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November 11th, 2009
June 15th, 2009
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 A note to anyone playing Fallout 3: If you've installed the Broken Steel add-on before attempting the Finding the Garden of Eden main story-line quest, there's going to be a section of the quest where you're walking through Vault 87 (I'm pretty sure it's the Lab section--it might be the Crew's Quarters, though). You're going to come across a two-story room (like in every other Vault) that'll be the second door on your left after going up a set of stairs. Once you enter, two Super Mutant Overlords will come out and blast the bejebus out of you. This is a pre-programmed encounter that I'm guessing was with Super Mutant Masters before I decided to pay money to up my character's level cap from 20 to 30. As soon as you step into that room, the encounter activates. So here's a hint: Backtrack to the stairs, and go into the first room on your left. Walk across that large room, and exit through the door on the other end. After taking care of all the other Super Mutants around, enter that same room from the other side (where the Overlords would be coming from). The encounter will activate, but this time, with the original Super Mutant Masters without Tri-beam Laser Rifles. Much easier to deal with. I hope my seventeen hours of gameplay yesterday (note: not all at that part of the game) helps you out. |
April 22nd, 2009
April 18th, 2009
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 - The E3 Trailer for Prince of Persia that I downloaded a while ago on my Xbox 360.
- The haunting music from the trailer: Saeglopur by Sigur Ros.
- The Android app Shazam (originally developed for the iPhone) which told me what the music was without the need for me to do various permutations of the search: "Prince of Persia trailer music."
- My Playstation 1 memory card has somehow lost my save game data for my not-even-through-with-disc-1, but-spent-over-a-week-of-playtime game of Final Fantasy VII.
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March 20th, 2009
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 This has nothing to do with the new Facebook layout. Back in 2002, I started this Livejournal, because, as ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) batnandu suggests, I'm something of an emotional exhibitionist. Drawing compelling content from the dross of my daily life, however, is a Herculean task--were I more dedicated to poetry, short fictions, photos, or videos, I suppose I could have some gems to offer every day. As it stands, I'm that post-modern, neo-geek, sarcastic, hipster-douchebag that only ever drops the occasional grain of wit (I'm guessing this is why Twitter might be so popular) amidst a sea of memes and self-absorbed whining. So if you go back and look at the succession of posts following that November, 2002 debut (no, really, don't waste your time), you'll find a series of memes and quiz results offered from sites like quizdiva.com, quizilla.com, or okcupid.com. With such a frequency that one of the people who (for some yet-to-be-determined reason) follows this LJ said, "please stop taking quizes, for the love of god." And yes, I did eventually tire of seeing the insipid things populating my friends page--I even wrote a filter for my friends page to automatically cut them. So it's with a supreme sense of resignation that I see the latest items scrolling onto my Facebook homepage: - "What painting are you?"
- "Which Great Philosopher are you?"
- "Where should you be living?"
These are the same kinds of things I stopped posting a long while ago, and it seems that Facebook is just recycling the whole Online Junior High Slambook concept again. But here's where it's even worse--each application that Facebook approves for its users need approval from each individual user before they allow it to post on that user's page. The quiz application developers, in their idiocy, instead of creating a single quiz framework application to access the user's information, set their quizzes up so that each individual quiz has to ask for access to the user's details. So every Facebook user wanting to take the both the "Where should you be living" quiz and the "Which 80s band are you?" quiz has to approve access for both quizzes individually, when the access required for both is essentially, "Can this application post its crap onto your news feed?" And all for those unspecific, non-committal gestures at your personality. |
March 11th, 2009
January 30th, 2009
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If you have a MicroSD card, and you volunteer its use to someone who wants to get a file off of a Samsung Helio phone, be aware that you might lose the 1.5 Gigabytes of MP3s, photos, and customized ringtones that you've built up when in an unknown series of steps, the phone reformats your SD card. Just so you know. |
January 16th, 2009
February 22nd, 2008
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doesn't mean they're not out to get you: Recently, James' mother replaced the batteries in "Elmo Knows Your Name" and is now convinced that the doll is homicidal.
