Drinking whiskey clear!
Time Warner Cable updated the firmware on their SA-8300HD DVR boxes on 10/26/05 at around 3:55am. I know because I was watching TV when the box turned off and a bunch of hex numbers ran across the front panel of the DVR. After it rebooted, I was curious, so I looked into the settings menu. Imagine my surprise when I saw this:
Continue reading “Time Warner’s DVR: how I made it to Engadget!”
What: Voice over IP (VoIP) telephone service
Where: http://www.voiceeclipse.com
How Much: $19.95/month
When I moved from Atlanta to Charlotte, I wanted to be able to keep in touch with family and friends as much as possible. To that end, Lisa and I signed up for MCI’s “The Neighborhood” plan, which gave us unlimited local and long distance calling for around $49.99 a month. This worked well for us for a couple of years, but two problems cropped up which made the plan less attractive: for starters, I simply lost touch with many of my Atlanta friends, which made the plan seems less necessary. Also, MCI raised the monthly fee, so that with taxes one month of “The Neighborhood” ended up costing around $76.
What: A multiple handset phone system from Uniden
Where: Many vendors (We bought it from Sam’s Club)
How Much: around $169 (see below for more information)
Lisa and I recently switched from a traditional phone service to voice over IP (VoIP) provider VoiceEclipse (see my review of the service here). One significant change with switching over to VoIP is that (for the most part), you’re stuck with a single phone jack – which is located on the back of the device the VoIP company sends you that connects to your router or cable modem. While it’s certainly possible to rewire your house for VoIP service, it’s simply a task that most folks don’t have the expertise or confidence to do. So the easy answer for this is a multi-headset phone. Although I was eager to volunteer my services, I don’t think that Lisa really wanted me monkeying around with the telephone cabling.
Now, multi-headset phones have (of course) been around for a while. But it’s only within the past year or so that they’ve actually become affordable in my opinion. But regardless of the model you choose, the phones all offer the same benefit: you can use multiple handsets from a single “base”, which means that you only need a single phone jack to use them anywhere throughout the house – which is prefect for VoIP.
I can’t believe that it’s taken me this long to write this! You see, one thing I noticed over and over when doing desktop support is that most people don’t know how to use Google! It’s not their fault – after all, it’s not as if there’s a “Google Class” or anything. But I’d see people get frustrated because they couldn’t find what they were looking for. Now and then I’d try to teach them a thing or two, but since most third-party desktop support is metered, most employers don’t care to pay $85/hour to have their employees schooled on how to use a search engine. Which is a shame, because more and more people are using the Internet at work – and if you can’t find what you’re looking for, the Internet is useless!
Longtime Ars Technica member Emkorial recently posted a thread in the Ars Lounge entitled “Giving Back: little tips you’re discovered to make life. work or projects easier”. In it, he posited the following advice:
How to perfectly install a power strip – or any device where there are 2 mounting holes – onto a vertical surface:
1. Take power strip. Turn it over.
2. Tear off a piece of masking tape the length of the strip. Apply it to the back of the strip.
3. Using a pencil\pen\poking instrument of choice, poke a hole through the tape where the two mounting holes are.
4. Remove tape from back of power strip and apply tape to mounting surface.
5. Screw in mounting screws where the holes on the tape are.
Viola! Perfectly aligned and spaced mounting screws, with no guesswork involved.
He then asked for other Ars readers to contribute their own tips… and behold, a slew of helpful tips came forth. What follows are a load of random tips that will hopefully make your life a little easier. The tips are divided into two sections: my own tips and tips from other Ars readers.
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens,
Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens;
Brown paper packages tied up with strings,
These are a few of my favorite things!
Sometimes when I have trouble falling asleep, I’ll lie in bed and make lists. Lists of anything. My “Top 10 Favorite Movies”… “Top 10 Favorite Italian Restaurants”… “Top 10 Favorite Office Supply Retailers”… “Top 10 Favorite Belgians”… anything. As I’ve been having a lot of trouble falling asleep lately, I’ve found that I’m doing this often. But rather than just letting them slip away into the mists of dreamland, I decided to put them together on a web page. As best as I can, I’ve tried remembering the lists and copying them down as soon as I get up. After awhile, the lists started to become an interesting read… sort of like those emails you get from friends where you’re supposed to fill in crap like this and forward it on to other people. I never forward those things, but as a sort of act of contrition for that, I present you with a “small” list of some of my favorite things! There’s also some of my “least favorite things” and some other funny stuff mixed in there. Lastly, please note that anything in a list is listed in order of preference, unless otherwise noted.
Do you remember MTV’s Remote Control??? It was a game show hosted by Ken Ober (with occasional guest Adam Sandler!) that featured categories like “Dead or Canadian” – where contestants were given a list of celebrities and had to guess whether each was… well, dead or Canadian.
