Closer Look

Upgrading PCs or servers is not always a black and white issue. I had a call from someone recently asking me about an upgrade. His own IT support company was keen to get him to move on to the next generation of servers with all the associated costs. As it turned out he was his […]

My beginner’s programming language called Leopard has been distributed through WeatherBug Labs for almost two months now, and it’s been exciting to hear what teachers, students, parents, and both programming neophytes and experienced programmers have had to say about the language. Just check out what this one teacher and her class had to say about […]

Each presentation you create has a set of properties. Filling in the properties when you save your presentation is useful when it comes time to performing searches. You can later search based on these file properties.
One of the ways that you can remind yourself to fill in the properties is to have Microsoft PowerPoint […]

If you haven’t already heard, Danny O’Brien of the EFF and founder of the DearAOL.com coalition discovered today that AOL was blocking all incoming mail that mentioned the “DearAOL.com” domain name. DearAOL.com, remember, is the Web site set up to oppose AOL’s plan to let senders bypass their mail filters and get a certification label […]

Victoria from the osxtiger Yahoo! Group writes:
If you belong to ANY Yahoo! Groups - be aware that Yahoo! is now using “Web Beacons” to track every Yahoo! Group user. They’re similar to cookies, but allow Yahoo! to record every Web site and every group you visit, even when you’re not connected to Yahoo!.
Look at its […]

I was babbling about the early days, before the Web and search engines. Remember Archie and Gopher servers? And WAIS and Veronica? It was still hard to find what you wanted. The first search engine I came across, I mean the first spider type, was Lycos at CMU. Except back then there was no fancy […]

So, I was fixing my aunt’s machine the other day, and I came across something… interesting.
Before I tell you what I found, I want you to be aware of some facts:
The computer in question is in a house where the kids have moved out, so the only time it gets any real use is via […]

Well, this was a real treat.
I posted my Google Talk account on Lockergnome a few days ago so that people could speak with me. In that time, I’ve spoken with several people:
A mother who is afraid of technology, but keeps up with it because of her subscriptions to the various Lockergnome newsletters.
A couple of folks […]

When Google Talk first came out I told Chris Pirillo that I could sum up the service in five words:
“Really dumb, um, really dumb.”
However, I had only used the voice feature with one person, and he sounded as if he was in the middle of a freeway. I had dismissed the service as “just another […]

Rocketboom is probably one of the most popular videoblogs on the Internet today.
Amanda Congdon and Andrew Barron are the people behind it.
I have gotten a chance to virtually sit down with them and find out more about how they began, and how they organize and create their daily video show.

This article has two purposes - well, maybe three. First and foremost it shows that many people read Lockergnome. I believe this points out the importance of putting out good information and to correct errant information as soon as possible.
The second purpose is just plain old blatant self promotion. Mine, of course. […]

What if you could not only read a computer magazine but also actually
see the concepts demonstrated onscreen? Or view a tutorial movie inside
of the magazine demonstrating the software you are planning to buy?
Home Computer Magazine
is a PDF publication from Cranberry Publishing in the
UK. It is an interesting concept. The online-only magazine is published
in two versions: […]

I read with some sympathy Chefelf’s post about the perils of what passes for spam, yesterday, and I figured I really should chip in a comment:
You know, I used to feel the same way, so I decided to do a real, undercover investigation of one of those outfits. It turned out to be legitimate. The […]

“Over the weekend, Microsoft posted the “Indigo” and “Avalon” community technology previews for free to anyone with the bandwidth to download them.
Previously, the pre-beta versions of the two Windows subsystems for Windows Longhorn, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 had been available only to MSDN subscribers.
“This CTP release recently became available to MSDN subscribers and […]

Windows is always a hassle to get loading quick on start up. For some reason it throws in a few extra things that are unnecessary for the most part. But what are the things you need, and what are the things you don’t need? Curt Simmons wrote a good article showing you on how to […]

Welcome! In this guide, I will briefly walk you through the steps needed to set up Windows XP in a fashion that will provide continuous, reliable uptime. This assumes that you already have some knowledge of the Windows XP installation process and the operating system.
Before starting, you will need the following:

Windows XP Product Disk
Windows XP […]