There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what Facebook is for and how to use it, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.
There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
(With full respect to Douglas Adams.)
There has been a large up cry about the new Facebook updates, and I’m a little surprised at it this time.
First off, this has happened a half dozen times in the past, and Facebook has yet to take something back that the users didn’t like.
Secondly, I didn’t think the changes were really that big.
Now, correct me if I am wrong, but I get the impression that the main complaints are partially due to a misunderstanding in how Facebook functions.
Facebook now gives users the chance to choose how much of a certain person they wish to see. You can use the subscribe button to see all of someone’s posts or only the “important” ones or none at all. This is entirely up to the friend, and not the owner of the account. I think this is nice, because I can go in and subscribe to friend who I care about, and possibly block some people I don’t need to follow. (Though, maybe it’s time to unfriend them…)
If you don’t want the whole of the Facebook world to see your posts, you have to limit your post to a list. (This is the way Google+ works, and to be fair Facebook has always had this functionality, but it has never been so easy until now.) If you don’t want all your friends on Facebook to see what you said to family members, you need to have your Family members in a group and when you post, choose to share it with them. No one else should be able to see the post, or the comments on that post.
Now, you don’t have control over who sees your comments on a post, (say, for example if you comment on a public posting) but Facebook has never allowed this as an option that I can remember.
I also see a lot of complaints about the new Top News section. I have never been a fan of the top news, I always want to see the recent news, and apparently Facebook tweaked the algorithm and isn’t doing a very good job right now. I don’t think it has ever done a good job. I just went through and unclicked all the “top stories” it suggested and I currently only see recent stories… not sure how long that will last, but it is a start.
I think the live feed is scary to some people, mostly because it’s live. The live feed doesn’t show anything that I couldn’t see by browsing my old news feed or glancing over someone’s profile. The fact that it is in real time and allows for quick and easy commenting only makes the site more like an instant messenger program than anything else.
Ultimately, everything that gets put on the internet should be treated as public knowledge. There is no safety or privacy out here.
That said, if you have Facebook friends who you’d rather not be sharing things with, you maybe should consider unfriending them.
Your Facebook account is FOR YOUR OWN BENEFIT. You don’t need to friend people if you don’t want to. You don’t need to share things if you don’t want to. You don’t need to use it if you don’t want to.
Facebook has been testing and tweaking their new code for months. This isn’t something they threw together overnight and they will probably continue to tweak it over the following months. I’m willing to predict that in 2 weeks most people will have gotten use to the change, or stopped complaining, or stopped using Facebook. All of these are acceptable options, but I will also predict that most of these changes will not be undone by Facebook.
The people working at Facebook have a vision of a sharing and happy utopia, something many of the users don’t share with them. As users we find a way to use our sites and we make due. When Facebook comes along and tells us we should use their site differently, we ultimately must fall in line or drop out. Facebook is a privately held company. You don’t own the site. You don’t own your profile. Facebook claims you own all your information, but you are putting it in their hands. You are putting it on their site. You have to play by their rules.
I’m not happy with all the changes they have made, but I’m doing my best to understand them so I can use the site how they would like me to do so. (That said, nearly everything I put online is considered public.) Feedback to the Facebook team is much appreciated, but telling them to “put it back how it was” is not an option they will be willing to consider. They live in a world of technology, and technology never moves backwards.
And look at the bright side. In 8 months they’ll change everything again and we can complain about that too.
When I first got my iPad, I was excited to try to use it as a portable blogging tool. Anytime I came up with any idea for a topic, I could sit down and type something out and post it online. I was rather disappointed when I realized the severe lack of good blogging tools.
My first iPad was an iPad 2, so I figured by the time it came out there should be a number of nice blogging apps that have been in development since the first one came out.
Instead, I found two. One was a free WordPress app and the second was called Blogsy. WordPress was unreliable and Blogsy had a strange interface and means of operations which didn’t meld to my liking and shortly after I experimented with both, I gave up on the idea.
Instead I bought an app called PlainText which let you make notes of text and synced everything up with DropBox. I could then go to my computer, grab the text file in DropBox and put it online using the WordPress web interface.
This worked alright, and since I had to go to my computer I could easily format things as needed and upload images to my ftp server. However, this was still a two step process and it would be nice to get the whole things taken care of in one.
