Recent Posts

1326

Living Room / Re: multiple monitors vs large monitor?

« Last post by Edvard on November 17, 2011, 07:23 AM »

...
Or (with a single monitor) consider using Linux since multiple desktops are both the norm - and work quite well in that environment. (Good thing too since multi-monitor setups can still get annoyingly tricky on some Linux boxes. It's gotten better recently. But it can still be a headache depending on the graphic card selected.)

-40hz (November 16, 2011, 03:40 PM)

Virtual Desktops are my lifeline on Linux... I can't work without them.
In Windows at work, I don't miss it (because all the Windows VDt's eventually annoyed me), but I do have two monitors.
Apples, Oranges, whatever.

Now I have acquired another 17" CRT for home, and it's quite fun having USEFUL Virtual Desktops AND two monitors.
Unlike the old days, multi-monitor is now a breeze on my Linux system, what with the Catalyst drivers for my ATI 2600GT.
If I didn't have that, Xfce 4.8 now has a GUI front-end to RandR/Xinerama/Zaphod/Compiz.
 

1327

Living Room / Stormdriver: blue pill or red pill?

« Last post by Edvard on November 15, 2011, 12:57 PM »

Anybody going to check this out?

StormDriver is a web app that provides a single interactive overlay for the whole Web without the need to install anything. For the first time ever, social interaction is not restricted to the walled garden of a social network. In StormDriver you can instantly see who else is on the same website as you, where people came from and where they are going.

You can interact and exchange ideas whenever and wherever you want, whatever the website architecture.

http://www.thereisno...gback.com/Home/Start

Mashable business reported on this before the site officially launched, where they stumbled upon a mystery site that closely resembled (to me, at least) a rabbit hole for a new ARG:
http://mashable.com/...nspired-mystery-site

Color me skeptical...
http://www.stormdriver.com/

from Mashable business

1328

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

« Last post by Edvard on November 15, 2011, 11:54 AM »

Yes, Scoopertino is a fun one (I liked the Apple kool-aid...).
And they were quite classy about the whole business after Jobs passed.
http://scoopertino.c...traced-to-steve-jobs

1329

General Software Discussion / Re: GIMP: Cursor Obscuring Image When Using Free Select Tool

« Last post by Edvard on November 06, 2011, 01:02 PM »

Wow, I never knew that, very cool! 
I use a larger cursor anyways, so I probably should be more bothered by it, but strangely I'm not.
There have been times, however...   

OTOH, I don't know of any further hidden secrets besides how getting comfortable with the hotkeys makes working with Gimp faster, and the fact that there are thousands of tutorials on how to do almost anything with it.

1330

Living Room / Re: Cute jokes' thread

« Last post by Edvard on November 06, 2011, 12:49 PM »

 

I like the direction this is going; here's my contribution:

1331

Living Room / Re: Post Your Funny Videos Here [NSFW]

« Last post by Edvard on November 05, 2011, 07:29 AM »

Okay, watch this one first:

Then this one:

 

1332

Living Room / Re: What is a "Gentleman's drink"

« Last post by Edvard on November 04, 2011, 01:55 PM »

Hmmm... Gin & Tonic smells like perfume and has a British heritage.
Ditto Earl Gray tea...
Coincidence? 

A gentleman's drink "compliments a Cuban cigar".

-app103

I whole-heartedly agree.
A friend of mine told me a story once:
He got an insane bonus on his paycheck one month and decided to blow it on something he'd never buy otherwise; a 200-dollar bottle of liquor (I don't remember what brand or type, just that it was amber-colored and came in one of those 'artsy' bottles).
He read a few things on what to mix it with but decided to first go for a straight shot just to "get the taste".
He said it tasted unique, but not very remarkable.
Not 200 dollars worth remarkable at any rate, so he chalked it up to experience and put the bottle away for a time when he was in the mood for experimenting.
About a month later, a friend of his came over for a chit-chat and spied the neglected bottle on the top shelf.
He immediately inquired about it excitedly, jaw agape.
"You have some of THAT?!?" he queried.
"Yeah," replied my friend, "but it's nothing special... wanna belt of it?"
His companion raised an eyebrow, wagged his finger and said "Not now. Stay right here. I'll be back" and immediately left.
After about 30 minutes, his friend had returned with his personal humidor and two very expensive-looking cigars.
He poured out a modest amount of the liquor for the both of them, and insisted they retire to the back porch.
Once comfortably ensconced in the porch furniture, his friend said "Watch... do what I do" and promptly prepared his cigar, lit it, took a full draw, leaned back slowly let the smoke lazily escape his lips, then imbibed just a little more than a sip of the mysterious fire-water.
My friend said he mimicked his companion's motions exactly; bite, spit, light, draw, let, sip, swallow.
"Aha..." he said with slowly-dawning amazement; "so THAT's what 200 dollar liquor is for!"

