Eee PC to Get Intel’s Diamondville, Hard Drives, and Fashion Forward Style

I was all ready to talk about Asus' EeePC and their competitors yesterday but we ran out of time.

Asus will be expanding the line in some interesting ways soon. Everex is moving into the market segment. At least on model is coming from HPQ and the rumors from Dell are very interesting. While everyone knew this segment would heat up, I don't think all that many of you with whom I discussed this saw things taking off like they appear to be. I know I didn't.

We will keep you posted, though, as our blog moves toward our 3000th post this week.

Jack

They Criticized Vista. And They Should Know

I usually try to avoid posting NY Times articles because of the subscription, but this one is worth firing up your throw-away email for.

It seems that many within Microsoft knew that lowering the bar and labeling low end PCs as "Vista Capable", pre Vista release, would cause heartache and confusion on down the line.

About the only solace one can take is that some Microsoft bigwigs have suffered the same pain and uncertainty at the release of Vista as their customers did. This article presents a picture of a company that was penny wise and pound foolish, and that now faces paying the piper because here comes da' judge.

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 03-09-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 03-09-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) First up for the week is a news item I ran across that fits my interest in robotics, DYI, new inventions, technology changing society, humor, and the just plain cool. A guy in Atlanta Georgia made a Robocop from a barbeque smoker, and is using it to patrol his neighborhood. This has the smell of a trend to me; evidently, he is being quite effective with controlling the turf he patrols with it. It seems to me there are several advantages to having a robot-vigilante type tool; it keeps the operator away from possible violence. Also offers the possibility of collecting photographic, and audio evidence in these on street type environments, make them small like the radio controlled AVT toys, you have a paparazzo’s dream. I am totally confused about how I feel when it comes to the ethics, and legality of all this, but then every time I walk into a casino I am being secretly filmed from hundreds of cameras, ATM’s, convenience stores, banks, parking lots, even my front gate at the condo’s where I live. Anyway, here is the link http://www.cnn.com

2) Next up a tax I can vote for, I ran across something about Ireland taxing plastic bags, I do not remember the source, but it spurred my interest so I started looking into it. It seems that in Ireland they have started a 15 cents tax each on plastic bag, in an attempt to help control pollution. I thought this was a great idea it is in effect a voluntary tax, but serves two purposes, raises monies to pay for environmental projects, while reducing pollution. The trees here in Las Vegas are bearing a strange fruit these days, plastic bags waving in the breeze everywhere. The “Ireland Solution”, is being watched in many other countries around the world, while several countries have banned them altogether. I could also get behind that idea. Link to the BBC story http://news.bbc.co.uk

3) This link is related to the last one just in case you thought the subject trivial, I have one here that might bring things into focus. I had no idea six months ago that this was going on, and I am sure most of you have not been aware of it either. It seems there are islands of trash in the Pacific Ocean the size of continents. These are putting toxins into the human food chain, destroying, fish, bird, and sea mammal populations. Just for starters, increase your awareness and check out this article. http://www.dailygalaxy.com

4) Now for something a little lighter, I really liked this link about a candle cannon it is a short video. If you like Myth Busters stuff you will really enjoy is one, I know I did. Not going to get into it to much other than to say just how far away do you think you can blow out the candles on a birthday cake. http://www.youtube.com

5) Now to wind up here is a link to the smallest production car ever made, from way back in 1963 the P-50. Was said to be cheaper than walking, the car cost less than 200 pounds, and gets over 100 mpg. If you are wondering how small, think about small enough to pick up and bring into the building set it next to your desk. Very cool video, about a very cool car, be sure to check it out http://www.youtube.com

Microsoft slates four patches for next week

Looks like the patches are mainly concerned with Office, this month.

Enjoy,
Jack

JAVA Updates

It's time to update your Java again, whether the runtime environment or the development kit. Here's a list of some of the security problems fixed and many of them are serious enough that we all need to do the update in a hurry.

Jack

Whistle-Blower: Feds Have a High-Speed Backdoor Into Wireless Carrier

So can you hear me now?

Sorry, I couldn't resist. This comes on the heals of the revelation that the FBI has gathered more information than it was authorized to. See: More FBI Privacy Violations Confirmed

Feature List for Internet Explorer 8

Straight from Microsoft. I don't see anything in there that will shake the world. It's just a good solid list of evolutionary growth in the feature department.

The crash recovery feature is probably the most important. If you're going to start using web apps via your browser, you don't want to lose work if something goes wrong. This feature is directed toward that need and though details of how it is accomplished are not yet available, we are told it is fairly zoomy. There are several ways of going about this sort of thing and it will be interesting to see how MS chooses to do it because there is room for a better way.

Jack

Open Letter to Steve Jobs: In Support of an iPod reader

Mac TidBITS has an idea. They want Apple to make an ebook reader. They think Apple can do a better job than Sony or Amazon has. They may be right.

I wonder how many people would buy this reader over the others? Surely the market is much bigger than that defined by Kindle sales. Perhaps Apple would price theirs realistically and try to make the real bundle on downloads, instead of gouging at both ends. And perhaps Apple's reader would be fully usable.

It could happen.

Jack

Know Your Enemy

Message Labs has taken code from some of today's Internet threats and given it to an artist, Alex Dragulescu, who used the code to generate images. They're kinda cool and definitely offbeat enough to make good desktop backgrounds.

Jack

Singularity: Microsoft's research OS available for download

Time for a little geeking out.

"Singularity" is strictly a research project, and not the next version of Windows, as has been stated by folks who don't read the entire document. However; it may point the way to the future in many ways. I found this article interesting and will likely attempt to make my way through some of the research papers. I hope you find at least this article of interest, as well.

Jack

IE 8 Will Default to Standards Mode

The cynics among us will simply say that Microsoft has seen the way the wind blows in the European Union and realizes they will lose this newest complaint from Opera over standards. The Microsoft boosters will say they are doing something good for us, as is their way.

You know what? I don't care who is right. I'm just happy it is happening. If MS sticks to this course of action, every single one of us will win. That's all there is to it.

The link is to the IE 8 blog at MSDN. It is worth a careful read.

Jack

Apple: Macbook Air Selling Like Extremely Expensive Hotcakes?

Whether you are bummed because you can't afford one, or don't want one for perceived inadequacies, the Macbook Air is selling out. For all the criticism, I believe that Apple has taken the pulse of the marketplace and has produced something that people want.

This article questions whether the shortages are a supply problem, or a demand situation and Apple isn't telling. I think it is a little of each.

Exploitation is Still Possible as Third-Parties Neglect to Implement Vista Security Features | Zero Day | ZDNet.com

Exploitation is Still Possible as Third-Parties Neglect to Implement Vista Security Features | Zero Day | ZDNet.com: "Consider this, Microsoft spends huge amounts of dollars and manpower creating protections for the Vista operating system, yet we still have old school vulnerabilities. Why? The answer is simple really, third-party created code is not stepping up and taking advantage of these powerful protection mechanisms."

People say this is Microsoft's fault!
What is wrong with this picture?

