MobileMe and Safari 4 Developer Preview

Apple's replacement for .Mac - MobileMe has (after a slightly rocky start) now launched and it looks pretty cool. It consists of a number of very polished webapps to do Calendering, Contacts, Email and Photo galleries, but more importantly it uses push technology to make sure that all your information stays up to date on any Macs you use, your iPhone etc. Linked with ActiveSync support, push mail makes MobileMe very cool for business people on the go.

Unfortunately, when I logged in to MobileMe, I found that a lot of the Ajax-y goodness wasn't working for me. In particular many of the icons weren't responding to mouse-clicks (though a right/control-click could be used ok and the desired option could be opened in a new Tab or Window - marginally workable but very annoying). Everything worked ok in Firefox so I eventually tracked the issue down (via a helpful Wikipedia article) to my use of Safari 4 Developer Preview. That left me with a real problem! You see Safari 4 has one killer feature I can't do without - full page zooming, rather than just changing font sizes. For an oldie like me who often needs a larger font size, the old zoom feature was a pain - only the text changed so the whole page layout and design was killed and overlapping boxes and controls often made readability a problem. But Safari 4 zooms the whole page, graphics and all to give an excellent result - layout intact and fonts large enough to read! If it came down to MobileMe vs Safari 4 I knew which would win!

Luckily a quick visit to the Apple Developer Connection revealed a version of Safari 4 Developers Preview with a date from a few days ago and I (correctly) surmised that this might solve the problem. So now things have settled down in the Cullen household, full page zooming intact, new MobileMe apps to check out, and continued lust for the iPhone 3G unabated...

P.S. I'm writing this in MarsEdit, having previously written it (or a nearly similar post) in ecto 3beta only to have it disappear when I tried to change from rich text to HTML mode. Sadly this isn't the first (or even second or third) time this has happened but it was the last time. Ecto development seems to have stalled and I'm leaving.

P.P.S. I then updated the Wikipedia article ;-)

Flee to the Desert

I'm now taking a new blog, nakedpastor (Darren put me onto ASBO Jesus, which in turn took me to nakedpastor). And this morning's post clicked with me, following my anti-institutional rantings of the other day.

Every once in a while I come to the realization that I don’t believe in church as it is. I don’t wish to support it. I don’t want to perpetuate its existence. I don’t want to reinforce its rules, its politics, its agendas, its programs. I want to get out of it altogether. I yearn to remove myself from this game completely and forever. I want, like the earliest hermits such as St. Anthony in Egypt, to retreat to the remotest desert and weave baskets. And I would do this not only as a way to get back in touch with raw simplicity and truth, but also as a demonstration of protest against the ecclesiastical system and its managers. Within, I’m done with it. When, oh when, will we ever ever realize that all we are doing with all of our ideas, visions, agendas, revolutions and reforms is tweaking that which imprisons us? We are the captains of modification. The result: people come along, take one look at the dolled-up corpse of our refined church, and say, “My, it looks really good!” just before we close the casket!

[From Flee to the Desert]

Moving

Well it's been a big week. Last Monday the removalists picked us up from sunny Cowra. They arrived at about 8.30am and left about 3.30pm. Airlie and I left at 5.30pm. Suzie left at about 7.00pm after cleaning the house (we're trying to sell it). Then a week ago today the removalists arrived at 9.00am at our new house and 3 hours later, left with the furniture in place and a mountain of boxes in the garage. We've been unpacking, cleaning, unpacking, cursing, unpacking and sleeping ever since.

Of course no move (and change of job) would be complete without a telecom fiasco, so of course I've had one, with my brand new mobile number turning out to belong to someone else who was very upset when suddenly their phone stopped working and I started getting their business calls! So I'm still waiting for the new mobile number, after which my business cards will have to be reprinted and all our friends and family will have to be sent a "Whoops those new contact details have changed already" email.

