Moving your video collection from DVD or Blu-ray discs to “on demand” digital content is easier than you may think. As the years have gone by your collection of commercial DVD discs has likely grown large. In recent years you may also have purchased blu-ray discs because of their superior High Definition resolution on large HD televisions. With the advent of devices like the AppleTV which lets you stream your own music and video content, more people are considering converting their existing content rather than repurchasing it in a digital (non-disc) form.

Over the past few years, I have converted my favorite movies and TV shows into a format that I can stream directly to my HD television. I also load movies onto my iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch devices.  The best part is that you can do it yourself without spending much money. Here’s how.

There are a number of devices you can hookup to your HD TV that can act as a media server. My favorite is the AppleTV which can play videos and movies in 1080p and it supports Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound. At only $99 it is an incredible bargain especially if you already use iTunes to manage your music and video content. You will also need a computer and an external hard drive to hold all of your media. I use an Apple Mac Mini to convert my disc content to digital files. If you do not have a DVD reader/writer the Apple SuperDrive is a good drive for Mac users. Another option to consider is the Samsung USB2.0 External Slim Blu-ray Writer Drive. It uses two USB 2.0 ports but requires no power cable. It’s small, lightweight, supports both DVD and Blu-ray, works on Windows and Macs; all for around $110. I use the Samsung drive to “rip” Blu-ray discs directly to my computer’s external hard drive.

Some Terminology

If you are a novice at converting video content there are a few concepts you need to understand before you dive into the deep end. “Ripping,” refers to the process of moving content from a DVD or Blu-ray disc to (usually) a hard disk. “Re-encoding,” refers to the process of changing a video from one format (or size) into a different format or size. Then there is “muxing or to remux” which refers to the process of repackaging the content into a new container but not changing the actual content. Lastly, you will want to “tag” content with metadata so that you can browse your video collection by title, category (drama, comedy, etc.), rating, etcetera. This may sound more complicated than it is in practice, yet if you follow the steps below you can have your own on-demand digital library.

Is this legal?

The first step is to choose a DVD or Blu-ray disc that you legally own. The U.S. Copyright Office has issued exemptions to prohibition on circumvention of copyright protection systems, which allow consumers to legally remove copy protection on DVDs and Blu-ray discs in order to backup or change the format of the content – which is exactly the process we describe. Be advised that you must have legally acquired and own any disc that you intend to convert and the conversion must be for your own private use. So if you live in the United States, what we describe here is perfectly legal.

Step 1: Rip the disc to your hard drive. There are a number of programs both commercial and shareware that can do this step. I recommend MakeMKV. While this program is still in beta (been there for years) it is free to use. MakeMKV comes in both Mac and Windows versions. It will take your Blu-ray or DVD disc and remove the copy protection and save the video, audio and subtitles to your hard drive without altering the content by compressing the video, for example. The MakeMKV program stores the movie into the Matroska Video (MKV) container format that is open and patent-free. The MKV format has quickly become a de-facto standard for storing movies.

After the movie is ripped to the hard drive you will want to preview it to ensure that the video, audio and subtitle tracks (if any) have been saved properly. I recommend you use the free Videolan VLC application as it will play movies in nearly all videos formats. It is important to check and ensure that you saved the correct audio track(s) as you want to be able to hear your movie in full Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound.

Normally you cannot stop at this step because the resultant video file is too large to fit onto many devices or too large for video streaming over a home WiFi network. DVD rips typically are between 5GB and 8GB in size. Blu-ray rips can be between 25GB and 35GB. Also the MKV format is not a container format that the AppleTV, QuickTime, or Windows Media Player is able to play.

Step 2: Encode the video into a format that works for your device. Apple products use the H.264 / MPEG-4 Advanced Video Coding (AVC) which is a standard for video compression of high definition content. In most cases you will want your videos in this format. The beauty of the H.264 format is that it can preserve the video quality at substantially lower bitrates than previous standards. I mostly encode my rips to play thru my AppleTV in 1080p (if the source is a Blu-ray disc). If I want to play the content primarily on an iPad or iPhone, I would likely save the movie in 720p resolution.