AlaskaJoe

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 03-02-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 03-02-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) To start off the week I received an email yesterday accepting me to a beta test for the Hulu site I wrote about a couple of weeks ago, when revisiting my online T.V. investigation. I was very impressed with my first visit. While I did not have very much time, because I had to prep for today’s show and I was only there long enough to watch an episode of Hero’s. The site was easy to navigate, there seems to be quite a lot there, right now mostly United States, but they say they are going to be adding much more. There were a couple of commercial breaks in the show, but only about 30 seconds each. I think there were only two, so that would be one minute, for a one-hour show, well less than an hour because of the lack of other commercials. The quality was top notch, no buffering, looked to be high definition, I’ll bring you up to date in a week or two when I have had some more time with it. If you sign up for the beta, let me know what you think. http://www.hulu.com

2) Link number two for the week falls into that to good to be true file, but someday just maybe, one will pan out. I have had an extremely busy week for some reason, so I have not had time to dig into the why not’s of this whole thing, but I am looking forward to it. Convert your car to run on water, and the guide is only $49.97, however it seems there are several companies offering the same, so you might want to shop around. Sounds like fun to me, any way if you get into it let me know, after all I just bought a truck. http://www.articleanswer.com

3) Well it is official today, March 1^st 2008, Netscape has passed away, BBC’s eulogy link here, complete with firefox’s logo in the story. Anyway as I am sure we will be discussing this on the show, I am not going to go into much detail, just an interesting article information wise. http://news.bbc.co.uk

4) This is one site that I am very interested in Riley’s opinion of; I have run across many sites dealing with visual illusions. This is the first time I have found one that deals with auditory illusion. You need to read the text to understand what you are listening for. It was illuminating for me to realize just how visually oriented I am. A very interesting site, spend a few minuets here it is worth the time. http://www.newscientist.com

5) AS most of you know by now I love to read about conspiracy theories, the big ones, little ones and all those in the middle. I believe the best way to improve your mind, and understanding is to open it to all possibilities. Ask your self just why is a good novel so interesting, is not all fiction born from the same spirit as conspiracy. The main difference is in the perception of fact and fiction, this last link for the week is aimed in that direction. The thing I like about this one is the lack of tedious detail. The site covers the concepts without the need to explain all the facts, in the usual defensive manner I find distracting. It is an excellent source to start surfing from, I like these places that get me off looking into how diverse we really are. http://uforeview.tripod.com

Mobo maker builds 'powerless' processor cooling fan

I have always been a fan of Stirling engines and have made several over the years, including one that stirred a beer pot utilizing the waste heat from the brewing process. This is an overwhelmingly cool application of a venerable technology.

Jack

How open source has influenced Windows Server 2008

Sam Ramji writes on an MS "Open Source" site.

Yes, it's company propaganda. Yes, it is spun to the moon and back. It's hard to find fault with that because as far as I or anyone I know can tell, it's all true!

Not that MS has not listened to users before. They really have. And not that this is the first time MS has delivered a product straight down the alley of user desire. It is not. But surely they have never done so much in a way so responsive to user requests. I have a hunch getting to know Windows Server 2008 is going to be a LOT more enjoyable than first I thought.

Jack

Desperate Microsoft cuts Vista pricing

For those of you who have not been paying strict attention (tisk, tisk) the price cuts are for RETAIL copies, like the one of Ultimate I got stiffed on just after release. It seems too many of the "build it yourself" crowd are installing Linux.

Jack

Microsoft Lists Programs Borked by Vista SP1

The problem is that the list is obviously woefully incomplete. While I suppose some of that is Microsoft's responsibility, it seems more than a little farfetched to lay it all on them. Or much of any of it, for that matter.

It's a cinch SP 1 will break some stuff. I am unaware of that sort of major upgrade to anything not breaking some stuff. And that includes the upgrade I just did to my Linux box. (Where IS that penguin, anyway? I'm getting tired of holding this gun.) I would like a much more comprehensive listing, but it is what it is.

Jack

Geek Meet 2008

Just a reminder that Geek Meet 2008 is April 11-13 in Las Vegas, NV. If you are going to be joining us and haven't already done so, please fill out the registration form at http://geekmeet.oncomputers.info. Registration is due March 1st, if you wish to receive a T-shirt. Hotel rooms at the Microtel Inn must be booked by March 10th if you wish to receive the group rate.

The *missing* update finally released Thunderbird 2.0.0.12 arives Feb 26, 2008

Mozilla lately has been put down regarding patches that stated a fix that included 2.0.0.12 of Thunderbird, well, that missing revision has now been released. The link above takes you to the release notes for the new version.

Report: broadband policy leaves billions of dollars on table

It's like we have been saying; broadband in America kinda, well, sucks. I guess that's the only word for it. And the national policy behind broadband adoption sucks worse. Change is going to come hard, though. You can bet on that.

Jack

Critical VMware Bug Breaks 'Barrier'

This is a big one. However; because it is located in the Virtual Machine itself, we can mitigate any possible damages until it is fixed by simply running a good AV on the Windows host machine and not using the Shared Folders feature unless we run it on a removable drive that we can scan after the files are put there or accessed. At least that's what I'm told so far.

The part of VM Ware's site dealing with this has been temporarily slashdotted by folks wanting to know. I'm sure we'll be able to get clear information by the morning, but for now it's out of reach. And VM Ware has said a patch is coming within two weeks, so a temporary workaround is tolerable. That's as good a time frame as companies like Microsoft can give us when they are caught in a Zero Day situation, though everyone would like to see it sooner rather than later.

Jack

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 02-24-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 02-24-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) First up for the week is another of those advancements in technology where I think we get the biggest bang for our buck, helping people who have problems to solve. Kind of like the exoskeleton, a few weeks back, but a little more conventional, although not much. This has to be the coolest wheel chair ever to hit the market place. It will be a wonderful future if this becomes the main stream, I do believe technology is our evolution as a species. If you are unfamiliar with this item, you should check it out. http://www.ibotnow.com

2) This item might appeal to the geek in some of you. It strikes me as an example of someone with way to much time on their hands, but I will leave it up to you. It is a musical composition using only the sounds found in windows XP, and 98, I thought it was interesting but to long. Amazing what you can accomplish during a three month bout with cabin fever, http://www.youtube.com

3) Now to answer the question, are there people out there in their garages inventing our future? Or, at least trying, using the internet in an attempt to breakthrough to the masses, well yes there are. Here is an example of a man and his son with a dream, while I do not think they are going to make it, I have to give them credit for trying. If they can get the numbers they talk about it would be most impressive, but they really need a design man, at least when it comes to curb appeal. http://www.dreamcar123.com/

4) In the do it yourself department I found this one, would be a great project for kids. It is an easy and not to complicated way to build your own world clock, for a few pennies. Looks like it works pretty well to me, although I have little need for one, as a teaching aid it might have some value. http://www.metacafe.com/

5) In the green planet department for the week how about a lamp that runs on gravity, and will last 200 years, now that is hard to beat. Very cool, check it out here. http://dvice.com

Vista SP1 Hoses Some Applications

Microsoft Knowledge Base Article #935796 tells us that some applications will either experience degraded performance or not run at all after Service Pack 1 (SP1) is installed. You can find it at the link above.

This kind of thing seems to happen to one degree or another with every Windows Service Pack. To be honest, I am not sure whether to be concerned that this time so many security applications are affected or not. Right now, I think the best position to take is to simply stay informed and make plans according to how things look as we get closer to the actual release of the Service Pack.

More than anything, we need clarification of existing information and the results of more testing. I'm sure that will be done, both by Microsoft and their testers.

Jack

Disk encryption may not be secure enough, new research finds

It's a huge flaw in the way encryption is executed and there are ways to work around it. Good practice can mitigate some of the risk. The rest may have to be tolerated until the devices we use change in the normal course of things or are changed to eliminate this risk.

The problems is that the encryption keys can be recovered from the computers RAM, even after the computer is shut off! Contrary, though there is some reduction in retention, RAM does not lose all the data stored in it immediately upon shutting down the device. And in hibernation/sleep or suspend states may not lose it at all. The encryption keys can be recovered by astute researchers in many cases.

