Some shit is flowing around about breaking compatibility for GTK+ 3.0. Imendio should stay clear of library code if that’s what they want to do. Thankfully, there are people who do get it, like Miguel de Icaza and Morten Welinder.

The hard part is keeping compatibility (something that even Apple doesn’t do right in between major OSX versions), and it seems that especially in the FOSS world, no one wants to do the hard things. In the world of Linux, coders should realize that it all comes down to “compatibility, compatibility, compatibility…” and not “developers, developers, developers…”.

My friend Dominique arrived with a present (thanks!) for me tonight: the Sony DVP-FX820 portable DVD player. Which of course I will be using as an external video monitor for my HV20 camcorder through its video-in port, rather than as a DVD player.

The screen is vibrant and high-res enough that even through the lowly RCA cable it delivers a very good image quality. This device is a must have for amateur but serious filmmakers, especially if there is a 35mm adapter in the mix, because not only the large 8″ screen helps with focusing, but also because you can rotate it effortlessly (don’t forget that most 35mm adapters record with the image upside down).

However, the most interesting point for me was something else. It was the fact that the Sony monitor has a wider display zone than the HV20’s LCD screen (less overscan). Many times I fell into the trap: I would frame a shot that looks great on screen, but when I see it on my PC’s LCD, there are crap objects outside the safe zone that were not visible in the camera’s LCD, and that ruin my framing! Having a safe zone on the LCD of the camera might have been a useful thing back in the day, but today’s videos that end up only online, or on TVs that have a “dot by dot” mode (like mine), doesn’t make sense to design camera LCDs with these limitations anymore. So I was happy to see that this Sony player can see “more” of the actual shot and helps you frame more accurately (especially horizontally).

You will need a “Triple Phono Plug Coupler” (aka a female-to-female 3-way RCA adapter) to connect your camera to this device. The only other problem this setup has is that it’s bulky, as you will have to dangle along a full DVD drive all the time, so you might need something like this. Battery life is pretty good for what it is (reportedly over 5 hours), and the device comes with a car charger.

More discussion and info about it over at HV20.com.

I received from Computer Geeks the other day some interesting gadgets and tools that I would like to share with you.

* Fore Care 1315 Advanced Wrist Blood Pressure Monitor

A month ago I visited the doctor and she said that I have high blood pressure! So I thought that this gadget might be a cool idea to try out. This is a very comfortable and easy to carry blood pressure monitor that fits around your wrist. It’s easy to use: you click the power button, you place your left hand on your right shoulder, the battery powered device inflates automatically and you then wait for a few seconds to read the results. Dead simple! Thankfully, in my case the high blood pressure problem didn’t happen to be major. But I will continue monitoring it and even chart it, as the device is able to store 58 measurements! In the meantime, I surely need to start exercising…

* A-Data 16GB Turbo Class 6 SDHC Memory Card

Who could have thought a few years ago that you could get 16 GB flash storage for less than $70. Especially at the size of an SD memory card! This is both a great value and a great buy. The specific card is fast, and it works flawlessly with video recording, which I verified with my Kodak HD camera. AVCHD camera users will be able to use it too. This model can record at 50mbps, and most consumer SD-based camcorders usually don’t need more than 25 mbps.

* 2.5″ USB 2.0 Multimedia IDE HDD Player w/Remote

I had an old laptop drive around, which I tried with this product. Installation was very easy, just four screws needed to remove to insert the drive. From that point on, it could function both as a USB 2.0 external hard drive, or as a TV media player! The enclosure has an RCA AV output, a 15-pin VGA and USB 2.0 ports, aCX (coaxial) - digital audio output and a DC jack. The player can playback MPEG4-ASP (XViD, that is), Mpeg2 VOB files, mpeg1, mp3 and JPG files. It can work both in NTSC and PAL. The experience of using it as a media player does not match something like the AppleTV of course, but for $30 bucks you get a basic TV player and you get to use that old laptop drive that would otherwise be sitting in your closet useless. That’s not a bad deal.