Both Blogs

CES 2011

Paul Federwitz — 2011-01-13T04:11:00+00:00

This year I had the opportunity to go to CES. The reason was to get an idea of what technology companies are working on. This helps us to create strategies for the future that take advantage of these technologies.

I knew going in that there would be a lot of tablets. Apple's release of the iPad last year was a huge hit and everybody else is trying to cash in. CES had announcements of 80 different tablets, most of them running some flavor of Android.

What surprised me was the many companies working on power management. This ranged from cell phone cases with solar panels to wind turbines and battery backup for your entire house. This has many implications for missionaries who are living in locations without stable electricity.

I compiled a report on my visit and the technology that I believe will impact Lutheran Bible Translators and other mission organizations. It can be found at {docs}ces-2011-report{/docs}.

More of the Daily Grind

Ali Federwitz — 2010-07-27T23:26:00+00:00

As promised, here are some more pictures of what we have been doing during our time in the US.

The kids have especially enjoyed being able to watch TV. PBS is one of our favorite channels.

Here we are in front of the giraffes at the San Diego Zoo.

And with Mickey at Disneyland.

Cheese, glorious cheese! I stocked our fridge with several blocks of it and we have some everyday. This may not seem like a big deal to most of you, but cheese is very expensive in Ghana. We are enjoying it while we can!

My brother, known as Uncle O, and I took Hannah strawberry picking. Strawberries are another treat that we can't enjoy in Ghana. Rest assurred, my freezer is well stocked with strawberries to get us through the winter! Paul and I took the kids blueberry picking just a couple of weeks ago, but we forgot the camera. :(

Of course, the kids enjoy playing outside a lot of the time. Paul tied the wagon to the tricycle using a jump rope. The kids love taking turns pulling each other in the 'trailer'.

Coloring with sidewalk chalk and blowing bubbles are other favorite outdoor activities. This is one masterpiece...

and this is what happens when you leave a 2 year old unattended to create his artwork. Notice the detail he added of coloring right where the rain will never reach? Also the use of wood paneling and screen so that we can't just wipe it off with one swipe of a rag? Well done, my son.

I have a lot more to share and we've got more activities planned. We've already taken the kids to a small, local carnival. Of course, we forgot the camera again! But, they enjoyed riding a couple of kiddie rides, playing a game or two (in which we accidentally won a live goldfish that only lived for a week) and we splurged on a treat of Dippin' Dots ice cream!

What have we been up to?

Ali Federwitz — 2010-07-06T04:04:00+00:00

We've been in the US for 7 months now. It did take awhile to get used to being back 'home.' The majority of our time has been spent on the road, traveling to see many of you! For the rest of our time here, we are planning on staying in one place with the exception of a few short trips within Ohio or to Michigan. Our main focus right now is Paul's work toward his Master's Degree and the arrival of baby #3.

Here are a few pictures of the things that we have been doing over the last seven months:

Christmas! Yes, that was a long time ago but this is a recap, remember?

Sledding in the yard. My kids LOVED the snow but HATED the cold. They sure look cute, though.

The water table at the children's museum.

A tea party. For princesses only, please!

Levi's SECOND birthday.

Lounging at a hotel.

Hannah's FOURTH birthday!

Reading books with Great Uncle Gary. We've had many fun moments with extended family but rarely have had our camera handy.

Coloring Easter eggs.

An Easter egg hunt. It was actually one of 3 that day.

WOW! That only brings us to the beginning of April and I've narrowed down the pictures quite a bit and have only chosen a few. Looks like you'll just have to wait for another post to take you from April until now. I'll be back in a few days with more images from our time in America thus far. Thanks for stopping by!

Tools of the Trade: The iPad

Paul Federwitz — 2010-06-25T00:13:00+00:00

At the end of May I purchased an Apple iPad to use in my classes. I had been planning on getting a netbook, but when this was announced in January it got me thinking. There are so many opportunities with a tablet that has a long battery life and an easy to use touch interface.