It's an interesting subject and the methods used to slow degradation of bits stored in RAM were so simple and inexpensive that their elegance will astound.

Jack

Intel pushes Raytracing again

I've been interested in ray tracing for over a year now. Apparently the developers concerned with our next generation of video hardware (or the one after that) have settled upon this as the way to do things. This short article will tell you what things.

Ray tracing is orders of magnitude more efficient at yielding "full reality" high definition content. In some ways it takes an awful lot more doing than rasterized images we are drawing now. The processor horsepower needs for ray tracing are staggering, even today. But, as everyone knows; Moore's Law just keeps chugging along and we will easily have that horsepower available to us before all that much more time has passed. And as this article tells us, the economy is to the programmer. She or he gets to write a lot less code to get a lot more effect out of it all. That is the difference. (Ray tracing will also lend itself to more automated ways of tweaking programmed images than we have now. Fill out a form about surface textures, degrees of reflectivity, etc; and the development environment does the rest. The programmers will have a field day.)

It's coming.

Jack

Microsoft launches new open standards, interoperability push

This is huge!

Apparently Microsoft has seen which way the wind blows and had a genuine "come to Jesus" moment. In addition to the European Union's efforts to push MS into true interoperability, something fundamental has changed within the company.

I suppose this could be more smoke and mirrors than reality, but I don't think so. They seem really, really serious about it all. The company's press release/announcement is here. and there doesn't seem to be any funny business going on at all. I believe them.

Their covenant not to sue seems all on the up and up and offers rather generous terms to open source companies. Individuals and small organizations fly free.

Lastly; There is a certain smugness at Red Hat, Canonical/Ubuntu and some other Linux organizations. Their refusal to sign patent pledges with Microsoft is now completely vindicated. A short commentary on that can be found here.

Jack

Trend Micro 2008 forecast for cybercrime.

Needless to say, the forecast is grim.

Even so, I wanted to post this because it seems to agree with what the members of our OnComputers community are reporting and expecting. In a way, this is a sort of kudo to all of you who have contacted us on security matters because it confirms that the things you are seeing are indeed part of the big picture and that you see them correctly.

Jack

Lamp lit by gravity wins Greener Gadget award

Sometimes I just fall in love with something I find on the web. This is definitely one of those things. It's a lamp powered by gravity. You lift some weight up and as it comes down, it powers the lamp for a half-hour or something like that.

Obviously efficient, it is also just a cool looking device and an obviously cool hack.

Jack

The internet as a platform? Not as ISP bloodbath looms

It all boils down to who is going to pay for the bandwidth?

We think we are paying for bandwidth, but the truth is that our "broadband" has been severely oversold by the ISP. They simply cannot deliver the volume of data nor the speeds they have promised to all their customers. The infrastructure is not there. This applies to the US, Canada and a host of other nations besides Britain, which is the actual subject of this article.

As more and more content is available in bandwidth-intensive formats, this is going to be more and more of a problem and we all know that sooner or later, we (the users) are going to end up paying for it in one form or another.

Jack

Don't Give Me That Vista Thing!

(Written for another site in January, I thought you might wish to see it here, as they did not use it.)

Bad reputations can be incredibly difficult to overcome and Microsoft's Vista operating system has enough of a bad rep that no one is going to let it date their sister, if you know what I mean.

That's too bad. Not that I'm a Vista booster. I'm not. But Vista is not all bad, by any means, my objections notwithstanding. It will serve a lot of users very well. Probably the vast majority of users, when you get right down to it.

A few days ago, I got a call from a friend. His aunt needed to buy a new computer. The old one died. We chatted for a while about just how to recover her address book and data (something my friend is quite capable of doing but he wanted confirmation of his plan's utility and efficacy). Then we talked about just what she needs from a computer.

She is a heavy email user, participates almost continuously in several IRC chat rooms centered on her various interests, surfs a lot, prints a lot of color photos along with black and white documents in volume. For this she has two printers. A color ink jet and a monochrome laser, along with a standalone scanner. She uses Vonage for most of her phone calls and she plays Sudoku on the machine.

A quick check showed Vista drivers for both printers and the scanner were available. Her display was also supported. As she was already using a simple memory card reader for transferring her photos from her camera to the computer, that was no problem at all. A quick proposal was put together centering on an HP computer equipped with Vista.

Her reaction was swift and definitive; "Don't give me that Vista thing!".

A bit of discussion revealed that she has both read and been told about just how bad Vista is. She had a lot of objections at hand, ready to go. She had been told that Vista was going to prevent her copying images, regardless of their origin. And that Vista would not support her games, scanner or printers. Plus, she had been informed that she would have to learn everything about using her computer all over again.

With such ingrained opposition, the easy course would be to simply purchase a computer equipped with Windows XP, or transfer her to a Mac. (There is no way she would go with Linux.) Instead, her nephew, my friend, simply lent her a laptop with Vista installed. We set her up a user account, installed her games and the appropriate drivers. Only the scanner required a download. The rest were already part of Vista. And we put all her data on it, as well.

A few days use turned her into a Vista enthusiast. The clincher was probably something others won't experience in comparison to their XP machines; greater stability. Her XP computer was never all that stable and would crash on occasion. (My friend and I worked on this and in the end attributed the problems to hardware, rather than the operating system or software. The machine would crash occasionally running a Linux live CD, too.) The Vista laptop, and indeed her new computer, both with Home Premium installed, are more stable than her XP machine was.

So she was converted. The new machine was duly installed and she is very, very happy with it. And features we never thought to point out to her because we take them for granted, like the USB and audio ports on the front of the machine, delight her, as well. It really is a nice computer with it's Core Duo processor and plenty of system memory (2 GB).

But Vista labors under it's bad reputation, partly undeserved though it is, and will for all it's life. For some users, Vista really is not a good thing. For others, meaning almost all users, it is completely adequate and, indeed, just what is needed. I think this applies to it's heightened security functions, more than anything else. One can argue just how secure Vista is, but there is no doubt at all it is more secure than it's predecessor.

Writers and other commentators still pile it on, though. Not just in the tech press, either. The criticism makes it into mainstream news, too. Vista is bad in this way. Vista is bad in some other way. It seems to never end. Frankly, I don't think Vista can recover. Given that, I wonder if the best thing Microsoft can do is to simply move on and bring out a demonstrably new operating system as soon as humanly possible. One with a new and clean reputation.

Jack

Faxing in OpenOffice.org

After having questions in chat about Faxing from OpenOffice, I found this article, thought I should pass it along.

Intel's Silverthorne Unveiled: Detailing Baby Centrino

We have mentioned Intel's "Silverthorne" platform (chipset and processor together) in connection with a couple products in the last two shows. Here, in all it's radiant glory is AnandTech's take on how it works and what it means. A somewhat geeky article, but it's important to wade through this one. That's because Silverthorne is as likely to be the next Centrino as not and, frankly, it raises the bar for low-power consumption platforms intended for devices larger than phones and smaller than notebook computers.

Frankly, I think this one is very cool and would fit right into my life as the heart of a UMPC or similar device.

Jack

Our Seti@home team

We are down to four active members. We can do better that that I hope.

AMD opens sources performance library

I had 9 emails waiting in my inbox about this one when I got to the computer this morning.

One and all pointed out to me that this is the sort of thing that has to happen for software developers to take adequate advantage of concurrency in modern processors. (For those of you who aren't keeping up with the jargon, 'concurrencey', or 'concurrence' is the new term for multi-threading in such a way as to utilize all the different processor cores available in today's multi-core, multi-chip machines.)

