Livin' the life...

I stumbled across the following USB stick lately, I could help but come to the conclusion that this is strictly created for soldiers or well, forest dwellers!

Here's the photo of another more snazzy looking one! It's amazing what USB sticks are being combined with these days. Then again, I guess that follows on quite nicely from the weird USB devices that are available in general!

Goo foxy!

Awesome work - we’re almost there!

Thanks to the support of the always amazing Mozilla community, we got more than 8 million Firefox 3 downloads in 24 hours. That’s more Firefox downloads than we’ve ever had in a single day -- an impressive feat indeed!

Please be patient while the good people of Guinness review our World Record attempt. This might take a few days so please check back here. And, a huge thanks for all of your support! (Ref)

Below is my certificate. :-)

I helped!

Probably this would go well on Twitter, but for now...

Right now, I'm downloading Firefox 3.0!

Ah I remember my short stint using Ubuntu.. definitely the best part of that time was the flexibility I had in customising my desktop and making it as "tricked out" as humanly possible. Actually, to the right you can see a screenshot of what it had looked like (note that I'm actually rotating the desktop - aka switching screens - in the photo)! Nice huh?

Anyway! I just came across this post - 10 Most Beautiful Looking Linux Desktop - that presents some exquisite desktop photos that depict how impressive a well-customised Linux setup can look - Apple, eat your heart out!

Remember folks, Linux distros are generally FREE, and if you have Microsoft Windows installed, you can easily dual boot and switch between OSs in a matter of minutes. Why not have a look?

A few moments ago I was attempting to run a .bat file in MS-DOS, but I kept getting a barrage of "Access Denied" messages. As I figured this was because I needed to run it as Admin, I simply right-clicked on the file, clicked Run as Admin, and.. well.. nothing happened!

Well, as per usual, I headed over to papa Google and after one semi-swift search (0.34secs), I found out that to run these type of files, you actually have to run the Command Prompt ('aka' MS-DOS) as Admin (Source)! Once you do this, all the commands you enter into the prompt will inherit this and run under Admin privileges!

.. Ok ok, yes, I agree, this is quite simple, and I probably should have deduced this on my own! But, the point is, it happened, and I'm putting this information out there (again) just in the event that someone else falls into the same predicament!

Back in 2005 5% of the Internet users said they were using RSS aggregators or XML readers to get the news and other information delivered from blogs and content-rich Web sites as it is posted online (according to the Pew Internet Project).

Feedburner recently reported that they track around 60 million RSS subscribers. Even if we bump that number to 70 million RSS users (counting people that use RSS with other applications or platforms) this would still convert to a meager 5,4% of the Internet users around the world, as of today.

What is the takeaway message? Only a very small percentage of the Internet population is aware of the RSS format and its benefits, and that number is growing slowly over time.

By creating the RSS Awareness Day and celebrating it every year we should be able to get the general public exposed to this format, hopefully increasing the usage of RSS feeds and related applications among Internet users. (Source)

Well.. Happy RSS Day!

A few days ago whilst browsing the Web trying to locate where a quote (i.e. "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion") I had heard earlier that week had originated, I stumbled upon a rather fascinating blog post titled "19 Eponymous Laws Of Software Development".

In that blog post I found the aforementioned quote - also known as Parkinson’s Law or the law of bureaucracy - and a ton of other pretty snazzy entries (not all related to software development). I especially like: Postel’s Law, Pareto Principle, Hofstadter’s Law, Linus’s Law and Wirth’s law. It's a nice article, I suggest you check it out.

Etymology of A Distro..

"On the flipside of things, there is a whole different world of OS names, some are funny, some are insightful, some are romantic, others are cute, some are too small to fill their creators’ huge egos, and finally some are like their proprietary rivals, just boring. So if you ever wondered what your favorite Linux distro means, you will probably find the explanation here. (or BSD, I know they are not the same but I decided to add to the diversity of this article.)" (Ref)

Great article. I have used Ubuntu and Red Hat. What about you?

Here's a very interesting article I read in Friday's Metro.

"The internet has much bigger problems that slowness (Metro, Wed) - the real issue now is the total amount of data we download today.

Thanks to the recent boom in popularity of streaming and downloading video from the internet, we are all downloading far more data than before. BBC's iPlayer has come under pressure from British internet service providers as the chief culprit thanks to its high-quality video and peer-to-peer network causing an unprecedented increase in data traffic.

