Michael P. O'Connor

My Life

Bat in the church today

Categories: Church, Random Thoughts

Comments: 2 Comments

Published on: March 18, 2006

Well today, as I was working on some of the computers for the church (I am still working on them at this time) a bat got into the lecture hall. There were some of the ladies from the church in there doing some scrap booking. Well they were not to happy about the bat in the room, so I was asked if I could get it out. Well I remember from when I was in 7 and 8 grad my sister use to keep buggies, and when they would get out we would use a blanket to try to catch them. So I grabbed a blanket and started to send it in the direction the bat was as it flew by. On the 3rd shot, BINGO! the poor bat fell to the ground with the blanket. The blanket did not cover the poor animal, so I pulled the blanket back and set it back on top of the bat. At that point I let the bat out outside. Later that day I was asked why I did not kill the bat. I will have to say I can not think of hurting a poor little bat just for getting stuck in the church, it just dose not seam right to me to kill one of God’s creates for no reason, and besides I think the bat was cute.
Some of the ladies started to call me “bat man” for catching the bat.

The importance of the ADA

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Random Thoughts

Comments: 1 Comment

Published on: March 17, 2006

Over at John Dvorak’s blog, there was a post about movie theaters wanting to put cell phone jammers in. I know it sounds wonderful, no one talking on the cell phone during a movie, no more cell phone ringing during the movie. But before we go for it, lets think of the down side. Medical emergencies, There are those that have illnesses that might have the problem of 911 being called at any moment, and it is my understanding that every second saved could make the difference between life and death. How about something that can affect a lot of people that are not even handicapped, heart attacks, and strokes, again every second saved could make the difference between life and death or partial recovery or full recovery. I got into a debate there about how this is a bad idea, and some guy there said, first that if some one could have those problem maybe they should not go to the movies, and how does the ADA cover 911 (or phone service as he put it)
Until today I never really thought the ADA was 100% needed, but after talking with some of those people there, I can see why it is needed, some people have such a microscopic view of the world that revolves around their selves that they can not even stop for a second to think about people that have different needs. Well they did convince me of one thing, and that is that the ADA is needed, mainly because of people like them.
I know we have lived with out cell phones for a long time, but I wonder how many people’s lives could have been saved by the use of a cell phone.

HAPPY ST. PATRICK’S DAY

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Misc (no other place to put this stuff)

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Published on: March 17, 2006

I hope every on e has a good St. Patrick’s day today, remember wear GREEN.

Tracking the Miles I have biked this year

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Biking

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Published on: March 16, 2006

Well I tried the site that does those tracking things, but I really did not like how it is done, so I will just update the header file for my site to with the number of miles I have biked this year, as of not it is 23 miles, if you look at the top of the page next to the my logo, you will be able to see the number of miles I have done this year, I plan on keeping that up to date.

I am out of shape

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Biking, Irish Tin Whistle, Random Thoughts

Comments: 1 Comment

Published on: March 16, 2006

Today I biked up to Squall hill, then down to the Pittsburgh Irish Center for the CCE meeting, this is a group of people that meet to play music together (I don’t play, yet, I hope to be able to join them in playing in the future when I get OK with the Irish Tin Whistle) I was OK going to the place, but coming back (around 9:20pm) coming up Forward Av. I could only make it only 3/4 of the way up. I was whipped out when I got to the top of the hill, but when I got up the rest of the way I got back on and rode rest of the way home, even up Murry Av. I know tonight is going to be a really bad night with my legs.
OK maybe I should give some back info here, for the last year and a half I been having trouble with my legs, cramps and violent twitches of the legs at night, that causes them to kick very hard, I have a bit of a fear that one night I am going to wake up in major pain from a broken toe.
I am hoping that by the end of May that I can bike up Forward Av with out having to stop at all. I have in the past mastered the hill on Neville St. and the hill of Bates, and Forbes Av from Oakland to Squall Hill.

This is wrong, just pure wrong, and I don’t see how it fixes the problem.

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Programming

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Published on: March 16, 2006

In this post I talk about how I had a problem with static variables in a class Well I have solved the problem, but the answer is wrong, just wrong. The way I solved it was call from the program area, the calls to the functions that change the value out of the second lib, into the program itself and it worked. But why does this fix the problem? I don’t know why or how, in fact I still think that the problem should not exist, but it did, and even with the problem, I don’t see the different from the static variable and static functions point of view is.
I still have the middle lib, but I just have to call the static functions that create the data from the program, but then when I am in the middle lib the data is now there for use. Go Fig, if you have any idea what was wrong, is wrong.

