There is a new Podcast on the block for you Japan enthusiasts to listen to. I have teamed up with Jamipanese on a new podcast which is about Japan. We aren’t just focusing on one aspect, but a lot of different things. Here are a few of the things we will discuss. I was going to bold what I was most excited about, but realized basically all of it would be bolded.

• Anime
• Manga
• Games
• Language
• Culture
• History
• Idols
• JDrama
• JBloggers
• and more

Each show is going to feature some part of these, and as we get going more we will build up a more formal list and structure.

I must say I am really excited about doing this because finally I can help make the podcast I would want to listen to, content wise.

This month for our first show Kirk and I are interviewing each other a bit so you can get a better idea about us and what we are doing.

So please visit the site and give the show a listen and don’t for get to subscribe too.

Site: http://www.allhailjapan.com
RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/AllHailJapan
Twitter: http://twitter.com/allhailjapan
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/All-Hail-Japan-Podcast/275218832350?v

Go, go now.

Here are the entries for this December Blog Matsuri. This was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. I definitely think you should check each of them out.

Joshua Zimmerman
Entry: Robot School Girl Horror
Description: This one creeped me out and got me excited, not that way, at the same time. I love robots and always get excited to see them. I was creeped out that they were turning them into school girls. There is a youtube video to watch too.

Just Another Day in Japan
Entry: Toilet Technology
Description: This is the exact reason I wanted technology as athe topic. I was after anything especially not so seen parts of Japanese technology. Funnily enough there was a conversation in my Japanese club once about toilets in Japan.

Lonelee Planet
Entry: Top 5 Japanese Gadgets from Thanko
Description: Thanko is a Gadget company and apparently they come out with some very interesting gadgets. Lets just say for one part nekomimi is going to sound awesome again.

Gakuranman
Entry: Omoshiro Zakka – R2D2 Soy Sauce Bottle
Description: This isn’t exactly technology, but I am a huge sucker for Star Wars especially droids so since droids are technology it is ok this time. Though looking at the picture it seems like it could get a little messy.

NihongoUp Blog
Entry: The digital camera that started it all
Description: I really liked this one post. I am a huge fan of photography so when I get to read/see history on the digital camera I am all over it. What is funny is the megapixel rating that it has. Never imagined it would be that number.

Maz
Entry: Karakuri (Part 1)
Description: This was an amazing entry. This is a side of the Japanese culture I had never even had a hint of knowing existed. Definitely give this a read, and watch the youtube videos. Imagine wooden robots.

Jamaipanese
Entry: 5 Japanese Robots
Description: Oh we have some more robot goodness here. These are as creepy and really show how far we have come with technology as humans. I will say I am an ASIMO fan, but after seeing the ApripPoko I don’t know anymore. However, the security guard looks a bit too happy to be one.

Muza-chan
Entry: 7 Reasons Why Japanese Trains Are Different
Description: While I am not a huge fan of trains, because of not so fun experience with them, I will say after reading this when I go to Japan I will probably not feel as bad about it. Seeing the different types and views of them I can see why people can be enamored by them. The first picture would make me nervous as a worker though.

Through Eyes From Afar
Entry: A Pinch of Salt
Description: I have got to give mad props on creativity of this one. When I think technology I think mechanical. Here is a good post on chemical technology/science. I will say second picture makes me wonder about whether I really like salt or not.

kirai
Entry: Manicure Machine
Description: This takes vending machines to a whole new level. I’ll just put it that way. The internals actually look kind of neat.

Japan Sugoi
Entry: Japanese Suima Automated Baby Crib
Description: I am living in the wrong country to be lazy in. Japan seems to make some cool stuff for those that want to be lazy, at times. I might have to import one someday if I have kids. Though can you tell me is it made out of wood or wood like plastic?

EDIT: Sorry I missed one I feel horrible about it, but here it is.

chottomatte.net
Entry: RIKEN Next-Generation Supercomputer, Kobe, Port Island
Description: I loved reading this especially since I am a programmer. I love computers. I especially want one this big.

Be sure to stay tuned for next months matsuri at loneleeplanet.

