I have to stop doing admin tasks when I’m tired and distracted! I just noticed that Six Apart had just released MT 3.11, a bugfix. I had about 15 min before class, and usually upgrades like that are trivial…
But in the rush, I accidentally, once again, blew away my MT install. Thank god I had already converted it to run from a database; otherwise I would have been one sad, sad man.

Anyway, I have a new rule: do not engage in blog administrative tasks when the beginning of torts class is imminent.

I’m in the market for a new laptop. I had a Dell 4150 that I absolutely loved, but it was heavy. Well, not by conventional standards, but by my stringent laptop standards. I have a huge brick of a machine for work, it’s a loaded Dell, which weighs nearly 8lbs. I was considering using that, but the idea of lugging it back and forth to school/home/work, well, that isn’t appealing.

So I’ve been debating about a Sony PCG-TR* but I waffle back and forth. Then I had this idea about a tablet PC… I thought, maybe the convenience of changing the form factor, combined with the svelte design would be cool. As luck would have it, we have two table PCs at work for evaluation, so I checked one out this weekend.

At first, I was really impressed with the versatility of the table, but honestly, the mystique wore off pretty quickly. After you get over the “cool” factor of being able to flip the screen around to any orientation, the little roughness around the edges of the OS start to grate.

There were lots of minor annoyances, which might have been specific to the particular model, so I won’t go into those. There was one major annoyance that would keep me from ever getting one: I type nearly 5x faster than I write.

The handwriting recognition for the Windows XP “Table” Edition, actually works pretty good. But honestly, unless you type painfully slow, it’s just quicker to type. And yes, it was cool to lay in bed with my wife, surfing the web with nothing more than a pen, but that doesn’t make it worth paying a premium for a feature that is nothing more than “cool”. I guess the tablet isn’t for me. I think that if you were in the position where you made a living off of presentations (the thing would rule for PowerPoint warriors) then it might be worth it. Otherwise, it’s a cool idea that isn’t quite there yet.

Wow. If ever there was confirmation that I’d done the right thing, switching from Internet Explorer to Mozilla Firefox, this would be it: a CERT Vulnerability Note about IE, which actually lists as a security fix, using a different browser!

For those who may not know, CERT is the Computer Emergency Readiness Team, which issues security alerts about the most pressing computer security issues. For them to have released this about IE is a major indication that Microsoft needs to address these browser security issues post-haste.

I was a dedicated Netscape user for many years, until finally, several years back, Internet Explorer eclipsed Netscape in functionality. Then I finally broke down and switched, but it’s always bothered me. However, recently, I discovered there is hope…

I just installed Mozilla Firefox 0.9, and, frankly I’m blown away. Not only does it seem to render pages faster than IE, but it has more features (hooray for tabbed browsing!!) and extensions and themes! So now I have a browser that not only blocks pop-up windows, but also filters out on page ads! Thanks to a little extension called AdBlock. And honestly, I have only discovered a handful of sites that only work with IE (mostly due to Active X stuff) and they are sites I can either live without, or fire up IE just for dealing with those sites.

Oh yeah, and since Microsoft doesn’t seem to care about making IE safe from a number of different security flaws, I’m glad not to use it. I’ll report more later, after I’ve been using Firefox for a while.

Okay, I know it’s a little late to grip about this now… but I hate, and I mean absolutely hate, the whole “My Computer”, “My Network” and “My Documents” thing with Windows. It’s so condescending… I’m not a child, I’m very capable of organizing my files into the directory structure that I want.

So one of the first things I do is remove this functionality from Windows:

1. Go to the Start menu
2. Select Run
3. Enter regsvr32 /u mydocs.dll
4. Click OK

Now if you delete them, they won’t come back! There’s also another annoying one, if you install Adobe Acrobat, the application creates a “My eBooks” folder which the above trick won’t fix. I wasted a good deal of time looking for a preference in Acrobat to disable this. Guess what? It doesn’t exist.

Instead, to stop this “feature” you need to go to the Acrobat directory and delete a plug-in:

1. Go to your Acrobat Directory (usually C:\Program Files/Adobe/Acrobat x.x)
2. Go to the Plug-ins directory (Acrobat\plug_ins)
3. Delete or re-name the ebook.api file

That should do the trick. Microsoft, Adobe, and other vendors should be ashamed for treating their customers like idiots. You can also visit TweakXP.com for some more great hints on dealing with XP annoyances.

LaCie has announced a 1TB drive… 🙂 Of course, it’s currently $1299, but I remember when the first 1GB drives hit the market at $1000… three years later, we were all buying 30-40GB drives for $200…

Wow. Apparently, rather than fix the security holes in IE, Microsoft would just rather you not actually click on links:
The most effective step that you can take to help protect yourself from malicious hyperlinks is not to click them. Rather, type the URL of your intended destination in the address bar yourself. By manually typing the URL in the address bar, you can verify the information that Internet Explorer uses to access the destination Web site. To do so, type the URL in the Address bar, and then press ENTER.