As a result, 'unlimited download' packages are no longer financially viable for any ISP, even big names such as BT and Virgin. It's just a matter of time before they start tightening limits, hiking up their prices or even going bankrupt." Edward Noad, London SE1.

Even though some of this guy's comments make things sound a bit gloomier than they are, I do believe in certain cases, he does make some valid and rather pertinent points; one good example is unlimited packages!

Case in point: I remember lately some flat mates and I were perplexed at why our Internet connection was going SUPER slow between the hours of 5pm-12am,.. then we got the word of a possible 'cap' on our downloading between that time. Normally that would not be a problem HOWEVER, last time I checked, we're paying for UNLIMITED Internet! Then again, these days, I guess nothing is 'unlimited', companies (such as my former mobile service provider!!) throw in a 'Fair Usage Policy' which, at its heart, is a mechanism to limit your unlimited access.

Ah well, what can we do? BBC iPlayer is an excellent idea. Possibly we need to get this faster Internet in place asap? Or will we have to revamp every 10 years or so? After all this has the perfect makings for a classical cyclic problem!

Wooppieeee!!!

"One of the final hurdles preventing Europeans from chit-chatting on their cell phones while hurtling through Euro airspace has been cleared, as UK regulator Ofcom (akin to our FCC), has given the OK for cell phones to be used on planes, as long as they're above 3,000 meters. (Many of the other approvals required across Europe have already been granted.) ...

Of course, in the U.S., no such plans are underway, though those hopeful for getting Internet access while airborne are in for a treat. This week, the FAA approved plans for American Airlines to offer in-flight Wi-Fi service, and that approval can potentially be applied to any U.S. airline that wants to offer the same type of technology (provided by Aircell). No news on a date when such services will be turned on, but many are hoping to have live Wi-Fi rolled out on at least a few planes by the end of the year." (Ref)

On a more tangential yet similar note though, check out this article: Airliner showers: A very guilty pleasure.

Cell phones, Wi-Fi, showers.. what next?!

I must say, Google is one of the Top 3 sites I visit online. And that's not only because of its market-leading Search, but also its many other cool and fun gadgets. Dare I say it, I actually thought that I had, to a good extent, explored all the "kingdom" of Google! However, today PC world outlines some other things (they call "pranks, goofs, and put-ons") that definitely slipped my eyes. Here are the "best of the bunch"!

11 Pimped-Out PCs: "From the cutting edge in eight-core PC gaming muscle to the retro styling of the Victorian era, these desktops and laptops reach for the heights of extravagant design." (Ref)

Definitely some quirky looking stuff!

As you can see I've included my favourite one in this post! It starts at around $1324 for a configuration with an Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 processor with nVidia GeForce 8800GTS graphics.

Which one, if any, strikes your fancy?

As the author writes.. "Here are listed 10 categories of devices you can buy to make you feel like a James Bond, from laser beams that cut things to x-ray goggles that see through clothes to CSI grade forensic lab hardware." (Ref)

My favourite two gadgets are shown below.

Laser	Virtual Secret Surveillance

(Please note that it is your responsibility to follow the law in your country with respect to the purchase and use of these gadgets. I neither (a) am endorsing any of these products or (b) accepting any responsibility for your use of them. Use them at your own risk!)

This person's post is simply excellent, exquisite even! (And it's not just me that thinks so, it's got over 800 diggs!) Here's an excerpt..

"Recently, the blogosphere echoed that sentiment with news of “Facebook fatigue”.

1. In January, The Register started by saying “Whisper it, but numbers from web analytics outfit comScore have confirmed what the chatter in bars and cafes has been saying for months - people are, just, well, bored of social networks.” About Facebook, they added that “behaviour seems much the same; join, accumulate dozens of semi-friends, spy on a few exes for a bit, play some Scrabulous, get bored, then get on with your life, occasionally dropping in to respond to a message or see some photos that have been posted.”
2. A few weeks later, Techcrunch also looking at ComScore data said “The number of people who visit Facebook has been leveling off over the past few months in the U.S., and even dipped by about 800,000 individuals in January. (…) Maybe all that friend spam has something to do with the decline. Will the Facebook fatigue get worse, or is this just a temporary dip?”
3. Adding his grain of salt, Rory Cellan-Jones from the BBC added: “The general feeling is that the kids, with their minute attention spans, have already tired of the social networking site and moved on to something more hip and happening. I think the opposite is true - that Facebook’s new wave of older users have decided it is just not worth the bother and are now leaving it to the kids.”

