OS — If it’s a big iPhone I’m not interested. OS X and I’d be hard pressed not to buy it.

Input — Here is where they can do something truly innovative, though I don’t know what. I would like a full qwerty-esque keyboard on the touchscreen, where the keys pressed are determined not by their location, but by their position relative to the rest of your fingers. So you lay your fingers down on the screen and start typing, not really worrying about where your fingertips press. Rather, you extend your left index finger up and to the right (-ish) and then your right index finger to the left (-ish) and then your left middle finger up (-ish), and the tablet realizes you were probably typing “the”.

The concern with a touchscreen keyboard is the lack of tactile feedback. But with a good enough algorithm, the type-and-only-sort-of-care-where-you’re-touching” technique might be enough to make up for not knowing where the keys are. My friend had a FingerWorks keyboard once that was entirely a touchscreen and it was difficult to type on. However, it allowed you to easily move the mouse and do complicated gestures without your fingers leaving the keyboard, so overall he was more efficient. Incidentally, Apple bought FingerWorks, so maybe some of that technology will make its way into the tablet.

Anyway, tomorrow’s the big day! Let’s see what it brings.

Evans and I did the video editing on that bad boy. iMovie is pretty impressive!

While I’m at it. Here’s another video my team had to make for the Hunt a few years ago. It’s the trailer for a hypothetical sequel to the movie Wordplay. Greg Schroll did most of the editing on this one (hence it’s higher quality…), although I did suggest the music that plays, and the (spoiler) laser pointer idea.

The binder it’s in mentions “Happy Eyes”, a cat I had when I was very young, so I think I started the story when I was no older than 10. But then about halfway through the “prologue” it switches from pencil to pen and I think that’s where I took over when I was older. From my knowledge of military ranks in it, I would imagine I was in Cadet Corps at that point, which would make me 12. I vaguely remember finding this notebook way back in the day, and rediscovering the story I had started even further back in the day, and trying to continue it.

Read on if you want to hear the start of a tale full of daring and intrigue that will leave you hanging…

Prologue

“Do you understand what you’re supposed to do?” Captain Rieekan finished his overview, and now began the specifics. “You two” — Captain Rieekan indicated two of the Special Forces Group — “will infiltrate the rebels’ base, avoiding being detected at all costs. Do you understand?” he asked again.

“Yes sir!” Sergeant Lance answered.

Clifford Lance was his full name, but he was less formally known to everyone as Cliff. He was born in 1985 and is now in the army at age 22. He understands everything but he doesn’t always go “by the book.” He will be with Private Jackson on this mission. All he ever told Cliff about his name was that it started with an A.

Although Cliff was one of the most valuable people to the Special Forces, he only had three stripes to show for it. He didn’t like being with A Jackson because he was one of the most incapable people he had seen yet.

“Information on this place is scarce,” Captain Rieekan began. “The rebels built this thing with whatever they could scrape together … [illegible/faded] … they stole a bunch of valuable electronic things from the company J.N.D. Electronics. [Switches at this point from 9 year old me to 12 year old me] We were lucky when we managed to steal that jeep. It gave us 3 important facts: number one, the base’s walls and top are guarded with LLP protection. That means Laser-Light Projection. We can’t simply beam it with a laser light that a sky-released missile would go to. Second, you two,” Captain Rieekan nodded his head toward Private Jackson and Cliff, “cannot kill anyone. We don’t know how they did it, but they somehow have sewn heartbeat and respiration monitoring equipment into their clothes. If either function stops or falters, an alarm will sound. And third, they have shielding on their walls powerful enough to withstand missiles. It can also withstand air-dropped bombs that have missed their target by only 10 feet. Under all circumstances that would be asking an awful lot of our pilots. What we need are two people, Sergeant Lance and Private Jackson, to sneak into the rebels’ base, planting the tagger in the ammunition and weapons room, if they have one. We can’t give you a whole lot of info Sergeant Lance. Sorry. You’re brave going in like that.”

