driving the support vehicle. The ascent was 20 miles long and rose around 5,000 ft. The road wasn’t terribly steep (4-5%) since it was in the national park and it was built so RV’s could make it up.
The first mile or two was very easy. I was cruising along at 16-17 mph thinking this will be a piece of cake. The gradient increased gradually until I was closer to 8-10 mph, where I would remain for most of the climb. I didn’t know what to expect with such a long climb (twice as long as the only other mountain I had climbed), and since I have a double chainring I switched to a mountain bike cassette with a 32-tooth cog before the ride. I could have gotten by comfortably with a 28. My regular road cassette only had a 25. This would have been usable, but much more difficult.
The first 12.5 miles on Newfound Gap Road had just a little bit of traffic, but it wasn’t bad. All the cars were going very slowly anyway, so my presence didn’t seem to cause any problems.
At Newfound Gap I stopped to get new water bottles from Melissa, then turned off onto Clingman’s Dome Road for the final 7.5 miles. There was very little traffic on this road. Aside from a short downhill this road was also a little bit steeper.
What had been foggy and overcast weather all morning turned into a light drizzle at the summit of Clingman’s Dome. Fortunately, we made another trip back there a few days later for a better view from the observation tower at the top.
I chose to descend the other side of the mountain, into North Carolina, rather than go back down the way I came up. Like the other side, this side wasn’t terribly steep, but it did have some long straight sections that relatively safely allowed for high speeds.
This was only the third time I had ridden a mountain, so my descending skills were a little lacking. Nonetheless I was able to get up to 48 mph or so on the descent.
At the bottom Melissa picked me up and we drove off to the next campground where we would continue our great adventure. I really enjoyed the ride up to and back down from Clingman’s Dome. It was challenging, but not ridiculous (like Mauna Kea). It was a good warmup for Mt. Mitchell a few days later.
| Ride Information | |
| Date: | 2005-08-08 7:39 AM EDT |
| Mountain: | Clingman’s Dome |
| Road Elevation: | 6318 feet |
| Climb Distance: | 20.0 miles |
| Climb Ascent: | 4837 feet |
| Climb Average Grade: | 4.8% |
| Climb Maximum Grade: | ? |
| Ride Distance: | 50.6 miles |
| Ride Total Ascent: | 5895 feet |
| Ride Maximum Speed: | 48 miles/hour |
| Ride Start: | Elkmont Campground, GSMNP, TN (2285 feet) |
| Ride End: | Oconaluftee Vistior Center, GSMNP, NC (2046 feet) |
A I mentioned, we came back to Clingman’s dome a few days later and parked at Newfound Gap. From there Melissa & I rode together the last 7.5 miles to the top. Despite her fear, I think she really enjoyed the ride. Conquering that mountain was certainly difficult for her. She often mentions that experience in the same breath as other difficult moments in her life (i.e. marathon #1, marathon #2, marathon #3, etc.) that have helped her learn to persevere.
The 50D
As long time readers may recall, I retired my beloved Canon Digital Rebel camera (which was a low end DSLR) last fall. I really, really wanted a high end Canon 5D mark II, but the price was simply prohibitively expensive (and they weren’t released yet). Instead I replaced my Rebel with the 5D mark II’s little sibling, the mid-range Canon 50D. The 50D has most of the features of the 5D mark II, really only lacking video and the full frame sensor, yet cost half the price.
When I got the 50D I immediately started shooting RAW instead of JPEG and switched from using iPhoto to Aperture to manage my photos. I’ve always been very interested in photography, but these three changes marked the point when I dove in more deeply.
At the same time I also purchased a pair of new lenses, a wide angle zoom (Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM) and a telephoto zoom (Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM). These are both on the low end of Canon’s top of the line L series of lenses, and they’re both much much nicer than any of the lenses I had used previously. In addition to the large apertures and great focusing, one of the neatest things about these two lenses is that the zoom mechanisms are internal to the lens on both. When you zoom in or out the lenses don’t change length.
The camera itself is relatively heavy, and these two lenses with their large glass are heavy as well. Whenever I hand the camera to someone else, the first thing they mention is how heavy the camera feels. I prefer to think of it as solid.
After eight months of use I can say that I’m quite happy with the camera. It’s not perfect, but it is very, very good. The resolution of the photos is very high. The focus is very fast and very sharp (particularly with the Canon L lenses).
The 50D (along with my newer lenses) have produced some of my favorite photos.
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM (wide angle zoom)
The Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM is great indoors.
…and for portraits.
…and outdoors
…and it’s perfect for landscapes
Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM (telephoto zoom)
The Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM lens is great for sports.
…and wildlife.
Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 USM Macro
The Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 USM Macro lens allows close-ups.
…and landscapes.
