Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with filter

I Can Haz Clean Air

airguitar2 — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 12:31:26 -0800

What is the best air filtration/purification system for a 1 bedroom apt. in Brooklyn? I'm still getting used to the difference in air quality here in NYC (I came from Wisconsin). My apartment, while great in many ways, is above a somewhat busy street, as well as an apartment of smokers below. As a result, the air seems heavy with contaminants and toxins of various stripes!

Has anyone had good experiences with an air filter/purifier/etc. for the purpose of removing city contaminants/air pollution? What works? The apt. is about 850 sq. feet.

Thanks in advance.

Filter for Flickr feeds

foggy out there now — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 04:10:19 -0800

How would I filter out a single user's images from a Flickr pool's feed? There's a Flickr pool for my community, and it's great. But there's a particular contributor who dominates the pool with self-portraits. I'd like to filter this person out of the RSS feed if possible.

I'm not a member of the pool, nor would I suggest this contributor be removed from the pool. I just don't want to see this user's work in my feed reader every day.

I'm subscribing to the feed via Google Reader if that makes any difference.

Help me batch print text files on the Mac

grumblebee — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:19:03 -0800

OS X: I want to batch print all the files in a source-code library. They are actionscript files, which means they are text files that all end in a .as extension. The files are in a complex directory structure (one root folder but files in multiple subfolders), and there are non .as files that I don't want printed. When the files print, I need some kind of separator ( spaces, asterisks, new page...) between each file. I can't seem to find a FILTERABLE batch printing app for OSX -- one that can print all files (of a certain type or naming scheme) in all folders and subfolders starting at a certain root.

I thought about opening Terminal and doing this:

find . -name "*.as" | xargs cat > outfile.txt

And then printing outfile.txt. That would be perfect except that I won't easily be able to tell where one file begins and another ends. I need

*****************

or some other delimiter between files.

If it matters, this is for OS X Leopard.

What to do about an office that smells like smoke, exhaust, and stale french fries?

lakeroon — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:25:53 -0800

How can I make the air in my office more breathable? HEPA filter, activated charcoal, or both? Brand/model recommendations? My office is in an old building with heat that is hard to control. Year-round I'd like to be able to modulate the temperature by opening the windows, but they're one floor above an area where people stand for smoke breaks, across the street from a restaurant that emits frying smells, and right at an intersection where cars idle. The air in here isn't that great even with the windows closed, but of course it's particularly bad when I try opening them.

Specs of the office: a single room about 200 square feet, baseboard heat, window a/c unit in one window, two openable crank-style windows.

From prior questions it seems like a HEPA filtration unit (the Austin Air HealthMate was mentioned) and/or activated charcoal might help with the smell, flying road dust, and headache-inducingness of this situation. Which would help more, or can they be used together? Should I try putting filtering material over the window screens and/or an active filtering device? (The solution does not have to be aesthetically pleasing.) Product recommendations welcomed. Thanks.

A carbon air filter that works?

Nish ton — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:36:46 -0800

Have you ever encountered an activated carbon air filter that actually removed odors, leaving the output air clean? Which one? Never in my life have I been so peeved at the whole steaming pile known as consumerism.

I've tried no less than 7 times now to find something that works.

I bought a honeywell filter appliance, a febreze, and a bionaire, only to find that there was something wrong with the carbon filter material itself in all 3 cases. Not only does it not clean the air, but even after more that a week running in the garage (12 days in the case of the honeywell) it was still releasing some sort of awful fumes. I strongly suspect the smell is added intentionally by companies to make the air "smell clean" to ignorant consumers.

After the misfortunes of finding the honeywell and febreze machines didn't work, and having bought and not yet gotten around to returning the bionaire, I decided to try something.

I bought some carbon filter stuff (they call it " paper" but it more like a mat of hair made from Polyethelene terephthalate), the sort they use in air conditioners in office buildings, from Camfil Farr. To remove odors, suposedly. Then I took the filter out of the bionaire machine and taped a few square ft. of filter paper over the intake.

Exactly the same smell and problem after running it for a week. I figured it was just a matter of finding a brand of carbon filter that actually worked. I tried 3 more filter medias from various sources, all with the same problem.

I read up on some of the physics and design principles and it is clear that it is easy to make a functional filter that will absorb household smells, but
apparently it has come to the point now that companies have decided to stick with just duping the masses into accepting useless junk instead, no matter how little effort making a functional product actually requires.

So has anyone ever encountered a filter that works?

BTW this really matters because I live in a house with no provisions whatsoever for bringing in fresh air during the winter.

