WYSIWYB: What You See Is What You Blog

Don't like Google's new sidebar? Be a pirate!

2010-05-07T14:14:00.003-05:00

It's been a shamefully long time since my last post, but you can thank (or curse) Google for shocking me out of my complacency. You see, I've been a loyal Google user for pretty much as long as Google has existed. A long time ago, back in the early days of the interweb, when computers were powered by sabertoothed squirrels running around on stone wheels, I used a search engine called WebCrawler. It didn't have a fancy search algorithm, and was basically just a text match. But it was clean and simple, and because the web was a much simpler place back then, it mostly did what I wanted it to do. But then WebCrawler was bought by a different company, and played corporate musical chairs for a while, and the site suffered because of it. (And WebCrawler is still around, but as one of those search aggregators that grabs results from search engines like Google and Bing.) I started looking for a new search engine.

I tried Yahoo for a while, and AltaVista, and a few others, but none of them really worked for me for various reasons. Yahoo, in particular, grew ever more cluttered with things that had nothing to do with searching the web. And then I heard of this new search engine called Google. It was still in beta at the time, but it looked promising. It claimed to use back-links to prioritize search results based on popularity, and it was mostly free of the clutter that had been accumulating on the other search engines I'd been using. So I gave it a try. And in over ten years, I haven't looked back.

Until this week.

Apparently under pressure from Microsoft's Bing, Google has decided to "improve" the design of its search engine, and has been conducting an "experiment" in which it has been more-or-less randomly picking people to try out its new interface. I wasn't one of those people, and have been blissfully unaware of it until this week, when Google decided to roll out the changes to everyone. I used sarcastic quotes around "improve", because the change involves a new sidebar on search results that a) can't be minimized or removed, and b) duplicates the functionality of the inconspicuous bar at the top left of the page. And I gave the same treatment to "experiment", because the people at Google, in their wisdom, didn't provide these guinea pigs any way of providing feedback as to whether they liked the change or not.

The frustrating thing is that many of the people who are still using Google instead of Bing do so exactly because Google is everything Bling Bing isn't -- simple, streamlined, and elegant. If people wanted Google to be more like Bing, they'd just use Bing. I'm baffled by Google's logic here. And I'm apparently not the only one. Do a quick search for "google everything sidebar" and about 90% of the results will be pages complaining about the change, or asking for ways to remove it -- which you can't except by using an extension for Firefox or Google's own Chrome web browser (which is a bit ironic, I think). Those who use other browsers or who don't want to add yet another extension to Firefox are pretty much stuck with it...

...unless you're a pirate! (Or a hacker, a Swedish chef, a Klingon, or Elmer Fudd.)

Google is (for now, at least) still using it's classic, sidebar-less results page for non-English language, including the oddball English variants like "Bork, bork, bork!", "Elmer Fudd", "Hacker", "Klingon", and -- me fav'rite -- "Pirate". So if you hate the new sidebar but still want to stick with Google and don't mind a more playful interpretation in the presentation of your search results, just go to Google's Search Settings and pick a language of your choice other than plain English. And I don't know about you, but it's a pirate's life fer me. Arrgh!

Oh, Yeah... And It Plays Games, Too!

2009-05-08T15:01:00.004-05:00

Last year about this time, I wrote an article about my Mom getting a Wii, and praised it for being able to appeal to all generations, even those whose most recent video gaming experience was Breakout on an Atari 2600. After a year, she's still playing on occasion. It really is a great little game console. I'm planning on getting Punch-Out!! when it's released in a couple of weeks, so I can let my nephew beat me up.

But as great as the Wii is, I got myself a Playstation3 for Christmas, and I'm in love. Sales for the system lag slightly behind that of the XBox 360, though sales for the Wii are more than double that of the PS3 and XBox 360 combined. But in my humble opinion, the PS3 is much maligned, and I suspect the slower sales may be due to people thinking of it as a game console. "But it is a game console!", you're thinking. Well, yes and no. The PS3 does play games, and some are actually quite good. The Playstation3-exclusive Metal Gear Solid 4, LittleBigPlanet, and Resistance 2 are all excellent, as are the non-exclusive Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots and Grand Theft Auto IV. Another PS3 exclusive, Final Fantasy XIII, is set for release late this year, and the previews are fairly impressive.

But the PS3 is much more than just a gaming console. If that's why you're buying it, then it's possible you may be happier with a Wii (for games that bridge the generation gap) or the XBox 360 (for more hard-core and adult-oriented games). But since getting the PS3, I've used it much more as a multimedia entertainment center than a gaming console. For starters, it's one of the better Blu-ray players on the market, at a cost somewhat less than most mid-range standalone players. Regular updates ensure the system is compatible with the latest Blu-ray specification. Further, it supports numerous audio and video formats, allowing you to store your audio and video collections on the hard drive for instant access. (For open-source fans, the PS3 doesn't currently play Ogg Vorbis audio or audio or video in the Matroska container, though the latter may change since the newest version of DivX supports Matroska with h.264 video and AAC audio.) Video file playback is very nice, and I particularly like the video thumbnail search feature with adjustable time increments. The PS3 also supports UPnP media servers, so you can even stream audio and video from a computer on your network.

Downsides? Well, there are a few, though most of them may eventually be rendered moot by future updates, or can be easily bypassed. Subtitle support for video files (not DVD or Blu-ray) is currently fairly poor. If you absolutely must have subtitles in your avi and mp4 videos, you currently have to re-encode the videos to hardcode the subtitles. As previously mentioned, while the PS3 supports the most common audio and video formats, support for open-source formats is currently relatively poor. h.264 video encoding is not currently supported, though this may be corrected in future updates, particularly if PS3 adopts the new DivX standard. Also, files cannot be modified on the PS3 — video titles cannot be changed, ID3 tags on mp3 files cannot be added or modified, etc. This can make managing audio and video collections stored on the PS3 difficult. You can add and delete files, but that's all. Of course, if you already have your collections organized, it's not an issue. And since the PS3 supports UPnP, it's easy enough to simply store your collections on your computer and stream them to the PS3. And speaking of collections, it would be nice if the PS3 supported sub-level grouping, such as by artist then album, though this isn't as much of a deficiency as a potential feature.

As for hardware, I have few complaints. Recent versions of the PS3 use more efficient processors that produce less heat, and so fan noise which was apparently a problem on early versions is practically non-existent. The Bluetooth controllers sync effortlessly with the system, which is one of my primary complaints with the Wii. My one gripe is that newer versions of the system only have two USB ports — older versions had four — though this can be easily overcome with a cheap USB hub.

If you're thinking of getting a PS3, I'd highly suggest buying the cheapest version available. Two versions are currently in production, and are identical except for the size of the hard drive — one is 80GB, and the other 160GB. Assuming you can tell one end of a screwdriver from another, upgrading the hard drive is extremely simple. For the difference in price between the two versions, I bought a 320GB drive and an enclosure, which gives me 5x the storage when the original 80GB drive (now used as an external USB drive) is plugged in, as opposed to the measly 2x storage of the more expensive version of the system.

Another small victory for freedom over Big Brother!

2009-04-10T17:07:00.006-05:00

I'm not usually one to support socialism, but... Congratulations, French Socialist Party!

A bill that would have created the world's first government agency devoted to tracking Internet activity and punishing Internet piracy was unexpectedly defeated in the French National Assembly yesterday, primarily by members of the Socialist Party who had opposed the bill from its inception.

I personally find this a bit odd since the French Socialist Party, like all democratic socialist parties, tends to be in favor of government regulation. I'm not usually one to support socialism (which may be my biggest understatement of the day), but in this case I don't care. For today, at least, I have nothing but love for the Parti Socialiste.

Of course, the defeat of the bill might have been helped a little by the National Assembly being nearly empty at the time, since the bill was expected to be passed with little opposition. The vote was 21-15. The Assemblée Nationale has 577 members, so it seems apathy won the day.

While the bill will almost certainly be brought before the legislature again, it's good to see that a few legislators are still championing freedom and common sense. After all, the measures enacted by this bill would have been easily bypassed simply by using public Wi-Fi hotspots, an anonymous proxy, Tor, or any of the other commonly used methods of ensuring Internet anonymity. And it wouldn't have done a thing to stop streaming of pirated media, which is becoming fairly popular.

As I said previously, I think we may be taking the wrong approach when it comes to intellectual property. Certainly the current measures used to curb piracy are largely ineffective. Of course, that's in no small part because those making the laws often don't fully understand the technical issues involved. Hopefully, the French legislators will wizen up a bit by the time this bill again rears it's dumb, ugly head. If it is passed, it would set a dangerous precedent for other nations to follow suit with equally misguided and ineffective Big Brother Internet monitoring agencies.

Listen up, my French friends — the freedom of the Internet is resting on your shoulders.

Symantec's Antivirus Secret?: Linux!

2009-04-01T15:48:00.011-05:00

I know this is April Fool's Day, but I assure you this post is legit...