You see, James' mother thinks that Elmo is saying "Kill James." From: The Consumerist |
January 9th, 2008
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I've lived with Engrish/Chinglish all my life. I still have a pencil box from grade school emblazoned with the phrase "Space Shuttle shall be realize to answer your dream." Engrish.com catalogs some of the more amusing offences (To everyone thinking they'd never do something so foolish, however, turnabout is fair play) This (long, slightly complicated article) is a pretty amusing account of how poor software and lazy proofing (update: and the simplification of the written Chinese character) are combining to create something that China definitely wants to eradicate before the Olympics come to town. |
January 3rd, 2008
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 Please stop fucking with my browser window dimensions. That is all. -thepeopleseason |
December 15th, 2007
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Technology is not liking me at the moment. In the past few weeks I've discovered the following items to be non-functional: - The DVD-ROM/CD-RW in my laptop
- The 6GB portable drive which I believed to be solid state, but when plugged in appears to have malfunctioning platters by the odd, high-pitched grinding noise
- The enclosed CD-RW drive hooked up to my desktop computer
- My electric razor
Suggestions to how I should Earl-Hickey this bad-tech karma are welcome. |
December 12th, 2007
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 Merriam-Webster President John Morse said "w00t" reflected the growing use of numeric keyboards to type words.
"People look for self-evident numeral-letter substitutions: 0 for O; 3 for E; 7 for T; and 4 for A," he said. "This is simply a different and more efficient way of representing the alphabetical character."
-- from "w00t" crowned word of year by U.S. dictionary While I'm rather amused that Merriam-Webster chose "w00t" as word of the year (granted, some two to four years after it really became vernacular for anyone who spent any amount of time online), to suggest that l33t5p34]< and "w00t" in particular is a result of numeric keyboard inefficiencies just indicates how badly Merriam-Webster is stuck in the 20th Century (and don't even get me started on their website). |
October 10th, 2007
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Stop using that Snap.com preview crap. It's ugly, it wastes bandwidth, it interrupts the regular flow of reading, and when you say "disable for all sites" it doesn't really do so. Quit it. -thepeopleseason |
May 23rd, 2007
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Your recent announcement of unlimited storage for all mailboxes does not make the use of your system any more appealing if you cannot recognize that messages with the subjects "Mortgage Approva1" or "Grow Your Pen1s" or addressed to five or more people with usernames which are identical up to the first four characters are not valid messages to me. As I have repeatedly reported these messages as spam to you, your failure to block them from my inbox leads me to believe that your spam catching system was programmed by either the proverbial million monkeys or the most-recently-deceased General Mbuna Fish whose widow is trying to unload several billion dollars into my bank account. To conclude: your spamfilter eats ass. Fix it. |
April 11th, 2007
March 23rd, 2007
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 Cory Doctorow, writer, technologist and blogger-proprietor of Boingboing.net was recently interviewed by US News and World Report about the projected downturn in American productivity. His suggestions about what we should do to turn the economy around in the long term resonate pretty well with me, given that I, myself, am something of a technology buff. A while ago a link came up on Digg.com about a biotech company in Singapore that was able to create human embryonic stem cells without introducing living non-human tissue. In the discussion that followed, two comments stood out to me: "are we losing to Singapore?" and "How is medical advancement about winning or losing?" I've posted about the general American distrust of science previously, where I included the following quote, which I think sums up why medical advancement is about winning and losing: Jobs and wages depend on science and technology. If our nation can't manufacture, at high quality and low price, products people want to buy, then industries will continue to drift away and transfer a little more prosperity to other parts of the world.
--Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World Our ignorant politics and corporate salad-tossing are eroding our competitive edge against the rapidly-modernizing third world. With the advent of the internet, countries like China and India, countries that value science as a discipline are overtaking American industries. With idiotic laws and copyright policies, the government is (at times, literally) handcuffing software companies with novel products, such as Napster. The kowtowing we do to the RIAA and MPAA will prevent companies like Last.fm and Pandora from seeing their innovative software to a profit. And the president's close-minded veto of government-funded stem cell research will only make for profits for cures created in other parts of the world. We are shackled to our old ways--we are far too scared, too dumb to change our cars, our business models, our minds. The technology that American ingenuity has created will only bring us so far--if we're unwilling to continue to learn, to stay on the bleeding edge, then we will, as the commenter on Digg stated, "[lose] to Singapore" and all the other developing countries of the world. |
March 8th, 2007
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In a clear example of the problem with Wikipedia, following my viewing of 300 Monday evening, my search through the content surrounding The Battle of Thermopylae has lead me to the urge to listen to Iron Maiden's Somewhere in Time. Points to whoever can trace the train of thought... |
November 20th, 2006
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 I don't need a new messenger bag. I just set up my new computer at work so that I don't need to lug my laptop in to hear the sound from YouTube vids and MP3s. But when I see that a company in Miami is making messenger bags from recycled (big damn) movie posters, the greenie and the geek in me may very well ignore both the $88 price tag and the possibility that said bag may not even hold my laptop. |
November 17th, 2006
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 Apparently using modern technology makes you a criminal. An astute former colleague just posted this to a mailing list we're on: Steve Ballmer:"Novell pays us some money for the right to tell customers that anybody who uses SUSE Linux is appropriately covered,” Ballmer said. This "is important to us, because [otherwise] we believe every Linux customer basically has an undisclosed balance-sheet liability." Doug Morris (Universal Music group chairman/CEO), discussing why Microsoft is paying UMG more than $1 for each Zune sold:"These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it," UMG chairman/CEO Doug Morris says. "So it's time to get paid for it." Damn, I use Linux and I own an iPod. Someone call the cops! Who else wants to accuse me of being a thief? Guess it's a good thing I'm not a BOFA customer... |
November 5th, 2006
October 16th, 2006
September 19th, 2006
July 28th, 2006
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One of my co-workers just walked in to the cave with a problem. He had been working with a document in Microsoft Office some time ago, and very distinctly remembers saving the file under a different name. He wasn't able, however, to find the document under the "Recent Documents" listing, nor was he able to find it in "My Documents." This sounded very familiar, so I asked him if he had opened up the file from his own hard drive or whether it was opened from the web or e-mail. See, a few months ago, I was faced with a Pinky who was brought to the point of tears when she couldn't find a Powerpoint presentation that she'd worked hours on. I only managed to find it when I followed the steps that she herself went through to open the document--open mail, click on attachment, work on powerpoint, save. It turns out that Microsoft Outlook, when opening attachments, saves them to a randomly-named directory under whatever is designated temporary storage for Windows, and then opens the appropriate program. When saving the opened-via-Outlook document, then, it will save any changes to that same randomly-named directory, unless told otherwise. Now I know the power users reading this will say, "Well, duh--you should always check to see where you're saving things." Indeed, some of the programmers in the audience might say "Why should I go through the trouble of checking where someone's saving something so they don't shoot themselves in the foot?" Well, if you're a Microsoft Outlook/Office programmer, I respond, "Because that's your fucking job." To begin with, Outlook should probably query the user on whether or not they wish to save/execute an attachment, given the prevalence of viruses and worms. And when any related application attempts a user-initiated save to temporary storage, it should probably ask "You know you're going to save this into temp storage, are you sure you don't really want to save to My Documents?" Hell, it's bad enough with all the stupid tooltips coming from the system tray and that fucking paperclip--where's the harm in adding one or two more actually-useful messages? |
July 20th, 2006
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Your mail notification system is borked. Please do the needful. |
June 18th, 2006
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 Somewhere in between the inception of modern computers and the current day, the aim of computer technology changed from "Let's accomplish tasks using the computer" to "Let's help people accomplish tasks when they use the computer." This isn't necessarily a bad thing--a human-centric view of computing is probably the best way of looking at the interaction between a computer and its user, but for the most part, the average computer user has lost the ability to get tasks done on a computer without having to use it at all. I doubt anyone can pinpoint when and how this exactly happened (I might point the finger to someone somewhere in the Pacific Northwest), but most commercial software out there doesn't really have the ability to perform tasks without extensive user input. The main exception in software, however, can be found in the Open Source/Free Software movements. While many say that an operating system like Linux lacks the bells and whistles of Microsoft Windows, having software which can reliably perform repetitive and labor-intensive tasks (say, like mirroring every file on a site like this) in my opinion, gives me a far better resource than watching an animated icon of a piece of paper travel into a picture of a recycle bin. |
June 2nd, 2006
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 People in the know about the entire alternative energy movement know that generating excess power through solar or wind turbines will net you a surplus energy check from the utility company. According to Treehugger.com, however: Wind turbines across the land should be a much-embraced idea but instead the concept has run into great opposition from local residents who find them ugly and intrusive. Here's my proposed solution--combine your individual wind turbine with a Persistence of Vision system. It doesn't have to be just a wind turbine--it could be a clockface, or if we're talking urban areas, you could even sell adspace and get a nice monthly check from some local business... |
April 26th, 2006
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 A meme from chinook_wind with the stipulation of the letter D: Comment on this entry and I will give you a letter. Write ten words beginning with that letter in your journal, including an explanation what the word means to you and why, and then pass out letters to those who want to play along. - digital I am very much a child of technology--I'm a gadget freak, computer programmer, internet addict.
