http://www.ComputerBob.com/journal_archive/2006/08.php .
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My honeymoon with Kubuntu Linux continues unabated. Every day, I learn more about it and find even more reasons to love it. I can still hardly believe that it was totally free, yet good enough that it completely replaced Windows on my main PC one week after I installed it. And I'm not the only one who feels that way. Several days ago, the editors of a popular Macintosh web site caused an uproar when they turned their backs on that operating system and switched to Ubuntu Linux (Kubuntu's older brother). If you're wondering why, one of them wrote a blog entry titled Why I ditched my Mac for Linux.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
Here's a tip that I read about several years ago, but was unable to find when I wanted to use it several months ago. Now I don't need it any more, but you may find it useful, either now or in the future. It's a simple how-to to let you Change Registered Windows Info.
This month will mark the 25th anniversary of the original IBM PC. I remember using a dual-floppy version of one of those at one of my first consulting jobs. A couple of years later, I upgraded many of the dual-floppy 5150s at a University to use a 5MB hard drive, which required me to first upgrade their power supplies to ones that put out enough power to run a hard drive. PCs sure have come a long, long way since then. By the grace of God, so have I.
Video effects just keep getting better and better. In this short video, a meteor crashes really close to some guys in a desert.
In a spoof of the movie, Mr. and Mrs. Smith, this
funny Toyota RAV4 commercial shows a happy couple vying for the right to drive the family SUV.
Did you notice the two new icons in my page header? I put them there to tell this site's visitors that Kubuntu Linux has completely replaced Windows on my main PC. If you point your mouse at those icons, you'll see tooltips that say so. Clicking the Windows flag will take you to Microsoft.com. If you click Tux, the Linux mascot, you'll go to my July 25, 2006, Journal entry, in which I wrote that I had just installed Kubuntu and it looked like a winner.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
It's always a good idea to consider the source of any information that you read, to help you decide whether or not to believe it. For example, Don't Worry, Be Happy - 20 PC Myths is a pretty interesting article. It tries to allay computer users' fears about 20 issues that often cause them concern. Some of those fears are unfounded, so it's good that this article refutes them. Unfortunately, it goes on to say that "there's no need to worry" about Windows' many security flaws. Why would it say that? Maybe it's because the article appears in Microsoft Windows XP: The Official Magazine. Does that mean that you should worry about Windows' many security flaws? Of course — you'd be crazy not to.
What's the latest word in protective body armor? Liquid.
Some people will do just about anything to get a beer.
Here's a very cute, very well done old
commercial that shows how much trouble a salmon company is willing to go through to get the freshest, most tender fish.
Linux is more stable than Windows. Linux is more configurable than Windows. Linux is arguably more secure than Windows. There are many, many versions of Linux from which to choose, and nearly all of them are totally free. Nearly all of the thousands of Linux software applications are free, too. Recent Linux versions even look and work like Windows. With Linux having all of that going for it, why don't more people switch from Windows to Linux? One person says that it's because Microsoft has instilled computer users with something that he calls the Micro-Prisoner Mentality. See if you agree.
IBM knows that the Linux market can be profitable. For the past seven years, IBM has been selling Lotus Notes software for Linux servers. Now, it has begun selling a Lotus Notes client for desktop Linux, because it foresees continuing growth in the corporate use of PCs running desktop Linux.
Are you starting to run out of storage space in your free 2.75GB Gmail account? Maybe you should sign up for a free 3GB Lycos Mail account.
Your cell phone makes me sick. No, wait, that's not right. Actually, there's a very good chance that your cell phone makes you sick.
Let's say that your digital camera is a good-quality 3.2 megapixel model that serves you well. Should you replace it with a new 5 or 6 megapixel model? Nope — you probably wouldn't notice much difference in picture quality unless you upgraded to one that has about 12 megapixels.
This very funny video from Late Night with David Letterman shows Microsoft's
tribute to its founder, Bill Gates.
For the past 8 years, Windows 98/98SE had been my favorite operating system, but today, It's official — I'm completely done using Windows 98 SE. My original plan was to gradually switch to using Kubuntu Linux, and then eventually archive Win98SE onto my external hard drive before deleting it from my boot drive. If you've been reading this Journal lately, then you know that my transition to using Kubuntu went quickly and easily, making it my new favorite operating system of all time. In fact, my switch to Kubuntu went so well that yesterday, when it came time to archive Win98SE, I couldn't think of one reason why I would ever ever go back to using it. So, instead of archving it and then deleting it, I just deleted it. Now my main PC is a dual-boot of Kubuntu Linux and Windows XP Home Edition — and I don't foresee my having to use XP at all, other than when I'm helping others who use it, or when I want to see how this site displays in the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser.
In the past couple of weeks, I've had a video card problem with Linux that I haven't been able to solve. I tried every published solution I could find (that I could understand how to do), but none of them worked, and I've read about many other people having the same problem. When I first installed Linux, my PC had an old 32MB Nvidia TNT2 3D video card. Linux recognized the card, but was unable to properly install its 3D capabilities. If I manually forced it to use the Nvidia legacy 3D driver, Linux would show me a black screen with "a DOS prompt" instead of the "Windows-looking" desktop. Each time that happened, I'd get the desktop to display again by manually replacing the 3D video configuration file with a backup of the 2D video configuration file that Linux had automatically created for me. That exact same problem continued yesterday, after I installed a new 256MB Nvidia Geforce 6200 along with its new Nvidia 3D drivers. I'm not a gamer, and I haven't installed any fancy 3D desktop interface yet, so I have little use for 3D graphics. In other words, the current lack of 3D support is not a deal breaker to me, but it may be to other users. Many other users who are having 3D video problems in Linux have reported that 3D worked for them until they installed a recent Linux kernel upgrade, so apparently the problem is in Linux itself, not in the Nvidia driver software. I suspect that the Linux development community will develop a solution for the problem in the near future — probably in the form of a bug-fix update to one or more Linux support files. In the meantime, I'll just keep using Kubuntu Linux in 2D mode.
