seryn

I don't read Cory Doctorow's blog because 70% of it was noise, but I admit that the rest of it would almost be worth wading through the dreck to see.

His TEDx speech on Facebook and internet privacy was really well done.

http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/Ele1rWQv0gQ/tedxobserver-talk-on.html

I especially loved the part where Doctorow explains that the nanny software parents use teaches kids that they don't have a right to online privacy, so why should they worry about what they post to Facebook.

Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle at work, the act of observation itself changes the state of the subject.

I did really enjoy Cory Doctorow's book, Down And Out In The Magic Kingdom as well.

I just did something cool.

I found a large fanfic I want to read. The author has a MOBI version. So I downloaded it and was going to read in the Kindle-for-PC app (as opposed to having to load every chapter individually into the browser, we've had flaky internet lately) and I realized I could get the cable out and actually send it to my Kindle. When I was looking at the help on how to do this, I saw the username@free.kindle.com mentioned and realized since I set wifi up, I can actually send my Kindle MOBI files for free. So I emailed it to my Kindle and didn't have to find the cord.

This worked perfectly. (I did take the precaution of setting my document transfer maximum to $0.00 to ensure there would be no fees.)

I have a Motorola 2210 modem. Apparently my new phone/internet service needs an ADSL2+ modem. (Though it's taken me 3 different Tech Support people to get this suggestion.)

ETA. My modem is an ADSL2/2+ modem and today's Tech Support guy is an idiot.


Does anyone have a recommendation? Amazon has one for $40, but I know nothing about them.

The ratings for my Motorola modem, which I bought from my ISP because they do handholding if you buy from them, is really poorly ranked.

When I bought my new service they told me flat out that I did not need to buy anything because they selected those Motorola modems so people who upgraded to the new service wouldn't need to buy anything. When I did their online signup, the modem enpictured appeared to be the Motorola 2210.

My bandwidth is massively lower with my "up"graded service. 25% lower. And we'd made the change because we honestly needed more bandwidth. 2.0Mbps is not sufficient if you stream Netflix and have someone working from home at the same time.

It had gotten to the point where if Simon was working from home then I had to leave or hide away in our tech-free room so he didn't keep getting booted off the VPN loop.

During the week, when Simon's not sick or stranded by bad traffic, I don't need the extra bandwidth. But I'm about to cancel my "up"graded service since it was a major downgrade. I certainly feel jerked around.

I hate to call people. I even moreso hate to call people when I need something from them that they wouldn't otherwise want to provide.

However, I love to call my ISP's tech support. I emailed them last night because of intermittent DSL outages and I was starting to get annoyed after a week of having to power cycle the DSL modem daily or more. The response to my open ticket was to please call them so they could arrange to replace the modem. The phone call itself took less time than composing the original email.

That's what I want from everyone I call. If everything was like this, no one would dread calling for help.

I have technical helps to offer through hard-won experience.

1) The "Startup" folder on Windows is a joke. No program ever adds itself there and if you add anything to it, your computer probably won't boot for the next century because of all the hidden startup shit that wants CPU cycles.

2) The secret stash location for optional runtime startup things is found using regedit. The easiest way to find regedit is to open the start menu, choose the thing labeled "run" and type "regedit" in the box.

2a) once using regedit, be extremely cautious because there is no undo and changes take effect immediately.
2b) I recommend using the Find tool from the Edit menu if you want something specific.
2c) The Run [this on every startup] can be found in (for my version of Windows, and this is why I recommended searching first)
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
2d) You can use the Favorites menu to add that location to a "bookmark" type holder. I highly recommend this.

This doesn't get rid of stuff that is supposed to run automatically, like Windows itself, like anti-virus, like firewalls, but it works for getting rid of the Open Office pre-loader, GoogleUpdate, and in my particular case Windows Messenger.

Yesterday I was looking for information on why my internet keeps going down, beyond "it's been wet out", and clicked on an internal newsgroup. Normally that works fine because I'm an Opera user and Opera has internal newsgroup support. Firefox launches Outlook which co-launched Windows Messenger. I thought I closed it fast enough but apparently it adds itself to the launch routine first thing.

Since it took me full on twenty minutes to find the right key, I figured I should make a note of it, and then I realized I should share my hard-won information.

I think it's really monstrous of Windows to have something they scream at you not to ever ever ever ever change (regedit has some scary warnings when you first open it) and have that be the way stuff gets itself to run every startup. They really should force things to add themselves to the startup menu so users can clear out the detritus without being told they're setting their laptops on fire with napalm and nothing will ever run again. Either that or there needs to be a tool to get rid of things you don't really want to use every time.

Like for me, having Open Office pre-loaded is really convenient when I'm using it on a regular (daily) basis. But since I use it about ever 2 months, I'd rather go get a glass of water than have it sucking down memory all the time and slowing down the reboot process.

I understand that there are tools for actually uninstalling programs. Where they remove tracks in the registry and release all the bindings in addition to removing the files and clearing the menus. I find this angers me. It's what uninstall is supposed to do. It feels like a scam that one needs to purchase additional software to cover something that should be part of the operating system.

I'm old. I want my computer to just run. I don't want to have to spend an hour bleeding air bubbles from its transmission fluid lines whenever it gets all halty.

Insert cursing here.

I hate the media laptop. If I just leave it on, it borks itself including running SYSTEM processes that cause it to disK swap for memory. If I put it to sleep, it loses track of where it's supposed to be outputting. If I turn it off, it takes like 8 minutes to completely warm up again.

Interestingly I got the mute button to start working tonight. The bad part? It was only working because all sound was going through the laptop's mono-speaker instead of through the monitor speaker. I realize mon- starts both of those words but it's really not the same thing.

