Paul Smith's Blog

OneNote 2010 beta almost has web notebooks

2009-11-17T18:10:39Z

A few of you probably know I've been after storing OneNote Notebooks on the web for some time now, we've had the ability to stick them on the local network for sharing with other users, but I really need them on the web. Since the main collaborator I work with isn't on my local network and I'm always having to sync his changes back manually.

OneNote 2010 has almost gotten there now, which will be using SkyDrive for storage. The technical preview didn't mention SkyDrive, although considering the Office Web Apps are using SkyDrive on their backend, rather than Office Live it isn't that surprising.

Hopefully we'll see this functioning shortly, before the final release, ideally when we have the OneNote Web App up and running. Then Adam can edit his own show notes. :-)

Bing UK now points to Bing Maps not Multimap hurrah

2009-11-13T12:33:24Z

Well after years of complaining it looks like Multimap is no longer linked from the UK Bing page. Instead it links to Bing Maps directly. How it should have been.

Best of all Bing Maps now have Ordnance Survey maps too, which previously only Multimap had.

What's so cool about Ordnance Survey maps? You're not going to find the Hundred Stone, the old dismantled railway, old Roman villas or Jack the Treacle Eater on a "modern" map.

Users with hacked consoles banned from Xbox Live - oh noes

2009-11-11T16:07:49Z

The BBC are running this as their lead story under technology at the moment.

How the hell is this worthy of being the lead technology news item at the moment. Microsoft have always banned modified consoles from Xbox Live for the last 7 years since the service was launched has anyone given it this much coverage when the other batches of users were banned? No.

What's worse, the BBC even features the opinions of one Radio 1 listener who was banned and turn it into an entire article.

I was pretty distraught at the time, I can't remember exactly what it said but I saw the words 'banned' and I was gutted, completely gutted.

At first I was in shock, I mean it's always at the back of your head using pirate games you know there's that possibility but you haven't heard about it, there's been no warnings and you haven't heard it happen to anyone in the last two years.

Too bad. The terms of use clearly states no modified consoles are allowed on the network. Not just to stop piracy but to stop people modifying games and cheating on the service.

I've probably saved about £600 and I've copied roughly 30 or 40 games. A lot of them I've downloaded or I've taken off friends that have downloaded themselves.

Go to jail, do not pass go, do not collect £200.

Why didn't dinosaurs evolve again after the Big Bang?

2009-11-04T15:27:49Z

While going through my logs last month I came across a rather interesting search query that somebody used to find my blog.

why didn't dinosaurs evolve again after the big bang

After a little chuckle I carried on, however I did jot it down for future use.

I suppose fundamentally it represents the terrible truth that ignorance dominates in our society. Nothing demonstrates this more than Sherri Shephard:

We knew the shape and size of the Earth 2200 years ago, it is disappointing to see not everyone is aware of it today.

I suppose I could just ridicule this person, but the fact they ask a question at least show they're interested in learning. Unlike Shephard, who during her whole life apparently never wondered what the shape of the world was, or was ever shown a map or globe of the Earth.

The fundamental answer for why dinosaurs didn't evolve *again* after the Big Bang was because the Big Bang predates the dinosaurs by about 13.6 billion years. There was no Big Bang after when the dinosaurs were about.

The question I suspect he or she was meaning was why didn't dinosaurs evolve again after going extinct?

There are a few reasons why this hasn't happened yet and why it probably won't happen again in the future.

Firstly the conditions present today are not like those of the Triassic, Jurassic or Cretaceous periods, the Earth is much cooler now, and because of this reptiles are small, the only large land animals are mammals because they are warm blooded. Because of this, it would be difficult for reptiles to compete with mammals as we're "dug-in" and would be difficult to be ousted. Like how mammals were small while reptiles dominated the Earth. You need an extinction event to shake things up. The impact that ended the Cretaceous period lowered global temperatures, this hurt reptiles badly but gave mammals are head start in the new environment. Today global warming could give reptiles a boost at the expense of many mammal species.

But even assuming the Earth of the future closely resembled that of a hundred million years ago, the probability of species resembling dinosaur species is extremely slim, we're talking trillions to one in probability this is because of how complicated the genetic code is. The change of the same mutations and then the same selections happening to create a species of dinosaur is incredibly remote. We may well end up with large reptiles again on the Earth. But realistically they will never be the same as species of dinosaur that have gone extinct. That genetic code is lost, and the chance of it arising again is too unlikely for it to happen.

My proudest achievement to date

2009-10-30T12:14:32Z

Today it finally happened. After so much waiting and hard work, so many recipes and so much chilled meat and northern spice, Dinendal, Guardian of Cenarius finally has his [Chef's Hat].

Below is my buying the [Chef's Hat] off Derek how exciting! Hi Derek how are you doing?

Now at long last I can wear my new silly hat in raids, and show everyone how much low level rubbish food I can cook, and more importantly how quickly I can do it.

What did you expect me to start pumping out Fish Feasts? Damn those things are expensive and time consuming to get the ingredients, too pricy for this Night Elf.