- drumbone Quite possibly the coolest musical instrument ever.
- do Or do not; there is no try. All that I have done since getting to Atlanta.
- dude If batnandu got this as a tattoo, I promised that I'd get "sweet."
- dark A possible translation of my last name, and what my complexion was like the time my fortune-telling uncle told my father that I should not grow a moustache or beard.
- dare This is the title of my favorite song from an 80s cartoon movie.
- desire I am nothing if not a creature of desire.
- devil Any mention of the word "devil" reminds me either of Grendel or the toast Dream makes with Hob Gadling in Sandman:
"To absent friends, lost loves, old gods, and the season of mists; and may each and every one of us always give the devil his due." It's a wonder I didn't fill this meme up with the names of the Endless... - dragon Despite everything that's been going on with it this year, I still love DragonCon, and hopefully will be able to go next year.
- drury I don't know...it's a funny word--funny-looking, funny-sounding--maybe not as much as "turd" but funny still.
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November 23rd, 2005
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 I should not have played Guitar Hero until 10:00 PM last night. Things to do: - Pack
- Make Everwood DVDs for Mom and Dad.
- Find issues of Fables and Y: The Last Man for Jerry
- Watch as much TiVo as possible to clear space, as I've been spending too much time playing Soul Calibur III and Guitar Hero to catch up on television.
- Dishes/Laundry
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November 8th, 2005
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Thanks to a link from ludditerobot, I found this Penny Arcade strip which pretty accurately describes the shenanigans that go on when batnandu and I play our latest obsession, Soul Calibur III (as well as its predecessor, Soul Calibur II). While we haven't choked each other with the game controller cords (yet), batnandu did punch me in the arm with some measure of seething anger... What's missing from that strip, however, is the coda where someone suddenly realizes, "Holy Shit, it's 5:00 AM." Which brings me back to ludditerobot's original link--last night after dinner with a friend from out of town, Oz came over and brought his latest purchase: Guitar Hero. We would move to batnandu's place sometime around 11:00 PM and play until 2:30 or so... and hence the title of this post. Now someone needs to make a music game which combines Karaoke Revolution, Taiko Drum Master, and Guitar Hero so we can get a whole band going. Preferably with some Journey songs. \m/ |
September 30th, 2005
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I just received a call at my home number from some company that didn't bother to explain why it was calling, nor did it indicate any means of getting myself removed from its calling list. The message basically said, "This is not a sales call; please don't hang up. We have a very important message for you. Please return our call to 770.524.8767 or toll-free 1.800.456.4601." I went ahead and called from a phone here at work, and was connected to someone. "Hi; you just left a message on my machine and I'd like to know what's going on." She replied, "Can you give me the number we called?" "I don't feel comfortable giving you that information." "Ok." <CLICK> I just reported them to the FTC. |
September 14th, 2005
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 A couple of weeks ago, right after Google Talk came out, I got online with Jerry and tried to use the voice chat system. Unfortunately, I just had a pair of earbuds and no microphone, so I basically had to speak loudly into the headphones while they were plugged into the mic jack of the laptop and use the onboard speakers to hear the brother. The result was less than stellar. Since then, I've been on the lookout for a decent headphone/microphone combination. My only qualm about going out and just picking up the latest and greatest doodad is that I've got three different applications for the headset--computer-based voice chat, handsfree cellphone, and PS2 online gaming. I wanted to find a way that I could minimize the number of headsets I needed to buy, but since the PS2 requires a proprietary USB connector (which apparently won't work with a regular, for-the-PC USB headset), my efforts went into finding something that I could use with both the cellphone and computer. In case you didn't know cellphone headsets are different from computer headsets. Computer headsets usually have two plugs--one for the sound output and one for the microphone input. Cellphone headsets, however, end in a single plug that's actually slightly smaller than the kind of plug you stick in your iPod, because they need to carry both the sound and the microphone on the same line. Enter Radio Shack's Computer Headphone Speaker Switch. This nifty device allows you to switch between speakers and a headset on your PC. It has a place to plug in PC speakers and two plugs to stick in your PC sound card's output and microphone jacks. The nice thing, however, is it also has the small, specialized jack for a cellphone headset. |