I don't normally watch 60 Minutes. I did see a few segments of 20/20 a couple of weeks ago that were fairly interesting, but I generally avoid news commentary programs altogether. I simply prefer unbiased news, and don't feel like I need some talking head interpreting the news for me. 60 Minutes, however, grabbed my attention a few days ago with a report called "The Internet is Infected". The report focused on the Conficker worm, which it called "one of the most dangerous threats ever", and its primary source was Steve Trilling, a vice president of Symantec, the company that develops Norton Anti-Virus.

Which, if you ask me, is a bit like asking Tylenol about headaches, or Allstate about driving without car insurance. If you'll notice, not once did the report say that Conficker only targets Windows computers, or that computers running Mac OS X or Linux are unaffected. Either 60 Minutes is completely ignorant of any other operating system other than Windows (which is actually a faint possibility), or it intentionally misled viewers into thinking all computers are at risk for the sake of ratings — and possibly advertising revenue from Symantec. Symantec isn't exactly an unbiased source, since it makes more money when people are more concerned about viruses. Of course they're going to say that Conficker is a serious threat. If CBS had gone to, for example, the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team or Carnegie Mellon University's Computer Emergency Response Team for its information, the report would probably have been a bit more helpful, and certainly less biased.

The Conficker virus is fairly widespread and could potentially cause some problems depending on the instructions sent to it by its designers (which, by the way, is apparently scheduled for today). But Windows users are actually fairly safe as long as they follow a couple of very basic steps to secure their systems: use automatic updates to get the most current patches for Windows, and run an up-to-date anti-virus application such as AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition, Avira, or Avast. If you're already infected, most major anti-virus applications including AVG, McAfee, Norton, and Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool can remove Conflicker. Mac and Linux users don't have to be concerned at all, of course, since Conficker simply doesn't affect those operating systems.

But that's not really the point of this post.

Watch the 60 Minutes report, and pause it at 3:03. Now take a close look at the monitor on the right. That's right, folks... Symantec uses Ubuntu Linux! Don't believe me? To the right is a screencap of the report at 3:50. That's certainly the Gnome desktop environment, and you can just make out the Ubuntu logo on the menubar in the top left corner.

Now why would Symantec use Linux, when less than 30 Linux viruses have ever been identified, and none of those are currently a threat? Compare that to the 461 Windows viruses currently active out of over 100,000 known, with new viruses being identified daily. Maybe — just maybe — Symantec isn't completely confident that their own product will protect their systems if they use Windows.

To be fair, Symantec does produce anti-virus software for Linux — but it's part of Symantec AntiVirus, primarily designed for corporate users and servers. Symantec doesn't make a Linux version of the desktop-oriented Norton AntiVirus. And yet they apparently use Linux desktops. If Symantec uses Linux desktops, it seems like they'd make a Linux version of Norton if Linux actually needed anti-virus software, doesn't it?

Is Intellectual Property an Invisible Dragon?

2009-03-31T16:06:00.014-05:00

In his essay "The Dragon in My Garage" from his 1995 book The Demon-Haunted World, Carl Sagan uses the analogy of an invisible, intangible dragon to examine belief in the absence of evidence. As a Linux user, the concept of intellectual property is one with which I'm quite familiar, since how FOSS and freedom of information can coexist with intellectual property rights is a commonly recurring discussion in the Linux community. But I'm beginning to think that intellectual property is like Sagan's dragon — despite overwhelming belief, intellectual property might not really exist.

The first step in examining this idea is to look at the basic concept of property. Most of the world recognizes the existence of personal property rights (even if some individuals or groups don't always respect those rights), so for the purposes of this discussion I'll ignore those philosophies (such as communism) that don't. Personal property rights are usually seen to be based on the sovereignty of the individual, a concept often attributed to John Locke — the 17th century philosopher, not the character from Lost, though I think the latter would agree with the concept. According to Locke, an individual "has a right to decide what would become of himself and what he would do, and as having a right to reap the benefits of what he did". Essentially, an individual owns himself, and therefore anything that is produced as a result of his labor. In terms of physical goods, application of this idea is fairly straightforward: if you produce it, it's yours to keep, sell, or trade. Wages and salary are simply selling one's labor (and the results thereof) to an employer.

It's tempting to apply this to purely intellectual products as well. After all, what is more purely a product of oneself than one's ideas? But if a person makes a chair, when he sells the chair it changes possession. The person no longer has the chair, and the other person no longer has whatever he exchanged for the chair. This doesn't apply to information. When a person sells an idea, it doesn't leave his possession. This is where the traditional view of property as applied to information falls apart. Information can only be exclusively possessed until it is shared with another — the very point at which the traditional view of property requires exclusive possession. The traditional view of property as a possession doesn't seem to know what to do with property not limited by physical constraints.

Perhaps the problem is that we mistakenly associate property with possession. Property isn't really about possession, after all, but control. A person may own property without ever possessing it. A person can buy an object and resell it without even having seen the physical object. The object is never in his possession, but it is in his control. Society recognizes his right to the property purchased, and therefore his control over it. Conversely, one can possess another's property. If this is done without consent, we call it theft.

Ideas, however, can't be controlled. Benjamin Franklin once said "Three may keep a secret if two of them are dead". The unofficial motto of the free content movement, "Information wants to be free", is simply a restatement of Franklin's observation. Information can't be controlled once communicated to another. A song once sung can be sung by another. A story once told can be retold. Attempts may be made to place constraints on the spread of information, but it can't truly be controlled. If it could, Martha Stewart would never have had the joy of preparing hors d'oeuvres for a few hundred fellow inmates.

So if information can't be exclusively possessed or controlled once communicated to another, can it really be considered property? Where is the evidence that this invisible dragon exists?

But how, you might ask, can information be a product of an individual's effort, and therefore something that the individual may sell, if it's not property? Perhaps the answer is simple — perhaps it's a service. Many of our actions have no tangible product, and yet we still recognize that those actions have value. We're perfectly willing to pay for artistic performance, psychiatric counseling, language translation, babysitting, and any number of other activities that do not involve the production or exchange of property. If information production and communication is properly viewed as a service, the problems posed by intellectual property disappear. As provider of a service, authors, songwriters, programmers, journalists and other information producers would still be reimbursed for their efforts, as would commercial distributors of information. When we purchase a book, we would be paying the publisher for the physical book and the service of distributing the information it contains, but not the information itself. Likewise, the publisher would pay the author for the production of the information, perhaps still based on the estimated popularity of that information, but not for the information itself. So everyone involved in the commercial production and distribution of information would still get paid. But the free distribution of information would no longer be viewed as an immoral or criminal act. We would no longer have to debate why a CD-quality recording of a song copied from broadcast HD radio is perfectly legal, while a digital recording of the same song ripped from a CD and downloaded from a P2P file-sharing network isn't, even though the result is the same.

I, personally, have yet to see any solid evidence supporting the existence of intellectual "property". If we view the production and communication of information as a service, then intellectual property becomes a myth. And I think Sagan would be proud.

What the frak? Sci Fi goes SyFy

2009-03-17T17:13:00.012-05:00

It's official. The executives of the Sci Fi Channel are idiots.

The Sci Fi Channel, which is owned by NBC and has been gaining popularity in recent years largely due to the critically acclaimed Battlestar Galactica — of which the series finale is airing this week — has announced that it is officially changing its name to SyFy. As one article announcing the change put it, "In some universe, the name 'Syfy' is less geeky than the name 'Sci Fi'. Dave Howe, president of the Sci Fi Channel, is betting it’s this one."

And these are the same people who seem to think that professional wrestling is science fiction. Fiction, sure. But science fiction? Of course, the Sci Fi Channel has, since its premier in the early 90s, shown more than just science fiction. Fantasy and horror have almost equal airtime. But wrestling?

Why exactly do the Sci Fi Channel execs think this branding change is a good idea? Well, here's a quote from Sci Fi Channel president David Howe:

When we tested this new name, the thing that we got back from our 18-to-34 techno-savvy crowd, which is quite a lot of our audience, is actually this is how you’d text it. It made us feel much cooler, much more cutting-edge, much more hip, which was kind of bang-on what we wanted to achieve communication-wise.

So... The name is changing because that's how it's spelled by the lol-crowd? And they think this will somehow make them cooler? Yeah. I'm sure changing the spelling but keeping the same pronunciation will really make a difference in the minds of the people who weren't previously watching the network.

The fact of the matter is that no matter how you spell it, it's still Sci Fi. If the network wants to draw a larger audience, the best method would be to show more quality programming like Battlestar Galactica and the new seasons of Doctor Who, and less garbage like wrestling and most of the infamously unwatchable movies produced by the channel. Why, for example, did Sci Fi pass on the television rights to the Star Wars movies, allowing the Testosterone Channel (otherwise known as Spike) to pick them up? Why does the channel not show more movies like Alien, Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, The Matrix, Terminator, Back to the Future, Blade Runner, Donnie Darko, The Sixth Sense, The Thing, Groundhog Day, Twelve Monkeys, or The Exorcist? All of these would be a perfect fit for the Sci Fi Channel, but instead I see most of them aired on channels like Spike and USA Networks — which incidentally is also owned by NBC. Meanwhile, the Sci Fi Channel shows Alien Apocalypse, Alien Express, Alien Hunter, Alien Lockdown, Alien Siege — are we seeing a trend here? — and, of course, professional wrestling.

