A Sign of the End?

The Russian’s did it first. We did it second. Then the Chinese, and if all goes to plan, next it will be India’s turn. What is it? Manned space flight. But, in what could be a sign of ‘things to come’, the U.S. is getting out of the business of launching humans into space. To me, this is another sign that we are on our way out the door of the super power house. Russia, with their vast energy reserves, China and India, with burgeoning industry (fueled by cheap labor) are definitely rising. And the U.S. is on the decline.

We have so much debt it’s unfathomable. Our unemployment rate is high and I doubt it will go down any time soon, if ever. One of the few things that could have reduced our labor costs would have been health care reform, but it’s clear now that anything that gets passed in that area won’t really provide an alternative to our employers having to pay for health insurance. So, our labor costs will remain high, and China and India, without the burden of health insurance on their employers will always have that advantage over us.

And don’t think that we will eventually be able to reform our broken problems. Our short sighted, eyes on the next election politicians will steer us down an irreversible path and only reform as a reaction, when it’s too late. And you thought global warming would be the end of us. No, for Americans, the end will come much sooner than that.

I’m upset about the space program. But I’m not surprised. Our lifestyle cannot be maintained, and this is just another sign. The end is just coming sooner than I thought.

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Tablet Computing

I first played with a tablet computer some fifteen years ago. At that time, the technology just wasn’t where it needed to be. Sure, there have been specialty devices like the UPS and Fedex scanners, and a bunch of others, but they are almost all custom or purpose built. Now, with the iPad from Apple, there’s a new way for smaller organizations to deliver custom applications that can run on generic hardware, in the field.

Disclosure: I own 30 shares of Apple stock. I have mutual funds that may or may not have stock in Apple or Apple’s competitors.

The organization I work for could benefit from a device like this. Imagine maintenance staff being able to get work orders on a device of this size. Or someone gathering field data about the environment and having the ability to enter that data directly into a computer on the spot. I’m not sure if the iPad would be capable of this yet. Certainly, a ruggedized version would be desirable for some field deployments, but for gathering data from clients in the home, an off-the-shelf iPad might be just right.

The thing I like about this is that it is smaller, and lighter than a netbook, but has a big enough screen to be truly useful. I’ve owned a Windows Mobile-based Smartphone before and it was just not practical for most applications. The iPad form factor should be just the right size.

Anyway, I’m not sure when I’ll buy one of these, but I am pretty sure I will get one eventually. Maybe I’ll wait for the second generation iPad — gotta get my money’s worth out of my Netbook first. Meanwhile, I’m certainly not going to be getting a Kindle DX as I had been contemplating.

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Free Icons

If you need a really nice, large set of free icons to use in your web or desktop applications, I recommend the Fugue set. As of November 30, 2009, it has 2360 icons, includes the Adobe Photoshop PSD files in case you need to modify them and they are free if you provide a link back to the site from your application, or you can pay a fee of $50 and skip the link back.

Below is a sample of the icons:

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ASUS Eee PC Netbooks Power Adapter Problem

Asus Eee PC Seashell Netbook

Image by Chris Pirillo via Flickr

Many people have discovered an issue with the power adapters on the ASUS netbooks. I’m not sure how many models have this problem, but if you have the power adapter plugged into the wall, and you unplug the other end from the computer, it apparently causes the power adapter to overheat, sometimes almost instantly, and to engage a thermal shutoff. I’ve experienced this myself a few times, but have now learned not to unplug from the computer until after I’ve unplugged from the wall. Some users have reported that after it happens, they place the adapter in the freezer for twenty minutes and it resets and works again. I’ve not resorted to that, but I simply wait a few hours, and it resets.

It’s an annoying problem, but at least you can work around it. Hope this helps.





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Kindle for PC

Amazon has just released a beta of software they call Kindle for PC. I’m not going to review the software itself. There are other sites that have done that (like ARS Technica, and CNet among others) but I’m going to describe my experience using it on an ASUS EEE PC 1005-HA, 10.1 inch screen, 1.66 mHz Atom rated at 10.5 hours battery life.

