As I wrote some months ago, my HP dv8300 laptop did the unthinkable and died on me. I had installed Linux Mint on it and was having a wonderful time with the new life the machine had compared to the old XP Media Center install that was installed previously. Everything worked flawlessly until one day it was hard locked when I tried to wake it from sleep. It's been a strange road since then, but all was not lost!

The laptop was out of warranty and it would hard lock with a garbled screen any time a GUI was booted. I ended up installing FreeNAS on it and using it to back up my iTunes library. This worked for months until I settled on Windows Home Server for my backup needs. At this point I could actually use the machine as a desktop for my daughter.

I downloaded Linux Mint 7 just to see what I could do with it. I put the CD in and booted the machine. Everything went well up to the GUI loading phase and then the same old lock up routine. The next boot I figured I would mess around with the video settings and see if anything could be done. I ended up trying failsafe mode and this led to the magic...I was in X with no issues!

Further testing revealed that this was due to the vesa mode drivers that were in use. I was able to install Mint onto the hard drive and use vesa only modes and everything runs wonderfully, if a bit slowly in the graphical department. The only outstanding issues I have are forcing widescreen video modes...I just cannot seem to figure out how to do it with the 7600 Go no matter the configuration I specify. Any advice here would be greatly appreciated.

Since the install, I've read about overheating problems in numerous HP laptops specifically relating to video hardware. I have no idea if these issues have been corrected or not, but I do know that to repair my laptop would have required a new motherboard. At the time, HP would have charged just over $450 for the part. It made more sense for me to just bite the bullet and buy my MacBook, which I am thrilled with. Hopefully anyone either shopping for a new laptop or looking to get some more life out of their broken HP can keep this information in mind.

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I've decided that it's time I learned a new programming language, or maybe even a couple. Using the same couple languages for the past few years has allowed me to become very efficient in it's use and syntax, but it has also caused me to think of all problems through the lens of only a couple of languages.

A bit of background to begin: I am well versed in C# and SQL. I have been employed in various positions over the past decade where I have worked extensively with COBOL, JCL, EasyTrieve, Visual Basic, VBScript (classic ASP hideousness mostly), JavaScript, VBA, and some VB.Net. I've touched a tiny bit of Cold Fusion, and I've putzed around with Linux shell scripting and C++.

You may notice some glaringly obvious languages missing from my repertoire, probably Java, C, and PHP. It should be obvious that I should learn one of these and I have seriously considered Java. Similarities to C# should make the transition relatively smooth and I should be able to become proficient quickly...the only problem is that this bores me. I want something that's more of a challenge and a step in a new direction. I think I'm leaning toward Python.

The problem I run into here is that I have nothing to code! No ideas pop into my head. Sure, there's the standard Hello World! application, but I want something more. I don't want to begin and end this attempt with a very simple app that just does some minor string parsing and printing to the screen...I want to do something more. Even if this could be part of a bigger project, maybe something open source where I could contribute. Something to give me a chance to learn the language in a way that I could remember it would be great.

As far as learning new languages goes, I seem to have a unique problem. Most developers have experience with the free software tools and languages and have a tough time learning the Microsoft stuff. I'm coming from the exact opposite position. Does anyone have suggestions for the best route to learn any languages for someone coming from my background? Tools, sample code, and different language suggestions are all welcome. The most welcome things would be ideas for apps. :)

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I've decided to clear up as much clutter in my house as possible. Part of this has been eliminating hundreds of CD's that I no longer want taking up space. To this end, I've started ripping these into iTunes.

So far everything has gone perfectly. I've set iTunes to automatically import the CD on insert, ripping all the songs as mp3's. I plan on storing the CD's out of the way, either in the garage or in the attic. If I decide that I would like to listen to an album I've saved off to the library, I can either copy the files to my iPhone or burn a CD to listen to since blank CD's are so cheap.

A couple of questions I have:
- Is there a better tool for keeping and managing my library than iTunes?
- Are there any issues with having an all digital music system that I should be aware of?

iTunes has done fine so far but has a few drawbacks. Sharing could use more features. I have to sync my iPhone, an iPod nano, and an old 3rd gen iPod to the library on two different machines. It would be really nice if I could sync using the sharing features, but I need to have the library open directly on the syncing machine. This gets REALLY slow if I try to store the library on a central server and open it from there. I've ended up storing multiple copies of the library on each machine and this is a pain to keep in sync. Any suggestions?

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After my HP laptop bit the dust and I purchased my MacBook I've become interested in a NAS solution. I've been testing out two candidates -- Windows Home Server and FreeNAS. I reviewed my FreeNAS experiences first. This is my review of Windows Home Server. I have 2 PC's for testing and I'll be testing both for mac compatibility, Xbox 360 streaming capability, and general ease of use.

Starting off I knew that Windows Home Server had a much larger footprint than FreeNAS. If you recall, my server configuration for FreeNAS was my old AMD 1800+ XP and I figured I would need something a bit more up to date for WHS to be effective. I unplugged my current HD in my AMD 64 3000+ machine with 3GB of RAM and rebooted. I popped the disc in and began installation.

Installation is very similar to installing XP, same UI and process. It does take a bit longer than an XP installation and several more reboots are required. During installation I was informed that ALL drives in the computer would be formatted. I was fine with this since I had already disconnected my prior system drive...if I needed to go back I would just need to shut down and plug it back in. The installation completed and I was able to perform updates to get everything to the latest version. In case you want to get in on the action without needing to go through installation, the most popular pre-installed Home Server is the HP EX495 1.5TB Mediasmart Home Server. I've seen one of these in action, and it is very tempting...

