What's with Google lately trying to shed its early adopters / geek user base?
First they found this wonderful way to piss off their early adopter crowd. Do they really expect IT pros stake their reputation and recommend a product which clearly is behaving in anti-user fashion? No communication, no updates, no changes to this clearly important feature of Google Docs. Here is a tip for you Google: ignoring the problem won't make it any better.
Finally took the plunge and got my hands on a Shogo SG080-CA picture frame. In Canada, this is marketed by Fidelity Electronics out of Vaughan, ON. Worldwide, it's marketed by Realease from France.
Due to the wealth of information available, I'll split this review in three parts.
Part 1 will talk about general impressions.
Part 2 will give technical details of poking around the frame.
Part 3 will document my hacking the frame in attempt to root it and make make it even more kick-ass.
The consolidation of the Canadian VoIP market continues. Quebec's Distributel (www.distributel.ca) acquired Cybersurf (the people behind cia.com and 3web) towards the middle of June 2009 for $5.5MM. More gory details here. So far, no other changes to each respective website or services being sold.
Here is how to install Hugin panorama maker on Ubuntu Hardy without the patent manure called Mono.
Use Ubuntu PPA which has autopano-sift-c. For example: deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/intipunku/ppa/ubuntu hardy main deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/intipunku/ppa/ubuntu hardy main
Install autopano-sift-c to satisfy the autopano dependency
sudo apt-get install autopano-sift-c
install hugin and friends
sudo apt-get install hugin
Enjoy
UPDATE: For karmic do something along the same lines:
1. Install PPA which has autopano-sift-c and latest version of hugin. For example this one will do. From commandline run:
Those arguing that Canada is just a 51st state, got another confirmation to their theory recently. A survey by the Dominion Institute confirmed without a doubt that the majority of American TV viewers .. err, Canadians, think they live in America even tho they officially reside in Canada. 51% of Canadians don't know the difference between a prime minister and a president, and they think we vote for a prime minister (which would make him a presdent). 75% don't know that the Queen is the head of state. 59% knew we have a constitutional monarchy but based on the two points above, they must have been guessing sine they had had no idea what is the meaning of those two words.
A new boycott campaign was unveiled by the Free Software Foundation via the Defective by Design website. For 35 days they are encouraging different ways of fighting DRM, a new one every day. Nice idea, eh? But then how would you feel if you had a noble cause and no one gave a fuck about it? Just a look at the list of items they suggest to boycott so far:
Out of the 12 so far, almost all (except for Zune) have been a retail goldmine. A few like iTunes are a virtual monopoly. It's clear especially at this time of the year. Have a look at that desperate mother standing in front of you in the long lineup at WalMart. She likely has a pile of iTunes cards in her hand to buy for Christmas. Let's face it, parents don't know any better, and kids could not give a shit as long as it plays on their new iPhone. At least it stop then from downloading viruses onto our Windows machines as they search for illegal music. After all, isn't all music illegal unless it's from iTunes? Or for more DRM fun, ask any Xbox gamer about DRM. Be prepared for a blank stare you receive. Let's face it, no one pours billions of dollars into marketing free thought or empowerment. In this day and age, the only empowerment comes from DRM. And the only empowered ones are the multinationals who leech money from stupid people. Play on!
Tonight Canada pissed away $300m just to show the rest of the Kyoto-loving world a collective middle finger. Apparently we also really want the DMCA here as well. Now back to our dysfunctional minority government programme.
EDIT 1: environmentalists get a further explanation here. Copylefts get an explanation here.
With the announcement of Google Chrome, it's pretty obvious Gecko, the rendering engine used in Firefox, is dead. Apple passed on it with OSX and iPhone, Android passed on it and now Chrome takes a pass on it. No sane company will touch Gecko after Apple and Google passed up on it twice. Firefox as we know it today is dead. It will have to change radically to keep the brand alive. Gecko has to go, no one wants it. With Gecko go all the addons, the part that makes Firefox ... well .. Firefoxy. At the moment, Chome redefines the browser GUI (both Firefox3 and IE8 feel old compared to it), security (time will tell how sound this will be), and speed at which web apps run (Firefox is almost there). It lacks in customizability (Firefox still rules there), and wide adoption (IE being the king of default browsers). It's fun to use, but can't yet be used for everyday browsing. It puzzles the mind tho what will Mozilla Corp do in 3 years when their deal with Google expires yet again.
I looked around for an invoice template on Google Docs and I could not find one, so I created a Invoice template as a Google Spreadsheet. You can get it at the following URL:
I'm no fan of KVM or an expert in propaganda, but when I see a PR release entitled "Xen proponents question merits of Red Hat KVM hypervisor" disguised as a news post on a news site, it makes me almost cringe. For starters, there are two linked-in articles: "For more on KVM and Xen: Red Hat Intros VMware alternative based on KVM, Xen vs. KVM, Microsoft's Xen-friendly drivers". First, RedHat's hypervisor is an alternative to Xen since this is what they are moving away from; VMware does their own thing, Microsoft does their own thing. Then, mentioning Xen, KVM along with "Microsoft's Xen-friendly drivers" headline .. not-so subtle suggestion there.
Now on to the main page. Right from the fourth paragraph, information presented is straight out of Citrix's PR releases. That paragraph supposed to give you a background to the story, but it lists ease of install as the only merit of KVM versus the next six features which make KVM suck. The next 11 paragraphs are straight quotes from Citrix's PR about how bad KVM is. Then RedHat's defense supposedly follows, except that out of the 4 paragraphs, only one attempts to present any information somewhat defence-like, the other paragraphs are stapled with words like: "unclear, work in progress, shortcomings, compatibility concerns". Well, I guess Xen is clearly the better choice, either that or the information presented on "Server Virtualization News" RSS feed is tainted.
As I said I am no fan of KVM, but this kind of viral newsmaking so blatantly obvious just ads to the notion that Xen is a lame-duck in its last death throws before becoming irrelevant.
Invention of the First Laser, check. 125th Birthday of Walter Gropius, check. First hot air balloon flight, check. Canada Day ...... what's that? In a carefully crafted reply, a Google spokesperson was overheard blaming Canada for the lack of a Canada Day Doodle. "If they were only a little bit significant," he stated, "we may actually find a Googler willing to donate some of their 20% to Doodle for them. But they are not. And it's their own fault.". In unrelated news Canada was also pinpointed as a cause for the recent stock market trouble, the rising inflation, high fuel prices, and the looming recession.
Sometimes you notice a subtle design decision which just makes you shake your head in disbelief. Such is the decision for removing the yellow background to a https URL address field in Firefox. Having and using both Firefox 2 and 3 builds, this detail has escaped me for some reason.
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