A few links

I tend to keep a lot of files and links on my desktop until I need them. You know how it is when they vanish deep into the recesses of your hard drive, never to be used again. Duplicated at least 5 times, in a combined rush of searching online for them again, and some terribly thought out filing convention, which you forget, the very moment you want to find them again.

I kept thinking, oo I must put that on the blog, and never did, so without further wibble, here are some of those links. Offloaded from my desktop to your computer.

My Audioscrobble. Now you can see what I listen to!

Another set of celebrity lookalikes. Think of them more as recently going through rehab, or some sort of major surgery and then you will go wow!

Hey Hey 16K
A masterful piece, capturing perfectly the days before computers did sci-fi movie type things.

Lycos Circles, seems to be some sort of portal sharing thing, interesting... or er.. not :)

The Crown Jewels. Warning, this may take a while for you to really grasp the gravity of the whole thing.

The Room of Doom, contains nearly as much technology as resides around my ankles here. This takes quite some work!



Ok now you have read it, click on the links and perhaps leave a comment here. The 5th comment a day wins a car!

Someone got a laptop....

Of all the gifts over the Christmas period, the best one so far has to be a laptop given to a friend of mine. Well done!

In other news, I just launched my Trillian chat program and was told they had updated it. It's been a while so I thought I would get the new version (you don't have to) and it works great! They fixed the ability to go directly to ALL webmail services from the Trillian window, instead of getting notification of the mail, but then having to go through all the bother of, going to a site, signing in, and then finding the email. Now it's just straight to your inbox. The look is quite different, and has a lot more features placed where you need them instead of having to hunt around for simple info, like avatar pictures etc.

Groovy!



She got a laptop! Great going S.

Christmas shopping

I had to venture out sooner or later for a round of present buying. Had done a couple of days of it, but this really was the day to get all those loose ends tied up. Had noticed, that what would presumably be an horrendous, wander round tumbleweed-like shelves devoid of anything approaching a present, actually turned out not so bad after all. I soon gathered I never knew how much I hated mall shopping. For having so many stores, they don't seem to sell anything at all! I cannot imagine what they sell? It's like they are run by the Men in Black with the neuralizers on constantly in the windows, making sure you KNOW you were at the stores, but have no clue why?

Well all this fruitless shopping turned up something pretty good after all.. I discovered something called Stromboli. It's my new best friend and it's going to get a great Christmas present from me! Apparently it's an Italian thing, who knew?

Well after all that, I got some gems. Also sent some email presents, as people always seem to get what they want that way. Merry Christmas chaps.

Wasn't a very interesting post was it??



Not stromboli

Half Life 2

Well, I was a little under the weather, and I did something I had never done before. I tried retail therapy. Seeing as everyone was going on about how you could purchase Half Life 2 over the net, and then it would be some auto installing, and updating thing, I gave it a whirl.

I kept seeing the boxes in Best Buy and telling myself I would get it for an early Christmas present (uuh oh hang on, this is America).. er.. I mean holiday gift. Instead I sat and went all steam powered.

You go to the site, click on the package you want, and then wait for it to be downloaded to the computer you are at. You can apparently use it on any computer, as long as you log into your steam account and press the go button.

Weeeeeeelll it took hours (trust me, do it over night, or when leaving for a long day out) and when it finally DID load in it was indeed heaven. I have only played a small way through, but the physics and wonderfully realistic locations are great. Characters flop from ledges, cowboy saloon brawl style, when shot. You can pick stuff up and throw it around. Which until I realised I should have been doing it, caused me to get stuck at an embarresingly early stage of the game. Sound is wonderful too.

I did how ever have an issue with the game. The rather extensive help section of the website, soon had the solution although it required deleting a half meg file to be redownloaded, and it has happened a LOT, since I did it. Hopefully the fourth time will be the last and I can get back to skulking around city areas, and popping off security chaps.

For $50 you get Half Life 2 and Counter Strike Source.. Source apparently being the name for a graphics and physics overhaul, similar to the one used in Half Life 2.

For $60 you get HL2, CSS, HL1 Source, Day of Deafeat Source, and the back catalog of Valve stuff. Nice, so I got that one.

For $90 you get all the above plus Hats, posters, mouse pads, etc.