On my FreeNAS machine I prepared for this installation by consolidating my data down to a single 500G drive and removing my rsync target drive to place in the WHS machine. WHS itself was installed on an 80G drive, and the system took 20G of space, leaving around 56G formatted for use in the drive pool. Combined with the 500G drive, this gave me a total of ~500G (formatted) of space for storage.

I opened up the Windows Home Server Console to manage the server. I added a user account for myself and gave it full access to everything. I added 2 shared folders, one for "Documents" and one for "Downloads", and I enabled Media Library Sharing on the Music, Photos, and Videos shares. Enabling remote access was easy in the console as well. I had to forward some ports on my router and enter my hotmail email address. I was assigned a *.homeserver.com url I could use from any computer to access my home server remotely. Very well done.

Taking a look in Windows Explorer, the shares could be found at D:\shares. I mapped a drive to my FreeNAS store and I copied all of my data over from the FreeNAS machine to the newly installed WHS machine. The copy took several hours. Once the copy was complete everything was immediately available to the network, media files and all.

For the Xbox 360 streaming test I have to change nothing at all. Enabling sharing on WHS did all of the work in the background and the 360 sees the server immediately. My entire music library loads extremely quickly and streaming is a breeze. My videos also load quickly and play without a hitch.

Looking in the Server Storage tab of the console I can see each drive in my server and add/remove drives from the storage pool. In the shared folders tab I find an option for folder duplication. Basically this will take whichever share I select and make sure the data is duplicated on two of the drives in the pool. I select my photos and my music for duplication. This ends up filling the smaller drive in the pool and I receive a notification of the problem. Duplication is automatically disabled for one of my shares until more space is added.

I decide to go all out and remove the 500G drive from the FreeNAS server and I add it to WHS. Adding the drive is simple, I click "Add" when I have the drive selected in the server storage tab and I am asked if I want the drive added as storage or backup. I choose storage and I'm up near 1TB of storage. I re-enable duplication and everything is good once again.

I scrounged up 2 200G drives to add to the server for 2 purposes: 1) bump me over the magical 1TB mark (now at 1.17TB!) and 2) testing out the backup features. I add one drive to the pool and I add the second as a backup drive. I configure the server to backup the Documents, Photos, Music, and Software shares. The backup proceeds without issue, and I am able to see the space used on the backup drive. This would be very useful with an external drive which could be removed and stored elsewhere once a backup is complete.

In addition to all of this, add-ins are available to add additional functionality. The most useful ones I have found so far are the Disk Management, uTorrent, and Duplication Info ones. All add-ins I have tried have worked without issue. The best place I've found for add-ins is Home Server Plus.

In addition to the built-in functionality, I was able to install uTorrent and PeerGuardian2 as services to use the box as my home torrent server. Enabling the web GUI in uTorrent and opening the assigned port on my router allows me to access uTorrent from anywhere, even on my iPhone. How handy is that?

Other notes in the comparison of FreeNAS and Windows Home Server: FreeNAS supports afp and a host of other sharing protocols and WHS does not, WHS supports adding any type of drive to the drive pool (I currently have 3 IDE, 2 SATA, and 1 USB drive) and while FreeNAS supports these, there is no pool of space, WHS media sharing is superior by far, and WHS backup features are easier to configure. The only thing I have remaining to test is backups from my mac laptops using Time Machine.

FreeNAS is a great product with a few drawbacks and the price is right. Windows Home Server just gets everything right and with my MSDN subscription the price becomes a non-issue. The biggest plus for WHS is the drive pool and how it is managed. In FreeNAS if the drive you store your movies on runs out of space, you'll have to do some work to add a new drive and get the shares sorted out...with WHS you just add a drive and put it in the pool. Having been a Windows user since Windows 3.1, I am completely blown away at how easy configuration of this system is. Adding drives, removing drives, backing up data, sharing media, it's all there in the console application.

The winner for me is Windows Home Server. Thanks for reading!

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After my HP laptop bit the dust and I purchased my MacBook I've become interested in a NAS solution. I've been testing out two candidates -- Windows Home Server and FreeNAS. I'll review my FreeNAS experiences first. I have 2 PC's for testing and enough hard drives to test both side by side for mac compatibility, Xbox 360 streaming capability, and general ease of use.

FreeNAS was the first NAS solution I've attempted to use. Booting up was a cinch and I was off and running with the live CD. I plugged up the trusty old HP and popped in the CD. Deciphering the text through the video artifacts wasn't too difficult and I managed to get the system installed onto a 64MB CF card. After a quick reboot and a few clicks to assign a static IP I was up and ready to get managing the system.

The web GUI that comes with FreeNAS is quite spartan but works extremely well once you have experience with it. I was able to follow along with the online installation guide to get my 100G internal HDD mounted and formatted UFS (the required format for the system). Once complete, I turned on AFP for my Mac upstairs and I copied down my iTunes library. The 35G or so of data copied down relatively quickly, and from my laptop I was able to update my configuration in iTunes to point to the new library location and viola!

This level of success so quickly spurred me to going a bit larger with this experiment. I have the following hard drives available for testing: 1 500G external, 1 internal 500G, 1 80G internal, and 1 13G internal. I also have 2 PC's that I can use for testing. The server I choose to use for FreeNAS is an AMD 1800+ XP with 512MB RAM. I install the 13G drive along with the internal 500G drive and pop in the live CD. Installing to the smaller HDD is easy once again. I format the 500G drive and load it up with all of my data.

