There have been numerous papers written on the subject that “internet access” is the latest class discrimination factor. A good example is the suggestion of “internet voting”. It makes it even easier for affluent, connected, city/urban people to participate in the voting process and handicaps those who do not have access to a computer [...]

I’ve blogged that I am switching back from Ubuntu Linux for my work PC. I still have not gone back. I have been trying to build a “useful PC”. It has not been easy. I’ve become spoiled by some very basic functions that are standard on Ubuntu (and most Linux).
My latest problem [...]

Yes, I finally decided to give an evaluation copy of Microsoft Vista a try. 28 hours later, I am SOOOOO ready to re-install Windows XP Tablet !
The target of my attempt was my “new to me” Toshiba M200. I rally like the machine but I discovered the Toshiba Hard Drive was failing. Fortunately [...]

I was speaking with a researcher / geek at a government think tank, or as they describe themselves …
A not-for-profit organization chartered to work in the public interest with three Federally Funded Research and Development Centers  - one for the Department of Defense, one for the Federal Aviation Administration, and one for the [...]

I don’t have a system that can display to multiple monitors - all my compute power is tied up in laptops of various sizes, shapes, and ages. each can have one external monitor but then I still end up either buy a bunch of monitors - one each - and a KVM or some [...]

This is a follow-on to my post “Home office goes multi-monitor with a twist“. I’m pretty happy with Synergy. One change I suggest (for sanity). I suggest either increasing the wait time that Synergy takes before switching to the next machine or enabling “bounce”.
I found, after a little use, that there were times when I’d [...]

We are better at rationalizing what we do than being rational about what we’re doing.
- Linda Stone.

This quote was in an article written about cellphones being everywhere. I don’t mean they are ubiquitous but rather, people feel compelled to always have their cell phone with them. There are lots of [...]

I wrote about using Lotus Notes “basic” as a way to conserve resources when you are not taking advantage of the extra features the Eclipse framework (aka Lotus Expeditor) provides. Well, I recently needed to switch over the full Notes “standard”. I got a shock when I lost my nice, tuned, custom frameset (seen [...]

I’ve wondered what all the excitement has been about Twitter. It’s not new by internet standards and yet I had not used it. So, I gave it a whirl. I ended that joyride last night. I posted a tweet saying ” no thanks”. Here are my thoughts and experience.

Twitter has a very [...]

I’ve been trying to find ways to extend my wireless network to the backyard and possible to the adjacent building. There have been three great challenges: (1) I don’t want to buy any more networking gear while I am renting; (2) the rental has limited - aka old - infrastructure; and (3) I want to [...]

I still don’t have TV service and I plan to keep it that way for a while longer. One thing I have missed is the evening national news. I found the NBC Evening News has been made available as a podcast. That’s good, but I don’t like to leave my computers running at night [...]

I was about to sit down for a little mindless television when the phone rang. It was a recorded message but I actually listened for 15 seconds. It was an automated system announcing that U.S. Congresswoman Thelma Drake (2nd District Of Virginia) was having a teleconference town hall meeting and if I stayed on the [...]

I dearly love my Thinkpad X60. It is light, it is quick, it has a biometric reader, and it is mine (not my employer’s). However, it has one really big drawback - it has only  a 1024×768 screen. My official work computer is a well used Thinkpad T40. The “company” announced I was allotted a [...]

We use IBM Lotus Notes for email and a number of useful applications where I work. There has been a significant shift with Notes since the introduction of it’s Eclipse framework - or more correctly the addition of Expeditor. This made a big difference for me when I was using Ubuntu as primary work environment. [...]

I spend a good portion of the weekend working on the farmhouse plans. In addition to being the owner, general contractor, and building the kitchen, I am also the architect. Fortunately for me, the steel contractor has a very accommodating drafting staff so they took my original floor plans and matched them up to the [...]

This is not a story of barn yard animals. It does, however, indicate that the engineers at Verizon Wireless have a sense of humor when it comes to disaster readiness - a subject that typically has very little to laugh about.
I once conducted an interview for a new-hire candidate where I posed the [...]

I just realized the farmhouse will need 24 ports of gigabit networking and to make my future life a little easier, there are places where I could use power over Ethernet (PoE).
I have some options. If I look hard and plan a little, I really only need PoE on about 6-8 ports. So, [...]

Ed was right on the money with is no surprise since he managed a much larger construction project than my farmhouse. So, the answer is the “remote” is run by “the kid” and controls the “pumper” to accomplish the “pour” …
+ + =

I don’t own an iPhone. I don’t even own a cell phone with a camera, but if I did, I would seriously consider a feature like what the Clarifi does. It’s a protective case with a slider over the phone’s camera lens. It allows you to slide a secondary lens in front of [...]

I learned to fly back in the mid 1990’s. That was not so long ago and at the time, I had two kinds of instructors - those under the age of 25 who dreamed of a commercial pilot career, and those over 60 who had a mixed career with military and commercial experience but who [...]

If you search the internet for the word “actiontec” and “linux” odds are good that (1) you have the device and (2) you have the dreaded DNS issues. It turns out this device acts as both a DSL modem and a router but it doesn’t d oit second job very well. It has a chronic [...]

This is an update on my prior post about using the Prism plug-in for the Firefox browser. I now have nearly a dozen “web applications” that I’ve made from websites. The fist one I created was for Google Reader. Now I have added one for my local weather, National Radar map, Grand Central, Premiere [...]