..." (Ref)

Cellan-Jones' comments (above) grab my attention the most and you can check his full post titled, "Facebook - back to the kids?".

This entire FB thing has been quite amusing I must say! But I do wonder if Twitter is.. really the next "best thing since slice bread" to invest in. To be totally honest, I'm more interested in the comments made about FB that I am in the original author's comparison of it with Twitter.

Anyway, in a couple months we will see the outcome (personally, I doubt Twitter will reign, it's quite limited in functionality and prospective audience compared to MySpace, Hi5 and their current successor, FB).  Whatever the grand result.. I'm sure MILLIONS of you out there are can't wait to hop on this cyclic bandwagon whatever tomorrow's new thing will be! No offense meant of course.

Here's an note-worthy article on Portals (eg. Yahoo!) in a "Web 2.0" World.

Abstract..

"Web 2.0 refers primarily to two major paradigm shifts in the way people use the Web: thin client computing and user-generated content. The portal plays a pivotal role in both areas. In thin client computing, data and applications are stored on Web servers, and a user has access from any computer via a Web browser, thus turning the Web into a gigantic application server -- a penultimate manifestation of Web 2.0." Full story here.

"Firefox just reached 500,000,000 downloads. This is an absolutely phenomenal milestone for Firefox. It is sort of hard to imagine what that number means. For some perspective, that’s roughly the audience size of 10,000 Rome Colosseums combined. It would be the weight, in kilograms, of 8,500 Boeing 747 airplanes. In dollars, for $500 million you and 15 of your friends can fly to the International Space Station." (Ref)

Congrats!! (Let's try not to focus too much on unique downloads though folks!)

Maybe missing an "if ($unread > 1)" statement somewhere Yahoo!?

"2008-02-12: Ten years ago, on 10 February 1998, W3C published Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.0 as a W3C Recommendation. W3C is marking the ten-year anniversary of XML by celebrating "XML10" and extending thanks to the dedicated communities -- including people who have participated in W3C's XML groups and mailing lists, the SGML community, and xml-dev -- whose efforts have created a successful family of technologies based on the solid XML 1.0 foundation. The success of XML is a strong indicator of how dedicated individuals, working within the W3C Process, can engage with a larger community to produce industry-changing results. "Today we celebrate the success of open standards in preserving Web data from proprietary ownership," said Jon Bosak, who led the W3C Working Group that produced XML 1.0." (Ref)

Congrats! To consider it for only a moment, the amount of 'languages' and specifications that are based on, and associated with XML these days (RSS, Atom, SOAP, XACML, ebXML to name a few) is nothing short of astounding. And to think that XML's not done there either, as it also seems a key component in the realisation of the Semantic Web dream! This definitely has been one of the greatest "giant" steps in technology specs for a while!

Just saw this article on Yahoo! and found it a bit of a 'wake-up call' on the features - or lack there of - of the new, highly regarded MacBook Air. Here's a snippet from the story:

"Here's a look at the accessories you'll need, and their price. Hope you put some extra money aside.

USB Hub (Varies): Apple is anything but generous when it comes to extra USB ports, so I'm not surprised the MacBook Air only has one. ...

Ethernet Adapter ($29): One thing that won't be practical when you travel is the lack of an ethernet jack on the MacBook Air. ...

MacBook Air SuperDrive ($99): The MacBook Air doesn't have an optical drive which makes it impossible to download software or watch movies on your computer. ... " (Ref)

So, yep, it does lack some stuff but if you want them, no problem! As is said above, just add those accessory prices to the $3,098.00 ( ) price tag of the 13-inch 1.8GHz (Ref) and you'll be set!

I'm sure a friend of mine would tell me straight, "If you know Google, you know innovation!" and honestly, I must agree with him, it's just their thing!

Today I'd like to point you to Google's new Experimental Search features.. I won't say much on it here to spoil your fun, so here's the link, march over there and see what Google has planned for you us!

Lastly, my favourite ones are the Keyboard shortcuts and the Alternate Views. (The Keyword suggestions is "old stuff", I'm not sure who cracked that first but Yahoo! has a pretty commendable implementation!)

Hmm, in retrospect, I actually am a bit bored of the same old Google Search! Then again, no, I retract that statement, the search is great. My reservations are with respect to its "old" interface! So I must say, these new "features" are just about due!