UPDATE: I fixed it! For the technically minded among you — and as a reminder to myself, so I'll know what to do again each time I upgrade my Linux kernel — here's what I had done that didn't work:
Those were the correct things to install, but they didn't work by themselves. Here's what I did to finally make them work:
That's when I finally saw the famous Nvidia "splash screen," telling me that the 3D drivers were running. I confirmed it by going to K Menu/System Settings/Display/Hardware, where it showed "nvidia" instead of "nv" hardware. Even if I hadn't confirmed it that way, it would have been obvious that I was using newer, better-optimized video drivers because now everything displays much quicker, scrolling up and down in windows is instantaneous instead of slightly lagging, and there is no delay or lag when I hold down the Backspace key to delete several words at a time. Yay!
UPDATE: I found an even better way to test whether 3D is working:
A window will open, showing 3 rotating, intertwining gears. Wait a few seconds and the terminal window will display a line, telling you the FPS rate. Let the gears window run for several seconds, to see if the FPS rate goes up. If the FPS rate is 900 or above, you're running in 3D mode. My FPS rate is 1447. When you're done admiring the rotating gears, just close the terminal window and both the terminal window and gears windows will go away.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
In an effort to try to prevent the upcoming Windows Vista operating system from shipping with any huge, embarrassing security holes, Microsoft has enlisted the aid of hackers. I suppose that's just another example of the old advice: "Keep your friends close. Keep your enemies closer."
They only last a couple of minutes apiece, but for years, they appeared in-between kids' favorite Saturday morning cartoon shows, teaching them important lessons about grammar, the U.S. government, and more. See if you remember all of the Schoolhouse Rock episodes. Conjunction Junction — what's your function?
It was U.S. actor, comedian, and movie director, Mel Brooks, who said, "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die." Keep that in mind while you watch this clip of Ryan Stiles accidently hurting himself while trying to get a laugh on TV's Whose Line Is It Anyway? Incidentally, Ryan Stiles lives in Bellingham, Washington — a beautiful spot that's one of my favorite cities in the whole U.S.
Here's a funny video in which the TV show, Futurama shows what things would be like
if life were more like a video game.
If you've been reading this Journal lately, you know that, for the past several days, I've written a lot about using Kubuntu Linux on my computer instead of Windows. Some of what I've written has been pretty technical and heavy, so today, I'm not going to write anything technical. Instead, I'm just going to share some cool videos for you to enjoy.
By now, you may have heard about Microsoft's embarrassing demonstration of Windows Vista's voice recognition feature this past week. Now you can see exactly what went wrong.
I'm not a gamer, but even I get this funny Mac commercial parody in which a Mac gamer tells us why Macs are better than PCs.
Here's someone who knows even less about PCs than your grandmother: Homer Simpson.
What do you get when you put four moderately talented guys in a room with eight treadmills and some rock music? You get a pretty entertaining music video. It's a pretty clever idea, but I wish someone would redo it with better dancers, better choreography, and a better set. Oh, and it would be much more interesting if they also used a greenscreen technique to digitally remove the treadmills.
What do you get when you put a couple of hundred people wearing brown shirts on a public square? You get a Coca Cola commercial, of course.
Here's an odd-looking Finnish band, Leningrad Cowboys, performing with the Russian Red Army Choir, doing a pretty good cover of the classic Lynyrd Skynyrd song, Sweet Home Alabama. I don't think they understand what they're singing, for a few reasons:
In fact, the way the lead singer pronounces the lyrics, it wouldn't surprise me if he got them by listening to the original Skynrd record and writing down what he heard. Now that's funny.
This prank is always good for a few laughs. It's
the fake photo booth from The Tonight Show.
Every day, I'm more and more happy that I chose to switch from using Windows to using Kubuntu Linux. A few days ago, a Linux security site rated Ubuntu Linux (the underlying code within Kubuntu Linux) the fastest of all Linux distributions to publish updates after security issues are discovered.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
I've seen published arguments about it for years, but here's an article that simply and clearly explains a few basic reasons why Linux is more secure than Windows.
If your computer stops working and you need to reinstall Windows, will you know your official Windows Product Key that you'll need to type into the installation program in order to get Windows to install? If your computer came with a CD, it should be printed on the CD case. Unfortunately, most new computers don't come with a Windows CD any more, and you may not have kept track of the official Microsoft paper certificate that had your Windows Product Key on it. So what can you do? It turns out that your Windows Product Key is stored in the Windows Registry, but it's hidden and encoded. Luckily, "The Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder is a freeware utility that retrieves your Product Key (cd key) used to install windows from your registry. It has the options to copy the key to clipboard, save it to a text file, or print it for safekeeping. It works on Windows 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, XP, Server 2003, Windows Vista, Office 97, Office XP, and Office 2003."
Are you looking forward to upgrading to Windows Vista some day? If so, I wonder if you'll feel the same way after you read Windows Vista - The Part Everyone is Too Scared to Talk About. As it was with Windows XP, Microsoft's modus operandi continues to be to give you new features with one hand, while snatching away your rights and freedoms with the other hand.
When you buy a new piece of computer hardware or electronic equipment, should you pay extra for an extended warrantee? The one-word answer to that question is No! If you want to know the reasons why, read Should I Buy an Extended Warrantee?