I hope the technical issues sort themselves out, as this game is luverrly. So far the story has been great, and just enough sense of "Oh crap oh crap oh crap" as you run stumbling away from fire, and not having the time to admire the bullet holes appearing on the walls in front!

For anyone reading who has no clue (and cannot be bothered to visit the links) this game is a first person shooter. You have gun, you need to put your bullets in the other players, or aliens. If you play online against other REAL people, you can be on teams, or against everyone, but again try to keep your bullets in someone else. You see from the eyes of your character, so knowing where others are is hard. Move yourself with the keyboard, you eyes with the mouse, and thats about it. Like cowboys and indians with blood and explosions. As in the movies, a handgrenade falling gently down a hole to join you, should always be treated with respect, from a LONG way off. Listen for the click of gun, thud of footstep, and rumble of burning barrel. Point weapons AT anything even remotely suspected of independant thought!



Half Life 2, you walk around and commit physics on everything

The Screen Savers

Now the three people that read my posts would probably notice a trend towards the geek. Shocking I know, but there we are. So a couple of years ago I stumbled across a TV show, which was all about the interesting bits of technology, and for the most part computers!

Great stuff, was watching the Screen Savers for ever and a day. Then one day Comcast came along and spent a huge wodge of cash on grabbing the show for themselves. Within a couple of weeks, the show had gone from informative tech news and know-how, to ADD riddled know-nothings with painfully empty heads.

I like a game like the next person, and the entire channel is devoted to it. Not a bad thing on the surface, but try watching any of G4's offerings. There are games on the channel, as well as reviews and other game related segments. The only problem is it is all so... er.. how can I put it... just so unwatchable. Just one long flit from sparkly shiny thing to the next. I am still awaiting the day when I would get any real information at all from any of it!

So as always...back to the point...

The Screen Savers appears to have died.

As Kevin Rose (one of only two presenters to have survived the butchery) recently pointed out...
"...the days of Linux command prompts on TSS are over..."

The show DID have great presenters, and a real enthusiasm for the subject matter. Now it is like watching an endless bad commercial, where the people on screen obviously have no idea what the script actually means. The only time taken seems to be arranging cleavage and making sure they all say how excited they are while not really listening to the conversation!

I am sure a lot of people have not bothered to watch any more. I keep the Tivo attached to the show, but I would not be surprised if the whole thing just winked out of existance in a short while. When the first firing round happened, it was out of the blue, and most of the presenters along with behind the scenes staff, were told to get out that same day. Perhaps normal for the TV industry? I certainly don't know. Could this be the G4 channel buying up competition and eliminating it? I don't know that either, but in this case, they were not catering to the same people. If the idea was to buy the TechTV channel along with all it's shows, and then wipe them away, giving them entire market share, then why do it with a channel that very much, seems to cater to an entirely different audience?

G4 just give me my TV show back ok? Please? Keep your teen can't-wait-for-a-loading-screen-otherwise-it-may-take-some-effort programming, and just give me back some informative people with valid opinions. Watching someone who KNOWS what they are talking about, and just getting on with what the geeks out there want to know, is where it was at. I wonder if SOMEONE might be able to pick up what G4 seems to have so intently messed right up, and make a show for an underserved population. If anything they have handed the original TSS format to anyone else out there that would like to mimic the show. I am sure there are a LOT of people that would tune in. Again I know nothing of televisions inner mysteries, but hopefully someone will read this, who may be able to do something about it. Slim chance I know, but a chance all the same.

Ok here is my take on who should be back... if you don't agree then let me know and it will make SOOOoooo much difference..

So as this is my site and I can say nearly anything I like, here is what would be nice, but ain't gonna happen. Sort of listed in order of preference, but switching the hosts around seems to work, or it did before G4 killed the show.

