bohemian Ramblings

My odd productivity scripts

2011-09-11T14:42:00.003-05:00

I love to save time when working on my computer and as such I have written a number of time saving scripts over the years.

I have several things I do whenever I am setting up a new system that I will be using for a while.

I create a folder off the root of the system drive named Tools and I add it to the beginning of the system path. In the Tools folder I copy my productivity scripts, and several folders:

docs - This contains my work, personal and technical documents
downloads - I set my browsers to download everything here
logs - Many of my productivity scripts log actions here
programs - I install my non portable development tools here when possible
scripts - Any helper \ productivity script that is not in the Tools folder itself go here
utils - Any app or utility that is portable goes here
workshop - This contains sub-folders for any language I program in and each language sub-folder contains version folders and\or project folders

By having the Tools folder in the path and numerous batch scripts in the Tools folder I can launch any of the batch files from the Run prompt. This allows me to skip several steps when launching apps or running processes. Here is an example script that launches the portable version of 7-zip:

@ECHO OFF
::: DOC: Runs 7-Zip
PUSHD %~dp0utils\7-Zip
SET Command=START 7-ZipPortable.exe
%Command%
FOR /f "delims=" %%a in ('cscript.exe //Nologo %~dp0scripts\vbdate.vbs') do @Set strDate=%%a
FOR /f "delims=" %%a in ('cscript.exe //Nologo %~dp0scripts\vbtime.vbs') do @Set strTime=%%a
ECHO %0 - %strDate%-%strTime% - Command: %Command% >> %~dp0logs\cmd.log
POPD

The first line @ECHO OFF tells the script not to echo the commands in the command prompt that is launched to run the batch file. ECHO OFF sets the echo state to off for the rest of the batch file and the @ symbol sets the echo state to off for the ECHO OFF command.

The three colons (:::) operates as a remark statement in the batch file. The batch "language" uses a single colon as a label and labels are not parsed at run time so using the three colons makes the script run a little quicker than it would if I used the REM statement. Also I can parse the batch files for the DOC label and generate a list of what the scripts do if needed.

PUSHD sets the current working directory temporarily, the %~dp0 sets is a variable that contains the path to the running script with a trailing backslash.

I SET a variable "Command" that contains the actual command used to launch the app or process. This allows me to use the "Command" variable to both launch the app and to log the use of the command later in the script.

The vbdate.vbs and vbtime.vbs scripts are vbscripts that I use to get date\time stamps for logging or when I automate file renaming for backups.

The ECHO %0 etc.. sends the batch file name, the date-time and the Command to a log file. The double greater than signs causes the information to be appended to the end of the target file.

The POPD command changes the current working directory back to where it was at the beginning of the script.

A number of these steps are not needed to actually launch the app or process but in different circumstances are useful to me for the way I work. For example when running the batch file from the run dialog I don't need to POPD at the end of the script, but when running from a command line it would leave the directory set to what was set by the PUSHD command.

I also use AutoHotKey extensively for a number of tasks. For example I keep a number of windows and applications open for days at a time but might only use them a few times a day (or week) so I use the Min2Tray script with AutoHotKey. I have a keyboard command that will call a vbscript to tile all windows horizontally and one to tile all windows vertically.

#!H::RUN %maindrive%\Tools\scripts\tileh.vbs
#!V::RUN %maindrive%\Tools\scripts\tilev.vbs

That is WIN+ALT+H or +V causes AutoHotKey to call one of the following vbscripts:

Tile horizontally

dim objShell
set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
objShell.TileHorizontally
set objShell = nothing

Tile vertically

dim objShell
set objShell = CreateObject("Shell.Application")
objShell.TileVertically
set objShell = nothing

I have another AutoHotKey script that will stop my music from playing and lock all of my work systems when I hit #L (WIN+L). Another script triggered by ^PrintScreen (CTRL+PrintScreen) that takes a screen shot and uses IrfanView (portable) to automatically save it as a png file.

All in all I currently have about 150 batch files, about 50 AutoHotKey scripts\commands\hotstrings, around 20 vbscripts and probably 10 - 15 Python programs that I have written to save me time and make tasks easier. These scripts save me minutes to hours throughout the week.

