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Mac Netbook Adventures #hackintosh

 We've been needing a small laptop for use in the college ministry - a way to do data entry on campus and not be dependent on my laptop (which I use to preach) or having students bring their own computers. A netbook seemed like the perfect solution - small, long battery, etc. The only problem was that I really wanted a Mac.

I know several people who have hacked OS X onto a variety of systems so I started a bit of research. I discovered that the Dell Mini 10v is really easy to make into a Hackintosh. Last Thursday night I sat down with a 16gb USB drive, a LEGAL copy of Mac OS X Snow Leopard, and NetbookBootMaker. I followed the Gizmodo guide for installation and everything went flawlessly. 

Here's the basic details:

• Dell Mini 10v - $318.75
• OS X Snow Leopard - $25.00
• USB Flash Drive - $0 already had it (you can get one for $20 at Amazon)
• a couple of hours

Total cost: $343.75 unless you need to buy a flash drive. Not too shabby for a nice little OS X laptop.

Performance has been really good for web browsing, simple word processing, etc. I will say that it doesn't play web video all that well (tested in Windows and it's equally bad). The battery life has been crazy. With active usage I'm seeing 8+ hours of battery and mixed use (surfing and letting it sit and play music) the battery lasted over 9 hours. I do want to upgrade the RAM to 2gb, but haven't gotten around to it. I'm also really spoiled by Apple trackpads - the 10v trackpad is horrible. I also wish the screen had a slightly higher resolution 1024x600 is a bit too few pixels (not a bigger screen, just more resolution).

I'm really bummed that Apple isn't offering a real netbook option. I've got an iPhone and I've got a MacBookPro. After spending the weekend using the HackBook exclusively I think Steve Jobs is wrong when he says that the iPad is the perfect device to fit between the smartphone and the laptop. The iPad fits really well into the bigger screen/eBook/video player/web surfing category, but it doesn't keep me from needing to carry my laptop around. I think there is a second gap that is filled by really small, inexpensive netbooks. I see a real need for the 10" netbook that costs under $500. The $300 netbook isn't quite good enough, there is clearly a step between the 10v and a MacBook that could be filled (slightly faster, improved graphics, more RAM). This is the PERFECT spot for an Apple netbook.

Here are some things I've done over the past several days that can't be done on an iPad:

• answer email using a real keyboard, mouse and mail client
• tweak a graphic using Fireworks
• screen share to another computer
• use BackToMyMac to share files from my MBP from a coffee shop
• quickly switch back and forth between a google spreadsheet, a PDF file, and my email
• use ProPresenter - it actually is decent for still background images and lyrics

Share your thoughts about netbooks.

Schweitzer Community Outreach Center

This past weekend we gathered people together to do the first project in the newly named Schweitzer Community Outreach Center. The building just to the west of the church that used to house luxury cars is already being used to make an impact in the community. Over the course of a couple of hours we packaged 400 hygiene kits for the homeless in Springfield, 150 health kits to be sent to Haiti, as well as hundreds of meals of beans and rice.

As we start a new stewardship emphasis over the next month, one aspect of Growing God's Church is expanded use of this facility for community outreach - housing disaster relief, food pantry, special projects like this and new offices for the staff. The project also includes expanded children's and youth space focusing on security and eliminating the church's debt. 

The video above was shot with our new Canon 7D and a 50mm 1.4 prime lens. The event footage was captured from 10-12 and the video was first shown in our Saturday night worship at 5pm. I'm very impressed with the workflow from the camera into Final Cut and prepped for final display. I'd guess that it took Zak almost three hours less time to produce this piece than similar shoots from our Focus FS-4. I've been having a lot of fun shooting both stills and videos with this camera/lens combo. Next step is a set of rails and a follow-focus. We may even add a matte box to the kit.

Christmas Worship Projection Sample

Saturday night I took a little bit of footage with the Flip cam during worship. Here's a sample from a few songs. The audio quality is really bad, the microphone on the flip really picks up the drums above everything else. It's also a bit shaky from being handheld. Next time we do this we'll need to setup a real camera with a feed from the board.