The best program to convert your rips into device-playable content is HandBrake. This is a magnificent piece of open source (GPL) software that works on Mac, Windows or Linux. HandBrake has many options and can be complicated to figure out the optimal settings to use. Thankfully, the program comes with several default profiles including a profile for the AppleTV2 that can be used as-is or adapted. I may write another blog post about the ideal conversion settings for Handbrake, but for now this article focuses on the overall process of converting movie discs to digital video files.

Completing this step will take a typical 25GB MKV file (blu-ray rip) and save it down to a 4GB to 6GB M4V (MP4) file.

Step 3: Tag your digital video file. The last step in preparing your new video file is to tag it with the metadata that describes the content. My favorite program for this is Subler which is only available on the Mac platform. If you use Windows, MetaX is a good metadata editor and costs $9.95. Both of these applications allow you to search online for a content match (movie, TV Show) and automatically tag the file with the relevant metadata. You should also be able to load artwork during this process so that the cover image shows up nicely as you browse through your movie titles. Both of these apps are worthy of your support.

Step 4: Load your video file for access. By simply using drag-and-drop I can add the video file to iTunes. I use iTunes to stream my content to all of my Apple devices. My iTunes library is on my Mac Mini which is always on our WiFi network which means my content is always available.

Hopefully you will find this quick overview helpful. Once you become proficient with this method there are other tools available for more sophisticated video conversions.

The National Park Service launched their official mobile (iPhone iOS) app in August 2011. It is available free from the Apple iTunes App Store as a 13.9 MB download. I’m reviewing the latest, 1.0.2 version which is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices running iOS 3.2 or later. The National Park Service (NPS) has flyers available with QR Codes that make it easy for folks to download the app while on the National Mall. At just under 14 MB the app download does not take too long using a 3G connection.

The app starts quickly and on first use asks your permission to use your current location. Users will want to grant permission as this app is designed to guide you as you travel about the National Mall and Memorial Parks in Washington, DC. The home screen brings up a rotating set of beautiful photographs of monuments with the NPS branding and navigation overlaid. The app has a strong visual appeal, good typography and uses the popular Glyphish Pro iconography.  Rather than using a “More” as the fifth navigational element the designers decided to add four additional nav icon links as shown is the screenshot. This is a bit unconventional but it does work well in this implementation.

The Overview provides a good summary of the National Mall and Memorial Parks (NAMA). A minor quibble I have is they provide links to “our outdoor activities page to learn more” and a link to the NAMA website. Both webpages are displayed in a web viewer and are not sized for mobile devices (mobilized). Why send users of your iPhone app to your website? A better choice would be to offer the content within the NPS app itself.

You only get one chance to make a first impression and the NPS has done an outstanding job with their first app.

The Events and News feature pulls from a NPS feed, which is an intelligent method to keep the contents of a native iOS app up-to-date without requiring a new version in the App Store. The first News item caught my attention as it invites you to a “Public Meeting on Washington Monument Screening Facility.” However, clicking on the item does not reveal the date, time or location. NPS needs to think about adding more useful content to their News feed. The Events feed contains links with more details but I would have preferred to see the events in reverse chronological order. The oldest (October) events were on the top and the current upcoming events were near the bottom of the list.

The Postcard feature is fun and worked well. I was able to take a neat snapshot with the NPS branded boarder around the photograph. You can email the souvenir photo right from the app. I appreciate how the NPS designers were thinking about how and what their audience would want to do with this app, and providing a souvenir photo is brilliant.

The core of the app are the sites and monuments. The NPS provides several ways to discover our national treasures. Map and Sites are two direct methods. The later is an alphabetical listing of each of the locations. Clicking on any of the sites brings you to the details page of that site.  The Map view allows you to explore sites via a Google Maps mash-up. It’s easy to use your fingers to scroll and zoom to see where monuments are located. Using this Map view you can see your own location relative to the monuments that are nearest to you (assuming you are on or near the National Mall).