A nice thing is that my new employer pays for my internet access at home. A not-quite-so-nice thing is that it is 1/3rd the speed of the connection I used to have. Oh well, one of the first things they want me to look at is revamping the website. After I've done that (to show my IT 'cred') I'll ask for an upgrade of the Internet account - even if I have to pay the difference myself!

My new MacBook Pro is yet to arrive so in the office at the moment I am struggling to use the old computer which was left on my desk - MS Outlook on a Pentium 3 processor with a 15" monitor - Ugggggggh! If the Mac doesn't arrive soon I may expire!

Today was a 'down' day - I spent most of the day looking after Airlie while Suzie had a well-earned rest. Tomorrow I brave the Office again to get some important setting up stuff done and to look regularly and forlornly at the parcel delivery area for a package marked 'Apple'.

Testing Ecto 3

I've had it sitting around for a week or so, but this is the first time I've gotten to test out Ecto 3 which is in public beta (actually perhaps it's public alpha).

One of the things which looks nice is a media panel like the iLife apps to drag and drop photos, movies and audio. Here's a shot taken recently of Airlie, our adoreable daughter.

Other changes are not yet obvious.


The hibernation continues...

...mainly prompted by the amount of emotional energy being taken up by juggling moving houses and jobs, and more importantly my Dad's continued deterioration (after more than 3 months in hospital the doctors are now indicating that it may be unlikely that he will recover) but I did really want to write down the thoughts below somewhere.

I was listening to a few interesting podcasts from emergent uk when I heard a couple of people referring to emerging church in the context of people who are “believing without belonging”. I think the idea being highlighted was people can (and do) have Christian beliefs without needing to be 'joiners', without needing or wanting to commit to weekly attendance or being part of one 'congregation'.

On the other hand, most of the emerging church talk I had previously heard tended to talk about “belonging without (or before) believing”. The idea being that people want to belong and can be invited to join and experience Christian community without being subject to some checklist of beliefs. Once engaged with the community and having imbibed its values they would then be interested and prepared to hear about the beliefs which shaped the community of which they were a part.

So which is true? I think probably both. From the anecdotal evidence of my own non-church-attending friends and acquaintances I would say that many of them believe some things. For instance they may believe that there is a good God. They may believe that love is the central principle of life. They believe that there is more to life than the merely physical and that spirituality is important. They may believe that the life and teaching of Jesus is a view of the divine. But they do not believe that the earth was created in six days, that Jesus was born of a virgin or that there is only one path to God. Above all they do not believe that the church's edicts help them to understand or to live life constructively.

They are desperately seeking belonging. But they don't think they belong in the church. Mainly because they don't believe the things they think they'd have to believe. And because they're more interested in relationships than in institutions. They'll willingly get together with friends on a weekly basis. But they don't want to be told they have to get together once a week on Sunday mornings.

So what do I do about this? Well, it seems to me that I need both to find the commonality with their beliefs and to offer places of belonging. You see, I suspect in the end that neither “believing without belonging” nor “belonging without believing” is good enough. I think humans want to belong with those who believe as they do. (I know I'm desperate to find and hang out with some people who actually believe that St George will one day win another Premiership...)

Or maybe the real problem is with neat theories that parcel us up into one camp or another. Do you believe? Do you belong? I'm not sure if I do or not. Maybe we could just hang out together and wonder...

Personal Update

I feel guilty for not having blogged for so long. I've kind of been in hibernation...

Why? Well at the same time I've had the good, the bad and the ugly -

Good. In the past three weeks I've been offered and accepted a new position as an Adult Education Consultant with the ELM Centre in Sydney (Education for Life and Ministry - the Lay Education arm of the Uniting Church NSW Synod). Within the same three weeks we've looked at residences and chosen the place we will be living from 1st September, and I've made the announcement about my intentions to Church Council and then the whole congregation. So, overall good, but as you can imagine, stressful.