Science fiction can be cool, as evidenced by Battlestar Galactica and the previously mentioned blockbuster films. Changing the name of the channel in an attempt to seem cool or hip won't draw more viewers. Playing quality programming that targets its primary audience will. You don't have to be an overpaid network executive to see that.

iPods and Ubuntu Linux: Yes, you can!

2009-03-16T19:34:00.007-05:00

Apple sucks.

I don't mean Apple products. Macs are a bit pricey, but they're very reliable. OS X isn't my cup of tea, but it's a solid and attractive OS. And the iPod set a standard for mp3 players that its competitors are still struggling to meet.

No, when I say "Apple sucks", I mean Apple, the company. And why, you ask, do I say this even though I freely admit that I like its products? Because Apple, even more than Microsoft, likes to lock you into using their products by making them interdependent on each other and incompatible with other hardware and software. The iPod is an excellent example. You can't just use any file manager to add or remove files from your iPod, as is the case with most other mp3 players. You have to use a program specifically designed to work with iPods, which typically means iTunes. You can use other programs, of course, but because of Apple's secrecy when it comes to interfacing with the iPod, few of them come close to matching the functionality of iTunes. Unfortunately for Linux users, Apple hasn't seen fit to release a Linux version of iTunes. So it's a good thing we have gtkpod. (Ubuntu users can install it by clicking this link.) According to Wikipedia's comparison of iPod managers, gtkpod is the only such application that matches the features of iTunes when it comes to managing your iPod — except possibly for a Java application called MediaChest which I was hesitant to try because of its unimpressive website that uses a Java applet that failed to run in my browser. (Oh, the irony.)

In keeping with the Linux philosophy of doing one thing and doing it well, gtkpod isn't fancy. It doesn't play music or videos, display photos, or manage your media library. It doesn't rip songs from CDs or transcode movies to an iPod-playable format. It just manages the files on your iPod. So if you use Linux and want to rip songs from a CD, complete with album art, to add to your iPod, then you need a couple of other programs.

First of all, you need an application for ripping CDs. A number of such apps are available, but the simplest is Sound-Juicer. (Ubuntu users can install Sound Juicer by clicking this link.) You might want to change some of the preferences as far as where and how songs are ripped, but the basic operation is extremely simple: insert a CD and click "Extract".

Of course, it would be nice to include album art for the mp3s you want to put on your iPod, so you have something nice to look at when browsing your music using Cover Flow. For that, we need another separate but incredibly simple application called Album Cover Art Downloader. This program pulls album cover art from any of several websites including Amazon and Yahoo, and like Sound Juicer, it's operation is exceedingly simple. Just select the mp3 files to which you want to add cover art, and click the download arrow.

Now that you have a number of mp3s with cover art, open gtkpod and plug in your iPod. The program will automatically detect your iPod. To add files to the iPod, simply make sure you have your iPod selected in the left pane, click the large "Add Files" or "Add Folder" button, and after you've selected the files to be added, click the large "Save Changes" button. Unlike some other iPod managers, gtkpod is equally capable of adding videos and photos to your iPod.

And if you're interested in converting DVDs or video files to play on your iPod, Handbrake is your new best friend. Ubuntu users can get the latest version by adding the Handbrake PPA to your Software Sources, and you'll probably want to install the unstripped versions of the ffmpeg libraries as well.

Another great idea from Microsoft...

2009-03-16T17:22:00.005-05:00

Noise Could Mask Web Searchers' IDs
New Scientist (03/07/09) Marks, Paul

Microsoft researchers say that adding noise to search engine records could protect Web users' identities, and that implementing such a technique would be a major step toward provable privacy. Records of Web searches are extremely useful to software engineers looking to improve search technology, and can provide valuable insight for scientists exploring digital search behaviors. However, attempts to make search data anonymous have been mostly unsuccessful. Microsoft researchers Krishnaram Kenthapadi, Nina Mishra, Alex Ntoulas, and Aleksandra Korolova say they have developed a safe way to release search data. The researchers propose publishing data associated only with the most popular queries, so that specific, rarely performed searches, such as for individual names or unique interests, cannot be used to identify people. The researchers also inserted noise into the data by adding digits to the data's figures. Korolova says that adding the noise gives the data provable privacy, and the amount of noise added defines the level of privacy that can be guaranteed. She says the added noise strikes a balance between guaranteeing privacy and providing useful data sets.

View Full Article

Ok... I'm all for privacy. One of the strengths of the Internet and particularly the World Wide Web has been anonymity in communication. Online, you're not young or old, male or female, white or black or Asian or Hispanic — unless, of course, you want to be. You're your ideas and beliefs, and the anonymity of the Web enables you to express those ideas without prejudice or fear of repercussions in the "real" world (unless you live somewhere like China or North Korea where Internet activity is actively monitored and the free exchange of ideas harshly supressed). Sure, there are always consequences to actions or words, but online those consequences are limited to heated exchanges of ideas and at worst social ostracism from a particular online community.

Because of the hodge-podge of technologies cobbled together to create the current Internet, most of which didn't have security as a priority, we've lost some of that anonymity. Companies and other organizations can glean a disturbing amount of data about our real-world identities and online activities from various sources, including the Web searches mentioned by the article quoted above. Security and privacy certainly need to be concerns in the design of future Internet technologies and our usage of current technologies.

But what is Microsoft's innovative answer to the problem of data mining Web search results? To withhold information and falsify the information provided. Genius!

The first half of this "solution" is nothing but common sense. If data mining of personal information is a problem, then the sources of that information should be particular about what information is provided, and to whom. On the consumer side, we implement this idea by not agreeing to Terms of Service that do not protect our privacy. On the provider side, organizations refuse to publish information that might result in bad press or a decline in customer confidence.

The second half of the so-called solution is profoundly stupid. Records of Web searches can be quite valuable to legitimate research. There's absolutely no point tp publishing these records if they're intentionally falsified. Falsifying the data renders it completely worthless to real research, while making it only somewhat less attractive to those who would use it for less noble applications. You might as well not publish the information at all. So how, exactly, is this a solution?

Way to go, Microsoft. I'm looking forward to your next big idea. By the way, how is that "Life without walls" ad campaign going? Because it seems to me that without walls you don't really need Windows...

A Brief History of Time (Battlestar Galactica Style)

2009-02-25T17:56:00.005-06:00

In case you missed the last couple of episodes of BSG, here's the long view of what's been going on for the last few thousand years...

Cylons were created by humans on Kobol, and were the 13th tribe that left Kobol for whatever reason everyone else left Kobol, apparently. They've never actually explained exactly what happened on Kobol to prompt the 12 Tribes to leave and form the Colonies. (Maybe the toilet in the cellar backed up. Trust me, something like that makes you want to move out quick.)

The Cylons go to Earth, stay there for quite a while, and forget how to resurrect when they learn how to procreate sexually (and who can really blame them?). They develop their own Centurions, who naturally rebel, and the two sides nuke each other. The Five were warned of the coming apocalypse by messengers or "angels" only they could see or hear (which sound remarkably like Head Six and Head Baltar). The Five manage to escape at the last minute (actually a little after that) by having rediscovered resurrection technology.

Earth is now uninhabitable, so they head out to find out what happened to the other 12 Tribes, and warn them of the dangers of creating a slave race. Unfortunately, because they lack FTL drives and have to take the scenic route (which takes about 2000 years, though it seemed shorter to them because they were going really fast, which actually makes sense it you ask Einstein), they arrive just a little too late, as the Colonies have already developed their own Centurions, who naturally rebelled (as Centurions are wont to do).

In an attempt to end the First Cylon War -- which at the time was obviously known as merely The Cylon War, or possibly the Great Cylon War, or maybe even the Cylon War to End All Cylon Wars... wait, where was I? Oh, right -- the Five make a deal with the Centurions: "Stop the fighting, and we'll help you make humanoid Cylons like us, which you've been attempting unsuccessfully with the ship hybrids". So the Centurions end the war, and the Eight humanoid Cylon models are developed.

Except that now the Ones (a.k.a. Cavil, a.k.a. John) think mommy Ellen is playing favorites, and kills his brother Abel... er, I mean Daniel. So now there are only 7 humanoid models, rather than 8, except that there are really 12 (instead of 13) if you count the Five.

Following along so far? Oh, well don't worry. You can go back and re-read it later. Continuing right along...

John/Cavil/One/"Cain" realizes he's in hot water for killing Daniel/Seven/"Abel", and he's still pretty steamed at his mommies and daddies for giving him a pink, fleshy body instead of a Mighty Morphin' Rock'em Sock'em Robot body, so he suffocates the Five, uploads new personalities, and covertly drops them in the Colonies hoping that they'll realize that humans are stoopid and Cylons rulz. w00t!

