JJjunk

7 Google Wave Invites Available

Josh — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 03:30:22 +0000

If you are looking for a Google Wave invite, let me know by sending an email using my Contact page. I’ll give them to the first people who request them. Also, it may take a couple days for you to actually receive your invite once I send it out. If you don’t know what Google Wave is, then where have you been??? Here are some links explaining what Google Wave is:

About Google Wave (Google)
What is Google Wave (Youtube)
Google Wave: A Complete Guide (Mashable)

Watch TV and Movies online with Clicker

Josh — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:20:48 +0000

Clicker just launched its public beta. I had heard about this site a little while ago, but wasn’t able to try it out. Now since it is in public beta, anyone may access it. The first thing that comes to my mind when I go to this site is Sidereel. If you don’t know what Sidereel is, it lists TV shows and movies and gives links to buy or stream the show or movie. However, the legality of Sidereel is questionable when you are not paying for the content that is being streamed.

As far as I can tell, Clicker’s sources are legal, and not everything is free. Some content is linked to Amazon and Netflix, which requires you to pay. Other content links to the network with which it is provided and allows you to stream it from their site. Then some things seem to be actually embedded on the page that clicker provides. I haven’t created an account, but doing so seems to allow you to add favorites and create playlists.

Other than TV and movies, clicker also provides music videos and content from artists. There is also a section for Web Originals where you can find web shows like Dr. Horrible’s sing along blog.

Personally, I’ll probably just head to Hulu when I have a show I need to catch up on, but if I can’t find it on there then I’ll probably head to Clicker.

Panda Cloud Antivirus – Free Antivirus for Windows

Josh — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 01:57:27 +0000

Panda Cloud Antivirus was recently taken out of beta and released to the public. Personally, I’ve been using Microsoft Security Essentials since its release, but I thought I’d try out Panda to see how it works. I have to say that the performance of Panda is much better considering that it does most of its processing in the cloud.

What Panda Cloud Antivirus does is it scans certain files like documents on the local machine, while it scans executables and other such files in the cloud. This maintains some privacy, but they guarantee us that our privacy will not be compromised with any of the files that are sent to them for scanning. If you want, you can sign up with some bogus email.

The only downside that I’ve heard of with Panda is that it can have longer scan times for a full scan. I did a quick scan and it was pretty quick. I’ll be using it more for the next few days at least to see how it does. The only thing that I wish it had was a scheduled scan option.

Wordpress – Delete Pending Comments

Josh — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:25:26 +0000

I had a huge amount of pending comments since removing the Intense Debate plugin. I was able to manually remove probably around 100,000 comments in my database by searching for specific words and IP addresses, but I still had about 60,000 spam comments in my pending queue. There is no easy way built into Wordpress to delete these comments, so I found a plugin called Delete Pending Comments, which does exactly that. Once installing the plugin, all you have to do is click on the link for Delete Pending Comments on the sidebar in your dashboard under Comments. It will then ask you to type in a sentence to verify that you want to delete all pending comments.

It worked quickly and freed me from having to manually do it myself. Definitely worth it if your blog somehow managed to pile up the pending comments queue. Oh, and don’t install Intense Debate, at least for now, hopefully they will fix the spam filter if they haven’t already.

Rizone’s Power Tools – Windows Tools and Utilities

Josh — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 23:11:54 +0000

I was having a strange issue the past couple of days that prevented me from accessing my website from my work computer. I have no idea why it happened, but I was able to fix it by repairing Winsock. I found a program called Winsock XP Fix that did the job, but I wondered if there would be a program that would do this on Windows 7. I found such a program, but it also offers a whole lot more.

Rizone’s Power Tools comes packed with loads of features. I haven’t played around with it enough to test it all out, but I can tell it’s going to be a great tool for troubleshooting and repairing miscellaneous issues on the PC.

To start off, when you open the program you are given a window with a memory optimizer, hard drive defragmenter, registry optimizer, disk checker, and links to a command prompt, notepad2, etc.

Now, if you take a look through all of the menus you’ll find even more features like repair Winsock, dead pixel repair, etc.