I want to get better at photography, but to do that I need to actually carry around a Camera with me. Currently I have a Point and Shoot camera that is a little pocket sized camera it is a Canon PowerShot SD1100 IS. Solid camera for a quick photography, and the camera I used to take all these pictures.

Lets be honest I would love to have a DSLR, but I don’t have the money. The cheapest I can find, of the ones I want, is $400 which is the Nikon D40. However, my dad does have an SLR he got back in the day. It is the Minolta X-700. Solid camera and a good learning tool, but it is film so there is some extra expense developing the film. Though in order to get better I need to start somewhere so I am going to start here.

The Problem

So why am I posting today? Well the problem is my dad has his camera in a metal case that used to be really popular to have, by the way he doesn’t use it much anymore. Having the camera in the case while I am walking about day-to-day isn’t exactly conducive to photography as it is bulky and HEAVY. Here are a couple of pictures.

So I set out to look for some DSLR camera bags that might be a good fit for this film SLR too. Not so much luck I am afraid, and the cheapest bag I found was $35, that I could touch. Don’t exactly have $35 bucks for a camera bag that isn’t going to work well with the current SLR I am using. So being that our family tends to like making due, and creating stuff I set out to make my own camera bag.

The Goals

What I want to make is a camera bag that uses mostly existing things I have, and also doesn’t look like a camera bag so I am able to carry around the bag without to much worry of someone swippng it.

The Solution

So first thing I needed was some foam rubber so I hit my local Army surplus and they hooked me up with some some. I got a 4″ and a 2″ thick 8×8 inch blocks of foam rubber. Total cost was $3.52. Awesome price.

Full digital zoom so a bit hazy.

Since I am a programmer using Microsoft technologies I tend to go to a lot of Microsofts free events in the area. Well I just happened to get Vista Ultimate free and this awesome lunch pale box thing.

Here is the concept of what I am after with it.

First and most important is getting the camera in there and snug. So I took out a trusty razor blade and got cutting.

At first I wanted to go almost all they way through with the circle cut out, but that turned out to be a bit problematic so I went ahead and cut all the way through. And in the bag I just put a piece of foam rubber in the bottom to allow even more cushion beyond the bag itself. Here it is all cut out for the camera. It isn’t so pretty but is functional.

In case you are curios what I used to do the cutting with I used for the more complicated parts a razor blad as above, but for the other areas I used an electric turkey cutter. Its like cutting butter .

For the next part it was the flash, and believe it or not was posing to be more problematic than the camera itself because of space issues. So I took a shortcut and did some massive big cuts and didn’t worry about a perfect form fit. Also just took the razor and carved out some space the extra film. Here is a picture of it done.

So the next problem to solve was protecting the top. For that I just cut a the 2″ thick foam in half to 1″ thick then trimmed as needed.

And here are the final pictures of how it looks.

Notice the final one with it all closed up it still looks like it did in the beginning. Now, however, there is a camera flash and extra film, all protected with some good solid squishy foam rubber. Again all I put out money wise was gas over to army surplus and $3.52 for the foam rubber. However, these bags are anywhere from $5 to $15 so you can buy them cheaply. Notice also I still have another level I could later put more equipment in. Lots of possibilities and for cheap.

So what do you think? and have you done things like this?

Note: I don’t normally post on photography, but since I want to take more pictures for this blog I am wanting to get better at it and I would like to chronicle how I get there.

Yesterday, there was announcement that TV Asahi and TBS are going to YouTube to stream their video content to users. They are wanting to use the popularity and the backbone of YouTube to offer quality service to viewers. However, I am not sure if something is getting lost in translation or not because what I am reading is “Streaming” and what I am seeing on their pages is news segments. Granted they are technically streaming its not a true live stream, anyway.

This is a great opportunity to get some real world content almost live since they seem be posting it the same day the news segments happen.

TBS

TBS is joining with just its news content, but as read while reading up it is free for now there are reports that they want to monetize on it later. Here is a link to their Channel on youtube and a video too.

TBS Youtube Channel

TV Asahi

TV Asahi too is adding their news stuff too, but it seems they are going to be going a step further and offering non-news content eventually too. I am definitely going to keep an eye on the non-news channel for sure.