It's true. And a LOT more will have to happen before the state of the art advances. The cool thing about it is that the necessary pieces are being put into place.

Jack

Mozilla Messenging

It's an additional function for Thunderbird.

I'm not sure the world is in dire need of another messenging protocol, but here it is. I'll hold off until they add it to Pidgin, thank you. I'm not using Thunderbird. There ARE a LOT of T-Bird users, though, and for all I know they are clamoring to have this. It's from the Mozilla folks, so perhaps there is less worry about security and privacy than there might be with other vendors. And the price is right.

Check it out.

Jack

Microsoft To Announce WorldWide Telescope On February 27

TechCrunch has what looks like a scoop on a new Microsoft feature that will allow one to view many portions of the Universe, as seen by the Hubble and ground-based telescopes. This is slated to be better and more comprehensive than Google Sky, though of course meaningful comparison will have to wait for the release.

Anyway; this is the kind of application for which it seems the Internet was made, despite what the porn dealers say .

Jack

DVD Jon Strikes Again!

"DVD Jon" Lech Johansen's company, doubleTwist, has released their new application, the "doubleTwist desktop", which allows users to convert their legally purchased (and even copy-protected) media files from one device's format to another, seamlessly and easily. It's Windows only and free. Click the link above for more information and the download.

Supports a very long list of devices, but iPhone support is still in the future.

Jack

Enclosed, but not encrypted

Here's the deal; Just because the box says the device encrypts the data doesn't really mean anything. Flaws in hardware capabilities, execution and algorithms render the encryption almost meaningless. Anyone who wants to study a bit can beat it. Anyone!

The article linked to at Heise shows how badly the makers and sellers of the device mislead the public. They say it is for "general purpose" users but the truth is that the encryption is no more than a speed bump on the way to reading the data. Better to use GnuPG, PGP or TrueCrypt on a regular drive in a regular enclosure. There are a lot of ways to accomplish what this device fails so spectacularly at; both free and proprietary.

Personally, I recommend TrueCrypt, though I use GnuPG, as well.

Jack

Hardware companies can’t write software

It's a rant about the crappy software hardware companies saddle us with when we buy their hardware. Good reading and I fully agree. I'm taking this as a warning about which brands to stay away from. Of course, I already knew about Sony.

Jack

Sorry

I would like to apologize to anyone offended by my experiment with Amazon, it won't happen again.

--MissM

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 02-17-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 02-17-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

For a special 10% discount on Skylook 2.0 or Skylook 2.0 Elite just use BEESKNEES as your coupon code. Thank you Jeremy Hague from SkyLook
For help on how to use this coupon, see www.skylook.biz/coupon

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) Let us begin the week with the good stuff, first up how to create plasma with a beer bottle and a microwave oven. How is that for shaking up the house hold, you will need a microwave oven preferably one that is not regularly used to cook your dinner, I cannot believe this is a good thing to do to one of your regular appliances. In addition to the oven you will need a blowtorch, is this getting good or what. Oh and a beer bottle, an empty one, wow a home run, you start it off by emptying the beer bottle. For me that would not bring the kitchen sink to mind, but I will leave it up to you. Here is a link to a video demonstration. http://www.gizmodo.com.

2) Now if that just gets your juices flowing, let’s kick it up a notch. Here is a whole lot more of cool things to do with that microwave you picked up at the garage sale to do the beer bottle. Among the unwise things to do with your microwave include titles like; “Lightning Storm”, “Ball Lightning”, “Plasma Pool”, “Tesla Coil”, “Vaporized Aluminum”, just to name a few. You may need another oven, thankfully garage sales, and thrift stores are everywhere. Anyway, if the mad scientist in you is screaming to get out here is the link P.S. There are lots more interesting things to do in the garage at this site. Especially if you enjoy freaking out your neighbors, my former disclaimers apply here. http://amasci.com

3) One more microwave site to consider this one sent to me by Joe who found it while looking for info on his home unit. It is a little tamer if those other sites seemed a little over the top you may want to start here. The only problem I had with this one is the choice of color, one of those hard to read due to lack of contrast. http://margo.student.utwente.nl

4) Enough with the microwaves, I was looking into T.V. on the net again. I cannot seem to get this off my brain, I started out with a site called hula supposed to give a schedule of internet T.V. shows available on the net. I signed up for the beta last week still no answer. http://www.hulu.com/ However linking on to other sites landed me at this one, but it sounds too good to be true as usual. What they are offering for a one time download, in addition to the 4000 world wide television stations is, free unlimited MP3 music over 90 million songs, free movie downloads over 80 million movies, free unlimited downloads TV shows full episodes, free CD/DVD copy soft ware, and much more, whatever that means. Granted some is most likely already available, but it has me asking why am I paying cable, and Netflix if it is real. Any feed back would be welcome, anyway here is the link http://www.television-on-internet.com/ I was referring to package B, A is cheaper but not as featured. By the way the site has a thing I have never seen before when you leave.

5) Last a little anti vista quickie video http://blip.tv/file/340692

Blog Housekeeping

I have backed up the blog through the previous post. I had to change the template to add the present to the right, and if anybody has any suggestions, please let me know.

As a result of wanting to add a little "sunshine" to your day. (Yes, I do think that the readers of this blog will enjoy this.) Amazon Unbox has the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Video available for free, until February 25th. I've not used Amazon unbox myself, but I am excited about their MP3s as an option to iTunes.

The online options for content are amazing. Since the price for this was right, when I posted, I thought I'd pass it on. Sorry to the bandwidth challenged... (and you know who you are ;) ).

This is a catch all post, so... here's one more thing.
Preliminary Chumby review from CNET (full review coming later this month).
In other open source hardware reviews, Bug Labs is producing open source "modules" that clip together, and function together.

That is all, for now. Have a great weekend, see you tomorrow.
--MissM

Use of Rogue DNS Servers on Rise

Yet another security threat that attacks via the browser. I just thought you'd need to know about this one.

Jack

Microsoft delivers 11 patches, 6 critical; Excel flaw left unpatched | Zero Day | ZDNet.com

Microsoft delivered 11 patches on Tuesday addressing 17 vulnerabilities. Six updates fix critical flaws and five address important vulnerabilities, but an already exploited Excel zero day was left unpatched.
Do your Microsoft updates!
AlaskaJoe

More iPhone Hacking

The latest firmware updates for the iPhone have been undone to the extent that the device will once again run on unapproved networks.

The details are a bit above my understanding, but the struggle is fun to watch.

Jack

CNET News.com

Starbucks ditches T-Mobile for AT&T | The Social - CNET News.com
"Ubiquitous caffeine conglomerate Starbucks has ended its Wi-Fi partnership with T-Mobile in favor of one with AT&T.

Under the earlier plan with T-Mobile, Starbucks customers needed a paid subscription to access the in-store Wi-Fi service, and T-Mobile HotSpot subscribers will continue to have access to Starbucks Wi-Fi thanks to an agreement between AT&T and T-Mobile. But the new AT&T plan allows all customers 2 free hours per day, with a $3.99 fee for additional 2-hour chunks of time. Monthly subscriptions will cost $19.99 and will enable access to other AT&T hot-spot locations in addition to Starbucks."
This was one reason I selfishly regretted not participating in the OLPC program, a free year of T-Mobile. I know, I know... sorry.
Starbucks ditches T-Mobile for AT&T | The Social - CNET News.com

And its official. Yahoo rejected Microsoft, saying the bid was undervalued.

h/t to Twitter

--MissM (I'm on twitter too, fyi)
P.S. Note to fellow bloggers, I'm going to back up the blog (this week), and update it to try some things :)

Game makers hit out at Apple

I wonder if this little article doesn't give the real reason why the Mac has never been taken up as a serious gaming platform.

