KentAhrens Weblog

A better local optimum

2009-06-30T20:59:00.004-04:00

As follows is a paraphrased clip from Michael Nielsen's "Is scientific publishing about to be disrupted?":

The problem is that your company has an organizational architecture which is, to use the physicists' phrase, a local optimum. Relatively small changes to that architecture ... don't make your situation better; they make it worse. So you're stuck gazing over at [a guy] ... who is at an even better local optimum, a local optimum that could not have existed twenty years ago ... unfortunately for you, there's no way you can get to that new optimum without attempting passage through a deep and unfriendly valley

Regina Spektor - Eet

2009-06-30T16:17:00.005-04:00

Writes NPR Music,

If you ever have trouble remembering lyrics, Regina Spektor has a song for you.

"It's like forgetting the words to your favorite song," Spektor sings in "Eet," a track from her new album, [Far] . . . "It's more about the sound than the food intake," she says in reference to the phonetic spelling of her song "Eet." The spelling hearkens back to Spektor's childhood: She was born in Moscow and came to the U.S. at the age of 9. She had to learn English, and she initially knew words only by their sound.

Spektor learned how to play piano by practicing on a Petrof upright that was given to her mother by her grandfather. The family emigrated, when permitted, during the period of Perestroika, Regina had to leave her piano behind [1].

Real-Time measure of Firefox 3.5 downloads

2009-06-30T15:51:00.003-04:00

Mozilla's worldwide Real-Time download site graphs Firefox 3.5 downloads per second.

How to find which version of Windows Vista is on your PC

2009-06-27T08:53:00.002-04:00

This article pertains to Windows Vista. Users of Windows XP can find help here.

To find the version of the Windows Vista operating that's installed on your Windows PC, click:

Start / Control Panel / System and Maintenance / System

(I found this information on Apple's website, the number 1 Google search result on the day I checked.)

Next Ubuntu edition will be without '100 paper cuts'

2009-06-15T21:09:00.003-04:00

For those of us (newbies) who experienced great pains upgrading from 7.** to 8.** (and are still afraid to even think about upgrading to Ubuntu 9.04), this seems like good idea:

A project led by Canonical's Design and User Experience team to improve user experience in Ubuntu by identifying 100 small points of pain for users, or "paper cuts", and healing them!

Via ars technica, Canonical to boost Ubuntu usability by tackling "papercuts"

How to remove the .NET Framework Assistant for Firefox

2009-06-10T09:30:00.000-04:00

This Microsoft article describes how to remove the .NET Framework Assistant for Firefox from your computer. The article also describes how to update the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 for the .NET Framework Assistant 1.0 so that the component can be disabled.

Convert a Chain-Food Favorite into Exercise Equivalent.

2009-06-02T23:23:00.001-04:00

Here is what some of our chain-food favorites will cost us in time spent doing common exercises.

Saying "O!"

2009-06-02T11:33:00.003-04:00

If I could only say 'O!' like Mr. Whitefield

-- Mark Liberman

A statue of Richard Whitefield lives outside of Mark Liberman's dining-hall at the University of Pennsylvania.

Liberman was thinking about how certain emotions were uniquely conveyed by a particular speaker. To LanguageLog, Whitefield's written words and printed texts "don't convey ... what (a phrase that was perhaps mistakenly ascribed to) Benjamin Franklin called 'the extraordinary influence of his oratory' ... Whitefield could make audience-members faint merely by saying the word 'Mesopotamia'."

In Baltimore. When attending a baseball game. There's a very meaningful point in the national anthem where -- just like Whitefield -- the "O!" Is pronounced in a particularly unique and meaningful way. The printed text, without the addition of some-type-of-semantic markers, may diminish the essential meaningfulness of the word.

How does one scribe this semantic markup?

First, let's consider this: Say that you are familiar with musical notations (I'm not). The "Baltimore O!" or "Whitefield O!" might then be marked-up with a Sforzando - literally forced, denotes an abrupt, fierce accent on a single sound or chord; followed by a Glissando, Portamento, and terminated with a diminuendo (or some other nicely ended "O!" word).

The unique meaning of the O! may achieve a special value because -- as a couple of stodgy and crazed old deutschmen termed -- within various polarities created by this text (this O!); cudgels forth an 'implied' reader to make expectations, meanings, and the unstated details of characters and settings through a wandering viewpoint.

MOMA recently attempted to capture the possible wandering viewpoints of potentially skeptically and easily-bored viewers through this viral video. The viewer = the reader = the observer becomes more interested when she wanders into a part of history that appears very similiar to her own. The video tugs on the observer:

The sculpture you are looking at drew ridicule and shame when the artist first exhibited it in 1913. Nearly a century later 'Symphony Number One' is considered a pivotal example of abstract sculpture. Your immediate reaction might be to dismiss this work, just as your boss dismissed you after making what anyone would agree was an honest mistake. But if you allow yourself to really look at this piece, you'll see that it awakens all senses simultaneously."

