antipaucity

Woot – everything has been migrated to the new hosting provider. Hopefully it all runs right now

As mentioned recently, I am about to be switching hosts from my current VPS provider, Tektonic.

I have found a non-VPS ISP that meets the requirements I’d previously outlined, and have everything but the MySQL databases for WordPress instances sync’d to the new host.

With a bit of luck, the migration will be invisible to all 4 of my readers

All who knew Kirk Aragon are still in shock over his sudden and tragic loss Sunday.

The N&O called me this week for a brief interview, and some of what I had to say is in an article published today by Aliana Ramos, along with the following preliminary information about the crash:

The private-plane crash that killed an Apex man this week probably was not caused by mechanical failure, according to early findings by an investigator with the National Transportation Safety Board.

…

Aragon’s plane went down about 12:45 p.m. Sunday, minutes after radioing to air traffic control that he was departing. A pilot who was in the air at the time told investigators that Aragon’s plane appeared to be lower than usual and losing altitude before crashing.

“The entire airplane was consumed by fire,” Rayner said. “The engine was significantly damaged; the gears are melted together; the instruments have been destroyed.”

…

Aragon was alive immediately after the crash and managed to separate himself about 10 feet from the plane, said Deep River Fire Chief Larry Kelly. A trio of area residents managed to reach Aragon before the fire department arrived and helped to remove some of his clothing.

“They helped to keep him calm until we could get there,” Kelly said. “He was conscious. I was able to talk with him to find out if anyone else was in the plane. He was in a lot of pain. He did not give any indication of what happened.”

My prayers are with his family especially today.

Due to an unforeseen circumstance, the 1430EDT BGLUG meeting today will be at the Tates Creek Public Library.

The library can be found at

3628 Walden Drive
Lexington, KY 40517

Wow. It’s been several months since I last posted a book review. I have been reading in the mean time – just haven’t gotten around to posting any of them hereon.

In the intervening months I’ve read 1434 by Gavin Menzies (follow-on to 1421) and The Lost City of Z by David Grann. I’m currently reading Netherland by Joseph O’Neill and Radical by David Platt.

I also bought a Kobo ereader at one of the Border’s stores in Louisville, and my wife and I have started reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain together.

I’m sure there have been others, too – but I’ll be posting reviews of them over the coming weeks.

I have been working on my Connexions submissions again recently, and have a collection ready for use (it will be growing as time goes on): “Debugging and Supporting Software Systems”

I realize there are some small typos in the current text, but I will be addressing that in a upcoming revision

I’d love to get feedback from anyone on how it could be improved/expanded.

The LightSquared situation keeps getting more interesting. InfoWorld has another story on them attacking GPS manufacturers for not being more careful about filtering adjacent frequency bands (per a DoD recommendation from 2008).

LightSquared is at loggerheads with makers and users of GPS (Global Positioning System) over interference between the navigation system and its planned cellular LTE (Long-Term Evolution) network. That network would transmit on frequencies close to those used for GPS. The company has long argued that makers of GPS equipment are to blame for the interference because they don’t use strong enough filters to keep their receivers from searching for signals in LightSquared’s bands. But this is the first time LightSquared has accused the vendors of flouting a specific rule.

The DoD’s GPS Standard Positioning Service Performance Standard called for GPS receivers to filter out transmissions on frequencies adjacent to the GPS band, LightSquared told the FCC in a filing related to the agency’s ongoing consideration of the company’s network proposal. The standard, issued in September 2008, recommends that receivers reject all transmissions on frequencies that are more than 4MHz outside the GPS band, said Jeffrey Carlisle, LightSquared’s executive vice president for regulatory affairs and public policy. That 4MHz buffer is essentially a “guard band” to protect operations on either side, he said.

LightSquared plans eventually to use frequencies adjacent to the GPS band for its LTE network, but after mandatory tests earlier this year showed strong interference in that area, the company said it would start out in a slightly lower-frequency block.

