So a colleague of mine knows i'm into anything design related and suggested I gave Roman Mars' 99% invisible podcast a try, and to be honest i'm now hooked.

99% invisible discusses aspects of design and architecture that are very often unnoticed by users, aspects that if not considered would completely change the dynamic and feel of the environments and technologies they exist in.

The podcast itself has very high production values, each episode is no more than 10 minutes long - a perfect amount of time for anybody with an attention span as short as mine. The topics Roman discusses in his shows are really fascinating, his narration style and seamless interjection of important anecdotes really aids the understanding and flow of the production. I was hooked after listening to his first podcast: 99% noise, which discusses the value of of acoustic design, soundscape and enabling noise levels in shared spaces.

I throughly recommend this podcast if you're even the slightest bit interested in design.

http://99percentinvisible.org

Roman is currently rasing funds for season 3 on Kickstarter, check it out here:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1748303376/99-invisible-season-3

Essentially it queries Foursquare for search terms then passes to Yahoo to find out the latlong from the place name given, and then uses the lat long with google street view to display the images for that location. The result is this below: When i search for Wellington i can see a whole lot of of people checking into their homes and publishing this information to the world...

Search for Wellington

Another rather humorous feature of the tool is it's general searches under the categories: Who wants to get fired? Who's hung over? Whose taking drugs and Whose got a new phone number?

So what does it mean? Well it kind of makes some of the privacy concerns about such location services a little bit more obvious for people who probably don't realize what they're doing when they are checking in. (despite the fact that it is re-iterated time and time again by privacy experts) I've mentioned this before too:

Modern society seems to be geared up to deal with and accept casual tradeoffs of privacy  - I personally am subscribed to this. You're reading my blog and know I have a twitter, I'm willingly giving a plethora of information about myself out into the fabric that is the Digital Age, but hey, who really cares about what Mark is doing? Well, A tech savvy burglar could potentially use the information i'm publishing to find out where i live, when i am at home (and more importantly to them, when i'm not) and read my twitter to find out that i just bought a brand new TV... food for thought.

Anyway, take a look at the website: www.weknowwhatyouredoing.com

So a few years ago a good friend of mine wrote a series of tutorials on the most complex video game ever created: Dwarf Fortress. His tutorials gave him fame within Dwarf Fortress Circles and thanks to that O'Reilly approached him late last year to ask him to write a comprehensive guide on it in a published media format.

The game is always in a state of flux so it was also a prime candidate for O'Reilly to start testing out a new method of keeping their books up to date using version control using Subversion and O'Reilly's rapid publishing framework.

Anyway, the book came in April and there has been a lot of critiques by people commenting about the book being published without approval from Toady (the developer of the game) - but these are just internet scum who don't do their research, as if they even bothered to look at the free preview on Amazon.com they'd see that the book has a forward written by Toady himself!

Anyway, now after defending his honor…  As Dwarf Fortress is highly verbose in every interaction that occurs in the game, Peter has told me some of the most entertaining stories based on events that have happened in his fortresses based on essentially random chains of events, one of my favorites being the story of a troll wondering into a fortress that starts to attack an unarmed dwarf with a club, the dwarf then wrestles the club from the troll where upon the troll rearms itself with a stray sock that fell from the dwarf during the wrestle, then precedes to flap the sock at the dwarf resulting in both bewilderment and light bruising.

Anyway, you can buy the book in both print and ebook formats from O'Reilly

The Author's twitter: @TinyPirate

Also!!!

If you're in Wellington and order a print copy, i can arrange to have your book signed for free by the author himself!!!

That's AMAZING!!!

So i came across this on google research's blogs:

http://googleblog.blogspot.co.nz/2012/06/using-large-scale-brain-simulations-for.html

Traditionally machine learning requires previously labeled data as a training set in order to then work on new input data. Many researchers these days are exploring methods to work with data that has not been labeled before hand, essentially allowing the system to learn from 'unknown' data and be able to associate items that were previously not known to be connected. Artificial neural networks are a conceptualization/mimicry of a mammalian brain's learning process.