What risks does drinking LA tap water pose?

Jenna Roadman — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 16:20:03 -0800

What risks does drinking LA tap water pose? ? Should I be using a filter? The plant says that water is potable after it is processed, but my neighbor just told me that all the dirty pipes it goes through, plus the fact that the potable water from the plant still isn't healthy means I should really get a filter.

Specifically I live in the West Hollywood area and can't seem to find any info on this.

These are my cons:

1) I'm living on Production Assistant wages at the moment and do NOT spend money unless absolutely necessary. This would cost me $34 for the unit and $34 for two filters (filters changing once every 4 months or so).

2) I HATE how slow the water comes out. I fill up my fridge with tons of flavored water bottles and this would really slow me down. Also, I hate the pitchers because you get barely any water out of such a bit unit, so I would have to get the sink unit.

I dont have self-control, but I AM lazy.

who else — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 15:24:20 -0800

Is there any way (on a mac) that I can block myself from being able to visit a website without being able to go back and unblock it, aside from getting someone else involved to block urls for me? Right now I have opendns set up and have blocked a url. But it would be too easy to just go log into opendns config and just unblock it. Is there anything that wouldn't let me unblock for a year or an amount of time I can set?
And I could block and throw out the password to opendns but I would want the ability to block more urls in the future.
With opendns I can still bypass it by just stopping using opendns but it is a hassle to reconfigure my IP settings, compared to just logging in and unblocking what I blocked. I need more roadblocks.

Do my fish need a change?

Drasher — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 07:33:07 -0800

[AquariumFilter] I have a Magnum H.O.T. filter on a 29g freshwater tank and I am considering changing to a Penguin Emperor 400. Is this a wise move? Do I have to run them in parallel? (and another weird question about inhabitants) [OK, the "AquariumFilter" pun was slightly intended] The tank is freshwater and has an assortment of guppies, Cory catfish, kuhli loaches, and a pleco. The substrate is gravel and the plants are all live (Java moss and fern). I have tried getting some easy fish to reproduce in the tank and after ten years, the guppies have finally done it!

The Magnum is a pain to clean and change; it must be removed and completely dismantled to change the filter elements. It looks like the elements of the Emperor just lift out while the filter remains running. I usually do not run chemical filtration (carbon); I stick to mechanical (filter "floss") and biological (bio-wheel).
It looks to me like the Emperor might be easier to service and the 400 has two large bio-wheels.

The Magnum quit on me again yesterday. Yeah, I know, my fault, but the filter element must have grabbed all of the algae junk at one time and clogged(!). Anyway, it was pulling nothing and cavitating.

I don't know how long that had been going on, but I could see that the fish were stressed. Then I saw something REALLY weird. I saw six (or so) worms. It looked like they could be tubifex worms, but I haven't put any live tubifex worms in the tank for a couple years! It is even possible that the worms lived and/or reproduced for that time? What good (or bad) does that say about the tank's eco-system?

How to be more comfortable being myself with people

Rowgun — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:31:49 -0800

How can I remove the "filter" from my mouth and be more authentic? Due to several factors (culture, family upbringing, working in customer-service focused jobs), I've found myself with a "Look on the bright side of life" filter on my mouth. I always try to say something nice, or laugh things off when someone says something mean. I've gotten so good at it that I hardly even realize I do it until someone points it out. This comes in handy in alot of situations but it has also made developing friendships/relationships very difficult.

People have often said it is very hard to get a read on my personality. I come off as aloof, and I don't feel comfortable sharing my true feelings and thoughts. To top it all off, I'm also an INTJ personality, which means expressing feelings and affection are not natural for me.

My question is, are there specific mental exercises I can do to help me relax, and be myself around people? Perhaps journaling, stream of consciousness writing? I've noticed having one beer can help me be more comfortable, but I'd rather not become dependent on that.

Any suggestions, advice, or personal experience would be greatly helpful.

Outlook/Exchange mailbox assistant

paulyballs — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 16:10:36 -0800

Does anyone know of any third party add-ons or software for Outlook/Exchange that works as type of a "assistant". What I'm looking for is software that will scan incoming messages based on a list of approved contacts. If a message from one of these approved contacts hits the mailbox, the message will continue to the inbox. If it does not, it will be routed to another folder in the mailbox that the person's admin will have access to. The admin will then have the option to click a link in the email (after review of the message) that will release it into the executive's mailbox and also have the option to add the address to the approved contacts list. Also, if the executive replies to the message, it will also be automatically added to the approved contacts list. I'm hoping there is something out there that we can use to help manage an executive's mailbox.