ANN News – TV Asahi News Channel
TV Asahi – Non-News Channel

This is exciting, at least for me, because it is an opportunity to watch news broadcasts in decent quality and kind of stay up with everything, and actually know how to control what I am watching. I have tried to visit Japanese news sites before and get lost trying to watch stuff. I recommend watching stuff on these channels to take advantage of learning more about Japan and working on Japanese comprehension.

News Sources:
YouTube Streams TV Asahi, TBS – The Japan Times Online
Japan YouTube Blog

I have gone through several desks, but none have I ever truly liked completely because they never seemed to fulfill my needs fully. It seemed like all the desks would fulfill 1 or 2 things but never all of them. So finally I decided to make my own. While it isn’t pretty I consider what I have to be a prototype for my future desk endeavors while I figure out the kinks. I have had/been using this desk for a year and really like it.

I just want to say these pictures suck because I have a real hard time getting good lighting in my room to take a decent picture.

So lets see “ALL” of it.

Notice the desk itself and the 3 computers on a platform. I figured out a long time ago that I have several desktops but I don’t want them all on the ground. So part of the desk would always have computers on it. I didn’t want them in the way so I moved them to there own platform low to the ground. That way they don’t soak up dust from the carpets.

(on a side note. I have my kanji poster above that to help motivate me to study)

This is the main desk they key features are that it is wide 42 inches and about 36 inches deep. The desks I was using before were only like 20 inches deep so i couldn’t have my monitor keyboard and textbook on the desk. Now I can comfortable have my monitor then my keyboard then textbook and notebook to do homework.

If you are curios as to what is on top of the desk. Well starting from the far left. Dell Mini 9, GIANT Monster can I keep for fun, Flashlight, Channel 9 character, 24″ dell monitor, 3 Hardrives and speakers, naruto, Shana, Visual Studio character, Rukia, Parking ticket 22″ Acer monitor, Razer mouse 2 rat pads, Diet coke and a Dell keyboard in the middle. On the little tray next to the desk is my wacom tablet and TV remotes.

Finally lets look at the best part of the desk the one thing I wanted more than anything else.

Notice the harddrives on the little drop down thing. I built that specifically so I have a safe place to put my external HD’s I have a HUGE fear of dropping them So i wanted a place where they could securely sit and didn’t have to worry about them being knocked over on accident.

Another key note is the whole desk is made out of steel, minus the wood tops, that way it is heavy and stable. i hate hitting my desk and it shaking. It doesn’t shake for the most part.

Not much of a unicyclist, but this is really cool. Would be very interesting to see this mass produced, though I don’t actually think it would be to very viable as even in the video demonstration it is a bit odd to use and not very predictable without a good amount of practice.

What seems to be the coolest thing to me though is it goes sideways. I would love to get hold of this and play with it.

From a technology stand point this is amazing to see much like the segway, but better. Again I doubt it will make it commercially, but is a good stepping stone towards more interesting things down the road. So the question is what do you think it would be like if this was sold commercially and got popular?

Original news source – Japan Times

A while back my tablet died. However, I was getting by with my work laptop, but the thing is huge and long ago realized I liked how small my 12″ tablet was. One of the limiting factors to what I could get was cost. So i started looking and found that netbooks would probably fit the bill for what I needed. I don’t “need” to code on the go I have a nice desktop for that. Basically I just want to take notes, check email, etc… you know normal people stuff.

After doing some research it looked liked the Dell Mini 9 was a good fit as it was cheap and could be ugpraded easily later on down the road. Unfortunately, $200 was still a bit to high so I finally gave up for a while. Well the other day my mom bought me one out of the blue as a surprise present, and I think to play with it herself on our vacation next month. While dell doesn’t sell them through the front door of their website their backdoor has a big stock. So I got a refurbished Dell Mini 9. Dell’s Backdoor

So lets take a look at it shall we.

So this is how it looked when it came.

And when I opened the box. I know these aren’t very good pictures but Fedex guy delivered it 2 hours after I went to bed. I wanted to get pictures of opening it, I wanted to see it and I wanted to go back to bed all really quick.

First thing I pulled out of the box.

And the second thing. Notice the Ubuntu disc. Even though it is 4 versions old Ubuntu.

Here it is out of the box. Notice the standard sized Dell keyboard behind it.

