Flux, Flex, and Other

Dear Mr. Cralle (my trigonometry teacher): You were right. The unit circle IS important to my life.

I’m working on a project where I’m trying to skew a component (an Image, actually) by an amount set by the user. But I’m running into problems with the skew amount calculation…

The actual project is much more complex, but I could replicate by problem in this simple example. I’m assuming something either in [ my understanding of the Matrix(), the way I’m calculating the offset, or the trig functions I’m using] are where it’s messing up, but I can’t figure it out.

A cookie for anyone who solves the problem…

Okay. The demo is here, and the source is here.

The blue canvas, on the left, is the source of the image I’m trying to skew. I’m drawing it, on the right, with two Image components. The slider says how far the right half should be moved up or down (as a percentage of the height of the right half)… and the left half should stay put but skew so that its right edge matches up with the right half.

It’s almost working, but the edges do not line up. The right half IS deflecting the proper amount, and from what I can tell, I’m doing the math right…

Anyone care to comment as to what’s wrong?

Sorry, Mr. Cralle…

“Hallo!  My name is Inigo Montoya.  You send me mislabeled crap.  Prepare to die” …

I’m not a Microsoft fan. I think the combination of their relatively crappy product(s), assuming their non-commercial customers are criminals and/or mindless drones, and the inaccessibility of their support system (I’ve found it far easier to Google for Microsoft support issues rather than using Microsoft’s support search site… and can you find a phone number on there anywhere?) make them a good candidate for technical hatred.

But the thing that really gets me is the lack of even remotely honest labeling. There was the instance where they upgraded everyone to the new (crappy) Internet Explorer 7 via the “Critical Updates” section of Windows Update… Which then followed on with future (actual) critical updates to fix the holes in IE7…

And now, this… I needed to sign up for Windows Messenger MSN Messenger Hotmail Windows Live whatever they’re calling it now since we use the Microsoft messnger at work.  It gives you a hotmail address, so now I have a hotmail address.  Fabulous.  I never use the Hotmail address, but occaisionally my messenger pops up an alert telling me I have email in my inbox.  It’s always marketing crap from Microsoft, so I found my way into the preferences to turn off all communication from Microsoft, other than the required “Updates, changes to the service, or information vital to the service.

I’m okay with that…  “We have a security flaw”, “Your storage just got upgraded to X gigabytes”, “Here’s your lost password” — all relevant and useful information that I am totally willing to accept.

Then this arrived this morning…

Now, I’m sorry, but I seriously doubt that getting Spooky haloween packs, Getting Sweet Stuff Now, and getting marketing emails for Windows Live OneCare counts as “Updates, Changes, or Information vital to the service”.

I think it’s especially telling that they REMIND you that this email is being sent under those pretenses, and that if you don’t like it, don’t let the e-door hit you on the e-butt on the e-way out.

For those of you not following the story…  Here’s parts 1 and 2.

Delta just called me.  One of the repair shops that is an hour or so away is going to come to my house, haul it out of the basement, pick up the saw, take it to their shop to repair, and then bring it back to my house.  That’s a lot of lugging around a 300 pound hunk of cast iron!

It took me a while to get to the right person at Delta to handle this, but I have to say I’m pleased with the result (assuming it goes through as planned).  The people I’ve spoken with have been very nice and seemed eager to help me, and (honestly… not “you’re supposed to apologize when the customer complains”) apologetic that their product had problems.  Their official policy is that it’s my bag to get the saw to them — it’s my fault for living in the boonies so I could drive it to them or ship it to them on my dollar.  But since I called, told them what I have been dealing with, they had the power to change the policy to make me, the customer, happy.

I’ll keep you posted on Act 4: The Extraction (I think she’s too big to get out the door, so they may have to disassemble it…)

Another thing I wanted to do while we were here, now that I have more space to devote to a workshop, was to watch EBay and Craig’s List to see if I could find any jewels in the area of low priced, high quality tools. I set up my RSS reader to watch the Craig’s List > Charlottesville > Tools feed, and saw a lot of stuff I didn’t want go by every couple of days. I mean, I WANT the propane fueled forklift, but I can’t say I have any real use for it.

Then, one day, there it was. Brand new Delta Tablesaw, still in the box, for $200. I called the guy selling it, and got some details. It was a 1 horsepower contractor saw, pretty much capable of doing anything I would need for the forseeable future. I went to pick it up, and as advertised, the thing was brand new. Tape still on the box seams.

The guy and I hefted it in the back of my car (it weighs about 185 pounds) and I drove it home. I got a neighbor to help me lug it down my basement stairs and set to work assembling it. It took about 2 hours… Last step: bolt on the cast iron extension wings. I put the first one on but the tops did not align. I spun it and tried the other way, but no joy — the mounting holes drilled in the table were drilled at an angle, so the table could not line up flush.

