This is really cool, and is the kind of thing I wish I had access to years ago… CVS is selling digital cameras and camcorders for startlingly cheap prices, with the only drawback being that most people have to take them back to the store to have the contents “developed.” And I say “most people,” but there are always clever people out there, possibly like yourself, who are willing take take the devices apart and figure out their inner workings. One such project involves the CVS camcorder and a model rocket. The guts of the camera were fitted into the nose cone of a rocket, and it was launched while video was being recorded. You check out the awesome results here. For more information on getting the videos out of the camera itself, see John Maushammer’s fine work.

For those interested in the super-super-high-speed FIOS internet connection Verizon is offering in certain cities (check yours), here’s a wonderfully detailed log of one installation, complete with start to finish photos. Once installed, the author was able to download at about 13 MB/sec, and upload at almost 2 MB/sec! That’s just unheard of for a home connection… I want it.

Once in a while, the Finder will refuse to eject discs, claiming they’re still “in use,” even though you may have no programs or files open and accessing it. I’ve tried quitting all open applications, closing all windows, and making sure no files were open (such as a disc image on the disc itself) — nothing will convince the Finder that the disc not in use. Then I ran across the Terminal command:
hdiutil eject -force [volume]
where [volume] is the volume name or Unix device (i.e. /dev/disk3, attainable by doing df first). After hitting Return, the drive pops open.

hdiutil is a great little tool Apple provides with OS X, and it can do many things besides eject stuck discs — create and resize images, burn .dmg files, mount and unmount them, all from the command line using a very simple syntax.

And, for the record, my position on the disk/disc naming scheme is this: If it’s magnetic media, it’s “disk.” And if it’s optical, it’s “disc.” It doesn’t really matter, but I make the distinction anyway.

Lately, I’ve been getting a ton of comment spam on Command-Tab. Fortunately, WordPress (combined with an extensive “bad word” blacklist) has been able to catch 100% of it, so you never see it. However, I have to deal with the comments held in moderation and actually delete them. I’m wondering how to stop it altogether…

I’ve considered several options, including challenge/response schemes like a question or a captcha image script, but I want to make it as easy as possible for real humans to leave comments (without registering — I don’t like that idea), but near impossible for an automated machine.

For now, the spam is from a specific few IP addresses, which I’ve blocked altogether by blacklisting them in my .htaccess file. What are your suggestions on stopping comment spam?