Christmas Music Celebration

This weekend we celebrated Christmas in music. There was an amazing diversity in worship as our traditional services featured the annual choir cantata with an orchestra and the modern services featured our praise band, the story of Christmas told through Isaiah in video, lighting and architectural projection.

I'm incredibly impressed with how well all of the teams worked to accomplish such a great weekend of worship. The transition between our 8:20 traditional service (the top photo) and the modern service at 9:45 was seamless. The orchestra/choir  moved quickly and were very helpful in making things run smoothly. Once the band set up and we powered up the lights/projectors, and were ready for worship. The experience in our two modern services was very different (lower photo from Saturday night). The transition back for the cantata at 11:00 was just as smooth.

More info about the modern worship:
We've done lights and projection in our sanctuary for special services in the past (Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, etc) but never a setup this elaborate for the weekend. You can see in the photos a truss on each side of the platform holding three LED par cans, a projector, and an LED moving wash fixture; at the back of the room we mounted a second set of moving heads. This is the closest setup to what we do at Green Room on the MSU campus we've ever had in the main sanctuary.

The total visual setup involved 10 LED light fixtures, five projectors, three Macs, ProPresenter, a TripleHead2Go, and our Chamsys MagicQ light rig. All of the imagery on the walls/screens came from either Awake Images or Shift Worship. Most of it was still, but we did throw in one snowy loop background with no front light for one of the songs.

All of this was possible because of an amazing group of people, most of whom choose to serve on the tech/worship teams. Zak posted info about the modern worship music (the Isaiah videos should be posted soon too).

Texting and Worship

Last night we made our first foray into texting during worship. We had a panel discussion answering questions that focused on how faith impacts life as a college student. I thought the questions were very good and the panel did an excellent job dealing with them. We did have a few issues in the moderation process, which is something we'll have to improve in the future. There were several questions that we didn't get to because they didn't show up in the moderation tool until after the panel was completed.

We used the services of Jarbyco to setup the the text-to-screen and moderation interfaces. They did a great job and made handling text messages really easy. A team in the back was able to filter questions and get them posted to the screens. I was able to read all the approved questions off my iPhone. The huge screen behind the panel scrolled through questions as they were being answered.

I'm looking into whether or not doing this on a regular basis is going to work. I try to keep the message time during worship on campus to about 18 minutes. I'm pondering trimming messages to 15 minutes and then spending three minutes answering questions every week. The Jarbyco tool will also let us do polls, voting, and send outbound text reminders/updates.

Last year we did a panel about romantic relationships where we had students step up to a mic to ask questions. I feel like the quality of the questions were much better this fall given the anonymity provided by texting (just the question showed up on screen). Working with college students I've become incredibly aware of how important texting is to effective ministry. I'm very excited to see how the use of this technology will unfold and how it will help us to be better communicators of the Gospel.

Theology of Technology Conversations

I'm spending this week in Kentucky at the Asbury campus in a class about the web in ministry. The primary purpose of the class is to familiarize students with the Internet and the web with each of us in the class completing some sort of a final web project. For my project I'm not building a web site, instead I'm working on the SUMC media player - a Flash RIA using the Flex framework, the YouTube API, and skinned through Catalyst.

While understanding and using the technology is an important aspect of the class I'm really enjoying the conversation that is frames the larger issue. Lots of McLuhan, social constructs, relational issues, how we tell the Story, and how Truth is represented in various media. It's a conversation that a lot of people never have and I'm really happy that the seminary is facilitating the conversation.

As church leaders, really as Christians, it's important that we understand the shift that's happening around us. The migration to digital information is as significant as the shift to mass printed text and from an oral tradition to a written tradition. How do we reflect this shift as individuals and as the church?

We Choose The Moon

I'm a huge space buff, and really lament the state of manned space exploration these days, but rest assured, this post isn't really a rant about how we've given up our desire to explore. Forty years ago we accomplished the single greatest exploratory and technological achievement in history, by stepping foot on the moon.