Then, because he's still a self-hating sadist, he nukes the Colonies in an attempt to destroy that which reminds him of the things he hates most in himself -- those fleshy, weak, emotional humans. Of course, he makes sure that his mommies and daddies aren't killed in the attacks, because he's still not done punishing them for making him. He never asked to be born, after all. (Which, of course, he wasn't, but do you really want to split hairs with a megalomaniac spoiled brat in an old man's body who'd rather nuke you than look at you? Didn't think so.)

And that brings us to the miniseries, which gets good ratings. So season 1 got the greenlight, and earned critical praise. So that led to 3 more seasons and a couple of web series, as well as an upcoming spin-off and made-for-television movie. Which brings us to the present, in which the Centurions have rebelled (as Centurions do) and the Cylons have split into two groups: the uglies and the pretties, with Three/D'anna/Xena-the-Warrior-Princess taking a radioactive sabbatical on Earth. The pretties have made nice with the Colonials, the Five are back together (minus Anders' brain), and everything is slowly falling apart.

Which is all right, though, because it's all happened before, and will happen again. And they have a plan.

A World Without Walls or Fences (pt.3) — A Newbie's Guide to Installing Ubuntu

2008-08-20T22:47:00.015-05:00

In the first two installments of this series I began many moons ago, I discussed alternatives to the Windows and Mac OS operating systems, and the differences between them. In this installment, we'll walk through the process of actually installing the Ubuntu distribution of the Linux operating system, including the option of installing it side-by-side with an existing installation of Windows.

Step 1: Preparation
Before you start, you'll need a few things. The first thing is an Ubuntu installation disc. You can download a disc image (i.e. an ISO file) from the Ubuntu website and burn it to a CD using Nero or similar disc burning software, or you can order an installation disc free of charge from Ubuntu. Make sure you get the proper installation disc for your computer. There are different versions for 32-bit Intel systems and 64-bit AMD and Intel systems. (Even if you have a Dual-Core processor that's capable of 64-bit processing, you may still want to go with the 32-bit installation, unless you plan on doing things like encoding video and compiling programs. There are still a few programs incompatible with 64-bit systems.) [EDIT: As of the beginning of 2009, I can say that 64-bit Ubuntu is as stable and as well-supported as the 32-bit version. If you have a 64-bit processor, I'd suggest taking full advantage of the hardware you purchased and install the 64-bit version.] You can also choose between the LiveCD, which lets you boot into Ubuntu from the CD to try it out without making any changes to your system, and the alternate install disc, which provides a non-graphical installer for systems incompatible with the LiveCD.

The second thing you need is, obviously, a computer. If you want to keep an existing installation of Windows, we'll need to do a bit of preparation before we can begin installing Ubuntu. Before you do anything else, back up your files!!! Installing a new operating system involves formatting drive space, which will permanently remove any information in the formatted space. Even if you plan on keeping your current Windows installation, it's a good idea to back up any files you don't want to risk losing.

We need to have at least 20GB disk space on the computer on which to install the new operating system. If you already have the space, or don't want to keep Windows, then the installation is going to be extremely easy. If not, then we're going to need to shrink your existing Windows partition, which means that the installation is only going to be moderately easy. If the case is the latter, defragment your hard drive before continuing, or you risk losing data.

Also, make sure you have a network cable handy, since you'll need an Internet connection to finish the installation, and you probably won't be able to use your wireless card to do so (if you have one). Go ahead and plug in the network cable now.

Step 2: Installation
Insert the Ubuntu installation CD in your disc drive, and reboot. At the POST screen — that's the one with the manufacturer's logo on it — you may need to press a key to open a boot menu to allow you to boot from the CD. It's probably something like F12, but differs by manufacturer.

If you're using the LiveCD, you will have the option of booting from the CD to try Ubuntu without making any changes to your computer. If you're the kind of person who would never think of buying a car without first taking a test drive, then this is probably a good idea. If you decide to boot into Ubuntu, you'll notice an icon on the desktop to begin installation, which will be no different than if you chose to install Ubuntu from the LiveCD menu.

If you're using the alternate install disc, you won't have the option of booting into Ubuntu from the disc, and the installer will be text-based. Don't worry — the installation process is the exact same as with the LiveCD. It just won't be as pretty.

Once you begin the installation, you'll be asked some basic questions about your computer, such as your language and keyboard layout. Answer all of the questions appropriately until you get to the point where it asks whether you want to use a guided or manual install. Choose the manual install. Here, you'll see a list of the drives and partitions currently on your system.

If you need to resize your Windows partition, select it and (in the LiveCD) drag the right side to your left to resize it and free up some disk space. (Doing this using the alternate install disc is slightly different, but not much more difficult.)

Select the drive, partition, or unallocated space where you want to install Ubuntu. If it is an existing partition, you'll need to delete it. Choose to create a new partition where we will install the operating system. This partition should be about 8-12GB, depending on how much software you plan to install. Take note that the size of a megabyte used by the installer is 1000000 (or 1000^2) bytes, rather than the more common 1048576 (or 1024^2) bytes, so if you want a 10GB partition, you should set the size as 10737MB instead of 10240MB. (Tip: Multiply the desired size in MB by 1.048576.) Use this partition as root ("/"), and format the partition as ext3.

Create a second partition equal in size to the amount of memory on your computer, and choose to use this partition as "swap".

Finally, create a third partition using the remaining unallocated space. Use this space as "/home", and format is as ext3.

Once you've created these three partitions, look at what you've done very carefully to make sure you haven't made any mistakes, because we're about to pass the point of no return. When you're sure you're ready, click Forward to continue the installation process.

On the next screen, you'll be asked for your name, username, password, and computer name. Fill in these boxes with whatever you want, but be sure you remember your username and password, since this is what you'll use to login to Ubuntu. On the next screen, you'll may be asked if you want to import any documents and settings from your Windows installation (if you're keeping Windows, of course). I personally prefer to manually transfer files and settings, but you can check the user account(s) listed if you want the installer to do it automatically.

Finally, you'll see a screen asking you to confirm all of the settings you've specified for your installation. Look over these, and if everything looks good, click Forward to begin the installation. Once the installer is done, which may take a while depending on the speed of your computer, you'll be prompted to remove the CD and reboot.

Step 3: Finishing Up
Once you reboot, you'll see a new screen, allowing you to choose the operating system you want to boot into. If you decided to keep an existing Windows installation, you should see entries for both Ubuntu and Windows. Boot into Ubuntu.

You may have nothing left to do at this point, but more than likely you'll need to install drivers for your video card and wireless card (if you have one). You may see a popup window in the upper-right corner of the screen that says something about "restricted drivers". If so, click on the icon to open the restricted driver manager, and check the box next to the video driver to install it. You'll need to reboot for the change to take effect.

If you have a wireless card, but aren't able to use it, you'll have to install the Windows driver for your wireless card. The only hard part about this is actually finding the driver. If your computer was made by Dell, Gateway, or another major manufacturer, you should be able to locate and download the wireless driver for your computer. Otherwise, you'll need to Google your wireless card to find the driver. Once you have downloaded the driver, open it using Archive Manager. (Even if it's a .exe file, it's still a self-extracting .zip archive, and can be opened using Archive Manager.) Now go to the menu on the upper-left of your screen and select System->Adminitration->Synaptic Package Manager. This is the big brother of Add/Remove Programs. Click the Reload button to update your package list, and then search for "ndis-gtk". Click the box next to the ndis-gtk package to mark it for installation, then click the Apply button to install the program. Now go to System->Administration->Windows Wireless Drivers, click the Install New Driver button, locate the wireless driver (the .inf file) you downloaded, and click Close. After another reboot — possibly the last you'll ever actually need to do — you should be able to use your wireless card.

Congratulations! You've now installed Ubuntu!

Next Time: Installing the bells and whistles

Beach, Barbeque, and a Good Book

2008-06-24T16:57:00.006-05:00

It's now well into the summer, and the 4th of July weekend is rapidly approaching. If you're like me, you'll probably want to spend at least part of your vacation relaxing on the beach or by the pool with a good book or two. Here are a few suggestions for light Summer reading to get you started. Just remember one thing — wait at least 30 minutes after eating before diving into your book (and make sure to wash your hands, especially if you've been eating barbecued ribs).

