If there is anything that Mormons are good at, it is cooking.  I think my Mom actually cooks better for a LARGE group (20 or more) than she does for just her and my Dad.  

So I just came across a great new startup called Cookthink.  It allows you to find GREAT recipe’s based off of ingredients, dishes, cuisine, or even mood.  

One problem I have had in the past with online recipe databases it that you never know what you are getting, but with Cookthink, they have a review process and only allow good recipe’s to get through.  

For the more techy folks out there, I created our own family recipe database using this free PHP program and a sql server.  It’s not great, but it is our’s… we just need to add stuff to it!

What other recipe options have you found out there?

I have been very impressed with Google Translate for a while.  The ability to translate chat’s, and pretty much anything is changing the way I can do research at work and especially for my family history.

I recently started getting more into family history, but my family roots come from Holland.  I speak German, but that is only good to a small extent.  A distant relative in France sent me several books, but some of them are written in Dutch.  I tried reading them, but could only get the basics.  I pasted the words in google translate and was able to easily follow the story.  Granted, it’s not the best translation, but you certainly can follow it!  Awesome!  

Today I read about a new Firefox extension today called gTranslate.  It allows you to select text on any page and translate it to any of the languages that GoogleTranslate supports.  That could be useful…  

I received this in an e-mail that was going around. It is a great compilation of people remembering President Hinckley, as well some sound bits from him. Enjoy!

Yesterday Alan Brown posted on LDSTech Forums asking for a Wiki for Clerk’s.  His argument is that the forum’s are a great place for discussion, but we need a place for reference materials for increasing number of techie problems the church faces.

There was a good discussion about it and in the end Tom (I believe he started the forum’s) said that they were working on getting approval for a wiki now.  That seems like an awesome idea.    I look forward to seeing what they come up with!

LDSTech posted a little article about a system they have been working on for a while for Mission Offices.  From their website:

“Internet Mission Office System (iMOS) is a Web application designed to
help mission office staff manage mission information and perform other
tasks.”

The main task pointed out is to visualize transfer scenario’s for the mission.  There is also a mention of financial features.

I imagine this will be a huge help for missionaries that serve in the office…

I just read that ldsWebGuy just put up a website dedicated to President Hinckley.  This is awesome!  Newsroom stories, video’s of President Hinckley bearing his testimony, a nice timeline, and even notable talks.  Great, great great!

Here are a couple of BYU-TV Stuff about President Hinckley (from morning study and today’s proceedings!)

• “Gordon B. Hinckley: Man of Integrity”
• “Remembering Presdient Gordon B. Hinckley” with:
• Professors Brent Top and Robert Millet
• Richard Cowan
• BYU President Ceicl O. Samuelson
• Sheri L. Dew
• Funeral Services

It appears that some of these links are not working exactly right, but they should get you close and give you an idea of what is there. 

This morning I was looking around for my Friday BYU TV Study and came across a mini-series entitled Joseph.  It is fantastic.  It plays every day at 3AM (which really isn’t a problem with the online version… you can watch it whenever).

When I was a missionary one of the most profound testimony building experiences of my mission was listening to Truman Madsen’s Joseph Smith, the Prophet.  Well, these video’s are the equivalent of these tapes for TV.  From BYU-TV Broadcasting Page:

“Joseph” features many faculty from BYU’s Department of Church History and Doctrine, Department of Ancient Scripture, and other scholars from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The project is a joint effort of BYU Broadcasting and BYU Religious Education. The series executive producers are Dean Andrew Skinner and Susan Easton Black. Dr. Black is also the series host.

The 6 hour television series and accompanying book was written by many of the same faculty that are interviewed and is a scholarly examination of the life and teachings of Joseph Smith. The series is not an exhaustive review of Joseph’s life but instead focuses on some aspects and events in Joseph’s life that have a lasting impact on members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today, two centuries after the birth of Joseph Smith.

The content includes Susan Black at the relevant church history sites introducing the topics to be covered, the expert interviews and quotes from Joseph Smith and his contemporaries. Hundreds of images of Joseph, artwork featuring events from his life, and footage of the relevant church history sites enhance the expert interviews.”

I highly recommend it!  Check it out!

1. “I Had Seen a Vision” 1805-1823 (Summary, Watch)
2. “The Most Correct of Any book” 1823-1830 (Summary, Watch)
3. “The Only True and Living Church” 1830-1832 (Summary, Watch)
4. “A House to Thy Name” 1832-1836 (Summary, Watch)
5. “Peace Be Unto Thy Soul” 1836-1839 (Summary)
6. “Calm as a Summer’s Morning” 1839-1844 (Summary)

Note: The last two episodes are probably going to be played today and tomorrow.. the other’s have been playing all week.  I’ll add links on Monday or so. 

Note 2: BYU still needs an easy way to embed their player on another page or share a link without having to send an e-mail… very difficult.