Recent Posts

10301

General Software Discussion / Re: Can't remember the name of Caller ID software!!

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 09:37 PM »

Are you possibly thinking of AnalogX's CallerID over at analogx.com?

10302

General Software Discussion / Re: Appnews.net - A new collaboration between some of our favorite software bloggers

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 09:12 PM »

Hi Rarst!

Very nice site. Saw the notices on gHacks and Freeware Genius and paid you an early visit. Added you to my feed list this morning. Thanks especially for the link to the technical details of how you set things up. Very informative.

Luck!

10303

Living Room / Re: how to improve DC's usability: the stackOverflow model

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 09:06 PM »

when someone posts their first or second post, people are probably a little more willing to cut them some slack and be more gentle, since we can assume they aren't as familiar with the site and are etiquette.

-mouser (April 30, 2009, 05:12 PM)

An excellent point. Although I hadn't thought of it that way before, it is true that I find myself doing exactly what Mouser said for exactly that reason. I guess I'll have to retract my +1 now that I'm looking at it from his perspective.

10304

General Software Discussion / Re: Rubber Ducky - a small, fun resource monitor

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 08:51 PM »

I still like the old System Load indicator from my Amiga days.

It was called Flynn and basically it was the animated face of the main character from Doom who sat on Workbench, (Desktop equivalent), and looked left/right, etc but when the load started to get heavy he progressively got more bloody and haggard.

-4wd (April 30, 2009, 08:01 PM)

Love it. Very dark humor.



Hmmm...maybe somebody can come up with a Resident Evil version? The more your system degrades, the more angry Alice's expression becomes?

(Hey, I'll take any excuse to get Milla Jovovich's lovely visage on my screen. )

10305

Living Room / Re: how to improve DC's usability: the stackOverflow model

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 02:53 PM »

I wish we wouldn't show post count either.

-housetier (April 30, 2009, 02:43 PM)

+1 

I think DonationCoder's forums are about as egalitarian and respectful of differing opinions as is humanly possible.

Even the occasional snit or mini-flame is exceptionally tame by any standard you'd care to apply.

Personally, I've always been impressed by the complete absence of anybody throwing their: professional experience, years with DoCo, financial contributions, age, employment status, school affiliations, college degrees, number of posts, membership status, evenings out with The Stones, or just about anything else in anyone's face when they're posting on the forums.

And AFAIK it's because there is a great deal of mutual respect and not because our Moderators  are busy stomping on the snapdogs and dead-catters.

Where else on the web have you ever found that to be the case?

What a cool bunch of people you all are!


<edit - Woops! - added the part that got cut off the first time I posted. Sorry!>

10306

General Software Discussion / Rubber Ducky - a small, fun resource monitor

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 02:47 PM »

This was a recent find over at xtort.net

MimarSinan Rubber Ducky System Monitor is a small system performance monitor that reports on your RAM and swapfile use, network traffic, plus hard drive and CPU activity levels. No big deal since dozens of other programs do that already. But what makes Rubber Ducky unique is the display. It uses a small "aquarium" complete with little rubber duck that sits above your system tray. Each element in the aquarium means something.

System Information at a Glance

    * small aquarium sits above the system tray
    * elements of the aquarium represent system information
    * see what is slowing down your system at a single look

Available Performance Monitors

    * water level: RAM usage
    * water color: SWAP file usage
    * bubbles: CPU usage
    * fish: NETWORK traffic
    * plants: DISK activity

Download link: http://www.mimarsina....com/rubberducky.asp

Cute and unobtrusive. If you're tired of squinting at tiny numbers and graphs, but still want something to help you keep a rough eye on what your system is up to, give Rubber Ducky a try.

 

10307

Living Room / Re: how to improve DC's usability: the stackOverflow model

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 11:46 AM »

I don't think I like the idea of karma and voting or anything that creates 'elitism' or divides members in any way.

-Gothi[c] (April 30, 2009, 11:01 AM)

Agree.

Rankings tend to diminish overall participation - and intimidate newcomers.

Some of our most interesting participants are self-declared 'neophytes' who are the first to admit they don't know everything they'd like to know about a topic. Oddly enough, that same humility is demonstrated by those DoCo members who just might.

 

10308

Living Room / Re: how to improve DC's usability: the stackOverflow model

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 10:33 AM »

Hmmmm....





I think it's an interesting approach for a Q&A or support site. But the DoCo forums cover a lot more ground than just that. IMHO, many of the discussions surrounding the questions are more interesting and valuable than are the answers to the original questions themselves.