Google's neural network for the research is made from a distributed infrastructure consisting of 100 machines with total of 16000 cpu cores, fed data into the system to produce models with more than 1 billion connections. The input data was derived by showing the system data from 10million stills (200x200px) taken from youtube videos

Google say that that the neural network  learned to respond to pictures of human faces, human bodies and cat faces - cat faces being the thing that journalists are picking out from the research because  lets face it - it's funny - and yep, cats rule the internet - as we kind of showed in some research we did with a Social robot with a persona geared around cat fanciers: Socialbots

Link to Google's research:

http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/research.google.com/en/us/archive/unsupervised_icml2012.pdf

Hario make a v60 based ice coffee brewer - the Fretta - of which the average price is NZ$50

While i was at Moore Wilson last Saturday afternoon i came across a Klip-It Container:

The next day i presented it to my friend and suggested we filled it with ice and brewed some coffee using our swiss gold filters directly onto the ice and try to replicate the refreshing nature that a Fretta offers.

The filter doesn't fit over the container exactly but it was close enough to test the concept.

It worked rather well (though obviously not as clean as you'd get from using the Hario filter papers) Regardless,  it was still pretty damn good.

The fact that the swiss gold didn't sit properly presented a bit of an issue, so using our 3D printer my friend designed an adapter for the container so that we could put the swiss gold onto it and leave room for evaporation:

Design in OpenScad:

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$fn							= 360/2;
 
fudge_factor				= 2;
 
wall_thickness				= 2;
 
vessel_od					= 109 + fudge_factor + wall_thickness;
swissgold_id				= 89 - fudge_factor - wall_thickness;
 
cone_height					= 20;
vessel_lip_height			= 4;
vessel_inner_lip_width		= 7;
vessel_inner_lip_height	= 12;
swissgold_lip_height		= 5;
 
y_max						= 96.5;
 
difference() {
 
	union() {
 
		difference() {
			cylinder( h = swissgold_lip_height, r = swissgold_id/2 );
			cylinder( h = swissgold_lip_height, r = swissgold_id/2 - wall_thickness );
		}
 
		translate( [ 0, 0, swissgold_lip_height ] ) {
			difference() {
				cylinder( h = cone_height, r = swissgold_id/2, r2 = vessel_od/2 );
				cylinder( h = cone_height, r = swissgold_id/2 - wall_thickness, r2 = vessel_od/2 - wall_thickness );
			}
 
			intersection() {
				translate( [ 0, 0, cone_height - vessel_inner_lip_height ] ) {
					difference() {
						cylinder( h = vessel_inner_lip_height, r = vessel_od/2 );
						cylinder( h = vessel_inner_lip_height, r = vessel_od/2 - vessel_inner_lip_width );
					}
				}
 
				cylinder( h = cone_height, r = swissgold_id/2, r2 = vessel_od/2 );
			}
 
			translate( [ 0, 0, cone_height ] ) {
				difference() {
					cylinder( h = vessel_lip_height, r = vessel_od/2 );
					cylinder( h = vessel_lip_height, r = vessel_od/2 - wall_thickness );
				}
			}
		}
 
	}
 
	translate( [ 0, y_max, 0 ] ) {
		cube( [ 100, 100, 100 ], center = true );
	}
 
	translate( [ 0, 0-y_max, 0 ] ) {
		cube( [ 100, 100, 100 ], center = true );
	}
 
	#translate( [ 0, 200/2, swissgold_lip_height + 50 ] ) {
		rotate( [ 90, 0, 0 ] ) {
			cylinder( r = 50, h = 200 );
		}
	}
}

After it printed, it looked like this:

And finally: the finished product - the adapter cost $0.51 to print, the Klip it container was $3.50. The total cost was $4.01 (I already own a Swiss Gold, so i don't factor that into it, but they cost NZ$39)

An introduction to Quality Coffee - Don't call me pretentious, call me enlightened

My initial rebuke to that is that is to ask you to consider that people who appreciate good coffee are just like people who enjoy drinking good whisky - parallels can be drawn between the two, for example: conceptually a coffee made from a single origin bean is comparable to single malt whisky and a coffee blend that your local coffee shop will sell you in an espresso is like blended whisky.

Blending coffee, like blending whisky, allows the roaster to always deliver a consistent product despite fluctuations in green bean supply and quality. It gives the roaster the freedom to work around seasonal effects without compromising the flavour profile of their blend. When you sell single origin beans, like single malt whisky, you are at the mercy of the crop. Some years will be great and some years will be mediocre and you can't hide the flaws by changing the percentages of each origin to compensate.