I have an Xbox 360 ready and waiting for some streaming content, so I turn on the UPnP service. Fuppes (the name of the UPnP service) is configured by pointing it to your media files using the web GUI. Once turned on you must complete a database rebuild and a virtual container rebuild, and if you have a large number of files this can be an extensive process. Amazingly enough once this was complete I was able to stream my DivX files to the 360 with no issues whatsoever.

FreeNAS also has built in iTunes/DAAP streaming, but I found it to be too buggy to use. It seemed to work ok from a client perspective, but cpu usage would max out on the poor server until I gave it the old kill -9 command. I'll be researching this further.

A bittorrent client is also built in (Transmission). This comes with it's own web GUI and it seems to work flawlessly. I'm highly impressed with this portion of the server. If only they could allow blocklists to be more easily enabled. FTP services are built in and work as expected.

All in all, I'm highly impressed...ESPECIALLY for a 100% free piece of software. Some services I have not had a chance to try out so far are iSCSI, RSYNC, and the web server.

My final plan is to select between this and Windows Home Server, then use my two 500G drives in a mirrored fashion. Right now, FreeNAS has a formidable lead.

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While it seems like a dream job, maybe it's not all so wonderful. I'm not sure how I would handle this type of situation. I'm still interested in learning app development for the iPhone, but things like this take some of the shine off of the platform. Lots of folks have visions of grandeur and hope to be the next big thing, but if you have to wait 6 months for a payment...

I'd almost guarantee they aren't having any trouble taking their 30% cut and getting it into the bank. How can they still be behind on FEBRUARY payments? That's quite a tremendous lag time, even if there are some issues. And the reply from Apple does nothing to quiet the issue. You can't just tell people "we know we're slow, but shut up and wait" and expect anyone to be happy about it.

Hopefully this really is a series of errors caused by overwhelming demand and things will be ironed out over the next couple of weeks.
Apple drives iPhone app developers to the brink

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Looks like Apple may be getting ready to expand beyond the AT&T network. Evidently Verizon has been in talks with them about creating TWO new devices to be run on their network. What a coup this would be for Verizon, but there's still a ways to go.

According to the article at Information Week, Apple already has prototypes of the two devices. One is described as an "iPhone lite" and the other is some sort of media pad. This is interesting because there would be no direct competitor to the iPhone 3G currently sold on the AT&T network.

Verizon and Apple have been in talks in the past when the original iPhone was being pushed, but Verizon did not like the terms of the deal. I'll bet they have changed their tune now, with the wild success the iPhone has had. It could be argued that this is all just a ploy by Apple to get better terms out of AT&T, but why would there be prototypes of the devices already crated? I believe they are serious about deploying.

New Gear from Apple and Verizon Wireless?

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What an absolute dream come true for the folks at Lexcycle. To spend a year working on a company and watch it become a hot enough commodity to be scooped up by one of the big guys on the block would be very exciting...and profitable to boot. The best quote: "Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed."

I have used the Stanza iPhone application for a while now, and it is high quality. Connected up to several e-book providers there was no shortage of content. While the article claims that no changes to the application are planned, we all know how that eventually turns out. Especially since Amazon has a close cousin in the Kindle application.

I hope the app stays free and gets even better than it currently is. Congrats to the folks at Lexcycle!

Amazon Buys Maker of iPhone E-Book Reader Stanza

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It's so easy. We've all had to deal with it. I've had to deal with it while writing this post with the TV on in the room. Some call it laziness, others claim it's just a lack of motivation. These descriptions diminish just how sinister it truly is. It is procrastination, and it must be avoided at all costs.

Completely discounting personal projects, if you have ever had a job with a deadline you've probably dealt with procrastination. Staring at that deadline that is seemingly far in the future, before you know it you've allowed an hour or two to slip by with no productivity. This tends to build upon itself, and eventually you look at the tasks ahead of you and there is no way to complete them on time.

Part of the problem seems to be accountability. This is offered by default in a team environment, but if you are starting up on your own you'll quickly find that no one is there to push you. You must set deadlines for yourself and HOLD to them. Can you impose a punishment on yourself for missing a deadline? Will you just let your tasks slip and have nothing to show for your initial drive?

A lack of motivation could also cause you to procrastinate. Even if you are doing something you feel passionate about, you'll have days where you simply don't feel like doing the work. Most of the time this is something you should tackle head-on...just make yourself get right to work. Start with something that is an easy win and go for it, promising yourself a small break once it is complete. I have found that this can spur my drive in unexpected ways and I may even cut my promised break a bit short.

Finally, disorganization or a general lack of direction could cause the problem. You find yourself meandering all over the place, not really focused on any single task. In this case begin a task list. Just write down everything you think of that needs to be done and prioritize. If you are working on a project for yourself this could be the toughest problem to tackle. You may not even know what needs to be done next. In this case you should make it a priority to find a mentor, or at least someone who has been where you are and can answer some questions to get you on track.

Unrealistic expectations can destroy your motivation, so avoid them at all costs. Manage those expectations from the very beginning, whether they are internal or external. Discipline yourself and try to develop a rhythm to your work, and you'll find the accomplishments begin to pile up. Otherwise the worst thing possible will happen: nothing.

