🏷️ i-tech

On the google home page today is quite an extraordinary simulation of a hanging metallic mobile toy that actually follows the laws of gravity, the earth's electromagnetic field and the eccentric orbit as it moves and responds to your mouse gestures.

I didn't know anything about Alexander Calder - the sculptor that the doodle is honouring so I had to look him up. V.interesting.

I knew this day would come. Chrome might be rock solid in its security features, but the fact that any odd person on the planet can write non-peer reviewed and non-standards compliant extensions for Chrome is a major drawback. Someone has just finished an elaborate hack to steal all your Gmail contact emails if you are using Scratchpad - the nifty app that lets you use Chrome as a notepad and syncs all of your notes to Google Docs as a backup.



The very fact that the zillion extensions I try out ALL need blanket access to ALL my browsing history and whatnots is a a bit disturbing. So what do we do? Chuck out all extensions? Chrome wouldn't be half as useful without these extensions that I use constantly. I am in a big quandry right now, as are several other Chrome fans, I am sure.

My current list of extensions:
    

• Add to Google Bookmarks - Version: 0.1.2 ID: idhcimbcedikofokpoignmlnnkidpeld

(Can't get rid of this, this is how I sync my bookmarks ALL the time.)
    

• Autocomplete = on - Version: 1.0 ID: ecpgkdflcnofdbbkiggklcfmgbnbabhh

(Nopes. this can't go. I need password filling...)

• Autofill - Version: 5.5 ID: nlmmgnhgdeffjkdckmikfpnddkbbfkkk

(Maybe this can go... but then I will have to refill forms over and over. Maybe not then.)
    

• Chrome IE Tab Multi - Version: 0.9.7.6 ID: fnfnbeppfinmnjnjhedifcfllpcfgeea

(Ridiculous work email OWA sometimes blocks attachments and I need this to access the attachments. I would gladly let go of this had it not been for the paleolithic work email.)
    

• FlashBlock - Version: 0.9.31 ID: gofhjkjmkpinhpoiabjplobcaignabnl

(I need this. I am so terribly annoyed by all the annoying ad videos that start loading automatically when you visit a website. This extension just blocks them all till you really want to watch a video.)
    

• History 2 - Version: 0.6.0

ID: cahejgbbfgmlmjgdjlibphdjeldhagkp
(The native history in Chrome is SO horribly structured, you can't find anthing. This extension eases the pain.)

• Lazarus: Form Recovery - Version: 3.0.3.1 ID: loljledaigphbcpfhfmgopdkppkifgno

(Can't do without this at all.)
    

• Link grabber - Version: 1.0 ID: modbohgknhnjilkoaggaacedmmfbfapn

(This could go... why can't Chrome have an Opera like view links features. Makes me want to switch to Opera which has all these features built in without the need for unsafe extensions.)
    

• MiddleButtonScroll - Version: 1.1.0 ID: ibehnpdcgpabccnlefccelhblhphbbpl

(This is for my linux box. It is again so annoying in linux, chrome doesn't let you scroll with the middle click button. This is probably the only difference that matters between Chrome on Windows and Chrome on Linux)
    

• One Window - Version: 2.15 ID: papnlnnbddhckngcblfljaelgceffobn

(I hate popups. Enough said. Can't get rid of this and am again annoyed that Chrome can't implement this natively.)

• OWA Chrome Companion - Version: 0.1.2.5 ID: gmloogbeidmnmkdeoibnfcglaenjcmah

(Keeps track of work email. Indispensible.)

• Readability Redux - Version: 1.3.2 ID: jggheggpdocamneaacmfoipeehedigia

(With the amount of ugly out there on the web, this is a lifesaver.)
    

• Scratchpad - Version: 2.2.4 ID: kjebfhglflhjjjiceimfkgicifkhjlnm

(Hmm... considering parting with this because of the latest hack. I could always pull up the Google Docs website directly, even though it does take a whole minute more to load and post.)

• Screen Capture (by Google) - Version: 5.0.3 ID: cpngackimfmofbokmjmljamhdncknpmg

(Pretty handy for any illustrations that I am doing. WAAAY more efficient than using the PrtSc button followed by Paint.NET edits.)
    

• Shortcut Manager - Version: 0.7.9 ID: mgjjeipcdnnjhgodgjpfkffcejoljijf

(Remaps annoying keyboard combinations. Chrome should have native support for this. Again dissatisfied with the lack of choices on chrome. Opera has this feature, why not chrome?)

• Tab Glutton - Version: 0.4.0 ID: ekfmaibfpamaegficfifofnlhalkbdfm

(I will go nuts without this. My average number of tabs usually hover around 50+)

I was looking up the sheer number of "distraction-free writing" applications and software that exist today when I came across this


What a hoot!

I never realized that there were as many or even more App review sites and listing sites as there are apps themselves... It's amazing how fast they have sprung up everywhere. There are so many of them that you can make a list of the listings of web apps. For eg.

• The unofficial Web Application list.
• Appappeal
• Go2Web20
• Codswallop
• Webware
• Nedwolf
• Ruby on Rails List
• Neobinaries
• Edutech Wiki
• Appstorm

and a million others. The list just goes on.

Hell, I just created one here.

Welcome to my Candara and Droid Sans Obsession. I am completely sold on these fonts.
Candara


Droid Sans


Love the way the letters curve, everything about these fonts is so perfect.