So now that we have seen it lets get some Tech Specs:

• 1.6 Ghz Atom Processor
• 1 gig of ram
• 4 gig Solid State Drive
• 0.3mp Camera
• 8.9″ Display
• 4 cell battery
• Now Running Ubuntu 9.04 with netbook remix

In order to install the newer Ubuntu I needed a jump drive so I went and found a 16gig one for 40 bucks. Here are a couple of images of it running remix ubuntu. See if you can name the anime of the wall paper.

Pretty isn’t it. Very very bright when it needs to be and suuuuuper light weight.

Notice the size compared to the can of Monster

So one of the things i was reading about the Dell Mini 9′s is they are more capable than people realize because intel integrated the north and the south bridge for their atom processors. As a side effect it is capable of running 720p H.264 video. That being said not just any decode works. With some research the best decoder is CoreAVC, but it isn’t free and it is windows only.

Not to fear there is a way to bring CoreAVC over to linux. Here is a Guide to getting CoreAVC on Ubuntu. After going through that. I got it up and running and the above anime is Hyakko which is 720p and a rough one at that meaning some computers that can play 720p will churn a bit with that one. Dell mini 9 played it fairly well.

Here is another 720p anime running pretty good and is an action anime so it is a good test to be sure. It is Majin Tantei Nougami Neuro. I still have a few quirks to work out with watching other video, but 720p is good to go.

I do plan to upgrade to a 32 gig ssd and 2 gig of ram, but we will see what happens. For now though I have a netbook that can do everything I need it to do.

Oh and everything works well out of the box on ubuntu. I was surprised. I only “needed” to jump into command line to do the coreavc+mplayer thing and that was because it was compiling from source. Now to get back to studying Japanese and Discrete math and finis up a couple of blog posts I put on hold because of getting my new mini.

As  final note. The Dell mini 9 does run OSX out of the box. Can just be a bit interesting to install. Here is an image of it running, but it is not my mini.

There are still a lot of people that have no idea what RSS is or why this little orange box image keeps showing up on most blogs.

This image: (or some variation of it)

What is RSS?

Essentially what most people really need to know is it is a “page” for people add to some reader so the reader can automatically get the latest updates to a site or pieces of information. In the case of a blog you would add the URL of an rss feed (for example: http://www.dumbotaku.com/feed/) to a reader. The reader will check every 30 minutes or once a day for the latest updates on the feed that the site generates and gives the updates to you.

In other words it helps you get content brought to you instead of you going to get content on websites. It is very convenient if you have a lot of websites you read everyday, but would save time if you didn’t have to actually visit the site. So now you have the “what” lets look at how to use RSS.

How to use RSS

There are many applications that you can use to subscribe to RSS feeds. Probably the most used from talking to people is Google Reader. So, lets go through quickly how to use it. (With pictures)

Step 1) Visit http://google.com/reader if you have an account sign in. If you don’t click on create account. It is simple and takes very little time.

Step 2) Be sure to sign-in. Once you are signed in you should see something like the image below.

Step 3) Now lets get the url of the RSS Feed. Normally you will want to do like the image below. Find the RSS Icon right-click and hit “copy link location” button. In your case just select and copy this url

http://www.dumbotaku.com/feed/

Step 4) Now we need to add that url (http://www.dumbotaku.com/feed/) to Google Reader. Go back to it and at the top left should be a subscribe button.

Step 5) When you click that a little box will open up right under it just paste the url in there and click on add

Step 6) Now you are subscribed to the rss feed. Just login once a day or every couple of days. To see what all feeds you are subscribed to look at the left side of the page.

Step 7) To see what the content is in that feed look at the right side of the page.

Now What?

Now you are using an RSS feed reader. No you can just open that up to read DumbOtaku.com content. Now try going and adding other sites/blogs that have RSS feeds on them to your feed reader. Also play with Google Reader a bit. Add several feeds and play around with using it and ready the content. To get you on your way here are some blogs you might want to add. Check them out.

• Yonasu
• Jamaipanese
• Kiss-Sui(Her button is at the very bottom)
• Danny Choo
• The Nihon Sun

I hope this has helped some of you that might not have known what an RSS feed is or how to use it. Once you get a better handle on use them they become addictive. So have fun consuming content faster with RSS.