"Eddy," he then told me in a somber, hushed voice, "I swear to you, that was the best damn drink I've ever had in my life."

And THAT (whatever it was) is what I would call a gentleman's drink. 

1333

Living Room / Re: Supernatural MacBook Destruction

« Last post by Edvard on November 03, 2011, 12:27 PM »

Hehe "Do you have a teleporter?" 

1334

Living Room / Re: Supernatural MacBook Destruction

« Last post by Edvard on November 02, 2011, 08:32 PM »

Link? (I don't watch TV, except the odd show from Hulu or YouTube that gets recommended to me).

1335

General Software Discussion / Re: The Glorious Return of Shell Extension City

« Last post by Edvard on October 24, 2011, 08:43 PM »

Man, haven't heard from that site in years. They win "Comeback of the Year" award.

-zridling (October 24, 2011, 12:39 PM)

+1 

Glad to see the site up again, it was one of the best places to find freeware AND read the latest tech news (via DailyRotation).

1336

Living Room / Re: Sansa Clip Zip: Wow!

« Last post by Edvard on October 17, 2011, 08:51 PM »

Hehe... mission accomplished 

I totally agree about the customizability, it's pretty awesome, but sometimes I yearn for the simpler Sansa menu; Scrolling through all that stuff just to tweak the bass by 2 dB's is a bit much sometimes.
The only thing I would add to the Rockbox if I could would be the capability for a customizable "home screen" with a user-definable menu or table of shortcuts to the most-used functions.
Hmmm... off to the Rockbox forums...

1337

Living Room / Re: Sansa Clip Zip: Wow!

« Last post by Edvard on October 14, 2011, 09:56 PM »

Many variations on this theme, and I like the Howard Leight foldables best, but the gist is:

1- Cheap headphones with large drivers like the Koss PortaPro or KSC75's  (I even found some Cobys that sound great... COBYs).
2- Inexpensive/lightweight hearing protector muffs.
3- Decent (rubber-y, not plastic-y) 3.5mm-stereo-to-RCA patch cord that you can cannibalize.

Voila!:
http://www.instructa...oof-HiFi-Headphones/
http://news.cnet.com..._105-20035598-1.html
http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=EfeWfnFCy-Y

1338

Living Room / Re: Sansa Clip Zip: Wow!

« Last post by Edvard on October 13, 2011, 08:42 PM »

My Sansa Clip v.1 typically goes almost a whole day's worth (listening on and off for an 8-hour workday) but it's a few years old now, so I assume the battery has lost a bit of life by now, and battery technology has probably gotten better.
What I could find on the net about it suggest it has a continuous-use life of ~15 hours.
http://www.sandisk.c...-clip-zip-mp3-player

1339

Living Room / Re: Sansa Clip Zip: Wow!

« Last post by Edvard on October 13, 2011, 03:21 AM »

I hope I'm not going too off-topic here, but just to report, I have a Sansa Clip v. 1 that I installed Rockbox on, and while there are advantages to both, I'm sold on Rockbox.

The stock Sansa firmware is very basic, but very easy to navigate; only four different menu items and you're on your way, which I find quite nice.
The RockBox firmware has a MUCH more complex menu system with an almost overwhelming array of options that I feel could be done better/simpler, but the reason I keep it installed is for the sound quality.

The stock firmware sounds OK, but tends to be a little on the "flat" side, and I've noticed it can be overdriven fairly easily e.g. when turning up the bass.
Rockbox sounds at least an order of magnitude better right out of the box with a flat EQ, and it has a fairly advanced 5-band shelving EQ with 3 different methods to control it, and you can save your EQ settings.
It also has a 'Balance' control that I've found quite useful on many occasions (damn those cheap earbuds!!), which Sansa does not have.