Candara is native to windows and droid sans is native to Android. But I want them both on both of my windows and linux systems. So here goes:

Installing both fonts on Linux.
From:

• Copy the fonts in their own folders under /usr/share/fonts/truetype
• Make these fonts available to the system: chmod 0775 -R droid/ candara/
• Cache the fonts so they are loaded on all the applications: chmod 0775 -R candara/ droid/

Installing droid fonts on Windows.
This is way simpler.

• Just download the fonts from this
• Extract to the Windows/Fonts folder.

While hunting for stuff, I found this, a complete image of a running android system ripe for hacking.
Hmm...

I can always use R, but sometimes Gnumeric comes in handy to whittle down lists filled with duplicates in a jiffy.

Simplified steps from

1. Say you have a column A with A1 to A100 rows with duplicate data that you want to eliminate

2. Go to Data > Advanced Filter. Under the input tab, choose list range as A1 to A100.

3. I don't understand why Gnumeric needs a criteria range for everything but it does... Even for duplicate-value-finding that involves no mathematical formulas. So choose a criteria range. Say B1 to B2. Make sure that the first cell of the criteria range has the same column header as the list range. So if, say your cell A1 was named "Numbers" then B1 should also be "Numbers". Leave B2 blank.

4. Check unique records only

5. Go to the Output tab. Choose an output range (longer than the input range, just to prevent any complaints from gnumeric). Click OK.

You should have the original list with no duplicates in the output range.

Do I really want this keyboard? I am tempted to get it because it is exactly like a laptop keyboard. I am a very noisy typist and can probably wake the dead with my typing... or at least make them toss around. Maybe this keyboard will stop all that noise and I don't have to drown out the sound of my own typing with music?





BUT I am sure accumulation tax applies to such frivolous things. I can probably buy more heavy metal instead... Besides, I am sure the dead need all the extra exercise they can get. I am resisting this totally unreasonable impulse to buy this absolutely unnecessary keyboard.

I upgraded to the latest VLC on Crunchbang today. It turned out that I had completely forgotten where the audioscrobbler settings for last.fm submission were in VLC after so many years of not changing them.


They are under Tools > Preferences > (Show Settings: All) > Interface > Control Interfaces > Audioscrobbler.

I always notice that the features that are super-important to me are usually buried under countless sub-sub-headings. Maybe that says something about the completely trivial ways I use my music playing software.

...and thus, effectively, stall future innovations in technology by Google, JUST BECAUSE their crappy outdated non-forward thinking technologies face the likelihood of making god forbid, less money than Google. While Google gives away and shares its technological innovations free with the people and helps make the internet a better and sounder place for the future, all Microsoft ever thinks of is making money and all Apple thinks of is how to keep extracting money in spite of their ridiculously high-failure-rate hardware and limited-software from snobby sheep.

And their combined evil solution? Well, just sue Google and its partner companies for every technological process ever patented by

• a) buying the companies that originally created these patents (who needs the brains to develop and innovate and actually apply for patents when you can conveniently buy the company that created and innovated, in the first place..) and
• b) by pouring money into nitpicky and downright grubby-paw litigation and
• c) using cunning backdoor strategies to win these ligitations.

In the end, these strategies make Microsoft's technologically PALEOLITHIC and appallingly poorly made software make money out of what Google slaved over creating.

I read the OS News website after a conversation with @paul yesterday and was completely blown away by the ever-expanding EVIL Apple and Microsoft are perpetrating against progress in technology, in general and more specifically, how they have both invested substantial amounts of influence and money to keep open source technologies like Linux stunted and shunned by a large proportion of the population. Worse, when one branch of linux, the Android OS, is honed into a commercial success for mobile platforms by the brains at Google, Microsoft and Apple make sure that they STILL fleece the unsuspecting population and make money out of Android by using underhand and totally loathesome unethical legal strategies.

All of this makes me loathe Microsoft and Apple even more. It cements my view that any self-respecting consumer who lives with technology and thus, has even remote interests in innovation in technology, should seriously think about means and ways to move away from the stifling monopoly that microshit and crapple have on the market. More importantly, it is time to take assertive steps to implement this move away from the technological cesspool that microsoft and apple have managed to create.

@matthew was telling me how he has walked and continues to walk with kids and a pram down Linwood and it remains one of the most positive things one can do for a neighbourhood. I couldn't have agreed more. In a weirdly analogous way, small individual actions to dispel general misconceptions about linux and opensource technologies (that are not bound down by the venal giants, Microsoft and Apple) make a world of difference to the neighbourhood of future technological innovation that are not geared to fleece people but empower them to be more productive and encourage independent thought.

I am glad that I have taken the first daunting step by embracing linux and at the very least, trying to learn to think for myself. If I can do it, anyone can. It's not that hard. It just requires the willingness to fight the cancer that hamper progress and thought.

Do it today, try out a linux OS, try out R for analysis, ditch SAS, move your office applications to a browser-based cloud, weed out microshit and crapple from your lives, try out some Google products. See how they change and rock your world. You would have done that small invisible favour to help take web technology and innovation a little bit further and away from the artificial and downright, atrocious restraints that it doesn't deserve.

I was searching for some answers on a forum when this gem appeared:


What on earth is a REAPER in the context of recording or shopping? Since when did random questions become so tough?

(or how Google is everyone's mother(tm) @paul, 2011)

I think @mrdeadlier did this once but there is now a site for finding out what Google thinks of you.

Let's see: Who is tinypliny?

tinypliny is the network based installer
tinypliny is the minimalistic one that does not even
tinypliny is the
tinypliny is an unknown quantity at this point
tinypliny is offline
tinypliny is that a sweater with the shorts?

Who are you according to Google? Find out at this

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PS: Who or what is Binky?