TV management for the elite!

Due to popular demand, I’ve decided to write a quick post to show y’all how to setup a pretty awesome and fairly automated way to pull media from the internets and watch it/listen to it anywhere in your home OR on the road.

There are many levels of involvement to this setup from the cheapest and simplest, all the way to the more expensive and elaborate. The complexity, however, only lies in the initial setup and once it’s all up and running..  sit back and watch some TV.

Simple setup

This section represents the core functionality of how I get my media downloaded. These items are also required if you want to move into the more complex setup like external storage management, etc. With this setup you’ll be able to setup automatic downloading of your favourite shows and watch them on your computer anytime you want.

Items required

1. a personal computer (Mac, PC, ubuntu, whatever)
2. an internet connection with a decent bandwidth cap (show episodes are generally 350 MB for an hour of standard definition TV and can be 1.4 GB for HD so you do the math)
3. a newsgroup account. This is different than your regular web service that you get from your ISP. Servers that store data and serve it up at blazingly fast speeds. Things you want to look for in your NG service: long retention days (999+), multiple connections (8+) and SSL. The one I use is usenetserver.com Prices can range but average between $10-$15 a month (cheaper than paying for TV!). You can even try their trials to see if you want to do it.
4. a newsgroup search account. Though the newsgroup account above gives you access to download files, there is another site and account that is used to search these millions of files that are online. sign up for nzbmatrix.com and/or newzbin2.es With the former you should sign up for VIP ($10 for 10 years, lol) and you get more than 10 searches in 24 hrs.

Setup steps

1. With your newsgroup service/search setup, you’ll need to download a couple of pieces of software to perform the searching and downloading. The first one is something called SABnzbd. This guy does the heavy lifting and performs the downloading through your NG service. It’s open source too (read: free!). Download this for your platform and run the installation.
2. The installation wizard is really straight forward: screenshots. I chose the classic theme. On step 2, choose viewable on my PC only. Step 3, enter your newsgroup SSL server info (for me this is  secure.usenetserver.com port 563 with username and password and I have 10 connections). Step 4 enter the search service you setup from 4 above. Click ‘Go to SABnzbd’
3. You should be able to see the console for SABnzbd. If not, you can check out their FAQ
4. Within the console for SABnzbd, go to Config > Folders and update the temporary download folder and the completed download folder to something more appropriate. something like c:\media\sabnzbd\complete & c:\media\sabnzbd\incomplete
5. Under Config > Categories add a category called ‘TV’ with a path something like c:\media\tv (remember where this is for later) and click save at the end of the row
6. Under Config > Sorting check the box that says ‘enable TV sorting’. Enter ‘%sn/Season %s/S%0sE%0e – %en.%ext’ in the sort string and scroll to the bottom and hit save
7. The next thing to download is a program called SickBeard. Installation instructions here: instructions.
8. Once complete you should be able to access it through http://localhost:8081 on your computer. Now you need to get all the pieces of software talking to each other.
9. With sickbeard console opened, go to Config > Search Settings and update the information similar to below
   

   Replace the data with your own.

   The server you’ll use will be http://localhost:8080 with a blank username, password and API key.

10. Under Config > Search Providers, check off whatever search providers you signed up for in the ‘Items Required’ #4 above and configure them in the ‘Configure built-in providers’ section (by adding the username and passwords/API key found at the site under account settings)
11. Now that everything is up and running and wired together, you’re ready to start adding shows to SickBeard. Click Home > Add Shows. Here you’ll want to click ‘Add New Show’ and search for a show you want to add. Say ‘Misfits’ (great show, consider adding this one). Here, sickbeard will check for matches against this and show you potential hits. Choose the show based on the name and the series start date and hit ‘Next’
12. Choose where the files for this show are going to be saved by sabnzbd. This should be the same folder from step 5. Hit Next
13. Select if you want to skip any episodes that have aired so far or if you want to download them now (skipped vs wanted), check Season Folders and choose your preferred quality (SD for lower size and quality, HD for much larger size but better quality). Hit ‘Add Show’
14. After some time you should see the TV show added to the list of shows. You can select the show and see the status of each episode whether it’s aired, downloaded, skipped, etc. If you open SABnzbd in your browser, you should see stuff start to download after a while. Once SABnzbd has completed each download, it should place the file in the folder that you specified.
15. Watch and Enjoy.

