Archive for the 'Reviews' Category

Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 Screenshots

Published
by
Chris Meller
on March 5, 2008
in Announcements, Beta Testing, Commentary, Cool, Geek Toys, Internet, Microsoft, Reviews and Techno-Babble
. 0 Comments

I threw together some screenshots and comments on Flickr while I was quickly giving IE 8 a run through tonight, if anyone’s interested.

IE 8 Beta 1 gallery

Desktop Icon

Prostates, Prejudices and Hypocrasy

Published
by
Chris Meller
on November 2, 2007
in Commentary, Gripes, Internet, Links, Public Opinion, Rants and Reviews
. 0 Comments

So I was recently linked to Paul Krugman’s opinion piece from the NYTimes entitled Prostates and Prejudices and I just can’t ignore it… I mean, you guys actually pay this man to put out hypocritical crap like this? Wow… I need to go to work for the NYTimes.

The third paragraph is where we really start to hit Rudy Giuliani hard:

Let’s start with the facts: Mr. Giuliani’s claim is wrong on multiple levels — bogus numbers wrapped in an invalid comparison embedded in a smear.

So a politician didn’t get his facts right or took something out of context to further his own point? Well, that’s not exactly news, but alright, let’s hear what you’ve got to say…

Mr. Giuliani got his numbers from a recent article in City Journal, a publication of the conservative Manhattan Institute. The author gave no source for his numbers on five-year survival rates — the probability that someone diagnosed with prostate cancer would still be alive five years after the diagnosis. And they’re just wrong.

Wrong you say? Ok, I can believe that. I mean, who’s ever heard of this City Journal and why would we believe a conservative Manhattan Institute anyway? Carry on…

You see, the actual survival rate in Britain is 74.4 percent. That still looks a bit lower than the U.S. rate, but the difference turns out to be mainly a statistical illusion. The details are technical, but the bottom line is that a man’s chance of dying from prostate cancer is about the same in Britain as it is in America.

Wa… Wait a minute. So you’re saying the survival rate in England is actually 74.4% but that it’s actually the same as the claimed 82% survival rate in the United States? I’m not sure my high school Algebra teacher would agree with you on that one, Mr. Krugman.

Oh, by the way, where did you get your claim of 74.4%? Forget to cite a source, did we? And how exactly does 74.4% end up equaling 82%? Oh, right, just take your word for it…

So that’s bogus numbers1? Check. Invalid comparison2? Check. Smear campaign against Giuliani3? Check.

Hey, I hate the man just as much as the 9/11 next 9/11 guy4, but come on. If you’re going to call the pot black, at least make sure you’re not the kettle first.

  1. Unless you can cite me a more reliable source than the City Journal. [back]
  2. Unless in the universe in which the NYTimes resides 74.4 does in fact equal 82. [back]
  3. Unless somehow this is supposed to be flattering to your former El Presidente. [back]
  4. 9/11… [back]

The “Grid” is Falling….The “Grid” is Falling

Published
by
Chris Meller
on November 29, 2006
in Advice, Announcements, Commentary, Daily Grind, Internet, Links, Media Temple, Networking, Random, Rants, Reviews and Techno-Babble
. 0 Comments

I happened to find this Digg story in the upcoming entries. The “Grid” is Falling….The “Grid” is Falling is about the crappy level of service provided by the new Media Temple “Grid” service.

Since I’ve been thoroughly displeased with the service I’ve had at (mt) over the past several months, I encourage you all to digg that story… for me, please! Not only is their hosting service absolutely atrocious, but their customer service isn’t much better.

For example: Last night all my sites were down. Instant reject for all connections. I open a “Service down or not responding” ticket (which is buried under what’s effectively a “Miscellaneous” category in their web system). At 9:30 this morning they finally respond with a message to the effect of “Yeah, it was a planned downtime.” How exactly was it planned? You didn’t inform any of your customers. The only way I found out about it was by reading the “Internal Incident” report I was linked to by a support rep…

As I said, horrible service. Don’t even think about getting a “grid” server from (mt), you’ll regret it. Please digg the story above, and let me know about any hosting recommendations…

Microsoft Brings some Vista Features to XP

Published
by
Chris Meller
on November 29, 2006
in Commentary, Daily Grind, Insomnia, Internet, Links, Microsoft, Networking, Reviews, Techno-Babble, Windows and Windows Vista
. 0 Comments

Early this morning, as my insomnia-driven computer addiction ensued at hours in which even the birds refuse to wake, I noticed that a couple of new Windows Updates had been deployed by my in-house WSUS box and were ready for installation on my client machines. I thought we’d already had our patch-Tuesday for the month, so I decided to check out what was being updated.

Much to my surprise, there was a new version of the Microsoft Remote Desktop Connection (aka Terminal Services client) app available. Since, as far as I remember, there has never been an update to this program (since it’s initial inclusion in Windows XP), I thought I’d go check it out.

Thanks to my handy dandy (unofficial) Microsoft Download Notification RSS feed, I was able to quickly track down the stand-alone download package1.

For those that may be interested, the short description of this update is:

Remote Desktop Connection (Terminal Services Client 6.0) provides a way to use any new Terminal Services features introduced in Microsoft Windows Vista and Microsoft Windows Server Code Name “Longhorn” from a computer running Microsoft Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Microsoft Windows Server 2003 with Service Pack 1.

This simple update boasts a host of changes. Most notably are:

  • Lots of new Authentication updates
  • 32-bit color support
  • Font-smoothing capability
  • Terminal Services “Remote Program” capability
  • Enhanced Device Redirection (for things such as printers connected locally)

My favorite feature, however, is without a doubt the new Monitor Spanning capability. That’s right, now I can finally utilize both of my monitors when doing a remote desktop. Oh sweet joy of joys. Microsoft, sometimes I just can’t help but love you guys2!

For those interested in more details, here’s a link to the stand-alone download, and the knowledge base article3.

Update: In case you have difficulty finding them yourselves, here are download links for other platforms. Still, I’d probably just snag it over Windows Update…

Windows 2003: here
Windows 2003 x64: here
Windows XP x64: here

  1. Oddly enough, Googling around and searching both Microsoft.com and the Microsoft Knowledge Base directly proved to be useless. [back]
  2. And god knows I try not to… [back]
  3. By the way… When did these start requiring passport logins? KB articles have always been publicly available, haven’t they? [back]

Sidebar Modules Kick Widget Ass

Published
by
Chris Meller
on October 28, 2006
in Announcements, Commentary, Internet, Links, Plugins, Reviews and Wordpress
. 2 Comments

I was complaining about K2 in #wordpress earlier, when Shorty told me to try out the self-contained plugin that gives you the same functionality as K2 Modules.

I jumped at the idea, since anyone who’s ever used K2 Modules knows that they kick sooo much ass that Wordpress Widgets will never touch. A quick Google got me Nybble Labs’ Sidebar Modules. There are no instructions, so it was a bit of a gamble getting things working. Happily, I found that it wasn’t tough at all.

Sidebar Modules use the same hooks that the Automattic Widgets do, so there are no additional changes that need to be made to your theme for them to work. Just disable Automattic Widgets, enable Sidebar Modules, and you’re good to go. It even supports the custom widgets plugin I wrote for an enhanced search form. Now how cool is that?

Just one more plugin to add to the list of amazingly useful Wordpress addons!