If you're an aspiring supervillian, you'll want to watch this clever animation, to learn how Linux will give you the power you need
to crush those who oppose you. If you're not an aspiring supervillian, you'll want to watch it to see how Linux could give you the power you need to oppose all of the Linux-using supervillains.
Microsoft has announced that It will release 12 new security patches tomorrow. Here are some details about what the new patches will patch. Veteran Windows users often wait a few days before installing new patches, to let others discover any unpredicted problems that they might cause, and to give MS time to patch the patches, if necessary.
There's a pretty good chance that some of your existing software applications are not going to work in Windows Vista. Here's why.
In an effort to protect its search engine users from malware, Google has added a feature to its search results that warns users of sites that may be hosting malicious software.
Ever since I can remember, scientists have said that radioactive materials decay at specific rates that cannot be altered by environmental conditions — in fact, that is the assumption that is used in the "carbon-dating" of prehistoric materials. I've never believed the scientists. On the contrary, and based on absolutely no knowledge of the subject, I've always predicted that some day, scientists would discover a really simple method to cause radioactive waste to decay quickly — like dipping it in vinegar, or super-heating it. Now it looks like I may have been right. Apparently, it may be possible to accelerate the decay of radioactive waste by super-cooling it. If the new process is proven to work, it could someday eliminate the need to store nuclear waste in huge underground storage bunkers for thousands of years.
Here's a funny commerical spoof that demonstrates a few differences between a Windows Media Center PC and a Mac. You can stop it after the commercial ends, unless you want to watch the rest of the computer show that follows it.
A few days ago, I showed you a video of Windows Vista performing embarrassingly poorly in public demonstration of its voice recognition feature. Well, you might not know this, but Microsoft has had a history of failed public demonstrations of its products. Here's one in which Bill Gates and an employee demonstrate what Windows 98 does when it senses that you've plugged in a scanner.
When I was in seventh grade, I decided that I wanted to play a musical instrument, but I wasn't sure which one. I was impressed by the shiny brass instruments that several of the guys my age played in the school band, so, for a few days, I thought about learning to play the trumpet. I changed my mind when I realized that:
I ended up choosing to play the guitar. A few years later, there I was, singing and playing my guitar at parties, just as I had imagined. Then I graduated to coffeehouses. A few years after that, my wife and I were able to barely make a living for 5 years, singing at 427 places in 26 states. I never regretted that I had chosen the guitar over the trumpet, but here's
a guy who plays the trumpet so well that he probably gets invited to play it at a lot of parties.
Why don't people leave comments after each of my Journal entries? Right now, the main reason is because my Journal currently doesn't give anyone the opportunity to leave comments. All of that will change when I finally take the time to painstakingly convert the past 3 years of my Journal entries into WordPress posts, a process that I haven't even started yet. If you have a blog and you're wondering why people don't leave comments in it, you should read 10 Reasons Readers Don’t Leave Comments.
A few days ago, Microsoft issued a challenge to hackers, to see if they could find any security vulnerabilities in Windows Vista. Almost immediately, a hacker met that challenge.
I've known several people who went into hospitals to be treated for illnesses and caught dangerous infections while they were there. One man I knew went in for an appendectomy, but caught a staph infection in the hospital and died 2 days after his surgery. Unfortunately, the air in hospitals often contains dangerous viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens. Fortunately, it is now possible to sterilize hospital air. I wonder why no one has thought of a way to do it until now.
I saw 14 before I got tired of looking. How many do you see? It wouldn't surprise me if it turned out that there were 30 or more.
Here are some amazing scenes of plants moving. What's amazing is that these incredibly lifelike shots are not stop-action sequences — they are completely computer-generated animations.
This is scary stuff: Apparently there's a simple new lock-picking technique that renders almost every keyed lock in the world useless. In fact, nearly anyone can open nearly any keyed lock in the world
in just a few seconds, using just "a bump key" and a mallet. I considered not even publishing this story, because it describes and demonstrates how to do it, but then I realized that "the bad guys" already know about the bump key method, so "the good guys" should know about it, too. According to locksmiths, a cheap keyed lock provides the same protection against a bump key as an expensive lock — namely none. Is it time for the whole world to switch from keyed locks to electronic keycard locks?
Until last week, my main PC had 512MB of RAM. I wanted to upgrade its RAM a few years ago, but had held off because Windows 98 SE was known to not play well with more than 512MB. Now that my favorite operating system of choice is Kubuntu Linux, I'm finally enjoying the benefits of having 1GB of RAM. Thinking back to 1980, the first home computer that I used (a friend's Atari 400) came with only 8KB of RAM. Even though my current PC has 125,000 times as much memory as that first computer had, for some reason, I feel like I'm only about 122,000 times more productive than I was back then. How much RAM does your computer have? See how it compares to other people's RAM use.
Whatever happened to that guy who played the creepy Eddie Haskel on Leave It To Beaver? What about M.C. Hammer of U Can't Touch This fame, or the girl who played the annoying title character of the TV series, Blossom? Find the answers to those and many other questions at weht.net, "The Online Compendium of 'What Ever Happened To?' and 'Where Are They Now?'"
You've probably seen several of the Mac vs. PC commercials on TV, but you may not have known that "the Mac guy" from those commercials doesn't know anything about computers in real life. It turns out that he's just an actor. Who would've guessed?
Here's a funny Earthlink commercial that reminds us all of
the horrors of using a dial-up Internet connection.
