Google sows the seeds of its own destruction by thriving...?
Meanwhile, IBM goes down the pan
| App of the day: |
|
Google and the quest for the answer to life, the universe and everything
|
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Google's Search for the Universal Search
Google sows the seeds of its own destruction by thriving...?
Meanwhile, IBM goes down the pan
Google sows the seeds of its own destruction by thriving...?
Meanwhile, IBM goes down the pan
DVDVideoSoft News
|
DVDVideoSoft News |
| YouTube Download does not work any more Posted: 24 Jan 2008 10:38 AM CST YouTube has just changed their video files hosting routine. So our YouTube download programs stop working. As for us we worked hard and already today we have fixed the problem and updated all YouTube related software. If you use the following programs, please download and reinstall them: P.S. Special thanks to FREEBIRDX! Our forum member who informed us about this problem first in his post “YouTube download does not work any more “. |
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The care and keeping of laptops and batteries
|
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Question: from msk6261
Do you destroy the "memory life" of a rechargable battery when you leave it plugged in all the time? Is it best to let the battery drain and recharge on a regular basis? Is it OK to almost always have the notebook plugged in? What is the best practice for keeping the longevity of the battery time and overall battery life?
Answer:
It depends what you mean by "memory life". There are two types of memory associated with notebook batteries:
a) the type of memory that prevents a battery from physically taking charge
b) the "digital memory" deterioration that causes notebooks' charge level calibration to get progressively less and less accurate
Type a) affects only NiMh/NiCd battery types, whereas type b) affects pretty much all battery types where the laptop monitors charge levels - including those of Li-on batteries.
The resulting effect of digital memory loss is that your notebook's power meter misreads the charge level in the battery, reporting the wrong % charge remaining figure to you in your taskbar and, reporting the same to your power management program!
Over time this inaccuracy may get greater until eventually your battery is virtually useless.
Note that some notebook manufacturers provide better power mangement than others: Dell, IBM/Lenovo and Toshiba seemed to suffer a great deal from this problem. They seem to all have one thing in common: once the battery is charged they don't stop charging and switch to AC power. Instead, they continue to run off battery power while charging, resulting in continuous charge/discharge of the battery. This is exceptionally bad as far as power meter calibration goes! There are dozens of Thinkpads owned by my employer that have very little battery life as a result of this flip-flopping of charge/discharge. You can identify this problem if your power meter reports 100%, 99%, 100%, 99%, 98%, 99%, 100% etc. over a period of just a few minutes.
Some laptops will respond to the detection of a battery becoming fully charged by cutting off charging and running from AC while plugged in. This will help to extend the life of the battery (yes, Li-Ons too, they have a limited number of full discharges during their lifetime).
Even if your laptop manages charging better, you will still find your power meter goes out of calibration over time. Although it is not recommended to regularly fully discharge your battery, you should periodically fully discharge it and fully charge it (don't leave the battery for an extended period with no charge in it). This will allow proper calibration of the power management program and ensure that the power meter gives a more accurate reading. It is important to do this whenever you notice a deterioration in the normal operating time of your battery - if you leave it too late then you will never get close to the times you once did. Note: this has nothing to do with Ni-MH/Ni-Cd battery memory loss! Although it will work for them too, for a different reason.
For Mac users:
OS 9 and OS X comes with a digital memory reset function to get around the calibration problem (reset NVRAM or something like that). Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be such a utility available from other laptop manufacturers
You can read everything you need to know about (li-on) battery care at:
http://www.rm.com/_RMVirtual/Media/Downloads/Lithium_Ion_Batteries_Care.doc
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
also try:
http://monkeyfilter.com/link.php/7094
http://www.laptop-battery.org/batterytips.html
and http://www.macintouch.com/laptopbatt.html (for Mac users)
Hope this helps.
Do you destroy the "memory life" of a rechargable battery when you leave it plugged in all the time? Is it best to let the battery drain and recharge on a regular basis? Is it OK to almost always have the notebook plugged in? What is the best practice for keeping the longevity of the battery time and overall battery life?
Answer:
It depends what you mean by "memory life". There are two types of memory associated with notebook batteries:
a) the type of memory that prevents a battery from physically taking charge
b) the "digital memory" deterioration that causes notebooks' charge level calibration to get progressively less and less accurate
Type a) affects only NiMh/NiCd battery types, whereas type b) affects pretty much all battery types where the laptop monitors charge levels - including those of Li-on batteries.
The resulting effect of digital memory loss is that your notebook's power meter misreads the charge level in the battery, reporting the wrong % charge remaining figure to you in your taskbar and, reporting the same to your power management program!
Over time this inaccuracy may get greater until eventually your battery is virtually useless.
Note that some notebook manufacturers provide better power mangement than others: Dell, IBM/Lenovo and Toshiba seemed to suffer a great deal from this problem. They seem to all have one thing in common: once the battery is charged they don't stop charging and switch to AC power. Instead, they continue to run off battery power while charging, resulting in continuous charge/discharge of the battery. This is exceptionally bad as far as power meter calibration goes! There are dozens of Thinkpads owned by my employer that have very little battery life as a result of this flip-flopping of charge/discharge. You can identify this problem if your power meter reports 100%, 99%, 100%, 99%, 98%, 99%, 100% etc. over a period of just a few minutes.
Some laptops will respond to the detection of a battery becoming fully charged by cutting off charging and running from AC while plugged in. This will help to extend the life of the battery (yes, Li-Ons too, they have a limited number of full discharges during their lifetime).
Even if your laptop manages charging better, you will still find your power meter goes out of calibration over time. Although it is not recommended to regularly fully discharge your battery, you should periodically fully discharge it and fully charge it (don't leave the battery for an extended period with no charge in it). This will allow proper calibration of the power management program and ensure that the power meter gives a more accurate reading. It is important to do this whenever you notice a deterioration in the normal operating time of your battery - if you leave it too late then you will never get close to the times you once did. Note: this has nothing to do with Ni-MH/Ni-Cd battery memory loss! Although it will work for them too, for a different reason.
For Mac users:
OS 9 and OS X comes with a digital memory reset function to get around the calibration problem (reset NVRAM or something like that). Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be such a utility available from other laptop manufacturers
You can read everything you need to know about (li-on) battery care at:
http://www.rm.com/_RMVirtual/Media/Downloads/Lithium_Ion_Batteries_Care.doc
http://www.batteryuniversity.com/parttwo-34.htm
also try:
http://monkeyfilter.com/link.php/7094
http://www.laptop-battery.org/batterytips.html
and http://www.macintouch.com/laptopbatt.html (for Mac users)
Hope this helps.
DVDVideoSoft News
|
Monday, January 21, 2008
DVDVideoSoft News |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2008 11:11 AM CST Hello all! This is the first post in our blog this year and we have lots of news. Find more details below. |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2008 11:10 AM CST Visit and bookmark the following link:http://www.dvdvideosoft.com/forums/index.php. Make it the home page for your browser Here you can ask questions, get answers from real people, and share your insights and experience. Everybody is invited! We hope that this forum will become your favorite place to find and share information about video related tasks and software. We will do our best to make this true. |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2008 11:10 AM CST I’d like to draw your special attention to the update of Free Video Dub. In this version we implemented the scene search algorithm. It reduces the time you need to find and delete unwanted scenes from your video. We hope that you will like it! |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2008 11:09 AM CST Thanks to Doc King you can see our software in action: http://blog.stanking.org. He used our Free Video to JPG Converter to extract a frame every 10 seconds from the original video file and then Free Video to Flash Converter to make a smaller file to post in his blog. Your stories or live example of using our software is greatly appreciated. Do not hesitate to write us, we will post it on our site! |
| Posted: 21 Jan 2008 11:09 AM CST Today we have just updated all our software. 3GP Converter: Deutsch, Portuguese (Brazil) Plus, all programs are available in Japanese now! |
| You are subscribed to email updates from DVDVideoSoft News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner |
| Inbox too full? Subscribe to the feed version of DVDVideoSoft News in a feed reader. | |
| If you prefer to unsubscribe via postal mail, write to: DVDVideoSoft News, c/o FeedBurner, 20 W Kinzie, 9th Floor, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
Check out the new music hardware
|
Saturday, January 19, 2008
The Samsung YP-P2 delivers 20mW per channel sound.
The iPod Touch delivers ???mW per channel - which means no more than 20mW /ch. (see how Apple neglect to provide us with the meaningful technical specs)
My old Cowon iAudio U3 spits out nasty 30mW /ch. - leaving the opposition in the shade, but it's been superceded by the U5 - and there's a bevvy of new lovelies to go with it on the
Cowon site.