I've often wondered what makes one web site more interesting than another? While, some people can write like Norse bangee gods, others (like me), not so much. We all have the ability to say O! and, in Baltimore, everyone in the crowd who sings O! is generally greeted with open arms. However, the O!s are very tricky to convey properly on a web page.

Using the 'display:block' css tag to create a nicer css menu

2009-05-20T10:49:00.002-04:00

We can create a "sidebar menu" for your website using a few CSS elements to achieve a specific look for the menu. An important component is the display:block css tag.

For example, let's say that we want to create a simple menu for our website so that the background color changes when we 'mouseover' an item. This could be done with the following CSS code;

a:hover {
background-color: Yellow;
color: #000000;
}

To some, this is a sloppy method, because the length of the background color box for each menu item will change depending on the length of the word.

So, instead, we'll use the css element display:block tag. This causes the element to generate a block box of equal length for each menu item. Much neater. Here's how.

Modify OpenOffice Calc So that the Delete Key Deletes Immediately

2009-05-04T13:17:00.004-04:00

You may have asked, "How can I change the delete key to work like Excel's delete key?"

In OpenOffice.org Calc, by default, you have to press Backspace to delete cell contents instead of pressing Delete key (like in Excel). However, here's how you can change the key functions so that when you press the delete key, the contents of the cell are deleted.

Choose Tools / Customize... / Keyboard tab / Select Calc radio button

Next,

Under the "Shortcut Keys" area of the box, highlight "Delete",
Under "Category", highlight "Edit",
Under "Function", highlight the first "Delete Contents" (note there are two).

Your dialog box should appear as follows:

Finally, click "Modify" button, "OK" and that's all there is to it!

For more info, see: How can I delete cell contents immediately with the Delete key like in Excel?

What colors are used on a web site?

2009-05-01T13:33:00.008-04:00

I was wondering what colors Google uses on their web sites and ran across the answer on a site by deauxmain titled, "View color information on any WordPress page".

On December 3, 2008, deauxmain found the following:

#000000
#0000cc
#3366cc
#551a8b
#808080
#a2bae7
#c9d7fq
#ece9d8
#ffffff

The colors on any site can be determined using this Web Developer Firefox Add-On. After installing the addon, the color information can be found by:

Tools > Web Developer > Information > View Color Information

How to do a "Mail Merge" from a Calc spreadsheet.

2009-04-29T10:43:00.002-04:00

Instructions for OpenOffice.org 2.0 on "How to do a 'Mail Merge' from a Calc spreadsheet".

See also: Solveig Haugland's articles tagged with "Mail Merge".

Remove 'Text Boundaries' by default in OpenOffice.org Writer

2009-04-21T23:03:00.005-04:00

To remove the gray boxed 'text boundaries' that are on by default in OpenOffice.org Writer:

Tools / Options... / OpenOffice.org / Appearance / Uncheck Text boundaries checkbox / OK

(procedure in Go-oo 2.4, but I think that it's the same in OpenOffice 3.01)

Custom Keyword Search in Google Chrome

2009-04-19T06:36:00.008-04:00

You can customize Google Chrome with keyword search features (just like Firefox).

Right click anywhere in the address bar and select 'Edit search engines...'.

See here and here for more info. And, all Google Chrome shortcuts.

Where are Google Chrome Files located on Windows Vista?

2009-04-06T22:17:00.003-04:00

According to "Unlock For Us" blog, Google Chrome temporary files are stored on Windows Vista here:

C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\

The Easy Way to Disable User Account Control (UAC) on Windows Vista

2009-01-21T21:49:00.003-05:00

For those who find the UAC annoying, The HowToGeek explains an easy method to disable the User Account Control:

Warning: Disabling UAC will lead to a significantly less secure system.

Open up Control Panel, and type in "UAC" into the search box. You'll see a link for "Turn User Account Control (UAC) on or off"
On the next screen you should uncheck the box for "Use User Account Control (UAC)", and then click on the OK button.
You'll need to reboot your computer before the changes take effect, but you should be all done with annoying prompts

Read more and get detailed instructions about "The Easy Way to Disable User Account Control (UAC) on Windows Vista" at the HowToGeek.

See Also:

User Account Control (UAC) overview on Wikipedia
Microsoft Technet User Account Control Step-by-Step Guide
Getting Started with User Account Control on Windows Vista

Note: After reading the Wikipedia and 'Getting Started with UAC on Vista' articles, I've decided not to disable the UAC on my machine.

Set Google Apps Gmail as your default email client in Firefox 3

2008-12-06T06:25:00.002-05:00

1) Go to Google Apps Gmail and sign in.

