TECHNOLOGY: 30 Essential Pieces Of Free Open Software for Windows

Monday, December 4, 2006

http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2006/12/01/30-essential-pieces-of-free-and-open-software-for-windows/

http://tinyurl.com/wtn8s

30 Essential Pieces Of Free (and Open) Software for Windows

***Begin Quote***

Recently, I received a fresh new laptop from Dell. Upon receiving it, I did the traditional “installation of Windows from scratch” on it to remove a lot of the garbage that is preinstalled on Dells. Then I got really busy installing tons of great software that takes care of pretty much every software need I have. Not only was all of the software free, every piece of it was open source, which means that the code is peer-reviewed; no spyware here!

What follows is a list of thirty pieces of software that are the cream of the crop of open source software for Windows. Not only is every piece of it free, almost all of them directly replace expensive software packages.

***End Quote***

use five. But, I’m getting weaned from the Dark Side.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: The newspapers should use rss to transform themselves

Sunday, December 3, 2006

http://www.blogmaverick.com/
2006/12/02/rss-the-newspapers-revenge/

http://tinyurl.com/y7zgc2

RSS – The Newspapers Revenge?
Mark Cuban
Dec 2nd 2006 5:11PM

***Begin Quote***

… how do you differentiate the paper from the net ? Its easy. For features, Online is where you put it up first to let people know you are working on it. Online may be where you intentionally overwhelm them with TOO many choices and too much information. Put up a complete 45 minute interview with Mark Cuban with a 400 word summary and you know how many people will listen to the entire interview ? None. People will read the 400 words and make a decision if they want more. Polished ? Absolutely not. And thats what differentiates it. Its your tease for the indepth article where you add context to the interview, write in depth about how wonderful, exciting and exceedingly handsome I am, get quotes from others confirming the same and create a story with such depth that maybe someone will believe it, but many will buy the paper expecting to find and read it.

***End Quote***

Now, I thought the fellow was a bozo. Between his reality show that made him look like an trivial idiot and his antics on the basketball court, I didn’t care for his whole act.

But, here, he seems to generate some strategies and tactics that could morph the moribund newspapers into web businesses.

Very interesting thinking.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: Letters 2 My Child

Saturday, December 2, 2006

http://www.letters2mychild.com/

Letters 2 My Child

Letters to my child is my domain that I bought from GoDaddy for several years.

I then used “Google Apps for Your Domain” (free) to host the web site and handle the email.

If your interested, I can show you what I did for this site.

Seems like an easy way to seed your business.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: Microsoft says “Don’t wait to buy a new PC”

Friday, December 1, 2006

FROM A MICROSOFT EMAIL RECEIVED TODAY

Don’t wait to buy a new PC

***Begin Quote***

There’s no need to wait to buy a new PC this holiday season. When you buy a Windows Vista Capable or Premium Ready PC, you can be confident that it will run Windows Vista. When you shop, just follow these tips:

Look for a PC with the “Windows Vista Capable PC” logo.

For an even better Windows Vista experience, including the breakthrough Windows Aero user experience, ask for a Windows Vista Capable PC that is also “Premium Ready.”

Be sure to ask your retailer about an Express Upgrade to Windows Vista.

***End Quote***

No need to wait indeed.

Nothing like a self-serving email from the evil empire.

I’m filing this under “ewe gotta be kidding”.

While I may be forced at work to move to Vista, and I’m not so sure that the penny pinchers there aren’t going to have sticker shock at the true TCO of Vista, I personally am not upgrading.

I have not yet identified an requirement that would induce me to move. If anything, the onslaught of the Web 2.0 services is challenging the whole paradigm.

Hmmm! What will you do?

 

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: Carbonite / PC Online Automatic Backup Service

Thursday, November 30, 2006

http://www.carbonite.com/

Carbonite
PC Backup Software and Online Automatic Backup Service

***Begin Quote***

# Unlimited storage capacity for your PC backups
# Automatically finds all your data files —
photos, documents, music, emails, everything
# Always on – just connect to the Internet
# Set and forget – just start Carbonite and relax
# Instantly detects and backs up changed files
# Never slows down your computer or Internet
# Exclude files you don’t want to back up
# Strong encryption for super security
# Backs up approximately 2GB per day
over DSL or Cable

***End Quote***

For 5 bucks a day?

I recently fired XDrive. I’m now trialing Carbonite.