Then I stumbled upon BlogPress. It works very nicely with my self-hosted WordPress Blog and doesn’t try to add too many obnoxious features. I can write posts, save posts and save them online or locally. It lets you add some photos or HTML if you want. The HTML you can insert is limited and the photos are automatically added to either Picassa or you Blogs photo space, which doesn’t help me much, but more on that later. So far, I haven’t had any crashes, or duplicate posts, or accidental deletes. (As I did with the other apps I tried.)
Now, I do like to self host my images, and keep them out of the WordPress folder structure. A few months ago I was experimenting with something and ended up buying a rather expensive (in my opinion) FTP app for iPad. Files Connect is a nice little $8 app and while it didn’t help with my project, I am finding it useful now because I can take screenshots of my iPad screen and upload them directly to my site, without having to worry about syncing or emailing or dropbox-ing anything. It’s not a perfect app, when I uploaded the photos for this post they were given 644 permissions which I was unable to change until I accessed a computer.
EDIT: The more I use Files Connect the less I like it. I can going in and rotate an image, but I can’t save it to the server when I am done, I have to save it to my iPad again and then re-upload. Also, every time I close the app I have to re-login and click my way to the folder I was looking at last, there is no state of remembrance.
The only drawback I have found while writing up this post is that the HTML to display the files needs to be added by hand, since it’s not possible to link an image file from the web with the “add photo” button in BlogPress.
Long story short: I highly recommend PlainText with DropBox for note taking and BlogPress with WordPress or Blogger blogs. I’ve only tried one FTP app, and Files Connect has treated me well, although I might consider looking at other options before purchasing.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Wednesdays are the worst days of the week, partly because of the their location, sandwiched between a mess of three days on either side, but mostly because they contain afternoons, and nothing is quite as bad as a Wednesday afternoon.
This particular day was no exception. The afternoon dragged on like a six hour board meeting and promised to be less exciting than C-Span when congress was out of session.
For the third time in as many minutes I turned to my black and white computer screen and clicked the check messages button. For the third time I found myself disappointed.
I stood up and grabbed my coat. I needed some fresh air, and if no one else was in the building I didn’t see how one more person would be missed.
Bright sunlight met me as I stepped outside. When you live in a windowless world you forget about things like the time of day, the sun, the clouds and even the sky. It was hard to imagine that such a warm and carefree realm existed so close to the cold confines of office life which so easily can consume ones entire spirit.
Outdoors the world was bustling with activity. Students played cheerfully at frisbee, while the more studious of the group sat on blankets and read heavy textbooks. The students where laughing happily, enjoying the camaraderie of other people their own age, a current luxury that many of them would no longer have access too once they moved out into the harsh cruel world of real life. It was always easy to forget about such things in the safe and closed environment of the campus.
I’m not bitter, it’s just Wednesday.
I turned toward the cafeteria. As much as I typically despise the loud and boisterous crowd which makes up most of the general public, anything was currently preferable to the desolate hallways and classrooms which surrounded me only a few minutes ago.
The cafe’s entrance was a double door into large room. The ambiance was far too bright and cheerful to be one of my local hangouts, but when you needed a cheap meal this was the place to go.
To my right the cashier reclined in her seat, knees bent with feet resting on the counter top. Her blond hair fell well past her shoulders and the look on her face was an even mix of annoyance and boredom. Nail polish in one hand she examined her paint job. As I entered, she looked up, clearly unhappy that she would now have to perform some “work.”
“Two-fifty.” She said blandly, smacking her gum a few times annoyingly.
I dropped a few bills on the counter and walked away, she never even moved to make change. Didn’t matter, I didn’t need it.
Over the main entree line a crowd of people gaped at a small bat, which was perched on the ceiling. I headed straight to the fountain machine in search of some cold scotch. I was forced to settled for some Dr. Pepper… Wednesdays.
Screams erupted behind me as the bat took to flight. I perused the salad bar, wondering if anything on the menu that would satisfy my hunger. It didn’t look promising.
A few minutes later I had a plate of pizza and chips, a dietary staple for the IT variety. I found an empty table in the corner and sat down.
“Didn’t expect to see you here tonight.” Said a tall slender man as his quietly sat down across from me.
I was watching my plate closely, but I recognized the sound of Jim’s voice. Dressed in a brimmed hat and trench coat I honestly couldn’t tell you if the man owned any other clothing. He certainly had a reputation, but what he did to get it or how he managed to keep it was beyond me. I couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t seen slinking around campus and I would be hard pressed to tell you if he was staff or student.