"Once again, Mac delivers!". If you're a Mac fan, I'm sure after Mr. Job's annual keynote speech a couple days ago - or more specifically, after feasting your eyes on that sweet-looking MacBook Air - that was your unanimous conclusion. If you're a shareholder however, I'm not sure you'd be so happy. Why? Well, let's read together:

"Apple's stocks took a beating on the stock exchange on Tuesday 15 January following Steve Jobs' annual keynote speech at Macworld2008 in San Francisco. Although shares in the company peaked as the CEO took to the stage they soon started to drop until Jobs announced the MacBook Air where they recovered slightly.
However as the news sunk in of what had been said the shares went south even further hitting $165 before a final rally before 4pm brought them back to a closing $169, down $14.88 (around 6%) at the end of the trading day from $180." [Source]

Oh well, I'm sure they'll be back up soon, after all, "HAVE YOU SEEN THE MACBOOK AIR?!" ...

"A source from Sandringham is quoted as saying: "When she saw William playing a game after lunch she thought the Nintendo looked tremendous fun and begged to join in. She played a simple ten-pin bowling game and by all accounts was a natural.

"It was hilarious. William was in fits of laughter.

"He was enormously impressed at having such a cool gran. His only difficulty now is prising it away from the Queen's clutches. She showed all the signs of becoming a Nintendo addict."

The Queen is already said to be something of a technical whizz, with reports that she owns a BlackBerry, an iPod and a number of mobile phones." [Ref]

I'm yet to try it!

Here are some articles worth reading for any of you who, well, go online! And, especially those millions of you who can't seem to pull yourself away from social networking sites.

Cyber thieves target social sites: "It is not just the average net user who is a fan of social network sites, so are hi-tech criminals. So say security professionals predicting what net criminals will turn to in 2008 to catch people out.
The quasi-intimate nature of the sites makes people share information readily leaving them open to all kinds of other attacks, warn security firms.
Detailed information gathered via the sites will also help tune spam runs or make phishing e-mail more convincing.

Friendly faces
There was no doubt that 2007 was the year that sites such as MySpace, Facebook, Bebo, Orkut rose to prominence as millions of people signed up to use them and started posting information about themselves and what they were up to.
But in 2008 these sites will become an attack vector for the hi-tech gangs who are now behind the vast majority of cyber crime." [Full story]

Boom times for hi-tech criminals: "Starting a career as a cyber criminal got much easier in 2007. So say security experts looking back on 12 months in which hi-tech gangs took control of the net's underground.
The economy supporting these groups has matured so much that now everything from virus-writing kits to spam-spewing zombies are available for rent or hire." [Full story]

Finally, here's a noteworthy Glossary which you may find helpful in understanding some of the terms mentioned above.

Following my Top Movies of 2007 post, when I saw these two articles featuring 'Top 10' tech products - Worst and Best, I thought I'd put them up, and let's see what people out there are thinking. Here we go!

Top 10 Worst Tech Products of 2007: Apple TV, iPod Battery Replacement Kit, Microsoft Surface - too expensive and seemingly fragile; a real let down!, NBC Direct, Palm Foleo, Pear Audio "Anjou" speaker cable, Ringles, SunRocket VoIP, Windows Vista and Wireless USB. [Ref] (Some you will have to google to find out what they are!)

Top 10 BEST Tech Products of 2007: Amazon Kindle (Read more), Apple iPhone (can't deny it. This device is a beauty), Asus Eee, Ibiza Rhapsody, Intel Classmate PC, Nokia N95 (tons of features for the $750 USD), Pioneer "Kuro" Plasma HDTVs, Shure SE530 earphones ($450 US though!), TiVo HD, and Vudu. [Ref]

And that's it!

Here are some very interesting technologies and applications I've heard about (and for some, been to workshops on) recently. I'm officially adding them my To Do list!

• Yahoo Pipes
• Silverlight
• Popfly
• Twitter (not really the workshop focus but it was mentioned with respect to Social Networking)

If you've played with any of these already, please don't hesitate to give me your review!

OK! About two weeks ago I took a trip to Birmingham with a couple mates just to check out the shops and such. Now, because I'd been to Birmingham a couple times before, I had a basic idea of the city centre so I quickly got us from the train station to the closest mall (in the Bullring). When we walked in, something strange, that I had never seen before caught my eye... it was a big.. white.. apple (click to see picture of what I saw).

