Update: the ipcc has been updated to work on iPhoneOS 3.1.3. It should still work on 3.0, too.

With the new 3.0 iPhoneOS a new carrier bundle is needed so as to enable a few new features. So I’ve uploaded a new Vodafone NL Carrier bundle, in IPCC format. Because this is the format Apple uses for their carrier updates, a jailbroken phone is not needed.

Simply download the IPCC, here, and put it on your desktop. Download that file such that it does not get processed after the download finishes. In Safari this can be accomplished by option-clicking the link. Note: IPCC files are really renamed zip files. Browsers try to be clever so the file might be renamed to end in .zip or .ipcc.zip. Make sure the file name ends in .ipcc or iTunes won’t recognise it.

You’ll need iTunes 8.2 with carrier testing enabled. On a Mac, this is done by typing:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes carrier-testing -bool TRUE

in a Terminal window, and restarting iTunes. Then, connect your phone to your computer, option-click the ‘Check for Update’ button and select the ipcc file. It should apply immediately.

This IPCC file does the following:

• Sets a carrier logo to eliminate scrolling ‘Voda…’
• Disables ‘call forwarded’ notification when calling
• Enables editing of data settings (APN, etc.)
• Enables internet tethering
• Enables MMS (settings preinserted)

Note: I had to restart my phone to get the MMS settings recognised.

With my beloved Macbook Pro in the shop for repairs involving the trackpad and keyboard, I’ve temporarily switched to a regular Macbook to which I’ve restored a backup from Time Machine. This is great: just boot the Leopard DVD, tell it you want to restore a backup, let it sit for an hour and a half and you’re done. It has your system ready to go, just as it was. Even on different hardware. (Of course, there are some requirements to doing it this way, like the hardware being compatible, drive large enough, etc.)

However after a day, I noticed something: Time Machine had stopped backing up and wouldn’t show my old backups in its whiz-bang interface. Telling it to back up to my existing drive would just make it start all over again. Problem!

As it turns out, this happens only because not only did I switch drives (this, of course, is the normal use case for a full-system backup app), I also switched machines. And Time Machine keeps track of what machine it was backing up from, possibly to avoid issues with two different machines backing up to the same drive that also happen to have the same name.

It wasn’t immediately obvious where it saves this info, though. None of the files in the backup directory seemed to contain any machine-specific information. Some digging revealed that the computer’s MAC-address is stored as an Extended Attribute in the backup’s top-level folder. This information can be revealed with the ‘xattr’ command (-l for listing, -w for writing):

bash-3.2# xattr -l *
Portia: com.apple.backupd.BackupMachineAddress:
0000   30 30 3A 31 36 3A 63 62 3A 39 30 3A 66 65 3A 34    00:16:cb:90:fe:4
0010   31 00                                              1.

Ok, so in theory I can just change that and be on my way again. Wrong! The backup folders are protected by ACLs so strong even the root user can’t break through them. Trying to change anything about these folders (including the permissions, deleting them, etc.) just results in an ‘Operation not permitted’ error:

bash-3.2# chmod -N Portia
chmod: Failed to clear ACL on file Portia: Operation not permitted

bash-3.2# xattr -w com.apple.backupd.BackupMachineAddress 00:16:cb:90:62:0d Portia
[Errno 1] Operation not permitted: 'Portia'

Luckily, there’s a way around this problem: simply disable the ACLs on the drive. This is done using fsaclctl, like so (my backup volume is called ‘Thingz’):

fsaclctl -p /Volumes/Thingz -d

-p for the path to the drive, -d to disable.

After executing that, OSX will simply ignore any ACLs present. They’re still there, just not used.

So to get to the point, here’s how to change a Time Machine backup so it’ll work from another machine, given a known MAC-address (as can be extracted from ‘ifconfig’). In the example below, the drive is at ‘/Volumes/Thingz’, the MAC-address of the new machine is 00:16:cb:90:62:0d and the machine’s name is ‘Portia’.