So.

It looks like the problems I have with the laptop are: 1) it doesn't get along with the monitor so all the media controls are worthless 2) it doesn't get along with the requisite shit one has to run so it doesn't get a dozen kinds of computer plagues and STDs. 3) it needs a wireless controller.

My computer, the one on my desk, has a borked headphone jack. I can hear things through it, but there's all this static. So I can only play things through the monitor speakers. Which means I can only do it when I'm home alone. Fucking hell. ... it's like watching Poirot is as bad as watching porn and drinking Jaeger.

Currently it looks like anti-virus is making my computer sick. *headdesk*

"system" is using as much memory as browser with several flash games loaded up. Research (via phone, because many of the places which identify malware are themselves malware purveyors) suggests that AVG updates cause this.

Zone Alarm doesn't get along with my video card. Nor does it get along with AVG. It got along so badly with Ad-Aware that I had to uninstall it.

I'm about ready to get a new computer. But that would require me to clear off my desk, a task so daunting as to make dealing with memory leaks seem feasible.

I think there are different types of goals and different types of lists.

As someone who has (or at least had and haven't acknowledged the change) a good memory, I don't usually need a list of every single thing I feel needs my attention. In fact, if too many things get onto my list, I get overwhelmed easily.

I do need a list to keep me focused on priorities so I don't lapse and do laundry when there's no milk. (Those tasks are incompatible because I cannot be in two places at once and the shared laundry room requires me being here so other people don't put their hands on my panties.) It also helps, somewhat, with scheduling. I have a good sense of how long things take and I will start on dinner at 4 if it will turn out better for a slow cooking. It also helps so I do things which will be easier for being done while everyone else is at work before 5pm.

Today I saw a posting about goal minimums. That is how I do my goals. If I tell you I'm going to read 25 books this year, I might read 50. If I said I was going to read 50, I'd be so far behind by now that I would give up and not read any more books at all. Most people seem to construct goal lists by looking at the maximum and aiming for that, otherwise they don't start until it's too late.

I hope the Google Tasks people stop sucking quite so much. I hate that you can't view more than one list at a time even in full-screen mode. I hate that you cannot have sub-tasks which are hidden until the main task has focus. I hate that they don't have schedule-able tasks. Like every Tuesday I'm going to wash sheets and every Friday I'm going to the grocery store so I don't have to go on the weekend. The current Tasks is like a really awkward interface to an electronic sticky note.

I would also like the kind of list where I can note things I have done and collect praise for them. It's 2pm and I haven't showered since I got up. (I did shower after midnight though, so that's "today" and I think it still counts; I'd rather shower after going to the gym.) I did eat lunch. It's not unreasonable if when I ticked off something I should do every day it puts up a little smiley face. There should also be space to add a note if something happened-- like yesterday I not only went to the gym, I measured myself and when I added that into the spreadsheet, I realized I'd slimmed down by an inch in the hip and waist both.

I want something where I can keep myself organized. So I could put down that the car was washed and then later I could find out how long it's been. Or better yet, there'd be a reminder added if I hadn't done that in N months. I'd like to have the ability to tell when we had tacos last, it seems like we're always having tacos but it had actually been almost a month.

But even if there aren't great organizational tools out there, I was glad to see the acknowledgement of "minimum goals" and seeing that other people get overwhelmed when the list is too long.

After ages of nagging, I finally conceded to allow Opera to update itself. I don't really like 10.51. It took a lot of effort to get it to turn on the specific menu bar that allows me to use keyboard shortcuts to access the bookmarks without it opening a panel. It defaults to a skin I don't like and my fonts got smaller.

Eventually I will get it all tweaked just the way I like it. And actually, when I let it do what it wants, this version is faster. It's just that I was already optimized and retraining this user is an enormous hassle.

I mean, I love Opera, but it's got this new punk haircut and a tongue piercing, ya know? It's going to take a while for my mental image to adapt.

I have something I'd like to have, to make cars smarter, which wouldn't be that expensive to add to the vehicles or to the roadways. I want my dashboard to display the current speed limit. I also want it to do so for everyone else.

The highway near my home has a 65 MPH limit. Fine. But a lot of the people driving on it are coming out of a 55MPH zone and there is no sign after the interchange because there is one right beforehand and California suffers from a massive dearth of speed limit signs. Maybe speed limit signs cost half a million each or something, but you can go 5 miles and 10 exits without seeing one on the interstate. So, I would like the people driving on the highway near my home to know they need to find the accelerator and actually speed up.

Also, I find that when I am 5 lanes over from the shoulder and all the other lanes are full of semis and SUVs, I cannot see the signs announcing a decrease in speed limit.

When I have exited the highway and am driving through residential areas, I am happy to drive the 20-25MPH limit, but yesterday the speed limit went from 45, to 30, to 35, to 25, to a school zone with children in it, to 35 again in under one mile on just 2 streets. Not all of those changes are actually marked. (See above irritation about the lack of speed limit signs.)

So it seems like my car should be able to ping the road and request current speed limit information. (Honestly, it seems like speed limits should be set dynamically based on traffic volume. That way people don't speed up to 70 between bottlenecks and have to slam on the brakes.)

Sure, this might not change anything, because people will still be driving and they still make individual decisions.

I would also like a much bigger speedometer in my next car. If you do not have room to put the odd tens on the dial, (it says 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 120...) then there isn't likely going to be enough visual differentiation that I can glance down and see if I am going 64 or 68 MPH. I'm not sure why my speedometer goes to 120. I can't think of anywhere in the country that's legal and other countries get their own versions of most car models.