Alex Albrecht (FIRED) - Wonderful host, really funny, and was great to watch!
Kevin Rose (One of two still with the show) - Knows his stuff, if a little stilted most of the time.
Sara Lane (The other one of two still with the show) - Do I have to spell it out, and while she is reading this... hey give Kev a break ok?
Patrick Norton (Chose not to travel to LA for the new show) - Best served occasionally, in his own segments. Great opinions and always good to watch, until he clams up and then needs rescuing.
Chris Pirrilo (Fired a LONG time ago) - Uber geek and thats what we seem to need.
Dan Huard (FIRED) - I REALLY want to like this chap, and if his new site articles reflect what nobody has been able to see up to now, he could be a great person on my fantasy line up.
Leo Laporte (Fired a while ago) - Keep him on filmed segments, nothing live. The less he can deliberately ruin other people's segments the better.
Morgan Webb (Still presents X-Play) - Knows her stuff and is great to watch.
Adam Sessler (Still presents X-Play) - Odd choice I know, but he has a great style.
Yoshi (FIRED) - Keep him doing INTERESTING mods, none of that frying eggs on a CPU crap!

Current Hosts
Kevin Pereira - Not too bad, and of all the G4 presenters, I would have picked him if, as in this case, I HAD to.

Chi-Lan Lieu - Nothing to say about her but FCUK OFF!!





Dead, and probably soon forgotten :(

Make Love not Spam

If you are tired of spam, there appears to be another way to pay them back for the wonderful 'service' a spammer forces upon you.

Lycos have come out with a screensaver which makes requests from known spam servers, in the hope that this will drive up their bandwidth costs to such a degree that it will force some out of the market.

I am not sure that this is entirely legal, but for now you can get the screensaver here, and join in the fight, before someone realizes this is in fact a USEFUL thing, and shuts it down. A denile of service attack is ilegal, and Lycos say that they have tested this and say that none of the servers will stop working, but it should seriously impact their running costs.

Each person could generate about an MP3's worth of spam mashing data a day, and when lots more download it, then it's going to get ugly. Aside from the DoS thing, there could be an issue with people being slowed down in general, with this traffic on certain networks.... We shall see.

**UPDATE**
Suprise suprise, everyone jumped on this one and lots of legal wranglings abounds. Everyone wanting to say nya nya, just for the sake of it, but holding off JUST A LITTLE, because of seemingly joining forces with those evil spammers!

Lots of articles (click this for an example) all telling of how bad Lycos are blah blah blah... Nice try lads, it's a shame nothing really happened.



Spam is tasty for people!

It's getting to THAT time of year.... sadly enough..

Since getting Tivo, I realised how much the television kept me informed of simpler things than current events, or politics etc. It kept me in tune with the generally accepted time line, you know like Christmas, spring, easter, halloween and others. I am certainly not a television person. I do not have one of those regular habits, of coming home, throwing down the bowler hat and briefcase, and sitting slack jawed at the television watching everythin and anything. I never was that way, and with the Tivo you can watch it when YOU want, not have to take what ever comes along.

Anyway...

I only recently discovered a thing in America called 'Black Friday' which is apparently the day after Thanksgiving, when everyone goes shopping! Sort of like Boxing Day is, back in the homeland.

Nearing the point....

On a visit to Best Buy, got through to the checkout and was informed by a young lady that she had been there since 4am that morning (it was now after 7pm) getting ready for the massive rush of Black Friday. They had even gone as far as getting lots of coffee and doughnuts for people to have if they had missed breakfast! I guess that Best Buy know how to keep people UP and spending, even if it was a sugar rush induced credit card bender!

I am sure you know what I am going to say, so to feel superior about yourself and PROVE it too, here goes..

She said that she was amazed by the amount of people that complained, after getting a free breakfast in the store, that the doughnuts were not good enough/the coffee tasted funny/why could they not take some home with them, and general cheeky whining about something they had no idea would be there, and cost them nothing at all. Now I would expect there is always someone who will moan no matter what they have put in front of them, and the girl expected it. What surprised her was that it was around 95% of the people that came in and had some of what was on offer! At that moment, I was reminded of what was to come as Christmas gets closer. Sad stuff

I always like to be cheerful to the people in a store, or anywhere for that matter, as it makes a return trip a good thing, plus it just makes your day a happier thing all around! People seem to react better to a smile and a happy conversation, or is it just me?



I am sure the rude people in this instance all use AOL, drive SUV's and wouldn't know how to work a Tivo. They certainly would never have found this post as they think AOL IS the internet!?!? So how superior do you feel now?