In the spirit of Remote Control, I’m pleased to announce my very own version! Below are several lyrics to songs by either the British band The Cure or from Public Television’s favorite “man in the neighborhood”. See if you can guess which artist wrote which lyrics. The answers are after the jump – NO PEEKING!!
#1
I think you’re a special person
And I like your ins and outsides.
Everybody’s fancy.
Everybody’s fine.
Your body’s fancy and so is mine.
#2
You know those things I said
All those things that made you cry
I didn’t really mean that stuff
I didn’t really mean that stuff
All I ever really mean
When I scream and shout the way I do
Is I don’t know
I really don’t
I’m just the same as you.
#3
I love it all
These games we play
I close my eyes
You run away
I’m sure I asked you to stay
But now you’re gone.
#4
I can stop when I want to
Can stop when I wish.
I can stop, stop, stop any time.
And what a good feeling to feel like this
And know that the feeling is really mine.
Know that there’s something deep inside
That helps us become what we can.
For a girl can be someday a woman
And a boy can be someday a man.
#5
I can go far away, or dream anything,
Or wear a scary costume or act like a king.
I can change all my names
And find a place to hide.
I can do almost anything, but
I’m still myself,
I’m still myself,
I’m still myself inside.
#6
Nothing ever puts me out
Nothing ever pulls me in
Nothing ever makes me want to jump
And nothing makes me want to begin
Nothing ever gets me down
Nothing ever gets me uptight
And nothing ever makes me run around
And nothing makes me feel I might
#7
It’s you I like,
It’s not the things you wear,
It’s not the way you do your hair–
But it’s you I like
The way you are right now,
The way down deep inside you–
Not the things that hide you,
Not your toys–
They’re just beside you.
#8
I never felt like this with anyone before
You only have to smile and I’m dizzy
You make the world go round
A thousand times an hour
Just touch my head
And send me spinning.
#9
Let’s think of something to do while we’re waiting
While we’re waiting for something new to do.
Let’s try to think up a song while we’re waiting
That’s liberating and will be true to you.
#10
If you’ve got an hour,
Now’s the time to share it.
If you’ve got a flower,
Wear it.
This is just the day.
#11
Oh you know how it is
Wake up feeling blue
And everything that could be wrong is
Including you.
Black clouds and rain and pain in your head
And all you want to do is stay in bed.
#12
Please don’t think it’s funny
When you want an extra kiss.
There are lots and lots of people
Who sometimes feel like this.
Icons used to be something of a black art in the Windows world. Few graphics programs like Paint Shop Pro or Photoshop handled the ICO format natively, so one was typically forced to use specialist software like Microangelo to create icons. And while using Microangelo wasn’t especially difficult, it was “different” enough that many people downloaded a demo, installed it, spent 10 minutes playing with it and then decided that it wasn’t worth the trouble.
Those days are gone though, thanks to a free Photoshop plug-in from Telegraphics. All you need to do is download the plug-in and install it per the instructions for your operating system and software (the plug-in works in most other programs that support Photoshop plug-ins, such as AfterEffects, Corel PhotoPaint, Paint Shop Pro, etc.).
Welcome to the all-new jimcofer.com website! As you can see, I’ve finally ditched the old FrontPage site for WordPress. I know that some of you are already unhappy with the change, but I hope you’ll understand – the new site will be so much easier to maintain!
For those of you familiar with WordPress, this site will hopefully be pretty easy to figure out. For those of you more familiar with the old site, please check out these new features and changes:
Categories: If you look in the right-hand sidebar on the home page, you’ll see an entry called “Categories”. Many of the pages from the old site have been converted to WordPress categories. For instance, the old “Geek Stuff” page is now the “Geek Stuff” category. New “Geek Stuff” entries will be posted on the main page, but will eventually “fall off” the front page. To filter your results to “Geek Stuff” entries only, just click the “Geek Stuff” category. Most entries are posted in the same order as they were on the old site, so everything should be pretty easy to find.
New RSS feed: There is a new link to the RSS feed. If you were using the direct RSS link from the old site, you’ll need to change your subscription URL to the new feed. If you were using the old site’s FeedBurner feed, you will need to change to the new feed.
Pages: Some of the pages from the old site won’t easily convert to a “category” format, so they have been converted over to “page format”. For instance, the old “About Me” page is now located under the “Pages” link in the right-hand sidebar.
OK, so… I never heard back from the folks at FeedBurner, so I just went ahead and set up a new RSS feed. If you are subscribed to the old FeedBurner RSS feed, you will need to update your clients to the following address:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/jimcofercom
If you were using the “direct” feed, you will need to upgrade your client to the following address:
http://jimcofer.com/personal/?feed=rss2
Please choose one of these two, as the old RSS feed is dead as of today.