Lately stories of the iPhone and other Apple hardware being so tightly controlled have popped up over and over and all of them lend credence to this article.

I guess Apple needs to wake up.

Jack

Microsoft Research's InkSeine coming this Friday

The most likely reason Tablet PCs (as envisioned by Microsoft) didn't take off was/is the lack of a "killer application". Well, that's my opinion and I'm sticking to it. There just was not a compelling reason to go out and buy one.

But Microsoft is a big company and at times very secretive about their researches, so we don't get to see what their developers and planners are thinking about and working on much of the time. Now up pops InkSeine, what looks like the basis of the killer app for the Tablet. It is not hard to see Microsoft's release/non-release of this as testing the waters to see if this generates any buzz at all among developers. If it does, I'll bet the little "research project" blossoms into a product development project faster than you can say "Steve Ballmer talks too loudly".

Be sure to follow the link to the features list. I found reading that really whet my appetite for a tablet. That has happened before, but this time things look more or less lined up to give us a really forceful argument for buying one. I hope they continue to develop it and bring it out as an add-on for Vista or as a stand-alone Tablet PC version.

Jack

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 02-10-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 02-10-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) For starters, this week I thought I would begin with an article possibility related to global warming. When one thinks of venomous critters, the first thing that comes to mind is usually spiders, and snakes. However if you want nasty it is hard to beat the box jellyfish when it comes to a threat to people. Seems it takes about 180 extremely painful seconds to kill a human being. The climate change is creating some serious problems with them, among several other species. The jellyfish has an especially effective survival mechanism it seems if you kill them off, their defense is to, immediately start a breeding frenzy in the billions. Here is the link to an interesting story, documentary movie coming out on the 12^th in England, I hope to find it on the net soon after, if I do I will post a link. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ Another example is the yellow jacket wasp, seems they usually die off in the winter, or at least they used to, the average size of a large nest has been about the size of a basketball. Not they are living through the winter and some nests have been as large as a Volkswagen Beetle. Story link here http://www.tuscaloosanews.com

2) This link is one of those about free energy that caught my eye. Woods Hole Oceanographic has a thermal glider that has been operating since December 2007, and still should have another six months left. Has been traveling through the ocean continually for thousands of miles, using zero fuel of any kind other than a couple of alkaloid batteries to operate the computers, and guidance system. Shows the answer to our problems is exercising our creativity. A very cool tool, and a good read http://www.whoi.edu

3) It is about time for a little U.F.O. as I have been rather quiet about the subject for a while. Although, I have been wanting to ask Jack if he has seen anything odd in the Texas skies lately. There have been several stories about sightings in Texas in the news lately with titles like “U.F.O’s and the Bible belt collide”. Anyway, the link I put up is not about that. this is from a Canadian paper about President Eisenhower’s meeting a U.F.O. back in February, 1955. It is about one of those items that came out during the disclosure project recently. http://www.agoracosmopolitan.com

4) On a lighter note, here is a little video on someone who setup an obstacle course for squirrels, smarter than they look. If you have a vending machine at work, you might consider one as a pet, and save a couple of bucks. http://www.youtube.com

5) This is one of those over my pay grade geeky things, but I got it in an email the person who sent it was excited about it in a geeky kind of way. I rather grasp some of it, but not enough to make any sense to me. Anyhow, I am posting it for your consideration. It is about googling your forgotten passwords. http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/

XP needs to live until 2009

I'm not sure what is going on here, but I have little doubt this is one step in some sort of carefully scripted dance designed to reinforce whatever decision Microsoft has made regarding whether or not they will actually keep XP alive in deference to the apparent wishes of a large number of people or kill it off in favor of their bottom line. I'm pretty sure I can guess where that one will end up, but I can't see why they might bother to go through the song and dance just to leave corporate policy unchanged.

The dilemma for Microsoft is to either please the segment of their customers who don't want Vista over XP and lose money or forge ahead with forcing Vista on everyone, whether they want it or not. The company risks becoming significantly less respected than they are. All the good work they have done with Vista is being lost sight of. And make no mistake; there is good work there.

I expect this will "resolve" to whatever MS has decided in a month or two. The company will announce that "after careful reflection" they have decided to (fill in the blank). Until then, this is at least entertaining.

Jack

Performance Results Mixed with Vista Service Pack 1

PC World tests the final code for Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1). The results are generally favorable, though the performance improvements are not as great as many might wish. The article is an interesting read, though I would wait on more tests by other organizations and researchers before drawing any firm conclusions. It's one of those "your mileage may vary" deals, to be sure and even PC World calls their results "informal" and "preliminary".

Still, it's well worth reading. I enjoyed it, too.

Jack

Apple updates QuickTime security

This happened yesterday and I missed it. Sorry about that.

It's an important update, as one can tell by reading the Apple advisory that accompanies it. The security flaws fixed here are both critical and actively being exploited, though there is disagreement on how widely. They affect both Mac and Windows users.

So, if you have Quicktime installed, patch it. It does not matter whether or not you use it. The application needs patching or you can be compromised. Period!

Jack

Truecrypt 5.0 is out and it's free

For Windows, Linux and now for the Mac OS X!

I've been recommending Truecrypt since Gail convinced me to give it a try, a couple years ago. It did not take long to convince me of Truecrypt's utility. This is the good stuff, folks. Not only does it work, but it saddles the user with the absolute minimum of extra steps through which she/he has to go. Check it out.

Jack

Spotted in the Wild: Rogue Microsoft Update Site

I guess it had to happen, but here is yet another trap for the regular (read clueless) user.

Jack

Why Search in Vista is a Farce

I'm going to start a thread in our newsgroup about this, too. I'd like to hear what you all have to say about it.

Personally, I am against Vista's search for the amount of resources it takes. However; I have not had any problems with the results obtained. I was surprised to see this post and find some others like it.

So, jump over to our newsgroup at news.oncomputers.info and discuss it.

Jack

Holes in numerous ActiveX controls

ActiveX is a grand idea, but Microsoft's execution of it has been plagued since it started with security issues. While that is not terribly surprising, what IS surpising is that Microsoft has not been able to tighten things up, at least enough to stop this seemingly endless parade of alerts. I guess it is as flawed a technology as it's critics suggest.

US Cert is telling users to disable ActiveX, at least for now. You can do that, but it will keep you from getting automatic updates to Microsoft operating systems or other products, such as Office. You also have to enable ActiveX to use Windows Update or Microsoft Update, but once you are done updating, disabling ActiveX is recommended. See this article at Computer World's site.