Storm Front (The Dresden Files, Book 1)

by Jim Butcher —

Storm Front

Small Favor

Storm Front

Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz — In the last few years, Dean Koontz has gone from an author I tended to avoid to one of my favorites, and a lot of that is due to the Odd Thomas novels. Odd is a fry cook in the desert town of Pico Mundo, California, who has two very special gifts. First, he makes exceptionally delicious pancakes. Second, he can see dead people. The latter tends to put him in some very peculiar and sometimes deadly situations. Despite the numerous tragedies he experiences, Odd approaches life with hope, humor, and — most of all — humility. One of the most unique protagonists I've encountered, Odd Thomas is simply enchanting. While technically horror, the Odd Thomas novels are humorous, inspiring, and highly entertaining.
The Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse by Robert Rankin — A serial killer is loose in Toy City (formerly Toy Town), and the old nursery rhyme characters are being killed one by one. To make matters worse, Detective Bill Winkie (who dropped the nickname "Wee Willy" years earlier), the one man who might be able to sort out the mystery, has gone missing. It's up to Bill's partner — an alcohol-soaked teddy bear named Eddie — and a newcomer to the city named Jack to track down the killer. If that sounds even mildly interesting to you, then you should really consider picking up this book. Don't think that because it's about toys and nursery rhyme characters that ...Bunnies... is a kid's book. This is a darkly humorous fairy tale, in which all of the characters you think you know are a bit twisted. Jill, for example, works at a brothel owned by Mother Goose, while Little Miss Muffet hosts a daytime talk show (appropriately called "The Tuffet"). Gratuitous sex and violence contrast absurdly (and perfectly) with the setting, resulting in a hilarious and action-packed story full of plenty of twists and turns, including a mind-bending finalé that I guarantee you won't see coming.
The Android's Dream by John Scalzi — When a human diplomat murders his alien counterpart with a well-aimed fart, an underachieving State Department employee is tasked with locating a rare sheep in order to avoid interstellar war. If you think that sounds like the setup for an outrageous slapstick comedy, you'd be absolutely wrong. Scalzi does inject more than the usual share of humor into The Android's Dream, but despite it's ridiculous premise it's actually a very solid sci-fi adventure. Scalzi has been favorably compared to Robert Heinlein for his earlier novels, but The Android's Dream feels a bit like the bastard offspring of Heinlein and Doug Adams. The result is incredibly entertaining. Actually, I bought this book yesterday with the intention of taking it with me to the beach this weekend, but made the mistake of reading a bit over lunch. Since I finished it around midnight, I guess I'll need to go back to the bookstore tomorrow to find something else to read at the beach...

45 Forever? I Can Handle That...

2008-06-09T15:06:00.004-05:00

While the predictions of futurists can be a bit hit-or-miss (hence the cry "Where's my flying car?!"), some end up being pretty close. Ray Kurzweil has a good enough track record for the National Academy of Engineering to publish his sunny forecast for solar energy, and I'm certainly hoping his most recent round of predictions, discussed in this recent New York Times article, is as accurate as his 1989 prediction that by 1998 a computer would beat a World Chess Champion (since IBM's Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov 1997).

Ray has predicted, among other things, that in another 15 years, human life expectancy will rise each year faster than we age. That sounds to me that as long as I don't manage to get myself killed in the meantime, I can be 45 forever — which doesn't sound terribly bad, actually. (Of course, the other alternative to continue growing older but never dying, until we're all nothing but shriveled, wrinkly things with no hair except what grows out of our huge ears and noses, which is a somewhat less attractive proposition...) Ray also predicts a technological Singularity sometime in the middle of this century — which any fan of Charles Stross, Vernor Vinge, Iain M. Banks, or Dan Simmons knows sounds pretty sweet.

Bridging the Gamer Generation Gap

2008-05-18T18:36:00.006-05:00

After a short hiatus, WYSIWYB is back on the air— or wire, depending. So what's brought me out of hiding? A rather odd announcement from my mother.

My mom, who is a year or so shy of 60, announced today that she's getting a Wii. It's not really news that the Wii has shown itself appealing to non-traditional gamers because of its innovative controllers and accessible games. But this is my mother! The last game I remember her playing for her own personal enjoyment (rather than to placate my nephew) was Breakout on our old Atari 2600 in the early 80s. Apparently, someone told her about Wii Fitness (which is set to be released in North America on May 21), and she figured that it would be cheaper to buy a Wii than to get a gym membership, and she'd be more likely to use it.

I still favor the PS3, as it's an all-around entertainment system rather than just a gaming console — though I'm sticking to my PS2 until the prices for the PS3 drop a bit more — but WYSIWYB may be seeing some Wii game reviews in the near future...

Hulu: My Newest Bookmark

2008-03-13T00:15:00.005-05:00

For those of you who haven't heard, there's a new Web site on the block called Hulu, and it's definitely worth a look.

From Reuters:

Hulu, the online video joint venture of News Corp. (NWS) and General Electric's (GE) NBC Universal, makes its public debut Wednesday with programming from Warner Bros., Lionsgate (LGF) and sports leagues.

At launch, Hulu will offer full-length episodes of more than 250 TV series, from current hits such as The Simpsons to older shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It also will offer 100 movies, including The Big Lebowski and Mulholland Drive.

While some of the movies and televisions series listed on the site are only partial clips, there are enough full movies and episodes to keep a videophile amused for weeks. The quality is surprisingly good, and while you "pay" for the videos by having the videos interrupted occasionally by un-skippable commercials, from what I've seen they are both infrequent and short, especially when compared to the commercial breaks on American television networks.

Not to be outdone, Google has announced some new developments in store for YouTube that suggest that it might not be long before we're streaming our favorite movies and television episodes from the world's most popular video site.

10 Best / Most Useful Firefox Extensions

2008-03-11T16:19:00.005-05:00

It's no secret I'm a fan of Mozilla Firefox, and one of it's most useful features, in my opinion, is the ability to add functionality through the use of extensions. In the past several years, I've found quite a few extensions that either are extraordinarily useful under certain circumstances, or else so much a part of my browsing experience that I can't imagine surfing the Web without them. So for your edification (and my own convenience, since I'm finding myself installing Firefox fairly often recently), here is my list of the 10 most useful Firefox extensions.

10. Stop-or-Reload Button — This simple extension simply combines the Stop and Reload buttons so that only the relevant button is visible. Not only does it save space, it's great for compulsive clickers, such as young children, who might prevent a page from loading by repeatedly clicking the Reload button in the hope of making it load faster.

9. ProCon Latte — ProCon Latte is a must-have extension for any parent! ProCon Latte is a content filter for Firefox, which prevents unwanted Web pages from loading based on both the site's URL and the site's content. It can also block all Web sites except those explicitly added to a whitelist. The extension is password-protected to prevent determined children from simply changing the settings. ProCon Latte isn't perfect — currently, it can still be disabled from the Add-ons menu, and on the highest settings it may block acceptable Web sites — but it's still incredibly useful. Of course, this extension doesn't prevent kids from browsing to naughty sites using IE, but parents can put a stop to that by disabling IE in Windows by going to Set Program Access and Defaults and unchecking "Enable access to this program" next to IE. Of course, your kids should be using a limited account which would prevent them from changing this setting, as well as other undesirable things such as indiscriminately downloading and installing malware- and virus-laden programs. The issue of using the Add-ons menu in Firefox can be avoided by using another handy extension, Menu Editor, to simply remove that option from the Tools menu.) While ProCon Latte is no substitute for more comprehensive parental control software, it's a good start.

By the way, if ProCon Latte doesn't provide enough control over your kids' Web browsing, you may want to look into another extension, Glubble Family Edition. Glubble uses a Web service to allow parents to control exactly which sites the kids are allowed to view. I prefer ProCon Latte both because it doesn't require a (albeit free) registration to a Web service, and because Glubble dramatically changes the way you browse the Web.

8. Web Developer — This extension isn't terribly useful for anyone but Website developers, but for them it's definitely a must-have extension. The Web Developer toolbar provides easy access to numerous tools to make developing Web pages considerably easier, including the ability to resize the browser window to simulate how the page will appear on different screen resolutions, the ability to disable various aspects of the page such as CSS and JavaScript, the ability to open a page's source code in an editor of your choice, and links to submit a page to W3C validation services.

7. QuickProxy — If you have a laptop that you carry between home and either school or work, and one or the other is behind a proxy, you know how tedious it is to constantly be changing Firefox's proxy settings. QuickProxy allows you to switch between different proxy settings with a single click. While other extensions, particularly FoxyProxy, provide many more features, the sheer simplicity of QuickProxy makes it much more attractive in my opinion.

6. Image Zoom — One of the few downsides of newer high-resolution monitors is that they make everything look small. While Firefox makes it relatively simple to increase the text size of Web pages, it doesn't provide any means of doing the same for images. That's where Image Zoom comes in handy. With a simple click on the context menu or a roll of your scroll wheel, you can easily increase or decrease the size of any image on a page.

5. IE Tab — Unfortunately, there are still a few clueless Web developers out there who assume that everyon uses IE, and design their sites accordingly. While rare, it is a continual annoyance to us Firefox users to have to open up IE just to view these sites. IE Tab alleviates this annoyance by allowing you to open a Web page with IE, but within a Firefox tab. With IE Tab, it's even possible to open and use Windows Update using firefox!

