Recent Posts

1076

Living Room / Re: Your favorite cartoons of yesterday and today?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 07, 2014, 03:57 AM »

I had to do a page search to be sure.

Transformers hasn't made the list yet!?


3rd level runner up Voltron.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Mind Mapping Software - What are the current top players now?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 07, 2014, 03:54 AM »

It depends what you mean by "top players".

-dr_andus (October 07, 2014, 03:51 AM)

I think "Top Player" is a misdirecting red herring. I'd ponder exactly what is desired, and then maybe sometimes a lesser known app has a killer feature. Let's call it the "drool factor". "Blah Blah Blah, all those big guys do x and y, but this little thing does THAT!? Gimme the Pro copy now!!" That's how it went for me.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Mind Mapping Software - What are the current top players now?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 07, 2014, 03:52 AM »

"...looking for a way to diagram out my thoughts, and create relationships based on them or identify new trends or connections between various topics..."

I think a broad comment is to ponder a little "what do you want the software to do"? I think this is one of those strange topics where you can stare at software all day, but to use a chess analogy, if you get a supercomputer playing chess thinking 40 moves ahead and the first move is wrong, you'll end up with gorgeously proofed out garbage.

Do you want little circles you can write in, and then add circles and circles until you have a nice cluster of circles linking everywhere? Instead, it just so happens the method I went with was a topic-tree list program, and if the same thing shows up twice, just add it into the second tree. Like, if you're studying the effects of fruits on health, orange shows up say twice, on "list of fruits" and "sources of vitamin C." My particular program doesn't draw lines between them there, but at a certain info threshold, it's not so bad to manage.

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Living Room / Re: Who is your Favourite "Doctor"?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 07, 2014, 03:41 AM »

I guess that's part of the appeal of Tom Baker.  I had the feeling he was laughing at the chintzy props even as he was taping the show.

I think I liked Eccleston in the new show partly because with high production values the camp thing  doesn't work as well.  He played it more straight ahead beat the bad guys.

-MilesAhead (October 06, 2014, 06:14 PM)

Maybe, but that feels just a bit dangerous to me - X of us genuinely "put aside" what we knew were cheesy props to get to the "sense of wonder".

I think if we start to drift into "yay, let's play, it's campy!", it becomes amusing, but only on a very light sugary level that doesn't have the power of inspiration I think a lot of us felt. Now when actors get handed a campy script that was supposed to be played straight, and they play it campy anyway signalling to the audience "Hey, I got handed this thing", sometimes they can get a brilliant one-time sendup like Galaxy Quest, but that doesn't change people's lives.

And with the rise of the net and modern video games, we don't get those old "nostalgic" pastimes like watching Rocky Horror 150 times.

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Living Room / Re: Your favorite cartoons of yesterday and today?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 05:39 PM »

I just remembered! I had forgotten about them!

There's a band called Toehider that does modern covers of all the old cartoon theme songs, *terrifyingly well*.


He/they really respect the source, just like the spirit of this thread, instead of snootily looking down for a cheap "let's go kiddie retro for ad clicks".

Here's a couple links:
Ulysses 31
(Interesting take on "It's me Nono, small robot you know..." - he cranks the energy up even more!
http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=ERDUOH4ParI

M. A. S. K.
http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=pCqOTIsjK8c

And lastly, the one that haunted my childhood forever - Spartakus
First, an unusual live version:
http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=vFORjmZGs64

Elsewhere on his albums there's another version. I forget how it all worked this many years later, but some/most of them were free in whole/part for varying amounts of time. I'd have to search my comp and my email to unravel it all.

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Living Room / Re: Your favorite cartoons of yesterday and today?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 05:33 PM »

One suggestion from that Washington Post article I'll disagree with is the "cartoons went away because of Quality Time". I still remember way more clearly than anything else from that period, that Sat AM cartoons came on *early*, sometimes as early as 6 AM. So though my Dad has always been an early bird, Sat AM cartoons were a great little thing to keep us amused to give Dad time to catch up on his chores or the bills while Mom slept until about 10.

I wasn't aware of the FCC angles though.

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Living Room / Re: Who is your Favourite "Doctor"?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 05:27 PM »

I'm torn; Tom Baker was the Doctor, but I enjoyed the flamboyant exuberance of Jon Pertwee.
....
Perhaps that's rosy-tinted nostalgia, but it just isn't the same show that I used to enjoy so much.  Much more slick production, of course, but what use is that?  It looks much like any other slick modern made-for-TV film.  People used to snigger at the cheap production of classic Dr. Who, but maintaining any sort of willing suspense of disbelief of a big ask with a show of this kind.  I thought the rough and ready, make do and mend look of the cheap production actually helped by making things more like real life.  Now, things seem too bright and colourful; everybody is too well turned out in designer clothes, too clean and tidy; even the modern cybermen look like they're fresh from a cyber boy band.  The classic "big ears" versions were more scary because they were humanoid but a travesty of humans.

