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Kristof Willen

Technology tinkerer. Electric unicycles. Star gazer. Whisky & synths.

Anagram hall of fame

Elvis = Lives
Clint Eastwood = Old West Action
Astronomers = Moon starers
The Morse Code = Here Come Dots
The Hilton = Hint: Hotel
Snooze Alarms = Alas! No More Z's


Many more great anagrams in the Anagram Hall of Fame.

Matroska in Mediaportal

I have a laptop that acts as a MediaPortal testbed. Dangerous stuff is tested there before I install it on my HTPC. If stuff doesn't work, that's the place. I was therefore quite surprised to see playback of Matroska video files fail on my HTPC, where there was no problem on my laptop. The only difference was that my laptop was Vista based, whereas my HTPC runs XP.


I roamed the MediaPortal forums long time. Many reported the same error, but no solution. Some had success installing the DirectVobsub splitter, but that didn't do the trick. Installed PowerDVD failed also. However, yesterday, I found the solution by simply installing the Matroska splitter. Putting the .ax file in the MediaPortal directory enabled Matroska video playback.

Dictee 2007

Een leuke jaarlijkse gewoonte is het groot dictee der Nederlandse taal. Met een prachtige gebeeldhouwde tekst van Jan Wolkers, naar gewoonte gevuld met godsdienst en erotiek, leek het dictee verrassend kort en gemakkellijk. Iets wat zich weerspiegelde in het lage gemiddelde van 23 fouten.


Ikzelf deed het een stuk beter met 18 fouten, waarvan 5 hoofdletter fouten. Mijn teerbeminde presteerde licht onder het gemiddelde met 27 fouten, maar dat ligt zeker en vast aan het lage aantal uren slaap dat ze de laatste 24 uur consumeerde.


En och ja, natuurlijk weeral een Vlaamsche winnaar :)

Geminid meteor shower

Tonight you might watch some galactical fireworks : the Geminid meteor shower peaks this night. Start watching this evening, around 10 pm local time. At first you might not see very many meteors—but be patient. The show really heats up after midnight and by dawn on Friday, Dec. 14th, there could be dozens of bright meteors per hour streaking across the sky. For the best results, watch the esastern sky in the morning hours before sundawn. Mars is in the vicinity, so that's a good beacon.


The Geminids are not ordinary meteors. While most meteor showers come from comets, Geminids come from an asteroid—a near-Earth object named 3200 Phaethon. It's a mystery how an asteroid can produce meteors, but the most common accepted theory is that Phaeton used to be a comet, and that the current asteroid is the inner iron core that remains.