This is pretty cool

2011-06-30T01:50:00.000-05:00

Open Source Ecology is a movement dedicated to the collaborative development of tools for replicable, open source, modern off-grid "resilient communities."

Shared DLLs

2011-06-28T01:50:00.002-05:00

How Shared DLLs work ( a work in progress )

Files that are directed to do so in an MSI database will place a value name in the Registry here
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDLLs

In the MSI Packaging world the common understanding of "Shared DLLs" that I have come across is:

They are dlls that have been listed in the SharedDLLs key in the registry
They are listed because they may be used by more than one MSI installed application
The regsitry key is created as a DWORD and it is incremented each time an application is installed with the file
They are decremented each time one of these applications are uninstalled
This keeps the shared dll installed until the final application using the noted dll is uninstalled.

Much of this is true but some correction, and further explanation is needed:

Actually the "Shared Dll" is an MSI's Component's file Key Path so it could be any file type really
This is correct
Correct, the value name is set to the file key path and the value data is initially set to 1
Correct
It leaves behind more than the referenced file, in actuality it causes the whole component to stay installed.

In the Component table the Attributes can be set to 8 (the bit flag name is msidbComponentAttributesSharedDllRefCount) to let Windows Installer know to increment the reference count in the Shared DLL registry of the components key file. If the key file already exists in the registry the reference count will be incremented whether this bit is set or not. This can cause orphaned files if the value exists but the package that installed it is no longer installed, this would cause the value data to be one greater than the actual number of installed applications sharing the files.

So I tried a few experiments:
I created a couple of MSI's that installed the same text files to the same directories, and had the same key path for that
componentbut in all other ways they were different.

App 1 component with same keypath but not set as shared dll
App 2 component with same keypath but set as shared dll

When I installed then in this order everything behaved as I expected:
Install App 2 - SharedDLLs value data set to 1 then
Install App 1 - SharedDLLs value data set to 2

When I installed them in the reverse order something strange happened
I expected:
Install App 1 - SharedDLLs value data does not exist then
Install App 2 - SharedDLLs value data set to 1

What I saw was:
Install App 1 - SharedDLLs value data does not exist then
Install App 2 - SharedDLLs value data set to 2
Uninstall App 1 - SharedDLLs value data still set to 2
Uninstall App 2 - SharedDLLs value data still set to 1 and the component files remain

I tried it again this way:
Install App 1 - SharedDLLs value data does not exist then
Install App 2 - SharedDLLs value data set to 2
Uninstall App 2 - SharedDLLs value data set to 1
Uninstall App 1 - SharedDLLs value data still set to 1 and the component files remain

More later, I am too tired to continue with this now.

Oh, and here is a tool that can check the size of the SharedDll Registry Key.

My Top Ten Favorite Tools I Keep On My Thumb Drive

2011-06-28T01:42:00.000-05:00

Most of these tools are completely portable, the ones that are not usually have a very small footprint. Many of these tools are open source as well.

In alphabetical order

RIP Frank Buckles

2011-02-28T20:57:00.005-06:00

The last veteran of World War I passed away yesterday, Sunday Feb 27, 2011.

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

He served his country. He is the last of that war, and his passing should be remembered, should be honored. I would like to see the flags at half mast this week, all week.

2009 in Review

2010-03-18T08:02:00.005-05:00

Well it's past time for me to jot down a few things from 2009, and well past time for me to post on my blog.

I started the year continuing the application packaging contract I had started at the end of 2008, it lasted 8 or 9 months in total.
We had an excellent family vacation in San Antonio with grandparents, some of the siblings and a great grand parent. We spent a week there doing a lot of river tubing, playing at the Schlitterbahn, we stopped by Luckenbach, Texas, which was totally cool, and in general had a awesome vacation.
I started a new application packaging contract as we got back from the family vacation. This contract lasted till just before Christmas which worked out pretty well since my wife's hours always increase as Christmas approaches.
We have been in the same apartment since the middle of 2008, and have renewed the lease a couple of times. We will probably be here for another year or so.
We had to have both vehicle's transmissions rebuilt, which cost over $4000.00
Played some D&D, some Hero System Fantasy Hero, some WOD, some Warhammer Fantasy and some Dark Heresy\Rogue Trader.
Got lazy about my blogging
Quit drinking Dr Pepper, most days I was drinking between 8 cans (96 oz) and 12 cans (144 oz) of Dr Pepper a day, some days though I would drink up to a case (288 oz). At the height of my habit more than a decade ago I would drink even more. I quit cold turkey Feburary 4, 2008, having the flu that week made it a little easier. To help with quitting I started drinking water all day long, since cutting down on thirst made me less likely to break down and drink a Dr Pepper.
I started eating healthier in July, increasing my fruit and veggies, cutting down on salt and junk food, and balancing my carbohydrates, fat and protein. In the process I have gone from 230 lbs to 169. 61 pounds lost and over 8 inches off my waist.

