Yesterday evening started out wonderfully. The video card had arrived and dinner was pastrami sandwiches. Delicious. I probably wolfed it down too quickly to actually enjoy it, but that’s what happens when I get a new toy. Ask Dana how much attention I paid her after I used her student status to get my Powerbook.
So I ran upstairs to my room and carefully installed the new card. I plugged everything back into my computer, removed the ADC to DVI adapter on my Formac display and plugged that in, and let her rip. The computer seemed to start up as normal. Good.
My video card was delayed yesterday, as the UPS site described. It was nowhere to be found. I cried and cried. Very sad.
I’ve been watching the tracking status intently today (with an updated delivery estimate of today). Just a few short minutes ago, I noticed that the status had been changed to delivered.
I finally get to play with my new toy. Seriously, I’m like a kid at Christmas with this stuff. To quote myself: “Weeee!”
I live in Massachusetts. Snow is not a weather phenomenon here; it’s a way of life. Due to that fact, I’ve learned to accept snow and snowstorms. They can’t be avoided, only dealt with. Every time the white stuff hits the ground, I know I’m going to have to shovel it off the driveway and the deck. I know I’ll have to clean off my car. I know there’s going to be so much salt on the road that I’m going to go through a gallon of windshield wiper fluid (because, unlike peanuts, windshields are best when unsalted). I know traffic is going to be terrible going in to work.
It may start to look like I have a personal jihad against the fine folks at LowEndMac, but I really don’t. I enjoy a lot of their content. Their archived Mac technical information is pretty good. Well, it used to be. It’s now filled with missing files (Error 404 abound!) and all attempts to notify them seem to be directed into /dev/null (or “sent into the void” for my less geeky readers). Some of their articles are interesting and inspiring.
When Google Desktop first came out, it was moderately cool. You could search Outlook Mail, your files, Internet Explorer web history, and AOL IM chat history. I use Windows at work, so I tested it out. It worked from what I could tell, but I use Thunderbird for mail, Firefox for web, and Gaim for AIM chat. I totally forgot about Google Desktop.
Then Google Desktop came out of beta. Not only did they add Firefox and Thunderbird support, they supplied a plugin interface. This is huge. That enables developers to add Google searching to any product. For example, someone could write a plugin to search Gaim logs. It’s tempting to get a free t-shirt, but as I don’t have a Windows box at home, I doubt I will even attempt making a plugin.
After spending a lot time surfing the net looking for the best upgrade for my Powermac, I decided on an ATi Radeon 9800 Pro Mac Edition video card. It’s the best video that will ever work in my Dual 1 GHz G4 Powermac. I know you’re all very excited for me.
What’s even better about it, is that it will likely correct the KotOR problems I was having. There was an update that was supposed to correct it, but I was too disheartened to try it again. Besides, I barely have time for anything lately. I haven’t even been playing Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
You may or may not notice that all attempts to load any address on this site starting with “www.godlikenerd.com” will now be forwarded to the same address with the “www.” stripped out. I like it that way. It keeps the addresses shorter and it hasn’t been necessary to put that on anything since the middle 90’s.
This is of course explained better at no-www.org. Anybody running their own domain name with the ability to use .htaccess files should check it out.
I’ve already run this idea by a couple people, but I thought I’d write about it so there’s some record that it was my damn idea. If you’ve read someone write about this or actually do it already, let me know in the comments.
Tag, You’re It # Many of you are already familiar with tagging, or folksonomies. Popular services use this categorization/organization paradigm to help users manage their content. For example, there’s del.icio.us for bookmarks, Flickr for pictures, 43 Things for goals, and even Technorati for blog posts such as this one. Some of these services are even beginning to list content from these other services when browsing tagged content.
Wired magazine has been steadily losing favor in technology circles. This isn’t because they’re a commercial giant. It’s because of piss poor reporting. In New Browsers, Same Unwanted Ads, we get to read all the same FUD that has been spread by Microsoft about other operating systems, just in the sphere of web browsers now. In other words, Firefox (and others) are only more secure now because of security through obscurity. You’re only safe because you’re using something that attackers don’t know about (yet).
Don’t you just hate it when supposed “authorities” on computing can’t get their facts straight?
Why yes, yes I do Dan Knight of Low End Mac. That’s why I’m taking you to task for ‘Creaky Operating Systems’ Good Enough for Millions. There were some mistakes in the original Washington Post article, but “correcting” them with more mistakes is plain irresponsible and loses you all credibility. Then again, Dan also wrote Apple does us a favor by not shipping a better mouse, so perhaps credibility isn’t on his agenda.