Another WordPress weblog by Enno ter Keurst
Google has presented their new desktop search tool.
It is a nice tool but it comes at a price. The price you pay is your privacy. With the tool you can index your documents which can be stored on more than one machine. In order to do that Google will have to transfer your data to their servers. This is a potential security risk for you personal but especially if you use the in your business environment.
Link: Electronic Frontier Foundation.
Link: Google desktop.
Goto this link.
Client: We don’t want to do this full-page newspaper ad in color. It’s not about the money. We just don’t want the ad to attract too much attention.”
Customer calling book and video store where I work… Hello, I am a high school teacher here in town. I am looking for a video of the Gettysburg address. And I do NOT want a reenactment! I want the REAL Lincoln!
Below is a call I placed to a tech support line for for an issue with a piece of mission critical hardware. Me: Thanks for calling me back. Tech: No Problem. Me: We are having issues with your virtual network adapter drivers. For some reason when I enable the network adapter all the COM ports on the system lock up. Tech: Oh yea, we know about that issue. Me: Ok, is there an updated driver? Tech: Nope. But we are working on that now. Me: What is the estimated date of arrival? Tech: hold please…music…Sir? We really don’t know. Me: Ok, is there a workaround? Tech: Definately! Me: Ok, what is it? Tech (dead serious): Don’t use the network adapter if you want to use your other COM ports!
“can you guys make it more like a power-point presentation, you know, with the sliding text stuff and all?”
On the BBC news website.
High Court judges ordered two men to pay the British Phonographic Industry between £1,500 and £5,000 for making thousands of songs available online.
(link)
What they did was wrong, but mabe the industry should also look at all the taxes we pay to compensate the music ‘theft’. We pay tax on cassettes, blank CD’s, blank DVD’s, recording equipment, VCR tapes, there was a proposal for a tax on mp3 players, when we walkinto a store with background music, etc. Somehow I get the feeling I’m paying more than once for my music.
You can find some nifty new Vista tools on the web. Two of them I will mention here; sidebar and a Photo organizer/editing tool (Microsoft Max). You can find Microsoft Max at this site where you can download a version. It reminds me a bit off Picasa. The free Google tool (link). I personally use Adobe Photoshop Elements and I like it very much.
The other thing I would like to point you too is Sidebars. Usefull if you have a big screen, not if you work on a laptop of tablet PC (like I do). (Link)
Is tumbled across this truly nice device; Kiss DP-600 (link here).
On its website it says;
First release of a new generation of Networked DVD and Media Players, the DP-600 will seduce you by its quality and its ability to playback video in High Definition. Its Ethernet and Wi-Fi Network Connectivity will amaze you, giving you ability to subscribe and stream Video-On-Demand and IP-Television Services. KiSS Online will change the way you look at your television, you can now check what’s on TV today, listen to WebRadio, view the weather forecast, see the latest stock indices and play games. Connect your PC to the KiSS DP-600 and play all your Multimedia files directly to your television with KiSS PC-Link. And of course, the DP-600 will also play all your DVDs, DivX, Windows Media 9, Nero Digital, MP3 and the majority of the file format available.
The specs are really inpressive. Move over Microsoft Media player!
Apple sets the Intel free? I think the other way around is more precise.
Apple can finally catch-up with the ‘Windows’ platform on speed and price. Although, speed Yes, price No. You are still paying way to much for an Apple like a MacBook Pro.
The first Intel based Apple is out; MacBook Pro.
If it only ran Windows, I would almost think of getting one.
AN EXTRAORDINARY “hyperspace” engine that could make interstellar space travel a reality by flying into other dimensions is being investigated by the United States government.
The hypothetical device, which has been outlined in principle but is based on a controversial theory about the fabric of the universe, could potentially allow a spacecraft to travel to Mars in three hours and journey to a star 11 light years away in just 80 days, according to a report in today’s New Scientist magazine.
The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a spacecraft.
Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension.
Read about this Startrek development in the Scotsman article.
Today Toshiba unveiled a brand new laptop with a detachable display. The detachable display works as normal notebook display when attached to the laptop. Separated, it’s light and ultra-portable.
More on this site.