Jack

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 02-03-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 02-03-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Geek Meet 2008 in Las Vegas April 11-13

If you are coming to keep watching GeekMeet.OnComputers.info for more information.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) Well it looks like we have survived TU24 last Tuesday. That means we can start planning what we are going to do in the future. I ran across something on the net that has me daydreaming about a future vacation. It seems there is a company in France planning to build something called a manned cloud. Essentially, it is a 700+ foot long blimp shaped like a whale, with a luxury hotel for a gondola. Complete with restaurants, library, fitness room, and spa. There will even be a sun deck on the top of the helium-filled envelope. Wow! Can you imagine having cocktails at sunset, on top in the open air at about a thousand feet in the air, or how about stargazing with a nightcap before retiring for the night? Check this out it is very cool. http://www.dezeen.com

2) This next site reminds me of something I saw when researching Craigslist. There are groups that do public stunts, like a hundred people accumulating at a mall, everyone entering as individuals mingling with the crowd, then on cue they all start barking like dogs, or something. They just do it for fun; I remember reading an old Sci-Fi book about the concept of flash crowds. The premises was based on teleporting booths, like a phone booth, you could just dial your self any where you wanted to go, every time something was happening on the news, large crowds of people would teleport to the scene. This site is about a group that stages events using groups of people, the one featured here was a couple of hundred people freezing on cue,for five minutes at Grand Central Station in New York. There is video of people’s response, interesting how the uninformed public reacted. http://www.improveverywhere.com/

3) This site covers some of the subjects discussed on the show, I am not sure if it is news to the group, but I decided if some of you are unfamiliar with it I should post it as a source of information. Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society and Oxford University’s Internet Institute are leading this initiative with the support of several prominent tech companies, including Google, Levono, and Sun Microsystems. Consumer Reports WebWatch is serving as an unpaid special adviser. They are a “Neighborhood Watch” campaign aimed at stopping “badware” on the net.http://www.stopbadware.org/

4) This is another “Geek” site I ran across I remember Jack talking about the MacBook Air, so when I saw this I thought it would be a good fit here. The title sort of says it all “Man buys MacBook Air, pulls it apart, takes pics. There is a link to ifixit’s step-by-step disassembly, complete with pictures and instructions, I guess handy if you need to replace the battery. http://www.reghardware.co.uk

5) Have you wondered where the Dot-com pioneers are now? I ran across this article thought it was something that you might be interested it, who is still around, who has disappeared, and who bought who. http://www.webware.com

6) The last one is about the plans to bring broadband to the entire United States; the article is quite current from Jan. 31, 2008. Talks about just how far behind the curve the U.S. is in relation to the world, when it comes to broadband. Discusses what we need to do, and why we are in the situation of loosing ground, what it will mean for our future. The article seem to me to be a must read on the subject, so take the time to check it out. http://arstechnica.com/

Technometria: Ajax Security

"Billy Hoffman gets excited and scary while discussing how as Web sites and traditional desktop software are rapidly moving to the Web via Ajax, the transition is being made with reckless disregard for security. [runtime: 01:09:08, 31.6 mb, recorded 2008-01-23] "I found this very enlightening, and scary at the same time. As more and more websites become user configurable, aka "ajaxy," this is something that those of us on the bleeding edge of surfing web 2.0 need to be aware of. --MissM

read more | digg story

Smart 'Lego' conjures up virtual 3D twin

No IT angle here, folks. But there are times when stuff turns up that is just too neat not to share. This is obviously one of them.

I could think of a number of real-world uses for this sort of device. As the article points out, though, the first thing that seems to leap to the minds of readers is games. One way or another, I hope this triggers your imagination. It sure did mine.

Jack

A tour of Google's new Experimental Search. Verdict: awesome

"Stuff" is happening at Google. Besides all this new search stuff, helpfully collated at Ars Technica, they are working up to previewing new offline capabilities for Google Apps. Just the search stuff is enough excitement for me, this week, but there is apparently more to come--soon.

Jack

Software Tool Strips Windows Vista To Bare Bones

Using vLite, you can reduce Vista's footprint on disk by 50% or more. That still won't make it as small as XP Pro, but it is a grand start. Of course, that begs the question of whether or not Vista needs to be as small as XP Pro on disk, but evidently some folks think it at least needs a starvation diet for a while.

The appearance of vLite is just the first page in this story. I predict there will be several more tools available to do similar modifications on Vista before long. Microsoft also is saying they will make succeeding versions of Windows much more modular to allow installation customization, though as this needs to be done at the installation and MS is now restricting the number of installations one can do under their activation scheme, this may benefit only those who buy the top version(s), which plays into Microsoft's hands, rather than serving the consumer.

We will be following this one.
Jack

Microsoft : Windows 7 STILL in planning stage and will take approximately 3 years to develop.

While hardly a surprise, this is contrary to the rumors we have been hearing about Microsoft rushing to complete Windows 7 (or whatever they end up calling the next version; I vote for "Windows Recoup") in order to sort of "pave over" the problem child that is Vista.

I guess we will just have to wait and see what actually happens.

Jack

Geek Meet 2008 will be the weekend of April 11-13 2008 in Las Vegas.

Geek Meet is ON!!!!

Here is the tentative hotel information. We have not yet signed the contracts, so please do NOT call to make reservations yet. This web page will be changed as soon as the contract is signed. (Later this week)
AlaskaJoe

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 01-27-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 01-27-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Interview with Jeremy Hague

we had an interview with Jeremy Hague from www.CallBurner.com a program made to record Skype calls. This is a very cool and easy to use program.
Jeremy has set up a coupon for us:
"CallBurner Skype call recorder (www.callburner.com) special offer: Save 10% off CallBurner (www.callburner.com) & CallBurner ExtraHot! (www.callburner.com/extrahot) when you use this special OnComputers.info coupon.

ONCOMPUTERS

For help on how to use this coupon, please see www.callburner.com/coupon.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) I was sent this link, I feel the need to put in a small disclaimer here; These links are for your information only, if you feel the need to perform any action based on them you do so at your own risk I am not responsible for any damages incurred as a result of that action. Okay enough of that, this first link is how to make fire with water, a chemical reaction that would have pleased me as a teenager, also might have put me in jail. I am often surprised what subjects can be found on the net how to make an atomic bomb would be included in that venue this is not that bad, or maybe worse, due to availability of ingredients. So if you choose to watch this please be responsible. http://www.instructables.com

2) The disclaimer in the last link would also apply here. This is a how to for an entertainment trick on how to play with fire, as in part of an act a fire-eater, or magician would do on stage. Learn how to juggle and impress your friends at your next party; just try not to impress the local fire department as well. http://youtube.com

3) On a little grander scale than just destroying the house and/or neighborhood lets move on to the latest in warfare. I was reading a story on advanced sight for small military robots. Article linked here http://www.networkworld.com an interesting article. As a small aside here the iRobot company listed as being licensed for the landar technology is the same company that makes the Roomba automatic vacuum, just incase you might have a few extra bucks to throw into the stock market. Anyway, this article led me to a link on the latest military technology. This site is put up by the Israeli’s, on international defense technology. Some very scary stuff here, but informative if the subject is your cup of tea. http://www.defense-update.com/

4) Okay we have covered the house, neighborhood, and the country, what is left? How about we take out the entire planet, and do it in the next two days or so. This one has me hoping there will be a show next week. Have you heard about TU24? Probably not, I know it was news to me, I had often heard the question “If there was an asteroid going top hit the Earth would the government tell us about it?” This could be an alarming wake up call to answer that question. I put up a link a while back about the comet Holmes becoming the largest object in our solar system, even larger than the Sun. It seems that was due to a rather newly discovered field of research called a plasma discharge. Sorry it is one of those subjects not listed in my pay-grade description. It appears TU24; an object about the size of the Sears Towers will be missing the planet next week, but will be passing close enough to enter our magnetosphere, if TU24 is a negatively charged object it could trigger a plasma discharge, causing an unknown amount of damage. http://www.tu24.org/The site is one that was put up only to disclose information about TU24, I found the most information in the FAQ section, you need to navigate from there to “The Real Danger from TU24”, the go button takes you to forums, try the “Real Danger” link first.

5) Last up for the week is a link about the former planet Pluto, and the mission to visit our far-out neighbor. Seems the first photos of Pluto are in, not much to look at, but I found the article about the mission a good read. http://www.planetary.org

KDE, not just for Linux anymore?