Computers are so useful to our work, but the goal is for local ownership and the work to be done by people from the language group. Computers stand as a major obstacle. A device like this could start to bridge the gap.

Back to the present…there are two ways that I am using the iPad for my coursework. The first is for reading. There are a lot of web pages and PDF’s that I have to read, and doing it sitting in an easy chair from a tablet is so much better than leaning over my computer screen. The second way is for my course on Human Computer Interactions. There are two usability tests that we must conduct and I have chosen to do both of them on the iPad using iWork Pages. The first is a heuristic evaluation. The second is a participatory test with three people. I am doing both tests from the perspective of somebody who does not have much computer background.

My heuristic evaluation can be downloaded here: {docs}iwork-pages-on-the-ipad-an-heuristic-usability-evaluation{/docs}.

This blog entry will be added to as I have more thoughts to share (and time to share them). I am very excited about the possibilities presented by this device. I don’t know that Apple is the best way to go because of restrictions that they apply to the device, but this is a device that is incredibly easy and fun to use. I am anxious to see what other companies do to answer.

What Is It?

Ali Federwitz — 2009-10-27T15:36:00+00:00

I got something last week for my kitchen.

Most people can't imagine how I survived 3 years without one.

It sat for an entire week before I even used it for the first time.

Can you guess what it is?

UPDATE:

It is a microwave!

There are many reasons why I never had one until recently: cost, unreliable electricity, non-essential, etc. However, some missionaries were leaving Ghana and sold theirs to me for a reasonable price. Our electricity situation is much better than we first came. I have really enjoyed using it as we are heating up a lot of leftover odds and ends to clear out the fridge before we leave.

Tools of the Trade: The Internet

Paul Federwitz — 2009-10-11T19:36:00+00:00

You don’t truly appreciate something until you lose it. We lost our satellite internet system from August 15th until September 28th and it quickly became very obvious how much we use the internet. It has also prompted this post on the Internet as a Translation Tool. This loss of a good connection is also why it has taken so long since my last post.

First, I want to cover some of the more practical day to day needs that may be obvious. Our largest use is email. This ranges from keeping in touch with family to updating our partners to communicating with our office in the US. Email is the one thing that we have to be able to do even when everything else does not work.

Another day to day need is keeping our antivirus programs up to date. At first this may seem circular as viruses are mostly spread via the internet so it is like saying we need internet access to fight things that come from the internet. I have worked on computers in a village that are powered from a solar system that have never been connected to the internet that stil have viruses. It seems that people have just enough access to get viruses (USB drives taken to internet cafés miles away) but not enough access to get antivirus updates. If I can keep the antivirus programs updated then I spend less time cleaning infected computers and more time doing other work.

Second is keeping our programs updated. This is not as critical as antivirus updates, but still very helpful. Keeping Microsoft Windows and Office updated gives us a more stable working environment. Keeping language software up to date gives us new features that make the work easier to do. We are better able to interact with the developers to add features that we need, whether they are in the US, Papua New Guinea, or anywhere else in the world.

Third, there is the problem that a computer person cannot know how to fix every possible problem that a computer experiences. Sometimes it as simple as looking up an error message that a program is exhibiting. This alone saves hours if not days of troubleshooting. Recently a computer came in that was having a problem with its screen backlight. Normally I would not have been able to do anything about this and would have had to condemn the computer to being useless. But I was able to research the problem online and find out that the specific symptoms pointed to a problem with the LCD inverter which costs $15. Thirty minutes online and $15 and a useless computer can be used again.

Fourth, internet access has had several very direct affects on translation work. Consultants and translators are in the same place for only a few weeks a year. At other times they may be several hours away or even in another country or on another continent. With internet access, they are able to send portions of scripture back and forth and hold long distance conversations.