4. FoxyTunes — If you're like me, you like to listen to music while surfing the Web, which means you probably have to switch back and forth between Firefox and your media player. With FoxyTunes, you can control your media player from within Firefox! The simple controls are compatible with numerous media players including WinAmp, iTunes, Pandora, Windows Media Player, Musicmatch, XMPlay, MediaMonkey, Media Player Classic, Real Player, XMMS, Noatun, Amarok, Rhythmbox and many others.

3. Tab Mix Plus — This extension provides much-needed enhancements for two of Firefox's best features: tabs and sessions. With Tab Mix Plus, you can control almost every conceivable aspect of your tabs, from the size of the tabs, to the options available in tab context menus, to whether or not your Bookmarks open in a new tab. You also get a session manager that is considerably better than Firefox's built-in session manager, which offers more options and even the ability to recover from a crash! I consider this a necessity for everyone, if only for the session manager.

2. DownThemAll! — One of the weaker features of Firefox is its rather simple download manager, which is lacking many features you'd expect of a modern download manager, including the ability to queue downloads. DownThemAll! is a full-featured download manager fully incorporated into Firefox. With DownThemAll!, you can not only queue your downloads, pause and resume downloads, and continue partial downloads, but you can also download all links or images on a page with a single click. DownThemAll! also increases download speeds by better utilizes your bandwidth with multi-part downloads. For those who prefer to use stand-alone download managers, you may want to look into FlashGot instead.

1. Adblock Plus — The uncontested #1 best Firefox extension, Adblock Plus is such an integral part of my browsing experience that using a Web browser without this extension is truly jarring. Adblock Plus does exactly what you'd expect from the name — it blocks ads. Adblock Plus uses a blacklist to block advertisements from known ad services and providers, and you can easily add to this list either manually or with a simple click on an offending item. This extension is great for anyone — it's truly amazing how much more pleasant browsing can be without being constantly assaulted from all sides by intrusive advertisements — but it's particularly useful for parents (since many ads may contain adult content) or for individuals with slower Internet connections, since Adblock Plus doesn't simply prevent items from being displayed, but prevents them from being downloaded at all, noticeably improving page load times. I really can't say enough good things about this extension, so try it for yourself!

Honorable Mentions — In addition to the additional extensions I mentioned while discussing my top 10, here are a few more that didn't quite make the list for one reason or another, but are nonetheless worth a look.

FasterFox — FasterFox allows you to tweak certain of Firefox's network settings to speed up browsing. It also has an optional pre-fetching feature that silently loads and caches all of the links on the page you are browsing, so that if you browse to one of those links, the page will be displayed much faster. This didn't make my list for two reasons. First, while I haven't personally experience this, some people have reported that FasterFox inexplicably made Firefox slower rather than faster. Second, some sites don't like pre-fetching, and will give you an error message if you browse to such a site. While such sites are few and far between, and disabling FasterFox's pre-fetching feature isn't difficult, it's still a bit of an annoyance.

Tab Preview — Tab Preview displays a thumbnail of a tab when you mouse over the tab on the tab bar. You have quite a few options available such as setting the size of the preview thumbnail, and overall it's a pretty nifty extension. It didn't quite make my top 10 list because I simply don't think it's that useful. Sure, the preview thumbnails are nice, but takes almost as long for the preview to display as it would to switch to the tab, somewhat defeating the purpose of the preview. If the preview displayed a bit faster, it would probably make my top 10.

ChromaTabs or ColorfulTabs — Some people may question why Stop-and-Reload Button made my list, but either of these arguably more useful extensions didn't, and it's a reasonable question. ColorfulTabs colorizes tabs in the tab bar to make it easier to distinguish separate tabs, while ChromaTabs takes this on step further and sets specific colors for different Web sites. Both extensions make it simple to distinguish between multiple tabs at a glance. The problem is that both of these extensions have known compatibility problems with some themes, as well as some extensions that modify tabs, such as Tab Mix Plus. I can't in good conscience recommend extensions that may conflict with each other. Stop-or-Reload Button conversely doesn't have any such compatibility problems, and is so simple and elegant that it seems like it should be an option integrated into Firefox. However, if you aren't using Tab Mix Plus (which I do highly suggest) or any other extensions that modify tabs, you may want to look into one of these.

Nuke Anything Enhanced — This is another extension that almost made the list, and only didn't because it's only useful in certain situations (though in those situations it's incredibly useful). Nuke Anything Enhanced adds the option "Remove this object" to the context menu which causes an element of the page to not be displayed. Unlike Adblock Plus, this is only temporary, and the object will again be displayed, which means this extension is most useful in removing unwanted objects from a page before printing. If removing objects were more permanent, this would definitely have knocked Stop-or-Reload Button out of the #10 spot.

Firefox Environment Backup Extension (FEBE) — This extension is potentially quite useful. It makes regular backups of your bookmarks, preferences, extensions, themes, passwords, and cookies, so they can be easily restored or transferred to another machine. Unfortunately I've had a few problems with this extension. It does fine backing up extensions and themes, but while it seems to back up other information such as passwords and preferences, I have yet to get it to successfully restore that information. Considering that the point of this extension is data backup and recovery, the unreliability in restoring backup information is, in my opinion, a fatal flaw. If the bugs are ever worked out, this would easily move up to the middle of my list.

Noia 2.0 (eXtreme) &mdash This only reason that this didn't make my list is that it's not an extension! This is probably the most pleasant and attractive theme for Firefox I've seen. Others may have a nice layout, or an attractive icon set, or a good color scheme, but this one has it all. Unlike a few other themes, I haven't encountered any compatibility problems with any extensions. Noia is, without a doubt, my personal favorite theme available for Firefox.

Is Firefox 3 User-Friendly?

2008-02-15T18:12:00.002-06:00

In a recent blog post, Firefox 3 UI designer Alex Faaborg revealed the latest designs for the Firefox 3 icons. While I suppose they're pretty enough, I'm not entirely sold on the user interface design.

Firefox 3's interface departs from the traditional Firefox interface in several small but significant ways, and not, in my opinion, for the better.

For one thing, they are using a keyhole design for the Forward and Back buttons. Is the Back button really so much more important than the Forward button that it deserves to be almost twice as large? I'm not sot sure. I'm also concerned about the history menu button. The new history menu button, located to the right of the small Forward button, looks like it's already depressed, which breaks a fairly basic rule of UI design: if something is clickable, make it look clickable. It also seems like the Forward and Back history menu buttons have been consolidated into this single menu button, which is bound to be confusing for many users. If I want to go three pages back, why do I click the small button (which already looks clicked) next to the Forward button?

I also question the logic behind moving the Home button from the Navigation bar to the Bookmarks toolbar. I don't think most people think of their Homepage as a glorified bookmark. I personally consider it more as a starting point for browsing — an actual "home" page. I use Google for my homepage (which I think is a fairly common choice), and so I use the Home button fairly often. I also don't use the Bookmarks toolbar, since I would rather use the extra real estate for the web page. For me — and, I think, for many other people as well — the Home button is conceptually better suited for the Navigation bar. If it is relegated to the Bookmarks, why have a separate "home" bookmark at all?

If the Firefox 3 team is so concerned about conserving space — which is the only reason I can think of for using the crowded keyhole configuration for the navigation buttons and for moving the Home button off of the Navigation bar — then a better solution would be to consolidate the Stop and Reload buttons. You can't Stop a page that has already loaded, and it's only logical that to Reload a page that you'd have to Stop if from loading first. Consolidating the Stop and Reload buttons based on the current status of the page just makes sense... but it could also improve usability, which I doubt is true of the design choices being made by the Firefox 3 team. By swapping the Stop and Reload buttons depending on the status of the page, the browser provides additional feedback to the user, and prevents the user from taking counter-productive actions such as frantically clicking the Reload button in a futile attempt to make a page load faster — a mistake commonly made by inexperienced Web users.

I suspect the Firefox 3 team might be falling into the same trap made by other software designers, and are trying to make their product look like other similar products on the market so that their product looks new and modern. The problem is that in doing that, you're assuming that the original product has a well-designed user interface. Otherwise, you're simply copying others' mistakes. Firefox 3 unfortunately looks quite a bit like IE7, which is only good for IE7 users who move to Firefox. The changes to the IE7 interface don't necessarily add to the user experience, and neither will those changes being made for the Firefox 3 interface. The Firefox 3 team needs to focus more on the usability rather than the aesthetics of the interface.

On the other hand, we can always install custom themes. It's just a shame if we feel like we need to do so to overcome the poor design of the default interface.

Hybrids, shmybrids...

2008-02-03T18:36:00.000-06:00

So I'm watching the Superbowl — more for the commercials than for the game — and I see a commercial praising the virtues of the GMC Yukon hybrid. Wow. For an extra $20,000, you can get 21 mpg in the city instead of 14 mpg. I can't express how frustratingly idiotic that is.

