Michael's Blog

UTF-16 to UTF-8 conversion

Administrator — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 15:01:01 +0000

I have a windows application that creates text file output in UTF16. I’m needing to import this into my database that expects UTF-8. Here’s how to convert in Linux using iconv.

iconv –from-code UTF-16 –to-code UTF-8 someutf16file.csv > prettynewutf8file.csv

Convert Virtualbox .vdi to raw LVM device, resize in process.

Administrator — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:36:29 +0000

>хотелско обзавежданеg a long-time user of Virtualbox I was faced with the common problem of outgrowing the space in a VDI file. I also understand well that encapsulating one filesystem within another adds a significant amount of overhead to an I/O intensive VM, so I needed a way to put my VM on a raw disk, not on top of another filesystem.

Bug-Infested candy from HEB in Flour Bluff

Administrator — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 01:21:50 +0000

Ok, this just really pissed me off to the degree that I feel compelled to make a public post about this.

Hey HEB, I don’t like eating bugs.

I don’t think I’ll be able to eat one of these again for a long, long time.

Close-up view

I circled the pictured item on my receipt.

HEB store identification:

HEB Food-Drugs #18/057
1145 Waldron Rd.
Corpus Christi, TX 78418

Whiting - Sept 6, 2009 - Newport Pass Area

Administrator — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 00:24:11 +0000

27 Whiting (1 already is filleted)

Hummingbird Mania!

Administrator — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 22:25:51 +0000

The hummingbirds are here in south Texas and are thicker then ever. I managed to shoot a few photos the other day of the noisy flock humming about the feeder.

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Hurricane Ike - Storm Surge - Tortuga Dunes Development

Administrator — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 12:16:24 +0000

Some people just don’t get it. Building a house on a barrier island is risky enough, and my opinion is that building a home on the gulf side of a barrier island is just asking for trouble. The Tortuga Dunes development is just such a project with homes only a thin dune away from the pure untamed fury of the Gulf of Mexico. There are no homes built in this area yet, and all those wishing to purchase out there should realize that that they’re probably buying a disposable house. If their insurance premiums aren’t higher than their mortgages, this only means that the rest of us are absorbing their risk into our premiums.

Hurricane Ike hit Galveston, a couple hundred miles north of here. The effects are still quite evident right here.

This water gushing upwards from a drainpipe is from just across the road where the Packery Channel has overflowed and water is pushing itself alongside the highway.

Here you can see waves coming right off the packery overflow. This area sometimes has standing water, sometimes not. I’ve never seen it actually connected to the packery before as it is pictured here.

This marsh area pictured behind the office normally does have water in it, although not quite this much. It is at sea level. Homes are to be build in an area right behind the line of dunes on the Gulf. I can only assume they’re building up the land well above sea level, but even if they are I’d still be concerned with the near instant erosion that is possible during a hurricane.

Finally got a new vehicle

Administrator — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 01:47:14 +0000

Well, I decided it was time to buy a real truck and stop my insane fishing excursions in a sedan so I bought a new 2009 Toyota Tacoma. I needed a reliable vehicle and something I could trust 60 miles south of the nearest road on Padre Island. Toyota has a great reputation for rock solid reliability. I’d rather pay a little more up front and have a reliable vehicle than pay a tow truck a few thousand bucks to tow me back to civilization. (yes, it can thousands for a beach tow)

If you look closely, you can see the front of the skid plate.

I opted for a quad-cab and a long bed so I’d have roughly the same sized bed as a standard cab with a standard bed. Toyota’s listings indicated that fuel economy is not a function of truck length, probably because of the same wind profile between configurations. The bed is also made of thick plastic, so probably doesn’t add much more weight.

The truck also has 4×4 with a limited-slip rear differential. If I still manage to ever get it stuck, I’ve got a couple 2×6 boards in back and a jack to unstick it. One thing I did right away was to replace the stock Dunlap AT20s with a set of Cooper General Grabber AT2’s from Delta Tire and Wheel. In my opinion Toyota should have provided a better stock tire.

One of the cool toys this truck has in a rear-mounted wide-angle camera in the tailgate. The video display is embedded in the rear-view mirror, and when turned off, looks just like a regular mirror.

My name is Michael….

michael-jott — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 23:51:19 +0000

My name is Michael. I am sending this blog today with my cellphone using nothing but my voice. I think the concept is pretty damn cool. listen

Freak Accident - Bottle of water caused a fire

Administrator — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 21:22:04 +0000

Homebrewers take heed:

Some time back I had what could only be considered a freak accident happen. I thought it worthy of shooting a few photographs of the event in hopes I can prevent this from ever happening to someone else. It seems water not only can extinguish a fire, but it can start one as well.

I had a large glass water bottle sitting outside filled to the top with water and a little bleach that I was cleaning out to brew some beer in later. Because I didn’t want to risk the concrete scratching the bottom, I set it on a square of cardboard. When I came home for lunch, this is what I saw.

All the cardboard that wasn’t directly under the bottle had completely burned up, leaving only a faint square of darkened concrete where it had been. The shape of the bottle and angle of the sun focused the sunlight into a small enough spot to ignite the cardboard. I’m so very glad I didn’t leave this bottle on the deck as I might very well have not had a house to return to.

You can really see how an intense spot of light was focused right at the area where the cardboard had been.

There were no traces of ash around nor any unburned pieces of cardboard. The wind had done a good job fanning smoldering cardboard and blowing the ashes away.

MySQL number of days in a month

Administrator — Fri, 09 May 2008 20:59:54 +0000

>мебеликомпютри is some fugly SQL.

If anyone has a better way, please tell me, but this is how I get the beginning and end dates of the current month. The date_add with 0 days in the first section just gets the date nice and 0-padded and probably isn’t necessary.

select date_add(concat(year(curdate()),’-',month(curdate()),’-',’1′), interval 0 day) as mo_start,
date_sub(date_add(concat(year(curdate()),’-',month(curdate()),’-',’1′), interval 1 month), interval 1 day) as mo_end;