If you don't have one, you're not a real audiophile ;-)
Then get yourself some proper headphones.
Whether you have one or not, you should get yourself a copy of JetAudio posthaste.
The iPod Touch delivers ???mW per channel - which means no more than 20mW /ch. (see how Apple neglect to provide us with the meaningful technical specs)
My old Cowon iAudio U3 spits out nasty 30mW /ch. - leaving the opposition in the shade, but it's been superceded by the U5 - and there's a bevvy of new lovelies to go with it on the
Cowon site.
If you don't have one, you're not a real audiophile ;-)
Then get yourself some proper headphones.
Whether you have one or not, you should get yourself a copy of JetAudio posthaste.
Lightning DOES strike in the same place twice... in Dell's case
|
Friday, January 18, 2008
Dell laptops in electric shock shocker read original article
We've discovered a worrying new feature in some Dell laptops: if you touch them, you may get an electric shock. This discharge can vary in strength from a gentle tingle to a sudden jolt. Disturbingly, you could also be shocked when connecting printers, PDAs and other peripherals to the offending laptops.
Referred by Jim
We've discovered a worrying new feature in some Dell laptops: if you touch them, you may get an electric shock. This discharge can vary in strength from a gentle tingle to a sudden jolt. Disturbingly, you could also be shocked when connecting printers, PDAs and other peripherals to the offending laptops.
Referred by Jim
I'm thinking of upgrading my hard drive
|
Well, my trusty laptop has a 100GB HDD, but it's always getting full... You know, holiday pics and movies, downloaded movies, all my ripped music - all that stuff Sony and Apple want to DRM-ify to death. Anyway, whatever it's full of, a good 80% of it is used up - and we all know how Windows needs space to breathe. I archive stuff onto my 500GB external drive and make the odd DVD backup, but I'd love a big capacity HDD.
I was looking on SVP, Pixmania, Dabs and Komplett and couldn't really find anything big enough. And then I found this
Seeing as this will probably never come into fruition, this will have to do instead.
I was looking on SVP, Pixmania, Dabs and Komplett and couldn't really find anything big enough. And then I found this
Seeing as this will probably never come into fruition, this will have to do instead.
| These drives will slot into the first 1TB notebook by |  |
Of course, all this was made possible by the good people at Hitachi, who have to be one of the best hardware manufacturers of them all. They even made the Raptor great. |  |
IBM programmers
|
Monday, January 14, 2008
Things must be improving at IBM. Mediocrity has been achieved.
How To Become a Hacker
|
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Here's an article by Eric Steven Raymond that offers advice on how to win friends and influence
people - provided they're hackers.
It includes links to such illuminating pieces as The HTML Hell page, containing such memorable paragraphs as:
"Surfers learn quickly that for every ten 'under construction' signs that go up, maybe two will ever come down before the heat-death of the Universe. This is stupid. HTML is not rocket science and prototyping pages is not a slow process. Anybody who can't find the time to clean the construction signs off their pages should yank them and take up a hobby better matched to their abilities, like (say) drooling, or staring at the wall."
Not to mention, the enlightening Loginataka (there, I just mentioned it):
"The true Way to the Knowledge of the Source is not the timid and footling way of the Student, but the Divine Foolery of the Hacker. Hack, then; strive against Mighty Problems, have joy in thy Striving, and let the Crashes fall where they may (maintaining the while, for the Good of thy Karma, a Rigorous Backup Policy)".
Read on... if you dare.
people - provided they're hackers.
It includes links to such illuminating pieces as The HTML Hell page, containing such memorable paragraphs as:
"Surfers learn quickly that for every ten 'under construction' signs that go up, maybe two will ever come down before the heat-death of the Universe. This is stupid. HTML is not rocket science and prototyping pages is not a slow process. Anybody who can't find the time to clean the construction signs off their pages should yank them and take up a hobby better matched to their abilities, like (say) drooling, or staring at the wall."
Not to mention, the enlightening Loginataka (there, I just mentioned it):
"The true Way to the Knowledge of the Source is not the timid and footling way of the Student, but the Divine Foolery of the Hacker. Hack, then; strive against Mighty Problems, have joy in thy Striving, and let the Crashes fall where they may (maintaining the while, for the Good of thy Karma, a Rigorous Backup Policy)".
Read on... if you dare.
Older Freeware versions
|
Monday, January 07, 2008
Some more sites to get some older versions of shareware programs, mostly free.
http://pricelessware.org/thelist/index.htm
http://www.oldversion.com/
http://www.old-versions.net/
http://pricelessware.org/thelist/index.htm
http://www.oldversion.com/
http://www.old-versions.net/
jQuery: Where have you been all my life?
|
Friday, January 04, 2008
Any developer who has spent an age arseing around with nasty old JavaScript will appreciate this tool.
PC World plunges to new depths
|
While negative press piles up on PC World's doormat, they obviously forgot to pay the electric bill buried somewhere underneath the thousands of letters of complaint from angry customers.
Anyone who visited their Irish site up until this morning will have seen the notice "account suspended due to non-payment" where the site used to be. Now it looks like PC World got reconnected - their site is up again (sort of... it's under construction). I wonder if they got charged a reconnection fee? ;-)
Here is a small sample of the unrest from around the blog-o-sphere:
Anyone who visited their Irish site up until this morning will have seen the notice "account suspended due to non-payment" where the site used to be. Now it looks like PC World got reconnected - their site is up again (sort of... it's under construction). I wonder if they got charged a reconnection fee? ;-)
Here is a small sample of the unrest from around the blog-o-sphere:
Lenovo to be released into the wild
|
Thursday, January 03, 2008
Have you read the news shocker on TechRepublic?
Lenovo is about to take on the home user laptop market by storm with such innovative features as:
Lenovo is about to take on the home user laptop market by storm with such innovative features as:
- cloth covered case
- red coloured case
- Chinese government spyware (probably)
SyncBackSE
|
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
For anyone looking for a great backup utility, try:
SyncBackSE
It rocks. It's not free, but well worth the money.
There is a freeware edition, but SE is worth the cash.
^---^
oo
>_<
SyncBackSE
It rocks. It's not free, but well worth the money.
There is a freeware edition, but SE is worth the cash.
^---^
oo
>_<
DVDVideoSoft News
|
Monday, December 31, 2007
DVDVideoSoft News |
| Happy New Year and Best Wishes for 2008 Posted: 30 Dec 2007 02:18 PM CST Hello, hello, hello! I’m sure that you have a great pleasure time these holidays. The program will have a profile editor, so you will be able to specify your device screen resolution, to play with bitrate and framerate in order to increase quality of output video or decrease output file size and to create custom profiles for your specific device with MP4 video support. Have a great time and do not forget to visit DVDVideoSoft! PS. I apologize for not answering to your personal emails for about a week or so. I promise, I will answer you within the first days of January 2008. |
| You are subscribed to email updates from DVDVideoSoft News To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email Delivery powered by FeedBurner |
| Inbox too full? Subscribe to the feed version of DVDVideoSoft News in a feed reader. | |
| If you prefer to unsubscribe via postal mail, write to: DVDVideoSoft News, c/o FeedBurner, 20 W Kinzie, 9th Floor, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
Upgrade to XP
|
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Excellent article on the smooth upgrade path available from Vista to XP
Posted by:
--
Jim
Te audire no possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure
Posted by:
--
Jim
Te audire no possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure
Blogging on Domino
|
Monday, December 17, 2007
Here's an example of how good DWA (Domino Web Access) and the Domino blogging engine can be
Reliability...
|
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Imagine if every Thursday your shoes exploded if you tied them the usual way. This happens to us all the time with computers, and nobody thinks of complaining.
- Jef Raskin
- Jef Raskin
FastStone Capture now on version 5.9
|
Thursday, December 13, 2007
In a post I made earlier this year, I lavished praise on one of my favourite little apps these daysFastStone Capture (the best bang per buck screen capture app there is, I think)
It's remarkable how many features they packed into 1.3MB:
- multiple image format conversion (jpg, png, gif, bmp, tiff, pcx, tga)
- export to PDF
- screen capture direct to Word, PowerPoint
- edit, edge effects, negative, sepia, blur etc.
- captioning
- image format quality setting, with lossless compression and instant preview
- zoom
- magnifying glass with negative feature to help those with very poor vision
- and of course, multiple screen capture modes, such as active window capture, selected window capture, freehand, region, full screen and scrolling window capture
- oh, and a colour picker
- and a screen ruler
Sample screencap (with added caption):
What really slows your PC down
|
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
For most people there are not too many surprises here. Our old friend Norton is up there.