-rjbull (October 06, 2014, 04:18 PM)

Unfortunately, I think there is some serious rosy-tinting affecting how we see SciFi, Fantasy, and some other genres, for all kinds of reasons. Because I'm not a Dr. Who guy, I'll use Star Trek, but I hope my points still hold.

- We were doing more dreaming then. I don't think it's an accident both Dr. Who and Trek started in the 60's. I'm not sure culturally what the British thought about the "American mission to the moon"; I'm guessing they said "well, we can't do this alone like they are, but we can lend them our scientists to help".

- Computing was more exciting. All those big flashing lights, and the things were huge, so you know only important projects got to have them. And maybe they even foresaw the miniturization push, but then if you add back the hardware you get something like IBM's Watson on turbo. So it would still be huge. And marketing wise, you had all those ENIACS and Mark IV's and stuff. Now we get Microsoft who decides to go from Windows 8 to Windows 10.

- Now we have grown used to a certain level of cinematic competence, it's harder to go back and really let disbelief go like we were kids in the old days. At least for me, subconsciously the contrast just stands out too much. It would be an interesting experiment if they used super-expensive cut-paste tech to "slice out" the actors of old Trek and CGI re-do the entire rest of the show like it would be today.

1083

N.A.N.Y. 2015 / Re: Prelim NANY 2015 thread

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 12:04 PM »

This will have to be moved, but I couldn't think of where else to put it.

It's October ... and I haven't seen any NANY 2015 chatter yet!

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General Software Discussion / Re: Looking for a EXTREMELY basic Multi Clipboard software

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 11:58 AM »

Please, for the love of god, thor, satan whatever, change your avatar. I can't look at the screen long enough to read your post, even though I'm always all ears for a light weight clipboard software.

-eleman (October 06, 2014, 06:23 AM)

Drifting off topic, but I had to respond - this is one of the subtle uses of AdBlock - it lets you hide pictures you don't like. There are a few people whose avatars annoy me too. Fine - just adblock them away and then they just vanish!

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Living Room / Re: Who is your Favourite "Doctor"?

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 06, 2014, 11:54 AM »

Both Dr. Who and Star Trek have a slight problem where the big passage of time skews things - "you learn from those who came before you", and production budgets and standards have changed, favoring the new guys. So we giggle at some of the quirks of the older shows, but they are only there to giggle at because they made enough of a name not to be forgotten.

I tended not to follow Dr. Who much at all - just never really got into it. I did watch some of the new stuff idly a while ago in a marathon, but marathons are a bit of a disposable activity.

The only other Doctor I know anything about is Tom Baker, but it's hardly a "scientific" opinion - your favorite becomes the only one you know!
: )

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

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 04, 2014, 07:16 AM »

And for a different kind of silly humor:
I've been watching a lot of TV lately. Every now and then there's a baby in a scene or two. I know sometimes a very quick shot is a doll, but I think there are a couple of babies around too. (Prob protected to the max by laws.)

So ... do these people get IMDB credits at the age of 3 months old? (Made up name) "Travis Wilkinson is 26 years old and has been acting for 25 years."

1087

Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 04, 2014, 06:36 AM »

Just a reminder: The word 'free' is not part of Microsoft's vocabulary. 

-40hz (October 03, 2014, 09:04 PM)

The word 'free' is not a part of any corporate entity's vocabulary.  People thought it was a part of Google's.  Look at where we are now.

-wraith808 (October 03, 2014, 10:27 PM)

I agree, but there's still a crazy difference between "qualitative data" and keylogging. Keylogging is very dangerous for anyone else to have, especially for silly reasons like "improving spell check".

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Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 09:34 PM »

Just a reminder: The word 'free' is not part of Microsoft's vocabulary.  

-40hz (October 03, 2014, 09:04 PM)

Right.

This just popped up from the Inquirer. It relates to potential keylogging hardwired into at least the prelim versions of Win 10, and we can only "wait and see" if in this cyber-security-crazed world if they release it without it being a secret backdoor still there for the Feds to play with.
http://www.theinquir...atch-your-every-move

"...or [if you] enter text, we may collect typed characters, we may collect typed characters and use them for purposes such as improving autocomplete and spellcheck features."

