Category: Computers, Science & Technology

OK, this is weird. I am technically considered by most a “card carrying member” of the “Religious Right,” OK?!?! This is embarrassing! There are “religious dewds” that want to stop Net Neutrality from succeeding! Sigh. (Actually, I am a Christian… I don’t consider myself “religious”… “religion” is stifling, Christianity is a personal relationship. So, I am not “religious!” But I AM for Net Neutrality! So, I am weird… OK!)

Net Neutrality ‘Gets Religious!’

“A group of US religious and ethical organizations, including Morality in Media, the Institute on Religion and Democracy, and Faith 2 Action, has issued an open letter to the Senate Commerce Committee, expressing support for the current language of a key communications reform bill that has emerged from conference, and is soon to be introduced for debate on the Senate floor. It is the bill around which the current debate on ‘net neutrality’ — whether to prohibit broadband service providers from being able to offer premium carriage services to larger content providers — is centered. The letter begins by praising the Committee for having ‘recently resisted attempts by Senators who wanted to regulate the Internet, but rather, included language that would specifically protect our ability to communicate our message.'”

Well, that’s good, but we can have a free Internet, AND still preach the Gospel! (I do it all the time! Grin!) So… it is STILL embarrassing! Sigh.

Did you know that “Dr. Bill – The Computer Curmudgeon” is not my only podcast? Did you know that we have over 1,100 subscribers? Did you know that I am tired of saying, “Did you know…?” Anyway, we are now listed on Blubrry, a Podcasting Community! Cool, huh?

Here are links to my other podcasts:

The Traditional Naturopath

The Spirit of Faith Netcast

and, here is the link to Blubrry:

Blubrry

About Blubrry (What they say about themselves)

“Why the funny name?

We at RawVoice believe in creating Fresh Organic Media. In time with our mission we felt that nothing ‘says celebrate the fruits of your labor with the people who make your show sweet’ than Blubrry. It’s not Blubbery but a crisp, refreshing podcaster AND listener community called blubrry– where there is no ‘E’ in fruit and no ‘I’ in our philosophy.

Blubrry is not a directory, it’s a community.”

Here we go again! Added to the 2006 update of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition… here’s the list:

Below you’ll find a sample of the nearly 100 new words and senses from the 2006 copyright version of the best-selling Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate® Dictionary, Eleventh Edition—available this fall in bookstores everywhere. How many of these words are already a part of your vocabulary?

Technology and Computers
mouse potato
ringtone
spyware

Science and Medicine
avian influenza
biodiesel
gastric bypass

Pop Culture
soul patch
supersize

Entertainment and Leisure
labelmate
ollie
wave pool

The Human Condition
drama queen
unibrow

International
manga
qigong

Business and Industry
agritourism
big-box

Nature
aquascape
coqui

Miscellaneous
polyamory
sandwich generation

2006 marks the bicentennial anniversary of America’s first dictionary—Noah Webster’s A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language. To see what words were “new” in 1806, check out A Glossary of New Words in the special anniversary section of Merriam-Webster Online.

Merriam-Webster – New Words

Cool! Our language grows and adapts… even for geeks!

No surprise there! But Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols says that others may be catching up. He also notes that the most popular Linux distros seem to be those that have large communities behind them.

Results from the 2006 Desktop Linux Survey

Steven, like me, thinks that other time, Freespire may catch up, but for now, Ubuntu with the regular Gnome GUI is tops on the list!

“What’s happening here? Well, if you take a look at which distributions did well, you’ll see they have one thing in common: they’re all community-based distributions. I think what we’re seeing with our survey is that the people who’ve invested something of themselves in their Linux desktop are the ones voting. The people who simply use the Linux that’s set in front of them, or just buy it, have less invested in it and so are less likely to vote. I have no doubt, based on all the Linux desktops I’ve seen in use at tradeshows, homes, and offices, that while Ubuntu is number one, SLED and openSUSE are clearly the real number two in the number of users, with Linspire in third place. I’d be willing to lay down a small bet that as Linspire’s recent community Freespire release gathers more supporters, and based on what I’ve seen of the distro, it will be near the top in our next survey.”

AOL can’t seem to catch a break. (Ain’t it great?!?!) They were labelled as official “badware” by an independent group – the StopBadware.org coalition.

AOL 9.0 Slapped with ‘Badware’ Label

“The high-powered StopBadware.org coalition has slapped a ‘badware’ label on the free version of the AOL 9.0 software program. The group, which is funded by Google, Lenovo Group and Sun Microsystems, accused AOL of installing additional software without telling the user; adding components to the browser and taskbar without disclosure; automatically updating software without user consent; and making the AOL 9.0 software difficult to fully uninstall. ‘We currently recommend that users do not install the version of AOL software that we tested,’ according to a report released Aug. 28 by StopBadware.org. The recommendation is a serious blow to AOL, which is already struggling with user privacy problems related to the recent disclosure of search data of more than 650,000 users. The report said the AOL 9.0 software comes bundled with a number of additional applications, including RealNetworks’ RealPlayer, Apple Computer’s QuickTime, AOL You’ve Got Pictures Screensaver, Pure Networks’ Port Magic, and Viewpoint Media Player.”

