Ok, so the title sounds like an ad from Popular Mechanics. Just about the one thing left from my first (and only) marriage…apart from the spouse, is a pair of “Smaller Advent” bookshelf loudspeakers, ca. 1972. At the time they cost about 75.00 each, and I bought the smaller version because I didn’t feel at the time that I could afford the larger version at $90.00, each. The speakers have been in constant use since I purchased them. Eventually, however, the sound was so fuzzy and weird that I figured that something had to have gone seriously wrong. Popping off the front grill, I found that the foam ring that surrounds the paper cone had deteriorated.

Enter Simply Speakers. These folks specialize in parts and assistance for repairing and restoring older loudspeakers. They seem to be particularly helpful with brands from the 70’s. For example, the Boston area provided a New England sound with KLH, Acoustic Research (AR), Advent, JBL, and Bose. Simply Speakers has parts for fixing any of these brands. A brief telephone call, and I had ordered a re-foaming kit, which consists of two foam rings, and some cement, similar to model airplane glue. Complete instructions were included, and they are also available on the Simply Speakers web site, so you can see what you are getting into. Here’s what it looks like after the repair.

The results were spectacular. The original foam had been deteriorating for years, which resulted in gaps between the speaker cone and the enclosure. This contributed to a gradual loss of bass response. Now that both speakers are completely tight again, they sound terrific with a tight bass and a smooth midrange. My favorite instrument to compare speakers is a ‘cello. The speakers sound warm and mellow.

The one tricky part of the repair was unsoldering and resoldering the wires that connect to the speakers themselves. This probably could have been avoided by simply leaving some slack, and cutting the wires, so that they could be wound back together and covered with electrical tape.

Cost for the kit was about $27.00. I probably spent a total of four hours total taking things apart, doing the actual repair and reassembling everything. Because I noticed the problem just before Christmas, I was eager to have a backup in place, so I went out and bought a pair of Boston Acoustics HS60s for about $320. While these sound Ok, they don’t compare with the Advents at all.

This is my favorite Mind Map. I think I may have first seen it on David Pollard’s site.

I recently read Friedman’s book Hot, Flat and Crowded, and came away with two main points:

1. The global warming phenomenon is far worse than we have been lead to believe.

2. There will be little incentive to invest in renewable and alternative energy sources in the U.S. until there is an economic infrastructure that rewards long term investment in these sources, as in higher energy taxes, carbon trading, etc.

The essence of his book is also contained in today’s NY Times column:

My fellow Americans, we can’t continue in this mode of “Dumb as we wanna be.” We’ve indulged ourselves for too long with tax cuts that we can’t afford, bailouts of auto companies that have become giant wealth-destruction machines, energy prices that do not encourage investment in 21st-century renewable power systems or efficient cars, public schools with no national standards to prevent illiterates from graduating and immigration policies that have our colleges educating the world’s best scientists and engineers and then, when these foreigners graduate, instead of stapling green cards to their diplomas, we order them to go home and start companies to compete against ours.

America still has the right stuff to thrive. We still have the most creative, diverse, innovative culture and open society — in a world where the ability to imagine and generate new ideas with speed and to implement them through global collaboration is the most important competitive advantage. China may have great airports, but last week it went back to censoring The New York Times and other Western news sites. Censorship restricts your people’s imaginations. That’s really, really dumb. And that’s why for all our missteps, the 21st century is still up for grabs.

Read the full column here.

I just downloaded Bento 2.0 (preliminary MacWorld review here) and in perusing the support forums I found Jesse Feiler, who is just across the pond (i.e. Lake Champlain). A kindred spirit, author and non-profit database consultant at North Country Consulting, here is his bio:

Jesse Feiler, author, developer, speaker, and consultant works with new technologies such as mashups and Facebook as well as databases and applications for small business and non-profits.

Jesse is a member of the FileMaker Business Alliance and author of many books on FileMaker specializes in FileMaker applications for small business and non-profits. He is well-equipped to handle conversions and upgrades to the newest version of FileMaker. In addition to new systems, he is available for “rehabs”–updates and improvements to existing FileMaker solutions. Current projects include point-of-sale and Web store for a small business, production management, client/project management, and research management for an arts foundation.

