EGOPOLY

Uninstall MSN Messenger: http://www.tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=288

Install firefox: http://www.getfirefox.com/

Install open office; extract the zip file; run “setup.exe -net”; then for each user, navigate to openoffice install dir and run open office setup, choose network install.

Run Norton Antivirus update 500 gajillion times.

Run Windows Update for 5 million centuries until all patches are in.

Set screen saver, desktop settings to something not stupid.

Configure wireless using IBM access manager

Shut off bloated services: Disable the following services: Infrared Monitor, Norton AV Firewall Monitor, Remote Registry, Task Scheduler

Remove Access IBM; Access IBM Message Center; Franklin Covey Crapware; Alias Sketchbook Pro; PC-Doctor for Windows (christ what crap that is); NetWaiting;

Fix and synch Windows Time. Remember to set date first. Idiots.

Go to ThinkPad Config in control panel; disable: Infrared; internal modem; device bay;

install google desktop

I wrote earlier about my genius plan for AOL. I was unaware at the
time that they were putting the finishing touches on a web email
package called… (wait for it)… AIM Mail.

I’d call it “Missing the boat email.” Or “too little too late
email.” Maybe “me seventeen mail.”

It’s aggravating that AOL has a virtually unassailable IM position,
and they are not leveraging the hell out of it at every turn. By
“leveraging,” I do not mean “showing Britney Spears-laced ads on every
pixel of the screen.” I mean taking the intrinsic advantages of an
authenticated, closed network to applications that need them badly.

Let’s review AIM mail for a second: 2GB storage; web interface; spam controls… yawn.
I mean that’s not a simple thing to do, for a user base the size that
they have. But they did not make it different. As in, AIM Mail
does something that no other email system does so I must have
it.

They did integrate some of the closed-network aspects that they
have available to them: for example, you can “unsend” a message if the
recipient hasn’t read it yet (and they are also AIM members.) Yay,
protection for for hot-headed morons who don’t think before they hit
send.

AIM Mail would be unique and useful if they took this positioning:
it’s not email. It’s doesn’t do what email does, which is to be able
to send and receive email from anyone on earth. Who needs that?
That’s boring; I can do that 15 million other ways. AIM Mail should
be buddy mail and that’s it. It should be only a tool for
getting authenticated messages from buddies: people with whom you have
a preexisting relationship.

Think about how you pay attention to IMs vs. email, and what is
more urgent and isolated in your mind. Think how cool it would be to
have email that was actually 100% for you, from people you want to
hear from.

Come on, AOL. Get interesting again.

This is a little script that could be written in Perl, or shell. But I wrote it in Ruby. If you put it on a web server, in a directory with a bunch of jpg files, it zips them up and returns them. I use it to pull down a bunch of photos from my web site to whatever photo editing software I happen to be using.

#! /usr/bin/ruby
require "cgi"

cgi = CGI.new

url = cgi.script_name
relativepath = ""

if url =~ %r{(.*)/photozip.cgi$}
  relativepath = $1
  if relativepath =~ /\.\./
    cgi.out() { "sorry" }
  end
end

basedir = '/someplace/on/server'
localpath = basedir + relativepath 

d = Dir.new(localpath)
hasjpeg = false;
d.each do |file|
  if file =~ /jpg$/
    hasjpeg = true
    break
  end
end

if hasjpeg
  if File.file?(localpath + "/allphotos.zip")
    cgi.out("status" => "302",
            "location" => "#{relativepath}/allphotos.zip")
    { "redirect" }
  else
    Dir.chdir(localpath)
    status = `/usr/local/java/bin/jar cf allphotos.zip *.jpg`
    cgi.out("status" => "302",
            "location" => "#{relativepath}/allphotos.zip")
    { "redirect" }
  end
else
    cgi.out() { "sorry, no jpegs here." }
end

I just got a frantic email from my aunt that she deleted the family tree document she had been working on.

I think backups (or the utter lack thereof) is a big problem for non technical people. It would be a great if somebody could create a NetApp snapshot feature of their OS or NAS drive. Something that consumers could afford, with a UI model that they would understand. Some kind of “Time Machine” paradigm might work well.

So, Apple is coming out with an Intel version of OS X. They still haven’t done what I said they would not do: release OS X86 that you can install on any PC. But soon you will be able to buy a Macintosh with with an Intel processor in it. Overall, I think this is a very good thing, because whatever marketing spin Apple has put on G4/G5 over the past few years, they are dog slow compared to Intel processors. For 99% of the things 99% of the people in the world want to do, anyway.

I wonder what this is going to do to Macintosh sales volume over the next year or so. I personally was going to but a Mac Mini to replace my old G4 Cube. But not now, no way. I’ll wait until the Intel mini comes out, which will be 3X faster. If 10% of Apple customers are thinking the same way, that’s 10% reduction in Mac sales this year.

Ditto for my powerbook which I was going to replace sometime in the next year.

Ruby is a totally cool programming languages. It’s almost as cool as lisp. I’m about two weeks into using it, and I suddenly am not thrilled about perl anymore.

Ruby manages to be practical and elegant at the same time. It allows you to write code that is terse, expressive and clear.