And then the year was over.

My Top Ten Favorite Muppets

2009-07-06T14:19:00.000-05:00

Kermit the Frog
Grover
Fozzie Bear
Big Bird
Animal
Robin
Aloysius Snuffleupagus
Gonzo
Rowlf the Dog
Miss Piggy
Beaker

How I setup x11vnc on my Ubuntu 8.10 (intrepid ibex) laptop.

2009-04-02T19:46:00.003-05:00

How I setup x11vnc on my Ubuntu 8.10 (intrepid ibex) laptop.

First I installed x11vnc via Synaptic (how to use Synaptic here).

Next in a terminal I ran x11vnc -storepasswd. It prompted me for a password (so I set a strong password) then it prompted me to verify by typing the password again.

After that it asked me if I wanted to write it to a file, I said yes.

Then I added an alias runvnc='x11vnc -usepw -forever' to my ~/.bashrc file to make it easier to launch. The -usepw switch causes it to use the password I setup earlier and the -forever switch causes x11vnc to keep running on the server side when you disconnect on the client side.

And finally, to launch x11vnc, I ran runvnc in a terminal.

GeekNerd Holidays

2009-03-05T00:13:00.007-06:00

Being a geek\nerd hybrid of sorts I decided to put together a calendar of important geeknerd Holidays, so without further ado:

January

Starting out on 1/15 we have Wikipedia Day, the day that the worlds largest encyclopedia went public.

February

Inventors day in America it is celebrated on 2/11, birthday of Thomas Alva Edison.

March

Square root day doesn't happen every year, and only falls in March once a century, but this year it happens to fall in March and when in March it is always on the third (3/3/09 3 being the square root of 9). We won't see this day again till 4/4/16
We March Fourth for GM's on GM's Day celebrated on March 4th.
3/5 is the Square root of Christmas. Nuff said.
The month of March also has a new celebration Nerdigras from 3/5 to 3/14 we celebrate all things nerd and geek.
Pi Day 3/14
Tolkien reading day March 25th is also the day to celebrate the Fall of Sauron!

May

May the Fourth be with you (Star Wars Day)**
May 22nd is the World Goth Day!!! *
The 25th of May is a busy day, we celebrate Towel day and show pride in our nerdiness and geekhood.

June

International Steampunk Day is June 14th.

July

In July we have the 22nd, noted in the European format as 22/7 which, being a very good approximation of Pi, is Pi Approximation Day.
A dear day to my heart is the System Administrator Appreciation Day properly observed on the last Friday of July (7/31 this year), I am not a SysAdmin but I doubt there will ever be a Setup Author Day.

September

Arrrgh ye be remembering the International Talk Like A Pirate Day right me hardies? It be falling on the 19 every year.
Software Freedom Day observed on the third saturday of September falls on 9/19 this year so, we be celebratin' sof'ware and piracy on the same day, hmm....
A paramount day to many a nerd should be (and is) Hobbit Day the day that Bilbo and Frodo were born. Though there is some disagreement as to what day on our calendar this really is, I observe it on the 22.

October

The 23 of this month brings us mole day, not the animal but the unit of amount of substance, celebrated between 6:02 AM and 6:02 PM this is a very nerdy day, Dave.

December

The second thursday after thanksgiving is the International Sweater Vestival so everyone wear your sweater vests with pride, it lands on 12/4 this year.
December 5th is the Day of the Ninja which was apparently started in opposition to the Talk Like a Pirate Day. Not real fond of this one myself but thought I would include it for completeness sake. *
Christmas is not overly geeky or nerdy in essence but I love this holiday so I am listing it, 12/25. However, it is a great day to get lots of geeky gifts!