His latest books are The Bento Book: Beauty and Simplicity in Digital Organization and How to Do Everything with Web 2.0 Mashups. His most recent non-technology appearnace was moderating HB Studio: The Early Years with Anne Jackson, Eli Wallach, Mary Anthony, and Ed Morehouse for The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center.

In a fascinating interview about the state of C++ and computer science education, Bjarne Stroustrup, the inventor of the language C++ talks about his background at the old Bell Labs, and his new career as a professor at Texas A&M University.

Programming is part of software development. It doesn’t matter how fancy your code is unless it solves the right problem and you can explain it to others. So, brush up on your communication skills. Learn to listen, to ask good questions, to write clearly, and to present clearly. Serious programming is a team sport, brush up on your social skills. The sloppy fat geek computer genius semi-buried in a pile of pizza boxes and cola cans is a mythical creature, best buried deep, never to be seen again.

Learn your first language well. That means trying it for difficult tasks. Don’t obsess about technical details. Focus on techniques and principles.

Learn another programming language; choose any language that’s quite different from what you are best acquainted with. You can’t be a professional in the IT world knowing only one language. No one language is the best for everyone and for everything.

Don’t just do programming. Computing is always computing something. Become acquainted with something that requires your software development skills: Mediaeval history, car engine design, rocket science, medical blood analysis, image processing, computational geometry, biological modeling, whatever seems interesting. Yes, all of these examples are real, from my personal experience.

From the blog from VoIP Supply, two interesting posts.

Asterisk Unsafe? What a Bunch of Crap debunks a story regarding people “taking over” your Asterisk VoIP PBX for voice spamming.

Sangoma has launched a new line of VoIP cards that are not modular…and therefore a little easier to work with.

Check out this Flash-based web site called The Girl Effect for an example of “using the medium”.

NIH webinar for SBIR submissions – Transcript

Note this is sort of raw and unedited….I’ll go back and clean it up later.

I’m cooling my heels waiting for a GoTo Webinar to start; and it hasn’t started yet, and already I’m annoyed…with an obnoxious message every 30 seconds “We’re sorry for the delay as the organizer hasn’t arrived. You will be placed on hold until the organizer arrives. Please remain on the line.”

The webinar consists of a VoIP audio to the computer, and display of a PowerPoint slide deck. Voice quality seems fine. You can submit questions either via a chat entry, and at the end of the webinar, they have been scrolling through the whole log and answering questions. They got a lot of questions….I submitted one at the beginning of the session, ad it looks like it appeared in the top fifth or so of the list..and that is where we are now after about 45 minutes of answering ad-hoc questions.

Page Limits: Phase I 15 pages max, Phase II 25 pages max, to include:

Specific aims
Background and Significance
Preliminary Studies/Progress Report
Research Design and Methods

Phase I one page max, Phase II 3 page max
(I-26 SF424 Application Guide)

You don’t need to identify an institute in the cover letter.
The CSR will assign it appropriately. (I-24)

Do you need approval by the IRB for Human Subjects Assurance at the time of submission?
No. — this is done just in time. (II-1) If they ask about an IRB….be happy…it probably means you’ll receive the award.

Permissible to submit a budget that deviates from the time and dollars normally awarded to Phase I or Phase II?
Yes, but they must be well justified. You are encouraged to discuss budgetary deviations with the program manager.
Average Phase I are $150,000 and average Phase II are $850,000

Difference between a resubmission and a revision?
(I-27) and (I-28)

Subcontractors are required to provide a letter of support which shows their role.

Multiple PIs?
Now allowed. Each PD/PI must have a role and a leadership plan is required (I-51)

F&A – Phase I f you don’t have a negotiated rate, propose a rate not to exceed 40%. They will not normally negotiate a rate.
Phase II will go with a 25% rate. If you request a rate higher than 25% then you will have a negotiated rate for the Phase II project.