Well! To be honest (even though I'm a Windows fan), I was quite excited at this illuminating apple and what it meant so I immediately broke away from the group and walked into this .. apple.. store.

The first gadget to greet me was a small thing that looked somewhat like a laptop but, a "wee" bit cooler, probably it was the sleek white exterior or the playful looking interface and GUI on the screen! So, naturally, being the Computer Person I AM, I hopped over and browsed it for about 2 minutes BEFORE!! I heard the term.. something'-touch' mentioned behind me!!!

When I turned around to feast my eyes on this device, I heard slight singing in the distance, and bright, bright, lights coming from its direction.. then.. oh then... I saw.. thee iPod touch. ( <- If I were an emoticon that would be me! ) .. And guess what!? I could PLAY with it!!!! Oh it was fabulous! The first thing I did was try to check out some music and videos, but sadly there were none! so next up - the browser! (One thing I always wanted to know was if it really works as seamlessly as the portray in the adverts! With the zooming and typing etc. Also, it's worth noting here that the device uses Wi-Fi access.)

First, I started typing in a URL, and it even had a drop-down of options to choose from and I think a history! After getting the hang of that (I think typing aspect is the biggest -ve, unless you have tiny fingers!), reality set in and I surfed directly to www.jasonnurse.com ! The site loaded pretty quick and was easily viewable and navigable! Next, I tapped once to zoom, used my finger to drag around the page a bit then accessed the blog link with a touch of my finger. Interestingly the blog page loaded great as well! (I did not do a full test obviously though because as I'm sure you can imagine, there were other people were waiting to give Apple's newest device a go.) After accessing one of the posts, I wanted to zoom back out to access another link, so, what do I do? Just.. 'pinch' the screen! Ouuuu. (forgive me but this was just plain cool.)

Drawback? Probably the biggest thing to note is that there's only one button off the screen, so probably 92% of contact will be with the touch screen interface. A problem can arise here simply because the keys are a bit small or because your fingers are too big! Many times I had to retype URLS because I pressed the wrong key!

Otherwise though.. and probably in general, I was/am totally wowed by the iPod touch. If I had the £199 (lowest price - 8GB), that would probably be on the list of potential gifts to myself for Christmas! Alas, at that price.. woo.. I think I rather stick to something less extravagant.. Probably the Resident Evil trilogy on DVD??

By the way.. when viewing a web page, if you turn the iPod touch horizontally, the page turns as well and you can view it landscape.. To return to the normal view, simply return it to its vertical position, even though, for me this didn't work sometimes and I had to get help getting it to work!

Anyway! Nice apple, macBook, iMac, iPhone, iPod touch.. nice.

Here's some rather interesting news!

Apparently, MDA, an industry group that promotes the use of mobile data, says that people in the Briton send over a billion text messages a week! In their report they also noted that persons in the UK sent 4,825 billion texts during September 2007, an increase of 25% on last year! Roughly this translates into 4,000 SMS messages every second, or 70 per person per month. The MDA now forecasts that 52 billion texts will be sent this year!

Amazing ain't it! Oh, and just for general knowledge, the UK is within the TOP 6 of the global league of countries sending SMS messages!
(Post Source)

Looking pass the headlines, I think this article is surmised appropriately by "Google/OpenSocial vs. Microsoft/Facebook". See excerpt below..

Google trys to one-up Facebook as it provides programming tools for multiple social networking sites.

Google will officially join the club of social software development platform providers Nov. 1, when it unveils a set of application programming interfaces that will allow programmers to write social applications that will work on LinkedIn, Friendster and other social networking sites.

OpenSocial is designed to help programmers build applications that reach more of the 400 million users of social networks than they would under the original open developer model, Google product manager Joe Kraus told eWEEK Oct. 31.

The Mountain View, Calif., search vendor's initiative is an answer to the launch of Facebook's highly successful developer platform, on top of which 7,000 applications have been built since the social networking site launched it May 24. (Source)

To be honest, I can't wait to give it a go! I thoroughly enjoy the 'power' that Google gives to developers and users alike. A facilitator of great things, that's where their money is! (eg. igoogle, custom searches, greader, youtube, gmaps etc.)