Anyone see any days that I missed. I am sure there are some.

Note: Added June 14th
* updated on 6/17/2010
** updated on 7/06/2011

SendTo shortcuts in an MSI

2009-02-06T13:17:00.013-06:00

I recently had to repackage a product that, amongst other things, created a "Send To" shortcut.

The Send To menu.

If you right click on a file or folder you get a context menu with "Send To" as one of the options. Then if you select "Send To" a submenu pops open and you are presented with several choices. Most of the options will create a copy of the file or folder at the target location or open the file in an application (hint: holding the shift key when selecting will move instead of making a copy).

These options such as "Desktop (Create Shortcut)" or "My Documents" are actually shortcuts that exist in a special hidden folder named SendTo. This folder resides under each user profile on the machine, except for the All Users profile. For some reason (at least on Windows XP) the SendTo context menu has a "Per User" behavior not a "Per Machine" behavior. This special folder does exist for the "Default User" profile, but creating the SendTo shortcut there will only affect new users not the existing users.

So, overall the project seemed pretty straightforward. The only problem was the "Per User" behavior of "Send To", because of client needs all the packages that we build or rebuild are set to ALLUSERS=1 (Per Machine installs), and we can't rely on self healing since there would be no direct way to trigger it.

My solution was to use Active Setup as a workaround. I added the following to the package: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\[ProductCode] I then set the default value to [ProductName] and I created two other String values:

"StubPath"="msiexec.exe /fs [ProductCode] /quiet"
"Version"="1,0"

So the first time a user logs in after this package is installed Active Setup will see that it has not run on them and will run the MSI installing the missing SendTo shortcut.

If there is a better way to deal with this I would like to hear about it.

Notes:
You can disable the "Send To" functionality with a simple registry change

INSERT GENERIC WARNING ABOUT THE DANGERS OF EDITING THE REGISTRY AND THE IMPORTANCE OF BACKING UP THE REGISTRY HERE

Launch regedit and go to this key: [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AllFilesystemObjects\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\Send To]
Double click on the Default value and remove the data: {7BA4C740-9E81-11CF-99D3-00AA004AE837}

This can be reversed by adding the data back to the default value.

Also if you are interested in various other things that can be done with the "SendTo" menu check out this Lifehacker search.

Useful Websites for Setup Authoring

2009-02-04T12:29:00.009-06:00

As a follow up to my post "Some Free MSI Tools" I thought that I would list some websites that provide useful information or help for Setup Development. This will most likely be a post that gets updated from time to time.

General useful Microsoft links:

~~Microsoft DLL Database~~*

Windows SDK's and Windows Installer

Blogs and information sites:

* Update 12/20/2011: The DLL Help application was retired on February 8, 2010 and is no longer accessible.

Guido on the History of Python

2009-01-14T11:07:00.004-06:00

Guido van Rossum, the creator and BDFL of the Python programming language has started a blog to write about the history of Python. So far it has been a very enjoyable read, I recommend it to anyone interested in Python.

He also has another blog that I find to be well worth reading.

2008 in Review

2009-01-13T18:38:00.004-06:00

I thought that I would jot down a few things from 2008, sort of a Highlights and Bloopers Reel overview.

I started the year with no job, which I liked, but was really not good, money-wise. So I spent some time looking for a job, at the worst time of the year to look for Setup Authoring jobs. And finally I decided to work on building up my side business. I had two partners who had been working on this company for a couple of years as their main job and we were struggling so I thought that I could help ramp things up.
I learned many things, but mostly I found that 3 computer geeks in the technology world have a really hard time doing effective marketing.
I spent our savings on bills while I tried to get the business to ramp up.
Eventually it became clear that what I was doing was ineffective and that I needed to get a normal 9 to 5 job to try to recover financially.
At this point we nearly had to move to Oklahoma, because the job market in Dallas was pretty weak for Setup Authoring and I had found job there. And so for weeks I would get up at 2 AM on Mondays drive from Dallas, Texas to Bartlesville, Ok. Work the job I had there, stay in a cheap hotel, a very cheap hotel, a cheap hotel that had something crawling around in the ceiling tiles. Something big. Then I would leave work on Fridays and drive back to Dallas.
Since then I have found one contract then another in the Dallas area so while we had to give up the house, we didn't have to leave the area.
We started gaming twice a week, "So I got that goin' for me, which is nice." (two games currently, both 4th ed D&D)
Several people important to me died this year.
Some Greats made more music.
Very excitingly a blog entry of mine got linked to by Lifehacker (here). Which increased my number of visits greatly.