Reporting on PHP
|
Monday, December 10, 2007
Got some reports to generate? Want to offer them in a variety of formats? No problem: you can start with pdf and xls and work from there.
The Register has put together a simple howto on the subject
The Register has put together a simple howto on the subject
Linux is poised to take over the low-end PC market
|
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Or so this article by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols would have us believe:
I've heard this kind of thing said many times before (Linspire, anyone?) and it has never really come to pass. It's true that with Ubuntu and openSuse you don't have to know anything about Linux to use them for most basic tasks, but when you run into trouble you'll need to be able to find your way around Yast2 at least, if not the bowels of the Linux filesystem. I suppose that's the way it is with Windows, but I don't think that the average PC user is quite ready for Linux yet, even Ubuntu.
I've heard this kind of thing said many times before (Linspire, anyone?) and it has never really come to pass. It's true that with Ubuntu and openSuse you don't have to know anything about Linux to use them for most basic tasks, but when you run into trouble you'll need to be able to find your way around Yast2 at least, if not the bowels of the Linux filesystem. I suppose that's the way it is with Windows, but I don't think that the average PC user is quite ready for Linux yet, even Ubuntu.
IBM Server Sales Slump - will Eclipz be the saviour?
|
Sunday, December 02, 2007
With IBM falling behind Dell and Sun in the server market (which is still IBM's core business), and with their main competitors showing no signs of slowing down, IBM introduce Eclipz to the world at large. Will it do anything to stimulate growth and entice buyers? Perhaps not, according to this article on tech-news. It seems that the impressive sounding 4GHz four-core Power 6 CPUs may not be as quick as the existing z9a CMOS based processors, so will customers bite? Will they believe the claims that z6 will "never lose data, never go down"? Only time will tell.
Read the full article on tech-news
Read the z6 product specification (pdf)
Read the full article on tech-news
Read the z6 product specification (pdf)
AV-Comparatives November Report
|
Saturday, December 01, 2007
Here's the monthly AV-Comparatives report for November. All the luminaries are there: Symantec, McAfee, Eset, AVIRA, Avast and Grisoft to name but a few...
On-Demand Scanning:
http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/ergebnisse_2007_08.php
http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/ergebnisse/report15.pdf
Retrospective/proactive scanning:
http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/ergebnisse_2007_11.php
http://www.av-comparatives.org/seiten/ergebnisse/report16.pdf
Lowlights:
NormanVirusControl only caught 2 of 12 polymorphic viruses, with AVAST and AVG next worst at 3 of 12. The honour of worst overall detection rates fell to Dr. Web (but it is beta).
Highlights:
At the top of the polymorphic threat spectrum were: G DATA, MicroWorld, F-Secure, Kaspersky, ESET and Symantec - all with 12 of 12. AVIRA, McAfee, Softwin, F-Prot and AEC were joint second with 11 of 12. Best overall detection rates were for AVIRA's AntiVir PE Premium (so this is THE AV to put on your copy of MiniPE ;-)
Very little has changed in the last 6 months, and still (for me) Nod32 provides the best balance between rock-solid protection and speed. I'm still puzzled as to how Symantec and McAfee score so high, when most of the infected systems I see are running them (if they are running AV at all, up-to-date or not).
Bring on the Vista SP1 hype!
|
Thursday, November 29, 2007
ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley has posted on the upcoming SP1 for Vista. We knew it was coming... has she got anything interesting to say about it?
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=986&tag=nl.e622
There are already 156 talkbacks (and counting)
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=986&tag=nl.e622
There are already 156 talkbacks (and counting)
Google Talk Widget added to the right-hand menu
|
Thursday, November 15, 2007
PCHelpForum now comes with new improved chat functionality ;-)
I've had the widget added to my iGoogle homepage for ages, but never thought to enrich any of my websites (or blogs) with it's wonderful googliness. Now that I have finally addressed my tardiness you can all enjoy the finest little IM service in the known interverse right from this blog. So that's all 7 of you then :-P
You can add the google talk widget to your own website by embedding a script. The Google Talk widget is different from Google Chat and Google Talk (client) in a couple of ways - there are new smileys and (more importantly) a new* group chat feature.
* Well, not strictly new, it's been around for nearly six months now - I just didn't get around to blogging it until now, OK?
I've had the widget added to my iGoogle homepage for ages, but never thought to enrich any of my websites (or blogs) with it's wonderful googliness. Now that I have finally addressed my tardiness you can all enjoy the finest little IM service in the known interverse right from this blog. So that's all 7 of you then :-P
You can add the google talk widget to your own website by embedding a script. The Google Talk widget is different from Google Chat and Google Talk (client) in a couple of ways - there are new smileys and (more importantly) a new* group chat feature.
* Well, not strictly new, it's been around for nearly six months now - I just didn't get around to blogging it until now, OK?
Top programmers are worth every penny
|
Monday, November 12, 2007
Once I was a novice programmer who worked for free (almost). I certainly wasn't very efficient, but I worked with an experienced programmer who was. He also happened to be a fairly patient mentor but would agree whole-heartedly with what this guy has to say:
http://blog.revsys.com/2007/08/a-guide-to-hiri.html
http://blog.revsys.com/2007/08/a-guide-to-hiri.html
Songbird - not only a great player
|
Friday, November 09, 2007
I like the way music blogs can be bookmarked and viewed within the player. Plus mp3's on the blogs are added to the player and making them available for download.
Top 10 Free video rippers, encoders and converters
|
Thursday, November 01, 2007
Tools to help you when either the format is wrong, or you just want to get it onto a different device (please use legally ;).
Microchuck
|
Friday, October 26, 2007
Users surprised by change to AU settings (Vista)
http://windowssecrets.com/2007/10/25/03-PC-rebooting-The-cause-may-be-MS-OneCare
U3 flash drives rendered useless on some PCs
http://windowssecrets.com/2007/10/25/04-U3-flash-drives-rendered-useless-on-some-PCs
Convert applications to run on your new U3 USB Flash Drive
http://www.eure.ca/
--
Posted by Jim (via email)
Te audire no possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure
http://windowssecrets.com/2007/10/25/03-PC-rebooting-The-cause-may-be-MS-OneCare
U3 flash drives rendered useless on some PCs
http://windowssecrets.com/2007/10/25/04-U3-flash-drives-rendered-useless-on-some-PCs
Convert applications to run on your new U3 USB Flash Drive
http://www.eure.ca/
--
Posted by Jim (via email)
Te audire no possum. Musa sapientum fixa est in aure
"Sling" your TV over the internets
|
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
OK, so you pay for satellite or cable TV. You have all the packages; all the optional extras. You pay a lot for the privilege (or perhaps you have a Dreambox ;-). There's just one thing wrong: you spend most of your waking hours at work, sitting in front of a PC, while your expensive TV subscription sits idle.
Not anymore.
Now you can watch your own TV from your laptop, PC or mobile phone. You can even change the channel. All you need is a very special set top box, broadband and some nifty software. It's not even that expensive.
Click here for details
Click here to purchase
Not anymore.
Now you can watch your own TV from your laptop, PC or mobile phone. You can even change the channel. All you need is a very special set top box, broadband and some nifty software. It's not even that expensive.
Click here for details
Click here to purchase
Just for balance
|
Thursday, October 11, 2007
Not everything Apple does is cool. Here's "Why Quicktime Sucks", a succinct little gripelet about how annoying it is when you have to deal with the Quicktime Movie format.
If you like it why not vote for it? If you are not insane, why not vote for something else.
Look to the right of your screen for a video format popularity contest...
If you like it why not vote for it? If you are not insane, why not vote for something else.
Look to the right of your screen for a video format popularity contest...
The Trouble with Vista
|
It isn't the features you can see in Vista, or the lack thereof -- it's the priority shift at Microsoft's core
This is an old article by Scott Finnie on Compterworld (since Feb '07)
This is an old article by Scott Finnie on Compterworld (since Feb '07)
Windows expert to Redmond: Buh-bye
|
Scot Finnie says "sayonara" to Windows, but his search for Mac software continues
More than 100 Web 2.0 Online Generators
|
Monday, October 08, 2007
The jury is out on how useful this one is. It's hard to be too enthusiastic about the recommendations of a site written in asp and running on BlogEngine.NET! It looks good so far though, I will say.
Shoutcast Internet Radio
|
Friday, October 05, 2007
This isn't a bad place to go for some Internet radio. You'll need to install a Media Player that supports Shoutcast's stream playlists. WinAmp is recommended, but I think Jet Audio handles it better.
