FreedomMind Blog

Well… I didn’t follow up my previous post as quickly as I promised, but I can blame that on U-verse itself. One component of U-verse is the Residential Gateway device, which serves as a DSL modem, router, etc. With previous routers, it was easy to map internal IP addresses to external ports, but not so on the RG. As a consequence, FreedomMind has been down since the U-verse installation. But now it’s back: FreedomVerse!

I’ll admit that I haven’t been too worried about it and that’s why it has taken me so long to do the necessary troubleshooting and implement the required solution: configuring the firewall to “DMZplus mode” for the machine hosting the site. Fortunately, I have only one machine to expose to the internet because this mode is only available for one.

Other technical observations:

• The default 192.168.0.x address range is a challenge to modify. It can be done, but requires all the devices, including the set-top boxes, to be restarted. Even then, they don’t want to release previous addresses. Maybe if I knew more, I could take care of this, but it was easier to just accept the default range.
• The Max 18 plan to which I subscribe seems very fast. I suppose it’s not as fast as the 20Mb plan I had with Charter, but I can’t tell the difference.
• The VoIP telephone service works fine. Since it is IP-based, there are some benefits such as logging, dialing from a computer interface, and more. The plan also includes many features that I may have had available even with my POTS line such as voicemail, call filtering, and many more - all configurable through a nice web interface.
• The RG has four ethernet ports on the back. That’s probably enough for most folks, but one is required for the primary set top box, leaving only three more. When I mentioned to the installer that I needed more (TV, Blu-Ray, XBox, and NAS drive), he happily gave me an 8-port Netgear gigabit switch worth about $60: technical limitation overcome by excellent customer service!

I will document some of my TV-specific observations in another posting.

This evening is my last evening with Charter cable. Tomorrow the AT&T technician is coming out to my house to install U-verse.

I’ll admit that a great deal of my excitement comes from the fact that one of my primary roles at AT&T is the design of interactive U-verse applications. One of the applications available at this time is Weather. I wrote the front-end code for the BellSouth version of the application which was slightly modified to become the AT&T version, for which I designed the information flow and layouts.

I’ll add another post tomorrow to describe the installation and my experience as a “new user.”

This year I decided to try using some “grey” in my jack-o-lantern instead of just the standard black and white (or orange and white) I’ve used in the past.

I considered using a traditional halloween image like bats, ghosts, or even a face, but in the end, I chose the iPhone. The back of the iPhone 3G ( and 3GS) is so simple that I needed something more. The original (2G) iPhone design is more distinctive, with the black plastic section at the bottom, so I based my template on that.

Design:

Template:

Photos:

I learned some lessons with creating the translucent (grey) section, so I’m glad I created a simple design. The skin of the pumpkin is very dense compared to the soft interior beneath. It’s difficult to shave off the skin without going too far into the pumpkin or beyond the area defined by the design.

I used an X-acto knife and a utility knife to define the edges and a chisel to shave/dig. The thickness of the pumpkin wall was a little over an inch thick and I was trying to get the translucent part to be about a quarter of that. The nice thing is that once I got the outer skin off, refining the carving was much easier.Not surprisingly, the areas around the details (the top of the apple and the leaf above it) were the most difficult. The leaf is actually thicker than it is wide.

Next year I’ll try something a little more complex, but I’ll avoid having too many thin items close to one another. Additionally, I plan to get some clay-carving tools like ribbon loops (I think that’s what they’re called).

I really enjoy making jack-o-lanterns. The whole process of selecting the photos, turning them into templates, transferring the images to the pumpkin, and carving the shapes takes some time, but it’s worth it to create something eye-catching…even if it will only last a few days.

I believe that this year I’ve made my best one. The subject is pretty simple, but the design is more complex than any previous ones. I chose to use the faces of our puppies and, because I got a fairly large (wide) pumpkin, to put both faces on a single pumpkin. I’m proud of the execution. The photos aren’t great, but you get the idea:

On the left, we have Suzy:

And on the right, we have Boo:

The template I used to create the carving was made by posterizing and editing a couple of photos from my iPhoto collection: