# Tim Sodhi muses
> Tim Sodhi - Enterprise Digital Platforms & Applications Architect; lifelong learner, mentor, & tinkerer-at-large.
Public Ghost content for AI and LLM tooling. Use `/llms-full.txt` for consolidated page and post context.
Append `.md` to any post or page URL to get the content in Markdown (for example, `/example-post.md`).

## Pages
- [About Tim Sodhi](https://tim.sodhis.org/about.md) - Tim Sodhi writes about enterprise digital platforms, cloud architecture, AI, homelabs, and the practical work of making technology useful.
- [Archives](https://tim.sodhis.org/archives.md) - [snazzy-archive]

## Posts
- [Goodbye, Apple Music: Vibing a player for an audience of one](https://tim.sodhis.org/goodbye-apple-music-vibing-a-player-for-an-audience-of-one.md) - There is a category of software that barely exists: software for one. Built by a single person, for a single user - themselves. In other words, me, moi-même. The economics rarely justify it, which is why so many good ideas sit on back burners for years, waiting for the tools to catch up with the wi…
- [How to run a (AI) life - with Hermes](https://tim.sodhis.org/how-to-run-a-ai-life-with-hermes.md) - Taking a sabbatical from the world of LinkedIn, where each post is a humble-brag, I want to go back to the roots. To the format that started it all. And write about what moves me, what makes my gears tick. SO, I'm starting a series about how I use AI in my day-to-day life. Not the hype version. The…
- [AI-powered PDF Sorter](https://tim.sodhis.org/pdf-sorter.md) - Spent the past few days building something I actually needed: a tool that automatically sorts/organizes messy PDFs. Anyone who's dealt with receipts, invoices, or contracts knows the pain. Hundreds of files named scan.pdf scattered across folders. Sorting them manually takes hours. So I scoped and…
- [A nu start](https://tim.sodhis.org/a-nu-start.md) - And so, welcome to my new forum. To my musings.
- [Installing CAS rubycas on Ubuntu](https://tim.sodhis.org/installing-cas-for-your-homelab-security-needs.md) - Let’s just say that my Homelab usage has gone through the roof in the last few months. Not only am I writing bespoke applications to solve my day-to-day needs, I am continually adding to the tools at my disposal. For instance, I recently decided to not renew my Evernote subscription, after discover…
- [Homelab - adding an nginx reverse proxy to the mix](https://tim.sodhis.org/homelab-adding-an-nginx-reverse-proxy-to-the-mix.md) - Of nginx tutorials there are many on the web. With my growing Homelab, having added Confluence to the mix, and having nearly eleven virtual machines on my Home Servers, I was simply tired of accessing them all with the port number qualifier. Moving the DNS provider to Cloudflare (Free) was the firs…
- [Quiver by HappenApps](https://tim.sodhis.org/quiver-by-happenapps.md) - Speaking of documentation – I would like to give a big shoutout to this amazing code/snippets repository App that I am using on all my devices. Say hello to Quiver by HappenApps. Developed by Yaogang Lian (who is an amazingly responsive developer), this app has become a part and parcel of my daily…
- [Homelabs, ESXi and Virtual Machines, oh my...](https://tim.sodhis.org/homelabs-esxi-vms.md) - I dabbled in the VPS world before getting a bit disillusioned with how much I needed to spend, in order to get a modicum of performance out of these machines. I initially signed up with a VPS I found on LowEndBox (shoutout to the awesome deals one may find there), but three months hence, I got anno…
- [Virtualmin and 127.0.0.2 loopback on OpenVZ VPS servers](https://tim.sodhis.org/virtualmin-and-127-0-0-2-loopback-on-openvz-vps-servers.md) - I’ve gingerly stepped into the world of being a SysAdmin, and what better way to delve into the thick of things than to manage a VPS? To that end I signed up for a great deal at Nodeserve for an unmanaged DDOS protected OpenVZ VPS and have been using my free time in the evenings to set things up. N…
- [Return of a Titan](https://tim.sodhis.org/return-of-a-titan.md) - No, I don’t just mean yours truly. Although just so much has happened in the interim between the last update and now. For one, we moved across the country, leaving the cold Buffalo winters behind and saying hello to 70F winters in Florida. Ah, the Bay area, with the best beach in the country some 3…
- [Using Composer in shared hosts with allow_url_fopen off.](https://tim.sodhis.org/composer-phar.md) - (AKA Using composer on hosts where one may not have root privileges). Due to the nature of the servers used by a few clients, I found myself scratching my head on how best to use Composer on these shared hosts. I hate having to require files from all over the place, it just rubs me the wrong way. S…
- [Excellent primer on Git](https://tim.sodhis.org/excellent-primer-on-git.md) - I must admit I have been living under a rock. I started off with SVN back in 2009, and have been using it faithfully for years now (six and counting). What was all the rage back then, soon lost its favor come the 2010s, but due to SVN being bundled with XCode, I continued to use it on my Mac, and M…
- [Making my way back...](https://tim.sodhis.org/making-my-way-back.md) - It has been too long of a break. What was meant as a sojourn turned into something near permanence. I remember my last post here. It was the day that Steve Jobs died. After his death, it was difficult to muster up the same enthusiasm and fervor for Apple and Apple products/software. Yet nearly four…
- [Goodbye, Steve Jobs.](https://tim.sodhis.org/goodbye-steve-jobs.md) - The world has lost a visionary. The founder, and artist extraordinaire, Steve Jobs breathed his last this evening at ~ 7:30PM EST. He died peacefully, surrounded by family, leaving behind millions of fans, shell-shocked and grieving. He embodied Apple, and transformed it from the failure it was bac…
- [OS X Lion on Gigabyte P55A-UD4P](https://tim.sodhis.org/os-x-lion-on-gigabyte-p55a-ud4p.md) - Greetings all. OS X 10.7 or Lion is out and available on the Mac App Store (MAS). Like it, love it, or loathe it, it is an evolutionary step in the progression of OSX. While the direction Apple is going in, with the new UI can be debated for hours, there is no denying the fact that millions will sw…
- [Logitech Quickcam Microphone not working - a solution](https://tim.sodhis.org/logitech-quickcam-microphone-not-working-a-solution.md) - Logitech’s Quickcam HD Cameras (particularly Pro 9000 HD) are good choices for the Hackintosh inclined. However, the Mics on these cameras are rather fickle in their relationship with OSX. There are numerous support requests in the Logitech forums from users who bought the non-mac variation of thes…
- [TRIM on OSX 10.6.7 is a-go for Corsair F120](https://tim.sodhis.org/trim-on-osx-10-6-7-is-a-go-for-corsair-f120.md) - I recently upgraded my main OSX HDD to a Corsair F120GB2 SSD. Boasting a Sandforce controller, which in absence of TRIM (or in addition to), performs aggressive Garbage Collection (GC) on the SSD, this particular SSD caught my interest because of the best transfer rates in its class. The Sandforce…
- [Back again after a brief outage](https://tim.sodhis.org/back-again-after-a-brief-outage.md) - Back last month, a sudden spike in the number of visitors to this site caused the shared hosting server I use (Hostgator) to spiral out of control. This, inevitably caused the provider to block my site. It was, succinctly put, a headache to get the blog back up and running again. But, after install…
- [Reeder for OSX is out](https://tim.sodhis.org/reeder-for-osx-is-out.md) - At least in beta, but the best, most minimalist, intuitive RSS reader for iPad and iPhone is now on OSX! Enter Reeder. The developers hit gold with their implementation of a beautiful, three-paned design for iPad, and iPhone. This has now been ported over to OSX. I have been playing around with it…
- [10.6.5 brings ExFAT - makes sharing files between OSX and Windows easier!](https://tim.sodhis.org/10-6-5-brings-exfat-makes-sharing-files-between-osx-and-windows-easier.md) - EDIT on 02/16/2011 – It works again! 10.6.6. Seems the bug was ironed out on 10.6.6. Thanks all who reported it. I didn’t have the chance to test it out on a Win7 machine (as I was fresh out of one). EDIT on 12/09/2010 – As Clinton pointed out in the comments below, a partition formatted in OSX as…
- [Best bandwidth monitor for Snow Leopard or Leopard](https://tim.sodhis.org/best-bandwidth-monitor-for-snow-leopard-or-leopard.md) - There has been a lot of debate over the lack of bandwidth monitor apps for OSX. Many will point the clueless reader to iStat Menus, and other such pointless apps, which don’t maintain the amount of data transferred, after a reboot. For Windows there’s the inimitable DuMeter, but nothing did I know…
- [AVCHD Editing on Mac revisited](https://tim.sodhis.org/avchd-editing-on-mac-revisited.md) - I recently purchased a Panasonic HDC-SD600 camcorder – featuring full HD 1080p recording options and OIS to boot. While I cannot praise the camera enough, the workflow for editing an AVCHD file on a Mac leaves something to be desired. The fact remains that even after nearly four years of widespread…
- [Starcraft II on Mac, vs Windows - performance](https://tim.sodhis.org/starcraft-ii-on-mac-vs-windows-performance.md) - O Starcraft II, the brainchild of Blizzard Entertainment, why doest thou suffer so under Mac OSX? I tried cajoling, I tried upgrades, and I tried updates, all to no avail. Mac fanatics and die-hards at Mac oriented forums will castigate me for this, but it is true, Mac OSX is simply not conducive t…
- [My new Hackintosh - Core i7 860 on GA - P55A - UD4P (v1)](https://tim.sodhis.org/my-new-hackintosh-core-i7-860-on-ga-p55a-ud4p-v1.md) - It took me some time, but after a lot of work and sweat, I am on a stable OSX (10.6.4) install on a Core i7 system. What a beast of a machine! I have it running stable, with an uptime of nearly eighteen days. The machine specs follow:- * Core i7 860 Quad Core @ 2.8 GHz * 4 8 GB DDR3 RAM @ 1600MHz *…
- [A post from Windows Live Writer Beta](https://tim.sodhis.org/a-post-from-windows-live-writer-beta.md) - Yes, the switch has taken place. Stay tuned, yet again.
- [Watch this space...](https://tim.sodhis.org/watch-this-space.md) - I am going back to my roots. OSX is a dish best served Hackintosh’d. An iMac was my cowardly way out. But that is history, the iMac’s on eBay and I am going back to my Hackintosh. Watch this space as I journal my way back, and get back up to speed with the developments since November ’09. Many more…
- [iBooks v1.1 is out!!](https://tim.sodhis.org/ibooks-v1-1-is-out.md) - With the advent of iOS 4.0, Apple just released iBooks 1.1 and my my, the best reader app just got better! Featuring syncing of places, bookmarks, notes between devices. This is HUGE! It works seamlessly – any changes made on your iPhone, or your iPad are immediately synced to your iTunes account O…
- [Wowza, Calendar and Notes syncing with Google on iOS 4.0](https://tim.sodhis.org/wowza-calendar-and-notes-syncing-with-google-on-ios-4-0.md) - iOS 4.0 is almost upon us, and with the plethora of features implemented, including multi-tasking (which works according to the Apple definition of multi-tasking), folders, and a shiny new UI, there is an easter egg that I knew nothing about, till I set out to include my GMail account. The biggest…
- [iPhone 4 ordered](https://tim.sodhis.org/iphone-4-ordered.md) - The guests are met, the feast is set, mayst hear the merry din! So spake the ancient Mariner. But here we are, about five hours into the iPhone 4 pre-order mania, and though the process has been painful at best, our orders are in. Though not with Apple.com, we did manage to get the order through wi…
- [iCal corrupt, MobileMe not syncing - a fix](https://tim.sodhis.org/ical-corrupt-mobileme-not-syncing-a-fix.md) - And so it came to pass. On a fresh install of the OS, 10.6.3, I chose the usual MobileMe options, to sync my Bookmarks, Calendars, Notes, and Contacts from the cloud. A few hours later, I noticed that none of my iCal calendars made it down from the cloud. Nada, nothing! There seemed to be nothing w…
- [MS Office 2011 Beta 4 - 100526](https://tim.sodhis.org/ms-office-2011-beta-4-100526.md) - Since I posted my review, MS Office for Mac 2011 Beta 4 is out. It seems that the only difference is that there aren’t any VBA errors in the build. Regardless, if you have access, download the update!
- [MS Office for Mac 2011 Beta 3 - mini review](https://tim.sodhis.org/ms-office-for-mac-2011-beta-3-mini-review.md) - The third beta of the new, re-polished MS Office for Mac 2011 is out. Written from the ground up in Cocoa, it look and feels like a real Mac app. Gone is the clunky Carbon interface, and the slow, unresponsive GUI. This version, though still in Beta, is a vast improvement over its predecessor which…
- [Highlight Stacks](https://tim.sodhis.org/highlight-stacks.md) - Remember the good old days of Leopard? You’d click on a stack, and a lengthy while later, it would pop-up a list of your documents, apps or what have you, with a nice halo around the hovered item. Come Snow Leopard, and Apple has fixed many of the endearing waits for the stacks to open/render, but…
- [Plex for Mac, a sneak peek at v9](https://tim.sodhis.org/plex-for-mac-a-sneak-peek-at-v9.md) - Version 9 has been a long time coming. Most had given the idea up, as vaporware, and pure conjecture. The kind of tales you send kids to bed with. But here it is, video evidence that it exists! For those who aren’t in the loop, Plex is an offshoot of XBMC a media center app for the Mac. In its curr…
- [Penultimate for iPad update - wrist protection](https://tim.sodhis.org/penultimate-for-ipad-update-wrist-protection.md) - What a wonderful update waiting for me this morning – Penultimate with wrist-protection! The problem of capacitive multi-touch screens is that they don’t lend themselves to scribbling notes with your finger or an appropriate stylus. Natural note taking (and believe you me, I know a thing or two abo…
- [Back again, for real.](https://tim.sodhis.org/back-again-for-real-2.md) - It has been a while since I last updated this blog. Rest assured I have been working quite hard, updating myself, as well as my gadget collection in the meantime. First things first. Yours truly won an iPad, mid-April, in an awesome giveaway sponsored by a leading gadget site. Needless to say I am…
- [Back!](https://tim.sodhis.org/back.md) - After a prolonged vacation in India – marred by illness, I am back home. It was loud, hotter than hell, dirty, dusty and so crowded, but it was my home in India. We just had an amazing time, when I was up and able. We managed to visit Mount Abu and Jaipur this time, however would’ve liked to visit…
- [EOS T2i announced!](https://tim.sodhis.org/eos-t2i-announced.md) - This is the camera I am going for. DSLR and 1080p (variable frame rate) video, how could anyone ask for anything more? Read more @ Gizmodo
- [Socialite (formerly Eventbox) ideal mate for Google Reader](https://tim.sodhis.org/socialite-formerly-eventbox-ideal-mate-for-google-reader.md) - For the longest time I resisted RSS feeds, dismissing them as too cumbersome to keep track of, and rather too concise for my needs. Over time though, with the plethora of sites I keep track of, not to mention the trackers and feeds for breaking news on CNN, BBC, I decided to make the shift to RSS.…
- [iPad is out... GOTS TO HAVE IT](https://tim.sodhis.org/ipad-is-out-gots-to-have-it.md) - Oh wow. Just wow. For that price. Can’t say no.
- [Snow Leopard 965P DS3/DS4 - Extra Extensions Folder](https://tim.sodhis.org/snow-leopard-965p-ds3ds4-extra-extensions-folder.md) - Hi all, by popular demand – here are the contents of my /Extra folder, including the working DSDT.aml and the extensions (kexts) therein. These work superb on my 965P-DS4 system, and should work for those with the DS3 motherboards as well. Let me know how it goes! http://www.mediafire.com/?4nxvnbn2…
- [AVCHD Lite vs Motion JPEG - editing ease on the Mac](https://tim.sodhis.org/avchd-lite-vs-motion-jpeg-editing-ease-on-the-mac.md) - UPDATE: 11/05/10 – Thanks to your insightful comments, I have written a new article on AVCHD editing on OSX. With the new camera come a whole slew of editing questions – which format is better, which format lends to easy editing, which format produces the best audio/video… To better educate myself…
- [Panasonic Lumix ZS3/TZ7 Videos with Snow Leopard](https://tim.sodhis.org/panasonic-lumix-zs3tz7-videos-with-snow-leopard.md) - This holiday season, my not-so trusty Sony Handycam SR300 succumbed to the black LCD syndrome. Really tired of spending upwards of $150 each time, getting it repaired, I decided in favor of moving to a new and better camcorder. The governing factors in the choice of a new video device were:- 1. Pri…
- [Happy New Year!](https://tim.sodhis.org/happy-new-year.md) - And here’s to a lot of New Year cheer and the prospects of greater expansion of our OSX expertise and know-how!
- [Snow Leopard on my 965P - File Server](https://tim.sodhis.org/snow-leopard-on-my-965p-file-server.md) - As I mentioned in my previous post, I decided to relegate my main machine (Gigabyte 965P – DS4) to a file server. I decided to go the no-hassles route and installed Windows 7. After painstakingly converting all my drives back to NTFS, I found to my chagrin, the great amount of lag when opening a ne…
- [Long time, no see](https://tim.sodhis.org/long-time-no-see-2.md) - Indeed, it has been forever since my last update. How better to cap this year, than with a post about what I have been up to, the latter quarter of 2009. Things have been going rather smoothly over the past three months. I finally have fully converted to the Mac side. Our home is now rigged with Ma…
- [SABnzbd+ on OSX FTW!](https://tim.sodhis.org/sabnzbd-on-osx-ftw.md) - The battle was hard-fought and indeed, I tried to stick by Panic.com’s Unison for as long as I could, but eventually I had to give in, and I proclaim the prominence and sing the virtues of a new Newsgroup Binary Client for every platform – SABnzbd. If you download Binaries from the NNTP, be it newe…
- [Syncing Apps via Dropbox on OSX - HOWTO](https://tim.sodhis.org/syncing-apps-via-dropbox-on-osx-howto.md) - I must admit I am one of the later adopters of the sensation rocking the world – DropBox. Until recently, I was convinced that I really didn’t need FileSync over and above what my trusty External HDD provides. I work extensively on my MacBook Pro at work, and back home I have my trusty Hackintosh (…
- [Chameleon 2 RC3 & EFI String Graphics Issues](https://tim.sodhis.org/chameleon-2-rc3-efi-string-graphics-issues.md) - So I am back from an extended road-trip with former colleagues from the Netherlands. It was an enjoyable trip that took us 1300 miles from home to Catskill, New York, and Washington DC, and back again, with stops here and there. I am headed back to work after a long break, and I must admit I did mi…
- [Boot 132 Snow Leopard finally here.](https://tim.sodhis.org/boot-132-snow-leopard-finally-here.md) - Seems that booting the retail Snow Leopard DVD on a Hackintosh is now possible with a new release of Boot132. Insanelymac has more information. I am going to try this later this week.
- [Snow Leopard on Gigabyte 965P-DS3 or DS4 motherboard, a brief guide.](https://tim.sodhis.org/snow-leopard-on-gigabyte-965p-ds3-or-ds4-motherboard-a-brief-guide.md) - This post has been a long time coming. I had promised something on these lines the previous week when I managed to boot my Hackintosh (see specs) in Snow Leopard. Like almost everyone, I installed from Leopard on to another partition. Wrought with its own challenges, this is however, the easiest wa…
- [Snow Leopard on 965P-DS3 or DS4 - 64 Bit goodness!](https://tim.sodhis.org/snow-leopard-on-965p-ds3-or-ds4-64-bit-goodness.md) - It’s here, and it is spectacular. The proof is in the pudding. More details to follow – installation guides, and kexts etc. In the meantime, search for 965P-DS4 on InsanelyMac. W00t.
- [Finally, Retail Leopard on Gigabyte 965P-DS3](https://tim.sodhis.org/finally-retail-leopard-on-gigabyte-965p-ds3.md) - Not a how-to A lot has happened in the OSX86 world. From its humble beginnings back in 2006, when it was the playground of the extremely talented few, and OSX installations were wrought with issues, to the “boom” period when large number of “distros” were the call of the day, and industrious users…
- [Textmate and SVN](https://tim.sodhis.org/textmate-and-svn.md) - The shift was overdue. Although Coda, my dev app of choice, offers everything a hobbyist programmer would need, it fails miserably on one aspect. Namely, code folding. For a long time, this trade-off seemed to still justify the use of this app for day-to-day development needs, in light of its other…
- [Open or Export CHM files on OS X](https://tim.sodhis.org/open-or-export-chm-files-on-os-x.md) - CHM files are the de-facto distribution standard of e-books in some circles (O’Reilly) etc, and though these can be opened natively on a Windows machine, the same cannot be said for OSX. One of the best (though certainly not the most popular for some reason) app for opening CHM files on OSX is iCHM…
- [OS X 10.5.8 is out - Choppy performance is back](https://tim.sodhis.org/os-x-10-5-8-is-out-choppy-performance-is-back.md) - Apple released Leopard 10.5.8 a few days back. The update went without a hitch on my MacBook Pro. The story on my Hackintosh isn’t so great. The choppy performance issues are back, after having been wiped clean in 10.5.7. Argh. I reinstalled OSX to no avail. I nearly borked my system in the process…
- [CoreAVC with Windows 7 RTM take 2](https://tim.sodhis.org/coreavc-with-windows-7-rtm-take-2.md) - Windows 7 RTM has been leaked. That’s old information. Most of us have it running on our systems already, with a 30 day grace period (maybe more with a rearm). I too snapped up a copy of the RTM from the interwebs when it came out on July 14th. Since then I have updated my HTPC and the Windows Mach…
- [Movie Collector 3 Pro is out - please stay away!](https://tim.sodhis.org/movie-collector-3-pro-is-out-please-stay-away.md) - Scathing review alert. I just got an email from Collectorz.com proclaiming “benefits and features” available to the Windows users of Movie Collector have now been released for the Mac platform in the latest version of this Movie catalog software. One phrase comes to mind – STAY away. The biggest re…
- [Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac SP2, Spaces issues still remain](https://tim.sodhis.org/microsoft-office-2008-for-mac-sp2-spaces-issues-still-remain.md) - It has been a few days since this update came out. I wanted to blog this earlier, however, just have been so busy at work, that I haven’t had time for jacques. I downloaded SP2 for Office 2008 as soon as it was announced on MacBU. I didn’t expect much, and didn’t even bother to read the release not…
- [iPhone 3GS - Week 4 and all is Great!](https://tim.sodhis.org/iphone-3gs-week-4-and-all-is-great.md) - Week 4, and the iPhone 3GS is chugging away like a champ. Having upgraded from a 1G 4GB iPhone to this beast, I am continually impressed by its speed, features, capabilities and the vast array of possibilities. Initially I resisted the temptation to Jailbreak my iPhone. I figured Jailbreak is just…
- [Windows 7 Build 7600 - RTM?](https://tim.sodhis.org/windows-7-build-7600-rtm.md) - Leaked on the Interwebz last evening, build 7600 x64 is being touted as the Window 7 RTM (Release To Manufacturing and not Read The Man). I was of course eager to try this build out, and a couple of minutes later I took it for a test run on my Windows PC. The verdict is – “hmm”. In part due to the…
- [Leopard - Desktop Wallpaper Location](https://tim.sodhis.org/leopard-desktop-wallpaper-location.md) - I have often wondered where Leopard (OSX) stores the stock Wallpapers available in the Desktop Option in System Preferences. A bit of digging led me to the location. /Volumes/’YourMacHD’/Library/Desktop Pictures/ Where ‘YourMacHD’ is the volume on which OSX is installed. I was rather surprised at f…
- [My New iPhone 3GS. Just wow.](https://tim.sodhis.org/my-new-iphone-3gs-just-wow.md) - Ladies and Gentlemen, it is here. My new Black 32GB iPhone 3GS is finally here. All the way from Shenzhen, China, making its way through Anchorage, Memphis and finally in my hands, this lil’ beauty was well worth the wait. The S, is it for Speed? is it for Superb? Is it for Simply Fantastic? All of…
- [TomTom coming to the iPhone 3.0.](https://tim.sodhis.org/tomtom-coming-to-the-iphone-3-0.md) - Yet another reason to upgrade the Firmware and get on the 3G Bandwagon.
- [iPhone OS 3.0 - almost perfect](https://tim.sodhis.org/iphone-os-30-almost-perfect.md) - I know it is early, and the official release isn’t till the 17th of this month, but I couldn’t help looking around at the NZB world for the OS 3.0. To my delight, I found it on the first query for my phone. Downloaded and installed, I am just delighted with the new OS. First and foremost – SEARCH!…
- [Back from Disney](https://tim.sodhis.org/back-from-disney.md) - After a week of intense fun and excitement at the Walt Disney World in FL, we are back home, and are certainly feeling the Disney Withdrawal Syndrome. A skeptic to begin with, I ventured forth a week back, not knowing what to expect. Conscious of the Disney brand and the fact that we were being sub…
- [DXVA, CoreAVC - x.264 & MKV playback in Windows 7 RC](https://tim.sodhis.org/dxva-coreavc-x264-mkv-playback-in-windows-7-rc.md) - With the advent of the latest and greatest of Microsoft’s OSs – Windows 7 – come a slew of issues with the reliable playback of HD videos that we have lying around in our collections. According to specs, Windows 7 RC1 shipped with an x.264 decoder built in. However this is far from a panacea for th…
- [The Infallibly Polite Alarm Clock](https://tim.sodhis.org/the-infallibly-polite-alarm-clock.md) - Presenting the infallibly polite speaking alarm clock. Wakes you up in the morning with a polite, almost apologetic message. Excuse me sir, I’m so sorry to disturb you, but it appears to be morning… very inconvenient, I agree… I believe it is the rotation of the Earth that is to blame, sir. Featuri…
- [New ACDSee Pro Beta for Mac - mini review](https://tim.sodhis.org/acdsee-pro-beta-for-mac-is-out.md) - The day one has waited for with baited breath, the Software one assumed would never be seen again on the Mac, the grand daddy of all image and file managers – ACDSee has arrived for the Mac OSX platform after a gap of nearly ten years. Ecstatic, enthused, just plain over the top happy to see this A…
- [Yep PDF document management](https://tim.sodhis.org/yep-pdf-document-management.md) - If you revel in scanning your documents and keeping an e-trace of all your correspondence, Yep is the PDF document management system for you. Yep organizes PDF files and allows you to tag them automatically based on the contents of the documents or define your own tags. For academic papers, it can…
- [10.5.7 and all is well.](https://tim.sodhis.org/1057-and-all-is-well.md) - Tuesday marked the release of the newest security and incremental patch for Leopard, OS 10.5. I am glad to report that upgrading from Software Update went well on my iPC Hackie. And a pic to prove the same. Cheers!
- [Star Trek - the reboot & rebirth](https://tim.sodhis.org/star-trek-the-reboot-rebirth.md) - The most widely anticipated and sought after film in the Trekker-dom, this film could not have been built up enough in my head. Rissa will testify that as the days counted down to the 05/08 release, I just have been going nuts – humming the intro music to the Original Series, talking like Shatner,…
- [MultiFirefox - Multiple Firefox Profile Manager](https://tim.sodhis.org/multifirefox-multiple-firefox-profile-manager.md) - You could do it with a shell script, or you could create multiple profiles using the profile manager in Firefox and launch it every time to select a profile. Or you could use MultiFirefox, an app that has made web development and testing so much easier. As any informed web developer would testify,…
- [First Impressions: Windows 7 RC1 (7100)](https://tim.sodhis.org/first-impressions-windows-7-rc1-7100.md) - I am back again after a long sojourn! While I was down and out, I did get the chance though, to play around with Windows 7 RC1. I am flummoxed at this release from Microsoft. Windows 7 comes as a whiff of fresh air to the souls stuck in the Vista purgatory. It is a huge step forth, even for those w…
- [Windows 7 RC1 (Build Ver 7100) leaked on the Interwebz](https://tim.sodhis.org/windows-7-rc1-build-ver-7100-leaked-on-the-interwebz.md) - This bit of news comes close on the heels of signs from Redmond on progressive builds of the latest and perhaps the greatest of Microsoft’s releases in a while (at least since XP) – Windows 7. News around the blogs and tech sites are exclaiming that leaked copies of the first Release Candidate (RC1…
- [Remove Attachments in Apple Mail ⌘](https://tim.sodhis.org/remove-attachments-in-apple-mail--e2-8c-98.md) - Right under my nose all the time, and never did I actually care to look for it, but rather bemoaned the lack of a “remove attachments” feature in Apple Mail. You see, I was looking in all the “wrong” places, namely in the contextual menu when one right clicks an email in Apple Mail. Other clients l…
- [How to edit the Normal template in Mac Word 2008](https://tim.sodhis.org/how-to-edit-the-normal-template-in-mac-word-2008.md) - As I began to rely solely on Word 2008 for my needs, I found myself messing around with the app to customize it to my needs. One of the first and most basic issues I faced from the get-go was using my own “Normal.dotm” template, as well as my letterhead. I could of course double click on the templa…
- [Time Warner Caps Dropped! Victory!](https://tim.sodhis.org/time-warner-caps-dropped-victory.md) - We won! Perhaps… but it is a start. Time Warner has dropped its plans to enforce Bandwidth caps across Texas and NY! Though with caveats, this is a great day! And that too, after I had ranted on in the previous post. Seems Senator Schumer’s displeasure was the push needed to bring down this ill-con…
- [Time Warner bandwidth caps in Texas and NY](https://tim.sodhis.org/time-warner-bandwidth-caps-in-texas-and-ny.md) - In this age of ubiquitous Internet access, not to mention the plethora of content that has been migrated from more traditional delivery media, to online repositories (read Hulu, CBS, etc), it is preposterous to even conceive, much less bring into regulation, that which is anathema for all dedicated…
- [We didn't start the flame war...](https://tim.sodhis.org/we-didnt-start-the-flame-war.md) - Epic lulz…. Just could not stop laughing. If you frequent Digg, or any of the other such copycat sites, you’d know why… FTW!
- [The latest Macbook Air killer falls flat - Dell Adamo](https://tim.sodhis.org/the-latest-macbook-air-killer-falls-flat-dell-adamo.md) - A very interesting article on this much awaited “Macbook Air killer”. Engadget dismisses this upstart with a low rating and a much deserved slapping around. Read here. $2000+ for this monstrosity, please… …but you’ve got to be pretty shallow to spend $2000 on a system and not care how it performs.
- [Welcome to a new home & a new domain!](https://tim.sodhis.org/welcome-to-a-new-home-a-new-domain.md) - The transition is complete! The old blog has been moved to the current address, and all are advised to refresh the feeds. Of course, the old blog will always redirect here, and so will the individual articles (from Google). The process was quite straightforward, and included a lot of SQL, as well a…
- [WRT54G2 - a cheap Wireless Adapter for the XBox 360](https://tim.sodhis.org/dd-wrt-and-a-cheap-wireless-device-for-the-xbox-360.md) - Success! After Drew in our office pointed me to a Gizmodo article mentioning how to create a cheap Wireless Device for the XBox 360 using custom firmware, I was all raring to give it a go. As one might know, an XBox Wireless Adapter retails for around a hundred dollars, and even with smart bargain…
- [Uploading images to Wordpress = FAIL?](https://tim.sodhis.org/uploading-images-to-wordpress-fail.md) - From the start, whenever I tried to upload a larger file to WordPress from an external editor, I always ran into an “500 Internal Server Error”. Just how many images etc did I have to scale down because of this, I alone know. I decided to get off my bum and research this a bit, and found that it is…
- [Trying out Blogo](https://tim.sodhis.org/trying-out-blogo.md) - My search for a reliable and aesthetically pleasing offline blog editor for Mac has led me to Blogo. I am excoriating myself for never having tried this puppy out earlier. I am so impressed by how easy this app makes blogging – every aspect from writing (in full screen mode when one needs to concen…
- [CookBook Pro](https://tim.sodhis.org/cookbook-pro.md) - Impossibly hot – that was my proclamation right after I performed surgery on the MacBook Pro. It was uncomfortably hot around the area where the magsafe adapter plugs in, with temperatures ranging from 160-190 F (70C-90C for the metric minded) for the GPU Diode and similar for the CPU. Many fanbois…
- [My New Toy - me new XBox360](https://tim.sodhis.org/my-new-toy-me-new-xbox360.md) - This post is hopelessly delayed and you’ll soon know why – but what a wonderful gift was I surprised with, on my birthday! Yes, this old man carved out another notch in the life chain on the 16th. Thanks you. But to the topic at hand! Rissa’s mom, dad and grandparents came to our place to celebrate…
- [Color Dropper in Leopard](https://tim.sodhis.org/color-dropper-in-leopard.md) - One of the more useful features included in Leopard, and indispensible to nearly all Graphic artists and web developers alike is the system-wide Color Dropper included in Leopard – the "DigitalColor Meter". Fire it off from Spotlight or for you anal people – it is Applications-> Utilities -> Digita…
- [The Bubble Guy of Allen Street](https://tim.sodhis.org/the-bubble-guy-of-allen-street.md) - The Bubbles Guy of Allen Street, known best as The Bubble Guy, has been bringing smiles to faces of countless, and has been brightening up the day (and the sky) for many, since about seven years now, with the simple act of blowing bubbles from his third storey apartment on the corner of Allen and E…
- [WordPress automatic upgrade fails - solution](https://tim.sodhis.org/wordpress-automatic-upgrade-fails-solution.md) - If faced with a non-starter upgrade process when trying to auto-update to the latest version of WordPress (from 2.7 to 2.7.1 for instance), make sure your server can handle PHP5. Adding the following line to .htaccess file on your root (between the # BEGIN WordPress and #END WordPress lines) will e…
- [New look...](https://tim.sodhis.org/new-look.md) - Presenting the newly reconstructed Tim Sodhi’s Weblog! Featuring mods of a numerous themes available, as well as some of my own hacks thrown in, this is the new face of my blog. Welcome one and all. It has been forever since I updated the look and feel of my blog. Truth is, the previous theme I cre…
- [Coda SVN support with Versions](https://tim.sodhis.org/coda-svn-support-with-versions.md) - For the unlucky few who don’t have SVN (Subversion) repositories set up for them: hosting one’s own SVN repositories might be the only solution. While Leopard ships with Apache2 and SVN support, enabling and configuring the same is tedious. This site walks through the entire process. For my needs t…
- [MacBook Pro Pr0n](https://tim.sodhis.org/macbook-pro-pr0n.md) - As promised here are the much anticipated porn pics – of the MacBook Pro kinds. The tease, strutting its stuff. Oh la la la! Naughty naughty! Does Stevie know? The Money shot! Am partial to the tops anyways. And that concludes this presentation. Time to bring your pulses down a bit… stay tuned for…
- [iLife '09 and Face Detection in iPhoto](https://tim.sodhis.org/ilife-09-and-face-detection-in-iphoto.md) - I have been asked numerous times in the last few weeks how I feel about the new iLife 2009 suite, and I have been noncommittal at best due to lack of time to actually work with the apps. No more, I say. The last few days I have delved deep into the app usage, and I am quite impressed. Though the ch…
- [Duplicate Mount Points after improper restart in Leopard](https://tim.sodhis.org/duplicate-mount-points-after-improper-restart-in-leopard.md) - This has been happening since a long time now. Sometimes when I need to cold-boot my Leopard installations, I log back in to my Desktop just to see everything has gone awry. Preferences for all my applications have been reset and my Documents are nowhere to be found. My only solution then had been…
- [Australian Open - the Hooligan's Grand Slam](https://tim.sodhis.org/australian-open-the-hooligans-grand-slam.md) - The Australian Open Grand Slam event in tennis is regarded as one of the four hallowed grounds for all Tennis players, professional or amateur. Is the appellation founded? The others being the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open. Each, as I wrote once before, are characterized by unique traits,…
- [Renamer4Mac - Renaming in OSX](https://tim.sodhis.org/renamer4mac-renaming-in-osx.md) - After my brief sojourn in Microsoft land, I heralded my return to OSX by addressing a long neglected sorting need. Over the months and years, my e-book and e-comic collection has grown by leaps and bounds. Whatever I finds, I downloads – has been the mantra. While this is fine for bigger downloads…
- [Windows 7: First impressions - Vista, done right](https://tim.sodhis.org/windows-7-first-impressions-vista-done-right.md) - Joining the millions who brought down Microsoft servers when Windows 7 Beta went live, I booked my place in the starting lineup to get the latest and best OS to come out of Redmond thus far. Yes, there I said it, Windows 7 is the hands down, complete winner, and it has not even reached GM status. I…
- [Testdrive Windows 7 Beta 1](https://tim.sodhis.org/testdrive-windows-7-beta-1.md) - Usually the prerogative of MSDN Technet Subscribers and *Arr Matey’s* – starting this afternoon, the average Joe Six-pack will be able to download the latest beta version of Microsoft’s next gen OS – Windows 7, for free! Starting from 12:00PM PST (or 3:00PM EST), interested users can download the l…
- [Happy New Year and MacWorld '09](https://tim.sodhis.org/happy-new-year-and-macworld-09.md) - A very happy and prosperous new year to one and all! I have been tardy in blogging so far this year, but as this blog reaches its second anniversary (check the archives for posts from ’06), I find myself growing inadvertently busier and less inclined to type out a post. But I will try and keep up.…
- [Still in Indiana, Merry Christmas!](https://tim.sodhis.org/still-in-indiana-merry-christmas.md) - Or rather, Boxing day! The morning of the boxing day finds us still in Indiana, after a very successful Christmas bash at Jen’s. Ate till I could eat no more, and then stuffed myself some more. Quite remarkable the propensity of a person to stuff oneself disregarding conventional wisdom. No wonder…
- [Temperature dips!](https://tim.sodhis.org/temperature-dips.md) - We are in Indiana for the holidays, and having a great time with Jen, Sam and the kids. The kids keep getting bigger each time we see them! Of course they are really curious about my beautiful MacBook Pro and are ever too eager to claw at it. Who can blame them, it Is a majestic machine worthy of t…
- [Updates to the site...](https://tim.sodhis.org/updates-to-the-site.md) - I undertook a poignant journey down the road this evening, updating my current blog with posts from my iWeb blog from back in the day (not so far away). Reading of my excesses at the Winter School in Innsbruck last year, brought a smile to my visage. Snow angels, a multitude of brews and a whole lo…
- [Theater and a concert](https://tim.sodhis.org/theater-and-a-concert.md) - I have been meaning to blog of late, but due to the pressing demands of work and the relaxation that follows at home, I have been unable to garner enough time and enthusiasm to blog one out. What follows is an apology post – of sorts. On the sixth of this month, Rissa and I attended a performance o…
- [XSlimmer - trim the fat](https://tim.sodhis.org/xslimmer-trim-the-fat.md) - I recently decided to give those "How-to-make-my-mac-go-faster" self help articles a shot. I usually steer clear of these articles/videos, for most of them assume a pedantic tone in peddling their hardly sage advice, and rather turn me off. But the other day I had the good fortune of reading one su…
- [Black Friday and new hosts!](https://tim.sodhis.org/black-friday-and-new-hosts.md) - The wonderful Thanksgiving feast being over, the day after is celebrated across the land with a fit of shopping frenzy aptly named "Black Friday". Retailers chop their margins razor thin to move their inventory, and attract customers by the droves for the holiday blowout extravaganza. If one is can…
- [Unison - backing up and restoring the app](https://tim.sodhis.org/unison-backing-up-and-restoring-the-app.md) - It is common knowledge that after Tally reintroduced me to the world of NNTP, I have come to depend on News for my very life. An endless source of latest distros and what not, the NNTP experience can be as good as, or as horrid as your News Reader. For ages I had relied on Outlook Express on XP for…
- [OSX and Trophy wives](https://tim.sodhis.org/osx-and-trophy-wives.md) - Overheard in a conversation this afternoon. “OS X now that’s like a trophy wife. She doesn’t cook or clean, do anything useful with her time, and throws hissy fits, but you keep her around… because oh look, so pretty”. Pretty much sums it up. Shame on me, swinging from one extreme to the other. Oh…
- [Back to the basics](https://tim.sodhis.org/back-to-the-basics.md) - In a move sure to shock the legions, Tim moved, fully and completely back to Windows Vista. Shocked onlookers were observed remarking “This is a temporary reversal, he’ll be back”, while others in the sphere were seen thumb-in-mouth, curled up in the fetal position, muttering “what will become of u…
- [Living it up in Indiana!](https://tim.sodhis.org/living-it-up-in-indiana.md) - A beautiful Sunday afternoon finds us in Indiana, visiting Rissa’s sister in good ol’ Anderson. We’ve been here since Thursday and my the time has really flown by! It is just so great seeing the lil’ kiddos again – one would swear they grow each time we see them (though it may be just weeks apart).…
- [On the road to VT](https://tim.sodhis.org/on-the-road-to-vt.md) - On the road to VT, am blogging from a rest stop near Utica, NY. A perfect trip thus far, we just stopped for lunch at Sbarro (worst slices ever, stay away!!) and are in queue for lattes. Another 300 or so miles to go on this gorgeous day. Can’t wait till Vermont!
- [Digital Rebel XSi](https://tim.sodhis.org/digital-rebel-xsi.md) - After a seemingly endless wait over the weekend, the newest member of our family of cameras was finally delivered this afternoon by our friendly UPS guy. A brand new spanking Digital Rebel XSi, or 450D for the rest of the world. I immediately delved into the manual and found myself snapping picture…
- [Wedding bells...](https://tim.sodhis.org/wedding-bells.md) - How does one express in mere words how perfect the wedding weekend was. The culmination of my hopes and dreams, to be one with the love of my life, to be joined in holy matrimony with the one I want to grow old with, to raise a family with, to go through each day of my life with her hand in mine, i…
- [Post surgery, all is well](https://tim.sodhis.org/post-surgery-all-is-well.md) - Thanks all for your good wishes, Tallytje and De Jong and everyone else. The surgery procedure went well, I was in and out within 30 minutes… reduced right now to a swollen ol man with a throbbing pain, and full of antibiotics and painkillers. Just a wee update m8s!
- [Save me and all that](https://tim.sodhis.org/save-me-and-all-that.md) - Sunday, the lord’s day, I have finally recuperated enough from the searing pain to take up my laptop again and pen in a blog post. The last few days have just been horrid. It began with toothache that was quickly suppressed with an analgesic or two, and it grew into this monstrous pain to end all p…
- [Let's Rock!](https://tim.sodhis.org/lets-rock.md) - Excited about Genius in iTunes 8! More as the announcements drip in. Edit – after trying out iTunes 8, and Genius, I must say I am rather underwhelmed by the track suggestions. Clearly an Apple attempt to replace Pandora, which indeed simply has no counterpart at this time. Add to that the Pandora…
- [Blogpost from my iPhone](https://tim.sodhis.org/blogpost-from-my-iphone.md) - Just a test from the WordPress app on the iPhone. It seems to work great!
- [Flickr and iPhone](https://tim.sodhis.org/flickr-and-iphone.md) - Let me take you back for a minute here, to the days of yore, when there was just one iPhone, and no other option but to jailbreak to add value to an already fantastic product. There was a plethora of options at your fingertips, and the community grew like no other. There were apps you could downloa…
- [iPhone again...](https://tim.sodhis.org/iphone-again.md) - It had to be, it just had to be. After having sold my iPhone back in Germany, I felt as if I had lost a very important part of my gadget inventory. I tried to fill that space with an iTouch, but nothing could assuage the thirst inside. So, by a stroke of luck I came across an offer I couldn’t refus…
- [Long time no see!](https://tim.sodhis.org/long-time-no-see.md) - Wow, it has been forever since I last updated here. For all of you wondering whether ol’ Tim is still around, the answer to your chagrin (I bet) is yes. Things have been crazy the last few weeks – hectic pace with ungodly hours being maintained notwithstanding. I find precious little time to indulg…
- [Bisons vs Louiseville game on Saturday](https://tim.sodhis.org/bisons-vs-louiseville-game-on-saturday.md) - This Saturday we headed to the Bisons’ stadium for what was essentially my first baseball game! It was a lovely overcast evening, with promise of a thunderstorm later that night. Downtown was deserted apart from the Stadium, which was agog with activity! This day marked my first intro to a taste of…
- [Happy Fourth of July!](https://tim.sodhis.org/happy-fourth-of-july.md) - My first fourth of July celebrations here! And what a way to celebrate. Last evening we had an open BBQ and what a spread! Mom and Dad sure know how to throw a party! There was corn, hot dogs, baked beans, relish, and more corn! I went nutsies about them corn, smothering it with butter and salt (a…
- [Blackjack II](https://tim.sodhis.org/blackjack-ii.md) - We have been scoping the market for a half decent carrier of late, and high and low we searched without success. Had to weigh all options and some carriers offered an attractive package with roll-over minutes, but then the rest of the family is with another carrier that doesn’t offer much in the wa…
- [At the cottage by the Lake](https://tim.sodhis.org/at-the-cottage-by-the-lake.md) - A delayed blog entry this time around. We are Rissa’s parent’s cottage by the lake. Sitting at the table with the girls and Sam working on our wedding invitations. It is an overcast day with the wind blowing and the temperatures dipping. A perfect day for invites! The conversation flows, banter, le…
- [Love this country!](https://tim.sodhis.org/love-this-country.md) - Wasn’t quite sure how it works around here, does one just walk into a Supermarket and whip out one’s laptop and start surfing? Seemed to be stuff of science fiction. But today as Rissa went to the Test center, I made my way to a big grocery market chain around here (Wegmans), full of trepidation –…
- [My new Macbook Pro](https://tim.sodhis.org/my-new-macbook-pro.md) - It’s here! After a lifetime of waiting, we were pleasantly surprised when the good ol’ Mac showed up on our tracking system last night! Long has the wait been, and sweet the reunion. But alas, all is well and here I am, in Bergen, enjoying my new MBP, downloading my mail from Mac.com (soon to be me…
- [A brief pic update!](https://tim.sodhis.org/a-brief-pic-update.md) - Here’s ME! :D Home
- [The series has landed!](https://tim.sodhis.org/the-series-has-landed.md) - Or something to that effect. Here I am, sitting in our study, with the love of my life, together, at last, not to part, and just how amazing it is, is hard to put into words. The transition was so smooth, it doesn’t cease to amaze me. It is as if I never left here, picking up the cords of my life w…
- [My Delicious Library 2.0](https://tim.sodhis.org/my-delicious-library-20.md) - Just published my Delicious Library online. Check it out. More later!
- [Upgraded to 10.5.3](https://tim.sodhis.org/upgraded-to-1053.md) - Perfect installation, after a lot many hiccups. I am happy to report I am on 10.5.3 with everything working. This update seems to have solved my problem of choppiness in Spaces and Expose. Being an ardent Spaces user this was a bone of contention, and made me cringe each time I loaded them up. Well…
- [Firefox 3 RC1 - 'Awesomeness' redefined](https://tim.sodhis.org/firefox-3-rc1-awesomeness-redefined.md) - Let me say this at the very onset – I was never a Firefox fanboi. I really depended upon IE for my development/browsing needs – on Windows of course. Joining my current organization, I got weaned away from my dependence on IE, and rediscovered Firefox after a gap of nearly 3 years. And so it began.…
- [GFXUtil FTW!](https://tim.sodhis.org/gfxutil-ftw.md) - I can report unequivocally the success of the GFXString hack for com.apple.Boot.plist! I followed an excellent tutorial I found on the Interwebs (can link if so requested), that outlined how to extract the Hex string for my GFX card. I did follow the instructions, plug it in my plist and repaired p…

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