Where do you install this filter in this Renault?

upc_head — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 12:02:11 -0800

In a 2006 Renault Kangoo (french car) where you do you install the passenger area air filter (filter's AC, heater vent air etc). In french it's referred to as the "filtre d' habiacle". My father has a replacement filter, but can't for the life of him find where it goes.

1.6 16V engine

How do I Filter out Facebook group mails?

skylar — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 23:16:06 -0800

I'm a member of hundreds of Facebook groups, which I enjoy except for the fact that their owners sometimes send me a direct email. The result is dozens of direct emails that I can't seem to find a setting inside Facebook to block. So then I move to my Gmail filters. Is there a way to filter out the Facebook group mails using Gmail filters? The identifying feature of mails from groups is that their subject header contains quote marks, so the sender is always Facebook and the subject header is always: "Group Name" sent you a message on Facebook. My question is: how do I teach Gmail to distinguish between these mails and mails from my actual friends, which don't have the quote marks around them?

Pool Filter... filter. "Incomplete" prime?

rocketpup — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 12:57:09 -0800

Replaced Jandy CJ200 cartridge filter with new Jandy SFTM22 sand filter. Pump pot no longer fills completely with water. Possible reasons? Contractor malfeasance? This weekend my Jandy CJ200 shot its top half many tens of feet into the air for unknown reasons. We had just cleaned the cartridge like many times before and had restarted it. The pressure release valve was definitely open.

Whatever the reason for this event, we simply decided to buy and have installed a new 22" sand filter, the Jandy SFTM22, which is apparently a renamed Hayward due to some recent corporate acquisitions.

Our pool service installed the new filter and left, but the pump never primed, and we couldn't get it to do so using the normal methods. Note that we have a Jandy JHPU1.0 1 HP pump.

So we got the pool service out again today and they managed to improve the situation somewhat, so that the water level is higher in the pot, and completely covering the inlet pipe. They say they did this by sealing some leaks, but that to fix it completely they need to replace the diffuser. We did backwash the filter, but it is brand new and the water was perfectly clear. There is no pressure release valve on this filter, not that I know if it needs one. It is currently operating at 23 PSI, and has been since it was installed. No idea if that is normal since it is brand new.

Note that the pot filled just fine when the CJ200 was in operation.

So I have a few questions:
1) Can the pump/filter just be operated this way as long as the water completely covers the inlet pipe?
2) Could this be considered a normal consequence of switching to a new filter? Maybe the new filter is easier to pass water through?
3) Could excess pressure in the system damage the diffuser without noticeably damaging anything else except for the old filter?
4) Could this have been caused by the contractor during installation?

Thanks for any help!

Dissecting the Photoshop "stamp" filter

BugsPotter — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 09:34:30 -0800

I'd like to programmatically recreate the Photoshop stamp filter - does anyone know how to dissect what the stamp filter is doing? The Photoshop settings I'm using with the Stamp filter are: Light/Dark Balance set to 25 and Smoothness set to 5. I'd like to be able to recreate this effect without using Photoshop, but I'm not really sure what's going on under the hood. Any thoughts or pointers would be much appreciated. Thanks!!

Help filter my furnace.

zempf — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 17:37:26 -0800

Our current central air conditioner uses 20x25x2 filters, which seem to be an odd size (after searching the aisles for a bit, I asked at the local big box hardware store and the ever-so-helpful worker there implied that I was insane & there was no such thing). Anyway, I've searched online a bit & some places do indeed sell them, but I was wondering -- would it be ridiculous to just stack two 20x25x1 filters together to save myself the trouble of special ordering the correct size?

Web graphics and ads filter?

jpg15 — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:53:11 -0800

Web filter filter: I seem to remember a link to an NYT article that just contained the full text of the article in nice big letters, with no graphics, banners, or ads. It was fully attributed, with links to the original, but it was much more pleasant to read, especially for a long article. Is there a website that will filter out the clutter and provide links that can be forwarded?

A hand-screenprint feel with digital technology

Foam Pants — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 17:02:28 -0800

I am looking to get a screenprint look on my graphic design work. What are some techniques or some filters I could use to enhance my Adobe Design Suite environment? I want to produce some projects that look something like these by artist Andy Smith. My work just looks too perfect, the edges and colors too precise. Not to mention my typography doesn't have that custom fit. I know that some of that is only achieved by actually doing it by hand but I doubt that Mr. Smith is making these stickers with a silk screen. Specifically I would like to:

1. Get that transparent, yet vibrant, colors that overlay each other from a screenprinting process.

2. Get system fonts to look a little more hand-lettered. I currently am doing this by laying them down on a slightly crooked path and mixing up angles and sizes a bit.