Since I've hit the UK, both in my flat and at university, I've encountered Facebook junkies (users). I've even been somewhat threatened to sign up or run the risk of not being informed of parties and limes and such! So once again, I have had to open up and face the, "To join" or "Not To Join" question.  In my attempt to decide on whether to sign up or not I came across some intriguing facts reports. The following was adapted from this BBC website:

Facebook has gone viral in the last 12 months, with more than 50 million users worldwide and a user base that is growing faster than great rival MySpace. According to Facebook, it adds 200,000 new users each day. [200,000? REALLY NOW?]

US research reveals that Facebook users come from wealthier homes and are more likely to attend college than MySpace users.

According to a report, 233 million hours of work are lost each month in the UK due to staff looking at social networks. [THIS... I believe.]

*sigh.. *Resume FB evaluation*.

One thing about researching, especially pondering over books and stats - you can find the most interesting of things! See quote below.

"Blogs have become a part of mainstream online culture. ... Bloggers tend to be male, young, broadband users, Internet veterans, wealthy, and educated." (Laudon & Traver, 2007, p. 408)

Hmm.. let's assess.. me. Male? Tick! Young? Tick! Broadband? Tick! Net Vet? Tick! Wealthy? I wouldn't say so. Educated? Am I? .. HMM! 4/6, not too bad a generalisation at all!

What do YOU think?

In my little time on this planet, I would say that I have met about only two guys who are excellent in the area of web site design and development. I mean, time and time again they blow me away with their ideas and implementations.

The one I'm going to 'big up' in this post is my bud, gingerstan! I'm highlighting him now mainly because he's recently updated his site and I must admit, he's just.. talent. So much talent that I had to post about it! (No he's not paying me.. but if he wants to.. he can feel FREE!) How he implements his portfolio (the flash version especially) and the use of the Google maps, just goes to show how versatile and innovative this bloke really is.

So people, without any further adieu, see usable, valid and aesthetically pleasing Talent.

Gingerstan, if you're reading, great job! To me, it's definitely a step up from the previous site. I'll email you with more detailed comments as soon as I can.

I blogged about this a little while back but unfortunately this was one of the posts that was lost. So.. here is the article again on how to view Postscript files on a pc. (Main programs being Ghostscript and GSview.)

Also, in a comment, Matt had suggested IrfanView as an alternative, so you can check that out as well - http://www.irfanview.com/.

Just came across what I think is one of the shortest BUT most meaningful definitions for the monster dubbed 'Web 2.0'.

"Web 2.0 is a technically and socially driven phenomenon that has made the internet world a platform for communication, collaboration and community learning." (RawSugar)

Impressive ain't it?

Men Are From Google, Women Are From Yahoo.. Nice article.. It gets my recommendation. Here's a snippet.

"On the Internet, as in life, men and women have different motivations for doing what they do. According to a recent report from Pew Internet and American Life, women view the Internet as a place to extend, support, and nurture relationships and communities.

Men tend to see it as an office, a library, or a playground--screw the community, this is about function not family." (Ref)

Hmm.. An office? True.. A library? True.. A playground? .. FUNCTION!!!!! lol

I've been hearing questions about blogging ever-so-often therefore in this post I just give a quick overview into your options to start blogging toDay!

Once you've decided you want to blog, the next question is - are you about free stuff or do you wish to pay? Now this may seem an easy decision - who'd want to pay if you can do it for free?! - but just remember that when you pay, (1) at least there's _some_ guarantee that tomorrow when you wake up your stuff is still there (yea I know, far fetched but still realistic!) and (2) you have the option of easily doing backups (of the SQL database or XML files)!

Now if you've decided on the free route, for a nice blogging tool that only requires you to add content, I suggest using any of the following sites:
- Blogger.com (Google-owned)
- WordPress.com

Setting up an account with these sites is relatively simple and you'll be on your way in no time! Another benefit with those sites is that if you wish, you can register a domain name and then have the domain name point to your free blog as my pal Ramal has done here.

On the other hand, if freeness isn't for you and you've decided to pay for your site, you have the following options:
Under Linux hosting:
- Wordpress (yes, they have a downloadable file as well..)

Under Windows hosting:
- DasBlog (what I use, for now...)
- SubText
- BlogEngine.NET (directly from MS I think)

Please note though that all these software are FREE, you only need to pay for the domain name and hosting then simply install setup one of these software within your hosted space. All of them come with setup instructions as well, so no need to panic!

Before I head off though, I'd like to bring something to your attention.. it's a nice little tool that I think is PERFECT for people who are not into heavy blogging but just like to post links, small articles, random photos etc. It's called tumblr and as they state when defining it, "To make a simple analogy: If blogs are journals, tumblelogs are scrapbooks." (Ref) As usual, you can find more info on tumblr at it's official website or at Wikipedia.

