Taking a splash in a bucket from the local hardware store.
Bath buckets
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Category Archives: Other Journals
Review of Endnote X8 for Mac
Some days I just don't like Endnote any more. In the past I have used a combination of Endnote and Papers2. A few years ago I wrote a review of Endnote X4 for Mac and I thought that I would go back and take a look at what I thought about that review and the new version of Endnote 8.
Keep in mind that I have over 8,500 references in my Endnote file. My biggest complaints are:
- It is slow.
- There still is no keyboard short cut for importing a reference.
- The "detect duplicates" script does not allow one to exit successfully prior to completing all the items in your detected duplicate list. (Which for some might be very long, and cause the script to crash!)
- There is no mechanism in the collections area to browse by Journal or Book series.
- When looking at a reference, there is no clear way to determine if it is in one of several collections (including in the check for duplicate script).
- There does not seem to be an export style for exporting to bibJSON. (I might be creating one soon).
- No auto suggest for missing citation metadata.
- for me, Endnote, when importing citations which contain a relative link to a PDF on my machine, does not actually import the PDF to an endnote managed folder. I want all my PDFs in one place. And if they are not in the Endnote managed folder I want a visual indication that they are outside the Endnote data folder.
These are my observations as I try and work with Endnote (and have over the last few months). For me, Papers2 (I haven't bought Papers3) nailed the interaction around PDF management and citation management, from a User Experience perspective. Papers2 just didn't have the custom Fields necessary for me.
Solar Stats
I recently acquired two Solar-edge inverters and associated Solar panels. I would like to also acquire a weather station to sit near my solar array, this way the stats geek in me could measure the actual efficiency relative to the potential efficiency. This is a list of links for software for reading the data from the inverters and the weather station to create a mashup.
Inverter log
Weather API access
Building a Raspberry Pi weather station
New sentences
This week we hear new things from Katja:
I watched RA two times.
push me closer.
And what letter is that?
D
Mommy wrote it.
Today Katja and I were talking about a new mark on the tag of one of her dolls. She said: "Mommy wrote it." That is she used the past tense of an irregular verb! "Me excited!" to use another of her current phrases. This is a phrase I heard yesterday after she said that we needed to get the "ingredients" to make a "birthday cake".
Missing bear found!
Blue bear, which is actually a dog… has been found. Blue bear is Katja’s special companion. He goes everywhere. Last Sunday he decided to stay the week at South Eugene High. It was a rough week without him — especially at bedtime. Katja would tell us that blue bear was sleeping in his sleeping bag. However, this Sunday he was found and returned! Things are looking up. 
SVG Fonts – the learning
SVG Font creation and usage
Today I have been working on an online CV. I needed a button for downloading a PDF version of a PDF. I wanted it to fit in with the Font Awesome and Academicons that my theme uses.
- Not all SVG files are created equally. - The first file I bought did not work with the font editor. But SVGs from the nounproject did.
- There is an online SVG font editor that worked really well for me.
WOFF usage
Another issue for me was the text font. I needed to display some combining diacritics with a clear font.
- There are some really good resources for adding CSS code for font faces...
- I had to learn a little bit about web fonts.
- I wanted to use SIL's CharisSIL font but it is not available via Google Fonts as a web font (but other SIL fonts are: Andika, Gentium Basic, and Gentium Book Basic). So I had to use SIL's down-loadable version and host it locally.
- FontSquirrel is really a great way to look at the base characters in a font. But it does not show renditions of glyphs comprised of bases and combining diacritics.
Ice cream
Biking to drop Katja off and then biking to pick her up has been great! I often pass this place and wish I had a $5 bill with me. Today I did!
The old books
When I was in 6th grade my grandpa flew to Germany and stayed with us for a few weeks. He and I pulled out my dad’s train set and put it together. I remember the really old catalogs from the 1950s that my dad had. 
Tonight Katja was sitting on my lap looking at my old LEGO catalogs. She must have sat there for 45 minutes going through them.
Great Resources for Property owners in Eugene Oregon
There are at least three resources for records on real estate properties in Eugene (though there could be more as well). These three are
- Eugene City Records
- Lane County Records
- Eweb Records
Eweb is the local electricity, water, and sewage provider.
Useful links for public information
There are a couple of things to check, these include any open permits at either the county or the city, an closed permits (to know what improvements were actually permitted), past ownership of the property and what was paid for the property (sales history), any deed restrictions, and any social history of the property.
- Sewer Plans for properties: http://pwe.eugene-or.gov/PWESewerConn/SewerConnImageSearch.aspx - Splash Page
- Complaints which have been field with the city since July 1998: http://pdd.eugene-or.gov/CodeCompliance/ComplaintSearch
Older complaints and their context must be ordered from the city via a records request. The fee for this is $20. - Permits (requests and grants) which have been field with the city since July 1998: http://pdd.eugene-or.gov/BuildingPermits/PermitSearch
Older permits must be requested from the city. There is generally a $20 fee for this, but having this history can be a great aid when looking at buying a property. - Property class and information for the sales of property for the last three years:
- Deeds and Title Search:
- Zone and urbanization plan Map: http://lcmaps.lanecounty.org/LaneCountyMaps/ZoneAndPlanMapsApp/index.html
- Soil Map: (also here is a 1925 survey.)
- City Zoning Map (but not historical zoning):https://www.eugene-or.gov/1951/Zoning-Map
- Tax Record
- Tax lot records: https://lanecounty.hosted.civiclive.com/cms/One.aspx?portalId=3585881&pageId=5145461
City Pointers
- City code: https://www.eugene-or.gov/DocumentCenter/Home/Index/283 - Splash Page
- Residential Permits: https://www.eugene-or.gov/858/Residential Things that the city requires a permit to repair.
General Pointers
- City records are generally organized by address.
- County records are generally organized by map & taxlot number.
- I have found this blog article generally informative: https://craigtomlinson.biz/2013/03/04/buying-and-selling-duplexes-in-eugene-springfield-lane-county-oregon
- One way to indirectly evaluate contractors is to look at their closure rates on city permits. That is, how many permits have they successfully closed and is that typical for a contractor? How many have they left open?
- Past sales: http://lcmaps.lanecounty.org/lanecountymaps/propertysales/index.html?esearch=1803054300400&slayer=0&exprnum=3
- Zoning: http://lcmaps.lanecounty.org/LaneCountyMaps/ZoneAndPlanMapsApp/index.html?esearch=1803054300400&slayer=0&maptype=WL
Reading tax records and RLID
- When reading the building classification code this PDF explains the codes used.
Generally helpful documents if leasing your home in Eugene
- ADMINISTRATIVE ORDER NO. 53-05-02-F
- https://www.eugene-or.gov/845/Rental-Housing-Code
- ORS CH 90