Book reviews for March 2020

The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro

The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro

5/5

Mostly read this in a deserted nightclub on the roof of a hotel in India with a warm but dirty breeze and some trippy chilled out music. It's the only way to read this strange book. Anywhere else I might not have enjoyed it quite a much after the first few chapters, but in the setting it was transcendental.

 

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ITHCWY Newsletter for March 2020

Actual, age weighted and age and life expectancy weighted results of the 2016 Presidential Election

More Bangalore: Timelapse featuring Tipu Sultan's Summer Palace, Lalbagh Botanical Garden, KR flower market, Bangalore Palace and Cubbon Park.

Coastal: an abstract timelapse of the California coast.

Jesse Wegman has written a book, Let the People Pick the President: The Case for Abolishing the Electoral College (review) and a NYT op-ed on switching to a more rational way of electing the President. If you support this idea I have a page on the topic with four concrete things you can do to help.

Hike to Kirby Cove Beach (Marin Headlands near San Francisco).

Tool to backup locked files on Windows 10 - great for XCOPY backups or just grabbing a locked file.

Previously:

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Great Blue Heron

By Robert Ellison. Updated on Monday, October 2, 2023.

Great Blue Heron

Several photos of Great Blue Herons at Crissy Field in San Francisco.

Updated 2020-05-04 19:32:

Great Blue Heron

Updated 2023-10-01 23:40:

Great Blue Heron at Stow Lake

Great Blue Heron and two turtles at Stow Lake in the Golden Gate Park

Updates

Great Blue Heron at Crissy Field

Great Blue Heron at Crissy Field

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(Published to the Fediverse as: Great Blue Heron #photo #heron #ggb #stowlake #crissyfield #goldengatepark Photos of Great Blue Heron at Crissy Field (GGNRA) in San Francisco, California. )

Backup locked files on Windows 10: Volume Shadow Copy Update

By Robert Ellison. Updated on Friday, January 13, 2023.

Demo of ShadowTask

The Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) can be used to mount a copy of a drive in a crash consistent state (like you just unplugged your computer) as a different drive letter. My shadow task command line tool makes it easy to do this. Here's an example:

ShadowTask64 C V test.bat

This creates a shadow copy of the C: drive, mounts it as V: and then runs test.bat. When test.bat completes the shadow V: drive is removed.

What can you do with this?

The simple case is grabbing a copy of a locked file. In this case test.bat could just run pause and then grab the file you need from V:.

It's also a great way to run a backup. In this case the batch file can run XCOPY (to a network share or portable drive) and you'll get all your files including anything locked like running executables or Outlook PST files.

Grab the latest from GitHub: abfo/shadow/releases. You'll find a ZIP file and source code if you want to use/extend this. There are 32 and 64-bit binaries - you need to use the right one for your computer and you also need to run the tool with administrative privileges. This only works with NTFS drives.

(Previously)

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(Published to the Fediverse as: Backup locked files on Windows 10: Volume Shadow Copy Update #code #vss #backup Command line tool that mounts a shadow copy of any NTFS drive in Windows 10 so you can grab a locked file or run a complete crash-consistent XCOPY backup. )

Vernal (Spring) Equinox 2020

Spring Equinox 2020 rendered in Catfood Earth

Spring starts right now in the Northern Hemisphere (Autumn if you find yourself south of the Equator). Rendered in Catfood Earth.

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(Published to the Fediverse as: Vernal (Spring) Equinox 2020 #code #earth #equinox #spring #autumn #vernal The exact moment of Vernal (Spring) Equinox 2020 as rendered in Catfood Earth. )

Firmware

Firmware update warning

"Please be careful not to update while in riding on vehicles, such as trains, or in environments where 2.4 GHz band radio waves such as Wi-Fi, microwave ovens, cordless phones and many other radio waves are intermingled."

It looks like I need to travel to the United States National Radio Quiet Zone in West Virginia to update the firmware in my headphones, and I don't think that's on the cards for several months so I hope the update isn't important.

Nice touch that they gave an example of a vehicle though, that really helps.

Maybe use a checksum Sony?

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(Published to the Fediverse as: Firmware #etc #sony What is the worst thing that could happen if you updated your headphone firmware on a train? Possibly Sony should invest in checksums. )

Kirby Cove

Trail to Kirby Cove in the Marin Headlands

Kirby Cove Beach in the Marin Headlands

San Francisco through the Golden Gate Bridge from Kirby Cove

Salesforce Tower framed by the Golden Gate Bridge

A short two mile out and back from the Battery Spencer parking area on Conzelman Road to Kirby Cove.

The Marin Headlands have had a bit of a traffic management change recently so you need to go through the tunnel to get in and Conzelman Road is now one way back to highway 101. The advantage is that there is way more parking then there used to be. I think I've only ever managed to park near Battery Spencer once in 20 years.

The walk is my least favorite profile, downhill to start and uphill on the way back and also not a loop. It's worth it though because it's short and Kirby Cove beach is quiet and has wonderful views of San Francisco through the Golden Gate Bridge. You can also visit Battery Wagner and Battery Kirby on the way back up.

Hike starts at: 37.829459, -122.48401. View in Google Earth.

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(Hike Map)

(Published to the Fediverse as: Kirby Cove #hike #sanfrancisco #ggb #map Two mile hike to Kirby Cove Beach in the Marin Headlands with outstanding views of San Francisco through the Golden Gate Bridge. )

News: We May Be Living in a Simulation, but the Truth Still Matters

By Robert Ellison. Updated on Sunday, October 23, 2022.

Coastal

By Robert Ellison. Updated on Saturday, February 19, 2022.

Frame from Coastal Timelapse

An abstract timelapse of the California coast.

The sequences were shot over about six hours using a Sony RX100V, f5.6, 1 second exposure, ND3 filter and ISO 80 to around 250 depending on the light. Most of the frames are from the Marin headlands, one sequence is from Sutro Baths in San Francisco.

Post production used Lightroom and LRTimelapse. I skipped LRTimelapse rendering and wrote a custom application to mirror the frames (for this video mirroring is left/right top/bottom and for one sequence both). I then used ffmpeg to render each mirrored sequence and Premiere Elements to edit them together. Finally I added music with Filmstro.

If anyone is interested in the mirroring application post a comment below and I'll tidy it up a bit and release it.

This timelapse is absolutely inspired by the main title sequence for Bosch on Amazon Video.

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(More Timelapses)

(Published to the Fediverse as: Coastal #timelapse #video Abstract timelapse of the California coast (mostly the Marin Headlands). Shot on Sony RX100V, post production in Lightroom, LTTimelapse, Premiere Elements, Filmstro and a custom frame mirroring application. )

More Bangalore

By Robert Ellison. Updated on Saturday, February 12, 2022.

Tipu Sultan's Palace, Bangalore

Timelapse of Bangalore (Bengaluru) in Karnataka, India:

The segments in order are:

(Previously)

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(More Timelapses)

(Published to the Fediverse as: More Bangalore #timelapse #video #bangalore #india Time lapse of Bangalore, India. Featuring Tipu Sultan's Summer Palace, the KR Flower Market, Cubbon Park and more. )