“A man might do many things to escape a life of monotony,” I replied glancing up briefly.
“Oh, if boredom is the problem, I might have a cure.” He said in his cool and sly manner.
Jim had a knack for knowing the details from the underbelly of the school, not that we had much of one. (An underbelly that is.) Yet somehow, he commanded respect from all the cliques, groups and organizations. He was a good man to have on your side if you liked being in the know.
“You have my attention.” I said, finishing the last bite of pizza.
“I heard a rumor that a certain printer isn’t behaving properly. Not willing to talk. Caused a bit of a stirrup, until someone threw it out of a window.” He looked at me out of the corner of his eyes, gauging my reaction. I wasn’t surprised. “Yes, I don’t think there is much you could do for that, but in the same lab someone was receiving virus popups this afternoon, and now it won’t boot.”
That intrigued me more. Though I was skeptical that anything could get through our massive firewall system and security, one can never fully discount sneaker-net.
“Well, I have to go. There’s a secret meeting that may or may not actually be welcome at in 15 minutes. I must prepare.” And with that Jim slipped away and disappeared into a crowd of kids who were just leaving the dining hall.
I finished my chips and drink and left the café. I made my way to the third floor computer lab, the one which was now famous for the flying printers, much to the dismay of most of the administration. I found the computer is question, and attempted to boot it. When nothing happened, I considered my options for repair, and decided to take the unit with me.
I got down under the desk to disconnect the tower from the cables, and noticed a stray unplugged power cord. Mental face-palm. I plugged the machine back in and watched it boot. Thanks to MS Steady State, the machine would be virus free by the time it finished boot, if it ever had one to begin with.
As the computer reached the login-screen, I turned and headed back to my office. The rest of my Wednesday awaited me.
In a small dark office in the back of a well lit building on the unfashionable end of a brand new college campus, located on the remains of a non-existent and ancient civilization there is a man trying to find the answers to life’s persistent technology. – IT Guy Noir
Mobile technology is changing everything and even the tech savvy sometimes need to take a moment to rethink how they do things.
I was recently asked to make a slideshow of photos for my Grandpa’s funeral. I approached the task as I always would have, yet was still determined to try to use new technology.
I added the photos to iPhoto (I had a family member scan them for me.) I then made an iPhoto slideshow with a bunch of music from iTunes and exported it as a movie file. I put the movie on my iPad and decided I would just play the video off my iPad onto a large screen TV via HDMI.
When it came time for the visitation I realized that the iPad could not loop my video without a 3rd party app and those apps could not access my movies that are in the Video app. Being 700 miles from home, I had no choice but to manually go to the iPad and press play every 15 minutes.
Yet, if I were to do this again, I would now take a whole new approach, something I would consider more modern.
What I should have done was load the music and the photos onto my iPad via iTunes and told the iPad to create a slideshow and repeat. This would have made a much better solution. First off, it could loop forever and I wouldn’t have to worry about it. Secondly, I could have chosen a larger selection of music. There were a number of songs I wanted to add to the playlist, but the slideshow wasn’t long enough to accommodate all of the music.
Now that I know, I can’t believe I didn’t think of this sooner. But I was thinking with desktops and iMacs. Sometimes, you just have to think with iPads.
Throughout my life, there are times when I really wish I could know what level I am at. I’ve been wearing the same hat for close to 8 years. Before that I wore different hats all the time. Am I a level 10 hat wearer? Maybe. I don’t know. How can you track these things? What level IT guy am I? What’s my geek level?
I have a brand new 2011 Ford Fiesta and have just passed the 6000 mile mark. As I watched my odometer slowly rise, I realized that in this one area of life, there is a finite and state saving counter. It just slowly works it’s way upwards, to no particular end… just like EXPERIENCE POINTS!
Experience points determine your level, but what system of leveling does one use for driving a car?
Turns out, World of Warcraft has an excellent leveling system which converts rather conveniently to car milage. (At least, up until level 60, then it gets a bit questionable, but is still usable until level 70, where we reach a million miles however, it is rather rare to get to 300,000 miles on a vehicle, so it starts becoming rather irrelevant.)