I've been listening a bit to Prank Call Underground, just for LOLs
http://www.shoutcast.com
http://www.winamp.com/player
Please comment on this post with your favourite Internet radio sites.
I've been listening a bit to Prank Call Underground, just for LOLs
http://www.shoutcast.com
http://www.winamp.com/player
Please comment on this post with your favourite Internet radio sites.
FastStone Capture - for all your screen grabbing needs
|
Friday, September 28, 2007
This has to be one of the most useful little programs in recent years. I remember when a lot of software used to be like this - simple, clean and with no redundant features. Snag It! was once like this, before it became an enormous catch-all program (not that isn't great, but I don't need all that stuff every day).
To top it all off, FSCapture can be downloaded as a zip file and extracted to your USB drive - no installation, no registry values.
It has recently moved from freeware status to shareware status. But it is definitely worth paying for. I've been using it for nearly two years now, and I can honestly say I use it every working day.
Download it now!
To top it all off, FSCapture can be downloaded as a zip file and extracted to your USB drive - no installation, no registry values.
It has recently moved from freeware status to shareware status. But it is definitely worth paying for. I've been using it for nearly two years now, and I can honestly say I use it every working day.
Download it now!
If you haven't looked at Mozilla's recommended add-ons recently...
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Thursday, September 27, 2007
... it's time you checked back there. Visit the add-ons page post-haste.
I particularly like (actually, love is not too strong a word) the following add-ons:
I particularly like (actually, love is not too strong a word) the following add-ons:
- NoScript - from the guys who brought you the essential FlashGot comes the add-on that may save your PC's very life
- CoolIris - that's "cool iris", which will allow you to preview the content behind a link on any web page without actually having to click it. Very cool, but not really that different to just opening the link in a background tab really
- Greasemonkey - this cheeky little primate is sooo fun to play around with (keep it clean - Ed.). You have to try it for yourself.
- Firebug - if you develop web applications or create static or dynamic web pages and sites you absolutely HAVE to install this. This add-on will let you explore the DOM of the current page, view and alter its CSS or JavaScript, changing values on the fly to see how it will look. Go on, get it now, you'll thank me later.
- Session Manager - far superior to Firefox's built-in session management
- Stumbleupon - it has to be either this or del.icio.us, you know what they do...
Unhook the OS from new hardware
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Wednesday, September 26, 2007
While Dell, HP Compaq, Fujitsu Siemens and others are offering XP again to buyers of new PCs, how about taking things one step further? Offer no OS and let customers choose one for themselves. Can this work? Rob Enderle clearly doesn't think so.
Random thoughts...
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Oh the dreaded blog description: "just some of my random thoughts". Sickening.
This is the very definition of randomness
Note to any decent amateur musicians out there in the blog-o-sphere: try playing some output from the random jazz scale generator
This is the very definition of randomness
Note to any decent amateur musicians out there in the blog-o-sphere: try playing some output from the random jazz scale generator
Spiceworks - how can they offer this for free?
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Spiceworks is an IT inventory management system that will let you keep track of every system on your network. You can generate reports and troubleshoot problems on multiple systems from one control center. The only downside is that while you can monitor Unix and Linux systems, you can't install and run Spiceworks from them. Still, the trump card is the price - there isn't one.
Get it here
Get it here
Your sister is as phosphorescent as a postal worker!
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Tuesday, September 25, 2007
That's possibly the best insult that Insult, courtesy of the some person(s) who really should know better, can throw at you.
Decide for yourself, if you've got nothing better to do
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of useless garbage to my attention ;-)
Decide for yourself, if you've got nothing better to do
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of useless garbage to my attention ;-)
Computer Humor - two normally mutually exclusive words
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Computer Humor - two normally mutually exclusive words come together to form a web page sprinkled with unfunny quips that aren't worth reading.
Why am I posting it? Well, what can I say? It's been a slow week.
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of the interweb to my attention
Why am I posting it? Well, what can I say? It's been a slow week.
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of the interweb to my attention
Are you a nerd? Take the test and find out
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Knowing who this guy is makes you a techno-freakin' nerd burglar, apparently.
Click on the image of His Nerdiness to take said test, you fucken faggit geekass homo you.
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of the interweb to my attention
Click on the image of His Nerdiness to take said test, you fucken faggit geekass homo you.
Thanks to muglatte for bringing this piece of the interweb to my attention
40+ Free Windows Apps For You
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The good people of Technology Bites have been kind enough to compose a list of... you guessed it... 40+ Free Windows Apps... for, erm... you?
Submitted by muglatte via email
Submitted by muglatte via email
Welcome to Zombocom...
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Monday, September 24, 2007
"... this is Zombocom, you can do anything at Zombocom, anything at all, the only limit is yourself..."
The unattainable is unknown at Zombocom.
Visit zombo.com now at zombo.com
**WARNING** You must have speakers to enjoy this limitlessly interactive service
**another WARNING** Don't click on the link, it is a waste of everybody's time
The unattainable is unknown at Zombocom.
Visit zombo.com now at zombo.com
**WARNING** You must have speakers to enjoy this limitlessly interactive service
**another WARNING** Don't click on the link, it is a waste of everybody's time
Dell lead the way (there's a first time for everything, I suppose)
|
As far as offering XP to PC buying customers goes, in any case.
Read about it here
Submitted by muglatte via email
Read about it here
Submitted by muglatte via email
Mashups in Minutes (or MiM, for those who need snappy three-letter acronyms, sorry, TLAs)
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For those of you who don't know already, a mashup is a buzzword used to describe web apps that integrate data from different sources and display them all on the one page. I suppose they're called mashups because they usually end up in one big mess. Management types keep demanding this sort of thing, so if you develop apps for a job you should probably find some way to knock one out quickly and easily.
Intel have been busy in this area recently, it seems, and they've brought out something that may just help SWDs a little bit. Regardless, this is a very light introduction to an area of application development that seemed to me to be just something you had to whip up yourself every few weeks to keep the stakeholders happy.
See here, and here to find out what all the big fuss is about.
Intel have been busy in this area recently, it seems, and they've brought out something that may just help SWDs a little bit. Regardless, this is a very light introduction to an area of application development that seemed to me to be just something you had to whip up yourself every few weeks to keep the stakeholders happy.
See here, and here to find out what all the big fuss is about.
The History of the Internet
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Monday, September 17, 2007
According some asshat called The Lemon.
Buy Viagra here, save 33% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Buy Viagra here, save 33% $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Excellent resource for web designers
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Friday, September 14, 2007
http://opendesigns.org/
Check it out, some of the designs would take ages to produce from scratch - some are way beyond my meager abilities :(
Check it out, some of the designs would take ages to produce from scratch - some are way beyond my meager abilities :(
Archeonology
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After having dug to a depth of 1000 meters last year, Scottish scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 1000 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 1000 years ago.
Not to be outdone by the Scots, in the weeks that followed, English scientists dug to a depth of 2000 meters and shortly after headlines in the UK newspapers read; English archaeologists have found traces of 2000year old fibre-optic cable and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech digital communications network a thousand years earlier than the Scots.
One week later, Irish newspapers reported the following: After digging as deep as 5000 meters in a County Mayo bog, Irish scientists have found absolutely nothing. They, therefore, have concluded that 5000 years ago, Ireland's inhabitants were already using wireless technology.
Not to be outdone by the Scots, in the weeks that followed, English scientists dug to a depth of 2000 meters and shortly after headlines in the UK newspapers read; English archaeologists have found traces of 2000year old fibre-optic cable and have concluded that their ancestors already had an advanced high-tech digital communications network a thousand years earlier than the Scots.
One week later, Irish newspapers reported the following: After digging as deep as 5000 meters in a County Mayo bog, Irish scientists have found absolutely nothing. They, therefore, have concluded that 5000 years ago, Ireland's inhabitants were already using wireless technology.
IT Hell
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Friday, September 07, 2007
Web 2.0
Circle I Limbo
OSI Seven Layer Model
Circle II Whirling in a Dark & Stormy Wind
cgi-bin
Circle III Mud, Rain, Cold, Hail & Snow
C++
Circle IV Rolling Weights
Internet Explorer
Circle V Stuck in Mud, Mangled
River Styx
IT Management
Circle VI Buried for Eternity
River Phlegyas
Bill Gates
Circle VII Burning Sands
Apple's Grooviness
Circle IIX Immersed in Excrement
IT Consultants
Circle IX Frozen in Ice
A Programmer's Best Friend
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Thursday, September 06, 2007
Ah, the plain old text editors - they can't be beaten. vi, Notepad (so simple it's bordering on stoopid), emacs and the rest. Quick, simple and essential.