Enjoy!!!

This article was just shared with me, so now I'm sharing with you.

"Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Information Services (IIS) continues to narrow the gap with the open-source Apache Web server, with a survey firm suggesting that the longtime second banana could surpass Apache as early as next year.

Microsoft, which added 2.6 million Web sites in the last month, grew to 36.2 percent of all active Web sites, according to figures released Monday by U.K.-based research firm, Netcraft Ltd. Apache lost nearly a million Web site names, as its share of active Web sites fell to 48.4 percent." Full article..

My comments? .. None really.. But then again, I'm largely a Windows lad, so this may be good news.?

Think about it.. how many things is Google really into.. and how many of those things do you use, anonymously or not.. For me, I use about 60% of the apps Google has made publicly available, everything from Gtalk, Gmail, Gdocs, IG, Gmaps, I've tinkered with. These days when it comes to searching, I hit Google, for an online Office? Gdocs. Videos? GooTube. Mail? Gmail. Unauthorised chat? (*snicker*) Gtalk. If I hear there's a fire in Calif, what else but GEarth??!

Plain and simple, this company is just.. "cooL". And they're expanding by the minute.. both geographically and in the "GLabs". But ok, I know you'd like to know what sparked this sudden.. "praise", (if you wish,).. In summary, it's this article, Google vs Everyone: 10 Markets Where Google Wants to Win.

The write-up compares Google to a number of other popular market leaders in WWW areas such as Chat, Search, Advertising, Video and Start Pages. What I find most interesting though is that no other company has branched into all the areas Google's in. Yahoo!, I imho is the one to come the closest but sadly they fall short in the online Office suit and blogging categories.

When it comes to the competition I think Google has it hardest in the Chat/Communications market. AOL, MSN and Yahoo! Messenger are some big hitters there.. especially noting the IM partnership between MSN and Yahoo!. Either way though, I figure the boys over in pretty G will find some way to push Gtalk.. sommmee way.

Anyway.. enough of Google monsTer for now! Hope you enjoyed!

This is mostly a reminder for me, but in generally, here's a nice way to access files on another PC on your network.

"Start > Settings Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Local Security Policy. In the left column, Local Policies > Security Options. In the right column, find Network access: Sharing and security model for local accounts. Double-click on this, then choose Classic.

From another computer, you can now access your current computer's hard drive by: Start > Run > "\\computername\c$" (for drive c). You may then be prompted for a login and password: enter the administrator login and password on the computer you are trying to connect to (If "computername" doesn't work, try using the IP address, i.e. "\\192.168.0.4\c$")." (Ref)

This file access method can work quite nicely with Remote Desktop.

My sister alerted me to this one yesterday and I thought it was a rather cool feature!

As you can see there on the left, as you type, Yahoo! suggests search terms.. Somewhat like Apple's OS X Spotlight and like Vista search feature.

Here's a snippet from the article I found relating to it.

"Yahoo Search has added suggest feature which tries to auto-complete queries based upon what you type. It not only helps you cut down your search time by limiting the number of words you need to type in the search box, but it also comes handy if you excessively misspell words. Previously, this feature was exclusively available on Yahoo Toolbar." (Ref).

Nicely done Yahoo! You guys will have to work on improving it though! I had to type in "jason nur" to FINALLY find me! (lol).

Was just doing some random browsing and found a VERY interesting article that documents an interview with Tim Berners-Lee (yesterday) titled, "The future of the Web as seen by its creator". In this article, Mr. Berners-Lee discusses popular topics such as Semantic Web, Web 2.0 and also Web 3.0.

Techie or not, I think everyone (who uses the Web) should at least give this article a look through.

Captain's log, stardate 20070710, Eastern Caribbean Quadrant.. As I sit here building this web application for work, I am amazed at how "easy" MS has made things for us developers. I mean, dragging and dropping controls, nice pretty configuration screens and tools, directory security by access levels at the click of a couple rectangular buttons.. Does this happen in other languages? PHP? Coldfusion? I remember my stint with PHP and, yea.. it's super flexible and sure, it's free, but man.. I can't imagine developing the apps I do now in PHP.. especially not considering the time frame clients demand!