Right now this tool is only in the testing stage, so it could be very buggy. The author is looking to push it to beta soon. Rizone’s Power Tools works on Windows XP, 2003, Vista, 2008 and Windows 7.

New Theme – WPLine

Josh — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:10:58 +0000

I’ve been working this weekend on getting my new theme set up since I have had the urge to get back into blogging. The theme is called WPLine, and it took me a little to get it right. The theme is originally in Vietnamese, so there were some words that I needed to translate into English (and there may still be some more that I missed). I’ll be tweaking it as time goes on, but this is all I’m going to do tonight.

I will be getting back into blogging, but I’m not quite sure how much time I’ll be able to spend. I graduate from college next month, so I’m very busy and trying to find a job. I hope all of my old readers come back, and I’ll be looking forward to new ones!

Really Starting to Hate AT&T

Josh — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 04:34:12 +0000

After reading all of the news this week about the new iPhone coming out soon, I’m really starting to hate AT&T. I’ve been with AT&T ever since I got my first cellphone over 5 years ago. I haven’t really had any trouble with service, but there are a few things lately that have really started to tick me off.

First of all, why do loyal customers who have a contract already have to pay a lot more to upgrade their phone. I’m not sure if other cellphone companies do this too, but I know AT&T loves to add on an extra fee if you decide to upgrade early. I probably wouldn’t upgrade to the new iPhone anyways, but if I wanted to, I’d have to pay hundreds of dollars extra… that’s how a loyal customer gets treated over new customers?

Secondly, AT&T has had months to prepare for the new iPhone OS release, but they don’t have MMS ready for the iPhone. Seriously??? Even cheap non-smart phones have MMS… and when the iPhone decides to have it, AT&T isn’t ready. If some other cellphone company legally supported the iPhone without having to unlock it, I’d switch in a heartbeat.

Also, and I’m not sure if this is AT&T’s fault or the iPhone’s, but lately I’ve been having some serious trouble getting messages on time. It took me 3 days to get a voicemail this past weekend. It also took me a couple of hours to get a text message one time a couple of weeks ago.

However, on a more positive note, I decided to take the risk and download the iPhone OS 3.0 from torrent. It installed great, and is running very smoothly. The search feature has to be my favorite, followed by horizontal SMS and email. Copy and Paste is great, but I never really felt like I needed it… although I know a lot of other people who feel differently. Now, I just can’t wait for Beejive to update for Push Notifications.

Well..It’s Here: The New iPhone

Shane — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 05:29:55 +0000

The new iPhone was just released: iPhone 3G S. The biggest thing is Voice Control. Use it to make calls, or even control your music. To me it is revolutionary, it will change the way we listen to music on a daily basis and make phone calls. But…I can’t afford that right now. But the good news is, the old iPhones will go down in price with the release of this new version. I haven’t had the time to do much research, but I hope this article from the Washington Post helps.

Here is the article by Mike Musgrove from the Washington Post:

“The latest iPhone, available next week, is faster than its predecessors, has an improved camera, can record videos and appears to be just what many Mac fans have been waiting for this year.

The iPhone 3G-S (courtesy of apple.com)

Apple unveiled the latest version of its popular iPhone, called 3G S, at a trade show for Mac users yesterday in San Francisco. The company, known for using the conference to launch new, often game-changing devices, touted its next-generation iPhone as its fastest-running smartphone yet. The “S” stands for “speed,” after all.

Speaking from the stage at the company’s Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple vice president of worldwide marketing Philip W. Schiller showed how the new iPhone’s camera lets users decide what the lens should focus on with the touch of a finger. With a set of voice controls, users can upload an iPhone video to YouTube with a spoken command.

The new device, priced at $199 and $299, will be available at the end of next week, the company said. The more expensive version comes with 32 gigabytes of storage space, a new capacity for the device. The less expensive iPhone has 16 gigabytes.

And the price of last week’s cutting-edge model, the iPhone 3G? It’s been reduced from $199 to $99.

Tech pundit Tim Bajarin, with Silicon Valley think tank Creative Strategies, said the cheaper, older iPhone should allow Apple to speed up the adoption of the smartphone. As for the new models, iPhone “is evolving into being a PC in your pocket, not just a smartphone,” he said.

