
Here’s a shot of my (Intel) Mac Mini driving 2 Apple 20-inch Cinema Displays, thanks to a DisplayLink USB hardware adapter and beta Mac OS X drivers (released today). Very cool… we’re going to try hanging 2 monitors on our laptop next…
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Words and pictures from Silicon Valley by Chris Gulker
From the monthly archives:

Here’s a shot of my (Intel) Mac Mini driving 2 Apple 20-inch Cinema Displays, thanks to a DisplayLink USB hardware adapter and beta Mac OS X drivers (released today). Very cool… we’re going to try hanging 2 monitors on our laptop next…
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Linda thinks this photo should have topped the blog today. This guy looked pretty happy in the tall green grass…
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We returned to Stanford’s Academic Preserve (aka The Big Dish) today for the first time in many months. My mobility, while still pretty slow-paced, has improved enough (since last December’s low point) to allow me to return, and walk for an hour, at some of my very favorite venues.
I’ve stopped obsessing on how, for 17 years, I jogged briskly along these trails here, running 5 miles in the time it now takes me to wobble a half-mile. Instead, I was grateful just to be in the air and sun, reacquainting myself with favorite places.
The cedar (I think) above has a shape and wild aspect that I’ve always appreciated. Big Dish, itself, is pointed up (it was straight up a couple days ago), prompting me to wonder what mission it may be pursuing.
As noted, the day was gorgeous: Linda walked 3 miles or more briskly while I made my way to the cow guard about 1/3 of the way up the Piers Lane side of the hill. Some cheery members of the herd who inhabit the springtime pasture here were there to greet me…
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Spring leaves on a liquidambar tree are silhouetted against a gray morningĀ sky as I took my morning walk today. Six-tenths of a mile in 35 minutes…
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IPFrontline has an interesting tear-down of an iPhone. The camera is a 1/5th inch-format unit from Micron. Available data so far points to the camera being a video camera – meaning the stills are framegrabs…
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What a crew, and what a night. Paul Chinn, former Herexer and current S.F. Chronicle photog sent me this pic of a pretty scary group. L to R front row: Dean Musgrove, Chris Gulker, Leo Jarzomb. Back row: Jim Reubsamen, Xavier Mendoza, Paul Chinn, Rob Brown and Mike Mullen. Thanks, Paul! I’ll have more to say about the Herex in a bit…
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We’ve been experimenting with the camera in the iPhone. It’s an amazingly tiny device, but provides rather more useful photos – 2 megapixel, 1600 x 1200 pixels – than any other ‘phone camera’ I’ve owned.
I’m very curious about the details of the camera. Judging by depth of field and some other clues, I’m guessing the lens aperture is around f 2.8 (in fact, I just did a ‘Get Info’ on an iPhone pic and it reports f2.8, but, curiously no shutter speed or other data).
Which got me to thinking about how this camera must work. I’ve noticed that the low light performance is good – very little shake is visible, even in low light situations (unusal for me because I usually can only manage to hold it with one hand). My guess is that this is really a video camera (it does have a video mode): there’s no mechanical shutter – the pictures are really framegrabs from what may be an analog video stream.
Since framegrabs are essentially instantaneous regardless of light level, low light ’shake’ performance should be good (we’ll be experimenting to see if our hypothesis is correct). Exposure, then, would be handled entirely in software, amping up or down depending on scene brightness.
This in turn means the lens needs to be relatively high quality – with focus fixed just this side of hyperfocus – the closest point to the lens where objects at infinity are also essentially sharp. The lens is noticeably sharper in the center two-thirds of the image (typical for relatively wide apertures like 2.8), which gives many pictures the appearance of being shot with a focusing lens, since the subject of most photos is near the center of the frame. Neat trick, and good use of the physics of optics, if I’m right. Voila 2 pix from iPhone: Peet’s Coffee in Menlo Park and tulips at Stanford Shopping Center…
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Linda’s mother Ede (pronounced ‘Edie’), God rest her soul, used the word ’satisfactory’ to describe things that pleased her. The impatiens in the flower beds around her house were satisfactory because they bloomed constantly and required little fuss once they were established.
Satisfactory is the word I’m choosing to describe my iPhone: I find myself using it a lot more than I used my Treo, which was really a phone with cantankerous contact software. I rarely used its slow, hard to read browser and its email feature was acceptable but not great.
Not only is the iPhone a better phone, but the contact software syncs effortlessly with my Mac, I have music on it (unlike my iPod, I always carry it and thus listen to the music more often) and I’ve used the browser a lot: to find a store and directions for a friend, to post entries to my blog, to check my Google Calendar, to show blog pictures of Grace to friends, and this morning, to read a New Yorker article about Senator Obama while waiting at Menlo Medical Clinic.
I also have a selection of family photos to show friends and acquaintances and have checked stocks and weather a number of times. I can’t wait for developers to come out with new apps… command line, anyone?
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We walked around Lake Lagunita this afternoon, after Easter services and lunch with John, Julie and Grace (as seen on Linda’s blog). This was a small, personal resurrection of sorts: after 17 years of jogging around Lagunita’s path two or three times a week, I returned today for a 30 minute walk after an absence of many months, sharing the way with families, dogs, students and lovers.
One other very bright spot was John and Julie with granddaughter Grace sharing Easter service and lunch. Grace was amazingly quiet during the service: her bright eyes looking everywhere. The brass chorus at full volume was a bit much for her tiny ears, but otherwise we were amazed at how well she weathered the service. Lunch menu: Linda’s famous ’summer salad’…
[update: goddaughters Cora and Frances, with mom Catherine and brother Hunter just dropped in on their way back up to Marin from Santa Cruz... what a day!]
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