So I was leisurely flying around Tokyo area and decided to snap some picture that were kind of interesting.  One thing that I ended up getting images of are schools.  There are A LOT of schools so I snapped a few of them to show.  I think they are kind of interesting.  Also, when I say there are A LOT I mean there are A LOT. Take a look for yourself.

I know the images are a little wide for my theme, but I didn’t want to spoil the full size so I went with the larger size anyway.

Now if you know me I am from middle of United States and haven’t left my house so I thought I should explain how I was able to fly around Japan.   It is truely amazing how many people don’t know about Maps.Bing.com (also known as live maps or Virtual Earth). Virtual Earth released pretty much about the same time as Google Maps, but like a couple of weeks after.  What is more interesting is a lot of the features Google Maps now has Virtual Earth started with.  At first Microsoft created http://preview.local.live.com. That is basically Street View which Google has, but was created long before Google did theirs.  However, Microsoft scrapped it due to privacy issues.  At the same time they were experimenting with Birds Eye View which is less invasive and allows Areal shots at an angle for you to figure out streets and buildings etc.  Microsoft hired pilots to criss-cross the skys snapping pictures at 45 degree angles all over the world, and they are constantly adding more cities to the database.

That is a brief summary of how I was able to fly around Tokyo from home, and a bit of technology history of which probably no one cares, but I find very interesting.  So now for the pictures.

Here is a picture of Toys R Us in Japan. This was amazing tome because i never thought there would be one in Japan. I never know it was an international store. Also even more amazing when I first hit birds eye view this is what popped up.

Here is an image of an industrial place that if i didn’t know I was looking at Japan I would never have known. Just goes to show we aren’t all that different.

There are many SRS applications people can use to memorize things, but Anki is the best for a variety of reasons. Before, I do a list of reasons some other alternatives for SRS are Mnemosyne, SuperMemo, Surusu, Smart.FM, and even ReadTheKanji.com. I have used all these besides supermemo, and anki is really the only one that fits all my needs.

A quick list of reasons Anki’s is the best:

• Client Version
• Online Version
• Sync Between the Two
• Sync Between Multiple Computer’s with Client
• Detailed Statistics
  • Daily
  • Short Term
  • Long Term
• Audio Cards
• Developer/Plugin Support

As you can tell probably the biggest reason I think Anki is the best is the portability of the Decks.  They can be done from multiple locations multiple computers online and offline.  To me this was very important because I use anywhere from 2 to 5 computers with varying degrees of connections online and I didn’t want not having an internet connection to be the reason I don’t study.  Plus there is an online version so if you are at a public computer you can use it too.

Here is a quick rundown of how to setup and use the online sync.

First here is an example of pre-made decks you can download automatically so you don’t have to make them.

First click on settings and preferences

Next add your Username and Password for your account or follow the link to Create a Free Account in the Network tab

You can easily download your deck just File -> Download -> Personal Deck

Just select the deck you want and hit OK.

The daily stats are really nice for seeing what and how you have done.

The long term and short term Graphs are good to see a visual Representation of progress. I tend to be really into analyzing progress and statistics of what i am doing to try to optimize my learning.  One thing that is beneficial to me is to actually see how much time a day I do study, and how much time total I have spent too.

Another point that I like is the Audio cards, now this isn’t “new” exactly a few others have this features, but not all of them.  It is important because if you can use it especially for expressions to better understand them.

For me the final important feature of Anki is the the plug-in architecture that allows developers to create plug-ins when they get that itch of “Wouldn’t it be cool if you could do…”.  There are a lot of plug-ins available and the best on of them for me is the Japanese one. Visit Joe In Japan‘s blog post Sentence Mining Explained for a good tutorial on how to install and use it.

While everyones needs are different when it comes to SRS I feel that Anki truely has all the features that are needed.  It has the best of everything and takes somethings a step further, statistics for example.  I didn’t use anki for a long time because it seemed a bit too complicated and confusing for what it was and that is why I preferred other applications, but the sync and statistics limitations on the  others killed me.

What do you like/prefer to use for SRS application. I am always looking for more to try.