But of course, I know, there's a price for the beauty of (the l33t versions of) MS tools, and at times the price is as shocking as the tools themselves! But.. really, can one say that it is not worth it? Also noting the amount of tools (more coming in each new edition) and the support from places like ASP.NET Forums?

I'd like to see two development teams build the same web application, one a ASP.NET team and the other a PHP team... I wonder who'd do it faster and which one of them would produce the better quality (reliable, and such) product.

Please note though, I'm not bashing PHP, it's a very workable, free alternative and I totally love the dollars sign ($) to indicate variables .. lol .. I guess the drag and drop of MS tools have me.

Ah Monday, the beginning of another week! To be quite frank, I'm somewhat glad to see the weekend go! It was a tooth short of a totally disappointing weekend! Everything I had planned to do, failed to "come off" and in some situations even backfired! Interestingly as well.. that was going to be my busiest weekend in a while! Had Friday night, Saturday night and Sunday afternoon & the evening planned.

Alas! Nothing happened (except Sunday evening) and I'm left to assume it was all for the best.

On the bright side of things, I got to resume my affair with Ubuntu and familiarise myself once again with the cool Beryl packages and generally, Linux's shell commands. Speaking about shell commands though, the techies of you who're familiar with Linux should definitely check out this video. In essence it demos a Text-Based YouTube Video Player for Linux. Thanks for the link Ramal!

Here are some interesting reads...

First, all of us have heard about it and I'm guessing about 70% of my friends have probably used it.. but really, how does Bluetooth work? This article is sure to give you a good idea.

Maintaining a 'good diet' is no longer only a female thing, us guys have recognised that it is a requirement either to keep healthy or .. to help get the body that interests the females, . lol, Anyway! Here's an article that speaks to 3 common Diet Myths. I found #3 especially interesting... and worrying.. as I really had no clue! I.. was living a dream it seems.

Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) can be soo greatt!!! Provided you know how to work it! Well for you who want some nice tips/tricks and lack a good CSS book, check out Ten CSS tricks you may not know.

I learned some nice stuff and I hope you do too! Enjoy!

This article from PC World was out for a month or so however, it displays some reallly good 'products', so just in the event that you missed it, here's the link!

My favourite 8 of the 100 Best products are: Google Apps (docs, spreadsheets); Canonical Ubuntu 7.04 (free OS with standard word processing, spreadsheet, email clients anyone? - did I mention that software is free too?); Google Gmail (I like the free POP forwarding the most); Google YouTube (my tube anyone?); Mozilla Firefox 2 (no need to have a genuine copy of Windows to run this baby! - [like with IE7]); Skype 3 (sweet for calling out of Barbados, not calling in!); Yahoo Flickr (great quality! Excellent photos are on here, if I didn't have my own photo site, I would definitely consider this); and Microsoft Office 2007 (it's pretty. ).

I haven't put up anything funny in a while, but I think this makes up for it! Check this out!

Enjoy!!

Google Earth's is undoubtedly one of the best FREE, MAP products on the market today. When I was heading to Uni in UK, dad and I used it to find the Uni, determine how far Uni was from my accommodation, plot out routes from my flat to town, friend's houses etc.! Truly, Google Earth is just plain COOL! (That's not only the techie in me talking... .. .)

So.. considering all of the above, my suggested article today is How Google Earth Works from the renowned Howstuffworks.com. It goes through some basic functions of the program, some fun stuff and also shows you how to customise it. I recommend this article for anyone planning on taking a trip (even within Barbados!) or just someone who's interested in Cities, technology or maps. One feature that just blows me away is the 3-D Views.. that you MUST check out! The only concern I have though is.. the amount of free information which is now so easily placed in the hands of .. "bad people".. :\ Mazal Tov to us all!

Just found a pretty "interesting" article on Yahoo! Tech titled Most Common Passwords. I REALLY think you should check it out as even I, a "renowned techie" (ha!), have used one or two of these passwords in the 'past'.

Some of the most common ones to me are:
1. password
2. 123456
3. jason

The benefit of course is that the are all sooo easy to remember which means almost instant access with little "scratching of the head". Hmm.. shoot.. now that I've shared these with you I'm going to have to do some quick password changing!! Probably I'll try.. password with two 'p's this time.

For those of you that are interested in making your password more secure, check out Password Makeover and How to Pick a Genuinely Secure Password. The main reason I've suggested those Yahoo! articles is that comments are allowed and therefore you can get pretty useful feedback from the 'general population'. Enjoy!!