All of the Presidential candidates have been talking about "energy independence" and a few have actually mentioned alternative energy sources. And hybrids are a step in the right direction. I have one myself — a Honda Insight, which I absolutely love, and which gets about 50 mpg — but they are only a band-aid solution. Yet automobile manufacturers by and large seem to be focused on producing hybrids to the exclusion of other, better, solutions. Now we have a hybrid Yukon. What's next, hybrid school buses? Hybrid dump trucks? The usefulness of a hybrid vehicle is completely lost on large, heavy gas-guzzlers. A hybrid Yukon is little more than a balm to the egos of wealthy idiots who don't really care about the environment but feel that they should. So now they can drive their huge SUV beast and still brag to their wealthy idiot friends that they care about the environment because they drive a hybrid, even though they could do better by driving a non-hybrid minivan or sedan.

If we want to really help the environment, and truly become energy independent, we as a society need to demand that auto makers seriously devote themselves to the development of hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles, grid-powered electric vehicles, as well as the infrastructure to support them. We need more and better public transportation (even — or especially — if it is actually produced by the private sector), and we as a society need to actually utilize it.

And we need to realize how dumb the idea of a hybrid Yukon really is.

The end of privacy?

2008-01-30T17:05:00.000-06:00

A recent AP article discusses the future of RFID technology — a future in which the products you buy inform the government or companies of your movements and shopping habits.

Forget the omnipresent cameras and microphones imagined by Orwell. In this brave new world, even the clothes you wear are spies for Big Brother. Sure, I'm as intrigued about some of the potential applications of RFID technology as anyone — after all, who doesn't want a smart home that customizes the lights and music for you as you walk from room to room? But the potential abuses of pervasive RFID technology are legitimately scary. It's not paranoia if you are constantly being watched.

I'm thinking that portable RFID scanners might become a hot gift item. I'll certainly be investing in one if RFID technology becomea as popular as discussed in the article, if only so I can locate and remove all of the tags in my clothes.

You don't have to be American to be an idiot

2008-01-29T18:20:00.000-06:00

I think this article from the BBC speaks for itself... Just because a group of people have restrictions on eating pork doesn't mean they would be offended by the use anthropomorphic pigs in children's stories — unless they were enticing the children to eat them, I suppose, but that would be a whole new level of weird. I also noticed that none of the officials mentioned in the article seemed concerned that they might offend their Jewish citizens, even though they have similar prohibitions against consuming pork.

They may have more interesting accents, but government officials in the UK aren't necessarily any brighter than their American cousins.

New on My Bookshelf

2008-01-10T23:19:00.000-06:00

With the end of the fall semester, I suddenly found myself with quite a bit more time to devote to my first love, reading, and in the past month I've devoured a sizable stack of novels. A few of those were surprisingly good, and a couple were the the best I've read in quite a while. So if you're looking for something to read in the new year, here are my suggestions.

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks — Brooks made a name for himself with The Zombie Survival Guide. His return to the world of the living dead is a decidedly moreserious and satirical offering than his previous parody. Written in a documentary style consisting of interviews of individuals who survive a zombie pandemic in the near future, World War Z should be on your reading list even if you don't ordinarily like the zombie-horror genre. Brooks uses the premise to examine (and take some wry jabs at) many facets of the modern world, including world politics, religion, philosophy, psychology, racial and cultural stereotypes, the cult of celebrity, pop culture, and the strengths and failings of the human heart.
Ilium by Dan Simmons — I've been somewhat apprehensive about this novel even though it's been on my list for quite a while, primarily because all of the reviews I've read talk about it's references and allusions to literary greats such as Homer, Shakespeare, and Proust. In my experience, I've found most of novels hailed by critics for their literary qualities to seem a bit pretentious, as if they were intended to display of the author's knowledge of literature and mastery of the language rather than to entertain and engage the reader. So I was delighted to discover that while Ilium is indeed amazingly literate and intelligently written, it is also an incredibly enjoyable read. Any fan of science fiction authors like Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Charles Stross, or Alastair Reynolds should find something to love about this book, but it should also appeal to history buffs or anyone who enjoys the sword-and-sandals action such as seen in the movie 300 (as a significant portion of the novel revolves around the Trojan War as described in Homer's Iliad). A minor warning, however: Ilium ends with a quite dramatic and extremely satisfying cliffhanger, and is concluded in Simmons' Olympos.

Is Ron Paul really such an underdog?

2007-11-17T21:39:00.000-06:00

I admit it, I'm a Ron Paul supporter.

And while it's hard to do anything on the Internet recently without seeing mentions of Ron Paul, when I'm sitting around watching television or reading a magazine, sometimes I feel like I'm alone in that support. Journalists on every news program use terms like "underdog", "dark horse", and "third tier" when mentioning Ron Paul, and almost invariably preface any discussion of Paul with a reference to his low percentages in polls.

But today I stumbled across an article entitled "Ron Paul is Not Being Included in Polls". Normally, I approach such articles with a healthy bit of skepticism (assuming I bother reading them at all), which is why I was a bit surprised when I realized that the author provided proof to back up his claims! The article provides links to quite a few recent polls performed by the major news networks, and from what I can tell, the author is justified in his claim. Since the numbers cited on the major news programs are often aggregations of such polls, a guy has to wonder exactly how accurate those statistics really are...

I'm certainly not suggesting that there's some sort of vast conspiracy against Ron Paul, but I do think that the news media might be approaching this Presidential race with a certain bias for the "obvious" candidates. Paul was pegged early on as an "also-ran", and the questions asked on poll questionnaires seem to reflect that bias.

It's no wonder that Ron Paul is showing so poorly on these polls. The surprising thing is that, given the questions asked, that he shows up on the polls at all.

I'm looking forward to December 16th, the day on which Ron Paul supporters have organized another "money bomb" fund raising event. If Paul has a repeat of the record-breaking $4.3 million raised on (remember, remember) the 5th of November, it will be considerably more difficult for the media and political pundits to marginalize his campaign. It would be hard to call a candidate that raises over $12 million from individual donations in a single quarter a "dark horse".

A World Without Walls or Fences (Interlude) — Avoiding the "Windows Tax"

2007-11-15T20:04:00.002-06:00

Here's an interesting passage from the Windows Vista EULA (End-User License Agreement):

By using the software, you accept these terms. If you do not accept them, do not use the software. Instead, return it to the retailer for a refund or credit. If you cannot obtain a refund there, contact Microsoft or the Microsoft affiliate serving your country for information about Microsoft's refund policies. See www.microsoft.com/worldwide. In the United States and Canada, call (800) MICROSOFT or see www.microsoft.com/info/nareturns.htm.

Some computer manufacturers like Dell are beginning to offer Linux or other free operating system installations on select computer systems. Even if you're planning on buying a new system that is only available with Windows, however, you still don't have to pay the so-called "Windows tax" if you plan on using one of the free operating systems like Linux or BSD instead.

Before you power up the computer for the first time, call your retailer and tell them you want decline the EULA and return your copy of Windows. They're legally bound by the EULA to give you a refund, though they still might try to either tell you it's not possible or else offer some sort of in-store credit or rebates.

If you stick to your guns, you should be able to get $100 or so back on your purchase, without sacrificing anything.

I recently purchased a new laptop, and decided to take my own advice. After a brief navigation of the Dell customer service phone system, I was placed on hold for half an hour (and subjected to a horribly distorted and static-filled version of the Dell theme song) until a customer service representative became available. After explaining the situation to the CSR (and quoting the pertinent bit of the EULA), I was placed on hold again for 10 minutes while the CSR entered the return into the system. I was told that the refund of $159 would be processed in four to seven business days (though it showed up on my statement in two).

All told, it was a much more pleasant experience than I'd been anticipating. All that was left for me to do was reformat the hard drive of my shiny new (and $159 cheaper) laptop and install Ubuntu.

Next Time: A Newbie's Guide to Installing Ubuntu

A World Without Walls or Fences (pt.2) — Selecting an Operating System

2007-11-15T19:55:00.002-06:00

When considering the installation of a new operating system, the first thing to do, obviously, is to pick one. With Windows or Mac OS X, it's a fairly simple choice. Consumers are usually forced into one or the other, depending on whether you're buying a PC or a Mac. Times are changing, though -- it's possible to install Windows on a Mac now that they're using Intel processors, and some manufacturers (notably Dell) are offering Linux installations on select PCs.

With free operating systems, the decision is a bit more complex. There are plenty out there, but the most popular are BSD and Linux. Both of these are Unix-like systems, and while there are some differences, they would likely pass unnoticed by the average user. Each can be installed on both PCs and Macs. BSD is a fairly direct descendant of the original Unix, and its development has been fairly structured. The development of Linux, on the other hand, has been a bit more... organic. It could be said that BSD was engineered but Linux was grown. Neither is necessarily better than the other, though there are plenty of people on both sides who would vehemently disagree.

There are three freely available versions of BSD. FreeBSD focuses on efficiency and reliability, NetBSD focuses on portability (i.e. being able to run on any machine, from your laptop to your Playstation), and OpenBSD is (ironically) obsessed with security. Unless you're concerned that government satellites might be reading your thoughts (in which case you fit right in with the OpenBSD crowd), FreeBSD is probably the best of the three for a desktop operating system, though like its siblings it's really targeted at servers.