September 9th, 2005
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 The latest computers capable of running our application for the client have built-in 802.11b antennae. The users have had a lot of trouble getting the Wifi working (they're the typical user--intimidated and clueless), so as a part of my job, I ran around town today testing with two of the machines. After eating first at our clients location (free lunch), I hit Lenox Mall to test at the Apple Store, Panera Bread, and the Food Court. I then drove down Peachtree and hit the Panera Bread next to the Imperial Fez, and then continued down to Whole Foods and Dunkin Donuts. Finally, I hit Aprés Diem where I could connect to their network, as well as the networks for The Independent and The Highlander. In the immortal words of my former roommate, Je vais vomir. |
August 24th, 2005
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C:\>net time /set
Could not locate a time-server.
More help is available by typing NET HELPMSG 3912.
C:\>net helpmsg 3912
Could not locate a time-server.
C:\>
Microsoft, I hate you with every fiber of my being. |
April 29th, 2005
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 From some blogger: Sometime in recent memory, Jack Davenport and some Sandman fangirl got it on at somepoint. Sad, really, that I only know Mariella Frostrup's name from those few episodes of the show. ETA: Why Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates blow goats, Reason #1138:I am in the process of trying to access a file that's on a PocketPC. The file is named "rsyncd.conf," it's located in the "\unix\etc" directory, and its contents are essential to what I am trying to do with the device. The only way that the OS has of natively viewing the file is to open the file up in PocketWord, the Microsoft Word analogue for Windows CE. The version of PocketWord that exists on PocketPC 2003 can only access two types of files--PocketWord files and Text files, and only within the My Documents directory. Even if I copy the file into the My Documents directory, I still cannot see it because Microsoft determines what kind of files to show by the three-letter extension. I should, of course, be able to just rename the thing "rsyncd.txt" or something like that, right? Of course not, because the File Explorer acts just like Windows XP, obscuring the file extension from the user, except with no discernable way of changing that setting. Why do they insist on making everything as dumb as the potential user that might use it? |
February 23rd, 2005
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I don't need a knife block. After seeing my brother's own concoction, I made my own magnetic knife holder with high-powered magnets and some metal rulers. Instead of the usual kind which mounts on the wall, mine's stuck to my refrigerator, out of the way. I don't really cook all that much, so I don't really chop all that much. So I don't need a knife block at all. Which doesn't really stop me from deeply wanting this. Too bad they don't actually sell the thing. |
January 25th, 2005
January 24th, 2005
2005.0124.2015::A query, on the odd chance there's someone who knows... |
 Reading through ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/syndicated.gif) dealnews20, I found this deal which got me thinking--How do they make bubble levels to hold the perfect amount of liquid so that the bubble just falls within the two lines? Who thought up the bubble level in the first place, 'cause--really?--in the immortal words of those Guinness commercials, Brilliant! And since these movies keep stumping everyone: - Described as: Cops' stories around Chinese Take-out place.
Quote #2: "It was such a relief when I saw it crying. It may look different, but it's still true to itself. It's still an emotionally charged towel." - Officer 633
This is Chungking Express, Wong Kar-Wai's quasi-anthology film starring, in two separate stories, Brigitte Lin (The Bride with White Hair) and Takeshi Kaneshiro (House of Flying Daggers); and Chinese pop-star Faye Wong and Tony Leung (Hero).
