Blogging is fun. But for some, to go through the trouble of logging in, and learning another new interface is more than they might want to do or have time to do.

Having others write posts for your blog is also fun and this too is where Email Blogging can really help. To blog while your traveling might also be a great time to make use of the convenience of Email Blogging.

Email Blogging is where you simply send compose an email as a blog post and then send that email to a secret email address (for your blog) and the blog either automatically posts the email as a blog post or adds it to the queue of posts as a draft (ready for the final edit before posting) that you can publish at your leasure.

Here is a quick HOW TO on Email Blogging:

First you compose an email…

Click for a larger version

Next you send the email to your secret email address.

Click here to see how the published post looks after having been emailed.

VitalBodies wants to thank the team that created Postie for creating a great plug in for WordPress!

At around 50,000 page views we decided to to celebrate and make the big shift to our own blog. We installed WordPress.org software on the VitalBodies.com domain and imported all our posts and all your comments. When the new blog was finished we announced the new blog on the old blog.

Today we are celebrating 10,000 page views on the new blog!  At nearly 75,000 (72,256) Page Views on the old blog, we set all the old posts in to PENDING REWIEW mode. We left one post announcing the new blog.

It is interesting to note that for quite some time we had duplicate posts on both blogs. The posts that got the most traffic were the posts that we pubilished FIRST on what ever blog they were on.

So if we published the same post on both blogs, which ever blog we published the post on first would get the most traffic.

If later we removed the first post, the second post would get the most traffic.

We would like the new blog to get the traffic plus we would like to maintain only one blog.

VitalBodies has worked hard to create an new web site to show case some of our design and web skills.

Click image to see a larger image.

Visit VitalBodies.net

We thought if we hit 50,000 views we might celebrate by moving our vitalbodies.wordpress.com blog to the VitalBodies.com/blog and start using Open Source software from WordPress.org rather than the free blog offering from WordPress.com.

This allows us much more blogging freedom than a WordPress.com blog like adding extensions.

But could we wait to hit 50,000 views?

We got to excited and started to make the big switch at 47,428 or so views!

So for the next 8-9 days it will take to reach 50,000 views we are launching our new blog and choosing a template and adding features.

Our new Carbon Neutral Web Site Hosting made the switch easy, fun and faster than we had expected and  we wanted to try out the one click install of WordPress and this blog shows it works!

(Click Image To See The Full Size Version)

Today’s cartoon is dedicated to dads that like to read The Funnies.

Cartoon created using all open source software including Inkscape.

“A weir is a small overflow-type dam commonly used to raise the level of a river or stream.”

THE CURRENT WEIR:
The water for the water system comes from a very small creek deep in the dense old growth woods on the Oregon Coast. The water is loaded with fir needles and sediment and the flow is weak rather than strong. The current weir is a small dam that raises the water level so we can pre-screen the water before sending the water down the hill through nearly a 1/4 mile of tubing. Even with the existing screen the tubing or screen can become clogged because of all the fir needles and sediment naturally occurring in the area and water.

THE CURRENT SCREEN: Our current screen is an open-ended 6 inch diameter pipe less than 2 feet long that has been drilled with lots of holes and wrapped in a stainless steel screen. The screen is Zip-tied on each end and the Zip-tied ends of the screen are then stuffed into the open ends of the pipe. This design works well for it’s intended purpose but tends to need cleaning about 4 times a year and clogs un-expectedly every now and then. What usually ends up stopping the flow is the weir filling up with sediment and completely choking the filter.

SCREEN DESIGN GOALS: Ideally the next newly designed screen within the weir would be self cleaning or non-existent. Because of the remote location on the side of a small water fall, that might not be possible. Additionally the size, shape and amount of fir needles and the low amount of flow also tend to make designing a self cleaning filter difficult. If a self cleaning design is not possible, the next screen design should prevent clogging and be easy to clean and monitor. Additionally, adding some degree of filtration to remove dirt and sediment would be helpful providing the filters do not clog or need changing more than the screen. The design should also be such that the water flow is not slowly reduced until the screen clogs. Instead, the flow should not be reduced until the entire screen or the entire filter needs to be cleaned.

CLEANING: Cleaning the existing screen is done roughly 4 times a year. As the screen slowly clogs, water flow is slowly reduced until the screen needs to be cleaned again. Cleaning the current screen requires
removing the entire screen and pipe unit from the weir and carefully removing all the fir needles and sediment. Occasionally the pipe and screen unit need to be disassembled and thoroughly cleaned or even rebuilt with a new screen. The next screen design should be able to achieve easier cleaning and perhaps only need to be cleaned once a year.