I've been fascinated by the We Choose The Moon web site since it launched. AOL and the JFK Library have done an exceptional job using current tools to retell the Apollo 11 mission for the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission. You can listen to the live radio stream and follow the status of the mission in real-time, 40 years later. The site is full of pictures and video from the mission. There's even a timer to let you know when the next stage is starting and when the landing occur. I've installed the AIR version on my desktop.

My favorite feature of the site is the coordinated Twitter feeds. I can't sit with the site open all day and just listen, but I've got a column in Tweetdeck for AP11_CAPCOM, AP11_SPACECRAFT, and AP11_EAGLE. The tweets are synchronized so they flow like a conversation. This is such a great use of Twitter. A lot of the comm messages are short bursts which fit into the Twitter timeline really nicely. 

Here's a sample from yesterday:

• AP11_CAPCOM: Hello Apollo 11. Houston. We have scrubbed the midcourse 1. Over.
• AP11_SPACECRAFT: Roger. Understand you have scrubbed midcourse 1.
• AP11_SPACEFRAF: Hey Charlie. Houston, Apollo 11.
• AP11_CAPCOM: Go ahead, 11. Over.
• AP11_SPACECRAFT: Hey maybe you better call Lou and tell him we might be a little late for dinner.

For those of you who were alive when Apollo 11 landed, where were you?

Summer Reading 2009

Now that my classes are finished for the spring I've got a bit more time to do some reading for both professional development and fun/relaxation. Several of these books have been on my shelf for months. Several of them I've started, but never finished because other things were a higher priority. I read Story when I was an undergrad, but thought a refresher might be good. I had meetings late yesterday night, so I took part of the afternoon to get started on the summer reading plan. Right now I don't have any fiction on the list and I need to add some. Got any suggestions?

Right now my summer reading list includes:

• Killing Cockroaches, Tony Morgan
• Church Unique, Will Mancini
• Flickering Pixels, Shane Hipps
• Intuitive Leadership, Tim Keel
• ReJesus, Michael Frost & Alan Hirsch
• Tribes, Seth Godin
• Story, Robert McKee
• In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan
• My Stoke of Insight, Jill Taylor
• The Unlikely Disciple, Kevin Roose

Donated Hardware Rocks

Yesterday I got to drive down to Monett to pick up some server hardware that was donated to the church. None of it is brand-spanking new, but it's going to make for a pretty nice setup. We were given a 42U rack cabinet, and four IBM x346 servers. The servers don't have any drives or a RAID card (just the onboard SCSI), but they're all dual processor (one with dual cores), have 16gb of RAM, and are nicely equipped with fibre channel cards.

We need to come up with some sort of a storage solution for all of these servers. We also need to determine exactly what we'll be doing with them. I know that two are going to be used to handle our internet hosting needs, one may be used purely as a development system, and I have no idea what we'll do with the fourth system. What I do know is that this hardware really needs to be virtualized to meet the full potential. We'll be starting down the path of learning the ins and outs of EXSi soon.

My first goal is to buy a drive caddy and a cheap ultra320 drive and see if the those will work off the onboard controller. Part of the plan is to see if EXSi really needs a drive in the system (usb key boot).
We'll probably be building some sort of large NAS or SAN to hold the data from these systems and nearline video.

If anybody's got tips for how to configure or use this hardware leave comments.

Nearly a day of content every minute on YouTube

I just read this interesting article over at TechCrunch about the amount of video being uploaded to YouTube every minute. In January it was 15 hours/minute, now it's 20 hours/minute. It will soon cross the one day mark. At 20 hours of video it's nearly 50 days of content uploaded every hour and 3.2 years of content every day. If you ever wondered if video on the web was feasible here's the answer. It would take you 23 years to watch all of the content uploaded to YouTube in a single week.

I'm amazed at the amount of manpower that goes into getting this much video uploaded. Even if you discount the content that is never edited or is illegally posted, it's still a lot of work. The bandwidth, storage, and processing power to make the content available online is also staggering.

At Schweitzer we're going to be launching a media player this summer and we've decided to leverage the YouTube platform rather than build our own. We'll put together a wrapper that does search, categories, and a variety of features to make it user friendly, but the playback is all going to be handled by YouTube. It's hands down the largest video distribution platform available.