In August we were able to take this ability to a whole new level. The Nkonya New Testament was being typeset in preparation for publication. Although the text had already been thoroughly checked, during the typesetting process each page has to be read several times to make sure no errors have been introduced. Normally the typesetter, the expatriate translator and the national translator are all in the same room over the course of a month or more. In this case, this group was separated over thousands of miles. Wes Peacock was in Dallas with Darrel, the typesetter. His wife Katie was in Canada with family. Emmanuel, an Nkonya man, was in Tamale with me. Each day as a section was done by the typesetter, Wes and Darrel would email it to Katie and Emmanuel to read over it. They responded with comments via email or Skype. This new ability is even more important as after 9/11 it is becoming more difficult for our national coworkers to get visas to the US or UK where a lot of our typesetting is done. You will note from the dates above that the Nkonya typesetting was going on while our VSAT was down. This did make things much more difficult and creative solutions had to be found, but with the Lord’s help, the work progressed.

There are a couple of articles that you may want to read as follow-up. The first is from a series that my wife is writing on our life and expectations when we first came to Ghana and what reality is now. She has recently written a post on our internet access. The second is a story from ABC on how slow internet access is in Africa. A company in South Africa was actually able to transfer data 50 miles faster via carrier pigeon than via their internet connection.

Then and Now: Technology

Ali Federwitz — 2009-10-10T15:59:00+00:00

When we boarded the planed to Ghana in January of 2007, I didn't know when the next time was that I would speak to my family in the US. Sure, I knew that there were phones and email throughout the country but I didn't know when I would have access to it all. While we were in Accra, the capital city, we had phones and the internet. We were even able to use Skype to call my parents during our first days in Ghana! That certainly was a blessing. Once we got to our house in Tamale, however, things were very different. Paul and I both had cell phones. However, the signal at our house was very weak and on top of that, for some reason, my phone only worked when I was in our house. If I were to go anywhere else, I wasn't able to make or receive calls.

As time went on, I got a new phone, cell phone towers were upgraded and new ones were put up in various places. We were then able to talk with my parents on an almost weekly basis. Paul and I were sharing a laptop computer to accomplish all of our work. He took it with him to GILLBT during the day and when the kids would go to bed at night, I would attempt to read the email that had come that day and write responses. In order to send and receive email, Paul used a slow dial-up connection at the office. Although if it was raining or the wind was blowing too hard the connection would drop.

In July, 2007 DSL came to GILLBT and soon after, Paul was able to set up a wireless network so that we could have internet access at home as well. Though it was no where near fast, it was a step forward. After only a month, the phone line was cut and DSL was out for another month before the repair was completed. The benefit of the DSL was that the connection was on most of the time, but it was still extremely slow.

It wasn't until March 2008 that I had my own computer. Now I could work on email throughout the day as the kids were napping or entertaining themselves. Then in November 2008 we got a satellite internet system at GILLBT. Internet browsing capabilities were now mine!

Though all of this technology has had its ups and downs, we've come a long way from when we first landed in 2007.

Some Days Are Just Like That

Ali Federwitz — 2009-10-06T21:39:00+00:00

Today is Tuesday. On Tuesday the kids and I go to GILLBT to eat fried yam for lunch with Paul. Since we have all had a hot meal, I take this day as a break from cooking and we just have sandwiches for dinner.

I've been wanting to do some baking for awhile now and I just haven't had the chance. I thought I'd take advantage of the fact that I didn't have to prepare a meal and use today as my baking day. I got the kids all ready and sent them outside to play. Then I started to pull out all that I needed for the things that I wanted to make.

I had a little bit of cherry pie filling and promised Paul that I would make him some cherry muffins. We used most of the filling on waffles one morning and so there was just the right amount leftover for muffins. I whipped up the muffin batter and then worked on the crumb topping (a muffin isn't a muffin without crumb topping!).