2) While in Google Apps Gmail, copy and paste the following into your browser's address bar and hit enter.

javascript:window.navigator.registerProtocolHandler("mailto","https://
mail.google.com/a/yourdomain.com/mail/?extsrc=mailto&url=%s","yourdomainGmail")

In Firefox, goto ... Tools / Options... / Applications Tab - and change 'Content Type: mailto' to dropdown 'Action: yourdomainGmail'

Source and Read More: Gmail Blog

Is It Better To Use The Alt or Title Attribute to Describe Images?

2008-11-18T11:17:00.002-05:00

According to Digital Inspiration, "Luckily, the rule is pretty simple - always add the ALT attribute to your images but include the TITLE attribute only if the image is a link." Read more about a nice way to think about tagging images.

Favicon Picker for Firefox Bookmarks Toolbar

2008-10-27T17:30:00.001-04:00

Change your bookmark icons! Right-click any bookmark, and select "Properties", then "Browse" for a new image or paste in a url. Works with Firefox 3 - Favicon Picker 3 0.4.0.5

Firefox "Chrome" appearance

2008-10-05T12:37:00.002-04:00

I've sometimes questioned the value of the various themes for Firefox, but actually like the Google-Chrome-like Chromifox appearance add-on.

The 'Old' Yahoo Search Start Page

2008-07-29T22:56:00.001-04:00

The Yahoo Search Page at http://us.builder.search.yahoo.com is identical to an earlier version of http://search.yahoo.com.

Gmail doesn't load in Vista

2008-07-23T18:42:00.006-04:00

Gmail and/or Google Apps email fails to load in the Microsoft Windows Vista operating system. The problem may occur after updating to the beta version of IE 8.0 or using IE 7.0.

Other Symptoms

Some Internet Explorer users are report that they see an 'Operation aborted' error message when they log in to Gmail.
Others describe the problem, "cannot access my Gmail account. The page loads, I see it briefly for less than a second, then it goes blank"

Solutions. The Gmail Help Discussion Group states that Google is aware of the problem and is working to resolve the bug. In the meantime, they suggest the following 2 workarounds:

Access the older version of Gmail at
http://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=1
Use a different browser, like Mozilla Firefox or Safari.

If you're using Google Apps email, the older version can be accessed using the following URL

http://mail.google.com/a/yourGoogleAppsDomain.com/?ui=1

An alternative solution (I have not tested this one) was suggested on thevistaforums.com:

Gmail works correctly if I uncheck "Enable Protected Mode" in the security settings of IE7, or if I hold the CTL key down when loading the page.

From what I can read, Protected Mode is supposed to help me by blocking malicious code from invading my system when using IE7, so I am not sure I really want to turn it off.

Read More at Gmail Help Discussion Group

Google custom domain WWW and non-WWW problem

2008-07-23T11:27:00.002-04:00

Here are a few web sites that talk about the Google Domains problem where www.yourGoogleAppsDomain.com will work, but yourGoogleAppsDomain.com returns an error.

Here's a solution works nicely for domains hosted at Godaddy: As Jimwarholic.com describes below, first change the CNAME record to have the WWW point to ghs.google.com and then delete Godaddy's default A Name record. Here are the details and more discussion:

Jim Warholic writes "I decided to tackle the custom domain name setup again for Google Custom Domain names. The instructions for setting up a custom domain name seem simple enough, but when entering a CNAME record and having the WWW point to ghs.google.com produces only half the desired results." More...

Nitecruzr's Google Custom Domain - Case Study #1 - "If you're going to setup a Google Custom Domain, you have to start with DNS properly setup. In most cases, you will want the "www" alias, as well as the rest of the domain, to refer to Google. This requires you to carefully use the setup procedures provided by your DNS Host." More...

Google Custom Domain Name Working with WWW and Non WWW - "After doing some research online for the WWW custom domain name issues. I found a helpful link with some information about deleting the "A" record in the DNS control panel of Godaddy for your domain name. ~ Wednesday's Internet Child

.docx and OpenOffice

2008-07-21T14:49:00.004-04:00

.docx is the file extension for Word Microsoft Office Open XML Format Document.

To convert Microsoft Office Word 2007 .docx or .docm files so that they'll work with Microsoft Office Word 2003, Word 2002, or Word 2000, you can install the Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for 2007 Office Word. After converting, the file will be readable in OpenOffice.

The DailyBlahBlahBlah blog has a few other suggestions -- Zamzar, Docx2doc and other online converters.

The upcoming OpenOffice 3.0 will support the file format when it is expected to be released in the fall of 2008.

Will my stuff work with Windows Vista?

2008-07-18T08:54:00.002-04:00

Microsoft has a site to help you determine if your software works with Vista.