Captain Rieekan turned his attention to everyone else. “You will wait a good distance away from the base and stand as backup to Sergeant Lance and Private Jackson. You will also stand as his mode of transportation and medical care when he comes back, so don’t leave.”

“Any questions?”

“Yes sir,” said a soldier Cliff recognized as Private Jones. Cliff remembered him from a previous mission. “Why don’t we just keep on making runs over the base until one of the bombs hits their mark?”

Captain Rieekan answered, “Well, first of all, from previous run-by’s we found out the base is undetectable by any type of radar. It was lucky one of our patrol men spotted the base. Out here in this Arizona heat he could easily have taken it as a mirage. So the main pilot, Major Rodriguez, and his crew will have to get a visual to be able to hit the base. Also, I want this strike to be quick and clean. One good shot and the base will be gone. My second reason is that we must get them on the first try. We can’t risk giving them any evacuation time. They built this base up from scratch, remember. They could do it again. Does that answer your question, private?”

“Yes sir.”

“Ah, good. Any more questions?” The captain folded his hands together, letting only the bottom of the palm and fingers touch. “No? Very good. You’re dismissed. This mission starts tomorrow at 1300 hours.”

Chapter One

At promptly 1100 hours Private Jackson heard a knocking on the door of his room.

“Coming,” he called out. He walked over to the door and opened it up. “Oh, hi Sergeant Lance.”

“Hi,” Cliff said. “How you feeling today? You ready?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“C’mon, let’s go see Captain Rieekan. You know we are going to finish off the rebels today.”

“I know, Sergeant. I’ll be there in a minute.”

“OK. See you then.” Cliff walked off to Captain Rieekan.

“Hello, Sergeant, can I help you?” Captian Rieekan said as Cliff walked in.

“Yes sir. It’s almost time for the mission and I would like to know any last minute details.”

“Well, Sergeant Lance, we pretty much went over everything last night. Oh, yes, I forgot to tell you, the bombing will begin precisely at 2200 hours tonight. If you feel pressed for time I could delay it.”

“No, sir, that’s fine.”

“Also, our guys came in with a map this morning. They said they found it.” Captain Rieekan shrugged and said, “Who knows how. Last night after you left, the patrol men came back. Corporal Onsurez was missing and he hasn’t shown up since.”

“Better get your stuff together, Sergeant. I’ll send out word for all the members of this mission to wait just outside the East Gate. So long Sergeant Lance.”

“Bye, sir.” Sergeant Lance turned around and left.

Cliff didn’t have a lot of stuff and he didn’t need a lot of stuff. So when he got to his room, he searched the room and succeeded in finding only a small compass, a ball of string, and a magnifying glass and mirror. He then slipped on a bullet proof vest and he holstered his gun. He looked over the room and grabbed his binoculars and left.

Chapter Two

Cliff made his way to the east side of the gate. A few other soldiers and Captain Rieekan were there to greet him when he finally showed up. Other soldiers slowly drifted in. Finally A Jackson showed up. Captain Rieekan then moved to the front of the crowd.

“In front of me are the jeeps. You will drive about 13 miles out. Everyone will then set up camp there. Private Jackson and Sergeant Lance will walk the remaining 3 miles. They will take everything they need and won’t return until the tagger is in place. Major Rodriguez will release the bomb at 2200 hours tonight. Good luck.”

Everyone started going to the jeeps, but Captain Rieekan signaled Cliff to come over to him. Cliff obeyed.

“I have the utmost confidence in you. As soon as you return, you will get another stripe, and Private Jackson will get promoted to Corporal. Once again, good luck.”

“Thank you, sir. And I appreciate your confidence.”

“Here, take this, and study it before you hit the base.” Captain Rieekan handed Cliff the map.

“Yes, sir, thank you, sir.” Cliff turned and hurried off to the jeeps. By now, everyone was ready, so as Cliff climbed into the jeep, the whole group moved off. In the desert, the jeeps did about 40 miles per hour, so it only took about 20 minutes to reach their destination.