Amazon Kindle with carrying cover, Open.
Image via Wikipedia

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Differential Upgrade to WordPress 2.8.5

If you need to upgrade a version 2.8.4 WordPress blog to version 2.8.5, and don’t want to upload all the files. I have created a zip file containing only the changed files. I was able to upgrade about 10 blogs in 2 minutes by FTPing the changed files only. There are no database changes, so this upgrade is easy. Click to Download.

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Gmail Bug

I’m a big fan of GMail, but I have experienced some bugs with it. For awhile, it was being very forgetful of my display images settings. (This is a feature that allows me to essentially, whitelist particular senders so that images embedded in the mail messages are automatically displayed.) The problem seems to have been fixed, but there’s another problem that is driving me nuts.

ScreenShot001

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Free Tools for Developers

Here are some free tools (mostly open source) that I use to help in my job as a software developer.

Winmerge – an Open Source differencing and merging tool for Windows. WinMerge can compare both folders and files.

PSPad — this is a nice code editor.  Notepad++ is great as well.

FileZilla — a great, free, open source FTP program. Supports SFTP as well.

GIMP — It’s not photoshop, but if you are working on graphics for use in an application, it’s more than adequate.

Microsoft FXCop — this application analyzes managed code assemblies (.NET Framework common language runtime) and reports information about the assemblies, such as possible design, localization, performance, and security improvements. You can configure which rules to have it report on. I turn many of them off. The latest version has a glitch that keeps telling me there is an update available even though I’m running the latest version.

Gadwin Printscreen — good program for grabbing parts of the screen for making documentation. Also, if your mouse cursor is visible, it will be captured as well. That can be handy. There is a pro version, but the free version does all that I need.  (Direct download link for free version.)

Syncback (free edition) — Good basic backup program. I used to use it to back up source code files to my web host through FTP. Now I use it to back up my (home) file server every day.

Fiddler 2 — Not sure if your headers are looking correct? This web debugging tool can help. Works in IE and FireFox and others as well.

Stylizer Basic — This CSS editor is unique and very cool. The free basic version is really crippled, but you get a trial period with full functionality. I’ll actually probably buy the full version.

OpenOffice.

Image via Wikipedia

OpenOffice.Org (for PDF documentation creation) — Since compiled help files (.CHM) seem to have fallen out of favor, I do my online help as PDF files these days. OpenOffice.Org Writer is great for this. In fact, you can even create PDFs with forms that can be filled out. No need to buy Adobe Acrobat.

Developer Xpress CodeRush Xpress — According to their web site: CodeRush Xpress is freely available to all Visual Studio 2008 developers and offers a comprehensive suite of tools that enable you and your team to simplify and shape complex code – making it easier to read and less costly to maintain.

SSMS Tools – an Add-In (Add-On) for Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio and Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio Express.

What free tools have you found? Post comments below.


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Mousewheel Improvement

Using dual monitor setups on my work and main home PCs, I’ve become increasingly frustrated by the default operation of the mousewheel. I’m hovering over my browser window, I start scrolling, only to find that the email client is scrolling on the other monitor because it’s the active window. The free software KatMouse, fixes that. Continue reading

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Microsoft Office 2007

Front entrance to building 17 on the main camp...
Image via Wikipedia

Our office finally ‘upgraded’ to Office 2007. Is it just me, or is this the most wretched piece of garbage Microsoft has created since Bob? I’ve complained before about Microsoft changing the damn icons all the time, which defeats the purpose of an icon in the first place, but now they’ve gone and destroyed the whole menu paradigm that has been in existence since before the existence of Windows. I want my File menu back. I want my Edit menu back. I want all my menus back Microsoft!!! At home, I’ve already standardized on OpenOffice.org. Looks like I’ll be using it more at work if I want to get actual work done.




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