It's not very often that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issues an announcement to computer users, but now they have. On Wednesday, the DHS issued a press release, recommending that people install a "critical" new Windows security patch as soon as possible. Users who fail to patch Windows will be vulnerable to having their computers completely taken over by remote attackers. I don't get it — to me, that sounds just like the hundreds of other previously patched Windows security problems.
Regular readers of this Journal are aware of the continuing controversy surrounding Microsoft's recent admission that Windows Genuine Advantage software had been spying on Windows users for more than a year without their knowledge or permission. Now, Microsoft is reportedly planning to add fuel to that fire by adding even more WGA restrictions to Windows Vista.
If you're willing to do some work, here are some ways you can speed up your slow PC.
Are you thinking of buying a new PC? If so, you should read Don't Buy That New PC Just Yet to find out why you should wait a few weeks.
Here's a funny-but-sad
billboard that's reportedly in Minneapolis. Call me cynical, but I suspect that it may be a "teaser ad" that's designed to get people's attention for awhile and then be replaced by a billboard that advertises a divorce attorney's services.
How much do you know about the upcoming Windows Vista? This long and comprehensive review of Windows Vista Beta 2 should tell you everything you need to know.
Speaking of Windows Vista, computer dealers have been afraid that they would lose out on Christmas computer sales due to people waiting until they can buy computers that come with Vista installed. To help them out, Microsoft reportedly plans to offer free Vista upgrade coupons to people who buy new computers, starting in October. Will that ploy increase sales of pre-Vista computers? I doubt it. The vast majority of computer buyers will probably choose to wait for computers that come with Vista preinstalled, rather than buying computers that come with Windows XP on them and need to be upgraded to Vista later.
As you know, this site's slogan is ComputerBob - Making Geek-Speak Chic™. That's a fancy way of saying that I try to explain complex concepts in ways that even beginners can understand. Trust me — it's a lot harder than it looks. For some tips on how to do it, read How To Write In Plain English.
What type of company would probably benefit the most from an extremely fuel-efficient delivery vehicle? A giant package delivery company like UPS, of course.
They're funny, unusual, and often kind of useless, but it seems like someone comes up with a new list of them every couple of months. They're the Top 5 Strangest Tech Toys.
There are few things as inspirational and moving as a loving father, selflessly devoted to his son.
If you're wondering, I'm still very happy using Kubuntu Linux to do all of my computer work every day. In fact, I haven't found any reason to use Windows XP at all in the past few weeks since I installed Kubuntu. If you recall, Kubuntu Linux uses the same underlying code as Ubuntu Linux, but Kubuntu uses the popular and powerful KDE graphical user interface (and its software applications) instead of Ubuntu's simpler Gnome GUI (and its software applications). Why have Ubuntu and Kubuntu become two of the world's most popular Linux distros in the past year? One 15-year-old kid from England expresses his answer to that question in his blog article, Why Is Ubuntu So Freakin' Popular? Don't forget to read others' comments at the bottom of the article.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
Is Linux actually more secure against viruses and malware than Windows? Apparently so, according to The Short Life and Hard Times of a Linux Virus. To summarize it, Windows is a very friendly environment for viruses and malware — Linux is very hostile to them.
American English contains hundreds of phrases and expressions that sound strange to non-Americans. Most Americans use them in their everyday speech, but have no idea how they originated. For example, where did the expression "goody two-shoes" come from? How about "the Big Apple?" If you're curious, take a look at Phrase and Word Origins.
Here's a funny animated image that shows what would happen if the Starship Enterprise ran Windows on its onboard computer.
What's it like to work as a telephone tech support person? Here's a funny animation that shows how frustrating it can be.
This company's
demo video clearly demonstrates their skill at creating convincing computer generated imagery.
This past Wednesday, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security told everyone to install the latest Windows updates to fix a critical security flaw in Windows. Now a leading computer security company predicts that hackers could mount a major computer worm attack at any time by exploiting that Windows flaw. Have you downloaded and installed this past week's Windows update yet?
Everyone is on high alert for terrorist activity these days. If you do any traveling with your laptop computer, you should probably read How To Prep Laptops For Airport Security.
I believe that everything serves some purpose, whether we humans realize its purpose yet or not. Scientists are now discovering that it may be possible to clean uranium waste with bacteria and fight global warming with enzymes. I'm looking forward to the day that scientists discover an important use for tobacco that doesn't involve sniffing, chewing or smoking it. And also when they discover an important use for mosquitoes.
I bet even your boss looks good, compared to the worst boss in the U.S.
I guess he's just not as scary when you take him out of the movies.
This is my wife's and my favorite TV commercial of all time. It's the Petsmart commercial starring
the little doxie and his Bobo.
For the past few weeks, I've been going on and on here about how happy I am to be using Kubuntu Linux instead of Windows on my main PC. In fact, thousands of computer users have switched to Kubuntu or Ubuntu in the past couple of years, and many of them have also written about their experiences. I don't want to be accused of presenting only one side of the story, so I'd like you to read one person's rant about all of the glowing K/Ubuntu stories on the net, which he finds really annoying. You might even discover that you agree with him. Just be sure to also read the comments that appear at the end — some of them are excellent, and they're almost all informative.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
How important are your site's title tags to search engines? Possibly more important than you realize. For the whole story, take a look at Evolution of the Title Tag - Top Two Tips for Improvement.
When I was a Microsoft Windows user, I felt like I had to constantly download and install patches to fix that operating system's security vulnerability du jour. Unfortunately, the Windows security problem is probably going to get worse before it gets better — assuming that it will get better some day. Now hackers are expanding their malicious efforts by finding security flaws in Microsoft Office, too.
I think tech support people will get some satisfaction from it. I hope other computer users will learn something from it. It's one person's Top Ten Pet Peeves of a Support Tech.