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Lately we've had some breathless reporting of the swine flu that is apparently making the rounds. Around 160 dead in Mexico and the number is rising, with around 1200 infections. Here's something you can use to put your mind at ease, or if you are in one of the marked areas, incite panic within yourself.

H1N1 Swine Flu - Google Maps
Here we see one of the many uses of Google maps. Different color markers are displayed where there are suspected, confirmed, and negative cases. Deaths from the disease are also marked. Surprisingly, there are quite a few markers displayed in Europe.

We've been lucky here in the US so far, as there have been no fatalities. Hopefully this virus will wind down quickly and the infections will be brought under control.

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Well, my old trusty HP laptop finally bit the dust. Evidently something went wrong with the on-board video and now it no longer boots into a graphical interface properly. There are artifacts displayed even while in text mode...I've never seen anything like it. Output to an external monitor contains the same artifacting.

This was the strangest thing, one minute everything is working fine. I place the laptop down and go do some laundry, have some lunch, and when I come back the thing has locked up. The power button is still responsive so I do a hard shutdown and the first thing I notice is the vertical green artifacts on the HP splash screen...not good. When in text mode there are vertical pipes (|) scattered all over the screen. Could this be memory that has gone bad? The video controller itself (nVidia 7600 Go)? I have no idea. I allowed the laptop to cool to no avail, when starting any graphical OS the mouse cursor looks fine but the rest of the screen is completely garbled and unusable.

The good thing is that large parts of the laptop are salvageable. The 17" screen should make a nice item to be placed on eBay. I haven't decided how I'm going to try selling it off just yet, but if you would like part or all of it please send me an email at mbs@techbustr.com. I will consider offers. The specs are as follows:

• Intel Core Duo (1.73GHz I believe)
• 1GB DDR2 667MHz RAM
• nVidia 7600 Go (with aforementioned issues)
• 17" glossy LCD
• The model number is dv8300
• I'll add more info later

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Microsoft is set to release the Release Candidate of Windows 7 by April 30 on their MSDN and TechNet sites and to a broader audience on May 5. If you haven't had the opportunity to use Windows 7 just yet, you don't know what you're missing. It is what Vista should have been.

The most obvious addition to this version of Windows is the new superbar. When I first saw it I wanted it GONE. Where is my quick launch toolbar? It's what I've used for years! I didn't know what I was missing until I read about it...now there's no need for any other launcher.


While it appears very similar to the OS X launcher at first glance, more functionality is readily available. All windows spawned by an application on the superbar are available by clicking and dragging up on the icon. Mouseover an icon with open windows and you'll be treated to a clickable preview popup that shows a thumbnail image of each open application window. The right click menu offers loads of extra functionality.

For a full overview of the Windows 7 superbar, check this Neowin post.

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I don't know what it is about these videos, but they may well be the funniest thing I've ever seen. I would try and pick individual ones to share as the best but all of them are absolute gems. If you are a fan of Star Trek: The Next Generation you owe it to yourself to give these a view.

Some of these may not be work safe, depending on your place of employment.

TNG episode 15 - "That Jean-Luc Picard"


Here's the link to them all.

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Recently I've found out I'm not alone in my troubles in dealing with the open working environment where I am currently employed. Being in a position which requires a large amount of focused concentration, I find it extraordinarily difficult to be productive and happy with numerous distractions. Attempting to complete tasks that would normally take a few hours becomes a tedious chore, especially when it takes several minutes to get back into whatever problem you're currently trying to solve after an interruption.
I must admit, I don't understand the latest infatuation with an open working environment. Sure, the level of communication among employees rises significantly, but I would argue that the quality of that communication suffers. Bystanders hearing bits and pieces of conversations can interject immediately, and while occasionally helpful this sometimes leads to a tangent in the conversation that is completely unproductive. On top of this, the total lack of privacy and personal space make for a very sterile and stress filled workspace.

I have worked in several different environments, from a private office with servers in the closet to an almost completely open setting. I feel the most exhausted at the end of the day after fighting distractions in the open environment. While private offices are not going to be available to everyone in a company anytime soon there should be a happy medium that's not to difficult to reach. In addition, why continue with the harsh overhead lighting when everyone in the room is staring at a backlit computer screen? Wouldn't things be much more serene with desk lamps and a bit of space you could call your own?

For more information, here is an interesting article about how the design of the space you are in can affect your work and mood. Happy reading (hopefully in comfortable surroundings).

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The latest version of Ubuntu Linux is now available. The only review I've seen so far is at eweek. I did notice they now have a Netbook version, so grab that and give it a shot if you have one.

Download from Ubuntu directly.

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I've been intrigued by the iPhone ever since I bought mine. I have to admit, part of my interest in purchasing a Mac comes from my desire to begin writing applications for the device. I come from a purely web and Windows based application development background, so coding for the iPhone is going to be an interesting change of pace for me.

The biggest issue I've had in the past has been ideas for applications to develop. What would people be interested in, and could I make it worth my while? I've decided since I started this site that there is simply no way to tell without giving it a shot. I've made myself much more open to my own ideas and I believe I'm ready to begin working toward making something new.

Here's an interesting post about an app called Whiteboard Capture. It's an update from the author about how things have progressed 3 months beyond the launch of the application. Notably, the app appears to be generating a very modest but steady return which is simply fascinating to me. Develop a few high quality, useful applications and who knows!

What are some good resources for information regarding app development for the platform? How difficult overall is development for the iPhone for someone familiar with object oriented programming?