KDE, on your Windows, on your OS X, on your OpenSolaris... And the intent appears to be the ability run software intended for other OSes, on any of the OSes, in the near future. It sound very ambitious to me, but since most new desktops and workstations being sold today, are now on some flavor of x86 CPU, it sounds more plausible today than it did in January 2006, just before Job showed off the Mac on Intel hardware in his keynote.

I don't see it has being stupid simple in the early days, but we may be able to pick and choose our software by our preferences, rather than our OS some day soon.

IE7 Auto-Rollout, Fact and Fiction

Ars has a good, short, bit about the IE 7 push. It will answer all your questions.

Microsoft's decision to treat IE 7 as a security update, rather than an application update, makes a lot of sense and no matter how you feel about IE 7, it really is more secure and treating it this way allows a lot more people to download and use it, making them more secure. And making US more secure, by logical extension.

Jack

JAVA 1.6 Update 4

Roger's Information Security Blog has a short piece on the new Java update, v4. The real attraction is the links, which centralize information and opinion on it for your convenience.

No one is sure whether or not this update is all that important. In such a circumstance, I tend to install quickly, as if it were important, to err on the side of caution. I guess you should, too.

Jack

IBM Will NOT Open OS/2 Source Code

To have OS/2 released to a development community has been the fond hope of many OS/2 fans and a lot of developers. It's not going to happen. I'm sure it could, but IBM is not going to pay for the legal legwork needed to stay out of patent and copyright hell. There is no reason for them to, in light of their already expensive and extensive committment to Linux and AIX.

Nevertheless; various communities have been trying to get IBM to release OS/2 for years. Now we've had a second answer to a petition asking just that. The answer is a resounding "no".

Jack

AT&T, P2P Filtering, and the Consumer

Now here's an interesting idea; the ISP as content filter. And this after AT&T led an all-out, expenses be damned campaign to add the "safe harbor" clauses to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that protected ISPs from just that responsibility.

Before you get too worked up reading this, remember it is just a trial balloon floated to see what happens. Still, it raises more questions than it answers and I'm sure AT&T's motive at this point is to see whether or not this could lead to angry mobs in the streets. Any less of a reaction and this might become real, but the possibilities are still slim.

Jack

ARS Technica Review of KDE 4

KDE 4 debuted this past week. Details are just coming out and, frankly, this looks like the spectacular and powerful desktop Linux has been in need of.

Version 4 has been redone under the hood and in all the visible spots. While not all new, enough of it is that just mentioning it all and tossing in some nice images takes 7 pages in the ARS review. The new version is buggy and not quite feature-complete, though it looks to me worth installing and working with right now. For that reason version 3.5, the current stable release, is still fully supported. I suspect it will take a while for the various distributions that offer KDE to switch over. That's okay.

The review is definitely worth your time. It's pretty well written and will give you a great overview of what is to come. As to whether or not you want to jump into version 4, you'll have to decide that for yourself.

Jack

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 01-20-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 01-20-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Geek Meet 2008

Geek Meet 2008 MAY be the weekend of April 11-13 2008 in Las Vegas.

We have received the final contracts for the hotel for Geek Meet. However, in the event that we do not fill the 10 rooms we have requested be blocked, the rate will be going up for each night. As of January 19th, we do not have a commitment from you, our listeners, that we will fill 10 rooms. As such, we have not signed the contract yet. If you are planning on coming to Geek Meet, considering coming to Geek Meet, thinking of coming to Geek Meet, you MUST send us an email to geekmeet08@oncomputers.info. If we do not have a firm commitment that we can fill the 10 rooms by next Saturday, January 26th, we will be considering canceling Geek Meet.

OLPC review, by Buzz!

Jack posted this in the news group and I felt there was enough interest. And I assume more read the blog than the newsgroup? (If I'm wrong please let me know in comments). A great, in depth review of the OLPC, One Laptop Per Child machine. But wait! There's more! ;) I was reading a blog about hacking the OLPC, and found a "tutorial" on installing Opera on it. Enjoy!

--MissM

OLPC

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) Okay, first up for the week something you will not see from me often, some links regarding football. The first is a Youtube link showing an unbelievable play in college football. http://youtube.com The second is an audio of the coach prepping the team on the play http://www.slatev.comI was most impressed with the sportscaster being able to get the calling of the action right. Any way I thought it was interesting, even though I know nothing little about the game.

2) This is a geek thing I ran across basically a clickable cartoon strip for geeks, if everyone has already seen it I apologize it was new to me, thought some of you may have missed it so here it is. http://www.ageeklikeme.com/

3) I have no idea how many of you are familiar with dowsing, this is a favorite subject of mine, but I am usually reluctant to bring it up, when I do I get those funny looks. Well this just seemed to be the time, so here I go. It was several years ago when I ran across this subject, I had off and on heard mention about water witches. One day I decided to look in to it, was surprised to read it is a serious subject; many municipal governments use them, also mineral, oil, and gas companies. When I read about pendulum dowsing, I decided to try it. I expected nothing, thought it was bunk just a lot of hooey. I was surprised when I got results, and I mean immediate results worked first time, every time. While I am still confused about the how and why, not sure about the quality of the answers I get, it is not always correct. Then there is that bit about correctly asking the question, you need to be careful about ambiguities, avoiding those questions that can be interrupted differently. I find that just the fact it works to be completely amazing. This is the best link I have found for a beginner to investigate the subject. Try it for yourself; I think that you to will be surprised, by the fact that it will give you answers to your questions. This link gives you the choice of language, and HTML or PDF http://www.lettertorobin.org/

4) This is for those who used to be so much better than I was with a yoyo; you deserve this now you will know how I felt. I was lucky to get it to come back up the string more than once. Any yoyoist (pardon) types out there should really like this video. He is the best I have seen, ever. http://toocoolvideos.blogspot.coml

5) I just thought I might put up a vacation destination for the Art Bell types out there, the brave ones any way. I found this while looking around for places I might like to relocate to, it is just one of those pipe dreams I occasionally think about, moving to a rural area. Well Southern Colorado; and Northern New Mexico were areas I was looking into. Then I found this I may have to check this area off my list, as it seems I would have to have nerves of steel, or brains of wax to consider moving here. Then again, it may be interesting, trouble is it might be to damn interesting. There are two parts, separate links. Part one: http://www.cyberwest.com Part two: http://www.cyberwest.com

Need a Mac Support Tech? Find a Linux Guru

It seems as if once a person is familiar with the fundamentals of Linux, or any other system that is built on the Unix philosophy (which the Mac OS X is, too) they are half-way or more to being able to work confidently on a Mac from the command line, which is where most corporate IT support work is done.

I'll call Steve Jobs right away and tell him, in case he wants to distance his company from the unwashed masses like me who use Linux.

Jack

A Lesson in User Failure: Investigating the Serial ATA Connector

Ryan Smith over at Anandtech has an interesting take on SATA connectors, with which I have to agree, though I had not thought of it that way until I saw this article. The piece is short, despite being posted on 3 pages, and very readable. I think you will find it food for thought.

Jack

Streaming radio causes new threat in Winamp

I know a lot of you are Winamp users. My wife and I are, as well. So I thought I had best post this. Winamp 5.52 is devoid of the vulnerability and I think upgrading is a critical matter.

Media players in general are taking huge security hits of late. This is because if such a player makes the use of more than one format possible, it also aggregates vulnerabilities. I am not at all happy about the problems in media players. They affect Free Software and open source players, as well. I seem to be upgrading my Linux players at about the same rate as I have to do with the Windows ones. Problems are evidently endemic to the type of application. Wonderful news, eh?