Below is me proudly wearing my new hat over the frozen wastes of Northrend.

What's next? Well that goofy looking Kalu'ak fishing rod of course! Only 22100 odd more reputation to go.

Anti-virus, anti-spyware and firewall recommendations for Windows 7

2009-10-23T11:46:20Z

I've had a couple of people e-mail me asking what they should install on their new Windows 7 computers since some of the firewalls and anti-virus software they've used in the past aren't compatible.

Long time readers of my blog will know the epic battle I've always had with anti-virus. To the point where during the Windows Vista timeframe I didn't run anti-virus. Obviously I don't recommend the average computer user to do that. But I could never find any anti-virus software that was both free, fast and not annoying.

In Windows XP you could tolerate anti-virus and 3rd party firewalls constantly nagging you and having annoying spinning icons in the system tray. In Windows Vista because the OS experience was so much cleaner than Windows XP anti-virus software like AVG or Avast always seemed drastically out of place and frankly noisy and annoying.

I was thrilled when Microsoft announced they were dropping Windows Live OneCare, a rather heavy security suite and replacing it with what was then codename Morro, now Microsoft Security Essentials. Why? Because it promised and delivered a Windows Defender-like anti-virus solution, namely fast, nag-free and out of the way. I would strongly recommend to everyone Security Essentials. It's a lightweight, fast and nag-free anti-malware application. Meaning it deals with viruses and spyware. In my opinion there is no competition anymore in the free anti-virus space, this is it.

Even if you've just brought a Windows 7 PC and have a trial version of Norton or McAfee I'd even recommend removing them and installing this instead.

As for a firewall. Post Windows XP SP2 this is really a non-issue. I'd recommend using the built in firewall. There's no need to clutter the machine with anything else.

And finally as a first line of defence against phishing and driveby malware if you're running Windows 7, you've already got Internet Explorer 8 there. Great. From a security standpoint there's no safer browser. If you're still on Windows XP or Windows Vista I'd suggest upgrading now. I know most of my readers use Firefox and that's fine for more tech-savy users. But I wouldn't recommend it for your average computer user, the data is clear, For phishing Firefox blocks 80% while IE8 blocks 83% and more malware in general Firefox catches less than 30% (other browsers were even less). Internet Explorer 8 was blocking 81%.

In short: Use Internet Explorer 8. Use the built-in firewall and install Security Essentials.

No games installed in Windows 7 Professional?

2009-10-23T11:15:13Z

For those people installing Windows 7 Professional you might notice that the Games Explorer and Start Menu look a bit sparse game wise. By default the games aren't installed in the Professional version.

You can of course quickly add them back.

Press Start
-> Control Panel
--> Programs
---> Turn Windows features on or off

Up the top of the list of components you should see Games. Check that box, or drill into it and specify individual games. And press OK. Within a few moments the games should be installed.

You can also add the Games Explorer on the Start Menu by right-clicking on the Start Menu -> Clicking customize and adding it in the new dialog box and OKing out.

Windows 7 themes by the boat load

2009-10-22T11:16:38Z

Windows 7 has launched today, and with it a whole bunch of themes. Not only can you download all the international themes that come with Windows 7, although only one is installed which matches your region now you can grab them all.

In addition you can also download branded themes, for example there's a Ferrari theme and a Gears of War theme and even a Coca Cola theme.

Hey I might have to start releasing the themes I use here. :-)

Following up on the BBC's weak Windows 7 peice

2009-10-22T01:02:23Z

As you may recall a day or two ago I blogged about a pretty major mistake the BBC made in an article looking at Windows 7. Well I'm following up with another issue I have with the review. At the end of the video the chap doing the review throws out:

In truth we've had a couple of problems with programs and updates we've tried to install.

Oh really? At the same time the following is displayed (yeah they couldn't even be bothered to use some screen capture software, instead filming a monitor argh):

Hmmm, unsurprisingly Sun's shoddy Java breaks. I've banned it from my machines because when it does work its always nagging you about updates and it has the nerve to fill up Add/Remove Programs with endless entries about itself and its updates.

Why do I have a problem with this? Well the general public will as always believe this is a Microsoft problem and the usual nonsense will be repeated. It's analogus to reviewing a new Samsung television set and mentioning in the review that your old Sony video tape recorder is broken. It's irrelevent.

The title of the article is A look at what's new in Windows 7 so why are they talking about Java and implying that Windows 7 is responsible for it not working?

Low volume with Audigy 2 ZS on Windows 7

2009-10-21T14:08:43Z

Just a quick note for those blasting Windows 7 onto their machines this week. You may notice lower than usual volume with your SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS. I've had a few e-mails along these lines and it seems to be due to the drivers currently on Windows Update.

I'd recommend trying the latest Daniel K drivers, in the past these have resolved problems I've had with lower than normal volume compared to Windows XP/Vista. At the moment the latest ones are here, however there will be a new release soon to correct a few bugs in these. The latest official drivers are dated from July but I suspect also resolve this issue, although I haven't tested these since the release candidate days.