The previous part of the statement was saying things like "app type and how long you use it" ... to me, ho hum. But "collecting typed characters" to "improve spellcheck features" ... that sounds pretty dangerous! I'm sure lots of Co's proprietary info policies and maybe even a few laws like Hipaa would get grouchy about that!

We've all learned that "data doesn't die, except when it's useful for it to do so.".

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Living Room / Re: Win10 Navigation Pane scrambled

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 08:54 PM »

Either you give them what they ask for... or accept that they might wash their hands of the situation.

-wraith808 (October 03, 2014, 08:00 PM)

If you read my original post to will see that I was asking for "ideas". I was hoping for a response from someone that had the same or similar problem which would indicate a flaw or a bug in the Win10 media. Instead I received a ridiculous request for a picture of the problem. That's when the hand washing started. Mine! I already knew the answer was worthless and washed my hands of it.
If you don't know the answer: don't reply  
Thanks anyway  

-Cuffy (October 03, 2014, 08:36 PM)

That's a bit of a fierce response.

"Been associated with computers since 1958 or '59. Bought my first one in 1981 then decided to build one in 1992 ...
Since 1992 I've built a few, installed an O/S or two, spent a few minutes troubleshooting, and never, in all that time, do I recall a screenshot being of any value"

So that means you are at least 65-70 depending how much of a prodigy you were.

And we all joke about off shore people telling you to reboot, but there's clever people here, but before they run wild on a hunch, they have prelim questions first that sound annoying. Sounds like you are there.

But I still like my "TV theory" - maybe they haven't seen the problem, but if they get enough otherwise boring looking data, some bunch of them go on fire and wheel off ______ ___________ ____________ ____________ and then solve it.

So don't give up on them now! Suffer through a couple of seemingly tedious steps. Then I guarantee one of the steps in the middle is tricky, because that's why the weird thing happened. Then a couple more steps to fix it if possible, or just log it as "bug in pretest version".

1090

Living Room / Re: Interesting "stuff"

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 06:12 PM »

Just glancing at all this, there seems to be a bit of scare-monger language going here.

"The bottle is enough to kill X adults".

Uh ... well ... you're supposed to take a couple tea/tablespoons or 2 pills at a time, not whole bottles of stuff. We sorta know better than taking whole bottles of stuff in other categories, so why is this one so different?

I'd think the right answer is "Got it. Take at most 2 at a time, 30 servings, so it lasts me a month". You don't take the whole bottle. That's the stuff of B TV shows. Put another way, the whole point of GNC is they sell huge cans of stuff ... but it's supposed to last you. They're the BJ/Costco of health stuff. So saying anything about the whole container is meaningless.

1091

Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 06:03 PM »

Sure it will be FREE BUT what is Windows 9?

-jadinolf (October 03, 2014, 05:51 PM)

Windows 9 is where secrets live. Upon order of the Dept of Homeland Security, Microsoft was ordered to create a second OS and call it Win 10, and for their nefarious purposes, only the Govt gets to have the secret copy of Win 9 for special testing!

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Living Room / Re: Win10 Navigation Pane scrambled

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 06:00 PM »

I've been watching too many middle-road dramas, but it sounds like we're 6 minutes into a 45 minute episode. When you're faced with something bizarre, you have to slow down and do "silly seeming things" just to get a bit of raw data and your bearings before the solution shows up at min 38.  : )

So it's just a screen shot, it can't hurt ... maybe not help, but maybe it's that step where you rule out random impossible things.

1093

General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Announced

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 01:43 PM »

The acid test will be when somebody who has used only Win XP or 7 installs it or gets a machine with it new and tries it out.

-Arizona Hot (October 02, 2014, 07:35 PM)

Yes, but that's what I'm saying: what are they offering (in terms of new killer features) that will entice masses of businesses and consumers to try it out? I'm not seeing anything so far.

(I understand programmers, sysadmin and the like will try it out because of their professional needs and curiosity - but I'm talking about MS's target customers, the vast majority of whom are still with Win7 and XP.)

-dr_andus (October 03, 2014, 06:51 AM)

The possible problem is not whether they will find it better, it is whether they will find it compatible with the programs they use and easily usable. These people want to continue what they have been doing with as little transition trouble as possible. They will have to transfer to it sooner or later, the question is when and with what problems.

-Arizona Hot (October 03, 2014, 11:57 AM)

I think we're close to the crux here, and I'm Your Average User.

I'm not looking for screaming new features, though a few cute ones can't help. (Copy and paste around command lines can't hurt! I still have a couple dos-type programs running around!)

