On the driver’s side, the front two plugs went in just fine, but the back one was more of a challange.  Something got misalighed while pulling the spark plug out, and we ended up having to take the upper valve cover, air pump, and fan shroude out to get the spark plug and jammed socket out.

Engine back to the state it was when we removed the alternator.

And finally, the new alternator installed in it’s mount, ready to go in tomorrow.

We installed a JVC KD-G440 AM/FM CD Player with remote.  It also features a 1/8″ Aux in, and a USB port to play MP3 files off of a memory stick.

Also today, we fxed the right fog light. All it required was a new bulb.

The head unit for the stereo will not power up, so I have removed it, and it will most likely be replaced.  The equalizer that was mounted to the bottom of the dash has been re-located to the glove box.

The alternator has been pulled, and is currently being shipped to a family friend for some repairs.  It wasn’t too hard to remove, but hopefully it goes in easier than it comes out.

And finally, we had the dent doctors out today to remove a few dents and dings from the bodywork.

The 911 SC Targa came standard with chrome trim, but this particular car has option M496, or black trim.

EDIT: No, it does not have the M496 option.

The 3.0 Liter 6 Cylinder, air cooled engine is specified to put out about 170hp into a 5 speed manual transmission.  The alternator on this car needs some work before the car hits the road.

Finally, the origional wheels on the 911 SC Targa are 6″ wide up front, and 7″ wide on the back.  This car has 7″ on the front, and 8″ inchers on the back.

The next step for me here, is a way to control this device via computer. To do this, I needed an interface that can allow a computer to talk to several servos.  I ordered a Pololu Serial 16-Servo Controller.  It came in kit for, and I had to assemble the PCB my self.  A fairly easy assembly, as it is all through hole components, and none are too close together.

My next project will probably be one of their Dual Motor Controllers.

Since this is a regional competition, it was spread out over two days. Normal competitions are usually a day or even just half a day, Nationals is usually 3 days, and continentals/worlds/other are more than 3 days long.

On Friday, the first day of the competition it was registration and Qualifier 1. Most people will assume that all that matters is being the fastest person up the wall. This is not the case, with the exception of speed climbing competitions. Each category will have a climb designated for them, that is set with their climbing abilities in mind. (Competition climbing in Canada is still a growing sport, so at this point everybody knows everybody.) Each hand hold on this climb is given a numbered point value, and a designation after the number.

If I just brushed hold number 23 with my finger tips before falling, I would be scored as 23-. If I was on hold number 23 solidly, I’d be scored 23. If I was on 23 trying to move to 24, I would get a 23+. These numbers are all entered into a spreadsheet and magically come out with a ranking for each climber.

After the first climb has been completed, we used Friday night to strip all of the routes off the walls and put up all new ones. (I was feeling quite ill on Friday night and couldn’t stick around to help out, Sorry Andrew!) Bright and early on Saturday morning is qualifying round 2. It works exactly like Q1 did, and again, at the end of the round, we emptied out all of the climbers and spectators once again to change the routes.

Next would be Semi-Finals, which work a little bit differently than finals. Before anyone is let into the gym, the competitors were let into an isolation room so that they could not see the climbs, and could not see any other people climb them. They are brought out for a 5 min preview where they can look at but can not touch the climb. After the preview, they are put back into isolation to wait for their turn to climb, and do any warm-ups, snacking, chatting with competitors, planning their climb, etc. Competition climbing is a very friendly sport in which all the climbers are willing to help each other out, offer tips and advice, and hang out!

Once the semi-finals have run, only a top percentage (based on original numbers in category) remain. And, as you may have guessed, we now do exactly the same thing for Finals.

Even if it does not sound like a lot of work, the number of hours that go into a competition of this scale, or any competition for that matter, are un-countable! I’d like to send a shout out to the crew at the Edge, and all of their volunteers to say that they did an awesome job on yet another awesome competition! See you all at Nationals!

P.S. I will link to a photo gallery shortly, once I get it online.

That’s right, nearest bank open evenings and saturdays is 633 kms away from here.

So, what bank do you guys use? Do they have some good features/services? TD and Van City are both close to my house, any opinions on them?

So, I have a very specific criteria for what all my BMS must be able to do.  Before I get into specifics of what all tools it contains, here are the requirements.  I’ve told myself that if it does not cover all of these, I have not completed it.

1. Cost effective.
2. Easy to use
3. Well Supportted
4. Easy to Customize

Cost effective is a very difficult thing for a real programming company to do.  They need to pay their programmers, pay their rent, bills, testers, etc.  I on the other hand, do not.  I am not doing this to make money, I’m doing it to help out small businesses, and to help myself learn more about something I enjoy.

