For a while now I’ve been looking for a good storage solution. For important things like pictures I would make duplicates across several drives. As my storage needs would grow, I would buy bigger hard drives and copy things over. My main machine became a behemoth with 6 hard drives in it. Still, most of my data was not protected.
I’ve updated the blog to Wordpress 2.1, which involved updating the theme. Let me know if you see any glitches.
I’ve released a new version of the Category Order Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog administrator to set an explicit ordering, spacing, and indentation of categories in the category list that appears in the sidebar. The administrator specifies the ordering in the new “Category Order” management page. There is also an option for placing the category post count inside the link.
New changes:
A screenshot shows the management page. Download it on my code page.
I’ve released a new version of the Category Access Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog maintainer to restrict access to posts belonging to particular categories on a user-by-user basis.
New changes:
Download it on my code page.
I’ve released a new version of the Category Access Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog maintainer to restrict access to posts belonging to particular categories on a user-by-user basis.
New changes:
Download it on my code page.
Sensimetrics has a number of interesting simulations of what sounds, speech, and music sound like to a person with cochlear implants. It dramatically shows why having 8 or more electrodes in the implant is important. What it doesn’t show is how a person’s brain can adapt to the sounds so that they don’t seem so foreign. This is especially true for children. That said, we plan to upgrade Christopher to the Advanced Bionics 120-channel processing strategy as soon as possible.
I had trouble with a broken link on the Sensimetrics site, and since the content may disappear, I’ve mirrored the demos here. For the sentences, you might want to try the videos first and see how much lipreading makes a difference. You’ll also notice that musical instruments sound a lot worse than speech. This is something that CI users have reported.
How accurate are these simulations? Well, I saw a talk by a physics professor who lost his hearing as an adult and now has a CI. He says that he can’t tell the difference between the 12-channel demo and the original.
Sentence 1 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sentence 1 Video: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sentence 2 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sentence 2 Video: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sentence 3 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sentence 3 Video: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Instrument 1 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Instrument 2 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Instrument 3 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Instrument 4 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 1 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 2 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 3 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 4 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 5 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 6 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
Sound 7 Audio: 1, 4, 8, 12, 20, Original
I’ve released a new version of the Category Access Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog maintainer to restrict access to posts belonging to particular categories on a user-by-user basis.
New changes:
Download it on my code page.
Christopher’s incision from his second CI surgery still hasn’t full healed, even after 6 weeks. So we went to our local ear-nose-throat doctor, Dr. Stonebreaker. As we were leaving, Christopher said “Bah-bah” to the Dr’s assistant.
At first we weren’t sure if he “meant it,” but after we said “bye-bye” he said it again. Then, since I drove separately from Dorothy and Christopher, he said it over and over in the parking lot. 
It looks like I got my first grant! I got a letter from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research saying that they’ll support my 3-year proposal for research on software plans. This certainly will help my tenure case, not to mention provide support for my two PhD students.
The grants office is talking with the Air Force to work out the details. Hopefully the funding will start to flow in January.
For the last week or so I’ve been working on speeding up an algorithm for formal concept analysis (FCA) that I developed earlier in the year. FCA is a branch of lattice theory in which objects and properties are arranged into maximal sets of related entities. It’s like saying birds lay eggs, mammals nurse their young, but there’s a weird creature called the platypus that doesn’t really fit in either category.
We’re using FCA to build software plans from trace data collected on software that is run with multiple test cases. I developed the algorithm because a tool we were using (ToscanaJ) couldn’t handle the large input we were giving it. Since then we’ve learned of ConExp, which is supposed to be a lot faster. I did a quick comparison of my algorithm to their implementation of the NextClosure algorithm, and it looks like we might beat them. Meghan’s working on a more formal comparison.
Meanwhile I have to turn my attention to a paper… The ICSE formal demo paper deadline is fast approaching…
We took Christopher to a couple fun places around Charlottesville in the days preceding his surgery. One was Safari Zoo:
I think he liked the animals coming up to the car. As you can tell from the videos, Daniel was having flashbacks to a bad giraffe incident when he was a kid.
We also hit Carter’s Mountain for some apple picking. Christopher didn’t seem to be fazed by the pulling of edible fruit from trees.
Yesterday Christopher went through his second CI surgery. The pre-op routine was pretty much the same as before, but this time the anesthesiologist gave him some happy juice before they took him away. That was pretty funny… Christopher’s eyes were half closed and he had a dopey grin on his face. It’s not every day that you see your kid drunk as a skunk.
