So I’ve had the new beta Yahoo mail for a little over a week now. Similar to what I think of the Yahoo Music Engine, the idea is good, but the execution is not quite what I’d expect from one of the top internet firms.

The UI is quite intuitive to anyone who is used to Microsoft Outlook. It did take a bit of time to tell your brain to use the UI like a real desktop application. I think we’ve all gotten used to the poor user interaction that web browsers provide. Does the new UI make me more efficient? I think so. With a lot of keyboard short cuts (i.e. using arrow keys and shift keys), the UI really speeds up a lot of the processes by reducing mouse use.

The application definitely does feel like it’s in the beta stage. I get a lot of JS errors and sometimes it just crashes the page. Yahoo Music Engine also had similar faults during its beta phase, but these problems didn’t really go away when the application became “un-beta”. I have a good amount of stock in Yahoo, so I hope when the new Yahoo Mail launches Yahoo would’ve throughly tweaked it to be fast and robust…

P.S. all the AJAX and Flash stuff is really making my G4 iBook feel slow Time for some core duo action?

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So I ended up doing 18 miles on the bike trainer. Here are some stats…

• Time: 1 hr 16 min
• Distance: 18 mi
• Avg speed: 14.2 mph
• Max speed: 24.0 mph

I would have more stats but my HR monitor crapped out in the middle of the ride. The screen just went all dark and I had to reset all my settings. Luckily all my exercise files were still there. I am guessing my gloves kept on hitting the buttons? I think my HR monitor has a keylock feature. I am going to turn that on…

Injury update: I think I have problems with my IT band. It’s a different part of my knee than last time. This time, it’s pretty much hurting right on the side of the knee. I can even feel it if I massage the side of my thigh (where that IT band goes through). *sigh* I hope this doesn’t mess up my training. The IT band was bothering me up to mile 10, but after mile 10 it went away, so I kept on going. Ankle is still sensitive, but not causing as much trouble as my IT band.

Alright, that’s all. Peace out!

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Sorry about not blogging lately. I’ve been ULTRA BUSY! To make up for all the blogging, here’s a SUPER ULTRA MEGA UPDATE!

First of all, you might notice ChapterThree’s new look and feel. You guys like it? That header image is dedicated to the folks that pitched in for my going-away gift (black 60GB iPod video). Can you guys spot the resemblance? Also, elyliu.com forwards to ChapterThree instead of ChapterTwo now.

Speaking of the iPod, I spent about 12 hours yesterday ripping every single CD I own into an MP3. All my songs are set up on the iPod now. Now I have…

• ~1400 songs
• ~dozen music videos (bought from iTunes)
• 14 episodes of Lost
• ~600 pictures
• ~30 video podcast about cars
• ~4GB of car videos (that still need to be converted to Apple format)
• ~2GB of random stuff backed up from my old work computer (mostly archived emails)

About my new job, let’s see… Here are some random thoughts about my new job in no particular order…

• There are less speed bumps in the ABC parking structure, but it’s about 1/2 mile to get to the bottom floor
• Having to use pac files to access the internet sucks…
• We have a kick-ass snack drawer. Bad, if you are trying to lose some weight.
• Free Starbucks rocks!
• The TV in your cube thing is nice. Now I won’t miss any Lakers games!
• I am starting to get tired of commisary food already…
• I got a tour of the prospect studios. We have a team over there that does video editing for ABC.com. I was able to check out the edit bays, server room (with Apple Xserve servers), and a few of the stages for TV shows. I am probably going to work with those guys to write some plugins for the new video workflow system we are installing.
• I spent most of my time ramping up on out systems. I feel so crippled right now.

Overall, everything is starting settle down and I am finally able to sleep again.
Read the rest of this entry »

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Someone made a real version of Sally Carrera from the upcoming Pixar movie, Cars. Read more about it here…

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…to ChapterThree, the next chapter in Ely’s life!!! I know, I know. This blog is still looking very…boring. I’ll make it prettier in the next few days.

Remember to update your RSS feeds! I am no longer posting in ChapterTwo. If you wish to visit my older blog, ChapterTwo, click here.

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