I am just a wee bit nervous that XP is fading slowly into a risk zone, and I basically believe that now without "TileLand" or whatever obscuring the decision, plus that extra couple years of development, I want and I think I trust the "backbone" of it, especially because this is the new edition with a comp sci guy as CEO.

So yeah, I'll switch my stuff over, and as long as it doesn't also include evil tricks like "this music is not authorized so you can't play it", and if all my most important apps work, off I go to forget about upgrading for another bunch of years.

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General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Announced

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 03, 2014, 01:36 PM »

The acid test will be when somebody who has used only Win XP or 7 installs it or gets a machine with it new and tries it out.

-Arizona Hot (October 02, 2014, 07:35 PM)

Well, I don't plan to mess with pre-release versions, but I'll exactly be trying a dual boot (with lots of help!) on the final version of Win 10 next year. Some article I was reading says it was supposed to be (my words) "not that hard". (More like "Q. is it possible to dual boot this?" "Answer: Yes, do __ __ ____ ____ ____ ___ ___ ___ __" aka some bunch of steps.)

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

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 02, 2014, 05:14 PM »

P.S. Idina Menzel is a minor goddess!

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

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 02, 2014, 05:12 PM »

Wraith, that's some combination of brilliant, terrifying, and something that she will either become a viral meme for, or be embarassed forever when she is 18!

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Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 02, 2014, 03:55 PM »

Clever trick

-Carol Haynes (October 02, 2014, 02:07 PM)

So it would seem, wouldn't it?

-40hz (October 02, 2014, 03:19 PM)

My text-to-speech program tried to do something like this - if you try out the time limited demo of a new version, it wiped out your paid copy of your older one!


However, I was able to dismantle it and go back to the old one, but it certainly was sneakier than that had to me!

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General Software Discussion / Re: Windows 10 Announced

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 02, 2014, 04:12 AM »

You know, something I have been hoping for, for a while, might in fact be coming through. Take a look at this line from the new Microsoft CEO's bio:

"Nadella subsequently traveled to the U.S. to study for an MS degree in Computer Science at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee,[21] receiving his degree in 1990."
http://en.wikipedia....g/wiki/Satya_Nadella

So we now have a comp sci guy at the top, instead of the marketing guy.

So, now that it's been a couple of days and everyone is having time to get past blurbs, I think this version from Yahoo might sum things up:
"Windows 10 Undoes the Disaster of Windows 8 (Mostly)".
https://www.yahoo.co...tly-98835840904.html

I am a utilitarian user of Windows - I have no "love" for the company; it just has not been worth my while to switch, and of course I've bided my time waiting for "the state of things to shake out".

"Windows 8, as the world now knows, was a superimposed mishmash of two operating systems. There was the touchscreen-friendly TileWorld interface, as I called it. (Microsoft, at various times, called it Modern or Metro; it has officially retired both of those terms and replaced them with nothing.)
...
They are quite separate, these two environments. Each has its own Help system, its own Web browser, its own email program, its own control panel, its own conventions and gestures. Worse, each runs its own kind of programs. Regular Windows programs open at the desktop, as always — but TileWorld apps open in TileWorld, with no menus overlapping windows. Like iPad apps.".

And then this funny line:
"And at the Windows 10 announcement, you would not have believed the words coming out of Microsoft’s mouth.

“In Windows 8, when users launched a Modern [TileWorld] app, it sort of had a different environment,” OS Group VP Joe Belfiore said in his demo. “We don’t want that duality.”

Now, when I wrote exactly that in The New York Times, Microsoft PR descended on me like the beasts of hell."

So besides some desperate cleanup on the UI, I'm betting that with a comp sci guy in charge, they could have removed a ton of bloat that could have hindered Win 8 from running on a certain class of aging machine. (Such as mine!)

Heh that even-odd pattern continues! Will Windows _______ from a few years from now quietly continue the good work? Or will they have found yet *another* way to shoot themselves in the leg (having run out of feet!)

It's online comedy gold, except they're serious!

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Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 01, 2014, 09:16 PM »

Another funny theory from me: "Hey, if Apple started owning the world with OS X, can't we have a "10" too? Pleeze?"

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Living Room / Re: Win9 will be FREE!

« Last post by TaoPhoenix on October 01, 2014, 02:26 PM »

What I'd give for a "day in the Microsoft marketing meeting."

"I know, let's go from 7, to 8, to ... 10!"

In other news, Microsoft gave $500 million to assist preschoolers with their basic counting skills!

(Just kidding!)