Why not just recommend avoiding browser security problems at all by watching TV instead??!

It’s worm time… and because in my family I’m “the computer guy” I am being asked by many people how to deal with it. First, if you are getting lots of “Message Undeliverable” or “TEST” e-mails from people you don’t know, they are probably the worm. Here’s some good rules of thumb:

• NEVER OPEN ATTACHMENTS FROM PEOPLE YOU DON’T KNOW
  
• BE WARY OF OPENING ATTACHMENTS FROM PEOPLE YOU DO KNOW
  

Attachments are how these worms/viruses spread. But let’s say you are infected, how do you recover? Three steps:
1. Get some virus software. There are a number of virus protection applications available. Norton AntiVirus from Symantec is one. McAfee’s VirusScan is another. Both are fine, personally I use McAfee. VirusScan On-line is reasonably priced at $29.95 and since it’s “on-line” it’s very easy to keep up-to-date. Get it, install it, run it… and keep it running.
2. Get rid of the Trojans/Spyware. Yes, surfing the web can infect your machine. Ever visit a site and get a pop-up offering to install cool cursors for you? Spyware. Visit a site offering to change your homepage to a great new search engine? Spyware. Okay, so you’ve got it, now get rid of it. Visit LavaSoft and get Ad-Aware. It will scan your system for Trojans/Spyware and it will also keep itself up-to-date. Get it, install it, run it… and run it again periodically.
3. Keep your operating system up-to-date. These viruses and worms propigate by exploiting security holes. So if you use a Mac, be sure to periodically run the Software Update. For Windows users you should take advantage of the Microsoft Windows Update. Visit the site regularly and keep your machine up-to-date.
There is never any perfect way to ensure you will never get a virus, but if you follow the steps I’ve outlined above, you’ll be a lot safer than most people. And if everyone kept their machines up-to-date, worms and viruses like this new stupid MyDoom would have a lot harder time wreaking havoc on us all.

There is a lot of commotion in the entertainment industry as we approach convergence. We have a broadcast industry that can’t seem to realize people care more about content and convenience than advertising messages, and a movie industry that can’t seem to adapt to new technologies, spouting 20 year old rhetoric over and over. There will be time to address those backwards views later, right now, my grip is with cable.

I live in a major metropolitan area, where I have cable from a very large national provider. I have 90 some odd channels, most of which I not only never watch, but I have actually programmed out of my Tivo (yes, I’m one of those). But what gets me, is that there is currently no way for me to get some additional channels (specifically the Food Network) that I do want, all the while my cable provider keeps trying to push digital cable so they can pump more and more advertising laden drivel down my throat. You know what? I think this would be a good time for cable companies to consider that, just possibly, less is more.

You see, I don’t want 150 channels. And I don’t want advertising. I pay for HBO, and do you know why? Not for the movies. I have DVDs for movies. I pay a monthly fee for HBO every month to see programming like the Sopranos, and more specifically, Six Feet Under. And do you know what? I would pay for other channels too, if the quality of programming were desirable, and my programs were presented commercial free. I’d probably pay the same (maybe even, gasp, more!) to the cable company if they offered a simple way for me to have, not 150 channels, but say 10-15 ala carte channels, of my choosing. My personal line-up would consist of:

* PBS
* HBO
* FOX (Just until the cancel The Simpsons)
* Cartoon Network
* Nickelodeon
* IFC
* Sundance Channel
* Food Network
* M2
* CNN

Yes, I would pay for each of these channels. I’d even pay 5.95 a month for each of them, which would actually increase my cable bill. I’m sure the economics of that don’t jive with the current broadcasting, advertising supported model of production. But here’s the best part, by continuing to support channels that produce quality programming, and ignoring vapid sitcoms, my money goes to reward the content I find valuable, rather than lowest common denominator content designed to hawk advertisers’ wares. I’m sure there are still many consumers that would pay to see Friends (someone has to be renting/buying those DVDs of the “Best of Friends” right?). Then my Tivo’s advertising skipping features become moot. I think this would reshape the overall broadcast and cable market, to provide highly specialized channels, which could charge accordingly for the interested community they would serve. There are details to be worked out, to be sure, but I am still convinced that a network could make a profit, and a considerable one, with this model; provided that they had content which a segment of the population found valuable, and they produced quality programming. The bottom line is that we don’t have this today because networks don’t produce quality programming. They aren’t interested in producing quality programming. They are simply creating vehicles for advertising, by lowest common denominator tactics to pursue desirable market demographics.

I have no problem with the broadcast industry crying over the loss of advertising dollars, but I think what the industry needs to realize is that the society in which we live is changing. Consumers are becoming more and more information savvy, and they value their time more and more each day. Instead of wasting all this effort fighting the growing movement of consumers who want content over advertising, or who want to be able to view shows on their own schedules, instead of a dictated schedule, why not put that effort into adopting business models that make sense for the golden age of information, and make some killer bucks in the process.