NEW WEIR DESIGN GOALS:
SELF CLEANING
PREVENTS CLOGGING
EASY TO CLEAN
EASY TO MONITOR
ADDITIONAL FILTRATION
DOES NOT REDUCE FLOW
INCREASES POTENTIAL FLOW AND HEAD
NEEDS CLEANING LESS OFTEN

NEW WEIR DESIGN: One idea is to build a small waterfall into the current weir. The waterfall could be a flat, contained area that the water flows over. This would allow the water to flow as a small, wide waterfall into a newly designed screen and filter box. By having the water flow in the form of a small, wide waterfall (rather than a tube) we would prevent clogging. In the diagram there is a 12 inch wide waterfall, that is seen from the side. Another even better design is to use a short run of large pipe coming from the weir to the weir filter. This would allow the Weir Filter to be completely outside of the stream bed. Large rocks can make their way down the stream bed in the rushing waters of winter. Over flow could (and should) pipe back to the stream. Ideally one should only take what water is needed and using a simple shut off like a float valve down below, stop the water from flowing down the pipe. This would leave as much water as possible to flow down the stream bed.

NEW SCREEN DESIGN: VitalBodies design idea was to buy or build a filter box. In water garden design they are often called POND SKIMMERS or WATER FALL FILTERS. This basic design is not self cleaning but is easy to clean, monitor and maintain. The design illustrated meets most all of our requirements. The filter basket would catch things like fir needles and small rocks and could easily lift out and be dumped.

“UV filtration could mean that we no longer have to use Chlorine.”

NEW POTENTIAL: Another design idea that VitalBodies proposed, is to make use of the water that is used for a micro hydro-electric generator. The power could be used to run a UV filter and what is called a UV clarifier. The UV clarifier is an underwater light that could be placed in the cistern to prevent algae and such. UV filtration could mean that we no longer have to use (or could at least use less) Chlorine Bleach to “purify” the water, much of which is used for drinking.

ADDITIONAL NOTE: VitalBodies also pointed out in our consultation that bleach, sadly, is only 6% chlorine, and the other 94% they do not have to state on the label what that is. What ever mystery 94% is, could be almost anything?

MAKING USE OF NEW POTENTIAL: To make use of this potential VitalBodies recommended that they might need to raise the low spot of the water line (tubing) that runs down the hill by moving a small section. In addition, we could have the tubing up by the waterfall be of a larger diameter for some distance, then come back down to the current diameter to increase HEAD. Since the flow of water is nearly 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and the water has HEAD and FLOW from traveling so far down (nearly 1/4 mile) to the cistern, we could likely create enough power to make cost-efficient energy.

NOTE: Electric UV (Ultra Violet) water purification can happen with or without hydro.

CONCLUSIONS:

Creating a new design for the weir and screen seems possible and affordable.

The new design could be allowing more water to flow down the stream bed by making simple changes to how the valves are set up like using a float valve.

As Eco Consultants,  VitalBodies promoted generating sustainable power with the system of tubing already in place or create even more power with some small modifications.

The system could easily reduce the amount of maintenance needed.

A more consistent flow of water could be achieved.

SIDE NOTES: VitalBodies used Inkscape an Open Source Vector Graphics program to create the illustrations.

VitalBodies has been selling eco and organic items since around the year 2000, back when the world was supposed to come to an end. Remember how all the computers in the world were supposed to come to a grinding halt and throw civilization into mass pandemonium?

The mass pandemonium did not happen as many people and companies acted in time an updated their computers. Or, perhaps the the threat was not real in the first place.

Pollution and the extinction or many species related to generating power or burning fuel is real though.

That is why we were excited about a solar panel that is easy to install, is affordable, and does not take special knowledge to setup or use.

This is a solar panel that is also perfect for those that are excited about making the move towards solar but might not have the time, budget, knowledge or location for solar voltaic array. With a SolarVenti you can start today. This panel would also work for many people who currently rent as one only drills a drier vent size hole in the wall and hangs some screw on brackets up. You could take the complete panel with you when you move.

VitalBodies was excited to become one of the only on-line retailers of the SolarVenti Solar Panel in the US.

VitalBodies ebay store has a number of the SolarVenti panels to choose from in different sizes with more information about the panels and there functions.

VitalBodies Ebay Store: Ebay Store
The SolarVenti’s in that store: SolarVenti
Additional Info On Our Site: Info
SolarVenti PDF: PDF
Installation Guide: PDF

If you still have questions please feel free to ask. There are SV7, SV14 and SV30 available in stock.

The Roof Mount Kit: The roof mount kit is a separate item from the SolarVenti (SV). The roof mount kit is for attaching the SolarVenti to a roof. You do not need the kit if you attach the SolarVenti to a wall. Most people wall mount the SolarVenti as it is much easier.