Jack

Why I’ve stopped reporting bugs to Ubuntu

You all know I'm an Ubuntu fan. However; this complaint by Matt Chisholm agrees with my experience and, frankly, it is a huge drawback to those like he and I who are able to coherently report bugs and willing to do so.

The pace of development at Ubuntu must be frantic, judging by the 6 month release schedule. Combine that with some cultural problems within the Ubuntu organization and (to some extent) the community and you have an atmosphere that is somewhat unfriendly to those reporting problems. Not really unfriendly. Nothing like that. But unresponsive and at times acting as if the bug were something personal the reporter accused them of.

I think once made aware of this, the Ubuntu folks will change their ways. That is what has happened at every turn when their users have called for change. It might take them some time, but that is just human nature.

Jack

Bot detector by Trend Micro

Now here's an interesting concept. It's free to try, right now, and I recommend trying it as soon as possible, especially on Aunt Sally's PC, if you know what I mean.

Jack

ULTRA Stackable

Now here is a development that threatens to remove one of my cat's favorite pleasures; the exploration of the cable nest under my desk. Only God knows what she thinks of it, but she always looks very satisfied when emerging alive from the clutter.

They're stackable peripherals. Not printers and such, but media readers, external storage; all sorts of stuff. Victor Wu has done a good job of reviewing this stuff over at Bjorn3D. The article is a bit "rah-rah" for me, but still, the gear is indeed enticing. Check it out.

Jack

Four critical vulnerabilities in Apple QuickTime

You've got to feel sorry for Apple over this, which comes on top of other, as yet unfixed critical vulnerabilities in Quicktime. Some of them require only a visit to a specially crafted web site, so they are really serious problems.

For right now, I would simply uninstall any Quicktime versions on my machine and do without until I knew for sure it was safe. Apple is apparently working frantically on the problems; they released four fixes already. Still, the application is not yet safe.

Jack

HP provides an update about WHS woes

Our good buddy Paul Thurrott has a post about Hewlett-Packard's MediaSmart Servers running Microsoft Windows Home Server and data corruption problems.

Now when you read this, keep in mind that these problems are completely avoidable and do not affect your backups made with Windows utilities and most others. It is nowhere near as bad as it sounds. Plus, as I reported last week, at least one team of dedicated researchers has been unable to reproduce the problem. The problem is real, but not the end of the world. And you can easily dodge the bullet.

Jack

NSA Must Examine All Internet Traffic to Prevent Cyber Nine-Eleven, Top Spy Says

From wired:
In order for cyberspace to be policed, Internet activity will have to be closely monitored. Ed Giorgio, who is working with McConnell on the plan, said that would mean giving the government the authority to examine the content of any e-mail, file transfer, or Web search. "Google has records that could help in a cyber-investigation," he said. Giorgio warned me, "We have a saying in this business: 'Privacy and security are a zero-sum game.'"

Mass web infection leaves researcher scratching her head

Here is [yet] another security story to follow as it develops. If the researchers cannot make head nor tail of it at this point, we surely cannot be expected to. I am sure all will be made clear as the researchers get a grasp of what is going on. Until then all I can do it worry about my clients.

Jack

Unwanted remote configuration for home routers

This story has been developing for a few days. It's still not clear which routers and system configurations are vulnerable. Right how, the fix is to disable UPnP, which of course applies to Windows systems. It seems the problem may well be larger than that, though, and apply to all sorts of systems as the UPnP referred to is in the router, not the PC. I will attempt to keep either this post updated or post again when more info is available.

Jack

10 Strange Keyboards

This was on Slashdot, this morning. I found it a bit entertaining and I saw a couple there I wasn't familiar with. So, for your amazement and amusement (and as a relief from being on hold with Direct TV or whoever you are calling today) here they are.

Jack

OnComputers Radio show Podcast 01-13-08

This is the On Computers Radio show podcast for 01-13-08. You can listen live every Sunday from 10AM to 1PM Pacific thats 1PM to 4PM Eastern. Join us for the live show and chat. If you prefer, you can download the same MP3 file here via ftp.

Links from the Gregg Zone!

1) Sometimes, something comes along that makes you smile, feel good, and affects you at a deep level, leaving you knowing there is a lesson to learn, some kind of message involved. Well this little video is like that, almost like one of those Aesop’s Fables from childhood illustrating a basic moral with a story. Except this is real life, not a story made up like a fairy tale. This shows how the world could be if you eliminate the predator / prey relationship from an encounter between individuals even as diverse as a cat and bird. We are after all a predator species, and we show it in so many ways. It seems to me that I see it in the conflicts between nations, groups of people formed into organizations like unions, businesses like insurance and loan companies, individuals as in criminal behavior, right down to the local used car sales man. Check it out this one will make you smile I guarantee, it might even hit you at a deeper level, like me. http://youtube.com

2) This new invention made me think about that song that went "In the year twenty-five / thirty-five your arms will be hanging limp at your sides". However, it is really a very cool tool and I would like to have one. There would be no more aching back in the morning, I can think of a thousand things I would like to try with this one. I thought rather than a war machine, it would have more potential for the disabled than anything I have seen come along for a very long time. I suppose it is just another example of that predator nature of ours, war first because we seem to think it is much cooler than compassion. Any way you really should check this one out, I liked it a lot. http://www.liveleak.com

3) Have you ever wondered how Google came up with their name? Or, what is the meaning of the word? I have run into many people who had no clue about either. I found this last week by accident, it is from Carl Sagan’s COSMOS series during the early eighties, I remember seeing it on T.V., and I have quoted it often over the years. He talks about a Google, and a Googolplex, the origin of the number, and an example of just how big a big number can be. On the T.V. show, he was relating how big the numbers in astronomy are, and how difficult it is for the human mind to grasp those concepts. http://www.youtube.com

4) I seem to have a lot of video this week well this is one more, sent to me by our friend in Southern California (and, no it is not necessary to send the kids out of the room). It is a slide show of an annual event in China done with snow and ice, almost on a Disneyland scale. We could never do it here the cost of labor would put it over the top. But, it is very interesting what can be accomplished using just snow ice and lights. http://community.webshots.com

5) Last, but not least something green, this one sent to me by Gary another friend who often listens to the show. An article from Scientific American Magazine about ethanol seems corn is not the way to go. Seems there is a prairie grass that has much more potential than corn, with a higher yield using marginal land. One of the problems I had with corn for fuel was using land better suited to grow food, somehow I did not like that trade off. This looks like the way to go to me, check it out, maybe you will agree. http://www.sciam.com

Microsoft preps Vista to thwart rogue gadgets

Now here is an interesting post on Paul Therrott's Super Site.

I think MS is on the right track, here. At least some resistance to malware has to be built into the operating system, if for no reason that it complements your security software (AV and such).

Jack

Spamming printers from the Web? Researcher shows how

Just the kind of news I needed. To top it off, so little skill is needed to pull this one off that by using the proof of concept code, with only the slightest modification, I can do it here and at a neighbor's house.

Printer spam will no doubt start arriving soon.

Jack

Shuttle's $199 Linux PC

Compared to the Everex $199 offering, the Shuttle one is a bit, ah, thin on features. Nice case, true, but no optical drive, which seems like a poor trade-off. I suspect the difference in features at the same price is made mostly of Windows XP, though details are at this time very hard to come by.

Right now; my money would go towards an Everex machine, weaker processor and all. It's more like a "traditional" PC and the Linux on it serves just fine, by all accounts. XP is something of an unneeded option in this class. Potential be damned. Real capabilities count for more.

Jack