Here's my pick for the best of the bunch:
1. jEdit
Pretty useful as a plain text editor in the basic download form, but with the enormous suite of available plugins you can turn it into an advanced text editing tool, a full-blown IDE (for Java, PHP, perl, Python, Jython, C, C++, Ruby and more), a database control center or even... you won't guess this one... an accountancy program.
There are some great commercial tools out there (such as UltraEdit32), but this is more than a match for any of them. It's find and replace functionality is the best I've seen, and that is perhaps the most important thing for the manipulation of huge amounts of text, such as the 80000 line xml files I've had to work with.
Free and open source. Cross platform, some functionality not available on Macs.
2. UltraEdit (UltraEdit32)
This is probably the only advanced text editor that can rival jEdit. For many people it's the ultimate choice and well worth paying for every year.
It has a mind boggling array of functions and pre-written macros for you to use and provides good code highlighting capabilities too.
Commercial, lifetime license available. Win32 only (still not ported for Linux - tut, tut).
3. Notepad2*
A tiny Scintilla based editor (but without the ugliness), I actually prefer this to UltraEdit32, but it doesn't begin to compare as far as funtionality is concerned. It's just quick and simple, and that's what I love about it.
It's just a basic editor with some great functions, like move line up/down, change line endings (to Win, Unix, Mac) and code highlighting. It will replace Notepad for you and provide you with quite a powerful editor to boot.
Free. Win32 only.
4. ConTEXT
This is well established by now. ConTEXT will allow you to do pretty much anything, but where it falls down on is startup speed. Fully featured, but a little slow and unintuitive, ConTEXT isn't exactly my first choice, but it does provide a direct challenge to UE32, in that it follows the same lines.
Free. Win32 only.
5. PSPad
I don't know what it is about all that great free software coming out of the Czech Republic, but this is seriously good. UltraEdit32 users will see a lot of familiar funtions here. Like all the previously mentioned tools, there is a file comparison feature that works very well. However, there are some quirky additions such as a Google Search on the current highlighted term, with advanced search available, and the choice to provide a line move feature with a difference ("swap lines" instead of move up/down).
I've put it in fifth place only because it's got a freeware look and feel as opposed to that open source feel, if you know what I mean.
Free. Win32 only.
Clever stuff all round - if you haven't tried at least one of these, it's time you did. Once you use them you'll wonder how you ever lived without them, especially if you have a lot of textual data to work with.
*Notepad++ runs this one pretty close - it really comes down to my personal preferece
Here's my pick for the best of the bunch:
1. jEdit
Pretty useful as a plain text editor in the basic download form, but with the enormous suite of available plugins you can turn it into an advanced text editing tool, a full-blown IDE (for Java, PHP, perl, Python, Jython, C, C++, Ruby and more), a database control center or even... you won't guess this one... an accountancy program.
There are some great commercial tools out there (such as UltraEdit32), but this is more than a match for any of them. It's find and replace functionality is the best I've seen, and that is perhaps the most important thing for the manipulation of huge amounts of text, such as the 80000 line xml files I've had to work with.
Free and open source. Cross platform, some functionality not available on Macs.
2. UltraEdit (UltraEdit32)
This is probably the only advanced text editor that can rival jEdit. For many people it's the ultimate choice and well worth paying for every year.
It has a mind boggling array of functions and pre-written macros for you to use and provides good code highlighting capabilities too.
Commercial, lifetime license available. Win32 only (still not ported for Linux - tut, tut).
3. Notepad2*
A tiny Scintilla based editor (but without the ugliness), I actually prefer this to UltraEdit32, but it doesn't begin to compare as far as funtionality is concerned. It's just quick and simple, and that's what I love about it.
It's just a basic editor with some great functions, like move line up/down, change line endings (to Win, Unix, Mac) and code highlighting. It will replace Notepad for you and provide you with quite a powerful editor to boot.
Free. Win32 only.
4. ConTEXT
This is well established by now. ConTEXT will allow you to do pretty much anything, but where it falls down on is startup speed. Fully featured, but a little slow and unintuitive, ConTEXT isn't exactly my first choice, but it does provide a direct challenge to UE32, in that it follows the same lines.
Free. Win32 only.
5. PSPad
I don't know what it is about all that great free software coming out of the Czech Republic, but this is seriously good. UltraEdit32 users will see a lot of familiar funtions here. Like all the previously mentioned tools, there is a file comparison feature that works very well. However, there are some quirky additions such as a Google Search on the current highlighted term, with advanced search available, and the choice to provide a line move feature with a difference ("swap lines" instead of move up/down).
I've put it in fifth place only because it's got a freeware look and feel as opposed to that open source feel, if you know what I mean.
Free. Win32 only.
Clever stuff all round - if you haven't tried at least one of these, it's time you did. Once you use them you'll wonder how you ever lived without them, especially if you have a lot of textual data to work with.
*Notepad++ runs this one pretty close - it really comes down to my personal preferece
Acer buys Gateway!!!
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Tuesday, August 28, 2007
That'll make them #3 PC manufacturer
It explains why Gateway were putting out all those loss-leading laptops over the last 18 months - they were making themselves an attractive prospect for acquisition.
It explains why Gateway were putting out all those loss-leading laptops over the last 18 months - they were making themselves an attractive prospect for acquisition.
Firefox or IE? Strange answer to security question
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Here's the jist - "not-for-profit", "independent" Honeynet Project undertakes study of browser security, using 30000 known exploit servers and find that Firefox shows up more remote code execution vulnerabilities than IE and Opera put together.
Thing vs. thing demonstrating that Firefox does more of something than IE and Opera put together (like ruling and not sucking, for example):
Yet, despite these amazing findings, I still use Firefox. Why? Well, because it's more useful, a pleasure to use and, in my experience, more reliable and secure. Oh, and it doesn't suck ass.
Opera is one hell of a good browser, but it won't be my first choice for some time. It may be high on security in this test, but that's probably because nothing is quite sure how to attack it - or its user base is so small it's not worth figuring out its vulnerabilities. Besides, there are a few sites and gadgets that don't work well (or at all) in it - though that probably says more about the way they are coded than it does about Opera compatibility. No SeaMonkey or Safari in this study.
Not convinced? Join the debate.
Preaching to the converted, am I? Join the debate anyway. Just for japes.
Thing vs. thing demonstrating that Firefox does more of something than IE and Opera put together (like ruling and not sucking, for example):
Yet, despite these amazing findings, I still use Firefox. Why? Well, because it's more useful, a pleasure to use and, in my experience, more reliable and secure. Oh, and it doesn't suck ass.
Opera is one hell of a good browser, but it won't be my first choice for some time. It may be high on security in this test, but that's probably because nothing is quite sure how to attack it - or its user base is so small it's not worth figuring out its vulnerabilities. Besides, there are a few sites and gadgets that don't work well (or at all) in it - though that probably says more about the way they are coded than it does about Opera compatibility. No SeaMonkey or Safari in this study.
Not convinced? Join the debate.
Preaching to the converted, am I? Join the debate anyway. Just for japes.
Two great freeware tools
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Sunday, August 19, 2007
The first, Texted, is a web developers friend - a unicode text editor with code folding, code completion (HTML, CSS and classes), advanced column editing and an FTP mode for uploading. "Why should I bother with this when I have Studio 8?", I hear you say - well, it's fast and it's simple, and sometimes that's all you need.
Teracopy is the real find. It's a copy and paste file transfer replacement for Windows Explorer that uses asynchronous copying to speed up file transfer. The handiest feature is probably it's error recovery: while Explorer just stops mid-operation when one file in a folder can't be transferred, Teracopy just carries on copying everything it can and lets you know which file couldn't be transferred afterwards. You can then choose to retry the transfer of that single file after you've figured out why it was "in use". With shell integration, you can bypass Explorer for copy functions for good.
There are lots of great shareware and premium tools out there that will do this better, but this is a very good freeware tool.
Teracopy is the real find. It's a copy and paste file transfer replacement for Windows Explorer that uses asynchronous copying to speed up file transfer. The handiest feature is probably it's error recovery: while Explorer just stops mid-operation when one file in a folder can't be transferred, Teracopy just carries on copying everything it can and lets you know which file couldn't be transferred afterwards. You can then choose to retry the transfer of that single file after you've figured out why it was "in use". With shell integration, you can bypass Explorer for copy functions for good.
There are lots of great shareware and premium tools out there that will do this better, but this is a very good freeware tool.