Bad. For the past three weeks my father has been in hospital. He has Type II Diabetes and as a result the circulation in his feet (one in particular) has been shutting down. He had a difficult bypass operation in which they had to use plastic veins because his own veins are shot or had been previously removed to use for heart or carotid artery surgeries. The operation has not been successful, so he is now facing amputation, at least of some toes and possibly the whole lower limb. But in the mean time they have diagnosed kidney damage (possibly as a result of the Diabetes medication) and evidence that he has had a minor heart attack after the operation. Then the blood thinners they put him on to try to help the heart and kidney conditions caused significant bleeding requiring a number of transfusions of blood and blood parts. He has been into and out of the ICU, and he is on constant morphine to deaden the pain of the foot. So, pretty much all bad, and as you can imagine, stressful.

Ugly. In the last week two major responsibilities came to a head - four performances of a play I've been rehearsing for the past six weeks, and a presentation I had to make along with our NSW Rural Chaplain, asking for the funding to enable him to continue in his position. The play went well, and we are hopeful that the funds will be made available for the Rural Chaplain but it was just a bit much coming all together. So, an ugly pressure, ups and downs, and generally, stressful.

Anyway, I'm going back into hibernation now for a while...

A Scintillating Dinner Party

Andrew Johnson of urban stone has tagged me for a 'four people, past or present, for dinner' meme. I don't think I've blogged this before but I've had the discussion and limiting it to four people is going to be hard, but here goes...

Isaac Asimov. My first choice - no contest. I would just love to have a long, rollicking conversation with this renaissance guy who wrote 500+ books on topics ranging from science and future prediction to archaeology and the Bible. And of course he is the author of the science fiction stories which formed my tastes as I devoured them, sitting in the library, lunchtime after lunchtime hiding from the bullies! I am not joking when I say that Asimov is one factor in my movement to a more liberal theology - for heaven without this feisty atheist would not, for me, be heaven at all.

Gough Whitlam. One of my passions in life is seeing the world changed for the better, and hence politics. And as a beneficiary of Gough's tertiary study reforms who now marvels (and despairs) at the huge debts current tertiary students rack up, I would be delighted to spend some time with this great, visionary, flawed, enigmatic, campaigner for a better Australia.

Jeri Lynn Ryan. Ok, so I'm a Star Trek tragic and who wouldn't want to have dinner with Voyager's 7 of 9? After all, dinner is about presentation as well as content and Jeri's good looks would grace any table (as the life–size cardboard cutout of '7' graces my study!). And as well as answering my constant stream of geeky questions about life on a Star Trek set, Jeri can also provide some culinary banter, being a lover of food, sometime moonlighting chef, and co–owner of Haute Cuisine restaurant Ortolon.

Mahatma Ghandi. Philosophy, law, theology, politics - this guy has got all topics of interest covered! And it would be awe-inspiring to talk to the person who has most significantly and successfully put into practise the non-violence teachings of Christ, and by so doing changed the world. I'm sure Ghandi would share my horror at the world situation, especially violence in Iraq and Palestine, but I also suspect he'd have some insightful and optimistic takes on what the future could hold. I need that now!

Well I know that as soon as I hit the 'Publish' button I'm going to think of someone I missed who ought to have made the cut but that's blogging...

BTW, speaking of urban stone, you really ought to check out Andrew's fantastic photos on Flickr. One has recently been used for an album cover!

Kenny

While I'm on the movie roll...

Suzie and I watched Kenny tonight and thought it was both hilarious and heart-warming. What was best was seeing such a genuine, humble, respectful and kindhearted character portrayed. Would that Australia had more Kennys! There are some absolutely fantastic lines - from the sublime (“My father had about 2 cents in his emotional bank account...”) to the ridiculous (“You have to try to drop the banana without blowing the trumpet...”). I'm off to try and find a “Wit and Wisdom of Kenny” website!

I'm also trying out MarsEdit for this post as suggested by Stephen.

Currently listening:
There Is A Kingdom from the album “The Boatman's Call” by Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

I'm testing Qumana...

I'm a paid up ecto user but have been having some bugs with its syncing with the website. Mark suggested trying Qumana, so I am.