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My PC that currently acts as a server for the house is having numerous issues and will need to be replaced by something in the near future. I'm currently debating whether or not to purchase a Mac Mini as it's replacement. Currently I own a PowerBook G4 and it's the most popular computer in the house, and it would be nice to have things like photos and music stored in an easily accessible and centralized location. I run Linux Mint on my laptop as I've noted in other posts and I am perfectly happy with it. I plan on doing the occasional DVD rip to divx, burning CD's and DVD's, and heavy torrenting.

By way of comparison, here are the specs on my current PC:

• AMD 64bit 3000+ single core processor overclocked to 2.2 GHz
• 3GB RAM
• MSI K8N-Neo2 motherboard
• nVidia 6600GT AGP graphics card w/128MB
• 250GB SATA HDD
• 80GB IDE HDD
• 500GB External USB HDD

I used to be a regular gamer, playing WoW and CS:Source frequently. Now I do my gaming on my Xbox 360. A few questions:

• How difficult is it do upgrade the RAM in a Mac Mini?
• How is the performance?
• I would run XP in VMWare for those times when I absolutely had to use Windows (work, etc). How is performance?
• How is the power consumption as compared to my 450 watt PC?
• Anyone wanna push for a custom built Linux box over the Mac?

I believe that's all. I'm open to any and all suggestions.

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Most people (including myself) considered piracy to be a problem of previous ages until the capture of a US flagged ship a few days ago. As the media finally got around to researching the problems we learned that crews are unarmed for a myriad of reasons. Evidently the simplest solution is not always the most politically palatable, so we begin an interesting process. We look into finding "High-Tech" solutions to the problem.

The coolest solution so far looks to be the Mobility Denial System which is just a foam that can be sprayed basically anywhere causing a total loss of traction -- I would think of it as portable teflon. The least interesting in my opinion is the Force 80 Water Cannon. It just conjures images like this up to me:

Yep, NOT a pirate repellent to be feared. I'm sure it's effective enough, but if you're going to the trouble of shooting them with something, why not use something with more of a guarantee? These new ideas for fighting piracy to bring up an interesting point: will this lead to an ever escalating "arms-race" of sorts? Crews will implement bigger and better defences while pirates overcome and continue their business?

The strangest solution: the LRAD - Long Range Acoustic Device. Hopefully John Galt will be operating it.

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It's easy to see where the hate comes from...who hasn't received a message from someone deemed "important" only to see either part of the message itself in this font or a signature completely inundated with it. I just don't see the point in launching a movement against it.

Calm down and take things on a case by case basis. Someone sends you an email in an annoying font? Tell them! Let them know that it's a font made for children to use and it does not lighten the mood of any email they send. I will concede the point about using the font for signage and how it is in general overused, but spare the drama.

Surely we have more to do with our time than attack a font!

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Just a quick update to let everyone know that Sun finally found a buyer in Oracle. Who really knows if this will help either company in the long run, but surely it can't hurt. Financial info about the transaction can be found at Fox Business. Sun closed up on the news so there must be at least a bit of a positive feeling about the purchase.

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Sometimes companies do things you just can't believe. Here we have Monster Cable deciding that Engadget has endorsed their product...if the quote is taken completely out of context. Surely they can't be expecting to keep anyone's trust when they do things like this. Are they having that much trouble coming up with real, true endorsements for their products?

As an aside, in my opinion Monster sells VERY overpriced cabling. If you really need any types of cables you'll find better deals online rather than in local shops. Evidently the local folks use these items as their cash cows with giant markups. A couple of places I've heard good things about are Blue Jeans Cable and Newegg.com. If nothing else, you can stay away from companies that employ tactics such as this to try and fool unsuspecting customers into purchasing their products.

Technorati Tags: IT, advertising, marketing

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After getting off to a slow start behind Hulu in the professionally made content arena, it looks like YouTube is finally getting serious. Depending on the relevance of the content they negotiate, we could finally have some serious competition in the streaming media market.

This is all well and good, but both services now fail in one department: the iPhone. I don't know whether it's AT&T or YouTube and Hulu, but it is simply inexcusable to continue having no access to this content on my mobile. I understand that flash seems to be a buggy, bloated POS, but somehow regular YouTube videos play just fine. I wonder how well Boxee will handle this "new" YouTube format?

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It's nice to see a human side to the people who are now the industry leaders. Take this story about one of Bill Gates earlier ventures called the "Traf-O-Data." Aside from having a terrible name the idea actually ended up as a moderate success. The first real demonstration, however, ended in Mr. Gates begging his mom to explain to the demo participants that it actually worked earlier.

As we all know, Microsoft was later founded and the rest is history. Just because one idea doesn't pan out exactly the way you hoped it would is no reason to completely give up. Technology changes rapidly and new opportunities show themeselves all the time.

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The founders of The Pirate Bay have been found guilty of breaking copyright laws and sentenced to 1 year in prison and ordered to pay damages to copyright holders. We can all sleep well at night knowing that the boogeyman got his.

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I am a college graduate. I received my degree a number of years ago and I have been working in my chosen field for most of the years since my graduation. I attended 3 different schools as I floundered about trying to decide exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I learned very little that was of real value. This begs the question: why do most people continue to push kids to go to college?

Attending college or not was never really in question for me, I was placed on the path very early on. There was no debate about it...I was going. I took all of the advanced placement courses offered in my school and decided on the vague profession of "engineering" as my aim. I knew basically nothing about what I was doing and I was about to spend massive amounts of someone else's money (scholarship!) on this decision. Naturally I hated everything about these courses within two months of beginning and I found my way out of there and eventually into information systems.