Building an Object Model in PHP
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Thursday, August 16, 2007
Follow the link to read through a very succinct tutorial on how to build a combo-box populated by values retrieved from a MySQL database (Note: the example can easily be adapted for PostGre and not-so-easily for DB2 - but why would you want to use DB2?)
Network Magic (might be worth a try)
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Friday, August 10, 2007
Just found a promising looking program called network magic. Read about it here.
I'll report back when I've given it a test run.
I'll report back when I've given it a test run.
Rant of the Week
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Wednesday, July 25, 2007
This week's "Rant of the Week" comes from Azag Thoth's comment on http://www.tweakxp.com/article37043.aspx. At the very least, it should surely win some sort of longest-ever-sentence-in-a-blog-comment award.
Well done Azag, your prize is in the post.
"Posted 1/9/2006 2:31:57 PM by Azag Thoth
Symantec Norton AV is cr@p so you get what you pay for. I've seen it progress over the years and it has many uninstall and software compatiblity problems (ie. it doesn't work well with others especially other companies that sell AV or security apps...this is quite intentionally by design.) Also it is a resource hog from heck as with other programs Symantec makes. An exception to the rule is Norton Ghost which is a powerful useful and fully funtional program (but Acronis is probably even better from what i've read from real people using it) of higher standards than there others which tend to suffer code bloat but reach the masses of average joe's everywhere do to rather user friendly straight forward interface/GUI which had idiots with no knowledge of the workings of a PC. The same holds true for AOL ... I mean AOH3LL the browser is a useless hunk of cr@p with broken functionality which is a mere shell over the top of IE but yet totally unstable and broken (try opening a PDF file in it for example...though it suffers your whole security ,OS and resources even more LOL.) Again my point being is is similar in popularity but why simply because it is targeted towards idiots and spoon fed to people like cr@ck through easy friendly happy go lucky interface with big fat cutsie icons and of course the other thing they have in common is the they spend more money in PR/ads/marketing than the others in their industries and spend less on research and development. But hey these same comnpanies could be selling you a nice REAL looking Rolex watch for 20 bucks! ;-) "There is a s*cker born every minute." - (falsely attributed to) P.T. Barnum"
Well done Azag, your prize is in the post.
Good stuff here...
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Saturday, June 23, 2007
If, like me, you've used Pegtop's PStart to provide you with a portable shortcut engine for your favourite portable apps, you might find something else you like on their website.
Recently, I rediscovered PStart's power as a replacement for the clutter of the Windows Start Menu. No matter what you do, you never seem to be able to keep it all that tidy for long. Either you have a huge flat menu that sprawls all over the desktop, or you painstakingly set up a multi-tier hierarchy of menus, sub-menus and sub-sub-menus that becomes a nightmare to navigate.
Now, you can forget about all that.
PStart's Items tab allows you to add your very favourite shortcuts - nothing remarkable there, you've already got your Quick Start - but the Search tab allows you to search for an application shortcut that is either contained within PStart, or in the Windows Start Menu. And it does it very quickly, right before your eyes, even as you type.
Have a look on Pegtop's site for a collection of simple little applications that just work, can be installed on a USB key or your PC, and are full of little surprises. They have some great screensavers too.
Recently, I rediscovered PStart's power as a replacement for the clutter of the Windows Start Menu. No matter what you do, you never seem to be able to keep it all that tidy for long. Either you have a huge flat menu that sprawls all over the desktop, or you painstakingly set up a multi-tier hierarchy of menus, sub-menus and sub-sub-menus that becomes a nightmare to navigate.
Now, you can forget about all that.
PStart's Items tab allows you to add your very favourite shortcuts - nothing remarkable there, you've already got your Quick Start - but the Search tab allows you to search for an application shortcut that is either contained within PStart, or in the Windows Start Menu. And it does it very quickly, right before your eyes, even as you type.
Have a look on Pegtop's site for a collection of simple little applications that just work, can be installed on a USB key or your PC, and are full of little surprises. They have some great screensavers too.
100 Web apps
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Friday, June 22, 2007
Great site for info and links on web based applications. I will add more as I come across them.
Computer Quotations
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Monday, June 18, 2007
The computing field is always in need of new cliches.
-Alan Perlis
Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done.
-Andy Rooney (1919 - )
The great thing about a computer notebook is that no matter how much you stuff into it, it doesn't get bigger or heavier.
-Bill Gates (1955 - ), Business @ The Speed of Thought
If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into a committee -- that will do them in.
-Bradley's Bromide
Why is it drug addicts and computer afficionados are both called users?
-Clifford Stoll
Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions, including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog.
-Doug Larson
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.
-E. W. Dijkstra
Not even computers will replace committees, because committees buy computers.
-Edward Shepherd Mead
To err is human, but to really foul things up requires a computer.
-Farmers' Almanac, 1978
I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.
-Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992)
Part of the inhumanity of the computer is that, once it is competently programmed and working smoothly, it is completely honest.
-Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992)
Computers can figure out all kinds of problems, except the things in the world that just don't add up.
-James Magary
Imagine if every Thursday your shoes exploded if you tied them the usual way. This happens to us all the time with computers, and nobody thinks of complaining.
-Jef Raskin, interviewed in Doctor Dobb's Journal
The most overlooked advantage to owning a computer is that if they foul up there's no law against wacking them around a little.
-Joe Martin, Porterfield
One would think that if you're anonymous, you'd do anything you want, but groups have their own sense of community and what we can do.
-John Allen, A network called 'Internet', CBC, 10-08-93
In all large corporations, there is a pervasive fear that someone, somewhere is having fun with a computer on company time. Networks help alleviate that fear.
-John C. Dvorak
There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.
-Ken Olsen (1926 - ), President, Digital Equipment, 1977
The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents.
-Nathaniel Borenstein (1957 - )
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973)
The computer is a moron.
-Peter Drucker (1909 - 2005)
If you put tomfoolery into a computer, nothing comes out of it but tomfoolery. But this tomfoolery, having passed through a very expensive machine, is somehow ennobled and no-one dares criticize it.
-Pierre Gallois
Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning.
-Rick Cook, The Wizardry Compiled
To err is human--and to blame it on a computer is even more so.
-Robert Orben
If the automobile had followed the same development cycle as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per gallon, and explode once a year, killing everyone inside.
-Robert X. Cringely, InfoWorld magazine
I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image.
-Stephen Hawking (1942 - )
All programmers are playwrights and all computers are lousy actors.
-Unknown
In a few minutes a computer can make a mistake so great that it would have taken many men many months to equal it.
-Unknown
Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 18,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vaccuum tubes and perhaps weigh 1.5 tons.
-unknown, Popular Mechanics, March 1949
-Alan Perlis
Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done.
-Andy Rooney (1919 - )
The great thing about a computer notebook is that no matter how much you stuff into it, it doesn't get bigger or heavier.
-Bill Gates (1955 - ), Business @ The Speed of Thought
If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into a committee -- that will do them in.
-Bradley's Bromide
Why is it drug addicts and computer afficionados are both called users?
-Clifford Stoll
Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions, including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog.
-Doug Larson
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.
-E. W. Dijkstra
Not even computers will replace committees, because committees buy computers.
-Edward Shepherd Mead
To err is human, but to really foul things up requires a computer.
-Farmers' Almanac, 1978
I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.
-Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992)
Part of the inhumanity of the computer is that, once it is competently programmed and working smoothly, it is completely honest.
-Isaac Asimov (1920 - 1992)
Computers can figure out all kinds of problems, except the things in the world that just don't add up.
-James Magary
Imagine if every Thursday your shoes exploded if you tied them the usual way. This happens to us all the time with computers, and nobody thinks of complaining.
-Jef Raskin, interviewed in Doctor Dobb's Journal
The most overlooked advantage to owning a computer is that if they foul up there's no law against wacking them around a little.
-Joe Martin, Porterfield
One would think that if you're anonymous, you'd do anything you want, but groups have their own sense of community and what we can do.
-John Allen, A network called 'Internet', CBC, 10-08-93
In all large corporations, there is a pervasive fear that someone, somewhere is having fun with a computer on company time. Networks help alleviate that fear.
-John C. Dvorak
There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.
-Ken Olsen (1926 - ), President, Digital Equipment, 1977
The most likely way for the world to be destroyed, most experts agree, is by accident. That's where we come in; we're computer professionals. We cause accidents.
-Nathaniel Borenstein (1957 - )
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-Pablo Picasso (1881 - 1973)
The computer is a moron.
-Peter Drucker (1909 - 2005)
If you put tomfoolery into a computer, nothing comes out of it but tomfoolery. But this tomfoolery, having passed through a very expensive machine, is somehow ennobled and no-one dares criticize it.
-Pierre Gallois
Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning.
