General

Windows 8 – Getting it to play nice

Been testing this out a bit now, and once getting used to the interface it is actually not too bad. I have Windows 8 dual booted with windows 7, so can choose which one to actually use. The idea is to eventually switch to only windows 8, but before I do so I would like to transfer a few things over, software settings etc, which is why I decided to install it on a separate partition and get it dual booted.

Wonder how the startup will react if I simply remove the windows 7 partition when I’m all set? Guess I should do some research before I go about doing that 🙂

The new system with apps, familiar for anyone that uses a smartphone or tablet, isn’t that bad. Missing a proper start button, an annoyance at first, but all a matter of getting used to the new way of doing things. And by now I am starting to get used to it. Admittedly there’s definitely a bit more clicking around though to perform different tasks, as many applications does exist as an app, but many more still installs like a normal application using the desktop view, so switching between applications isn’t quite as easy as just a click on the taskbar anymore, but almost.

There’s sort of a taskbar option if you hover the mouse in the top left corner, first you see the most recent app, with a bit tricky mouse movements you get a list of all active, plus you get the option to move to desktop view, if you are currently on home screen or in an app. Note, you can’t get to a desktop application window directly, you can only go to the desktop, where what you left on top will still be on top.

I have set up the most commonly used applications only so far, much to my surprise Spotify does not yet have an app option, that is actually something that I could see useful as an app. You can add a shortcut icon for it on the start screen, but it will switch you to the desktop view to open up Spotify when you click it.

Some things are not so obvious on how to find, took me a bit of clicking around to find a list of all apps and applications installed, this includes things that come with windows, such as the control panel. You can add anything to the start screen though, just got to find them first 🙂

Currently trying to set that machine up as a home web server, that isn’t working all to well. Though I don’t think that is the fault of windows 8 actually. It started with me downloading an installer package from MySQL, which I think is the same as I had installed when that machine were running windows 7, only problem is I got an error from the installer that the processor wasn’t supported.

And this with the exact same hardware. Granted I’m not 100% certain it was the exact same installer I got from MySQL it could be a different minor version of MySQL server, but it was MySQL server 5.1, which is the same as I had, and still have on the windows 7 boot, on that machine.

I downloaded a newer one that allows me to install just fine, the next problem I ran into was trying to get the already existing data to follow along with the install… I set the data folder to be the one I already got all in, but no, that doesn’t work at all. My phpMyAdmin install nicely connects to MySQL, but refuses to show any of the old databases. Ok, I redo the steps after realising the new installer package actually allows me to install 5.1, so I try this thinking it may be an version issue that prevents the old databases from showing up, no, still no luck 🙁

Next attempt, I install fresh up and points the installer to a diff, empty directory, to use for the data, somehow now I can’t find that at all :/ Guess something went wrong somewhere this time up too…

Now question is, how the hell do I get MySQL to play nice and read data from the old databases? I have done this maneuver before, taking the databases and successfully moving to a new machine, why should it be any harder when I switch operating system on the same hardware? I mean, technically, the steps should be virtually the same. Except the data would be moved AFTER MySQL being installed. Which is what I attempted in the last try, when I managed to lose the whole directory I wanted MySQL to store its data in. How did I manage that? How many attempts do I need before it starts working? Who knows. I will eventually get there though surely.

 

Hobby Projects

I’m not dead :)

Been a long time since I last updated you all here. Over a year has in fact passed…

Things have happened in my life, things that took time and energy to sort out, and quite frankly I simply didn’t feel like updating the blog. Probably gonna be very sporadic posts going forward as well. But it should at least not take over a year until the next one.

All set to go again :)
All set to go again

Finally got the loom moved to my new location as well, the hold up has been getting room for it, but finally got the keys to the hobby room in the basement of this apartment building a few weeks back, so last weekend me and my sister took the loom apart and moved it here. It’s now all set to go in its new location.

Assembly of the loom is rather quick, done in 15 mins or so, but threading it, that did take a couple hours. There’s “only” 184 threads in it for this setup, which gives a width of roughly 35 centimeter on the finished weave, perfect for table runners.

Next time I think I’ll set it up for making rugs, I expect there to be needed roughly a 100-150 more threads for that, depending on how wide I want the rugs to be, limit being the physical width of the loom. Don’t even wanna guess the time that will take to thread. Not to mention I’ll actually have to start completely from scratch, something I have never done before. This time I at least had some of the work done already (all threads were already rolled up on the warp beam).

Making rags to weave with
Making rags to weave with

Work in progress right now is taring up old bed linen and make rags to weave with, takes a lot more time then I expected it to do. Having a friendly helper cat doesn’t really speed up the process. She loves to either come lay down in the middle of it all, or just try to catch the tared rag strips as I make them into balls.

My "helper"
My “helper”

Bagheera decided to come and lay down in my work, effectively making it impossible for me to do something other then cuddle her. And trust me, when she’s in that mood, she will lay there expecting me to scratch her belly, or just pet her, for an hour or two..