First, disable Time Machine (unselect the backup drive and turn it off), then, adapt the following to your needs:

cd /Volumes/Thingz
fsaclctl -p /Volumes/Thingz -d
xattr -w com.apple.backupd.BackupMachineAddress 00:16:cb:90:62:0d Portia
fsaclctl -p /Volumes/Thingz -e

Tell Time Machine to use the drive as a backup drive again, and it should continue right where it left off, with all the backups available again in the flying interface.

Small print, at regular size
I can not guarantee that this will work for everyone. It seems to work just fine for me, however. I am not responsible if you wipe all your backups because you tried this. Thanks.

I mean, those Philips Living Colours lamps have been out there being sold to the general public for what, just about a year now? And no one google knows about has had the idea of computering it up? Seriously?

Obviously the internet has lost its cool.

So now I have one of those lamps (which, by the way, are really nice) and all I can do with it so far is use the remote to make it change colour.

I’m fairly sure that in endo-speak, I’m a dinosaur now. So just to get me out of that list and prevent Planet Botfu from turning into Planet Safari_Al (though yes, I am two months late with that), some random words.

Requisite. Lucrative. Tantamount. Unintrusively. Flagrant.

There you go.

So if you happen to want to look at the images inside the iPhone, that is the bunch of PNGs no image viewer will shake a stick at, now you can. Just download my bit of code from svn://svn.poop.nl/pub/iphone-fixpng. Tested on OSX/Intel. There are instances where it will break, though you shouldn’t run into those with images from the iPhone.

You’ll have to compile it yourself. Install libpng into /usr/local and type ‘make’ in a shell.

Convert the PNGs into readable files by running fixpng input.png output.png. Then if you feel so inclined to make them pretty, you can flip the R and B channels around by running something along the lines of flipchannels input.png output.png.

Update: Also tested using a PowerPC Mac, so the Makefile in svn compiles to Universal Binaries now.

I just uploaded my 1000th photo to flickr:

It’s a fairly dull, flashed, slightly out-of-focus photo, but such is life:

During the space shuttle Atlantis’ activities in orbit, I’ve been watching NASA tv a lot. Some very cool stuff to see and hear. In fact the whole concept of TV from outside this world is something I like a fair deal.

The most refreshing part of it all, though, is NASA’s apparent general attitude to openness: they will let you see everything the astronauts and ground crew are doing, hear everything they radio to eachother, and will tell you in detail what’s up if you happen to be in the position of being able to ask. They also provide high-resolution imagery (highest they can generate, in fact) of pretty much everything there is to see. And while that alone is a very nice thing to do, it gets even better: all NASA’s images are explicitly not protected by copyright. Only exceptions are NASA logos and such, but if you make a toy space shuttle and want to slap a logo on it, they’ll usually give permission for that.

In today’s world, most of this doesn’t happen too much. I’m glad to see some people still get it right.

So for some non-copyright-protected images from and about space exploration, now and in the past, have a browse at Great Images in NASA (GRIN). All in good humour, too:

Ok, so just to address the two things that I thought would annoy me about the MacBook:

• The keyboard: not that bad. The flat keys feel a bit strange at first and the vertical return key seems to be a bit thinner, but overall it’s ok.
• The screen: not as bad as some PC versions of glossy screens, but still crap. I work with a lot of terminals which happen to have a dark background, and that makes the gloss show up badly even in fairly dim lighting. I can see myself move around, and anyone who might happen to be behind me. When the screen is mostly bright that disappears for a large part, but stuff like ceiling lighting will still show up. Not a good idea for an office environment with the fluorescent lights that go with it.

Picture to illustrate the screen problem:

Also note how the remote handily sticks to the screen bezel.

The rest is pretty nice. I absolutely adore the magnetic features: the MagSafe connector obviously and the new, entirely brilliant magnetic latch. No more buttons to press to open the laptop, yet it stays shut well-enough to make you think the the little hook that popped out before is still there. The speakers sound fairly ok considering their size, and overall it’s been pretty speedy.

And don’t worry, I’m still against this Intel thing. That will take time.

Let’s add cyberhq.sg to the mix, too. All I’m after now is the .aq version, which might prove difficult to get.

Actually I’m also after cyberhq.int. Anyone out there who can make that happen?

I am now the proud owner of cyberhq.hk. More internationality to come.

Oh and Akismet rocks.