Chris Worfolk's Blog


Installing Imagick on Ubuntu 12

February 10th, 2013 | Programming, Tech

To install Imagick, you would normally do this via PECL.

sudo pecl install imagick

However, when trying this on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, you may get an error similar to the following.

checking ImageMagick MagickWand API configuration program...
configure: error: not found. Please provide a path to MagickWand-config or Wand-config program

You can resolve this by installing a few extra packages.

sudo apt-get install libmagickwand-dev libmagickcore-dev

Now try re-running the original command and it should be successful.

Typo

February 9th, 2013 | Religion & Politics

Chris Ward tweeted this picture.

BCQIpAzCAAAnm2G

The Good Samaritan

February 8th, 2013 | Humanism

Last week at Atheist Society, retired Religious Education teacher Margaret Bramham presented a talk on the Gospels. It was an interesting talk, though I couldn’t help thinking about this Mitchell & Webb sketch.

Miller & Carter

February 7th, 2013 | Reviews

Last week, we headed down to the new steak house located on the Headrow, Miller & Carter.

Despite having just opened, it was actually relatively quiet. We are able to walk up without a reservation, and I would say only about 30% of the tables were occupied – though there were enough people in there to give it some atmosphere.

Was it the best steak I’ve had in Leeds? No. But George claimed that his was. My personal opinion was that it can’t match the top tier of Blackhouse and Gaucho, but it was still an excellent steak, and certainly not somewhere I would be adverse to going back to.

Fish

February 6th, 2013 | Food

Last weekend, I had the parents over for dinner, which seemed a good excuse to do something other than meat and wedges, thrown in the oven for 20 minutes and then consumed. So we headed down to the market to pick up some fresh fish.

Langoustines, which are used in scampi, were dead easy to prepare. All I did was drop them in a pan of boiling water and leave them for four or five minutes until the flesh turned from a translucent colour to an opaque white.

We got a whole red snapper, that we had cleaned when we bought it (which means removing all the guts) and then rinsed it when we got home. I then stuffed it full of ginger cut up into small cubes, several slices of lime, dill and a block of butter.

We also got a whole trevally jack, which was probably the nicest one of the two, again had it cleaned, and then stuff it with lemon slices, parsley and another slab of butter. I then cut a few slits in the sides, rubbed a little salt in the wounds and wrapped them both in tin foil and stuck them in the oven for about thirty minutes. Seemed to work quite well.

Taking positives from the Super Bowl

February 5th, 2013 | Distractions

The 49ers have a lot to be proud of from their performance at Super Bowl XLVII.

When they first started bringing a box of squirrels, who enjoyed gnawing through electrical cables, to games, everyone laughed. But clearly they aren’t laughing any more.

The 49ers almost managed the greatest comeback in Super Bowl history. The biggest deficit ever overturned was a mere 10 points, yet the 49ers found themselves having come back from a 22 point deficit with a first a goal. Clearly, they aren’t a team that is ever down and out.

The 49ers almost won – with only two minutes on the clock, we were 5 points behind with a first and goal. Unfortunately the Ravens defence held up, but statically, if the 49ers can put themselves in those situations, they are going to convert more often than not – especially now Ray Lewis isn’t around to coordinate the defence.

Colin Kaepernick is still only a second year, and this was still only his tenth NFL start. Most likely, he is only going to get better from here – he’ll stop wasting time outs, he may or may not throw less interceptions, and his game management will get better.

The 49ers have shown they have a great range of options – Frank Gore continues to run the ball brilliantly, Vernon Davis is back in the play calls and Michael Crabtree remains a strong target too. On the defence, players other than Aldon Smith showed they can sack a quarterback too.

And finally, David Akers managed a perfect record – sure, he wouldn’t have done if it hadn’t have come back for a roughing the passer flag, but hitting everything that counted at the Super Bowl, as well as making that NFL-record equalling 63 yard kick agains the Packers at the start of the season mean that Akers does at least have a few positives to take away from this season.

Super Bowl Champions

February 4th, 2013 | Distractions

blog_ravens

We did it! Long may my favourite team, the Baltimore Ravens, reign supreme!

Note to self: don’t forget to turn the other one of these off.

Super Bowl Champions

February 4th, 2013 | Distractions

blog_49ers

We did it! Long may my team, the San Francisco 49ers, reign supreme!

Note to self: don’t forget to turn the other one of these off.

No acceptable C compiler found on Mac

February 4th, 2013 | Programming, Tech

If you’re trying to compile from source, you may get an error similar to the following.

mac configure: error: no acceptable C compiler found in $PATH

This may be because you haven’t installed Xcode. If you have, something has broken, and you need to reinstall it. First, remove it with the following command.

mac configure: error: no acceptable C compiler found in $PATH

Now restart your system and once it has started again, go to Applications and select Install Xcode. This will reinstall it.

Billy Talent – Dead Silence

February 3rd, 2013 | Reviews

Ah to be 17 again. Billy Talent were rocking the scene, I was there before they were big, etc, etc.

Now, I’m somewhat older than that, and I would imagine Billy Talent are too because time works like that (on this scale at least). I didn’t expect great things from their fourth studio album, and first not to be self-titled, given their previous albums had been good, but not amazing. But it turns out I was to be pleasantly surprised.

While the screaming of Benjamin Kowalewicz has certainly become greatly toned down as the band have matured, it turns out that they actually have some great music underneath it. My personal favourite so far is Show Me The Way.