Go get ’em, guys!

And, I mean “HOT” in both senses… it seems to run hotter, and very fast in the “hot” sense as well! But, the new CPU chip is out!

Mobile Core2 Duo: Performance at a Cost

“The mobile version of the Core2 Duo, code-named Merom, completes the circle: The company now has the same architecture across desktop, mobile, and most server platforms. The mobile version is identical architecturally to the desktop Core2 Duo, but adds more aggressive power management. That’s a good thing, as we’ll see shortly, because the new CPU can run hotter when pushed hard than Intel’s previous Core Duo mobile line.

So, there you go! “HOT!”

Internet Explorer Version 7 is getting close, but is it too little, too late? Microsoft announced the release of Release Candidate 1 (RC1) of IE7. However, even though it is BETTER than the old IE, Firefox users are not likely to move back.

Microsoft puts up first IE7 release candidate

“Speaking of Firefox, which is now estimated to have more than 15% market share, Mozilla is due to release FireFox 2.0 Beta 2 on August 30, slipping seven days behind its original August 23 schedule. Firefox 2.0 release candidates are due in September with final release due on October 24. With the current slippage of Beta 2, it is not clear whether Mozilla will hold to the October 24 deadline. While it is unlikely that Firefox will suffer significant defections to IE7 as a result of being a few weeks late to market with its new release, winning customers from the much improved IE7 will be a much tougher proposition than from IE6. The world is waiting to see Firefox 2.0 can maintain the edge Mozilla has established in the browser war.”

Try a cost to PC users of $7.8 Billion!!! Wow! How much have YOU spent on getting your computer repaired or re-installed you software? If you are a geek, how time did you spend? (Time is money!)

Viruses and Spyware Cost Users $7.8 Billion

“Consumers paid as much $7.8 billion over two years to repair or replace computers that got infected with viruses and spyware, a Consumer Reports survey found. That figure was down from a similar survey a year ago. Still, it suggests that people are paying large sums to cope with the flood of malicious viruses and other programs that can slow computers or render them inoperable. ‘There is a very high national cost to this,’ said Jeff Fox, technology editor of the consumer magazine. ‘People think they’re invincible, even when this kind of money is involved.’ In a nationwide survey, the magazine found that unwanted commercial e-mail, known as spam, is the biggest computer-security problem. But viruses are the most expensive, with people paying $5.2 billion in 2004 and 2005 to repair or replace afflicted machines, the survey found. Infections of spyware, a type of software that can track computer users’ habits or collect sensitive information about them, declined slightly in the past six months, the survey found. But such infections caused almost 1 million U.S. households to replace their computers, the survey found.”

I have run Linux on desktops, servers, and laptops… but I am a geek (and a proud one, as well!) But, would I “turn a noob loose” on a Linux system? Well, I must admit, I have hesitated to do that. One, because I didn’t want to be “Mr. Support” having to talk them through EVERY SINGLE THING that they wanted to do, and two, because I wasn’t sure they could handle the differences between Linux and Windows. But, recently, I actually installed Linux on a customer desktop… at the customer’s request! Why? Because he was tired of getting viruses, spyware, and having his machine crash! I gave him the usual warnings that Windows apps wouldn’t run, that he couldn’t go into a CompUSA and buy a program, but that he COULD download any Open Source program with one simple click from “Click-N-Run”… yes, it was Freespire Linux!

You know what he said? “As long as I can surf the web (with Firefox), read my e-mail (with Thunderbird), and listen to my MP3 files (with Mplayer, or Lsongs), then I will be happy… I have another system that my kids can play their Windows games on! I want to have a safe, clean web surfing machine!” Dewd. Who would have thought? Folks are beginning to “get it!”

The state of the 2006 Linux desktop

“What I found more interesting, though, was a sea-change in how people saw the Linux desktop. It wasn’t just that there were far more people that were using Linux desktops, it was that they didn’t see it as a statement of their loyalty to Linux over Windows. They were using it simply because it worked. You could especially see this with people giving Freespire a try. Linspire made it almost impossible to be at LinuxWorld without getting a copy of its Linux. Many people decided to give it a try in its live CD mode. They were, in a word, impressed. What impressed them was the same thing that has made Freespire controversial in open-source purist circles: its incorporation of proprietary drivers and codices. With Freespire, they could just use their laptops’ WiFi capabilities without worrying about it. With Freespire, they could view QuickTime or Windows media files or streams without additional software. Yes, of course, any Linux expert can add in those capacities, but with Freespire, you don’t even need to know Linux, much less be a Linux guru, to get your laptop to just work the way a Windows user would expect it to work.”

This flash movie shows how the new KDE “Kickoff” menu and taskbar will work in future versions of KDE.

KDE “Kickoff” Preview

“As previously blogged, openSUSE 10.2 will have a redesigned KDE start menu created by the KDE and usability team at SUSE, after doing usability testing with other start menus. We now have a working prototype, code-named ‘Kickoff’ (started during world soccer championship, obviously), which is currently being tested with real users in the SUSE usability lab.”

This looks really cool!