Somewhere over the years there seems to have been a shift in the perception of education in the US. It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when this shift started, but the results are evident. You may have seen the "Education Connection" advertisements on television. According to them you will potentially earn ONE MILLION more dollars over your lifetime with a degree than someone without. Has college become merely a glorified vocational school, is it sliding into complete irrelevance, or is everything A-OK?

Technical education has started to present a very unique set of problems for higher learning institutions. Look for posts about these issues later on, perhaps as part of a series.

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This looks like an outstanding piece of backup software for Linux. According to Lifehacker, all of the crontab and rsync commands are set for you by a great UI. Currently I run OS X as my home server but Linux on my laptop, and while Time Machine is very easy, there aren't many options you can set. I'll be installing this tonight to see how well network share backups are supported.

UPDATE: Well, I've followed the steps outlined in the comments section of the Lifehacker post to update synaptic with the backintime sources. Installation was a breeze, and backups are simply a copy of the files and directories chosen to your selected location. Very simple as advertised. The interface seems intuitive and easy to use. I still need to configure a network location for testing, but based on the location selection abilities of the application, this shouldn't pose any issues. I have also not tested restore capabilities yet.

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The EFF has a great example of how people fear what they don't understand. This one is amazing. How many of us have ever used an operating system that was "a black screen with white font which he uses prompt commands on" before?

EVERYONE. All of the popular PC operating systems have this functionality. How do they know he didn't just have a command prompt up in windows maximized to full screen? I just don't understand how this type of insanity continues to be perpetrated within the court system. Blatantly invalid technical details seemingly run rampant.

I think any law activity (warrants, trials, etc.) that includes anything with this much technical detail should be reviewed by someone with at least a slight inkling of what the jargon means. This abuse would have been caught almost immediately if the officer or judge had any training as to what they were attempting to do in this arena.

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I have been in the software development industry for a number of years now and I consider myself a moderately seasoned developer. I have experience with several different languages and I try to learn something new every day. I have seen most types of code, and sadly a large majority of it is crap. I understand that sometimes you simply must make an app work and work now, but there is no way that this happens often enough to merit what I've seen throughout my career.

I'm not under any delusions about the causes of this bad code; there are a million reasons. The deadline was too short. The requirements were too vague. We just hired a whole group of COBOL developers to write our enterprise level Java app because they were cheaper (and no, I'm not joking on this one). While these are likely the biggest issues, there is another that could be stopped before it begins.

This post got me thinking about the topic. Besides the code I've actually seen and had to deal with, I have now been part of more interviews on the "I've already got a job" side of the table than the "please hire me" side. The years of experience listed on the resume usually mean nothing at all. Occasionally you will hit on the right combination, but normally there are numerous caveats that come along with those "15 years of .Net experience and an expert in SQL." The saddest part of this is the developer in question generally believes they truly have loads of experience they are bringing to the table. 

If someone with the attitude of knowing more than anyone else in the room is brought in, it can easily become toxic to a development team. Any insight that comes from an outside source is quickly objected to even before any discussion begins. Where is the motivation for anyone else on the team to put any of their ideas forward in this situation? This will lead to poorly executed projects and crap code in most cases, and this could have been prevented on the front end.

How can you get through to someone who falls into the perpetual novice bucket?

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While most of my professional work has been ASP.Net based and quite IE centric, I've found that utilizing Firefox for troubleshooting makes development far less tedious. Here are 15 add-ons for Firefox designed to assist with development work. I have used a number of these in the past and they were quite helpful.

The ones that look the most interesting to me are LinkChecker, Web Developer, FireBug and Colorzilla. If I were a PHP developer I'd check out FirePHP for sure.

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Here is a very interesting dissection of a series of posts about why programmers act the way they do under stressful situations. The basic gist is that stress can be a good thing and a motivator if it is not overdone.

The problems arise with chronic stress. From the series linked from the blog post above: "Fear becomes conditioned and habitual." When you enter this mode it is VERY hard to break out of it. You begin to worry about every imaginable boogeyman and you'll have no luck getting into a focused state, which is necessary to write any type of good code.

As much as it would be a wonderful asset, I do not perform my best work while under loads of stress. When I'm programming, I generally need time to think through a problem to come up with a good long term solution. When the stress of a very close deadline looms I tend to throw out whatever code will suffice just to meet the deadline and end the stressful situation. I had a bad project a couple of years ago where the deadlines were already extremely tight and the client was allowed to add all sorts of change requests to those deadlines. This resulted in LOTS of long hours and poorly implemented ideas.

Overall, the biggest overlooked problem facing software developers is "the interruption." It comes in many shapes and sizes and is extremely unpredictable. It seems to be a bigger issue in what is considered to be an "open working environment," where everyone is visible merely sitting at their desk working. This is an invitation for anyone to walk up to you and break your concentration at any time. The only method of fighting this seems to be wearing headphones, even if they are turned off...and even that is only moderately effective.

For the best productivity from developers, try out what is going on at Fog Creek Software. For most businesses this is a pipe dream, but I believe it would make a BIG difference in the ability of developers to deliver quality products. The best quote from the page above: "A programmer is most productive with a quiet private office, a great computer, unlimited beverages, an ambient temperature between 68 and 72 degrees (F), no glare on the screen, a chair that’s so comfortable you don’t feel it..." Many developers instead must try to focus through various project status meetings in their sitting area, conference calls right by their desks, and project management people who need updates multiple times per hour.