DoCo's forums are particularly interesting to me because I get to read what a lot of bright and technically astute people are thinking as opposed to just what they know. There's a process of dialog here that I don't think you'll find in too many places. It's that dialog - and sense of community - that keeps me coming back. I don't think that something like the stackOverflow model gives you that. It's geared for Q&A's rather than the give and take of dialog.

stackOverflow has a certain vibe of its own. It's better adapted to people that want to just go in, get an answer, and then get out.

It also strikes me as being somewhat more... competitive, if that's the right word? From looking at some of the responses at stackOverflow, I get the distinct impression there's a tendency on the part of many of the participants to get in "Fast & First" with an answer. You won't find many long thoughtful posts like we get from some of the regulars at DoCo.

So from my perspective, DonationCoder and stackOverflow are two websites with fundamentally different goals and audiences. In a way, stackOverflow is a subset of what DoCo is about. DoCo is geared towards building a community. stackOverflow is a switchboard.

I think the stackOverflow approach might be ok in something like a "quick answers" section. But not as a general replacement for the present forum setup. I'd probably even consider going with a Wiki model before I did that.

Just my 2¢

10309

General Software Discussion / Re: JkDefrag further developed as MyDefrag

« Last post by 40hz on April 30, 2009, 09:08 AM »

I hope this is not a precursor to creating a shareware version. 

-y0himba (April 29, 2009, 07:58 AM)

If Mr. Joren Kessels decides to go shareware with MyDefrag, I don't have a problem with that. Since it's his intellectual effort, it's only fair that he should get to decide how he wants to release it.

The very liberal EULA ( http://www.mydefrag..../Manual-License.html ) doesn't seem to indicate his intentions go much beyond establishing authorship, and explicitly limiting  liability for damages should something go wrong.

 

10310

Living Room / Re: The entitled generation....Are they right?

« Last post by 40hz on April 28, 2009, 11:43 AM »

So I guess I prefer surly teens over surly record company execs after all. Because teens eventually grow up.

-Jimdoria (April 26, 2009, 12:40 AM)

...to become their generation's surly record company execs...

"So it goes." - Kurt Vonnegut

10311

General Software Discussion / Re: Ubuntu 9.04: Thoughts and experiences

« Last post by 40hz on April 28, 2009, 11:16 AM »

Did you add yourself to the 'audio' group?

For years, no matter what distro I've been on, for some stooooooooopid reason I always have to do that for audio to work.

-Edvard (April 28, 2009, 10:41 AM)

Yes I did. Found out about that little detail the hard way just like everybody else.

This time, everything ran ok until I tried to run jackd in realtime (with realtime kernel, natch).  :Thmbsup

-Edvard (April 28, 2009, 10:41 AM)

Don't know about you, but I think I'm going to stop screwing with the 'vanilla' releases of 'Buntu and just download UbuntuStudio after the 'rush' blows over. (That, or find out which BritNix magazine is including it on its cover DVD. )

It has just about everything I could possibly want - including the realtime kernal - and it comes with Jack already configured.

Maybe next week...

10312

General Software Discussion / Re: Ubuntu 9.04: Thoughts and experiences

« Last post by 40hz on April 27, 2009, 09:17 PM »

AHA! The old oops-I-burned-the-iso-too-fast error, eh? Good thing you caught it soon.
But why, pray tell, did you go and install PulseAudio? WhyWhyWhy? 

-Edvard (April 27, 2009, 06:26 PM)

I'm a closet masochist.

Actually more for R&D purposes than anything else. PulseAudio doesn't seem likely to go away no matter how much you or I would like it to so I'm trying to stay on top of where it's at each time a new mainstream distro comes out.

Basically, I wanted to see if it either: (a) worked -or- (b) I could get it to work under 9.04.

So far (for me at least) the answer to both questions is still: NO.

No problem. Now that I have a reliable installation CD , I'll just load it up one more time.

Except without Pulse.

10313

General Software Discussion / Re: Ubuntu 9.04: Thoughts and experiences

« Last post by 40hz on April 27, 2009, 03:28 PM »

OK. Curiosity finally got the better of me. I installed Xubuntu last night. This was a clean install onto an empty drive.

It took three tries using the same CD, which tested out fine (media, and filescan) BTW.

First installation hung when it went to install GRUB. The second install went OK until I tried to get updates, at which point it went into a tailspin and trashed something. A subsequent reboot hung each time while trying to start the Xserver. I checked xorg.conf, but there was nothing in it to indicate a problem there. Found nothing much useful in any of the logs to indicate what the problem might have been. If I entered a startx command once I was logged into text mode, I'd just get a command prompt back after about ten seconds with no error message.

At this point I figured I'd give it one more try. That's when it got weird.

The third installation went absolutely smooth. No problems, lags, or errors anywhere. Xserver started normally and the desktop came up just fine. Everything seemed to be working correctly, except for my sound card, which stopped working right after I installed PulseAudio. (So what else is new right?). I eventually got the sound restored after some research and configuration noodling - but the resulting sound output is now producing occasional bits of static and an annoying amount of distortion on audio playback. This is particularly annoying because this same machine has excellent audio quality when running under Hardy Heron.