- Described as: Artist with broken heart saves fugitive.
Quote #9: "She'll only break your heart, it's a fact. And even though I warn you, even though I guarantee you that the girl will only hurt you terribly, you'll still pursue her." - Nora Dinsmoor
"...Ain't love grand?" Alfonso Cuaron's Great Expectations which is lush, exotic, and actually makes the toothpick-thin Gwyneth Paltrow look sexy. I threw my Nora Dinsmoor icon on both movie quizzes, but I guess that was too obvious or something...
- Described as: London lovers pine, meet, and part.
Quote #11: "Ruthless trained killers are just a phone call away." - Prime Minister
Love Actually which is on right now as I type this on HBO Signature. I guess I'm just a big ol' sap, but I really love this movie. That Keira Knightley and Laura Linney star certainly doesn't hurt.
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January 6th, 2005
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Why in the name of all that is techy and cool is there only one device on the market that you can use to connect a network of computers to an 802.11b Wireless LAN? This isn't bleeding edge anymore. |
September 7th, 2004
2004.0907.1326::Why Answering Machines are Better than Bellsouth Voicemail: Reason #874 |
 In the event of a power outage, you can leave your home and still call to check to see if the power's been turned back on. |
August 17th, 2004
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I just implemented this on my friends page. Now I just have to figure out how to automatically cut large images and extended non-breaking text... |
June 26th, 2004
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Today, you sent me the following "news" under the subject "Lots of GREAT News": 3) 1.1 million e-mail addresses on 80-20's list. It is a factor of 3 increase over the 300,000 email addresses in the 2000 election. Wow. That's pretty impressive. Or it would be if you didn't obtain your mailing list addresses using known spammer tactics. Since I've received e-mail from you going to <myusername> at both my yahoo and hotmail accounts, plus to addresses which I last used in 1993 for posting to Usenet, I figure that threefold increase in addresses on your list are a result of either the unethical spammer practice of culling addresses from archives or the purchase of an unscrupulously-obtained list. Either way, it means I'll nary give the 80-20 Initiative a single penny until you rebuild your address list so that it comprises only the addresses of people who actually would care to be on it. In the meantime, I suggest you give a swift kick in the nads to your unresponsive system administrator. |
June 23rd, 2004
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 Sometime last year, the laptop that I had on a rolling cart in my bedroom upped and died. This happened while I was in Biloxi--at some point, I believe the thing overheated and just shut down. When I got back from Mississippi, I flicked the mouse, and when nothing came back, I power-cycled the machine. The display didn't come up, and after a few hours of troubleshooting, I gave up on the beast, ordered a USB laptop harddrive enclosure, and wrote the thing off. Yesterday, after getting the Independent wireless network up and running via a laptop that I brought into the bar, I took the thing home, set it on my rolling cart, plugged all the wires into the back, and went to take a shower. When I came out of the shower, I flicked the mouse. Nothing came up on the display. Noting that the light of the mouse would turn on when I moved it, I hit the Vulcan Nerve Pinch (Ctrl-Alt-Del). When that did nothing, I power-cycled the machine. Mashed keys, removed/reinserted the battery, removed/reinserted the harddrive. All for naught. I noticed when turning the thing on, the power indicator comes on, and then the caps lock indicator flashes: *blink...blink-blink*. I suppose that means that there's some kind of hardware problem, but since this machine is about as old as the web, it's been a little tough trying to find documentation on what those flashes mean. And it's not like they could have just used the standard beeping error codes that most computers use. So it seems the Rolling Cart of Laptop Doom has claimed another victim. Hopefully Dealnews will have a good deal on another USB harddrive enclosure, but who knows--that thing was probably less than a Gig in size--it's probably not even worth it... Grumble. |
June 22nd, 2004
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I'm sitting now, at the Independent (The Bar formerly known as DuPree's). We've just wired them for DSL and Wireless access. Bonus. Party. |
June 18th, 2004