The next time you find yourself in a shouting match with one of your kids or one of your parents, remember this very clever
Cingular cell phone commercial.
It seems like every few days, we read another horror story about someone who had their identity stolen. And it always turns out to be a huge and lengthy hassle to restore their credit and reputation. Keeping Your Identity on a Short Leash has some good advice to help protect your identity from thieves.
It was written as sarcastic advice for aspiring web comics creators, but The Top 10 Ways To Impress an Editor has some good advice that is relevant for any job seeker. After reading it, I have a little advice for its author: if you're really that frustrated being an editor, you should probably consider going into a different line of work. In fact, I'd be happy to take your place. Have your people call my people — we'll do lunch.
Here's some advice that you may never need, but it's good advice anyway. It's a video, totally in Japanese, demonstrating how to write smudge-free on fabric with a permanent marker. The secret is to spray the fabric with something and then allow that something to dry before writing with the marker. Since the name on the spray can is in Japanese, I had to watch until the end to figure out that what they were using was hair spray. The hair spray washes out in the laundry, but the permanent marker writing stays sharp and clear.
You would have to look long and hard to find anyone with more upper body strength than this break dancer.
You would have to look long and hard to find anyone with more flexibility than
this gymnast.
Several days ago, I told you that Microsoft would be releasing several Windows security patches in its latest Windows Update. I also told you that many experienced Windows users wait a few days to install new patches, just in case the patches themselves cause new problems. The next day, Microsoft released those security patches. A day later, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recommended that all Windows users download and install those security patches as soon as possible. Now it has become clear that the new patch can cause Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser to crash. Microsoft reportedly expects to release a patch for the patch on August 22. I can't be the only one who's sensing a pattern here.
If you do any web design, you know how inconvenient it is to determine the color code for a shade of color that you see on someone else's Web site. Now, a Firefox browser add-on, ColorZilla makes that task (and others) easy. "With ColorZilla you can get a color reading from any point in your browser, quickly adjust this color and paste it into another program. You can Zoom the page you are viewing and measure distances between any two points on the page. The built-in palette browser allows choosing colors from pre-defined color sets and saving the most used colors in custom palettes."
If you've been brave enough to follow the news of world events lately, you know that several news sources have been caught digitally altering news photographs. In some cases, they've done it to make the photos more dramatic, but in a few cases, they've done it to falsify news stories. You may come to the conclusion that there's no such thing as an unbiased news story after you see Pictures That Lie, a collection of altered news photographs.
My next-door neighbor Mike recently bought a new Ryobi 18v cordless electric drill, and we've been using to install drywall in his home's new addition. It's very powerful and does a great job, but apparently it's nowhere near as powerful as this Milwaukee drill.
Did you know that Google and other online search sites save the details of every search that you do, along with your computer's unique IP address? How can you protect yourself from that invasion of privacy? In this funny video, Stephen Colbert offers some advice on Internet security.
I've heard it on the radio hundreds of times since it came out in 1979. In fact, i's probably one of the most listened-to rock songs of its time. Over the years, many scholars have tried to interpret the meaning of its cryptic lyrics. I'm no expert, but after carefully studying
the lyrics and
the music video of Another Brick In The Wall, by Pink Floyd, it seems to me that the band has some kind of anger issues about going to school.
Today is a perfect day for choosing to be a new person; embracing wisdom and innner strength gained through experience, while leaving behind baggage that burdens the soul.
Here's a review of a book whose title I really like: Say No To Microsoft At Home And Make The Easy Switch To Linux. I said no to Microsoft and have been using Kubuntu Linux exclusively for the past few weeks. I absolutely love it. Of course, I've had a few minor problems that caused me a little stress — like when I first set up the driver software for my new Nvidia graphics card — but I did some searches and learned how to fix them myself. The few bugs that I've encountered so far have all been due to the failure of the graphical user interface to correctly save my chosen configuration settings. The solutions have been to open a Konsole window (a "command prompt" window to you Windows users) and manually type the appropriate commands to save my chosen configuration settings. I admit that it's not the most user-friendly way to get everything working correctly, but I don't mind doing a few things that way while I wait for the powers-that-be to work all of the bugs out of the GUI interface.
The Windows Firewall (and third party firewall software) has long been the target of viruses and malware, which often try to corrupt or disable the firewall so that they can be free to do their dirty business. Here's a short how-to that describes one way to restore the Windows Firewall's functionality after it has been compromised. Even more importantly, it shows another example of how the biggest threat to any computer's security is the computer's user. It's hard for me to believe that, in this day and age, anyone could be so ignorant of email security threats that they would actually open a .zip file attachment that arrives in "an e-mail (in italian) with a nonsensical joke about the ex-president Berlusconi". I think the lesson here is that, with a little common sense, you can avoid viruses and malware, instead of repairing the damage that they cause.
Here's a site that says, "IE 7 will be deployed as a high-priority update via Automatic Updates for Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 shortly after its final release." If you don't want your computer to automatically download that new version of Internet Explorer, that same site will tell you How To Block Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 Installation Via the Registry.
Can computers smell fear? Of course. If your computer knows that you're afraid of it, it will lock-up and misbehave in other ways, just to have some fun with you. Show no fear and your computer will respect you. Format its hard drive a few times and it will fear you. Apparently, I'm not the only one who feels that way. One author has compiled a list of 10 reasons why computers and the Internet are out to get us.
The guy in this short video seems kind of weird, but I have to admit that I was pretty impressed when he
pulled the top half of his body off of his legs. How did he do that?