Each monument has a detailed page that offers an Overview, Info, Album, Events and a button to add the site to your My Tour. This allows you to build your own tour of monuments to visit. The Album button allows you to view photographs of the monuments as well as historical figures and artifacts. I was pleasantly surprised to see that audio and videos of NPS Rangers are also provided in some of the Albums (see Lincoln Memorial). The inclusion of the audio and video was an excellent choice. The Rangers give their own personal statements on why a given monument is important to them. Ranger Elmi Kawther who is from Africa, had a heartfelt message on what the Lincoln Memorial means to her.

It appeared that the photos were loaded over the Internet which may help keep the size of the app small enough for a convenient download.

One feature that I would like to have seen – given the overall high quality of this app – is a way to “check in” to the locations I was visiting. Perhaps an integration with Foursquare would make this a truly killer app. If not Foursquare, then perhaps a checklist of sites that I’ve visited with virtual badges or pins as a reward for visiting a set of monuments.

Location-aware social features could work well with the Tours feature built into the app. The NPS pre-built five self-guided tours that give walking distances between each location. This is another really neat feature and instead of randomly wandering around the Mall, this feature allows you to visit sites based on theme or how much time you have available.

The Park Lens feature uses the built-in iOS compass capability. Holding your phone up to a location lets you augment what you see with additional content. Have no doubt, this is a technically sophisticated feature. It is clear that the iOS developers know what they are doing.

I did experience one app crash after watching a video. This is not uncommon for technically ambitious apps that are only a few months old. I suspect that user submitted crash reports will help to squish any remaining bugs.  While hooking my iPhone 4S up to a MacBook Pro with XCode, the console logs suggested that the app checks to see if I had Twitter available for use, which was surprising as it doesn’t (yet?) integrate with Twitter or any of the other social networking apps such as Foursquare.

All in all, the National Park Service hit a homerun with their official National Mall and Memorial Parks iOS app. They are to be commended for not rushing and putting out a half-baked, poorly conceived app. You only get one chance to make a first impression and the NPS has done an outstanding job with their first app. I can’t wait to see what they do for an encore. Perhaps versions for other popular sites such as the Grand Canyon? We can only hope!

Smartphones, and their mobile applications are quickly becoming ubiquitous. The technological adoption of the mobile Internet (smartphones) mirrors that of the television during the 1940s and the Internet during the 1990s. Meaning, rapid adoption. The message for the U.S. federal government is clear – make your websites and data mobile accessible.

The U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) maintains USA.gov and a listing of mobile applications built by federal agencies. I plan to review a different mobile app each week. For the first review, I’ll start with an app that I know quite well, the Transportation Security Administration’s “My TSA” mobile web and iPhone app.

The MyTSA app was launched in time for the Fourth of July travel rush in 2010. The launch was timed so that it was part of the initial launch of apps.usa.gov – the Mobile Apps site for the USA.gov portal.

There are currently two versions of the app, an iPhone (Apple iOS) version and a “mobile web” version that will work with all devices that have a web browser. TSA currently is working on an Android version but no availability date has been released by the agency. This review is based on the latest (iOS) 1.2.2 version of MyTSA.

TSA realized that many travelers have questions about the airport security process and rules while they are traveling or en route to an airport. So the MyTSA app was conceived to be a “trusted traveler’s companion”.  MyTSA provides real-time operating status for U.S. airports from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA); a tool to find out if an item is allowed in your carry-on or checked baggage; information on ID requirements, liquids rules, and tips for packing and dressing to speed through security.

The home screen of the app contains a wealth of information in an attractively designed layout. A nifty feature of the iPhone version is that it automatically geo-locates the nearest major airport and brings up FAA airport delays, TSA security checkpoint wait times and current weather conditions and temperature. Based on user feedback, TSA added a “Settings” page whereby you can choose to geo-locate to either the closest major airport (default), the closest airport (includes all mid and small airports) or you can set your favorite airport to always appear on the home screen.

