Hiking O'ahu: Kealia Trail

14 days ago

So we spent a few hours on the awesome looking Backyard O’ahu but found over and over that the great looking hikes were all either illegal or needed advance permission to use. Bummer. So we found the Kealia Trail, nice and close to our rental home on the North Shore, and did a nice early morning punch.

A view from near the top:

I shot a couple of panoramas, too, and stitched them up with Hugin

Here’s the GPS data from the hike:


View Larger Map

The workflow to produce this data is a little bumpy, so I’m documenting it so I can remember it for myself, and presumably it’ll be interesting for someone else as well.
Tools

  • Garmin eTrex Vista HCx
  • Mac running Leopard

Steps

  1. Save the track on the GPS
  2. Connect to your computer and use Garmin Bobcat to import it.
  3. Elevation View: Clean up the tracklog to have just the points you want. The elevation view is just a screenshot (using Skitch) of the elevation view feature of Bobcat.
  4. Export a GPX File The export is a bit silly: You have to add the tracklog to a folder and then export the whole folder as a gpx. Ok.
  5. Create the Google Maps compatible version: gpsbabel -i gpx -f Kealia\ Trail.GPX -o kml -F kealia_trail.kml
  6. Load it in Google Maps. Drill down into your data set and turn off everything but the “path”
  7. Right-click your path (very important) and say ‘email’. (Sounds nuts, but it’s the only export function I can find?) Drag and drop the file out of the email that got created and throw the email itself away.
  8. Upload the kmz file to some hosting somewhere.
  9. Go into Google Maps and search for the URL of that KMZ file.
  10. Choose ‘Link to this Page’ ... ‘Customize and Preview embedded map’.

Everybody's blogging it so why can't I: Frequently used Mac Apps

25 days ago

With no information other than the programs, here are the ones I find myself actually using.

No particular order — semi alphabetical. Enjoy!

Slowing down songs on the Mac

57 days ago

I’ve recently been practicing some songs on my guitar, trying to get them just right. The problem’s been that, especially with a song like the one in the screenshots I’ve included in this, the beat is pretty quick. When you’re learning it and either trying to hear the notes, or play along with tab, music, or chords — you can get left behind.

Cool, so how to slow it down? On a Mac, it’s pretty easy. I’m assuming you’ve got the song in iTunes. (This works if you bought the track from the iTunes store or from any other source that iTunes will play.)

Step one, find the song, right-click (or control-click) it, and click “Show in Finder”.

Step two, right-click (or control-click) the file and open in Quicktime Player.

Step 3, open up the AV Controls Menu:

Step 4, tweak away and learn the song!

I find the playback rate especially useful — start out at 1/2 speed, and work your way up to 3/4, 7/8, then full speed, and if you really want to practice, 1.5 speed or double-speed! Also, the mixer’s not the most incredible thing, but if you’re trying to learn bass (as I have been) you can kill off the treble and throw the balance to one side, so you can listen to yourself play with the other ear and mute as much of the “rest of the song” as possible.

I also use the A/V Controls menu to watch a lot of educational/documentary movies and screencasts — ones where the content is king and the pacing is not so important (as would be the case in a “theatrical” style film.) I can get almost to double-speed and that’s a great way to absorb a lot of the technical google videos. You can always slow it down again if you’re having trouble keeping up with something.