And then the year was over.

Change tracking markup visible by default in Word 2007

2008-11-07T00:02:00.009-06:00

By default in Word 2007 documents that use change tracking have the markup shown when the document is opened. While it can be useful to see what changes have been made to a document when editing a document, I find it a useless distraction when trying to read a document. So for anyone who is interested here is how to change that default.

Click the Office button in the upper left hand corner of Word 2007
In the dialog that is opened choose 'Word Options' in the bottom right corner left of 'Exit Word'

In the left hand column of the dialog that opens choose 'Trust Center'
On the right side of the dialog, near the middle click 'Trust Center Settings...'

In the left hand column choose 'Privacy Options'
Near the middle on the right Uncheck "Make hidden markup visible when opening or saving"

Click OK and OK and Word will no longer show Markup by default.

Note: Some documents are set to 'Final Showing Markup' individually. These will have to be switched then saved and they too will no longer default to Final Showing Markup

Internet Explorer 7

2008-11-05T19:39:00.007-06:00

I am a commited Firefox user, but sometimes, especially at work, I have to use Internet Explorer. In using IE 7 I have discovered a couple of issues that I thought I would relate.

The IE 7 run once issue:
When IE 7 is first launched it brings up a configuration page that allows the user to change the "search provider" and activate the phishing filter.

The problem occurs when the settings fail to save and so this page is displayed every time IE7 is launched instead of the home page. To work around this issue you can add the following entries to your registry

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main]
"RunOnceHasShown"=dword:00000001
"RunOnceComplete"=dword:00000001

Or use this file: DisableRunOnceIE7.reg

The IE 7 unable to add new Search Providers issue:
In the upper right hand corner of IE 7 there is a search field that uses Microsoft's Live Search [link]. This field can point to a number of different search providers but sometimes IE 7 fails when trying to select another provider, instead, various script error may occur. This can be caused if shdocvw.dll is registered after IE 7 is installed. To work around this issue you can add the following entry to your registry.

[HKCR\TypeLib\{EAB22AC0-30C1-11CF-A7EB-0000C05BAE0B}\1.1\0\win32]
@="C:\\WINDOWS\\system32\\ieframe.dll"

Or use this file: RegisterIeframe.reg

To roll back the change use this file: Registershdocvw.reg
(If your Windows folder is not named Windows you will need to edit the files to reflect the correct location before you use them)

Time to stretch and rest my eyes

2008-08-28T15:58:00.004-05:00

I have been reading a lot about eye strain lately and ran across the suggestion to focus 20 feet away for 20 seconds every 20 minutes to ease eye strain. So to help with that, and to remind me to do my cube calisthenics I threw together a very simple VBScript that pops up a message every 20 minutes. And I decided to post it here so I would be able to grab it from anywhere.

The 'sleep' value is set to 1200000 milliseconds, which equals 20 minutes, but can be changed easily. The message title and message body can easily be changed as well by changing the values of the initial variables.

intSleepTime = 1200000
strMsgTitle = "Rest Time!"
strMsgBody = "Get up and stretch and rest your eyes!"

While intMessage < 2
wscript.sleep intSleepTime
intMessage = MsgBox ("Rest time!" &VbCrLf&VbCrLf& strMsgBody &VbCrLf&VbCrLf& "Click Ok to continue or Cancel to exit.", 65, strMsgTitle)
Wend

Google Gears with Portable Firefox

2008-08-15T09:57:00.007-05:00

I have discovered (here) how to make Google Gears portable with Portable Firefox:

Install Google Gears to your local machine.
Create a folder named {000a9d1c-beef-4f90-9363-039d445309b8} under the extensions folder where your instance of FireFox portable is installed (e.g. \FirefoxPortable\Data\profile\extensions or \FirefoxPortable\App\firefox\extensions\) (Reader Drakkim pointed out that: \FirefoxPortable\Data\profile\extensions should be used instead since the App path is deleted on upgrade see his comment below).
Copy the contents of the Gears Firefox files (probably here: c:\program files\google\google gears\Firefox to the folder you created.
Uninstall Google Gears from the local machine (Unless, of course, you want to have it installed on that system.
Restart Firefox if it is running.