Blending coffee can be used to produce a full bodied drink with multi-layered tastes throughout a sip, for example, to produce a blend with a nice acidity snap (comparable to the snap that carbonated water gives you on the tongue) with a good body, it may consist of beans sourced from Nicaragua, Colombia, Brazil that have been roasted to full city (roasted to just before the second crack) - which will give a nice body, Central American beans roasted French (dark and oily, taken at the end of the second crack) which will carbonise the sugars in the bean and bring out sweetness. Finally, perhaps some Ethiopian or Kenyan - city roasted (roasted to just after the first crack) for some light flavours and good acidity. Anyway while i'm not by any means a roaster, i hope i've been able to give a bit of an example and given some insight into how blending coffee can be used to give different flavours of coffee.

So back to the single origin coffees, as mentioned i prefer to have a single origin coffee prepared through a non-pressurised brewing method. These kind of beans are treated very carefully throughout the entire production chain, growing in the best conditions, processed carefully, and finally roasted to a profile that suits the batch to bring out the best flavours - through this diligence the end result is quality and flavour that mean that the bean can stand very well on its own merits without needing to be blended. Drinkers of coffee made from beans of a single origin will comment on the flavours that can be tasted in beans from the specific region and plantation it is from - this discussion of the flavours in the bean is often why people who are passionate about coffee may be seen by others to be pretentious. If you've never tasted single origin coffee and you're fortunate enough to live in Wellington (where, correct me if i'm wrong - we have more coffee shops per capita than any other city in the world), take a trip down to one of the many quality coffee shops we have and hit up one of the baristas, most of them are always very passionate and happy to talk to you and help you experience something new. Memphis Belle also run cuppings every couple of weeks in the evenings and will guide you through the cupping process and how the flavours and aromas are identified and assessed.

Hacienda La Esmeralda, Panama -  Special Geisha

So the Special Geisha comes from the geisha (or gesha) varietal of the Arabica coffee plant and is known for growing much taller than other varieties with much more distributed nodes, less foliage and a slightly larger berry:

From Supreme's Blurb:

"Hacienda La Esmeralda is located close to Boquete on the slopes of Mt Baru, in Western Panama. In one small valley, high up on the farm, the La Esmeralda Special grows. It is here that a unique combination of climate, elevation, and varietal come together to create one of the world’s most remarkable and highly sought after coffees."

For all of the samplings i used my handheld ceramic conical burr grinder:

You'll note by the colour that the roast is quite light:

First tried Chemex, then Swiss Gold, also did a cupping

It cups really well, the flavours and aromatics are very easy to distinguish. Very floral aroma as Supreme's description suggests, the caramel and more fruity tastes are the most distinctive. Note: cupping is probably different to what you're thinking, it's a process by which coffee professionals will analyse the flavours, aromas and fragrances in a coffee. It is an essential process used to assess roasting profiles, develop blends and describe the nuances of a coffee.

Both the Chemex and Swiss Gold filter produced more or less the same kind of intensity, which were unfortunately a fair bit less vibrant than what i had tasted when i did the cupping.  Though as the coffee cooled down, the flavours were the most colourful around 55 °C.  Very light body, almost tea-like. i'm not going to describe the flavours and aromas as they are all on Supreme's website.

Swiss Gold Coffee Filter

Me and my friend were discussing that it is very comparable to Nekisse - light, citrus flavours with a nose of strawberries - though we both agreed that the Nekisse had more taste to it, while the Special Geisha was more subtle. It would have been good to try the two side-by-side to make a final judgement on that but Supreme have not had any Nekisse for a while now.  i've not tried the Geisha with a Siphon yet - and i probably won't get a chance to as i'm heading out of Wellington for Christmas tomorrow.

I'd like to give a big thumbs up to Supreme for importing this bean. It's a very expensive bean and at the price they're selling it to the consumer they're not going to turn a profit on it, really they've imported it because they can - and give their customers a chance to experience something that does live up to the category "Rare and Interesting".

Reflected in a cup of Special Geisha

But then me and my friend were discussing it and when you think about it a bit more, you could consider them as displaced people, refugees (like the Aliens in District 9) or as survivors of a nuclear disaster living in a post apocalyptic world, it becomes a bit more fun…

They had libraries, rainwater collection for water, sanitation, alternative solutions for energy, they even had a local government where in they held assemblies to vote on and decide matters, such as getting legal traction for their right to stay in Zucotti park, or where they are going to head together.

Then i think of the NYPD going in last night kind of like the oppressors in District 9 (the human race) or the bandits in games like Fallout - destroying their shanty town, throwing away their rainwater collection systems, their tents, their library of books and the thousands of dollars of donations.