Here is a chart of levels and experience as found at www.wowwiki.com
Now, it is fair to say that the level of your car does not represent your level of driving skill. Like a character in Warcraft, the car will level independently of it’s driver. You are basically leveling up your car like an item.
My car is new (like starting a new character…) so I’m sure all of you have much higher level cars than myself. What level are you currently at? What do you wish you could level up at in real life?
I’ve always enjoyed playing video games but very rarely have I taken it upon myself to go hunting for glitches or cheats. Usually I head to gamefaqs.com when I need help or am looking for cheats, but there is one cheat that I found, which I have never seen on gamefaqs, which I have never heard anyone talk about, which I discovered, completely on my own, and quite by accident.
Now, it may be that no one really cares, I honestly don’t blame you if you don’t. By now it’s been about 10 years since I discovered this glitch and if no one cared when the game came out, no one really cares now.
The game is Super Smash Bros Melee, and the cheat was getting the maximum amount of points on Adventure mode with single player.
The procedure is rather simple and outlined in the YouTube video embedded below.
On the first level you must do everything in your power to get a negative score. This includes dying once or twice, using a single attack for most of it, and a huge amount of shield breaks. Usually I would race through the level and sit at the end and shield break for a few minutes, then end the level, making sure I don’t end on any of the special point inducing times.
At the end of the level the point counter starts at 0 and begins racing up until it reaches your total points for the level. if you’ve done things correctly, your score is negative, so the counter will never reach your score and will continue until it reaches 999999999. (You can press A to skip the count up and it will still give you the maximum points.)
Now all you have to do is finish the rest of the adventure!
I had this idea the other day. It’s not a perfect analogy, but I don’t think there is such a thing. If you have any suggestions for improvements or additions, leave them in the comments.
Broadcast cable or dish:
For a hefty monthly fee you have full access to all food currently being served. You can eat as much or as little as you like, but some dishes will be served at specific times so don’t be late. You meal will be interrupted every 7 or so minutes by a salesman who has paid for the pleasure to talk to you. His short pitches are potential entertaining, but repetitive. You have a few options for how much food you would like access to, but all your meals must be eaten at home.
Netflix:
For a moderate fee you have access to a large buffet of food and you may eat as much or little as you like. If you put down a meal you can pick it up at a later date without much trouble. You may choose any dish they offer to eat at any time. Certain menu items can only be delivered as take out and for a small fee will be delivered to your door within one or two business days. You may eat the meals anywhere you have access to the service.
RedBox:
Stop buy for a quick and cheap meal whenever you like. Menu is limited, but the prices are low. Meals must be eaten within 24 hours or a second fee will be charged.
Hulu:
Stop buy and get a free meal anytime you like. Menu selection is limited and you must have appropriate access to eat. Your meal will be interrupted several times by salesman who have paid to talk with you, many of whom represent global charities showing you dying children and asking for money. For a moderate fee, you can gain access to a larger menu, including popular dishes that chefs made over past weeks, but your meal will still be interrupted by salesman. You are allowed to eat most meals anywhere you have access, but not all meals are available on all platforms. There is, however, a large selection of appetizers, which are usually followed or preceded by sale pitches. Occasionally when ordering a meal you will be directed to a different restaurant where the meal is originally from and told you may order it there.
I have just finished my latest project. A real live Portal Test Chamber Sign, complete with lights.
You can find full documentation on my DIY: Portal Test Chamber Information Panel page.
If you just want to see the pictures, check them out on my flickr page.
With a new iMac on my desk, I figured it was time to do a bit of spring cleaning on my setup.
I realized I had several power cords, speaker cords, and ethernet cords that were not even connected to anything.
If you are reading this, that means the my site was successfully transfered over to a new server. I’ve finally taken the step away from shared hosting and moved into the “big boy realm” of the web. My good friend Bob Martens has offered to share his server with me, which is great. He worries about the techy-server command line stuff that I don’t feel like messing with and I grumble about how easier things were back on Lycos and Tripod… JUST KIDDING! I haven’t used them in years… Are they even around still?
Anyway, the move is so far successful, minus a few WordPress plugins that didn’t seem happy with their new home. They were quickly replaced and things are looking good. If you notice any glitches over the next few weeks, drop me a line. I’ll be tweaking things while I adjust to my new surroundings.
This is what would happen if Bungie and Square Enix teamed up to create a FPS-RPG.