Desktop Linux just keeps getting more and more popular. Right now, 22,000 students in 24 Indiana high schools are using "low-cost, easy-to-manage" Linux workstations. The state of Indiana hopes to expand the use of Linux to 80 high schools this year.
You've probably seen TV commercials for a product called Auto Cool. It's a small plastic fan that fits into a car window and runs off of solar power. Its makers claim that it will keep car parked in the sun more than 30 degrees (F) cooler than a car that doesn't have an Auto Cool device. Just by watching those commercials, I could tell that the product was a scam, because:
Despite all the evidence to the contrary, I guess a lot of people were fooled into buying an Auto Cool, because there's a whole web page just for Auto Cool customers to post their complaints about it. Caveat emptor.
Here's a funny clip from the TV show Jeopardy! in which a contestant gives the exact same wrong response that I would've given if I had been on the show.
Mr. Bean causes hilarious trouble wherever he goes. In this clip from the old BBC series, he visits a hospital and gets the treatment he deserves.
I featured one of their skits a few months ago, but this clip of the very clever and creative
Men In Coats contains several funny skits.
Have you ever had a U.S.B flash drive "die" on you? It can happen if you unplug it from a Windows computer at the wrong time. Now there's reportedly an easy way to resurrect a dead U.S.B flash drive using Linux.
Will Windows Vista be free from constantly needing security patches? It's anyone's guess, but I think probably not. In fact, the pre-release version of Vista has already required security patches to fix some of the same security vulnerabilities that Microsoft patched in Windows XP several days ago.
The chief executive of the Open Source Development Lab predicts that Microsoft will some day release an inexpensive Linux version of the Microsoft Office suite. If Redmond attempts to lure Linux users away from using open source office suites like OpenOffice.org, that tactic will fail if most Linux users feel the way that I do. I wouldn't use Microsoft Office on my Linux PC, even if they gave it away for free.
I always thought that it was called Teenage Wasteland. The real name of that song by The Who is much more pretentious:
Baba O'Reilly. The
Blue Man Group does
a very credible rendition of it that's worth a listen, even though I think the female singer's "pretty" voice is a poor match for the rock anthem's angry lyrics.
If you work in IT, you'll probably recognize them, either because you've done some of them yourself, or because you've seen your boss or coworkers do some of them. They're Peter Coffee's Top 10 Stupid Things that Smart IT Pros Still Do.
A couple of weeks ago, America Online began offering free anti-virus software to its users. Now some security experts are concerned by the software's EULA (end-user license agreement), which "would allow AOL to send spam or serve up adware at some point in the future." No wonder so many computer users don't trust AOL.
He's getting close to buying a new SUV, so my next-door neighbor, Mike and I were talking about how to get a good deal a couple of days ago. The two of us came up with several, but not all, of the tips in Car Buying: 16 Tips to the Best Deal.
How would you like to save $225 (U.S.D)? Take a look at Fifteen Easy Ways to Save Fifteen Bucks.
I've always wondered about the wisdom of holding professional automobile races on the downtown streets of large cities. Here's a video that shows
one possible insurance risk. It could just as easily have hit a pedestrian or a car full of people.
Wouldn't it be great if someone could think of a way to vaporize all of the trash that currently sits in landfills, and use the energy that is generated to power both the vaporization process and millions of homes? Someone has. Will the first such power plant actually be up and running in 2 years? Time will tell, but I don't think I'll feel safe living within 93 million miles of it, since its plasma arc gasification process will run hotter than the surface of the sun.
If you weren't unusually smart, you wouldn't be reading this Journal. Now that I've helped you feel good about yourself, I hope you still feel that way after you read the Top 10 Most Commonly Thought Things That Are Wrong.
Didn't the Professor on Gilligan's Island already invent this about 40 years ago?
If you can think of a good use for a V8-powered chainsaw, then I'm really glad that you're not my next-door neighbor.
Hunters sometimes use decoys to lure their prey. According to this funny video,
animals sometimes do it, too.
There's a new service for those times when there's something that you really, really want to tell someone, but you'd rather wait and tell them after you're dead.
Only a few people ever won a million dollars on the TV show, Who Wants To Be A Millionnaire? No one won it as cleverly as this guy did.
Do you ever wonder what the stunt people from The Matrix movies do for fun in their spare time?
You may have car insurance, health insurance, dental insurance, life insurance, personal property insurance, and homeowners insurance, but you're not fully protected unless you also have
robot insurance.
Yesterday, there was an update to Ubuntu/Kubuntu Linux that caused serious problems for a lot of people. I'm no expert, but here's my understanding of what happened. Ubuntu/Kubuntu users saw the icon at the bottom of their desktops, telling them that there was an update available for the Linux Xserver software. Xserver is the software that allows Linux to have a graphical user interface (like in Windows) instead of just a command prompt (like in DOS, for those who are old enough to remember). Unfortunately, there was something wrong with that update, so many people who installed it ended up with a black screen and a command prompt, instead of the normal Windows-like desktop, icons, menus, etc. While many Linux veterans probably knew what commands to type to roll their systems back to their working, non-updated status, the vast majority of Ubuntu/Kubuntu users probably didn't have a clue as to what to do to fix their non-functioning computers. And Canonical failed to post any announcement of the problem or solution to the problem on the main Ubuntu web site.
Fortunately, within a couple of hours, a member of the official Ubuntu support forums posted a step-by-step, 2-minute, command-line solution to the problem in those forums. Unfortunately, that solution was only available to computer users who had the ability to connect to the Internet (probably with a different computer) and who had the knowledge to look for an answer in those particular forums. To make matters even worse, the bad update was reportedly left in the Ubuntu/Kubuntu software repositories (download sites) for 9 or more hours after serious problems with it were first reported, so countless other users continued to install it on their computers. In fact, it is my understanding that the bad update was not removed from the repositories until it was replaced with a new, bug-free update later in the day. As a result, there are probably still thousands of computers around the world that will be completely unusable until someone either finds and implements the solution described above, or gives up on using Linux and installs Windows XP instead.
