Pretty simple to do, but regardless here is a copy-and-paste'able set of commands that should work on OS X/Linux (if you have the Apple Developer Tools installed, or the build-essential package on Ubuntu):

cd /tmp/
curl -O http://www.python.org/ftp/python/2.6/Python-2.6b3.tgz
gunzip Python-2.6b3.tgz
tar -xf Python-2.6b3.tar
cd Python-2.6b3/
./configure --prefix=/usr/local/python2.6
# lots of lines ending in "... yes" hopefully
make
# will take a while, no errors
sudo make install
# enter your password, as it requires root access to put files in /usr/local/
# lots of stuff flies by..
sudo ln -s /usr/local/python2.6/bin/python2.6 /usr/local/bin/python2.6
sudo ln -s /usr/local/python2.6/bin/2to3 /usr/local/bin/2to3
# this puts python2.6 into your $PATH</pre class='code'>

That will install python2.6 into /usr/local/python2.6/ and symlink the commands python2.6 and 2to3 into /usr/local/bin/

While this isn't exactly the normal sort of NF article, this took me hours to work out.

I have a bunch of gigs recorded on an Zoom MRS-1608 recording desk. Until recently to capture/edit the recordings, I recorded the master-output via a Line-in connector on an iMac (into Soundtrack Pro). This worked fine, but all the levels were set on the desk, and mixed-down to a stereo output, which means to change the levels, you have to capture the song again. And there is no way of adding effects to specific channels and so on..

The solution should have been simple - Zoom have an application called "Audio File Manager", an extremely buggy and broken application that (should) take the recordings via USB, or a CD and convert each track to a .WAV or .AIFF file (which can then be edited in any audio application)

Git is a "distributed version control system" (DVCS). It's website is http://git.or.cz and you can read more about it on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_%28software%29

There are precompiled versions available for Windows, Linux (via apt-get/yum/etc) and OS X, but if you want the most recent version, or to install it in a non-standard location, compiling it form source is actually very easy (on OS X at least).

This guide was done on OS X Leopard (version 10.5.3), but the steps are basically the same on Linux (just skip the bit about fink and Xcode), and other versions of OS X.

Download!

http://github.com/dbr/tvdb_api/tarball/master - Always the latest version as .tar)

(click for full-size 512x512px PNG with alpha)

MacPorts and Fink are basically like apt-get on OS X (it installs open-source software on Mac OS X)

Pretext

This article will pretty much be my opinion, thinly disgused as a subjective comparison between watching films and TV shows, either on DVD, or by downloading them via Bittorrent and the likes.

I am totally ignoring the legality of this comparison. I am only going to cover what should be the most important factor: Convenience for the viewer.

This is the second part of the catchily named Regex-for-people-who-should-know-regex-but-do-not guide. If you are unfamiliar with the basics of regular expression syntax, then I recommend you first read part 1, or any of the many regular expressions primers available online.

Regular expressions are very useful. If you have to deal with text at all, you will find them indispensable. In programming, they can be used to verify user input (e.g check an email is valid), sanitize input (make sure the user only used allowed characters), remove sections of the string (remove all non-alpha-numeric characters). And not just for programming! You can use regular expressions in many text editors to edit the current file. You can use them in the grep command to find very specific lines, or in the sed "stream editor" to edit out bits of a file..

Perian?

Perian, the Quicktime "all-in-one" codec pack, which allows Quicktime Player (And Quicktime based applications, including Front Row) to play various extra formats, including DivX/Xvid, .mkv etc etc.

The problem

One problem - well, more of an annoyance than a problem.. With version v1.0, it started being released as a Preference Pane icon - I never have to change it's settings, so it doesn't need to be in the preferences..

I always found reading about others computer setup interesting, in a slightly strange way. Since I enjoy reading such things, it makes sense for me to write such a thing. Hopefully other neverfear members will write similar descriptions too.