-Rick Cook, The Wizardry Compiled
To err is human--and to blame it on a computer is even more so.
-Robert Orben
If the automobile had followed the same development cycle as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per gallon, and explode once a year, killing everyone inside.
-Robert X. Cringely, InfoWorld magazine
I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We've created life in our own image.
-Stephen Hawking (1942 - )
All programmers are playwrights and all computers are lousy actors.
-Unknown
In a few minutes a computer can make a mistake so great that it would have taken many men many months to equal it.
-Unknown
Where a calculator on the ENIAC is equipped with 18,000 vacuum tubes and weighs 30 tons, computers in the future may have only 1,000 vaccuum tubes and perhaps weigh 1.5 tons.
-unknown, Popular Mechanics, March 1949
Nobody in the game of football...
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Nobody in the game of football should be called a genius. A genius is somebody like Norman Einstein.
- Joe Theismann
- Joe Theismann
Five crucial things the Linux community doesn’t understand about the average computer user
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Wednesday, May 30, 2007
5 reasons why Linux still isn't exactly taking the world by storm? Only 5? I can think of way more than that - and the reasons stated are obvious. There is a great diagram on page 2 though, showing a timeline of Linux distros, clearly graphing the branching out from Debian, Slackware and Red Hat. Note that (open)Suse has stayed on the same track for some consderable time now. That really shows from the minute you boot openSuse up - joined up thinking and the most complete home computer OS of the lot, save OSX, which is just leagues ahead of everything.
openSuse 10.2 is superb: it has the best desktop, the "slab" which is a sort of quick access panel giving you a place to put everything you want to be able to find in an instant, and of course, YaST2 - simply the best "control panel" ever. Of course, the package manager is not great - it's no apt-get - but I've found it OK. Apparently, openSuse is the first Linux distro to support hibernation on almost all major brand laptops, out of the box. That said, some users have reported trouble with getting drivers. So the minus points are package management and drivers... mmm... so what's new there? For all the great things you can say about it, Ubuntu gives trouble when it fails to detect what version it is! That would be like a WinXP machine downloading Win2k updates and Win2k apps! And don't think I'm making it up either, because our local server runs on a schizo Ubuntu with an identity crisis - causing all sorts of pain. And they say Ubuntu is the beginners' choice!
To be honest, despite my own preference for openSuse, Fedora seems the most solid and simple distro yet. It's refined in ways that couldn't be possible for openSuse (which is new in comparison, while Fedora is on v6) and solid in ways that Ubuntu won't be for some time. If my life literally depended on it, I'd choose Debian - it's package manager is great and it's like a Toyota - but if I was choosing for my department I'd go Fedora as a client because it's the quiet guy that just gets the job done, and full-blown Suse as a server because it can take the most abuse and has configuration and control tools that take the pain out of sysadmining.
Whatever... Go openSuse! and Slax! Looking at the timeline, you can see that Slax and openSuse branched off from Slackware - SuSe back in '94 and Slax in 2003. So perhaps I should really go Slackware, but I'm not sure I have so much time on my hands. Anyway, if I was a real purist I'd go Gentoo - you virtually have to build the fracking thing yourself from scratch, for frack's sake!
Anyway, it's all academic really - I'm blogging away here from my WinXP laptop that I only bought because I couldn't afford a Mac ;-)
openSuse 10.2 is superb: it has the best desktop, the "slab" which is a sort of quick access panel giving you a place to put everything you want to be able to find in an instant, and of course, YaST2 - simply the best "control panel" ever. Of course, the package manager is not great - it's no apt-get - but I've found it OK. Apparently, openSuse is the first Linux distro to support hibernation on almost all major brand laptops, out of the box. That said, some users have reported trouble with getting drivers. So the minus points are package management and drivers... mmm... so what's new there? For all the great things you can say about it, Ubuntu gives trouble when it fails to detect what version it is! That would be like a WinXP machine downloading Win2k updates and Win2k apps! And don't think I'm making it up either, because our local server runs on a schizo Ubuntu with an identity crisis - causing all sorts of pain. And they say Ubuntu is the beginners' choice!
To be honest, despite my own preference for openSuse, Fedora seems the most solid and simple distro yet. It's refined in ways that couldn't be possible for openSuse (which is new in comparison, while Fedora is on v6) and solid in ways that Ubuntu won't be for some time. If my life literally depended on it, I'd choose Debian - it's package manager is great and it's like a Toyota - but if I was choosing for my department I'd go Fedora as a client because it's the quiet guy that just gets the job done, and full-blown Suse as a server because it can take the most abuse and has configuration and control tools that take the pain out of sysadmining.
Whatever... Go openSuse! and Slax! Looking at the timeline, you can see that Slax and openSuse branched off from Slackware - SuSe back in '94 and Slax in 2003. So perhaps I should really go Slackware, but I'm not sure I have so much time on my hands. Anyway, if I was a real purist I'd go Gentoo - you virtually have to build the fracking thing yourself from scratch, for frack's sake!
Anyway, it's all academic really - I'm blogging away here from my WinXP laptop that I only bought because I couldn't afford a Mac ;-)
Liverpool 1 - 2 AC Milan
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Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Another foot(ball)note
Despite the disappointment, I'm always glad to see Milan pick up that trophy - they're probably my favourite team (after Liverpool, of course). What they did from the late '80s to the mid '90s was almost perfect and they are the one truly great club side I can think of since Liverpool fell away. This team is nothing compared to those great line-ups, but they still have some top players:
Kaka, Maldini (despite being the old man of calcio), Nesta, Pirlo, Gattuso and Seedorf - all very worthy winners.
Now then, with the homage to AC out of the way, we can proceed to the diatribe:
Wtf was Benitez doing puttng that team out?
How they lined up:
Kuyt
Zenden Gerrard Pennant
Mascherano Alonso
Riise Carragher Agger Finnan
Reina
Zenden was unfit, and played like the useless cripple he is.
Kewell was a non-entity, despite (and because of) some nice, (meaningless) touches
Riise is not the best left back - Arbeloa is at least as good (even though he's a right back)
Kuyt cannot lead the line by himself, and Crouch is the best (fit) goalscorer the club have and should be used at every opportunity.
Pennant needs to work on his crossing, badly.
How I think they should have lined up:
Bellamy Crouch
Riise Mascherano Alonso Gerrard
Arbeloa Carragher Agger Finnan
Reina
Arbeloa should have played LB to allow Riise to play further up the field.
Gerrard should have started on the right, free to roam, leaving Pennant a substitute option.
Then came the subs :(
1. Kewell on for Zenden. What was the point in that? Kewell had an impact against Charlton - that's about his level.
2. Crouch on for... Mascherano?! He had Kaka in his pocket and Liverpool were trailing by 1 goal. Why free Kaka up to let him show his class? Inzaghi was making those runs for the whole game, but no-one could get free in the midfield to put him through until Mascherano was taken off.
It reminded me of Man U - Milan when Gattuso was taken off with 30 mins left leaving Scholes free to take over and capitalize on the space.
Crouch should have come on for Kewell ;-)
3. Arbeloa on for Finnan. Like for like. An experienced, classy right-back replaced by an inexperienced, classy (maybe) right-back. Goodnight.
Performance:
Played well 1st half
Contained Milan well, Mascherano took care of Kaka and even Pennant pressed hard and did well but failed to deliver good crosses. The deflected free was a sucker punch and wasn't deserved.
The second half was much worse. Zenden had nothing, and Kewell had nothing either. Pennant continued to fluff his crosses and Gerrard could not make any impact from that strange position he was asked to play. Kenny Dalglish or Bergkamp he ain't. Alonso had no-one to aim for and started to make wrong choices. Kuyt drifted out to the left and right wing, leaving NO-ONE in the box (why do forwards do that?).
Kewell had no impact and Mascherano going off left a big hole, which Kaka took great advantage of, to absolutely no-one's surprise. Crouch made a difference, but he didn't perform any miracles. By bringing Arbeloa on for Finnan, Benitez was sending a clear message to Bellamy just how little he thinks of him - which is a shame, because Bellamy could have changed things.
By the time Kuyt scored, it was too little, too late and really a result of Milan getting complacent and switching off.
Summer signings for Liverpool:
Left winger (Zenden and Kewell are crocks)
Right winger (Pennant doesn't cross well enough)
Scoring centre forward (a fit Robbie Fowler - Kuyt still doesn't look a natural finisher)
Left back (Riise is not the best LB, and neither is Aurelio)
Extra Centre back (just for cover)
Playmaker / Attacking midfielder (it takes real class to open up defences)
LM: Simao? But I'm not sure if he's up to it.