Once the muffins were in the oven, I decided to make some oatmeal chocolate chip bars. For some reason, I am not good at making cookies and so I thought I would try to make bars instead. I had a bag of dark chocolate chips that someone brought to me and this seemed like a good way to use them. The recipe calls for the whole bag but I think some may have ended up in my stomach! While I was working on the cookie dough, the timer for the muffins went off. They were still pretty raw so I put them back in and set the timer for 10 more minutes.

Just as I was pouring the cookie dough/batter into a pan, I smelled something strange. Nope, it wasn't a burning smell. It was gas. The gas on my stove went out, the muffins weren't quite finished and I had an entire pan of raw cookie bars! I called Paul and asked him if he could come and change the gas tank. He thought I was capable of doing such a task and told me what to do over the phone. I was feeling really good about myself because I didn't hear the sound of any gas leaking or smell any gas as I attached the regulator. Not even Paul can switch the gas tanks without the hissing sound of gas. Then it occurred to me that maybe this is not an accomplishment but rather a sign that something is wrong.

I went back inside and tried to light one of the burners on the stove to get the gas flowing again. I turned the knob to the highest setting and it lit but the flame was barely flickering. I turned it off and lit the oven, again on the highest setting, and again it barely flickered and then...it went out. This is when I figured out that both gas tanks were empty! I covered the raw cookie dough and put it in the refrigerator. I left the muffins in the oven hoping that it was still hot enough to finish the baking process. The muffins are flat but still moist and seemingly baked all the way through. I was hoping to do more baking including another batch of muffins and some granola. In the afternoon I wanted to make cinnamon roll dough and pretzel dough to freeze for another day.

It is a good thing that I am only making sandwiches for dinner, otherwise, I'd have to start gathering wood for an outdoor cooking fire.

Never a dull moment here, I tell ya!

Then and Now: Dagbani

Ali Federwitz — 2009-08-06T15:12:00+00:00

Dagbani is the language spoken by the Dagomba people. They are a predominately muslim group with a large presence here in Tamale. It was our goal to have regular language learning sessions in Dagbani with the hope of communicating with those in our community. I really wanted to be able to go to the market and do my shopping while speaking Dagbani. After we got settled into our home in late March 2007, we found a language helper and began sessions 3 times a week. At first, Paul and I had individual sessions and then we decided to work together since we were repeating the same things and seemed to be moving at the same pace. Although we did our best to practice in between sessions and focus our learning on scenarios that we would likely encounter on a regular basis, it didn't feel as if we were truly making much progress. In August, after 5 months of sessions thrice weekly, we discontinued our lessons.

What was the problem? Well, there were many. Don't get me wrong, we were not under the impression that we would become fluent in Dagbani in just 5 short months. The biggest issue is that our immediate neighbors speak a wide variety of different languages and none of them are Dagomba. Although they may speak Dagbani, it is not their first language. Even at GILLBT, English is used by the majority of people. We just did not have the opportunity to use or practice our skills on anyone but each other and our language helper.

While this is a disappointment to us, there are still possibilities for learning Dagbani little by little. For the time being, we know how to greet people for the appropriate times of the day. This is an important part of the culture and does help in our relationships with those around us.

The Sound of Silence

Ali Federwitz — 2009-08-06T14:51:00+00:00

Every parent knows that if it's quiet around the house, the children are up to no good. There is that brief time where you enjoy the calm and then you realize that the storm is brewing.

Hannah and Levi were playing together outside. The rain had just finished and they begged to go out and play. I knew that it was messy outside but I also knew that they would enjoy being out there.

Hannah is making 'cookies' and setting them on the ladder to sell them. Although Levi is wearing brown trousers, be assured that he is covered in mud. Do you see how wet the kids are, especially Hannah? That has nothing to do with the rain that had just come. Of course not, that would make too much sense. They are wet because, according to Hannah, "We needed to get our hair wet and take a bath in the dogs' water." That is why I get for asking.

While they really were not causing any trouble, it was more of a mess than I had prepared for!