I'm sure that yesterday's problem gave Ubuntu/Kubuntu a huge black eye, not just with new Linux users who are those distros' main target audience, but also with experienced Ubuntu/Kubuntu users who had enthusiastically evangelized Linux to their Windows-using friends. Despite all of that, I think yesterday's mistakes present an incredible opportunity for Canonical and the Ubuntu/Kubuntu developers to learn many valuable and important lessons. It's like I always taught my students: You'll probably always make some mistakes and run into some unforeseen problems with your computer. If everything always goes right for you when you're first learning about computers, you'll never really learn what to do when something goes wrong. On the other hand, if you make some mistakes and run into some problems along the way, you'll learn a lot more about how to avoid making mistakes and how to deal with problems. To me, it was inevitable that Ubuntu/Kubuntu would eventually suffer some sort of problem due to human error. What's more important to me is whether the Ubuntu/Kubuntu people learn from that problem or not.
I'm going to continue using Kubuntu Linux because:
I also hope that Canonical will also take the advice of several Ubuntu Forums' users, and add a roll back feature to Ubuntu/Kubuntu's start menu, to allow even non-technical users to easily uninstall any future updates if they cause any problems.
UPDATE:
On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
If you aren't afraid to follow some simple instructions, 10 Time-Saving Hacks for Win XP could... um... you know — save you some time.
What technology is poised to replace hard drives in the future? Some people say it's flash memory, though it won't happen unless and until the cost of flash memory is competitive with the cost of hard drives.
Internet Service Provider, Earthlink, just added an anonymous email service for its paid subscribers. The new service lets Earthlink users use 5 different anonymous email addresses when they register at web sites. Each anonymous email address is linked to the user's real Earthlink email address, allowing the user to keep their real email address private. I did some research and learned that webmasters who don't want Earthlink users to register at their sites with anonymous email addresses should configure their registration software to ban *@mypacks.net.
Here's a video of someone
doing some impressive precision driving in a cute little car.
It was exactly one month ago that I first installed Kubuntu Linux on my main PC. I think I only used Windows XP once in the past month — to export my Outlook 2000 email messages and Windows Firefox browser bookmarks so that I could import them into the Firefox browser and Thunderbird email client in Kubuntu. Your mileage may vary, but Kubuntu completely replaced Windows for all of my computing needs. If you're still thinking about trying out Ubuntu or Kubuntu Linux on your PC, My First Dive Into the Ubuntu World will give you one Windows user's perspective on how easy it is to install and use Ubuntu.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
If you don't want Google and other search sites to save all of your private Internet searches, take a look at 6 Ways to Keep Your Search Secrets Safe.
Have you ever wondered what's going on when Windows makes you wait while it automatically downloads and installs Windows Updates? If Windows Update Could Talk is a funny piece that sort of explains the Windows Update process.
Take a few seconds and try to think of the cutest animal that you've ever seen. I bet it wasn't cuter than finger-sized monkeys.
Here's a 1963 McDonald's commercial,
introducing Ronald McDonald for the very first time. You probably won't recognize the actor playing Ronald under all of that clown makeup, but you may recognize his voice — years later, he was the portly weatherman on NBC's The Today Show. Yes, that's right — Willard Scott was the original Ronald McDonald.
The Linux kernel (the basic code inside every Linux distro) turned 15 years old this past week. For those who care, here's the original set of comp.os.minix newsgroup messages in which its creator, Linus Torvalds, who was a graduate student at the time, announced, "I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones." Thank you, Linus.
This past Wednesday, I told you about a bad Ubuntu/Kubuntu Linux upgrade that, for all intents and purposes, rendered thousands of users' computers unusable. The Ubuntu/Kubuntu community posted a work-around 2 hours later, and the Ubuntu/Kubuntu developers released a bug-fixed version of the upgrade later that day, but it ended up being a traumatic experience for many Ubuntu/Kubuntu users. At the time, I said that Canonical and the Ubuntu/Kubuntu developers had made some serious mistakes in the handling of that bad upgrade, and I hoped that they would learn some important lessons from the experience. It's only been a couple days since then, but I'm happy to say that it looks like they've already learned a lot from the experience.
Every once in awhile, I find some funny Windows error messages or dialog boxes like these.
If you've ever created a flipbook, you know that they're fun to look at, even though their quality can be a little rough. Here's a long flipbook that was made by connecting several short ones.
Fiat drivers really don't like it when bicyclists lean on their cars.
Here's
a very memorable commercial in which IBM blatantly used
FUD to sell its Web security products and services.
For the past few years, most new computers have come with a DVD burner. If you've ever bought recordable DVD disks, you've probably wondered whether you should buy DVD+R or DVD-R disks, since most DVD burners can use either type. In the past, I've never seen any good reason to choose one over the other, but now that I know that DVD-Rs are Evil, I will buy only DVD+R disks from now on.
It seems that thieves and scammers never run out of ways to cheat people. According to U.S.A Today, "The IRS warned taxpayers Wednesday not to be duped by scammers posing as private debt collectors the agency has hired to chase unpaid tax debts." I hope there are some huge fines and long federal prison terms waiting for those who are caught.
If you're looking for information about someone, or if you're just curious to see how much information about you is published in online public databases, you should visit Background Databases.