RM: Simao can play there too, but maybe Joaquin - although he seems a bit of a nutter.
CF: Tevez? Berbatov? If you don't have classy wingers you need someone who can make something out of nothing, but if you have the wingers you just need a poacher - which Berbatov isn't. Question is: who is, these days?
LB: Someone who can defend well and bring the ball forward, overlap and put crosses in. Grosso springs to mind - he's the best I can think of.
CB: Not urgent - just a luxury - but someone young, yet experienced, like Mexes. I know he didn't look to good against Man U, but I still think he's a decent player.
Playmaker: Kaka obviously! But I'm sure he's out of reach. Good playmakers are elusive, but all the best teams have them - Liverpool certainly did when they were great.
Thing is, Benitez should have money to spend, but:
A) Will he know how to spend it? and
B) Can Liverpool attract the really top-drawer players?
XoftSpySE
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Monday, May 21, 2007
Being an avid fan of Xoftspy for some time now I was a bit miffed to see that ParetoLogic had decided to sunset plain old vanilla Xoftspy. Naturally, they prompted me to download their fancy pants new second edition - bah! I hear you say...
Not so. If you have a current valid license and want to switch to XoftSpySE, all you have to do is follow the links and download the new app, filling in your name and email in the process, and the nice guys at ParetoLogic will send you a license key!
Apart from a new look, the app remains much the same, except that it scans much more quickly.
I have no idea if it is any better or worse, because I had no spyware before I scanned (according to the old Xoftspy, Spybot S&D and Spysweeper) and no spyware detections as a result of the scan.
But, as I said, it's quicker - and that can only be a good thing.
Not so. If you have a current valid license and want to switch to XoftSpySE, all you have to do is follow the links and download the new app, filling in your name and email in the process, and the nice guys at ParetoLogic will send you a license key!
Apart from a new look, the app remains much the same, except that it scans much more quickly.
I have no idea if it is any better or worse, because I had no spyware before I scanned (according to the old Xoftspy, Spybot S&D and Spysweeper) and no spyware detections as a result of the scan.
But, as I said, it's quicker - and that can only be a good thing.
Do you like to make animations?
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Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Then check out Project Dogwaffle - it's a big barrel of fun. A veritable box of delights and an effing good laugh.
I give it 11/10 (or 4.2 thumbs up)
I give it 11/10 (or 4.2 thumbs up)
Is 25GB enough
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Thursday, May 03, 2007
Need 25GB of online space for whatever. Can be yours for free.
One for the Bradford fans
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Monday, April 30, 2007
"I understand that the police are looking into the pitch invasions at
Elland Road. So far, they've searched the Championship but have been
unable to find any Leeds" - Rob Freeman.
Elland Road. So far, they've searched the Championship but have been
unable to find any Leeds" - Rob Freeman.
Audio File Manipulation
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Sunday, April 29, 2007
Free Audio Pack (developed by Koyote Soft) comes with three separate tools:
Download the bundle from ZDNet, or download them separately directly from Koyote Soft.
Another indispensable tool (that you have to pay for) is WavePad which you can download from NCH Swift Sound
In my opinion, while Koyote Soft have done a superb job in offering such useful software for free, WavePad is the far superior program overall - but I think both are definitely worth having.
- A CD Ripper (to mp3, ogg, and wma at fixed and variable bitrates)
- An audio file format converter (wma, mp3, ogg, wav, m4a to various file formats)
- A direct audio waveform editor (trial only)
Download the bundle from ZDNet, or download them separately directly from Koyote Soft.
Another indispensable tool (that you have to pay for) is WavePad which you can download from NCH Swift Sound
In my opinion, while Koyote Soft have done a superb job in offering such useful software for free, WavePad is the far superior program overall - but I think both are definitely worth having.
Wonder goals
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Wednesday, April 25, 2007
A Comparison between Messi's and Maradona's wonder goals:
Here's how you do it with players hanging off your shirt:
Here's how you do it with players hanging off your shirt:
Alernative Open source software that doesn't cost
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Thursday, April 12, 2007
Have a look here at Open source software that is available instead of the mega buck stuff
Speed Up My PC 3.0
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Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Here's a utility from Uniblue (liutilities) that seems pretty useful.
It allows you to free up RAM, optimise the way applications use clock cycles and clean up backup files you don't need...
It all seems great in principle, my work PC is seriously short on memory, and any utility that could return some memory to the pool after apps are done with it would be welcome.
This is what the Memory Optimization feature looks like - notice the "Free Up RAM" and "Deep RAM Recovery" buttons.
The problem is, however, that these optimizers don't tend to work well on systems running near their limits - and Speed Up My PC 3.0 on my work PC was no exception. After freeing up RAM a few times, the system got unstable, and the utility doesn't do anything about PF usage either, which seems a glaring omission.
It did seem to perform its other functions well enough, but it was the memory management I was most interested in and, ultimately, most disappointed by.
Don't be put off by my less than glowing review - try it yourself.
It allows you to free up RAM, optimise the way applications use clock cycles and clean up backup files you don't need...
It all seems great in principle, my work PC is seriously short on memory, and any utility that could return some memory to the pool after apps are done with it would be welcome.
This is what the Memory Optimization feature looks like - notice the "Free Up RAM" and "Deep RAM Recovery" buttons.
The problem is, however, that these optimizers don't tend to work well on systems running near their limits - and Speed Up My PC 3.0 on my work PC was no exception. After freeing up RAM a few times, the system got unstable, and the utility doesn't do anything about PF usage either, which seems a glaring omission.
It did seem to perform its other functions well enough, but it was the memory management I was most interested in and, ultimately, most disappointed by.
Don't be put off by my less than glowing review - try it yourself.
ScribeFire
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Sunday, April 08, 2007
If you're starting to think you'd be better named Sir Blogalot, try ScribeFire*.
It's a very useful Firefox add-on that allows you to manage multiple blog accounts through one handy, feature-rich UI.
*You may have seen it in it's previous incarnation as "Performancing", but it has improved quite a bit
It's a very useful Firefox add-on that allows you to manage multiple blog accounts through one handy, feature-rich UI.
*You may have seen it in it's previous incarnation as "Performancing", but it has improved quite a bit
Java Tips
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Friday, April 06, 2007
This is a good resource for Java programmers - especially beginners and intermediate level coders.
Check it out
Check it out
Greenpeace rated each company on its policies on recycling and use of toxic chemicals
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Thursday, April 05, 2007
Pull my finger
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Wednesday, April 04, 2007
Turn your sound up, make sure plenty of people are in earshot and go there.
Computer Training, Education, & Tutorial Resources in Information Technology
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Tuesday, April 03, 2007
One of the Very Best Computer & IT Education and Training Gateways on the Web Today
Imagine Finding All the Free IT Training and Computer Tutorials You Ever Need and Want!
Imagine Finding All the Free IT Training and Computer Tutorials You Ever Need and Want!
I need a raise
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"Boss, I've got to have a raise," the salesman said to his sales manager.
"There are three other companies after me."
"Is that a fact?" the manager asked.
"What other companies are after you?"
"The electric company, the phone company, and the gas company."
"There are three other companies after me."
"Is that a fact?" the manager asked.
"What other companies are after you?"
"The electric company, the phone company, and the gas company."
CNN Reporter
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In Jerusalem, a female CNN journalist heard about a very old Jewish man who had been going to the Wailing Wall to pray, twice a day, everyday, for a long, long time. So she went to check it out. She went to the Wailing Wall and there he was! She watched him pray and after about 45 minutes, when he turned to leave, she approached him for an interview. "I'm Rebecca Smith from CNN. Sir, how long have you been coming to the Wall and praying?" "For about 60 years." "60 years! That's amazing! What do you pray for?" "I pray for peace between the Christians, Jews and the Muslims. I pray for all the hatred to stop and I pray for all our children to grow up in safety and friendship." "How do you feel after doing this for 60 years?" "Like I'm talking to a goddamn wall."
OS/2 is 20 years old today: dead but still walking
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IBM renowned for keeping their finger on the pulse. They somehow managed to let themselves sidetracked, hoodwinked call it what you will by Mr. Bill Gates and his snakeoil sales pitch.
PingPlotter
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Monday, April 02, 2007
More useful SW flagged by the guys at TechRepublic:
http://www.pingplotter.com/
Screenshot:
Download:
Two versions - Standard or Pro (neither is free)
http://www.pingplotter.com/download.html
http://www.pingplotter.com/
Screenshot:
Download:
Two versions - Standard or Pro (neither is free)
http://www.pingplotter.com/download.html
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