VitalBodies got the opportunity to play around with Inkscape, an Open Source Vector drawing program that is somewhat like CorelDraw or Illustrator. Inkscape’s native format is Scalable Vector Graphics SVG.

Click image for a larger graphic. Created with Inkscape and exported to PNG…

Having barely tried Inkscape before, the results seem exciting. With more time and effort this could have been more polished.

First Impression:

The way this program can blur lines is amazing and useful.

The gradient editor is fast and easy to understand like most of the program.

The overall ease of use and power of the program is excellent for what was attempted.

There is something refreshing about the way the program does what you would expect with relative ease.

The interface is clear and easy to use.

For the most part, an artist who is used to working in vector graphics can jump right in.

Inkscapes is fun and a pleasure to use.

Doing art is fun in Inkscape…

What A New User Ran Up Against:

Having hardly used the program you expect some kind of a learning curve.

There were a few things we missed which might or might not be the program’s fault.

We did not see how to turn on and off Snap to Guide Lines for the guide lines we created and it remained a mystery as to why the program seemed to default to 90dpi for exporting bitmaps or how to effectively change that and keep the drawing’s dimensions what we wanted. We were hoping for 96dpi, which is our LCD screen’s native resolution.

Changing the font of the selected text was a bit odd as the drop down menu would not always show up or would flash on and off.

The biggest challenge an old hand at CorelDraw will face, is that you can not do multi-page layouts where you have many many pages. The program is not designed as a page layout program (in that sense) like CorelDraw or the Open Source program Scribus is.

VitalBodies suggests converting/exporting to SVG if you plan to try some of your existing drawings in Inkscape. You can also export to PDF but you may get mixed results on things like gradient fills and such.

Would VitalBodies Recommend Inkscape:

Without a doubt. This is an amazing program first off, and profound for being free. Having spent years in CorelDraw this will take some getting used to but VitalBodies figures about three solid drawings and this will feel like home…

Scalable Vector Graphics:

Generally speaking, you have vector or raster art in the world of creating 2d computer screen art. A raster image would be made up of dots like what you manipulate in Photoshop or GIMP.

As the wikipedia would currently say “Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines, curves, and shapes or polygon(s), which are all based upon mathematical equations, to represent images in computer graphics.”

In most vector programs you do not see the mathematical equations unless you get deep into the code or do art at a code level which most people do not do. What you would see is letters/fonts, shapes, lines and such that you easily move about and change.

In terms of the process of creating art, the differences are huge. To select a pre-drawn shape (like the gradient sky behind the mountains) in a raster program can be very difficult and could involve using multiple techniques and tools unless that shape is on it’s own layer. In a vector program you would just click on it. This is because in a raster program you have to somehow select all those dots.

CorelDraw or Inkscape are both excellent vector programs. Inkscape is free, open source and fun to use.

How To Install Inkscape In Ubuntu Hardy:

Applications > Add/Remove… > Supported Applications > Search Inkscape > Enable (check in check box) > Apply Changes…

VitalBodies:

VitalBodies recently shifted to using all Open Source programs running on an Open Source Operating System Ubuntu. VitalBodies would like to thank the Inkscape team that makes art a pleasure!

- Draw Freely -

- Visit Inkscape: http:www.Inkscape.org -

VitalBodies finished the creation of the VitalBodies.com/zen-cart/ Shopping Cart.

This cart is based upon a Zen-Cart.

VitalBodies wanted an Open Source Shopping Cart solution and Zen-Cart seemed perfect.

(Click image to see a larger clearer version)

The entire VitalBodies web site is W3C Valid Table-less XHTML Strict and Valid CSS and zen-cart was the closest to table-less we could find. At the time VitalBodies started using the cart, table-less was the direction that the Zen-Cart team was heading.

VitalBodies wants to thank the Zen-Cart team for their great cart!

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VitalBodies.com/zen-cart/

Visit VitalBodies.com/zen-cart/

VitalBodies recently finished the creation re-creation of the MelitaMarshall.com Web Site.

This site is based upon a template, VitalBodies created for the Oregon House web site.

Melita wanted wanted the site to tie into her existing business Oregon House and the Oregon House web site but be able to change in style as needed.

VitalBodies created the template to be W3C Valid Table-less XHTML Strict and Valid CSS.

(Click image to see a larger clearer version)

The entire web site W3C Valid Table-less XHTML Strict and Valid CSS.

The web sites original tabled design was done by Paradigm-Graphics some years back.

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MelitaMarshall.com:

“I bring wisdom from my own spiritual journey as well as experience in business entrepreneurship and training in holistic healing into the vessel of our healing sessions. My goal is to help you gain insight into what is limiting you, and coach you to find the courage to reconnect with your source and your core.“

Visit MelitaMarshall.com