Last Call
Last Call Karlo.Org is going down for perhaps as long as a month while I move residences. I'll get it back online as soon as possible. Sorry.
« December 2001 | Main | February 2002 »
January 23, 2002
January 22, 2002
Anthrax Screensaver
Anthrax Screensaver Help out researchers seeking a treatment for Anthrax association by joining Intel's distributed computing effort to stop Anthrax. This software ads a distributed computing client to your computer that employs unused computational power to help find proteins that will interact and bind to a compound produced by the Anthrax bacteria, possibly rendering it harmless.
January 21, 2002
Good Eats
Good Eats It's old, but it's about one of my favorite TV shows so I'm going to post it. Teevee.org has a great review of why Good Eats is the best cooking show on TV. "...Alton Brown is having a wonderful time. He was born to be in front of the camera: He's comfortable, energetic, amusing, and he knows how to hit his marks. He is infectious; he makes me want to cook."
PocketPC 2002 Fixes
PocketPC 2002 Fixes Philippe Majerus' web site offers a selection of free utilities for the PocketPC, most of which will be welcome downloads for any advanced desktop Windows user. Download and install his task manager, battery indicators, registry editor, etc. all for free.
January 18, 2002
Mobile wireless
Mobile wireless I'm testing out the new Socket Communications low power wireless lan compact flash card from Socket Communications in my HP Jornada 565 right now. So far it works great, but I haven't had a chance to try it with a dedicated access point yet. Being able to walk into any Starbucks (or a million other locations including schools and office) with my Jornada and log into my home computer, surf, and check email would be fantastic. Once I get it tested with a dedicated access point, I'll post some more opinions about it.
One thing that's for sure -- wireless ethernet (and not just this card) really burns power in mobile devices if you're not careful. I recommend using it in quick bursts, rather than say downloading large files. I tried sending a 5 meg video to my handheld the other day and I used quite a lot of the battery in a matter of minutes. The same thing happens on my laptop when using a Lucent card.
Pogo
Pogo A new device on sale in Britain offers wireless phone, web mp3, sms, and PIM functions. Wonder how long until they show up here... there are some black and white ones now but this has color, flash support, etc. A little big though... not something you can keep in your pocket.
January 17, 2002
Tivo Makes You Soft
Tivo Makes You Soft My Defenses are Down details the problem all Tivo watchers face: you lose your acquired tolerance and immunity to commercials, bad re-runs and channel flipping. "...a steady diet of TiVo -- which carries with it the expectation that all television is television I want to watch, when I want to watch it, how I want to watch it -- has made me soft and unsheltered."
I'm going to be moving home soon, and bringing my Tivo with me. Even though I have lots of gadgets, I know it's that silver Sony Tivo that's going to be like the discovery of fire in the house. I just hope the Tivo won't have a nervous breakdown when 4 people, instead of 1, start making requests of it. Worse yet, how the hell am I going to get all those preferences out of it when I move? I may have to leave my Tivo, and get a new one (don't tell it I said that.)
January 14, 2002
Can-yonn-er-ooo!
Can-yonn-er-ooo! I used to want the Canyonero (of Simpson's fame) but now for my runs to the big blue room I'll take the Maximog, a 20 foot long, 6 ton SUV that gets about 9 miles to the gallon - and has 123 gallon fuel capacity. Don't try to fill that up in Europe without taking a bank loan.
For the James Bond type, accessories include a trailer with office, kitchen and washroom, a jet boat that does 0-60 in 4 seconds, remote unmanned aerial drone, and motorcycle.
Seriously, anyone who buys one of these should be sent with a toothbrush to scrub oil off seagulls and otters at the next big oil spill.
January 13, 2002
Renovations
Renovations The grey and grid design was getting tired, so I've started working to "renovate" the site and move us into CSS rather than tables (sorry IE 3.0 users, but it's time). Why did I get rid of the graphics? Well, I'll be putting a few back in, but in general I felt that it wasn't adding much to the site, took away from the photos I put in posts, and that I couldn't update the design often enough to keep it current. So I've gone back to basics and reduced the design to the bare essentials.
Unfortunately a few sections are not yet done because they will require quite a bit more work to make them happy -- in particular, the gallery is a bit unhappy with the new template and I'll have to figure out a way to improve how it reacts to it. I apologize for the temporary inconsistency -- consider it the price of progress.
Can you tell I have a final exam this week I should study for? Does it show that much? No wonder I don't get much web development done now that I'm not a full-time student. I wonder how much of the web is directly the result of procrastination.
January 10, 2002
Clueless Hotelier
Clueless Hotelier In the wake of a rather amusing Powerpoint-format complaint that's going around the web, DoubleTree Club Hotel Houston General Manager Joseph Crosby has decided to send several web sites a very cross email demanding that they take it down (even though he didn't author the content, and doesn't own its copyright.) He's also kind of peeved that people seem to the moxy to actually post his name and title in connection with the news about issue. Hmm... somebody doesn't read newspapers very often. Last time I checked, you can't claim copyright over factual items (like your name or title) to prevent their use in reports that are actually about you.
January 4, 2002
Happy New Year
Happy New Year Seemed like time to clean house, so I removed some items, took the lame tag out of the header and I'll be making a few other changes to the site. Still haven't had time to redo the layout, but I think maybe in a few weeks after I finish editing my Christmas home videos.