Cliff was relieved when they passed the monotonous sand and cacti and pulled into a clearing. Everyone unloaded the jeeps. They set up their camp, and then wandered around their small area. Cliff climbed a small sand dune. He pulled out his binoculars and glanced around. He thought he saw a small glint of metal. He put the binoculars to his eyes and looked. Yes, out in the distance he saw the rebels’ base. It was kind of a circular shape, and closed up almost all around it. The sergeant pulled out the map and looked at it. On the overhead view, sure enough, it was a circle. He put the binoculars in front of his eyes again, and swept his view across the ground. To his relief, there were no approaching troops or anything. He went back to the clearing and studied the map. Halfway around the base there was a lookout station.

And there you go… what will happen next?! Why didn’t I finish this engrossing story!?

I like the copyright at the bottom because it seems more “professional”. But mindlessly mimicking professionalism is dumb. If I actually paid the $35 and registered my site with the Copyright Office, then I’d put that down there in a heartbeat. Still, I don’t seem to need to do that in order to justify the symbol:

The use of the copyright notice is the responsibility of the copyright owner and does not require advance permission from, or registration with, the Copyright Office.

But, really, do I care if someone uses my design or words? No.

There are three things that I want down there:

1. Notice that I was the one who designed and implemented the site.
2. What year it was “born” (might be cool in 20 years to show that gabedurazo.com has been around that long)
3. “Gabriel Durazo”, to help search engines link this site with my name. “Gabe Durazo” (URL) and “Gabriel J Durazo” (In the header) both point here no problem, but not “Gabriel Durazo” yet.

But if I have those three things, I may as well toss in a &copy and be done with it.

I had to dip into the wp-includes directory to modify just one file category-template.php, and that was only to change the wp_list_categories() function. Ordinarily it outputs a list with class — I’m forgetting now — but I changed it to my “sidebar_item” class, so that it would behave the same as the other items in my sidebar. I’m afraid that change will get wiped out if I update WordPress, though (which is part of the reason I’m making this post!)

In case you’re interested, this is the state of my php files:

(First, let me say that vim’s :TOhtml command is absolutely brilliant. I just highlight the contents of the files that I want to show, type :TOhtml, hit enter, and BAM!, I’ve got some nice HTML to paste into this wordpress textbox. It seems to work in Firefox, don’t know about any other browsers.)

index.php

 1 <?php
 2 /**
 3  * @package WordPress
 4  * @subpackage Default_Theme
 5  */
 6 get_header(); ?>
 7     <div id="content">
 8     <h1>Blog</h1>
 9
10     <?php if (have_posts()) : ?>
11         <?php while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
12
13             <div class="blogpost" id="post-<?php the_ID(); ?>">
14                 <h2><a href="<?php the_permalink() ?>" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link to <?php the_title_attribute(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2>
15                 <small><?php the_time(‘F jS, Y‘) ?> </small>
16
17                 <div class="entry">
18                     <?php the_content(‘Read the rest of this entry &raquo;‘); ?>
19                 </div>
20
21                 <p class="postmetadata"><?php the_tags(‘Tags: ‘, ‘, ‘, ‘<br />‘); ?> Posted in <?php the_category(‘, ‘) ?> | <?php edit_post_link(‘Edit‘, ”, ‘ | ‘); ?>  <?php comments_popup_link(‘No Comments &#187;‘, ‘1 Comment &#187;‘, ‘% Comments &#187;‘); ?></p>
22             </div>
23
24         <?php endwhile; ?>
25
26         <div class="navigation">
27             <div class="alignleft"><?php next_posts_link(‘&laquo; Older Entries‘) ?></div>
28             <div class="alignright"><?php previous_posts_link(‘Newer Entries &raquo;‘) ?></div>
29         </div>
30
31     <?php else : ?>
32
33         <h2 class="center">Not Found</h2>
34         <p class="center">Sorry, but you are looking for something that isn’t here.</p>
35         <?php get_search_form(); ?>
36
37     <?php endif; ?>
38
39     </div> <?php // this div closes the content div ?> 
40     <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
41     </div> <?php //this div closes the container div opened in header.php ?>
42
43 <?php get_footer(); ?>