Easy to use is an absolute must for the scope of this project.  It requires almost all of the business’s employees to buy into the system in order for all of the features to work.  If it isn’t easy, people will revert back to the ‘old way’ of doing things.  The old way sucks. I’ve been there.

Well supported. I know that not only will my software occasionally have bugs in it, but that the user will attempt to use it in a way that I have not thought of.  I want to maintain a small customer base, and be able to work with them one on one on the issues that they are having. This is where easy to customize comes in.  I have weighed both sides of this issue, and have decided that each customer will have their own ‘version’ of the software tailored to their specific needs.

I will outline some of the basics of what all my BMS will be able to do; however, the requirements document has not been completed yet, so I don’t even know what all of the features will be! (This may raise the question as to what I have been doing all this time.  I’ve been learning, building small modules, breaking them, learning better ways, rebuilding, and breaking. Repeat.)

Calendar:
Almost every small business has appointments.  The business that I know most about happens to be a rock climbing gym, and such a place will be my main target audience.  The gym I worked for had both an indoor gym, and a portable climbing wall.  Both of these require time and staff, as well as payment, and special needs.  The portable wall needs staffing for events, operators, insurance, maintenance, and a few other things on a per event basis. While this is going on, there is also an indoor climbing gym to be running. It has regular hours, but also has events out side of it’s hours, needs staff for different positions, special events, regular daily weekly and bi-weekly programs, private bookings, and so many other things.

Staffing:

The climbing gym requires staff for both the indoor part, and the portable wall.  The indoor gym requires one supervisor for all of it’s open hours, as well as any outside of hours events.  Different supervisors can handle different events.  Some of the programs also need a coach, sometimes the coach needs some help.  The private events may require a few belayers, or someone that can handle the more unique cases.  A powerful staffing tool is essential for the BMS, and will be the core of most of the system.

Membership:

Most climbing gyms/fitness facilities have a membership system of some sort.  We will need to be able to track contact and personal information, payments due, privleges, family memberships, training, programs the member participates in, and other details. This will be coupled with an option for a swipe card system, so you can track facility usage, and for insurance purposes.

Internal Messages:

Almost every business needs to have internal communications.  This module is fairly simple, as it is basically a forum.

External Messages:

If you can’t contact the business, what good is it? I will need a module for tracking phone messages, emails, and even customer’s that stop in with questions.  If the message is from a member, it needs to be coupled with their account, if it isn’t, than we will need contact details for that person.

Special Programs:
Most gyms/fitness facilities have some special programs. For example, our competitive climbing team meets twice a week. We will need to be able to track the people in this, as well as coaches, and any other details that the coach will want to store.  We have a course that all members take called the ‘belay course’ in which they learn how to work the ropes while they are climbing.  This course needs at least 2 people to happen, and a coach.  A module will be able to track students, and coaches.  When they finish the course, it should update the member’s file to say what qualifications they now have.

To Do List:
This is another fairly basic tool, but covers some special items. For example, on the last day of the month, an employee may need to run a report. This can show up here, as well as any daily, weekly, bi-weekly, etc. tasks.  Special one time tasks can be done here as well.  They can be assigned to certain people, have notes and events attached to them, etc.

Other Tracking:
Some businesses will have needs to track other things, such as first aid.  Tracking lists can be dynamically generated with customizable fields so that the user can pick what sorts of lists they have, and how they are organized.

Web Interface:
I plan on a basic web interface for this, but it may grow into a more advanced feature.  For the start, I would like to have staff able to check their shifts through the company’s website. Later features may include private event bookings online, registering for courses, making your membership payments, and the ability for the company owner to access most of the above information from home/on the road.

Well, that pretty much covers the scope of what I am trying to do.  This first implimentation would be local, but from there I would like to move on to either a ‘you buy it, and run it on your own servers’ or a ‘pay monthly, and it’s hosted on our servers’. I’m leaning towards the latter, as it’s easier to support and guarantee that it will work.

I appreciate any input that anybody may have on this, such as ideas for features, etc.

I say that it will be more useful to me, let me explain a bit more about what I mean by this.  A more experienced programmer who will not be named once told me that you know you’ve done a good job if you can please 75% of your audience, 75% of the time.  That’s all good if you are building something intended for a large audience, and many uses.  This blog is only intended for me, and the readers.  The reader’s needs are fairly basic, they need to be able to read new posts, comment, and have a way to find older posts.  The basic word press install already does that.  I would like to modify the part of the site that I see.  I have many ideas for things to add and change, but you’ll see those when I get to them.

That said, the first change I will be making is a new skin, I am already tired of the plain blue!