Matthew Reeve

There has been a lot of comment over the last couple of weeks from different groups about who should be paying for Higher Education. These comments have generally indicated that there are three beneficiaries of education: the state, the individual, and the employer; however employers are not taking a direct responsibility to pay for it. With the Higher Education funding review underway and due to report back in the Autumn, I have been thinking how this might be addressed and how it might possibly affect the work that I do.

I think the idea of a £10,000 a year tuition fee … Continue Reading

Sat in the Oratory on Ash Wednesday (where as a treat there is no Allegri Miserere mei!), I have been deliberating as to how to mark Lent. Previously I have given up alcohol, not shaven, or some other sundry sacrifice. The fact is, I can’t see this being a huge sacrifice. This year I have been looking at my charitable donations, so it seems fit that I should support some charities as my “sacrifice”. Currently I am supporting the new Music Building at the University of Birmingham, and the Midlands Air Ambulance. So I will find something else to add … Continue Reading

I said on Twitter that I would explain more about my NFL allegiances. It’s an area I’ve been considering ever since I went to NFL UK 2008 when the Chargers lost “at” the Saints. At that stage I didn’t really have a team, in fact I didn’t really follow NFL that much, I went that year because I am interested in the game as I am with baseball and ice hockey following numerous trips to Canada and the USA. Having MLB and NHL teams and having followed the NFL closely in 2009 made me think that I should pick an … Continue Reading

I have spent much of today playing around with my home theatre equipment, mainly my new HTPC which is to replace my old Sony PVR. It’s not complete yet: I want to add a blu-ray drive and a DVB-S2 card (to be able to view and record Freesat in HD), but as of today I now have digital audio output so have proper surround sound and so it has reached the stage where the Sony has no benefits.

One thing I am finding is that the interface for MythTV (which it uses) is much better than in my old Sony PVR, … Continue Reading

As many of you will know, I’ve been quite busy over the last few months. Christmas is always busy for me, as with the sheer amount of singing which goes on around then the first day I usually get to rest in December is Christmas Day. I spent the whole of Christmas with a bad cold and so it wasn’t quite as relaxing as I had hoped or needed. January wasn’t that much quieter either – Ex Cathedra’s 40-part concert on Sunday was very hard work and quite stressful, but performing is rewarding and enjoyable and the evening was rounded … Continue Reading

After a bit of work I have decided to revert back to a blog-style site, and to make a resolution to contribute a bit more regularly to it. For a short while, though, I need to migrate two previous sites into it so please bear with me.

I today bought a collection of second-hand Opencockpits boards for my cockpit. Most of them are copies of boards I have in place, giving me a bit of resiliance in case of disaster, but amongst them were two input/output boards which I can use to install temporary switches, and a (sadly Boeing) COM box kit, partially complete. Hopefully soon I will get to put them all together, at the moment the priority is to build the MIP where my old futon was so that I can free up the desk. I’ve not flown for a long time and I am … Continue Reading

I have just published my latest geocache, Balaam’s Wood. This is a D5 cache set somewhere near Rubery Great Park, and involves the hunter having to decode a short extract of Mendelssohn music to work out the final co-ordinates. I hope you enjoy it!

Over the last week or so I have been trying to improve the FCU and have now added some backlighting and the LCD displays. As you can see, neither is perfect, I need to put more LEDs behind the panel, put in a screen to stop light leaking around the LCDs, and to secure the LCD displays to the PCB. I am still not sure how to strengthen the stripboard as it is too bendy, and I also need to rewire some of the LEDs I have removed which sit between the LCDs. Software-wise I need the displays to start … Continue Reading

On 8th August 2009 I had a trip up to see a couple of sims in the Hull area. These provided me with a fantastic opportunity to see two very well advanced A320 home cockpit constructions. Both are very different, one by Barry Kensett having more of an infrastructure, and one by Darren Sugden being more functional. Both have Opencockpits cards and SIOC (the programming system for them, which reassures my decision to go with these cards.