In another post, I’ll write again on some extra peripherals you can setup to take the load off your computer (so you don’t have to leave it running all the time to manage the downloads), increase your storage and centralise the media so you can start watching on any of your TVs instead of your computer. Let me know if you have any questions (I’m sure I’ve missed something)

You're welcome.

Monday mornings back at work are usually quite nice for me, except for this one. Coming in to find out that the mini display port on my 2010 macbook pro is kinda like an end of days for me. You really come to expect that having dual monitors for work really is the norm so trying to spend my morning working on my 15″ display got the better of me.

Instead of scouring the net for various generic issues that may be ‘somewhat’ similar to mine, I opted instead to schedule another appointment at the ‘Genius Bar’. Ugh I hate that name. The only apple store in Ottawa is quite close to work so I scheduled the apt over lunch and popped down for hopefully a solution. Here it is:

Reset the computer’s PRAM

1. Turn off computer.
2. Turn on and immediately hold command & option & P & R keys. Yes all 4 at the same time! You may get a hand cramp pulling this
combo
3. Keep holding until you hear the startup sound for a second time

Yup .. that’s it. Everything was find and dandy after that. Ah well, at least I got to have a nice lunch at the Rideau Centre.

First picture taken with my new 4S iPhone

The iPhone 4S camera, it’s heralded as the best smartphone camera in the market. It was one of the largest highlights out of this years ‘minor’ hardware revision the iPhone saw (aside from the dual core A5).

This was THE main reason I upgraded my iPhone (at least that’s what I tell myself). I mean c’mon: 8MP, f2.4 (a half stop better than the iPhone 4), kick ass sensor and an array of lenses including an IR lens to help with colouration. The picture on the left was one of the first images I took with my beautiful phone. You can see the rich yellow colour of the kronenbourg, the clarity of the lettering on the glass and the fact that I’m sitting in a poorly lit bar.

Now I’d like to take you to how my images look now. Over 2 and a half months (the phone only came out Oct 14th here in Canada), my phone has gone from amazing to shaite. In the image below you can see on my phone the whole image has a haze to it. Almost like it’s not focused. The light seems really misty and colours are all off. The haze also seems to get worse closer to the bottom of the picture, especially around the sunglasses.

My coffee and sunglasses

The culprit? a protruding camera. The camera on the iPhone 4S sticks out from the rest of the body just barely, but enough to be the main part sitting on the table you just put your phone on.

Can you buff this out?

I took a peek at my iPhone 4 (handed down to my wife) and the lens is perfect. The metal ring seems flush with the phone and the lens perhaps is slightly recessed. I never had a case for either of my phones. I can’t stand how bulky the cases are. I also have a mount specific to my phone that fits it perfectly. It was a pain to have to take the case on an off every time I got into my car. I suppose I’m paying for it now.

I’ve got an appointment with the ‘Genius Bar’ tomorrow to have a chat and see if I can’t get a replacement. I went and put on a skin until I figure out what they’ll help me out with. It’s in the picture above. You can just see the edges of the skin around the camera. It’s amazing. If you’re looking for a great skin: Best Skins Ever. Hopefully tomorrow I get good news and a replacement phone.

23andMe

For those of you that have never heard of the company 23andMe, a little background from Wikipedia:

23andMe is a privately held personal genomics and biotechnology company based in Mountain View, California that is developing new methods and technologies that will enable consumers to understand their own genetic information. The company is named for the 23 pairs of chromosomes in a normal human cell.
The 23andMe website is currently split into four categories: Health and Traits, Ancestry, Sharing and Community, and Research. They currently test or are researching over 100 diseases, conditions, and traits.