static members of objects

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Programming

Comments: 3 Comments

Published on: March 16, 2006

I think I am going to scream. I have an object in a lib that I made, this object has a static member that I expect (as per the C++ specs) that it should be the value I set it to last time I used it. So imagine the following class.
[code]
class a
{
private:
static int A;
public:
static void setA(int v) { A = v; };
static int getA() { return A; };
// there is more stuff but these are what is important
};
[/code]
that is the .h file, now the .cpp file has
[code]
int a::A = 0;
[/code]
Now the above code is compiled up into its own .lib file (MSVC++ 6.0) Now I have another lib that is linked to the above lib and it does something like
[code]
void f()
{
a::setA(20);
}
[/code]
now lets say I have a program that links to the second lib so lets say I call the following
[code]
void main()
{
f();
cout << a::getA() << endl; } [/code] I would expect the output to be [code] 20 [/code] but the output is [code] 0 [/code] I am trying to figure out how to have the value of a::A to stay the same across the calls to the libs.

Attention all Hams and SWL

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Ham Radio, Short Wave Radio Stuff

Comments: 3 Comments

Published on: March 15, 2006

Qrz is reporting that we might see a massive spike in sun spot activity. I don’t know much about how this will affect people into astronomy. But I do know that this will affect RF on earth. It will not help me on the Ham radio band since I do not work on the bands of 6 meters or below. I can work 6 meters, techs are allowed on it, but below 6 meters I can not go on legally. But here is what is exciting me, this should make listening to the Short Wave Radio fun, since the RF in these area of the bands will be able to travel better under high sunspot activity.

Snow??

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Misc (no other place to put this stuff)

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Published on: March 14, 2006

Well I went to lunch with one of my coworkers, and it was snowing out there. What happend? it was in the 70’s yesterday, and now we have snow. I really hate snow, I wish it would go away.

Well I tried to play my first song on the Irish Tin Whistle today

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Irish Tin Whistle

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Published on: March 13, 2006

Well as I have said about 2 times before, I am trying to learn the Irish Tin Whistle. Well as I was practicing today (and boy do I have a loooooooong way to go, before I can do anything OK), but today, I did try a song, a very simple song, but I did try it, and it resembled what I thought it should sound like. I am hoping that by Christmas I can play a few Christmas songs.

A video up for my friends

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Church, Friends

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Published on: March 13, 2006

Many months ago I helped some friends of mine with a video. I was the first (besides them) to find out this info, they had me hold onto it for a while. Last week I was asked if I could put a link up for them so they could post it to their blog, so I added it to my video section of my web site. You can see it at here on my site you can see the Wards web site here. They are good friends of mine from church.

Goals for this year

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Biking

Comments: 4 Comments

Published on: March 12, 2006

I am going to try to bike 1000 miles this year, I got the idea from Rob at unspace

Finally

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Irish Tin Whistle, Play

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Published on: March 12, 2006

Well I been more then busy this week, but I finally got some free time today (well not really free time, I just multi-tasked, aka recorded the Scanner Net, and finally got to practice the Irish Tin Whistle.
For the last week I been unable to get time to practice it. I also got most of the stuff I brought home from my office organized, I never realized how much stuff I took in over my 2 years and 4 months in CASOS. My couch still has allot of stuff on it to be organized and sorted, and put some where.

Todays St Patrick’s Day Parade

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Ham Radio, Web Site

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Published on: March 11, 2006

Well I got to help out with the St. Patrick’s Day Parade today. I also took my camera, and when there was a moment that I could snap pictures I did so, I got some pictures of people, that some in the Pittsburgh region might recognize. You can see the pictures here on my photo section of my website
It was a fun time, I also got to meet and shake hands with Rick Santrum again, that is 2 times in 3 months, I must be doing something right. I also got to meet and shake hands with Governor Rendal, and Mayor O’Connor, not my first choice in those offices (if you read my blog you probably already know that), but still a honor to meet and shake hands with them. We worked off of the .88 repeater for the time, I first was to tail one of the parade marshals that was in charge of the General Devision of the Parade, then after that I helped out with keeping track of what group was marching by so that the order of the people could be kept clear, I ran that info back to Jeff H. who then just radioed that on to the front of the pack.

I went for my first bike ride of the season

by Michael O'Connor

Categories: Biking

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Published on: March 10, 2006

I decided to do a short bike ride today. I don’t count my rides to work and back for the last 2 days since, they are only about .2 of a mile long. I decided to try out a route to where I will be working from the 20th on. I decided on the way to go, I am thinking of dropping down Neville St. to the Panther hollow path, then jump on the jail trail, then get off of the jail trail at the Bates St. exit. At the bottom of Bates, I will cross over 2nd Av, to Technology Dr. and take a right on Technology Dr, and that will take me right to USS.

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