Overall, I'm happy with  Sansa's products as a whole, and it's good to know that RockBox will soon support the Zip.
http://www.rockbox.org/

1340

Living Room / Re: Real life version of a Half Life 2 map

« Last post by Edvard on October 12, 2011, 05:38 PM »

Falling doesn't bother me; it's the sudden stop at the end that I'm not fond of! 

1341

Living Room / Re: Real life version of a Half Life 2 map

« Last post by Edvard on October 12, 2011, 04:34 AM »

The Wikipedia entry says that video is a test for acrophobia^w, and the original Youtube description says:

The original version. Filmed with a Sony handycam. No clipping.

Insane

Myself I'm not particularly afraid of heights, but I do have a healthy respect for them.
(says the guy who, when a teenager, worked two summers at the carnival tightening Ferris Wheel turnbuckles from a few stories up; no safety line.   )

If by some perverse turn of fate you liked this video, look up Mount Huashan.  

1342

Living Room / Re: Steve Jobs is dead.

« Last post by Edvard on October 09, 2011, 02:43 AM »

^^ Very true, but I don't think it deserves flames.
Lauding Mr. Jobs for what he accomplished is certainly appropriate, but plumbing the memory hole for his inspirations is no crime, either.

I like how commenter DrDemenz put it on KnowYourMeme.com's Steve Jobs page:

The world lost a great man.
If he hadn’t overcharged hipsters and the computer illiterate for mediocre devices,
others wouldn’t have gotten off their asses to make better, less expensive products.
If he hadn’t made computers hip and trendy they wouldn’t have become our friends.

If not for the iPod, we’d be using mp3 miniCD players.
If not for the iPhone, we’d be talking on monochrome Blackberries and Moto RAZRs.
If not for the iPad, tablet computers would still cost a grand and be nothing more than laptops opened all the way.

Skynet destroyed the world because it was the social outcast.
Now it’s one of the cool kids or at least a functioning member of the student body.

Was never an Apple man but I was proud member of the electronic age.
You will be missed.
Goodbye Mr. Jobs.

Never owned or even wanted an Apple product in my life, but there's no arguing Mr. Jobs' influence on everything else.

1343

Living Room / Re: work bathroom story

« Last post by Edvard on October 07, 2011, 06:53 AM »

I have worked night shift for most of my working life, so a busy bathroom was never a concern.
However, I do have an interesting bathroom story:

One place I worked at was in an older multi-story office building downtown, the kind with a marble-column facade and brass fittings in the elevators.
One night around break time, a female co-worker came to me and said "come here, I want to show you something".  
She was the 'weird' girl on shift that I was on friendly terms with, and had gotten to know her well enough that she actually wanted to show me some curiosity, and not making overtures of fraternization.
She went to the shift manager's office (not unusual, it was sparse,always open, and shared between 3 shift managers and various personnel) and grabbed a key from the top drawer.
She then took me to the elevator and we went up 3 floors.
When the door opened, we got out and she led me around a corner where a women's bathroom was.
"It's ok, there's nobody here" she said and opened the door.
It. was. immaculate.
White marble counters and floors, brightly lit, a modest chandelier hanging from a cathedral ceiling, the whole 9 yards and then some.
Most curious was a wooden door at the other end, marked with a brass plaque as "The Quiet Room".
My co-worker took me to the door and opened it with the key she had purloined.
Inside was a simple carpeted room about 6 feet by 10 with two orange tweed-covered chairs, a couch, two of those old two-tier coffee tables popular in the '70s with a desk lamp and stylish ashtray on each one.
A single large window over the couch offered a heady view of the city northward.
She kneeled on the couch to face the window, opened it, lit a cigarette and said "Isn't this place great? I wish it were on our floor".
I lit one for myself and joined her gazing over the city lights, chit-chatting until break time was over.
One of my best cigarette breaks ever, and we only had opportunity to go there twice again after that before she went back to working on day shift.
A year later, the office closest to that ladies' room expanded their office into the space the "Quiet Room" occupied.
Ah, memories...