My first impressions are very positive.

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Posted by reinkefj

FUN: Bumper cars .. for real!

Thursday, November 30, 2006

http://fuvoo.com/FuvooPermaLink.aspx?PostID=134

There is something very wrong with this tunnel
posted by DrunkDonkey – Wednesday, November 29, 2006 @ 8:06:59 AM

There is a river running over it, and water leaks at some points. When the temperature reaches -38 degrees, like it did this winter, the road freezes and the result is the attached video taken during a single day.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: My “luddite” friend doesn’t understand …

Thursday, November 30, 2006

From his email about my blog post.

***Begin Quote***

Wow…a “luddite” solution to a tech problem…”long
quill pen”….hmmm. :-) You are beginning to see
the light, my brother!

***End Quote***

Now this is amusing from the fellow who can’t figure out how to comment on a blog.

But, I’m easy to do business with.

Now, I’m a belt and suspenders kindda IT guy. I like multiple diverse routes. Multiple diverse backups.

I KNOW they screwed with my data silently because I have EVERYTHING backed up and cross filed. And, off sited!

At least ever since that monumental screw up by the Merrill Lynch PC Support group. That’s where backups were running but nothing was being backed up. And, in those days, I backed up to to a different disk and a zip drive. A power surge nuked by primary and backup. When I went to restore my personal backup, the Zip disk was eaten by the drive. So I went to the corporate resource and they had swat! co my four levels of backup failed me.

That doesn’t mean I’ve given up on technology. It just means I am very protective of MY data. When I give it to Plaxo or LinkedIn, it’s still “MINE”. And they shouldn’t mess with it.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: NOT RECOMMENDED scanschell2000n

Thursday, November 30, 2006

http://www.card-reader.com/hardware_scanshell2000n.htm

ScanShell 2000N / 2000NR

***Begin Quote***

Check our portable duplex scanner ScanShell 3000DN

The ScanShell 2000N is now the ScanShell 2000NR with a USB 2.0 HighSpeed interface.

It is a portable, 600 DPI high-resolution A4, Twain compliant color scanner, which offers high quality image capture. Supporting Windows operating system, the Scanshell 2000R works with any standard USB port and requires no external power supply.

***End Quote***

DON’T YOU DARE!

Don’t buy anything from these guys. Or if you do, don’t complain to me.

Once again this productivity tool frustrates me. What should be a neat little gadget doesn’t work reliably.

My expectation is that a useful tool should be like a hammer, screwdriver, or axe. Pick it up use it and don’t worry. When like my snow blower, it doesn’t. OR, requires me to have the strength of Arnold. OR, the genius of Einstein. OR, the attention to detail of a tax accountant. Well, I lose my patience.

This particular POS required a reinstall and, a fresh download of drivers, (Figure that out? I checked the checksums and file dates, identical!) Finally, XP installed it. Or, at least stopped whining about it.

But, it doesn’t scan the one lousy picture I want it to scan.

Arghhh!

So, don’t buy this “solution”.

(I did a web search on Google and Yahoo before I did. But didn’t find any gripes. Else I wouldn’t have either.)

So much for productivity thru technology. This is in my personal technology Hall of Shame just a notch below IBM’s ViaVoice and just above that Toro Snow Blower!

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: How to connect to your home or office computer remotely

Friday, November 24, 2006

http://www.pcmech.com/show/internet/1048/1/

http://tinyurl.com/ybsghv

Remote Connection Guide
how to connect to your home or office computer remotely under or running Windows, Linux and OS X.
Category: Internet & WWW – November 23, 2006.
Posted by Jason Faulkner.

***Begin Quote***

Remote connection is one of those things, like high speed Internet, when, once you have it, you can never go back. Most people never bother to set it up either because they do not [think they] need it, think solutions cost too much or believe it is too hard to set up on their own. If you fall into the one of these groups, I am going to change your mind.

***End Quote***

While I use gotomypc, and have been for a while, I think that being able to “phone home” is always useful. Here’s how to do it for free, which makes it a “no brainer” fmpov.

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Posted by reinkefj

TECHNOLOGY: Kodak’s software rudely grabbed jpeg hook

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Kodak’s software offered a faster way to upload pic to their site.

What it did was install a piece of BLOATWARE that seized all the picture associations like jpeg and waddles in every time one wants to look at a “picture”.

Arghhh!

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Posted by reinkefj

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