Here’s something that’s a little disturbing, though:

There is no mandatory standard for filtering in GPS receivers, and the FCC does not certify the devices for this

And here:

In addition to the DoD recommendation, the International Telecommunication Union, a United Nations agency, has also warned since 2000 that stronger filtering might be necessary to protect GPS from nearby transmissions

The ‘Coalition to Save Our GPS’ had the following to say:

“GPS receivers incorporate filters that reject transmissions in adjacent bands that are hundreds of millions of times more powerful than those of GPS. What LightSquared is proposing, however, is to transmit signals that are at least one billion times more powerful,” the group said in a statement. “There has never been, nor will there ever be, a filter that can block out signals in an immediately adjacent frequency band that are so much more powerful, nor has LightSquared put forward any credible, independent expert opinion or other evidence that this is possible.”

I’m no expert, but “hundreds of millions” is distinctly not far-off from “one billion” (since one billion is equal to ten hundred million). I also acknowledge not having much domain expertise in radio signals, transmission, etc – but what LightSquared is looking to do seems a lot more useful than worrying about some poorly-built GPS receivers.

The FCC said earlier this week that it would not allow the LTE service to launch unless the interference issue was resolved.

LightSquared has said it is confident the plan will be approved next month.

I’ve taken an interest in LightSquared recently.

Today InfoWorld reports that the FCC “won’t allow LightSquared’s proposed mobile broadband service to interfere with GPS signals, even though the potential interference would be caused by GPS receivers picking up signals outside of their designated spectrum”.

So, the devices are in error, but the FCC is going to prevent LightSquared from interfering?

Sounds like the FCC should be going after the receiver manufacturers to ensure their systems don’t bleed over, rather than after a company not operating on GPS spectrum.

Wait, I forgot: that’d be too logical for a government agency

In follow-up to my post from last week, two members of the Staybridge staff contacted me on Wednesday of this week. Their replies are posted below. Also, a disclaimer: I never asked for anything to be done in recompense for the situation – I just wanted it fixed.

Mr. Myers:

Please accept my apology for the delay in responding to your email. I have received it through IHG Guest relations and was not aware of it until this morning. I have copied the email to go over with the executive housekeeper. While we have been challenged with very large sports groups, staying one week or longer, it is no excuse for poor service. I was not aware that the complimentary room was not a direct benefit to you. In lieu of the issues you encountered I will add 10,000 priority club points to your account. The description of your stay, by no means, represents the type of service we strive to present to all guests. Thank you for taking the time to let me know. If I may be of any further service please do not hesitate to contact me directly my cell phone number is 317-640-2708.

Sincerely
Gary W Miller

General Manager
Staybridge Suites
Indianapolis/ Fishers
317-577-9500

And from the other manager (quoted as sent, including any typos):

Hi Warren,

I was reading over your comments in regards to your recent stay with us. I want to sincerely apologize for the problems that you encountered. I understand that the company was paying for your stay and that the comp night was not an actual benefit to you. I have included a free night certificate for you to use in the future. While it doesn’t make up for the problems you had, I hope that you and your family can use it for personal use next time you are in the area. I have also upgraded the room type to a one bedroom suite for you. I will be sure to address these items with housekeeping and the front desk, so that the same mistakes doe not incur. Again, please accept my sincerest apologies.

Natalie Page
Guest Services Manager
Staybridge Suites Fishers-Indianapolis
317-712-5101 direct dial
317-577-9500 front desk
317-712-5200 fax

When I emailed Gary this morning asking why he had not replied to the emails I sent him directly, this was his reply:

Mr. Meyers

That is the correct email address. However, I am having issues with my email account over the last few weeks. I am receiving an exceptional amount of “spam”. It is not unusual for me to have over 150 emails every morning. Yours may have been deleted by mistake. I did however receive your email through IHG Guest Relations. That is what I was responding to. I hope we can be of service to you in the future.