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Since my client has moved me from the office that I was working in, I've moved to a desk where I'm working in the corner of a desk that wasn't meant to have someone work in it's corner (there's not really enough space to fit anywhere else). Today, my elbows are killing me, from resting non-ergonomically, directly on a hard table surface. Back when I was at my old job, they had these "Surfboards," large, black, somewhat-kidney-shaped metal boards with a large rubber-ended lip which you could fit into the 90-degree corner of a desk and effectively have a good keyboard and mousing space. I talked to the Coffee Achiever (who still works somewhere organizationally similar to the old job), and someone at her workplace said they got theirs at Staples. Having scoured the Staples.com site for "Surfboard," "Above-desk drawers," "Under-desk drawers," and "Desk Accessories." Does anyone have a lead on this item? ETA: Found it. Unfortunately, it's $170. |
June 17th, 2004
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Of the rare individuals reading this journal by actually going to the front page and clicking through the entries, some of you may have noticed three new links at the bottom of the left-side linkbar. Labelled "current..." I've taken to listing the various media that I'm partaking of at the time (of the last update). Since two of the items will be books ("current read" and "current bookclub"), I figured I'd go ahead and link to Amazon (and no, I'm not getting anything from the link). Linking to Amazon is a bit of a pain in the ass. The fact remains that Amazon URLs, while from a coding point of view probably a huge weight lifted from their developers, are quite possibly the most user-unfriendly aspect of their site. Apart from their coders, who knows what part of the URL actually contains the portion of the site that pertains to the product you're looking at and what part will grant some anonymous surfer access to your wish list and credit card number? (yes, I'm being sardonic) Paul Bausch, author of Amazon Hacks knows. And he provided the following page on O'Reilly's site for creating shorter URLs to Amazon products. Since I'm a geek, I threw together the following bookmarklet to click on when you're surfing Amazon and want to generate the short URL. It'll generate a small popup window where the short URL is easily copy-and-paste-able. Link It
Edit: Since LJ apparently doesn't let you embed javascript code in a link anchor, the link goes to a page I have on my own site with the bookmarklet.
The technically-inclined might ask why I didn't just use javascript's alert() function--Mozilla Firefox doesn't appear to allow you to copy and paste from the alertbox. |
June 15th, 2004
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 An assortment of things that have, either peripherally or directly, made my life slightly less boring (in a good way or bad...) in the past few days. - That which I should not have picked up at Target for seventeen dollars:
- Soul Calibur II for the Playstation2, which I played in Weapon Master mode until 12:30 AM last night, despite my intentions to go to the Independent and be social.
- They who should suffer grievous bodily harm:
- The people who stole Rob's chained-up 2001 Kawasaki Ninja ZX 9R at some point last night. They should have the skin flayed from their faces. Glow-stick sodomy is too good for them.
- He who should have massive amounts of funding:
- Rob del Bueno, bassist for Man or Astro-man?, who's trying to push biodiesel use in the Atlanta area and the Southeast through his site, Vegenergy.
- He who must not be named:
- Voldemort
- She who should probably write something a little more substantial than "testing. testing..." since she went ahead and registered for an LJ:
- genny0926
- That which does not work:
- Motorola's Mobile Power Tools, which have given me the capability to hook my new phone up to my computer and synchronize calendar and contacts, but which, for some inexplicable reason, will not upload my self-created MIDI file as a polyphonic ringtone. Damn you.
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June 10th, 2004
2004.0610.1259::You expect me to pay to ride this filthy contraption? Have you the brain worms? |
Via Engadget, British inventors Matthew Roach and Mark Pawlewski have filed for a patent on software that will prevent digital televisions from displaying cartoons after detecting a certain amount of animation in the signal. WTF? |
May 20th, 2004
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A message for the technically-uninclined: If you're browsing around a website, and you see something that looks interesting to you, and would perhaps be interesting to your friends, DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, ENTER THEIR E-MAIL ADDRESSES INTO ANY FORM ON THE SITE. That's just an invite for random assbags to spam your friends with Viagra ads and Mortgage rates. Instead, send a message with the site address to your friends--if they want to chance the spammage, it's best to leave it up to them. |
April 15th, 2004
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Taking a cue from Cap'n Ken, here's my list of favorite RSS/Atom syndication feeds. Some of these are very seldom updated, some too frequently, but I find them all useful or entertaining in some way... ( list of feeds follows... )Now that LJ has done away with syndication quotas, anyone have any rec's for more feeds? |
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