Dana's Mixed Bag

Google maps has been around a few years now and has a nice set of hacks out there. My favorite involves hijacking the title of the pushpin marker balloon as shown in the photo below. This is a pretty easy hack, to be honest:

• Zoom-in to the target location on the map (pick any view)
• Right click on “Link to this page” and (left) select “Copy Shortcut or “Copy Link Location”
• Paste the link into the Address Bar (Firefox users click Ctrl-lv) and do not click “Enter”
• Find the coordinates in the long text pasted into the Address Bar (some string like 35.782171,-78.638763)
• Drag-select both coordinates and Copy them.
• Paste the coordinates into the Google Maps Search Bar
• After the string, hit the spacebar, then “(“. Type the title of your balloon, then “)” and click “Search Maps”
• To copy this map as it is, copy the new URL from “Link To This Page” (as in Step 2) and paste it into any application.
• Better yet, paste the URL into tinyurl.com and use the URL they give you!

Pretty easy, huh? You’ll find this as a great way of labeling an exact location for someone.

Tags: Great Sites, Pin, Tech // 2 Comments »

Ty Dembicks got a photo of this sign posted in a hotel bathroom.

Tags: Photography, Pin // Comments Off on Lost in Translation

Tar Heel fans who like electronic calendars rejoice! I’ve uploaded the 2007-2008 UNC basketball schedule in the .CSV format.

Outlook/Palm Users:

• Create a new folder in your in Outlook calendar (Heels08, for example). Use the File | Import and Export… to import from “another program or file”, then “Comma Separated File (Windows)”. This will set up the Heels’ schedule in your new sub-calendar where you can make whatever changes you want.
• When you are happy with the way the subcalendar looks, change the calendar view to “Events” (instead of 7-day or 31-Day or whatever view you’re using). “Select All” from the list, and drag them over to your main “Calendar” (The Treo and other Palm Handhelds only sync to the main calendar – time for Palm to get with the program on that one!). If you want to keep your sub calendar intact, use Ctrl-drag instead of plain drag. That will create a copy of each event to the main Calendar and keep the Heels08 calendar in place. Sync your handheld to copy the events to the handheld.

iCal Users:

• Used iCalTextImport to import the .CSV version of the schedule.

Download uncbball08.csv
(right click on the link above and “Save As…”)

Note: Use at your own risk. I do not accept responsibility for any consequences resulting from errors in the schedule.

Tags: Pin, Sports // 4 Comments »

Wolfpack fans who like electronic calendars rejoice! I’ve uploaded the 2007-2008 NCSU basketball schedule in the .CSV format.

Outlook/Palm Users:

• Create a new folder in your in Outlook calendar (Pack08, for example). Use the
  File | Import and Export… to import from “another program or file”, then “Comma Separated File (Windows)”. This will set up the Pack’s schedule in your new sub-calendar where you can
  make whatever changes you want.
• When you are happy with the way the subcalendar looks, change the calendar view to “Events” (instead of 7-day or 31-Day or whatever view your using). “Select All” from the list, and drag them over to your main “Calendar” (The Treo and other Palm Handhelds only syncsto the main calendar – time for Palm to get with the program on that one). If you want to keep your sub calendar intact, use Ctrl-drag instead of plain drag. That will create a copy of each event to the main Calendar and keep the Pack08 calendar in place. Sync your handheld to copy the events to the
  handheld.

iCal Users:

• Use iCalTextImport to import either form of the schedule.

Download ncsubball08.csv

(right click on the link above and “Save As…”)

Note: Use at your own risk. I do not accept responsibility for any consequences resulting from errors in the schedule.

Tags: Pin, Sports // 2 Comments »

Canes fans who like electronic calendars rejoice! I’ve uploaded the 2007-2008 Carolina Hurricanes schedule in both tab-delimited and .CSV formats.

Outlook/Palm Users:

• Create a new sub-calendar in Outlook (Canes08, for example). Use the
  File | Import and Export… to import a “tab-delimited file”. This
  will set up the Canes schedule in your new sub-calendar where you can
  make whatever changes you want.
• When you are happy with the way the subcalendar looks, change the
  calendar view to “Events” (instead of 7-day or 31-Day or whatever view
  your using). “Select All” from the list, and drag them over to your
  main “Calendar” (The Treo only syncs to the main calendar – time for
  Palm to get with the program on that one). If you want to keep your
  sub calendar intact, use Ctrl-drag instead of plain drag. That will
  create a copy of each event to the main Calendar and keep the Canes08
  calendar in place. Sync your handheld to copy the events to the
  handheld.

iCal Users:

• Used iCalTextImport to import either form of the schedule.

Tags: Pin, Software, Sports // Comments Off on ’08 Canes Schedule Download