The “Status” feature shows airport delays either in a List view or a map view using a Google Maps mash-up. You can pinch-and-zoom to drill down to a specific geographical area. Zooming in on the map view brings up all 450+ airports.

A very popular feature is the “Can I Bring?” which lets you search for any item to see what the security policy is regarding the item. TSA added a type-ahead (predictive searching) feature to help users correctly spell the item. Currently there are over 3,400 items listed in the “Can I Bring?” database (all of which have the correct spelling).  If you search for an item not in the database you have an opportunity to submit the item as a suggestion for TSA to add it to its database. Considering that TSA started with around 800 items during the initial launch, the vast bulk of the items in the database are from passenger suggestions. This has turned out to be a great method to crowd-source a database of searchable items.

Another popular feature is the “Guide” which contains guidance on topics such as acceptable IDs, liquids, special medical needs, helpful tips on packing and what to wear, traveling with food, traveling with children and a section on the new TSA imaging technologies.

Experienced travelers appreciate the “Wait Times” feature that shows recent passenger submitted security checkpoint wait times. As these wait times represent crowd-sourced content, the data tends to be spotty. As the displayed data is limited to the latest 25 times over the past 30 days, some airports only have a few listed times. This feature will grow in usefulness as more people use the app. TSA architected the backend web service in such a way to allow third-party app providers to contribute wait times directly from their own mobile apps.

A recent update from TSA includes a few new features. There are now embedded videos – streamed from YouTube – so you better have a WiFi connection as the video performance over 3G is not that great. Videos include a welcome message from TSA Administrator John Pistole, information about Advanced Imaging Technology and other useful tips to take the stress out of your checkpoint experience.

Current weather conditions and a seven day weather forecast are now part of the application. The weather screens are very attractive and easy to use. TSA uses the iOS “pagers” feature to swipe through the weekly forecast. The weather information is pulled directly from live feeds maintained by NOAA’s National Weather Service. I find myself using the MyTSA app each morning just to get a good local weather forecast. This feature alone makes the app a worthwhile download.

One of the cool elements of this app is how TSA cleanly integrates open government data from the FAA, NOAA and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS). The BTS provides airport on-time performance statistics which TSA uses to show percentages of flight delays for arrivals and departures and the reasons for the delays. Perhaps a motivating factor for this data is that very few of the aircraft delays are because of security. Most of the delays are because of air traffic, carrier or late aircraft.

The MyTSA app has been prominently featured and mentioned on the White House webpage for Open Government Initiatives, the Campaign to Cut Waste, and the White House Blog post, “Top 10 Must-Have Government Apps”. In addition to kudo’s from the White House, “My TSA” was named Best Government Mobile App from the American Council for Technology and Industry Advisory Council (ACT-IAC) at its 9th Annual Excellence.Gov Awards event in Washington, D.C. in March 2011.

InformationWeek recognized TSA as one of the Top 15 Government IT Innovators during the 23^rd annual InformationWeek 500 Conference in September 2011. TSA was recognized for the deployment and enhancement of the My TSA mobile application.

Everyone talks about how we need to be more energy independent for financial and national security reasons. Politicians and commentators also say that we need a broad-based approach to energy that includes greater domestic development of oil, natural gas and coal; as well as nuclear and alternative energy sources.

The economy is largely dependent on cheap energy for GDP growth. In France, approximately 75% of their electricity is generated from nuclear power. In the U.S. we have not started construction on a new nuclear power plant since 1974. Everyone talks a good game but we are unable to bring them online because of over regulation and lawsuits.

My solution to this problem of bringing new nuclear plants online would be to open federal lands to the construction of power plants. This would reduce the amount of oversight and regulation at the state and local levels. It would limit lawsuits to the federal courts. Further, I would fast-track construction permitting.

Candidates for the 2012 election should run on a platform of opening federal land to new nuclear construction whereby a minimum goal of four to as many as ten new nuclear plants should be approved within the 2012 – 2016 time-frame.