Imagine if we had the ability to focus on a problem and actually figure it out.

Update: I've written more on this topic in my post "On Your Working Environment".

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If you have young kids and you would like them to begin working with computers, this will interest you. Qimo is based on Ubuntu Linux and is made specifically for children aged 3+. According to the site there are very few menus to use and the OS is designed to be very intuitive to youngsters.

I'll be attempting to install this on a laptop well below the recommended specs for my daughter. I'll post an update in the next few days to let everyone know of my success or failure.

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If you have fastidiously been avoiding IE8 for one reason or another, it's time to listen up. You will be upgraded by automatic updates...at least if you run XP or newer.

I'm kind of torn on this. If this were the process all for newer versions of Windows software, perhaps the malware/virus situation would be far better than it currently is. Changing things this late in the game, however, could cause some issues. I know of some applications still in production environments that are still only compatible with IE6/7, and they will need to be updated prior to this roll-out.

Overall this should be a good change and a worthwhile upgrade. IE8 should be quite a bit more secure than 6 or 7. Once users get used to this type of upgrade path, development for the latest and greatest platforms could be quite a bit easier. No more specific code for out of date browsers!

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This should be a very high profile alert if you currently use VMWare for your virtualization needs. Evidently someone figured out a way to execute code against the host machine from inside the virtual machine. I believe we all thought that this was inevitable, but it is still quite unnerving to hear about.

The Software Developer Times has more info. Who knows how long this has been going on? I do know of numerous companies who use VMWare to run production services, and this will likely have a HUGE impact on them.

How often do you think of patching virtualization software anyway? It's one of those "set it and forget it" software installations, at least in my experience. I guess it's a good thing I'm a developer and not a part of an infrastructure team!

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It's hard to believe how much the British seem intent on driving their civilization directly toward 1984. Consider their new use for Smart cars here. This is just creepy.

Using these vehicles to monitor traffic and sending you tickets for being distracted? What if you've lent your car to someone, or someone stole your vehicle? That would be a nice gift to receive...someone steals your car and talks on their phone while joyriding around town and then YOU receive the ticket.

This is a great example of technology being used the WRONG way. Why do people not stand up and stop this type of abuse? Besides, isn't the purpose of police patrols to curb bad behavior? How does hiding behind a camera push anyone to follow the law?

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April fools day came and went with no real activity, but now it looks like things are beginning to roll. The p2p capability of the worm was activated and some new capabilities have apparently been downloaded by at least some clients. One thing has become clear: the motivation behind the worm appears to be money.

Interestingly enough, apparently a fake antivirus application could be downloaded and installed to infected machines. More information can be found at the trendmicro blog (look toward the bottom of the post). From the screenshot, the fake app looks pretty realistic...and offers to clean up your PC for the modest price of $49.95.

To test if you have the worm and for removal instructions, see my post from April 3.

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Get your gear! We now have a store at Cafe Press! If you have any specific requests for items please leave them in the comments and we'll see what we can do for you.

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Well, we certainly can't say we didn't see it coming.  This relates pretty directly to my earlier post on the Cybersecurity act currently making the rounds in Congress.  The WSJ article on the electrical grid hacks connects these as well.  While I have no doubt that hackers would certainly like to target our infrastructure, this is strange timing.

The most interesting piece of the article in my mind is that the current network in the U.S. is actually 3 in 1, the East, the West, and Texas.  Looks like a great idea Texas has there, the grid should probably be divided into even more segments.  I wonder which portion of the grid appears to be the most vulnerable?

Another question I have about this...why in the world are these systems even connected directly to the internet?  What good could possibly come from that?  If something doesn't need full network access it should NOT receive it.

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Here is an interesting concept for a search engine - SearchPDF. It seems to be very effective, if a bit slow. There's not a lot of information about how it works, but the homepage displays "Powered by Google" at the bottom. I would assume you could get the same results by using the correct Advanced Search on Google, but this site makes it VERY easy.

Besides, how could you turn down free eBooks!

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This may be the ugliest vehicle I've ever seen.  If there was any wonder why GM is on the brink of bankruptcy, here may be part of the answer.  Aside from the ungainly aesthetics, the size appears to be just "wrong" on a number of fronts.  Too big for the sidewalk while being small enough to be a death trap on the road, and no storage space for your stuff.  Sign me up!

Here's the part where I would normally say "Surely this would be useful in some places!" and yes, there is one I can think of...a daily rental vehicle for people just visiting an area.  However, there are already cheaper small-scale transportation alternatives to this PUMA (is this the acronym for EVERYTHING now?) thing, and most of them include you not looking like a complete tool.  You could:

• walk
• run
• take a cab
• ride a bicycle
• ride a moped
• ride a scooter
• ride a motorcycle
• ride a skateboard
• ride a REAL Segway
• get a full-on used car for less $

I guess I just don't see a big market for this thing even if it weren't hideous.  Am I missing something here?  Is GM overcompensating for the fact that nobody want's SUV's anymore and they've gone off the deep end in the other direction?

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There are some issues, but all is not horrible. Check out the pdf to bring yourself up to speed on what's coming.