To make many angry phone calls short, Delta told me I could take it to, or ship it at my expense to, their licensed repair center — over an hour drive away. Or I could return it to Lowe’s (did I mention it still had the original Lowe’s bar code on the outside of the box? Nice…)

I had an awesome experience at Lowes. They took the mess of half assembled saw with shredded box and gave me a store credit (since there was no receipt). They no longer stock that saw anywhere, so I upgraded to the 1 1/2 horsepower, bigger, badder saw with a stupendously nice fence system. By returning the saw for the full original sales price, getting a credit back for the sales tax and applying a 10% off coupon I had, I now have a $600 + tax saw/fence package for a total of $400 out of pocket. Sweet.

But wait.

So I repeated the put it in the car (with a forklift at Lowe’s this time — the new one weighs just under 300 pounds), lug it down the stairs (Patty’s folks were in town, so we unpacked it in the car and walked each piece down the stairs), and assemble it routine. This was more complex, so it took about 5 hours. Tables aligned great!

So the other night, I just finished all the alignments and fine tuning (fence to blade, blade to miter track, blade 90/45 to table, etc) and was going to cut my first hunk of maple. Went to raise the blade, turned the dial to raise it and <plink> a worm gear falls out of the bottom of the saw and the blade drops inside with a <thunk>.

So I called Delta, again. This time I got someone better who is going to send a licensed tech to my house to fix all of my issues. We’ll see how that goes, but hopefully soon my shop will be humming with the sounds of a functioning table saw. I’ll keep you posted.

Patty and I are currently Verizon Wireless customers. We got a discount from my employer, and have done okay with it over the last few years. Patty’s been having difficulties with her phone recently, and they keep replacing it with refurbished phones that seem to have the same issue. Not so great on the customer support and generally feeling like we need a change.

If anyone from the cell phone industry ever reads this: Why do I feel like I’m buying a used car every time I go into one of your stores?

So anyway, we decided to give Cingular AT&T a try - people we know have generally liked them, and we also get a discount for them from my job. Plus, all the phones (even the pretty nice ones) are free or like $10 when you sign up as new. Cool.

I currently have a Treo 700W - runs Windows Mobile, Mobile Office, syncs with Outlook, all that good geeky stuff. But also pretty expensive, and requires a monthly data plan. My good ol’ SuperEgo popped in the other day and helped me decide that I really don’t use those features that much, and should just opt for the free/cheap phones they offer when we sign up. I felt good. Like after you take a bunch of recycling to the recycle center.

Clean.

Right with the world.

Responsible.

All grown up.

And then the other shoe dropped. AT&T is getting the iPhone at the end of June… Hmmm…. And Patty (very sweetly) chimes in with “Well, if you’re going to get a new phone AND you have mentioned you want an iPod, it’s just about the same cost…”

Remember the crazy long armed monster in the Bugs Bunny version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?

yeah. that guy.

That’s my Id going “I want it I want it I want it I want it”. I swear, that’s what my Id looks like. Replace Bugs with me, and the axe with an iPhone, and you’ve got my psyche right now.

SuperEgo pipes in: “It’s the first generation. Let them work the bugs out”
Id: “Shiny Shiny Shiny Shiny Shiny”
SuperEgo: “Plus they’ll come out with a new model with a lot more storage in 6 months or so”
Id: “Precious Precious Precious Precious”

And that’s pretty much where I am right now. No real reason that I can’t wait to get it for a while (and I probably should wait, thank you very much)…

… but did you see the new ads? (shiny shiny shiny shiny)

We found out that my company will not be giving us a corporate move, since I was the one initiating the request. Grrrr. They moved me down here last time under the same circumstances… Something about people abusing the policy. Oops.

We started looking into movers, and I mistakenly submitted a request at a site that makes movers compete. So we’ve got about 30 emails and 50 voicemails and all of them sound shady and way too eager to tell us why their competitors suck.

In the end, we decided that we’ve only had one contractor (our exterminator) work for us whose work we were satisfied with. That and the movers were multiples more expensive than moving ourselves…

So on Friday, June 22, the FogleClare caravan streams east towards Atlanta, then off to Charlottesville. Patty will be driving one of our cars, and Ill be driving a 24′ Budget Rental Truck and towing our other car on a dolly behind me.

We’re not sure how to divvy up the pets yet between the two vehicles. Higgins LOVED the hurricane evacuation two years ago. I think Dakota is making a grass roots campaign to ride in the truck with me. I think he wants to be Fred (the dog) from Smokey and the Bandit