Linux is a completely different beast altogether. There are about three hundred different flavors (called distributions) of Linux, though the core of the operating system itself (i.e. the kernel) is essentially the same from one to the next. The primary differences between distributions are the software bundled with the operating system and the community of users and developers that supports that particular distribution.

Linux, in my opinion, is the better choice of operating system for the average PC user for a couple of reasons (other than it's cool mascot, Tux). First, Linux tends to have slightly better support for the more PC-specific hardware like webcams and WLAN cards. Second, Linux is significantly more popular (by several orders of magnitude) with PC users. While "because everyone else is doing it" is usually a poor excuse to do something, there are times when it's a good thing. A larger user base and development community means that any problems with the system will tend to be identified (and ideally corrected) that much more quickly. By far the most popular distribution of Linux for PCs is called Ubuntu. Ubuntu has a huge user base, as well as a regular release schedule.

Ubuntu itself actually has a few variants, the most significant being Kubuntu. The difference between the two involves the last decision that needs to be made when installing a Unix-like operating system: which desktop environment to use.

Unlike Windows and Mac OS X, Unix-like operating systems are not inherently graphical. To get the attractive and convenient windowed interface with which we've all become familiar, BSD, Linux, and their relatives need to run desktop environment software. This is actually a good thing, because it gives the user greater flexibility in altering the computer's interface with a minimum of effort or difficulty.

The two main desktop environments are GNOME (pronounced "Guh-nome") and KDE. The difference between Ubuntu and Kubuntu is that the former is packaged with GNOME and the latter with KDE. Its possible to change desktop environments after installation, or even to install both and switch back and forth between the two. Each has software written specifically for that desktop environment, but again, it's possible to run such software while using the other desktop environment. You'll take a very slight hit in performance, especially when starting the software, but this might not be very noticeable given the power and speed of modern computers. While there are quite a few differences between GNOME and KDE, for the time being let's just say that GNOME is a bit like a cross between Windows XP and Mac OS X, and KDE is more like Windows XP or Vista. Both, however, are much more customizable than Windows or Mac OS X, and can be configured to look and (for the most part) act like either.

The most recent version of Ubuntu family is 7.10, "Gutsy Gibbon". Both Ubuntu and Kubuntu conveniently provide installation disks (free of charge, of course), either through the mail or by download, which allow you to test each operating system before you commit to an installation. I tried each on my old laptop, and found no hardware incompatibilities or other problems. While I like quite a few of the applications written for KDE, Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon feels slightly more polished and complete than Kubuntu Gutsy Gibbon, so I'll be discussing an Ubuntu installation for the rest of this series.

Stay tuned for the play-by-play commentary, with pictures (and maybe even videos)!

Next time: Avoiding the "Windows Tax"

A World Without Walls or Fences (pt.1) — An Introduction to Alternative Operating Systems

2007-11-15T19:53:00.001-06:00

"In a world without walls or fences, who needs Windows or Gates?"

I've been running Windows Vista Business Edition since February of 2007. Unlike most people, I actually like it... at least once I turned off the unbelievably annoying User Account Control and downloaded new device drivers for a few components. The search-as-you-type feature in the Start menu and Windows Explorer windows is extremely handy, and the file structure is more elegant (e.g. "C:\Users\username" rather than the verbose "C:\Documents and Settings\username\My Documents"). And Vista is sexy... at least if your system has sufficient resources to run Aero without becoming as sluggish as ticket sales for Lions for Lambs.

But change is inevitable (except from vending machines). A few weeks ago I decided to abandon Windows as my primary operating system. Yes, there are operating systems out there other than the ubiquitous Windows and the Mac OS X operating system that you find on the iMac and MacBook. Most of these operating systems are derivatives of Unix, an operating system developed by AT&T Bell Labs in 1969 and used primarily for servers. The most common of these are BSD and Linux, and they're used daily by millions of people.

Let me toss out some statistics to make this seem a bit more respectable... More than 4 times as many Web servers run a Unix-like operating system. And according to the W3C (the people responsible for developing standards for the World Wide Web), Linux is the operating system of choice for 3.4% of people on the Internet. That may not sound like a lot, but it's approximately the same number of people that are currently using either Windows Vista or Mac OS X.

So Linux machines are as popular as Macs, they just don't have those funny commercials. Oh, wait a minute... maybe they do.

But why, you may ask, would anyone want to install a Unix-like operating system instead of Vista or Mac OS X? Hrm... Well, how about because it's free? That's right, most Linux and BSD distributions are 100% free. (Free to you, anyway... TANSTAAFL applies to open-source software just like everything else, but that's a post for another day.) Much of the software designed for these operating systems is also free (and incredibly simple to install, but more on that later). Or how about because it's more secure? Linux and BSD users don't worry about viruses or spyware, because they're virtually immune. True, part of this is because of the popularity of Windows -- viruses are naturally designed to target the largest possible audience to maximize the mayhem -- but it's also in no small part because the security of these operating systems is simply better.

But surely these operating systems are too arcane and complex to be usable by anyone but technophiles and geeks? Um... not really. Anyone familiar with Windows should be able to adjust to using a Unix-like operating system (or rather its desktop environment, but more about that later) in no time at all. In fact, the differences between Windows and Mac OS X tend to be quite a bit greater than those between Windows and the desktop environments of Unix-like operating systems.

If you're interested, Michael Horowitz has written an excellent and exhaustive non-biased comparison of Linux and Windows. Some of it is a bit outdated, but it is an excellent resource for anyone debating a change in operating systems. There are a few points on which I disagree. The first is the installation of software in Linux. I find installing software much easier on Linux than on Windows, but YMMV. The second is Linux's support of hardware devices, which has greatly improved in recent years. Third is his opinion whether Linux will become a serious competitor to Windows in the personal computer market. He says no, but an ever larger number of desktop users are turning to Linux. Already, as many people use Linux as use Mac OS X. While Linux isn't going to overtake Windows as the dominant operating system anytime soon, if at all, it is already a serious contender.

Next time: Choosing your operating system

Nice Ubuntu Installation Video

2007-11-15T16:50:00.000-06:00

For those who don't want to wait for my series, here's a fairly nice video showing the installation process for Ubuntu Linux using the Live CD. This video shows each step of the installation process, but only for a very basic installation. It doesn't discuss partitioning your drive properly, barely touches on using or customizing Ubuntu once it's installed, and certainly doesn't provide any information about some of the more common issues you might encounter, such as installing drivers for unusual video or wireless cards. However, it does an excellent job of demonstrating how simple installing Linux can be.

Since that video also doesn't show off any of Gutsy Gibbon's nicer desktop effects, for those of you who like the slick appearance and graphical features of Vista and Leopard I made this short video of my desktop. (I had to severely reduce the resolution of my screen to get smooth video capture, so what you're seeing doesn't come close to conveying how slick Ubuntu looks on my system. I'm still playing around with my screen capture software, so hopefully my future videos will look better.)

[EDIT: Videos moved to the "Tech" playlist of the Video Player.]

A Preview of Things to Come...

2007-11-15T03:10:00.000-06:00

Welcome to WYSIWYB. Here's a brief overview of what you can expect to see here in the coming months...

To kick things off, I'll be doing a complete do-over of the "A World without Walls or Fences" series I began on Facebook back in September, which is a beginner's guide to installing and using Linux on a personal computer. I've had quite a few interruptions since I started the series, so I'm starting over to make it more cohesive and comprehensive. I'll be discussing the shiny new version of the Ubuntu distribution of Linux, "Gutsy Gibbon", and will include plenty of tips and tricks for installing and customizing Linux that Brian P. and I have picked up in the last few weeks. If Vista's security alerts are giving you carpal tunnel, if you're not quite convinced that a Mac is really worth the extra $500 or $1000 on the price tag, or if you're just curious about the not-so-geeky world of Linux desktop computing, stay tuned.

Also, with less than a year until the election, the 2008 presidential campaign is now in full swing. I foresee quite a few politically themed articles in the coming days, both serious and satirical. I've already come across quite a few juicy links and videos that all responsible, informed voters (with a healthy sense of humor) should see before casting their ballots next November.

Finally, the miscellanea... As I'm nearing the end of my last semester as a graduate student (sort of), I may very well post a few articles about my experiences away from the safe harbor of academia. And it's a near certainty that you'll be subjected to rants and musings about life's absurdities or little injustices, comments and reviews of the latest books I've read and movies I've recently ~~downloaded~~ seen, and links to all manner of weird and wonderful things found on the Web (many of them likely to be brought to my attention by the "Wizard of What???", Jamie J.).

So keep watching this spot. You might see something you like. And just to get the ball rolling, here are a few choice videos for your edification and enjoyment!

[EDIT: Videos moved to the "Politics" playlist of the Video Player.]

Check back later for more political eye-candy!