header.php

 8 <html>
 9 <head>
10     <title>Gabe Durazo . com – Blog</title>
11     <base href="http://www.gabedurazo.com/" />
12     <link rel="stylesheet" href="styles.css" type="text/css" />
13     <link rel="shortcut icon" href="/favicon.ico" />
14 </head>
15 <body>
16     <div id="container">
17     <?php include ’http://www.gabedurazo.com/includes/header.php‘; ?>

sidebar.php

 7 <div id="sidebar" role="complementary">
 8     <ul id="sidebar_items" role="navigation">
 9         <li class="sidebar_item"><h3>Archives</h3>
10             <ul>
11                 <?php wp_get_archives(‘type=monthly‘); ?>
12             </ul>
13         </li>
14         <?php wp_list_categories(‘show_count=1&title_li=<h3>Categories</h3>‘); ?>
15         <li class="sidebar_item"><h3>RSS</h3>
16             <ul> 
17                 <li><a href="<?php bloginfo(‘rss2_url‘); ?>">Entries (RSS)</a> </li>
18                 <li><a href="<?php bloginfo(‘comments_rss2_url‘); ?>">Comments (RSS)</a> </li>
19             </ul>
20         </li>
21         <li class="sidebar_item"><h3>Meta</h3>
22             <ul>
23                 <?php wp_register(); ?> <?php //this functions makes <li>’s ?>
24                 <li><?php wp_loginout(); ?></li>
25                 <li><a href="http://wordpress.org/" title="Powered by WordPress, state-of-the-art semantic personal publishing platform.">Thanks WordPress</a></li>
26             </ul>
27         </li>
28     </ul>
29     <?php get_search_form(); ?>
30 </div>

footer.php

1 </body>
2 </html>

styles.css

 71 /* WordPress Styles */
 72 div.blogpost {
 73     padding: 0.5em;
 74     margin-top: 1em;
 75     border: dashed 1px black;
 76     background-color: #ddd;
 77 }
 78 div.blogpost h2 {
 79     padding: 0;
 80     margin: 0;
 81 }
 82 div#sidebar {
 83     padding: 0;
 84     margin-top: 0.5em;
 85     background-color:white;
 86     border: solid 1px black;
 87 }
 88 div#sidebar h3 {
 89     margin: 0;
 90     padding: 0;
 91 }
 92 ul#sidebar_items {
 93     list-style-type: none;
 94     padding: 0;
 95     margin: 0.5em;
 96 }
 97 li.sidebar_item {
 98     margin: 0;
 99     padding: 0;
100     margin-right: 1em;
101     float: left;
102 }
103 li.sidebar_item ul {
104     list-style-type: none;
105     margin: 0;
106     padding: 0;
107 }
108 li.sidebar_item li {
109     padding: 0;
110     margin: 0;
111 }
112 #searchform {
113     padding: 1em;
114     clear: both;
115 }
116 textarea#comment {
117     width: 700px;
118 }

Getting it to float off to the right is trickier than I would have thought. Now it’s just kinda hanging out down below. Oh well. That’s for tomorrow.

Then I have to fix up the comments and a few other little tweaks, but all-in-all, I think it’s looking pretty nice. You should have seen this page before! It was just the generic theme. Now it’s got a nice gray background, a crazy dog at the top, etc.

Anyway, I don’t count on anyone reading it, so don’t you worry about that. I will use it more as a place to keep track of what I’ve done to get this site going, and random thoughts I have that I’ll want to remember for the future.

I suppose I can make predictions, too, and then point to them in the future (deleting all the ones that fail, of course…).

First order of business: Integrate this blog with my site. Time to delve into the WordPress php!