Original source: http://portableapps.com/node/7364

Note: If you go to this site it will tell you if Google Gears is installed or not.

Update: Welcome Lifehacker readers!!! I am really excited about being linked from Lifehacker since that is one of my favorite websites.

Update: I seemed to have overlooked a need in the first posting of this entry so in order to remedy that see the following:

To uninstall Google Gears go here.
To remove Portable Google Gears:

You can exit FireFox and delete the folder {000a9d1c-beef-4f90-9363-039d445309b8} that is under the extensions folder where your instance of FireFox portable is installed (e.g. \FirefoxPortable\App\firefox\extensions\).

You can go to the Addons dialog in FireFox (under the Tools menu) and click on Google Gears and choose Uninstall.

Update: Reader Drakkim pointed out that \FirefoxPortable\Data\profile\extensions should be used instead since the App path is deleted on upgrade. I have updated the instructions to reflect this, please see his comment below.

Update: Currently Google Gears does not work with FireFox 3.1b3 (or apparently with any of the 3.1 beta versions).

Some Free MSI Tools

2008-08-14T12:49:00.011-05:00

As a professional "Setup Author" ( LOL ), I am always looking for (or writing) tools that will make my job easier. And I know that other packagers do the same so I thought that I would put together a list of tools I find useful or interesting in the setup authoring realm.

MSI 4.5 SDK -This is primarily useful for packagers because it contains the newest version of Orca (see next entry). But it also contains Msival2, and several other useful tools for packaging.
Orca - Allows direct editing of the MSI tables.
SuperOrca - This is an Orca like tool for editing MSI's
.MSI Diff - Compare two .MSI files and view a report of their differences.
MSIX - Extracts transforms and binary streams from Windows Installer files (msp, mst, msi)
WiX - Windows Installer XML, the first Microsoft Open Source project. WiX allows you to create your Installer via an XML dialect. There are several useful tools included in this toolset.
CabSDK - Can be used to create cab files.
Windows Installer Command Line Builder - Allows you to build command line parameters for Windows Installer.
Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 SP1 - Allows you to create separate virtual machines on your Windows desktop

I will continue add to this entry as I have time.

Note: this post was edited and updated on 11/05/08
Note: this post was edited and updated on 02/04/09

DefaultDir

2008-08-13T17:26:00.007-05:00

Am I the only one to notice that the DefaultDir category often disappears from the category set in the (underscore) _Validation table? Is this a Wise thing or something else. For the longest time I thought it was just me or a template I was using, but I started noticing it at different companies I have worked at.

Anyway the fix is easy, find the _Valadation | Category row in the _Validation table and under the Set column add ";DefaultDir" without the quotes (the semicolon is needed as a separator) and the error is resolved.

Without this entry in that column the MSI fails ICE03.

Update:
I should mention that a similar issue seems to happen with the Shortcut | ShowCmd row in the _Valadation table. On that row under the Set column the value should be "1;3;7" without the quotes, but Wise seems to change it to "0;3;7". This is easy enough to fix but it is annoying that this glitch continues up to at least Wise Package Studio Pro 6.1.0.281 (the version I am using currently)

Charity

2008-06-15T11:23:00.005-05:00

I have long felt that much, if not most, U.S. foreign aid is wasted. We give this money to governments that use it to bolster their corrupt regimes. But political realities keep us from better allocating those funds.

So what can we do?

We can vote for people who will change the system or processes that allow such corruption, but that takes time. Instead of relying on the government to do something that is not their job, I think that we should individually support smart charities and businesses that creatively help the impoverished and needy of the world.

Here are a few places that I have been looking into:

I will add more as I discover them.

Update:
Read this post about donating your old eyeglasses.

