Read the rest of this entry »My central HVAC system has issues cooling down the 3rd floor of our house during the summer.
To solve the problem, I started using my central HVAC system to cool the 1st & 2nd floor only, and I’m using a portative air conditioning unit on the 3rd floor.
To control the AC unit, I use my PowerMac (which is always on), to which a SmartHome PowerLinc USB Controller is connected.
I created a small PHP script which runs every minute, and determine if the AC should be on or off, and tells Shion to turn it on or off. Shion talks to the USB controller, which in turns talk to the SmartHome ApplianceLinc, which then either activate or desactivate the power outlet.
Remote-controlled air conditioning using Mac OS X and Shion
July 18th, 2009Auto-start XBMC on Apple TV boot
July 3rd, 2009Read the rest of this entry »Here’s how to have XBMC auto-start when your Apple TV boots.
TV Forecast widget not working? Here’s how to fix it.
March 5th, 2009Read the rest of this entry »TV Forecast is a nice widget that Matt Comi created. You tell it what TV shows you watch, and it will keep track of the upcoming episodes for those shows.
The only down side to that widget is that it data-scrape TV.com to get its data.
Not only is this illegal, but it also tends to break the widget every time TV.com change their layout in any way.Getting tired of that, I decided to open the widget’s code, and change the data source to something more stable: TheTVDB.com
Encrypt Gmail offline (Gears) data
February 3rd, 2009Read the rest of this entry »Since Gmail released the Offline feature in Labs, I guess many people have enabled it. I did, as soon as the feature was available in my account. And one of the first thing I did after enabling it, is trying to see how I could secure the data it downloads.
Review of CrashPlan: Multi-platform backup solution for everyone
December 2nd, 2007Read the rest of this entry »CrashPlan, it’s a remote backup solution for (almost) everyone.
The principle is easy enough: install the software client (available for Windows, Mac OS X or Linux), change the default selection of files that will be backed up (if you want to) and you’re on your way to never loose a file again!
Clavier Mac canadien français sous Windows XP (Parallels, VMWare, Bootcamp…)
October 25th, 2007Read the rest of this entry »Installer Windows XP sur un Mac, que ça soit dans Parallels Desktop, WMWare Fusion ou avec Bootcamp, c’est parfois bien pratique. Ce qui n’est pas pratique par contre, c’est d’essayer d’utiliser un clavier Mac canadien français dans Windows! Plusieurs touches sont différentes, dont les accents, plusieurs Shift-chiffres, etc.
Facebook application: Import Gallery pictures into Facebook
June 22nd, 2007Read the rest of this entry »The result is now a nice Facebook application which seems to work just fine for most people who tried it:
Gallery Import application on FacebookNow when I want to import Gallery pictures into Facebook, I’m just a few clicks away!
Review of Netgear HDX101 Powerline HD Ethernet Adapters
June 21st, 2007Read the rest of this entry »So bottom line, if you want to try those new things, make sure you buy them at a retailer that will take them back if you’re not satisfied. Or wait for the future to arrive, since this seems to be the best advice Mr. 2nd level had for me.
And if you want good technical support, don’t deal with Netgear!
How to fix non-working Folder Action on an external hard disk
June 20th, 2007Read the rest of this entry »I had a problem with Folder Actions: they always stopped working after a while! Quite annoying.
GobbleRSS – PDA-friendly web-based RSS reader
June 19th, 2007Read the rest of this entry »After I finished reading my latest book, which is what I usually do during my daily commuting to and from work, I started looking for a way to read my RSS feeds on a Palm device during that time. First, a friend of mine lent me his Palm Zire 31 (thanks!). Next, I started looking for a way to get unread RSS items from Google Reader into the Palm device. I was pretty happy with Google Reader itself, since I could read news at home, or at work (and soon enough, between the two) and not have to deal with duplicates etc. Using a desktop client would have been much more complicated, especially since I use a Mac at home, and a Windows PC at work. So, after looking for a while for a Google Reader API, or some other ways to download unread RSS items from Google Reader, I gave up.
I then started to implement my own Google Reader, which I dubbed GRC – Google Reader Clone.