I read that The Gap pulled this commercial after showning it only a few times. Gee, I wonder why.
Possibly the most poorly made stop-motion animation that ever made it to TV is the old Frosty the Snowman story that still gets shown every Christmas in the U.S. The most well-known and highest-quality ones might be the Wallace and Grommit series of children's movies. The one thing that nearly all stop-action animations have in common is that the characters are some sort of doll or clay model. Here's an interesting stop-motion animation in which the main character is a human being.
It's Happy Fun Ball!!! Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball.
How did corporate system administrators react when Microsoft ended all support for Windows NT Server? And what can they do to replace that corporately ubiquitous operating system?
This funny commercial answers those questions.
Over the years, Microsoft has created more than a few operating systems that have problems if your computer doesn't have enough RAM memory and can also have problems if your computer has too much RAM memory. Pre-Windows-2000 versions of Windows couldn't handle more than 512 MB of RAM, and now laptops running Windows XP can refuse to go into hibernation mode if they have more than 1 GB of RAM. Luckily, the article contains a link to a recent Microsoft update that addresses the problem.
Here's a visually interesting old (1906) stop-action animation done with chalk on a blackboard.
I'll leave it up to you to figure out whatever symbolism you think is in this really well-done 3D animation, Fallen Art.
Here's an illusionist, scaring people on the street with
a shocking illusion. I'm sure you'll want to watch it more than once.
Will you still be using your PC's DVD drive 3 years from now? How about 2 years from now? I think you may want to stop using it a few months from now, when new 300 GB, ten-times-faster, holographic-memory discs and drives start appearing in stores.
Please be extra careful the next time you try to teach your dog how to drive.
Good boy, Romeo! You're a good, good boy!
If you're going to be a ninja, you'd better be sure to pick a good partner.
What happens when you try to use a helicopter to tow a motor boat? Yes, you guessed it.
Here's a funny sketch from Saturday Night Live in which Christopher Walken plays
a guy answering a census taker's questions.
Eight years ago today, I started this web site on the Geocities' free web hosting site. At the time, I was teaching 12 different college courses, and this entire site consisted of a home page with links to my 12 course syllabi going down its center. Within a few months, I had added all of my class schedules, assignments, instructions, tips, quizzes, tests, and final exams, plus online class question and discussion forums. Then, over time, I wrote articles to explain computer concepts to my students, and compiled links to many other sources of good information. This site eventually served as an information source for over 2,000 of my own college students at 2 different colleges, as well as for countless other students, at the colleges where I taught and at other colleges, universities, and high schools. I've always been a teacher at heart, so in the past 8 years, it has been my pleasure to spend over 7,300 hours of my own time, to create, host, and maintain this site, and to individually help hundreds of computer users through email messages and this site's forums. In the process, I have learned countless lessons about all facets of web design, marketing, tech support, and dealing with people. Today, this site contains over 700 static pages, several hundred dynamic pages, many free online services, and hyperlinks to thousands of other web sites and pieces of software. I'm very happy and proud to know that it has grown to be internationally popular, having served nearly 165,000 visitors from at least 95 countries around the world, but I'm especially proud that some of my students from 4-8 years ago still visit this site, contribute to its forums, and send me email messages. In the near future, I hope to make this site even better, by converting this entire Journal to WordPress, to make it interactive and easily searchable. With millions of web sites from which to choose, I sincerely thank you for visiting this one, and I welcome your comments and suggestions for improving it.
Wow, I just thought of a completely true-but-possibly misleading National Enquirer-type headline for a mostly factual news story: Indian Communist Baby Wants Schools To Use Linux. That makes you want to read the story, doesn't it?
The Windows Vista rumor mill was working overtime yesterday. Amazon.com is reportedly accepting pre-orders of the upcoming operating system, and several sources have stated that Microsoft will officially release it on January 30, 2007. Various sources also reported different price ranges for the new OS, and Redmond stated that pricing has not yet been set in stone. Are you all excited about it yet?
If you use Windows 95-XP, and you have any yellow question marks denoting unknown devices in your Windows Device Manager, Unknown Device Identifier may help you identify those devices and download the software drivers that they need.
Our cat, Pookie, is a sweet little calico with a very big heart, who mothers our other three pets, licking their heads to groom them whenever she gets a chance. Here's a sweet kitty whose kittens died, so she adopted and is raising an irresponsible mother dog's puppies.
Here's another one of those Mac vs PC ads, showing that Apple may be running out of good selling points for the Mac. The whole point of this one is that the Mac
has a better power cord.
Are you a desktop Linux user? If so, you may be interested to see the results of a DesktopLinux.com poll, showing which distros, browser, email client, etc., are the most popular. I learned that I'm using the most popular application in software category. That makes sense, since I'm a relatively new Linux user, so I purposely choose to use the ones that I thought would have the most users and support.
Though I've been a very happy Kubuntu Linux user since July, I know that most people are going to keep using Windows, instead of replacing it with a version of Linux. Before you roll out Windows Vista to your company, or even install it on your personal PC, you would be wise to read 10 Things to Consider Before Rolling Out Vista.
UPDATE: On September 2, 2006, I switched from Kubuntu Linux to SimplyMEPIS Linux.
You've got mail! Unfortunately, you no longer have a job.
Parents, are you tired of pushing your children on their backyard swingset? Just get one of these.
It's the first time I've ever seen what he looks like, and I think he looks surprisingly non-geeky. Here's a video of Linus Torvalds, the creator of Linux, giving the correct pronunciation of his first name, and of the word Linux.
What could be so frightening that it would cause a startled momma panda to scream?
I think you'll be surprised to see.
