Music Review: D-Rail - Mr. Miyagi EP

Fresh tracks coming out of the Houston/Canonsburg area! Darrell Thomas has just released his new 5 track EP on Hollow Entertainment titled, "Mr. Miyagi" this week:

SoundCloud link to the EP here: https://soundcloud.com/d-rail724/sets/mr-miyagi-the-ep-ft-dt

He recently became a verified artist on Spotify as well:

 https://open.spotify.com/artist/1llYxMO15QIcqoSAvVemno?si=SZ6wK9ZTS4WSM5eye08oAw

D-Rail has been a good friend of mine for a while and he's always working hard to get his music out there. This 5 track EP hits in the middle of summer and provides nice cruising music. The EP clocks in at 16 minutes and 7 seconds. The official track list is:

1. Way Back

2. Vacation (feat. DT)

3. Faster Than The Wind

4. Magic (feat. DT)

5. Time

This EP has a much more relaxed and laid back vibe to me compared to some of his other stuff like "The Last Step" mix-tape. The beats are well polished and tie in nicely together. All of the tracks flow well and the audio production is very well done. Off the EP, my two favorite tracks are Faster Than the Wind (great to drive to) and Magic. 

Take a listen to Faster Than the Wind here:

https://soundcloud.com/d-rail724/faster-than-the-wind

(Girl catch me if you can, I'm going faster than the wind). 

D-Rail is currently selling physical copies of the EP for $5. I nabbed one up yesterday and it is a pretty slick package:

To contact D-Rail and buy a copy, hit him up at the following places:

drail@hollowentertainment.com

Twitter

Instagram

Facebook

And even if you can't buy a copy right now, please follow, listen, and share his music around with others. I've noticed all the hard work he has put in and it deserves to be recognized. 

'App is Damaged and Cannot Be Fixed' Mac OS High Sierra Fix

Have you downloaded a program in Mac High Sierra and noticed this error? The program refuses to open and the only option is deleting it to the trash. This happened to me and I thought my software was bad until I saw of this fix. This is actually a security setting change in High Sierra. 

 

Once changed, under privacy and settings you will see the option appear for Allow apps downloaded from: anywhere. 

 

This anywhere option is turned off by default, but many advanced users will want to enable this so their software can run correctly.

 

To enable this, open up a terminal window and run the following command:

 

sudo spctl —master-disable

 

That will enable software from anywhere to run on your Mac system and your apps should now open properly without displaying the message that they need to be trashed. 

 

 

Google Docs Add-ons for Teachers

Just a quick video today of some neat add-ons that can be used used within Google Docs:

Thanks to Rachel Porter for creating and sharing this video.

Find Wireless Signal Strength in Windows

Today I have a quick little tip/command to find the signal strength of a given wireless network a computer is connected to.

For this to work you will need to be running Microsoft Windows and you will need access to the command prompt.

To test the current signal strength, open up a command prompt and run the following command:

netsh wlan show interface

Note: You may have to run the command prompt as Administrator depending on your system settings.

The stats will pop up and you will want to look at the bottom portion where it says signal:

                                     The signal field shows the wireless strength percentage


Quick little way to double check the connection other than looking at the network bar.

How Many Languages Do You Know?

Just a random Youtube channel I came across, but it’s very impressive. This guy has studied lots of languages and likes to catch people off guard by his knowledge. 

Find the channel here: 

www.youtube.com/user/laoshu505000

 

So, how many languages do you know? Do you use them regularly? 

 

Scratch Programming For Everybody

Have your children showed an interest in programming? Do they enjoy learning through technology? Have they already learned some fundamentals in school or been asking to try it at home? Summer is a great time to introduce or continue them on their programming journey!

Recently, our school has started getting children introduced to programming at the elementary level through the Code to the Future program. Children can learn many important skills through programming that can be helpful to other subjects. Here is a quick list of beneficial skills that children can acquire while practicing programming. I've been in the classrooms and have seen the great projects our students have worked on.  I've always noticed the enthusiasm and teamwork of the students as they complete their projects. One programming language that the children work with here is Scratch and it is has been a big hit.

Scratch is an interactive programming environment created by MIT. The focus of the project was making programming concepts fun and easy for children to learn. This is accomplished using block-based drag and drop programming. Children learn about these concepts by moving items around the screen, waiting for mouse clicks to occur to update items, playing sound effects when certain events happen, and much much more. Children can use Scratch to make little games, animations, or even tell a story. 

The Scratch programming environment looks like this:

Scratch is a great programming environment to start children on because it was built with kindergarten level children in mind. The programming environment uses images, bright colors, sounds, and animations to keep children engaged. Scratch is also very accessible. It is web-based, so no extra software needs to be installed and programs are built and ran within any web browser. This means Scratch can run on all types of hardware like desktops, laptops, Chromebooks, iPads, Android-based tablets, and even smartphones. 

To get started on a new Scratch project, simply go to the web address blow:

https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/editor/?tip_bar=getStarted

My boss Justin has recently made some good intro Scratch videos. These could be used by both parents and children. He currently has 3 Scratch videos on his YouTube. I'll link to the first video in his Scratch tutorial video series below: 

The nice thing about following along with these video tutorials is that you can go back and watch how things are done and you can follow along at your own speed by pausing the video to try the programming steps. Justin has been actively making videos and is taking suggestions for new tutorial content. If there is a concept you would like to see a tutorial made for, just hit him up on his YouTube channel and let him know! His channel can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjoyFwlzKL0svQIswEixCxQ

Beyond that, some other Scratch programming resources can be found at:

https://scratch.mit.edu/tips

https://www.ossblog.org/teach-scratch-programming-open-source-books/

https://en.scratch-wiki.info/wiki/Getting_Started_with_Scratch

Please pass this post along to anyone that is interested in learning the basics of programming. As always, if you have any questions about Scratch or if your children are working on a program and get stuck, feel free to send me a message and I'll do my best to help out. 

Have a great summer of coding! 

~ Michael