Serves me right for breaking my 'rule' (more of a guideline really) about problematic installations.

Oh well.

-----

Addenda: I just discovered the CD that I was using for the installation was burned at 40X. I know from experience that the machine I installed Xubuntu on has a no-name CD-RW drive that doesn't like to read anything much faster than 32X even though the drive can supposedly handle as high as 52X. Since I decided to reinstall Xubuntu one more time, I cooked up a new installation CD at 16X and everything went perfectly the first time.

  I should have known. 

10314

Developer's Corner / Re: Hotkey nostalgia

« Last post by 40hz on April 26, 2009, 08:50 PM »

It actually used the demand paged virtual memory supported in hardware on the 386. I think it went away after a short time.

-MilesAhead (April 26, 2009, 06:58 PM)

Are you thinking of of SoftLogic Solutions's product Software Carousel; or IBM's ill-fated TopView? Quarterdeck borrowed heavily from Topview when DESQ became DESQiew.

10315

Living Room / Re: ZDNET: Have we arrived in the post-Windows era?

« Last post by 40hz on April 26, 2009, 04:15 PM »

Also you don't need X to run Linux.

-MilesAhead (April 26, 2009, 12:01 PM)

Agree. You don't need X at all really. But since the apps most people want to use depend on a GUI, it's a showstopper for about 96% of the people out there.

Getting old code would definitely be a smart move if you could get your hands on some.

I've got an antique 386-20 w/8mb of RAM and WFWG loaded on it that still surprises me with what it can do. I have copies of WordPerfect, MS Word, Quark XPress, Aldus (pre-Adobe) Freehand, Interleaf, Lotus1-2-3. TopSpeed Modula2, Turbo Pascal, Turbo Prolog and a pile of other stuff that all still works quite nicely. You could actually get some serious work done on this machine. Lord knows I did.
 

10316

General Software Discussion / Re: Mind Map-Concepts-Illustrate

« Last post by 40hz on April 26, 2009, 12:15 PM »

I've tried most "mind map" and "info dump" applications, and so far I haven't found anything as that works as well for me as a sheet of quarter-inch graph paper and a pen.

I find computer-aided thinkertoys are great once you have something down and reasonably fleshed out. They excel at incremental refinement, reorganizing, and structuring tasks. But I find them too confining and complex (i.e. useless) when I'm looking at the proverbial blank page.

I'm also not completely sold on Mind Mapping in general. I've read just about everything Tony Buzan has written. And while a lot of his concepts are useful as far as they go, the important distinction to make is the qualification "as far as they go." (I also think Tony Buzan has a very bad habit of constantly looking over his shoulder to see who is noticing just how smart and clever he is, but that's a subject for separate rant. )

So from my perspective, the benefits and advantages of the Mind Mapping technique is somewhat exaggerated. It's useful for a certain category of ideation - but it's not a panacea by any stretch.

Just my 2¢

10317

Living Room / Re: ZDNET: Have we arrived in the post-Windows era?

« Last post by 40hz on April 26, 2009, 11:54 AM »

Does linux still support 386?

-f0dder (April 26, 2009, 06:43 AM)

AFAIK, the only thing that still supports the 386 in any useful way is NetBSD. It also has driver support for the ISA architecture - which you'll need if you're using a machine of this vintage.

You can even run NetBSD on an old IBM Personal System/2 with MCA slots if you're that kinky!

Just how useful it would be is anybody's guess since an X server wouldn't be doable. But then again, an 80386 is also a more sophisticated CPU than what UNIX was originally developed on so...

I'll bet a real NIX gearhead (who had EMACS down cold) could probably blow my doors off with what he/she could do with such an 'obsolete' setup.

 Like Gypsy Rose Lee said: It ain't how much you got. It's how you use it that counts."

10318

Living Room / Re: ZDNET: Have we arrived in the post-Windows era?

« Last post by 40hz on April 25, 2009, 03:35 PM »

Actually, from what I have read the Mac vs. PC ads were extremely effective - for Apple. The newer "I'm a PC" ads by MS haven't been effective - at least not yet.

-J-Mac (April 21, 2009, 04:54 PM)

Apple's ads are more effective at "preaching to the choir" then they are at "converting the infidels." Otherwise, Apple would be seeing a significant growth in market share.

I think Apple's primary goal for their current advertising campaign is to prevent defections rather than gain new users.

Just my 2¢

10319

Living Room / Has anybody ever tried a FON router?

« Last post by 40hz on April 25, 2009, 11:59 AM »

Does anyone here at DonationCoder use a Fonera router ( www.fon.com/en/ ) ?



