BarGolf.net

Why is this here.. It’s a place holder so when I come up against this problem again I don’t have so much trouble find out what it means.

Basically some Windows applications I’ve worked out started throwing up “ contains an Invalid Path” pop-ups when run on Windows 2003 Server R2 or Vista. That’s all the pop-up says and its not generated by anything in the code.

After some digging it transpires that if you use the CRecentFileList object for handling MRU entries then you’ll get this pop-up if you have ever added empty (”") entries into the list. So the simple workaround is not to add empty entries. The problem occurs because the MFC42 DLL on these OSes differs to the one on earlier versions of Windows.

Matt.

Well the good news is that both House and Heroes have finished. The bad news is that a new series of Dexter (in high-def on FXHD) has started and I’ve got Grand Theft Auto 4 for PS3. Network multi-player is just too much fun.

Still, my VB.Net contribution to libHaru was accepted so should be part of the package by now.

And after yet another user asking for “moving time” in my Facebook MyMotionBased application I finally spent half a day rehacking it all. On the plus side the new data fetch from MotionBased.com is a lot less clunky than the old “parse the RSS feed” approach. Unfortunately this probably means I should update my Wordpress Plugin too. And there’s still the “News” page, “Stats” page etc. features for MyMB that I should get around too.

Done nothing on the PS3PVR front though.

More of a place holder for me this.

I used VMWare so I can run the Garmin MotionBased agent to upload my run data from my Forerunner 301. Since Gutsy’s kernel update at the beginning of the week (2.6.22-16-generic) I’ve been needing to rebuild the vmnet kernel modules each reboot.

Finally I got bored with this and googled about. Seems that for some reason /etc/vmware/not_configured is being left around even though the modules are fine. Removing this file should sort it out.

Bah… and yay.

Matt.

When I get my finger out there’s a few things that I’m currently mucking about with,

VB.Net bindings for libHaru

libHaru is an open source PDF generation library. I got interested in this with some PDF generation stuff I was doing at work, so fed back some VB.Net interop skills I’d picked up to generate a VB.Net binding.

MyMotionBased Facebook application

My Facebook application that integrates people’s (runners, cyclists etc.) MotionBased.com activities into their Facebook profiles. My recent work has been some performance improvements and I’m hoping to put some long requested features in place soon.

Simple PVR app. for Linux

I know, they’ve been done a million times before. But I want a web based schedule served from my box in the roof (2x DVB-T cards) I can operate from my PS3 which squirrels the video files away so TwonkyVision can serve them back to my PS3 later at my convenience.

What’s stopping me from getting on with this stuff?

I managed 10 miles on my long run today, which is the furthest I’ve ever run. 9th Mile was the hardest had to keep remembering to pick my knees up to stretch them out a bit. Legs ache now mind you.

I missed last weekend’s long run because I was recovering from “EuroDoubleVision” - which was quite dehydrating.

Typically MotionBased is monkeying around and taking an age to process the upload, but SportsTracks shows from my GPS log that most miles were under 9:30 pace. Not fast enough for a sub 2 hour half though - which is my aim (not that I’m entering any more races ever though).

Whoops. I’d turned off comment moderation emails as RECAPTCHA seemed to be handling all of my tramadol spam nicely and completely failed to check if there were comments awaiting my input. Sorry folks!

I’ll check more frequently now I know I’m supposed to.

Another brief update..

I’ve published my MotionBased add-in for WordPress to the WordPress plugins repository as WPMB. This should now be regarded as the definitive location to obtain the add-in.

So far about 10 people have found it without me mentioning it.

Cheers,

Matt.

Well I’ve got a new Laptop. A very old Dell Inspiron 8000 - it was pretty good in its day, 1Ghz CPU, 512Mb and a nice 1400×1050 screen. I’ve splashed out 30 quid on a new battery (the original wouldn’t even charge), located an old 802.11b (B!) wireless card and given it the full Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy treatment.

I had some grief when I upgraded my 7.04 Feisty on my desktop machine to Gutsy. VMWare didn’t work, and I had endless troubles with the graphics card / dual monitor set up - which is still not quite as good as it was in 7.04 (but I have go the nice Compiz effects working). However on this laptop everything has gone great. The only thing that didn’t quite work was the standard driver for the wireless card (r8010) would just hang the box if I tried to connect to an AP. I’ve blacklisted it for now and used the ndiswrapper approach - I don’t wholly approve idealogically speaking - but it means I can sit in front of the telly watching Arsenal v Chelsea whilst updating my Facebook application code.

.. though it would be nice if suspend worked. Well suspend does sort of work - but unfortunately the resume part doesn’t.

Just a short note to say I’ve got the the point where I think I can publish my MotionBased plugin for WordPress.

You can see what it looks like in my sidebar on the left, and download the source from the link on the left.

Cheers,

Matt.

Following last Sunday’s abortive long run, I decided to start back at basics - do some more core and leg work at gym (which fortuitously I had failed to cancel back in September) - and build up distance again.

Seeing as it was very cold I decided not run outside (hence no log). After getting marooned 3 miles away from home last time I didn’t want that to happen in this weather. Instead I put down a steady 3 miles in the gym - I got the occasional beginning of a twinge from my pesky left knee but found that if I concentrated on foot placement for a bit it would go away. The other distraction was I had to go back to thinking in Km again, which left my brain with something to do. Actually at 5K I was feeling pretty good about my knee, but decided not to push it and instead stick to the plan.

I’m off to France next week with work so my knee will get another rest too, which should help. Hopefully over the next month I’ll build back up to 10Ks then see if I can revert to my original 10-13M plan.