It turns out that Advanced Bionics had a representative in the OR for his surgery. Apparently they redesigned the electrode array so that it curls more, causing it to hug the inner part of the cochlea more. In theory this would allow the electrodes to more directly stimulate the auditory nerve, but they said that they haven’t seen a big difference in trials.
Anyway, afterwards we chatted with the representative, mostly because we wanted to hassle her about when the Auria was going to come out. We’re kinda tired of the body-worn processor, and can’t use the behind-the-ear model if we want to be able to trade it in for the new one when it comes out.
Bad to the surgery: Christopher’s recovery was pretty much the same as before. Today he’s been very wobbly on his feet, more than I remember before. The good news is that this time he isn’t messing with his bandage, so maybe we can keep the cup on for a full two days.
Here are some photos:
I’ve released a new version of the Category Access Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog maintainer to restrict access to posts belonging to particular categories on a user-by-user basis.
New changes:
Download it on my code page.
It’s been a little over a month since Christopher’s activation, and he’s starting to respond some to sounds. When we call his name, about half the time he’ll look around for us. He can also hear (but not see) me doing “raspberries” and do them himself. A couple of days ago I took him for a walk, and the ice cream truck was coming up behind us. He heard the annoying music and turned to see what was coming.
Some day we’ll take it for granted, but for now we’re excited every time he provides definitive proof that he’s hearing.
I’ve released a new version of the Category Order Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog administrator to set an explicit ordering, spacing, and indentation of categories in the category list that appears in the sidebar. The administrator specifies the ordering in the new “Category Order” management page. There is also an option for placing the category post count inside the link.
New changes:
A screenshot shows the management page. Download it on my code page.
I’ve released a new version of the Category Access Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog maintainer to restrict access to posts belonging to particular categories on a user-by-user basis.
New changes:
Download it on my code page.
This week has been crazy. On Monday and Tuesday, Christopher’s CI was activated. I also had my last shot at the NSF CAREER proposal due on Tuesday. Plus John Regehr passed along a call for the Air Force Young Investigator Program, due on Wednesday.
Over the weekend we had a SIGbeer mini-reunion. So I spent the whole weekend polishing off my NSF proposal, then re-writing it for the Air Force submission.
On top of all that, I’m on Ken Blakely’s thesis committee, which was meeting Wednesday morning for his proposal. I kinda totally forgot about that, but was able to get there in time for the questions, and I met with Ken later in the day.
Whew! Things are starting to get back to normal now. There are 2 or 3 more proposals coming up in the fall, and a couple papers as well, but for now I can take a breath and get some work done.
Last Saturday John, Sarah, and Jonas were all in Charlottesville, so the Englers hosted a get-together at their house. This coincided well with Christopher’s activation the following Monday, so we decided to head up on Friday and stay at Dorothy’s parents’ house through Tuesday.
There were an amazing number of kids. Nearly every couple had at least one, and several had more than one. How things change so fast… It wasn’t long ago that we were all singl eat the Greenskeeper contemplating mixers with the nursing school.
Here’s the album. (Note: You’ll need to log in to see pictures of kids.):
It was really good to catch up with the Regehrs, and to finally meet Jonas, after 1.5 years!
On Monday our son Christopher had his CI activated at the University of Virginia. He was 13 months to the day. We went with the Advanced Bionics device with the BWP. He was really tired on Monday, so we didn’t get really good behavioral indications that he was hearing (except that when the audi turned up the volume he cried).
On Tuesday we went back in for a checkup and increasing of the mapping volume. This time he had a really good nap beforehand, and was quite happy. The audi got him to look up a couple times while he was playing when she sent a tone to his implant.
There’s also a test where one electrode in the implant array acts as a detector, and the other as an actuator. This way the device can measure itself at the point of contact with the auditory nerve. This is really cool, and something I didn’t know they could do. In any case, Christopher’s response curves were textbook-perfect.
Christopher mostly ignores the implant, which is good because we were worried that he’d mess with it. Unfortunately, he also ignores any sound that he gets from it. Hopefully as he explores the world he’ll begin to understand that things have sound. We’re trying to train him to respond to sound, and I guess that will come in due course.
Here’s what Christopher looks like wearing his harness with the processor in it:
Here’s the whole photo album, which includes movies of him responding to sounds as the audiologist tests him:
I’ve released a new version of the Category Order Wordpress 2 plugin. This plugin allows the blog administrator to set an explicit ordering, spacing, and indentation of categories in the category list that appears in the sidebar. The administrator specifies the ordering in the new “Category Order” management page. There is also an option for placing the category post count inside the link.
New changes:
A screenshot shows the management page. Download it on my code page.