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And here's a picture of my gorgeous daughter.

She's the one in the middle, pictured with two friends on our back balcony.

Powered by Qumana

Update:

After some hassles with uncooperative photos, multiple postings etc, I'm back to ecto. But Qumana did have nicer eye-candy...

Five things meme

Stephen tagged the universe, and its a good opportunity to post again on my favourite topic ;-), so here are five things you probably didn't know about me:

1. At age 9ish I was on Japanese TV (if you don't remember seeing me its probably because I was the one in the snowman outfit).

2. My parents went to a Royal Garden party with the Queen (of Australia (curses)) and Prince Phillip, and all I got was this lousy story...

3. I have a life sized cardboard replica of 7 of 9 looking at me in my study (and my wife, Sue, gave it to me!)

4. My first computer was a DEC LSI-11/23 with a hard drive about 2.5 foot cubed which shook the whole house as it ran up to speed.

5. I arranged for Sue and myself to have dinner with Christian writer Adrian Plass and his wife Bridget as my 10th anniversary gift to Sue.

Have a glorious Christmas, New Year and any other relevant holiday!

Greed

So what does it say about me that the thing which gets me blogging again is the possibility of personal gain?

Nonetheless I do think that the MacAppADay offer sounds a great one. My Mac productivity and experience is greatly enhanced by a whole raft of shareware and freeware programs (maybe I'll blog that list later) and if MacAppADay helps to get more people looking, downloading and trying apps it will be good for Mac development and the Mac platform.

So sign up to MacAppADay's RSS Feed and check back throughout December. I will be!

Movie magic...

On the fishers, surfers and casters blog, Paul Teusner asks, 'Why should we think about mass media?' In the comments, Stephen posed the challenge,

What would your list of 5-10 books be that would make a good introduction to religion and media?

My comment in response was,

Really given the article, shouldn’t it be 5-10 *movies* which would be illustrative of a good introduction to religion and media…?

And Paul naturally asked me to put my money where my mouth was. :-0

So here is a list of some movies which inform / provide the vocabulary for / become a medium of, my own spirituality. I'm keeping it brief but am happy to enlarge on any of them in comments if someone is interested. Also I found that it was hard to pick specific films, for the reason that movies are so much a part of my life - I've watched hundreds (thousands?). And the movie which speaks to me at one time is clearly a function of what's going on in my life at that point, what the spiritual issues or questions are for me then etc. Nevertheless, here goes:

The Village - What is fear? How does it shape our lives? Our beliefs? How can we continue to be part of a messy, hurtful world? Did the Creator get it wrong?

X-Men (1 or 2) - Alienation seems to be part of life. What makes us human? More interestingly - what prevents us from being fully human?

Dogma - Alanis Morissette as God. Need I say more? No seriously - a playful, quirky God. That speaks to me. The rest of the movie is also an interesting exploration of justice, right and wrong, consequences.

Saved - Ok, so it's not rocket science, but I went to that school (except our principal couldn't do standing somersaults...). If evangelical / conservative faith is so true, why is it so ugly?

Spirited Away - I can't explain this one. I just know it moved me in a way few other things in life have. Maybe its because I lived the first 12 years of my life in Japan. Natsukashii ne... But there's also something I can't put my finger on in the content, that says something about the way the world is.

Wrath of Khan - Yeah, ok, I know I'm sad. Still... I cried when Spock died. Sacrifice and love are at the heart of the universe.

Ok then, there's half a dozen. I'm sure there's more. What about you?

The Change to Typepad

I suppose it had to happen...

If I'm going to do this blogging thing I guess I need to do it right. So I'm migrating from Blogger to Typepad and I hope in the process I don't lose my 3 avid readers. (Actually I'm safe with one of them 'cause Suzie reads it directly on my computer...)

Update:

For some reason, using Ecto to transfer my posts overrode the date it said was on it and made them all as at today. So being the anally retentive guy I am I just spent the last hour manually editing them via the online interface - talk about a slow job!