Sincerely

Gary W. Miller

Yeah, I get a lot of “spam”, too – but when the subject line includes not only the reservation, but my Priority Club number, and is addressed directly to you from a corporate address… it sounds like a weak response.

Regardless, at least there was some form of reply to the situation – not what I would have expected, but I suppose it’ll do.

About 14 years ago, good friends of the family bought an old farm house with some outbuildings in rural Schoharie County in NY (outside Middleburgh, in a locale called “Hunter’s Land”).

One of the first things they wanted to do with the house was to re-engineer the heating, which included properly insulating the house, and then adding a back-to-back fireplace and stove nook in the living room, backed to the kitchen (the nook was designed to look like it had once been a fireplace). Jeff holds a PhD in Chemical Engineering, and works full-time with fluid dynamics for a government contractor. So when he deep-dove into fireplace fundamentals, fluid flow mechanics, and heat transfer, all of us who knew him well knew he’d come out with the best available design for heating his new home.

The design Jeff eventually settled on was a modernized Rumford fireplace (Count Rumford was quite the experimenter). One of the major differences between a Rumford design and that of a “traditional” fireplace is the smoke chamber is reversed – ie, the slope goes from front-to-back, and not back-to-front (see diagram, provided by McNear).

comparison diagram of Rumford and traditional fireplaces

The primary advantages to this reversal are: reduced/eliminated smoke discharge into the room (especially at low-flow heating circumstances), and simplified construction (no corbeling of the back wall). Other improvements in the design are broader radiatory angles for heat dispersion, and reduced fuel consumption.

Fortunately for Jeff and his wife, his brother-in-law was a mason, so costs could be reduced for installing the chimney and fireplaces to just that of labor and materials: still an expense, but lower than hiring it done outside the family.

Also fortunately for them, they had a ready supply of friends to help tear-out the non-load-bearing wall separating the kitchen and living room, cut a hole in the floor, pour a foundation for the structure, and build-out the subhearth.

During that period, I was going weekly to their house where Jeff and I would spend most of the evening geeking-out: I was in high school, and Jeff was teaching me how to program in C++ (well, ok: he taught me how to program in C using C++ keywords, and then I taught him object-orientation). His day job involved utilizing both commercial and in-house finite element analysis tools (utilizing a [then relatively] new equation solver: GMRES), and he used the time with me to try-out ideas he might want to incorporate at work – just in a new/easier-to-use language than that which he employed from 9-5 (his work centered around Fortran). (As a sidebar, we both learned an enormous amount during those days – good times [even ultimately leading to the Story of Mr G {the second version of the story}]). Back to the story.

Installing the fireplace was a fairly straight-forward process: once the wall and floor were down and cut (and the support beams for the house re-supported on the fringe of the subhearth and the middles cut out, the fireplace was laid-up “normally”. Thanks to pre-cast pieces from Superior Clay, installing the throat and smoke chamber was a cinch. Bringing the flue and chimney up through the roof was likewise a pretty quick process (the portion of the house the chimney went did not have a second storey), culminating in the first celebratory fire about a year after the whole process started (Jeff worked on it part-time during evenings and weekends, getting help as he could).

During that time, I learned a buttload about masonry, the densities of limestone and cast iron (the mantle and stove), re-engineering existing homes, temperature profiles of a fire, and fluid dynamics in action. Due my current occupation at the time, I had access to a host of thermocouple devices, some of which I checked-out and brought to Jeff’s house to profile the fireplace for where it was hottest, so that fires could be built (and a reflector plate installed) in the most efficient manner.

After a few years in Hunter’s Land, Jeff & co moved to a new domicile closer to his work (cutting his ~60 minutes each way commute by 80%). They again decided to add a Rumford fireplace to their home, but hired the entire project out for time purposes.

Since that time, I have been a proponent of fireplace heating, and of some level of self-reliance on fuel (and food) supplies (when possible).

Who knew a year-long hobby project would end up having such a long-term effect?

Given the chance, I’d LOVE to implement such a fireplace in my own home when we finally buy one.