M363 – Software Engineering with objects..

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As previously mentioned in an earlier post, I plan to resume studying with the Open University, but for a BSc (Honours) Open instead of a BSc (Honours) Computing and IT. Esentially there is no change to the modules I’ll be studying, however, it means that I can use my prior study towards my degree instead of having to replicating a lot of lower level study.

Depending on who I talk to, I get different opinions on whether this change of degree will have an effect on my future career, but that’s something I’ll have to deal with in the future…

Anyway, I have registered for M363, Software engineering with objects and earlier today I received my registration pack in the post. Roll on February!

Blogging with TextMate 2…

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Earlier tonight I tried to make a blog post via TextMate 2 and its blogging bundle. To do this you first of all have to install the bundle!

TextMate -> Preferences -> Bundles and check the box next to Blogging.

TextMate Bundles

Once the bundle was installed I then configured my blog.

Bundles -> Blogging -> Setup Blogs

TextMate Blogging Setup

However, when I tried to test my setup by fetching a post.

Bundles -> Blogging -> Fetch Post

I received a string of 406 errors, hmm thought I, and after a wee while I had a nagging feeling that I’d experienced problems like this before. A quick search on google and it looked like the problem was with my mod_security rules. I therefore loaded up the eUKhost website and started a virtual chat with one of their Live Chat agents, he quickly came to the same conclusion as me and made the necessary changes.

A change of degree…

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I received another email from The Open University about my modules that were expiring soon, it seems (and I’ve confirmed this by phone) that the modules only expire if I wish to count them against a BSc (Honours) Computing. If I instead wish to put them towards a BSc (Honours) Open, they are still good! It also appears that I can gain a BSc Open, by completing just one more level 3 module!

Unfortunatly I have missed the registration deadlines for the courses starting in February 2012, so I’ll have to wait until February 2013.

Study twarted once again…

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Ah! The risks of trying to combine a full time job and day-release study! I recently resumed my studies at Moray College, no sooner had I started than my employer informed me that I had to attend a course in Stafford that would mean missing three of the final four weeks of my course. Once again, I discussed this with my guidance tutor and I have decided to withdraw from the course again.

With work being so turbulent at the moment, maybe I should reconsider distance learning?

TextMate 2.0 (Alpha) and Python 3…

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I’m currently learning Python, and as a new Python programmer I’ve opted to go with Python 3, that said I want to keep the standard Python 2.6 install available, just in case. As you may be aware I’m also a Mac user and therefore a TextMate user. On 13 Dec 11, the first public alpha of TextMate 2.0 was made available to those of us who have both a TextMate license and an Intel Mac, which I’d guess must encompass a LOT of Mac developers?

Anyway, one of the things they’ve got rid of in TextMate 2.0 are the old project files, I was using these to direct TextMate to my Python 3 install (and yes, I am aware that there are other ways to do this). However, it seems we can now use a Git Style Configuration (erm, okay I’ve heard of Git and should probably be using it, but I’m still using Subversion!). Anyway, it seems that this means we stick a .tm_properties file in the root directory of our project. So to achieve the same effect as my old TextMate Project File I created a .tm_properties file containing the following line of code:

TM_PYTHON = "/usr/local/bin/python3.2"

and hey, presto I can run Python 3 code from within TextMate 2.0.

How to access USB drives from the Command Line…

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This is another blog entry primarily aimed at reminding me of how to do something, that I’ll no doubt have forgotten by the time I need to do it again!

I currently store all of my ebooks on my server, a nice central location which is easy for me to access from anywhere at home. However, I was due to go away for a four month period trip and decided to take a copy of my ebook directory away with me on an external hard drive. My initial thought was to simply copy the directory and it’s contents from my server to my external hard drive, but all those small files sure do take a long time to copy…

Why not simply plug my external hard drive into my server? Well I should probably point out that my server is configured as a headless system and as such runs Fedora without a GUI and is administered via the Terminal in OS X. Naturally as I haven’t needed to use an external USB drive before I hadn’t configured my Fedora install to use them, and so we finally come to the point of this blog posting!

To find out the device name for your USB drive you can navigate to 

/dev/disk/by-label

and then use 

ls -la

Terminal window screenshot

As you can see my USB drive is called 

ELEMENTS

and it’s device name is 

sdc1

To create a mount point for the drive use

mkdir /mnt/usbdrive

and then to mount it use

mount /dev/sdc1 /mnt/usbdrive

You can then use the drive like any other drive, for example

cd /mnt/usbdrive

Finally to unmount the drive, use

umount /mnt/usbdrive

An unexpected development…

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A couple of days ago I was informed that I shall be going overseas to work, for four months, in the next week! As you would expect this new has caused a certain amount of disruption and as I will not be able to sit my M363, Software engineering with objects exam, I have decided not to complete my third assignment.

I have also been in contact with my guidance tutor at Moray College and have decided that it would be prudent for me to withraw from studies there, and resume them at a later date…

OS X how to view your installed Video Codecs…

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As part of my Everyware Computing module, my tutor has included a series of videos to help us get to grips with Android development using Eclipse. Curiously I could watch some of them on my MacBook Pro but not on my iMac.

This was no doubt due to video codecs (or a lack of the required ones on my iMac) and I must have installed the necessary codecs on my MacBook Pro when I did some video editing on it a couple of years ago, but which ones?

After a little research I discovered that you can view your installed Quicktime video codecs, if you go to:

[Hard Drive] -> Library -> Quicktime

Rather obvious once you know where to look… That said, there is still one video that I can’t play on either of my Macs, and while it has been made available as a download (rather than imbedded in a flash website) which I can play, I’m determined to work out why it doesn’t want to play!

Useful codec packages for OS X include:
Perian for Divx.
Flip4Mac for Window Media.

While for video conversion, editing and playback:
Squared 5 – MPEG Streamclip seems to work!

My continuing quest for a BSc in Computing…

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Earlier this year the Open University informed me that some of the modules I was using towards my BSc (Honours) Computing have a time limit which would soon expire! This means that I’d have to complete and pay for even more modules. After giving this some serious thought during the summer, I have decided to stop studying with the OU and instead enrol with the University of the Highlands and Islands, via Moray College.

I will be completing my BSc Computing, over the next two years by attending Moray College on a day release basis. That said the lectures are delivered via video conferencing, which is a new experience for me. My modules this semester are Everywhere Computing, which involves a fair amount of Android development and Web Science, a multidisciplinary research module studying the Web and the issues and challenges it presents.

All in all two rather different modules, which I suspect will challenge me in completely different ways during the next three months…