3. Get my "ink" to fade out and splotch like silk screening. Perhaps there is a quality filter? I am not opposed to laborious processes as long as it works.

Being a self-taught graphic designer that never has any contact with other graphic designers, I have no one to bounce ideas off of or help me mess with techniques. This is an issue that has been bugging me for a long time.

HVAC Filter MERV ratings - which is best (for my usage)?

torquemaniac — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 12:09:39 -0800

HVACFilterfilter: It's time to get a new filter for my residential HVAC system. Please help me understand MERV ratings. I've done quite a bit of research and it appears to me that MERV rated filters up to about 6 or so are used mostly to keep the insides of the HVAC unit itself clean & operational and that filters rated 7-12 are used for further conditioning the air itself. I.E. - filtering out dust/dander particles to prevent them from being breathed in & keeping the house cleaner as well. Is this assumption correct? In theory I can see it, does real world experience bear this out?

My house is a small 1000sf open plan with one bedroom that stays mostly closed off & a small bathroom that mainly stays open. I live with a flock of 9 parrots, three of which are old world birds who produce a *lot* of dander. Will the higher MERV rated filters help with the dander/powder? Or should I just keep dusting regularly & get the lower MERV (and substantially cheaper) rated filter? I'll note the air return is right next to the front door and away from most all activity in the house.

The filters themselves range anywhere from $8USD x 12 (MERV 6) to $16USD x 6 (MERV 12) when bought in bulk. They're generally $15 - $50 when sourced individually. I'm concerned that not only are the higher rated filters substantially more expensive, it appears they require a more rigid rotation schedule and could possibly bind up or air lock my HVAC system. I'm using a 20x20x4 filter which should get between 3 (Merv 12) & 6 or more (Merv 6) months per filter - which makes it look like the higher rated units are at least four times as expensive. The one that came with the unit when it was new a little over a year ago was touted as "change every year or two" by my HVAC guy - I took it out and banged a lot of the powder off it before firing up the A/C for the summer today & it seems to be working fine. I don't want to push it, though. I called my HVAC subcontractor and they didn't have a clue. So, here I am, trying to figure this out before dropping a huge chunk of change on a bulk purchase of filters I'll be using for the next few years. TIA!

How can I filter out all but the latest entry in Excel?

Serial Killer Slumber Party — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 17:30:26 -0800

MS Excel Problem: How can I filter out all but the latest entry for each unique ID? I have a data set that consists of a lot ID number, an event date and then details surrounding it. The problem is that each lot ID will have a number of events (and thus a number of rows with the same ID number) and I only want the latest event. I've been playing with the 'advanced filter' option but can't think of a set of criteria to do this. The only solution thus far is to order them by ID and then date and do it manually, however this is going to take a lot of time.

Any suggestions?

Only New Entries In Delicious RSS Feeds For Tags

Brian Puccio — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 10:38:14 -0800

Can I filter out previously posted URIs from a delicious RSS feed for a specific tag? I'm subscribed to a handful of delicious RSS feeds for certain tags. While the signal to noise ratio isn't great, I do see about a dozen things on each feed that is something I would have missed otherwise. However, most of the stuff that I see on a daily basis (over 200 posts) are URIs I know have been posted before. I estimate I can easily cut in half the stuff I don't want to see if there was a feed that only included a URI that was completely new to delicious. Is there any way to do this? Is there a yahoo pipes for this? Something else I should look into (aside from roll my own aggregator and filter manually)? Thanks!

High caffeine, low rent

Acheman — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 11:08:33 -0800

Where in London can I buy a filter coffee and read undisturbed for hours? Should be quiet, needn't be 'nice', Bow or London Bridge locations a bonus but all considered. When I lived in Cambridge, I used to go to the food court at The Grafton Centre, a slightly grotty shopping mall, to buy a cheap and nasty filter coffee from a takeaway pizza place which had used to be a Sbarro. The owners had painted over the Sbarro signage but retained many of the trimmings, presumably because it seemed like a waste of money to buy new ones. It wasn't heavily used - they had many, many more chairs than patrons - or heavily serviced, so I didn't feel bad about stretching my drink out while I read books on Lacan and Critical Theory, pencil in hand, headphones in. Sometimes when I got hungry I'd have a slice of pizza for about £1.50. I went there about three times a week after work, and always had the same thing, but they never acknowledged me as a regular or guessed my order before I gave it to them. It was heaven. I only stopped going when their coffee jug broke and they made it clear they had no immediate plans to replace it.