I keep seeing write-ups for this little gadget, and I'm wondering if it's half as good as I keep hearing it is.

Dan Pataki over at gHacks.com seems to think highly of it:

http://www.ghacks.ne...thout-your-computer/

For those of you who don't know, a version of this router made a splash a while ago. It's claim to fame was that it could upload and download files independently - without needing to remain connected to a computer while it was doing so. The new version sports some even more intriguing features.

So...anybody out there own one?

10320

General Software Discussion / Re: Start Panicking! ... and polishing those tin foil hats.

« Last post by 40hz on April 25, 2009, 07:01 AM »

I'm off to take a serious look at NoScript. 

-nosh (April 25, 2009, 05:36 AM)

Good. "Make it so."

(Seriously. Don't surf without it. )

10321

General Software Discussion / Re: Ubuntu 9.04: Thoughts and experiences

« Last post by 40hz on April 24, 2009, 06:19 PM »

Did  they finally get their hassles with Pulse Audio sound fixed?

10322

Living Room / Re: The horror that is my kitchen upgrade project

« Last post by 40hz on April 24, 2009, 03:09 PM »

Wow! You're brave.

Heavy remodeling is hard on the nerves, the pocketbook, and relationships.

The ONLY time my GF and I ever had a really serious (as in risk of break-up) argument was during our home remodeling ordeal back in 2000-2001.

The memory of that debacle still gets my stomach in a knot.

Good luck.

10323

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by 40hz on April 24, 2009, 11:06 AM »

I don't know if this fits the definition of "Silly Humor" but this is one of my favorite web pages. It's funny (to me anyway) not to mention being a little scary. It's up on a terrific website called The Office of Strategic Influence.

This is a purportedly true blog about one poor guy's relationship with a truly psychotic individual. It's called: Things Rachael and I argue about

Rachael found this webpage. It's not that I think she's going to kill me or anything, but she's just nuts enough to make me genuinely scared for my life. So I'm printing out several copies of this and signing it as testimony, should something bad happen. Knowing her was perhaps the worst thing that happened in my life, and it left me emotionally tortured, financially devistated, and all around feeling a hopelessness for humanity. Should I accidently fall out of a tree, or should lightning strike me, or should I suddenly cease to exist, I am printing this out and signing it, because I garuntee Rachael had a part in it. I am confident that these written accounts are so acurate that I am willing to sign it in to testimoney today if I had to.

Link: http://officeofstrat...fluence.com/rachael/

While you're there, check out the rest of what they have. Look at the links below HUMOR on the homepage. These people are funny.

Getting Fired with Gusto is one of my favs: http://officeofstrat...luence.com/business/  <<ADULT ADVISORY - LANGUAGE>>

10324

Living Room / Re: Best programming books ?

« Last post by 40hz on April 24, 2009, 07:48 AM »

+1 with you on Wesley Chun. Great author and a great book!

---

I was always happy with the O'Reilly Learning (fill in the blank) books.  As far as I'm concerned O'Reilly does it better than anyone. I have a ton of their stuff on various topics. (IMHO, their book Active Directory provides the only decent coverage of the topic. Better even than Microsoft.)

Many professional coders got their start with an O'Reilly book. These are professional tools. Look at the reference shelf in almost any coder's workspace and you'll likely see a few well-used O'Reilly books sitting there.

The material is paced nicely - neither too fast nor too slow. I also like their style. They speak to you as though you're an adult with a brain in your head who actually intends to learn something. They don't coddle you. But they also don't lull you with four slow chapters and then take off and leave you in the dust after that.

If you methodically work your way through an O'Reilly title, you will always come away with a good understanding of the topic. I taught myself Python with Learning Python and a few other titles in their Python series. And I use what I've learned in the book Python for Unix and Linux System Administration nearly every day.

---

I also highly recommend Frederick Brooks classic The Mythical Man Month. This is THE book on software project management by the man who was central to the development of IBM's (at the time) radical System-360 operating system. It's at least 20 years old by now, but still incredibly relevant. I understand an Anniversary Edition is now out with a new Preface by Brooks himself.

This is one of the best computing books I ever read.

10325

Living Room / Re: Recommend to me the BEST USB stick to get

« Last post by 40hz on April 23, 2009, 08:48 PM »

Maximum PC just did a write up on an extremely small USB stick that measures 19x15x6mm (that's tiny!) with 15mbs read and 6mbs write speeds. The 8GB version retails for  $33 USD and the 4GB version goes for $22 USD.



At those prices they seem almost too good to pass up. I just ordered a half-dozen.

Maximum PC article here: http://usb.brando.co...e_p00892c041d15.html

Order at this link: http://usb.brando.co...e_p00892c041d15.html