Slashdot is taking over my life

Can't post any more just now, gotta get back to slashdot and read the news.. If you haven't tried it then do so. Loads of tech news and even more responses to articles by those that like to think of themselves as in the know.

I REALLY have to be going as I need to get back to pretending I understand all the acronyms!



Slashdot really is news for nerds

Toslink (Optical) Audio splitting or combining

Look, I had no idea optical inputs and outputs were referred to as Toslink either, but anyway onwards....

I made a big mistake and got a cheapy KLH receiver (oh WHY OH WHY LORD?!?!?), because I am not into audio, and wanted to get some gaming surround sound out of the consoles. It's there, so why not use it? Mistake was that this terrible system, worked, after prodding at the remote more than the person in front of you, at an ATM! You have to enter a menu to enter another menu to scroll down to activate the optical (or Toslink as we now all know) input. They for some really wild and wacky reason, you have to come out of all those sub menus, right back to nothing before the actual setting takes effect. And before you say it... every time you switch off the unit, IT GOES BACK TO DEFAULT SETTINGS!!!

So I dashed out and decided to get a receiver that would indeed cope with a DirecTivo, Xbox and PS2. No prob here, I can use the optical inputs, if I can find one with three of them. It appears, from my chats with people in the stores that I need to use this feature if I want surround sound from the speaker setup. So the hunt for a decent system that did not cost more than God's Christmas list!

Ok I settle on a YHT-150 from Yamaha. Not the most expensive one, but very nice and nearly 50% after BestBuy coupons, instant rebates and gift cards they showered upon us at checkout time!

Then came the issue at hand. 2 optical inputs and 3 optical audio devices. Hmmm what to do? The answer seems to come in the form of the Toslink Digial Audio Splitter. Take two optical devices and stick them into the same socket on the back of the receiver. Hopefully this sorts out the input problem. Now I have to see if the selection on the receiver allows for the same inputs to be used while looking at different video sources. Oooo the complexities of life :)

If like me, you are getting, or are only recently educated on such things, please bear in mind the cost of such a thing...

The receivers are always in the hundres of what ever currency your country uses, but the optical cables are expensive still. Anything from $20 to $40 for a 6 foot piece of it! Be warned!



This appears to cost around $10.
Oh and if you were wondering about this optical malarky, then go around the back of your consumer electronics and look for what looks like a little square peg. Pull it out of it's hole and look for a red light, THAT is the optical socket flashing in it's sci-fi-edness!

Pathmark, still 0 out of 10

A quick one here while I wait for the turkey to become less food poisony. I was in Pathmark, now I don't go there unless I have to, but the aforementioned turkey was being given away (for all the pain and suffering caused on previous visits no doubt) and it SHOULD have been a simple matter.

Go in
Get turkey
Get out!

Who was I kidding! It's like when you have a disagreement with a person and decide that's the last time you will ever do that again. Then time passes and you think, "Well ok it's probably not going to turn out too bad." Of course it IS that bad and you wish you had never wasted your time.

So got the turkey, and really only a couple of other things. Got the the checkout, still a long time, but not relatively for that place. The people in front nearly at the end, and then it begins....

The last but one item rang up one too many times, the lady (on only her 3rd day of employ with the company) could not figure how to void the sale. Usual procedure was not working. She called the supervisor, waited. Next line over was in the same position, THEY TOO called the supervisor. Then both cashiers asked the people in their lines to go and get the supervisor. Such an important chap, he must be busy? They return with a simple "Someone else said that he is coming". More time passes, and eventually a very sour faced chap, turns up and with not a word to anyone, presses a mystery combination which frees the checkout from it's glitch.

Now apart from not saying a word to anyone about the fact we had to wait almost 10 mins (the people in front with a small child too) he never told the young lady (who was incredibly apologetic) HOW to get out of this in the future. So every time this happens everyone has to wait for his extremely lazy backside to haul itself disinterestedly up to the checkout to let everyones day continue.

Message for the supervisor

NOBODY WANTS TO SEE YOUR MISERABLE FACE AND AMPLE FRAME AT THE CHECKOUT, TELL THE PEOPLE THAT MATTER HOW TO DO IT OK?



Supervisors look like this when they take off their enviroment suits and revert to their real appearance.