Now I'm living in London and haven't found anywhere comparable. I'd like to go somewhere where I can buy a cheap filter coffee - none of this latte bullshit - and make it last for hours without being made to feel bad. Somewhere with a lot of space and no atmosphere, where I can be invisible. Preferably somewhere within easy reach of home - Bow - or work - London Bridge - but I'd travel further afield if necessary. I travel to and from work via Canary Wharf, but all the coffee establishments there seem pricey, only serve latte bullshit, and have the kind of table service where they glare at you after half an hour. I'd prefer somewhere where you could die in your seat at 10 AM, have teenagers use you for chip target practice all day, and only be discovered late in the evening by a lady with a mop and a tragic backstory. That serves cheap filter coffee. Do I make myself plain?

I archived w/o labeleling. Are my emails forver hidden?

hasna — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 14:54:43 -0800

About a year ago, I accidentally archived a ton of old emails in my Gmail account, without putting any labels on any of them. (I thought I knew how archiving worked at the time, but obviously I was wrong) Aside from just randomly searching for keywords every time I need to find one of those archived emails, is there any way to access them? Preferably en masse, so I can add labels to them once and for all.

I understand Gmails "great and wonderful" search ability, but I've found that a number of times, the obvious keywords aren't in the email I'm looking for, especially registration/sign-up confirmations/info, where the sender's email address isn't the same as the site I signed up with.
(I hope that makes sense... )

Maybe there's a Greasemonkey script out there somewhere I can use?

Hot Tub Water Filter

Raybun — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 13:52:11 -0800

There is fine iron sediment in my well water. My hot tub has a water circulating system that cannot tolerate filter blockage. A service man told me that even minor filter blockage damages the pump seals. I do not have a piping circuit diagram for the tub and cannot describe how the filters operate in the system nor how the alleged differential pressure safety valve is supposed to function. There is a secondary filter that gets restricted after a few hours of initial use with iron buildup. The service guy told me that, even without my suspended iron problem, this secondary filter should not be in my, or in any other Coleman spa systems. Neither the filter packages or the spa owners manual have any micron specs for the filters.
All of this is just background for my question.

I need to be able to filter 300 gallons of water as the tub is filling and/or build a circulating filter that would be used before the main pumps are turned on. Filling the tub takes roughly about half an hour with no filtration. This is too large a volume of water for a household Ro filter to handle.

I have an unused small swimming pool filter system that could be used to either filter the water as the tube fills and/or use as a circulating filter before the circulating pumps are turned on. What is the smallest particle in microns that a sand filter can remove from water? I can also easily modify this system, if used as a circulating filter after filling, into a removable media filer.

I could also build a filter with stacked Scotchbrite pads. My parts washer uses a Scotchbrite polishing pad to filter sediment from the cleaning fluid.

Is it possible to use a hose mounted filter, such as the Gardenmate, that can be backflushed?

Any Form-Follows-Scrounge ideas?

Please help me filter out the good from my list of NYC doctors covered by my insurance.

scazza — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 12:04:27 -0800

Please help me filter out the good from my list of NYC doctors covered by my insurance. This is my last resort after days over months of searching trying to connect the dots and find doctors. Maybe you guys can help. I have searched on yelp, zocdoc, and all kinds of lists of good doctors (nymag) on google for ways to filter the list of doctors my insurance covers and have come up empty. I can't believe after days and hours online I've come up empty.

1. I am looking for a really awesome family practice doctor who can do it all OR a coop-type office that has multiple doctors (gyn, internal medicine, ortho or DO, etc.) I could see on my visit that takes my obscure crappy insurance First Health/Coventry Health Care.

2. Or techniques to filter out the good from the bad in an insurance's list of doctors.

I live in Brooklyn 11220, am often in 11215 and don't mind going to Midtown or below. I'd prefer a female or very nice male. I would really appreciate anyone who has wisdom about this or is willing to help. I'm at my wits end. Thank you.

I want a YouTube RSS filter

scottreynen — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 09:43:46 -0800

I would like to take a given RSS feed (e.g. MetaFilter's feed), and create a derivative feed containing only the items with YouTube links in the content, with the destination URLs changed to the YouTube links (rather than the source of those links). Does something like this already exist? If not, what's the simplest way to create it? I can write code if necessary, but would rather not if there's an alternative. To give some context, I have a bunch of feeds (Hulu, video blogs, etc.) on a computer attached to my TV, and all of them allow me to click through to the destination URL and load a video immediately. I'd like to be able to do the same with various feeds that only sometimes point to YouTube videos.