Chief executive Steve Jobs, who has long been a dominant presence on the stage at this event, was a no-show. A survivor of pancreatic cancer, Jobs has been on medical leave since January and is scheduled to return later this month. Late last week, news sites were abuzz with a report asserting that the event could mark Jobs’s return to the company.

Apple had already previewed the third major version of the iPhone’s operating system in March. The device’s software offers 300 new features, the company said. That includes some long-overlooked basic features that iPhone owners have been waiting for since the device went on sale, such as “cut and paste,” which allows users to copy text from one application to another.

Apple also introduced “Find My iPhone,” a feature designed to help owners who have misplaced their device. Lose the phone under the sofa, and users will be able to send the iPhone a message ordering it to make a sound. If the device has been stolen, it will be possible to send a command to erase its memory, so that sensitive information is not compromised.

Other new applications include a GPS program that will give users turn-by-turn driving directions, another function that owners or potential owners of iPhone have been requesting. With another application from online car rental agency Zipcar, customers could unlock rental car doors by pushing an iPhone button.

The company unveiled new versions of its MacBook Pro laptops, which will feature longer-lasting batteries. According to Schiller, the number of Mac users has tripled in the last two years to 75 million.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/08/AR2009060801919.html?hpid=sec-tech

Check out the new iPhone at your AT&T dealer or at the Apple Store.

http://www.apple.com/iphone/

Tweetie vs. Nambu

Josh — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 17:25:11 +0000

Sorry for another Twitter post, but I’ve been spending a lot of my time lately on there. This post is going to take a look at some of the pros and cons of both Tweetie and Nambu, which are both great Twitter apps for Mac.

Tweetie

This is the newest app for me to try out. I was really excited to hear about Tweetie coming out for the Mac since I love it on the iPhone. If you haven’t tried it out yet, there is a free version (with ads) that you can download. Tweetie adds some nice effects for switching between different views, and it feels like a really solid app. I really like how it will add a dot beside the replies or DMs to let you know you have new messages. Also, if you search for a certain term you can open that search in a different window to always see new search results.

There are a couple things however that I know are already getting complaints. First of all, there is no grouping or filtering of any sort. It doesn’t seem like the creators have any intention of adding it in soon either. Another thing that bothers me is that you can’t drag your replies or DMs out to another window. This would sort of be like TweetDeck with its multiple columns, but instead it would be separate windows. Tweetie only works with Twitter too, which might be a negative for some people.

Nambu

Nambu is another Mac only Twitter app, and so far my favorite one. It has multiple views to give you an option of choosing between combined, sidebar, or multi column view. Right now I’m using the sidebar view, and I love that it gives you a count of unread messages beside your replies and DMs. Grouping and filtering are also much like TweetDeck, which is great for when you have a select few people that you really want to stay up to date with.

One thing that annoys me is that when I’m trying to group people I search for them and the correct results don’t come up. For some reason, when searching for their username it won’t work. I normally have to type in their real name in order for the correct results to come back. Sometimes however I don’t know the person’s real name, so I have to go to Twitter.com and search for the person, which is an extra step that shouldn’t be needed.

Right now only Twitter is working on Nambu, but Friendfeed, identi.ca, and Ping.fm are planned to work soon too. I know I’ll be using the Friendfeed option when it’s available.

Twitter Updates for 2009-04-20

Josh — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Five Best Screen Capture Tools http://bit.ly/1iOTb #feedly #
More Cool iPhone OS 3.0 Features – Data Detectors in Notes http://bit.ly/UJD4n #feedly #
Trying out Tweetie for the Mac. Yay! #
I wish you could open more than just searches in a separate window with Tweetie for Mac. It would also be nice to have grouping/filtering. #
Facebook Fixer Enhances Facebook’s Design http://bit.ly/ooQLG #feedly #
Hybrid Hummer Promises 100 Miles per Gallon http://bit.ly/sFqdP #feedly #
Scientists Break Brain/Twitter Barrier http://bit.ly/auys9 #feedly #