Firefox

2008-06-12T23:11:00.004-05:00

Firefox 3 is set to be released on June 17, 2008. I am pretty excited, I have been using Firefox, and Mozilla before it, for I guess 5 years now and I love it. So I decided to check out one of the Release Candidates for version 3. I went to PortableApps.com and grabbed the RC2 installer that they had and dove right in.

Here are some "Things I Have Noticed":

It's faster, it launched faster, it loaded pages faster and it ran faster even with many tabs open.
The addon manager will list recommended addons and will allow you to search for addons from the manager interface!
A little star icon has been added at the end of the address field. When you click the star, the page you are on is bookmarked, if you click it again you get the dialog to name, organize and tag the bookmark.
Bookmark Tagging. I love this, you can add your own tags to the bookmarks that you save allowing another dimension for organizing and searching.

According the the release notes there are a lot more features than what I have listed here, so check it out!

Keep in mind that some of your addons may not work with the new version.

Oh and try to download it on the 17th if you can. They are trying for a world record for most downloads in one day.

I am really digging...

2008-06-04T12:15:00.003-05:00

"Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show". It is a web comedy, on You Tube, created by Greg Benson and Kim Evey the husband and wife comedy team behind Mediocre Films.

GTCMS is a weirdly compelling parody of the American view of Japanese pop culture married to something akin to Pee Wee's Playhouse. It is fraking hilarious and everyone should watch it.

The most recent episode guest stars Wil Wheaton, and is well worth the view. He plays a smarmy Hollywood Agent trying to get Kiko (the star of the show) to sign up with him.

Go. Watch. Enjoy.

My first attempt at Flash Fiction

2008-06-02T22:46:00.006-05:00

Flash Fiction is basically very short short stories. I like this idea since it seems to be a way to work on writing skills in smaller bites. Having such a limit on the length of the story it can allow the story to be finished in as little as a single sitting. So without further ado, here is my first attempt:

Lessons

The light from the twin suns seemed to flutter in and out of the shadows in the thick dark atmosphere on the planets surface. I was having trouble with the corrosive gases that swirled like smoke from a pipe. The air of this planet was scoring the view panel of my helmet. I could only guess what it was doing to the rest of my HES suit.

We should have waited for the readings to complete before we attempted a landing. The shuttle lost altitude too fast; the pilot did not expect the odd turbulence that we experienced. It was all I could do to sit still and let him fly. But he got us down, what good it did him. Or me for that matter. He told me to wait and stepped out of the forward airlock. I heard his screams start almost immediately, then they abruptly stopped.

The airlock took forever to cycle, but by the time I got outside it was too late. The pilot had stepped from the airlock onto what appeared to be solid ground, obfuscated by the hazy fumes that passed for air on this godforsaken rock. But what looked solid turned out to be a small pond or lake of some caustic liquid. As I tried to reach for him he sank beneath the surface of the hellish acid lake his HES suit rapidly disintegrating as it sank.

Carefully I reentered the shuttle and took the rear airlock out. Using a sonic range finder from the survey equipment I was able to verify that the ground was solid so I stepped out and looked around the shuttle. Besides losing the pilot I could tell that the front of the shuttle was in the lake, and it's integrity was already compromised.

I was trapped, the shuttle losing integrity, and unable to reach the ship in orbit. My suit had maybe two days of water, supplements and air.

So I stopped the simulation and took a D in that class.

My Top Ten Favorite Web Comics

2008-05-28T16:40:00.009-05:00

Guilty Pleasure:
Marry Me

Strange that I like it:
Questionable Content

This is the list so far.

OpenOffice.org tip #1

2008-05-21T21:22:00.007-05:00

Tonight I was prompted by a Twitter from Wil Wheaton (who I follow on Twitter) to figure out how to create a hotkey to bring up the word count dialog.

Since I took the time to figure it out I thought that I would mention it here.

Within the OpenOffice.org Writer choose the 'Tools' menu and select the 'Customize' item from the menu (or hit Alt+T then C).

Choosing this menu item will launch the 'Customize' dialog. From here click the Keyboard tab, and choose a Shortcut key that is not in use (I chose CTRL+F5). Within the Category field (near the bottom left) choose 'Options', scroll down in the 'Function' field and choose 'Word Count'. From here click 'Modify' (on the right near the top) and then click OK and you are done.

So there you go, pretty straightforward, once you know where to look.