Essentially for $200, you get a kit, spit in a tube, send it back and they analyze the sample provide you a breakdown of health predispositions, traits and ancestry. The first time I’d heard about 23andMe was when it was mentioned in a segment on how evil Google is on a show called Hungry Beast.

They mention 23andMe at the minute and a half mark. A couple episodes later, they dedicated an entire segment to 23andMe.

This got me curious. Despite the ‘What if you find out something bad?’ thoughts, I decided to go ahead and order a kit (oh and one for my wife, cause nothing is more fun than doing it with your partner). What if I find out I have an 80% chance of getting Alzheimer’s disease? Well, it’s going to happen anyway. I WANT TO KNOW!

Right now, my profile reads “Your sample was received on December 30, 2011.   Allow 6-8 weeks for processing.”. This will be perfect timing as my wife and I are heading travelling for the month of January. Check back soon for a chat of the results!

Charger with my wife's old 3GS

My wife and I are booked for a nice little vacation in January to Costa Rica, and I’m really really looking forward to it. Mostly to relax, but still we’re doing a LOT of travelling within the country to many cities. With all this travelling around, I find myself wanting to research, document and kill time on my iPhone and iPad.

As some have heard and some already know, constant use of your mobile device EATS your battery alive before you get a chance to get back to some kind of outlet.

Lo and behold this travel charger. I’ve now owned this particular unit that I got from DealExtreme for some time now and it’s fantastic. The reason this $37.99 beauty is better than most is that it packs a 9000mAh capacity, which means it’s charged my iPad once and my iPhone several times in one charge. It’s 2.2A output covers the 2.0A minimum req’d by the iPad to charge. I’ve just ordered the 9600mAh battery as a second unit for my wife to carry around and for me to compare. Happy charging!

Thanks for the update Shoeboxed!

Probably one of my biggest pet peeves on the app store is a severe lack of app update description. As a developer, I tend to look at each app update to see how other devs (or marketing group) are telling their users “what’s new!” I used to just to the ol’ “Update All”, but the more I use an app the more I want to know if new features are getting stuffed into the app. I’m sure we want to get the most of our free or 99c apps.

I try and provide my users with the most detail on an update as I can. Minor Enhancement? Here is a list of most or all of the bugs that I’ve found based on feedback and testing! Major revision? Here’s a solid laundry list of what you can expect out of the enhancements! Of course, the list that I give to our business lead doesn’t always match word for word what ends up in the app store. But I try.

Camera+ update FTW!

Camera+ on the other had does a great job with both their app and their app updates. They even throw in whimsical little icons!

Wordpress for iOS

In three words: ‘Not that great’. I was kind of hoping for a mechanism to upload images from my iPhone into my media library without creating a full blown post with each photo. Most of the review of gadgets that I get my grubby hands on, I’m going to be taking pictures with my iPhone camera. I mean, I have the phone on me 24/7 anyway, so naturally I’m going to use it’s camera. I see there are some 3rd party tools that will do the trick for me, but I was hoping that this app would take care of that for me.
Still on the topic of image, I’m not sure if anyone that has used the app has attempted to upload and use an image in a post? For some reason the app doesn’t really like to play nice embedding the html. Once you’ve decided to use the image in the post and publish, I find I just get stripped up HTML.

At least you can view your blog stats. I’ll just be happy with that.

Although I feel like I should be saying hello again old world as this may be my 3rd attempt at holding up a blog. Hopefully it sticks this time. I feel like I have more to talk about this time round. Since my last blog attempt I have more hobbies it would seem as well as a more involvement in the development community. I hope to share it all with you here.

Stay tuned

This guy knows Movember

Oh, and happy Movember. Hope it was a good one. It certainly was for me and the Prostate Cancer Canada Network