E-Submission Survival Tips

Be sure that you have registered both in Grants.gov and in the eRA Commons.
It can take 2-4 weeks or even up to 8 weeks for newly established or foreign businesses.

Follow all of the FOA instructions.
Pay particular attention to Section IV of Application and Submission Information.
Download fresh application forms for each application deadline. For example Adobe Forms are going to replace PureEdge forms. Some of this is to support the peer review. Anything posted with a receipt date after January 31, 2009, will be done with Adobe Forms (hooray!)

After submission, you must track the application in Grants.gov

Errors stop application processing and must be corrected.
Warnings to not stop application submission and are corrected at the discretion of the applicant.

Reviewers never see your warnings. They never see the number of attempts tp submit.

You can correct errors and warnings for 2 business days after the submission deadline.

Common application errors.
Mssing eMail in SF424 (box 5) in the Applicant Information section
Missing PD/PI Commons User name in credential field of Sr/Key Person Profile form

Submit early. You must plan for multiple submission attempts. 60% of small business applicants need to correct errors, compared to 30% of academic submission. There is contention for help-desk resources.

If you can’t view the application in the ERA commons, we can’t review it. You can’t imagine the things that were attached to the application (recipes….etc).

Get connected to receive notifications or process/policy changes and contingency alerts.

Use the eRA Commons help desk and document the issues. It is especially important is issue threatens on-time submission.

http://ithelpdesk.nih.gov/eRA/ – allows you to open a trouble ticket.

Center for Scientific Review

Suzanne E. Fisher, Ph.D. Director of Receipt and Referral.

Advance approval is not given for late applications. A window of consideration is 1 week. Anything received after 1 week will not be reviewed at all.

Format, approved fonts, Arial, Helvetia, palatino, Georgia, type size 1/2 inch margins, Applies to enitre application. This is to be kind to the reviewers.

Cover letter should be used for a number of purposes
Institute/Center Assignment
Suggest review assignment
Identify areas of expertise needed to evaluate the applicaiton
Required for a changed/corrected submission
Cover letter is not shared with the reviewers.

Only 1 resubmission will be required, (right now you can do 2…but that is ending)
You have to change the content, and you have mark changes in the text.
Looking for scientific changes. Think of what would be helpful for the reviewers.

If you don’t see the application in the Commons…..they can’t work on it.

Verify the Activity Code
Request change in writing
Don’t expect us to be mind readers.
Best person to talk to is the person who is available when you call.

Applications reviewed but not discussed a the Scientific Review meeting, about 40% applications fall into that category.

Grants.Gov

support@grants.gov
1 (800) 518-4726
Customer service number and trouble ticket with case notes.

First-timers need to obtain the following:
DUNS number (from Dunn and Bradstreet)
Tax Identification Number (from IRS)
Central Contract Registration (CAGE code)
Grants.gov password

There is a Grants.gov blog (!)
Once a quarter they have a “stakeholder webcast”
CFDA – Catalog for Domestic Assistance
Keyword Search is powered by Google.

Cover sheet shows a list of the mandatory forms.
You can save the forms package to a network drive if multiple people will be working on the package.

Once you submit, you get a Grants.gov email receipt. Then Validation eMail which either says the package was submitted or rejection due to errors. The most common problem is a DUNS number error.
Eventually, you’ll get an eMail showing that the agency has retrieved the application package.
They have three cutomer support reps.

ALL PDF ATTACHMENT FILENAMES MUST BE LESS THAN 50 CHARS AND MAY NOT CONTAIN SPACES

Background and Significant length recommended to 2 or 3 pages.
They have a full list of all validations that they go through. The help desk can direct you to the list of the validation.

The biosketch is the way for you to show to the reviewers that you are capable of performing the research.

Multiple PD/PI leadership plan. Intended for a team approach type of projects. Multiple disciplines. Follow the instruction for the leadership plan. Google on http://grants.nih.gov/grants/multi_pi

Phase I specific aims should include milestones with specific aims

CDC has only about $8 million in their SBIR budget.
NIH has about $650 million
(per year).

