Talk

Well, it’s Ubuntu tutorial day again and you might be wondering where the latest piece is for today? Now before you assume that I fell asleep at the wheel, let me explain what the deal is. During my off-hours, I’ve been pounding out what I believe is going to simplify some of the headache involved [...]

A friend of mine sent me an e-mail recently with a link to an article about Blu-ray and HD-DVD formats in the context of DRM and Windows Vista. Being that I harbor strong opinions about DRM, reading that article reminded me how loath I am to move to an OS that has DRM so core [...]

Not too long back I made the claim that any enterprise move to Vista was going be lackluster at best. Sure enough, enterprise migration has been off to a pretty slow start. Much of it has been claimed to be security oriented, however I believe more than that, it comes down to the OS not [...]

When I first read about this botnet issue, I was rather shocked that the target OS was not being examined at length here. After all, it’s not OS X or Linux allowing this botnet issue to become so prevalent. It’s Windows.
Now in an effort to be fair about this, I will take the stance that [...]

Alex King writes:
I organized a bounty for the creation of a “BlackBerry as a modem” solution for Mac OS X earlier this year. The resulting product (Pulse, from Brain Murmurs) is a solution that allows you to use your BlackBerry as a standard Bluetooth modem. It works great on both Windows and Mac.
Current problem:
The Pulse [...]

I am definitely liking what I see with EmperorLinux more and more each day. My latest discovery is support for EVDO and RTT pre-configured without this kind of headache! It’s wild as I have never purchased a pre-configured Linux box in my life (for myself), but when you have someone who takes care of TabletPC [...]

Don’t you just hate it when you try to do the right thing and get a headache in return? On the heels of the battery recall saga comes a critical Broadcom WLAN driver vulnerability. My company’s fleet of Dell laptops, of course, was impacted by this security issue. We quickly did a sweep through our [...]

It’s taken me awhile, but I am only using Windows for work related needs with regard to my consulting duties these days. Short of that, I am now Windows free!
And this brings me to a conclusion that I have recently come to. Over the past few months, I have found myself saying something aloud that [...]

So Microsoft is considering the robotics game. Right on, more power to it. But you have to admit, the very idea of a Blue Screen event or, worse yet, a zombie event, poses a less than rosy picture here.
Jokes aside, I have to wonder what level of security Microsoft can bring to the robotics world. [...]

A funny thing happened on my way to this forum… or I should say in my nondescript office in downtown Chicago. One of my users, and next door office neighbor, stepped into my doorway and blurted out that her “Excel was broken.” She continued on by saying she knew the cause - my colleague had [...]

I am a very happy Linux user, but am also aware that Linux is not for everyone. Having said this, I was a fan of SLED 10. So it’s not like I am anti-SuSE by any means.
When I heard that SuSE 10.2 had come out, naturally I was curious. Has it overcome some of the [...]

The inkjet printer market cracks me up. So many advances in print quality and technology, and yet most major manufacturers seem to design their printers to drive the sale of ink cartridges. Why do you think they are so eager to give many printers away these days? I mean… really… have you seen the size [...]

I’ll be honest here, I have yet to find a consumer level router brand that has even approached impressing me. Usually, this routine starts off with me spending a fair amount of coin on one brand or another. Even after doing a ton of research, it takes about a month or so to find a [...]

It’s been a while since my last post… I’ve had some more family crises to deal with. My mother, who has been in a nursing home for over a year, has had some setbacks that have put her back into the hospital. It’s been so tough on her since we lost my dad last [...]

Enough of the news regarding the “Wii,” let’s move on to the “why” of the Pepper Pad. For those who are unaware, the Pepper Pad is a new Web-friendly, handheld computer running on Linux.
Now here is the problem as I see it: the Pepper Pad is not the most ergonomic device that I have ever [...]

Simply brilliant. How in the world something like this can happen is frankly just beyond me. Granted, the issues were said to be caused due to changes made to the Gmail Web site, however, it does make one wonder a bit. I guess it all just seems kind of funny in a way; your closest [...]

We need your help. I have a friend of mine that has apparently “lost” some photos from a Secure Digital card while transferring the pictures to her computer. The PC itself had crashed during the transfer via a card reader. Since this event, the card is now showing zero pictures whatsoever. Just in case, no [...]

“So simple, even a caveman can do it!” All right, this statement may apply to car insurance, however, I simply don’t feel that those three-in-one printers can claim the same level of simplicity.
It all started yesterday when an ex-client of mine called me with complaints that their three-in-one stopped printing as it should. The printer [...]

It’s hard to believe, but after all of the problems, delays and so on, we are finally going to see a mad rush for the big box stores as the PS3 is released on November 17th.
While I remain sure that the Xbox is going to do a lot better than the last time around, I [...]

One of my clients had an old Compaq desktop that crapped out on him the other day. I’d actually upgraded it for him some time ago (against my advice, mind you) by adding RAM, a bigger hard drive and a clean re-load of Windows XP. The machine performed admirably during this time, but clearly [...]