I've been following the live stream on:

http://www.ustream.tv/theother99

I really like their "mic check" system, where one person shouts out "mic check" and then everybody repeats what that one person says throughout the crowd to create a living megaphone system.

Has been quite interesting but i'm not sure their mixed messages and idealisms are actually choreant… I'm not sure i'll ever get the Martin Luther King style question: "Where were you when they let the unwashed masses back into Zucotti park?"

Tonight I finally got around to plumbing in my coffee machine - turned off the water at the mains on the side of the road at around 8pm while it was still light and started plumbing it in. All I had to do was to tap into the cold line going to the mixer tap on the sink.

I disconnected one end of the dux quest under the sink (old school) and started adding my 3 way adapter, unfortunately I ran out of teflon tape... 8.30pm... I went onto internet and checked the warehouse in Lyall Bay was open until 9pm and left home to get there before they shut. Just as I got back home the sky opened and started pouring down with rain!

I finished my plumbing job and went to the mains to turn the water back on... the handle on the mains supply kept on spinning but it didn't feel like it was actually doing anything, i kept turning and it came off! Great! :-/ I was able to turn the tap with a spanner in the end, but it was really hard going,..

I got back inside to check on the plumbing and the old dux quest piping was spraying a small jet of water out under the kitchen sink... I put a saucepan down and ran back outside to turn the mains off again.

Unfortunately I found out why dux quest piping is no longer allowed to be put into homes... it's just not durable and tends to break. Fortunately I had the braided hose for my coffee machine handy so I took off the 3 way and plumed it to that and gave up for the night.

*sigh*

Will get some short braided hose from Bunnings tomorrow and try again then...

• Hot Knife
• Scissors
• File
• Dremel
• Silicone sealant

Yeah... pretty basic stuff here

Slightly related sign that was up when I was entering...

Pipe!

Tube! (I already cut it down to size before taking this photo, but it cost about $6 for a metre)

I then marked across the bottom section of the pipe where i wanted the tube to slot into and then used my hot knife to cut out a rough half moon shape. Used a file to clean it up best I could, then finished it off with the dremel to make it smoother

Slot Cut

As you can see below, the tube fits quite nicely into the slot i cut out. Although in it's present form, the tube slides around on the groove.

Getting its groove on

The next picture is just to show you the general idea of how it'll be used.

General Idea...

Obviously the above is a bit rough and bashing spent grind into this will just make it fall out the bottom, so

Circle on clear plastic sheet

With it cut out, i needed to attach it to the bottom of the pipe and make sure it was water proof, so this stuff works a treat:

Sealant

Sealant applied

Next, asthetics:

Spray painting it a coppery colour

Find something suitable for a stand (I found an old VESA monitor back) - glue on a grippy material to the grooves to stop the tube sliding around (also helps to hide rough dremel work) and....

Almost done

Last step is to put the tube in place, and set up for a posed shot pretending to use it in action...

Finished!

That's all folks!

You'll also know that just 2 weeks ago I purchased an ex commercial espresso machine for my home

Anyway...I decided that i'd design a couple of handy tools for the Espresso Machine and print them out on the 3D printer. So, I designed a holder that clips onto the side of my Espresso Machine that... holds the Tamper.

I also designed a stand to put the portafilter on as I tamp (with a groove in it for the spout on the portafilter) I designed them in OpenScad - which is a CAD tool for programmatically minded people like myself

Tamper Holder

Tamping Stand

I've also uploaded the Source Code to these to Thingiverse under the GNU public license:

• Tamper Holder on Thingiverse
  

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  difference() { cube(size = [60,65,5], center = true); cylinder(h=13, r=29, center = false);   } translate ( [0,32.5,17.5]) { cube(size = [60,3,40], center = true); translate ( [0,2,18.5]) { cube(size = [60,5,3], center = true); translate ( [0,3,-3.5]) { cube(size = [60,2,10], center = true); } } }

   

• Tamping Stand on Thingiverse
  

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  difference(){ cube(size = [50,60,60], center = true); translate ( [0,0,-10]) { cube(size = [40,50,60], center = true); } translate ( [0,-20,19]) { cylinder (h=13, r=15, center=false); } translate ( [0,-35,30]) { cube(size = [30,30,140], center = true); } }

   

I present to you the finished products:

Tamper Holder in the flesh

Tamping Stand in the flesh

What do you think? Have any other suggestions for some other kitchen implements I should design?