Basically, Section 14 is potentially unconstitutional based on the 4th amendment. See the text beginning on page 38 of the document I've linked above:

(a) DESIGNATION.—The Department of Commerce
shall serve as the clearinghouse of cybersecurity threat
and vulnerability information to Federal government and
private sector owned critical infrastructure information
systems and networks.
(b) FUNCTIONS.—The Secretary of Commerce—
(1) shall have access to all relevant data con-
cerning such networks without regard to any provi-
sion of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting
such access;

The emphasis above is mine. First of all, the government having unfettered access to private sector ANYTHING is highly problematic. Secondly, why on earth would they need access to the data concerning these networks? Access to any private data requires a warrant. Enough is enough with the OMGEMERGENCY policy.

I see where banks have taken TARP money from the government are now unable to get them out of the banks even by paying the money back. And now with the forced management change at GM, here is another timely piece:

SEC. 18. CYBERSECURITY RESPONSIBILITIES AND AUTHOR-
ITY.
The President—
(1) within 1 year after the date of enactment
of this Act, shall develop and implement a com-
prehensive national cybersecurity strategy, which
shall include—
(A) a long-term vision of the nation’s cy-
bersecurity future; and
(B) a plan that encompasses all aspects of
national security, including the participation of
the private sector, including critical infrastruc-
ture operators and managers;
(2) may declare a cybersecurity emergency and
order the limitation or shutdown of Internet traffic
to and from any compromised Federal government
or United States critical infrastructure information
system or network;
[snip]
(6) may order the disconnection of any Federal
government or United States critical infrastructure
information systems or networks in the interest of
national security;

I do not trust anyone in government with this level of power. At this point I wonder if this could even be enforced? Could the President order the disconnection of private networks if they are deemed "critical infrastructure?" What is the penalty if someone says "NO" or simply provides a way around these controls? We already know how well the DMCA has been working for our best interest...

Here's hoping there will be loads of negotiation over this and the bill will be corrected as it must be.

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This has to be one of the coolest things I've ever seen: Linux running inside of Windows. This evidently fits on a USB thumb drive and can access Windows files directly. Apt-get even works! I'll be giving this a try once I have access to a Windows box again (Monday) at work.

The main thing that would hold me back would be typos on the (tiny) site for the application. I guess I'm making a pretty big assumption in believing that this will work just fine. How else can we find new software besides being trusting?

More info over at Lifehacker...I guess that can ease my mind if nothing else. I'll be waiting with baited breath for a Linux Mint version.

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To see if you have the Conflicker worm, follow this link to the eye chart by the conflicker working group: http://www.confickerworkinggroup.org/infection_test/cfeyechart.html.

You'll know immediately if you are infected. If you DO have the worm, shame on you for not letting Windows update itself properly. Nothing of note has happened thus far, but who knows what will be going on in the future if you do not remove it. Instructions for removal are at the bottom of this page.

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We all know Google will end up owning everything attached to the internet in the end.  It wouldn't be terribly surprising if they did purchase twitter, but in my opinion it wouldn't be very interesting either.  I must be the only person in the world who could care less about twitter.  I still use skype and google talk for my IM (microblogging) needs.  For web browsing I enjoy reading more well thought out postings.

At any rate, it looks like it ain't happening...yet at least.  How would it affect twitter if it did happen?  I'm not sure if things would change at all...

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This seems to be the latest trend, but it just seems to be stepping in the wrong direction. Isn't access getting cheaper and more broadly available? Why would we now ADD restrictions to unlimited plans? Unlimited actually means something to most of us.

I believe these ISP's are shooting themselves in the foot because they think they have a monopoly. If we're lucky, this will lead to the rise (once again) of local ISP's. Maybe this is no longer financially feasible, but things sure were much nicer back in the day. I happened to be friends with some of the local techs at the dial-up place (cococo.net FYI, sadly now taken by a squatter with a pr0n fettish, don't say I didn't warn you). They ran linux and let me and my friends look in on the operation from time to time...it was fascinating. Now you're lucky to even get someone on the phone after being on hold forever.

Get off my lawn!

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Hulu claims to be here to take over the world, but they refuse to be spread in an unapproved manner.  This is completely contradictory to everything their commercial claims!  We WANT to see your shows on Boxee and other apps that allow us to break away from a browser and use, you know, a television to watch television shows.

In what way is this a bad thing?  Why do you keep trying to stop it?  I completely don't understand, other than the providers are just extremely afraid of what might happen.  I thought a larger market for your product would always be better?

Besides, some of us run a local proxy server that strips out all the ads anyway.  One of these days somebody will come up with a way to run a browser on these set top machines that performs an auto zoom on the video content, and THEN where will you be Hulu?

Update: Boxee is already around all the problems Hulu has put in the way.

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Here's a question for all you folks not reading this blog yet: Does anyone have any experience running Linux Mint on a Dell PowerEdge 1750 server? I happen to have an extra one just lying around with no hard drives. It does have USB, and I happen to have a 4GB SD card and a USB card reader. Can I install Mint on that card and boot it? I can use the CD-ROM drive but it's quite slow and quite unwriteable.

Another question, will the dual Xeon 2.8's be faster at video ripping/compression than my laptop's 1.7 Centrino Duo? Both machines have 2GB of RAM.

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Found this iPhone holder at Boing Boing. Made one, it works relatively well, especially for the price.

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This is how not to do tech gifts.

1) Don't give the Prime Minister DVD's (for the wrong region even)
2) Don't give an iPod to the Queen.

START DOING BETTER. Thanks!

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Hello! We will be posting tech info for you on this blog.

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