1344

Living Room / Re: Berkeley scientists make pictures from brainwaves

« Last post by Edvard on October 06, 2011, 07:15 AM »

Well, there was that composite photo of like ~20 years worth of Playboy centerfolds in one exposure that IIRC looked VERY similar.

-Edvard

Found it:
http://flavorwire.co...enterfolds-by-decade
(safe for work)

1345

Living Room / Re: Berkeley scientists make pictures from brainwaves

« Last post by Edvard on October 06, 2011, 01:12 AM »

This is your brain - this is your brain on acid.

-f0dder

No dude, this is your brain on magnets...  o_O

Wouldn't it be easier to just show a very fuzzy photo of a naked woman?

-40hz

Well, there was that composite photo of like ~20 years worth of Playboy centerfolds in one exposure that IIRC looked VERY similar.
You might have a point there.  

P.S. Found the news link:
http://www.washingto...gIQA1f4aqK_blog.html

1346

Living Room / Re: Hoping for a Patent Bloodbath XD

« Last post by Edvard on October 05, 2011, 04:37 AM »

Ummm... guys, I don't think that's too far off:
https://www.donation....msg264048#msg264048
 

1347

Living Room / Berkeley scientists make pictures from brainwaves

« Last post by Edvard on October 05, 2011, 04:33 AM »

University of California, Berkeley, scientists have managed to create a close approximation of what our thoughts look like. First they mapped brain wave response to 18 million seconds of random YouTube videos. Then, patients viewed a series of videos, and those brain waves were matched with the correlating visuals from the first test.

http://www.youtube.c.../watch?v=nsjDnYxJ0bo

from something I read somewhere and somebody else reminded me about it.

1348

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... someone using CAD software

« Last post by Edvard on September 30, 2011, 02:40 PM »

OK, just downloaded and compiled...
Looks pretty snazzy (QT4 and the green icons are a breath of fresh air)
2 of my pet peeves about this program are still there:
1- No American paper sizes listed in Document Preferences or the Print dialog (yes, there is a "Custom" size, but seriously...).
2- In "Print Preview" the scaling options are listed as inches to inches, when it should include inches to feet (e.g. 1 inch = 10 feet)
The most common architectural scale (in the US, anyways) for normal house plans is 1 inch = 4 feet, but that ratio isn't in the menu, so I have to enter it manually.

Pros:
LibreCAD has a "Custom" size listed in the print dialog, QCAD doesn't.
Now I can finally make 36" x 24" PDF's that are in scale.
That's almost a deal-maker right there...

Cons:
Can't figure out how to change the icons.
Minor annoyance, but I wonder how long those green icons are going to seem "cute".

Bugs:
In LibreCAD's print preview, the scale box is empty until you click it, then it shows the menu.
After entering in my standard 1" = 48", it resizes the preview correctly, but the box goes blank again.
I'm sure that's a VERY minor issue that's going to take a few keystrokes to fix, but it's a bug nonetheless.

Overall, I've got good feelings about LibreCAD, I think I'll keep it...

Thanks for the tip, Bob99!!  

EDIT: I just found the PNG files for the icons.
Prolly easy enough to make the colors into something a bit more subtle, but it would be better to give the option to change them from within the application rather than have to re-compile. 

1349

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... someone using CAD software

« Last post by Edvard on September 30, 2011, 01:32 PM »

Ooh, I'm going to check that out...  

Hopefully they'll extend it, as well.
I think I'll join in the fray as there are a few enhancements I tried to hack in a few years ago, that these folks might be able to help with.
Namely, American architectural paper sizes... 
Seems like such a small thing, but it was like the tag on the back of your undershirt; insignificant but ever so annoying...

1350

General Software Discussion / Re: In search of ... someone using CAD software

« Last post by Edvard on September 29, 2011, 02:28 AM »

Ooh, looky!
http://sourceforge.n...rojects/qcadbin-win/
http://www.himili.co...windows-gpl-version/

That's the Community Edition compiled for Windows so you don't have to. 
One of them ought to work...

What's the difference?
http://www.ribbonsof...qcad_doc_faq.html#35
Basically, no Polyline support, as well as the Community Edition being an older version with fewer features.
I've been using it with no problems, but I've never used the Pro version, so I wouldn't miss what's missing.