Bibliography and References Cited.

Propose a budget and time frame that is reasonable and appropriate for the research, and justify it. You are not limited to the $750,000. (Phase II). Time period and award amounts are guidelines.

Note there is the ability for the small business to request a fee of 7%.
Patent costs are NOT allowed as indirect or direct costs, (but you could perhaps use the fee for this).

Program status: scheduled to be reauthorized by September 2008, but instead it was extended to March 2009. Agencies have been advised to do business as usual. Award amounts remain the same that they were in 1992 (!) (but stay tuned).

They will post the slides on the webinar.

F&A costs they have lots of questions. Section 1 page 96 gives you everything you ever wanted to know about F&A. Usually you are instructed to leave the fringe section blank in the budget form, because it is usually figured as part of indirect costs. Earliest possible start date for people submitting in December would be July.

On Phase I they don’t negotiate an indirect rate.
Phase II they give an option to allow up to 25% without negotiation. If you want to negotiate a rate, then include the estimated rate in the application, and then be prepared to start the negotiation process (which can be 6-12 months!!)
Look in January – they are looking to change these figures.

Is filing a FastTrack substantially reducing my change to get funded compared to a Phase I only?
Works well if you have strong preliminary data, etc. strong milestones, may have letters of interest of commercial partners, for companies who have a commercialization record.

In 2007:
24.1% of Phase I were awarded
19% FastTracks were awarded

Example Phase I and Phase II successfully funded grants are available at the NIH web site.

It is possible to submit preliminary data after the deadline Phase I ? Yes

Negotiation of indirect rates doesn’t happen until you have been selected for an award.

Examples of justification for the 7% fee:
Reality is that it is granted. Typically we don’t negotiate it.

You should mark EACH multiple investigator with PD/PI role.

You need to submit multiple days in advance of the deadline.
Follow the instructions very closely. SF424

PI cannot be a consultant.
STTR requires that the PI put in at least 10% for the project.
SBIR doesn’t require an actual percentage, but typically it is more than 10%

Look at sample collaboration agreement for STTR for dealing with IP

Mac users, Citrix has a capacity of 50 users. Use it off hours. (outside of 10AM-10PM)

(LK – this basically is a disaster…find a PC! hopefully it will be fixed going forward. )

A number of questions from people who said they couldn’t get their letters of support by the deadline. No sympathy here.
This may be a reflection on the applicant. (Translation: Be sure that you have them in a timely manner). However, you can negotiate with the SRO.

Only the contact PI needs to be affiliated with the small business, meeting the 50% employment rule.

Rest of the questions will be posted. NIH Web Site Webinar November.

Why the native Grabber application in OS-X can’t save in someting other than a TIFF file format is beyond me, and a whole lot of other people besides. Over at Lifehacker, the fans have it all figured out. Shameless quote:

Check out TInkertool/Onyx. They’re both really nice tools for macs, but the nice thing is they include an option to change the Grab filetype.

Also, if you want commands to take screenshots, in PNG, look no further then below:
Command(Apple)-Shift-3 – Whole desktop/menubar/etc.
Command(Apple)-Shift-4 – You drag and define the space it takes the picture.
Command(Apple)-Shift-4-Space – It allows you to take a picture of anything, and just that thing, whether it be a window or something like that.

It saves the files on the desktop as Picture 1.png, Picture 2.png, etc.

Hope this helps.

Thanks pardner.

I received a notice that Parallels 4 is available, and since I had recently bought a copy of 3 for the iMac, the upgrade was free. In between a bunch of other stuff, I downloaded and installed it, and I have to say I’m impressed. Version 3 upgraded my existing Windows Vista virtual machine fairly smoothly, and I’m installing an Ubuntu Linux VM right now from CD that I had lying around with 8.04 (Hardy Heron, if memory serves). Now since there is a new version 8.10, I followed the Ubuntu instructions to do an in-place upgrade.

By default Parallels allocates 512K of RAM and 34 megs of disk space for an Ubuntu installation. The Ubuntu installer said the upgrade could take some hours.