I recently watched the first episode of FoodMob and learned just how simple it is to cook poached eggs. So today, I took my first crack at it and I think it was a success. I followed a pretty straight forward recipe/process:

1. Put about 3 inches of water in a pot. I don't have a sauce pan.
2. Add a teaspoon of vinegar for each cup of water used.
3. Get water boiling.
4. While water is boiling, crack an egg into a small bowl and get some toast started.
5. After water is boiling, turn down heat so water is just simmering.
6. Spin water around so you get a little whirlpool.
7. Slide egg into middle of whirlpool and wait about a minute.
8. Go grab toast while waiting for egg, may be burning by now.
9. Scoop egg out of water with slotted spoon and drop it on the toast.
10. I threw a little black pepper and some salt on top.

   

Click here to download:

first-attempt-at-poached-eggs-zHvAEcEsBgzjBmeBiapt.zip (3883 KB)

P.S. I like my yoke a little runny, if you want it to be solid then just leave it in the water a bit longer.

I often find myself wanting to select some text on a website, right click and have Google search the rest of the site for the text. So I made this simple Service in Automator. If you want to use it, unzip the file and copy it to ~/Library/Services.

I find it really useful for sites that have poor search engines or none at all.

It only works in Safari, for now, and it's a little bit slow but I'll work on it a little more before it permanently joins my Hacks section.

Click here to download:

Search_This_Site.workflow.zip (63 KB)

After a week of crazy, 10-15 hour days, I finally had a chance to sit down and make something I've been wanting for a long time. Say hello to Steve "Paper" Jobs. Template available here.

     

Click here to download:

Check_out_what_I_made....zip (322 KB)

Thanks to Oliver who pointed me to this tableware collection which includes a coffee cup similar to one I've blogged about before. After shipping it comes out to about $30 which is a bit steep, would love to find a cheaper version.

Update: Found a better deal on Amazon for the "mug" version of this cup.

Update (02/23/2010) : A nice side effect of this change means I don't see the Mailplane or Google Reader icon with "unread counts" because I don't have to Apple+Tab to compile/review the PDF.

I've made some modifications to the default "Typset and View" command in TextMate's LaTeX bundle. 

Before these changes I would:

1. Make and save edits in TextMate 
2. Go to a Terminal window and run a shell script
3. View the updated PDF in a Preview window

This was annoying. Lots of Apple+Tab'ing to do something that is very routine. So my new process is:

1. Make edits in TextMate and press Apple+R

This runs the following shell script:

#!/bin/bash

osascript -e "tell application \"System Events\" to keystroke \"\`\" using {command down}"

cd "$TM_DIRECTORY"

BASENAME="${TM_FILEPATH##*/}"
PDF_FILE="${BASENAME%.*}.pdf" 
PDF_FULL_PATH="${TM_FILEPATH%/*}/$PDF_FILE"

echo "<pre>" > textmate.log
pdflatex -file-line-error -halt-on-error $BASENAME >> textmate.log
bibtex $BASENAME >> textmate.log
pdflatex -file-line-error -halt-on-error $BASENAME >> textmate.log
pdflatex -file-line-error -halt-on-error $BASENAME >> textmate.log
echo "</pre>" >> textmate.log

if [[ -e "$PDF_FILE" ]] # does the file exist?
   then echo "<meta http-equiv=\"refresh\" content=\"0; file://$PDF_FULL_PATH\">"
   else cat textmate.log
fi

rm textmate.log

Before the script runs, TextMate saves the file I'm editing and opens an output window which I leave open. TextMate switches focus to this output window automatically so the first thing the script does is switch back. This allows me to continue typing while the PDF is being compiled. Then I run pdflatex and bibtex enough times to get everything worked out. And finally, if the PDF compiled cleaning I add a meta tag to the output so that the stdout results of pdflatex disappear and everything is replaced by the PDF. If the PDF doesn't compile the output of pdflatex is left in the window so I can track down the error. I use "textmate.log" as a temp file to prevent the streaming output from distracting me.

Edit February 09, 2010 : I added a page to sort by affiliations.

So I took some time to design what I think is a nice way to browse the CHI 2010 conference schedule. The Program page allows you to filter program by strings that appear in Session Titles, Paper Titles, Authors or Location. Additionally, to see the papers in a particular session you click to expand. You could also use it to make a quick personalized program by expanding sessions of interest and printing out the result. Clicking on any author will take you to the Author page and show you all of the authors papers. The Author page allows you to jump by starting letter of last name or filter by any part of the name. For each paper listed for an author clicking on any fellow authors will filter to the papers written by the fellow author. Each paper is also accompanied by the session it is in. Clicking there will take you back to the Program page and an expanded view of that session. In both cases the filtering is done live as you type. All of the filtering is done on the client side using Javascript. You can type accented characters directly into the search boxes.

       

Click here to download:

My_version_of_the_CHI_2010_Pro.zip (660 KB)

Note : The results presented here are entirely non scientific.

THE CHALLENGE : In a variation on the Pepsi v. Coke taste challenge, I decided that it would be fun to do a Pepsi Throwback vs HFCS Pepsi challenge. Here's how it works:

1. Each participant is given 3 cups. One marked "A", one marked "B" and the third is plain water for rinsing in between sips.
2. Each participant tastes from the cups "A" and "B" with water in between.
3. Each participant answers 2 questions: Which cup is the Pepsi Throwback? and Which one do you like the best?

OFFICIATOR : Matthew

PARTICIPANTS : Nirmal, Mansi, Rebecca, Mike

RESULTS : All 4 participants correctly identified cup "A" as the one with Pepsi Throwback. However, the participants were evenly split regarding which Pepsi they preferred. To sum up the results, Mike made a quick graph:

I encountered this coffee mug at a sari store in Mumbai called Seasons. While Mansi and her cousins were busy trying on outfits, the rest of us were asked if we wanted something to drink and my coffee came in this mug. Something about the tilted handle made it very comfortable to hold and I offered to purchase the mug but my offer was rejected. Not entirely sure why.

If I can't purchase a mug with a similar handle, I will probably end up making one myself.

     

Click here to download:

I_want_a_coffee_mug_like_this_.zip (588 KB)

Mansi and I didn't make a Jackolantern last year. This is our first one together and maybe the first one I've been involved in actually cutting. We were inspired by this design.

                         

Click here to download:

Pics_Mansi_and_I_make_our_firs.zip (941 KB)

I setup Dropbox to simplify data gathering across multiple computers. I
suspect I will get back on the Dropbox wagon once I get ahold of the
new Mac Mini to use as my HTPC.