…and portraits.
I love almost everything about this camera. I can only really think of a few complaints. First, I always leave the camera in Auto White Balance mode. When I shoot indoors (usually without a flash) the white balance almost always needs adjusted. This is simple enough to do (though I can’t always get it just right), but it’s a little annoying sometimes.
Second (and this one’s kind of big), is the camera is very noisy at higher ISO speeds. This model was supposedly much better than previous generation DSLRs, but it’s not good. In most cases 800 and above are unusable, so I rarely shoot higher than 400. That by itself isn’t atrocious. The bad part is that the automatic ISO mode will set the ISO up to 1600 (which is nearly always unusable), and it almost always errs on the side of setting the value too high. This means I can’t use the automatic ISO mode and instead I have to set it manually. I usually use 100-200 outdoors and 400 indoors. I switch between indoors and outdoors multiple times per week so I always have to remember to change the ISO settings, but I often forget. I have two cheaper cameras that solve this problem with a simple setting allowing you to choose the maximum ISO value for the automatic mode. I would love to have a similar setting on the 50D. It’s frustrating, but given that this is my biggest complaint about an extremely sophisticated piece of technology, it’s not that bad in the scheme of things.
Third, the live view focusing is very slow. Other camera manufacturers have made this work (live view focusing on my Olympus E-420 is much faster). Additionally, the traditional half-press of the shutter button does not activate autofocus in live view, a separate button is required. Perhaps they did this on purpose because they knew their live view focus was so slow. Who knows. Regardless, it has room for improvement here.
This is by far the nicest camera I’ve ever owned (or even used). Quibbles aside, I wouldn’t trade it for anything else (in the same general price range). I still dream of owning a full frame DSLR some day, but until that day comes, this one is a keeper.
The Insect Photography Workshop
Last week was National Pollinator Week. Who knew?
The UIUC entomology department held a number of events, including an insect photography workshop. I thought it would be fun to try something a little different so I walked over to the Pollinatarium yesterday for the workshop. The workshop leader is a UIUC post-doc in entomology who studies ants (my sister-in-law Kim is an entomologist who studies fire ants in Texas). He also photographs insects for text books.
Among his tips were:
- Know your subject
- Use your camera’s manual settings
- Simplify the background
- Place the subject away from the center of the frame
- Light is important
- There is no single correct way to take photographs
We tried to keep these points (and more) in mind as we walked around the nearby prairie & forest to practice. It was a lot of fun. Here are a few of my favorites.
You can see more of my insect photos from the workshop here.
The iPhone
The original iPhone was announced at Macworld Expo in January 2007 while Melissa & I were living in Nicaragua. It was amazing, a phone that ran the same beautiful, wonderful operating system as my desktop and laptop computers. The crowd at the Macworld keynote was disappointed the device wouldn’t be available until June. No matter, I wouldn’t return to the U.S. until August.
I ordered my iPhone in July and had it shipped to my parents’ house so it would be waiting for me upon our return. Around the same time I also ordered a new (non-i) phone for Melissa. We arrived at my parents’ house on a Sunday evening. The iPhone was there, in all it’s glory, but I couldn’t actually use it yet. Apparently, because of the way I set up our account with AT&T, I needed to activate Melissa’s phone first. This required talking to AT&T customer service, which wasn’t open on a Sunday evening.
The disappointment only lasted a few short hours, which was nothing compared to the months of waiting I already endured. I got everything straightened out with AT&T first thing Monday morning and my iPhone was up and running. I loved it.
Two months later, while I was locking up my bike at work, I dropped my padded carrying case about two feet onto the concrete. The phone slid out face down. I was concerned the concrete might scratch the glass. Even worse, the glass cracked. It was still usable, just less beautiful… but not enough to warrant $199 to replace the screen.
In April 2008 the iPhone (and iPod Touch) developer program was announced and I signed up right away. As a software developer I am exited by the prospect of running my own code on my phone/PDA (much as I did with three previous Palm OS devices, and three Windows Mobile devices). At first Apple highly recommended not using your primary phone for development purposes, so I bought a refurbished iPod Touch.
The iPhone 3G was unveiled in June 2008 to much fanfare. I didn’t really care that much as AT&T still does not offer 3G data service in Champaign-Urbana. I was excited about the built-in GPS and larger storage capacity, but not enough to upgrade. Fortunately, my employer acquired on which I have been able to use. Score. In the meantime I set up my old iPhone for Melissa.
Finally, earlier this month the iPhone 3GS was announced. More storage, better camera, video recording, built-in digital compass. My AT&T contract was nearly up so I qualified for upgrade pricing. It didn’t take much convincing for me to order one. It was Fig’s Father’s Day present for me. It arrived last night and I’ve been using it all day today.
