Archive for August, 2007
Your dose of Friday awesomeness
Microsoft is desperately trying to market the upcoming Halo 3 for the Xbox 360 to Korea:
The Battle of Feed Readers
So back when Google Reader originaly came out (October 2005) I gave it a whirl. In general its like everything else google: feature packed, web 2.0, and ugly. Of course its still in Google Labs, which means its public beta.
Back then Google Reader had a few problems for me:
- The interface is overly clunky. I just want to read my RSS feeds from various sites in a simple and organized manner.
- Google Reader doesn’t always pick up updates on feeds until several hours after the site has made updates.
- You have to leave Firefox open if you want constant notification of your news.
The later problem really isn’t that huge of a problem for me, considering I mostly leave Firefox open anyway just for my Google Calendar Notifier.
So I switched to using a standalone windows client, on my home machine and my work machine.
FeedReader3
FeedReader is actually a really cool piece of windows software, with a very minimalistic and quick responding interface.
I do desire to continue using it, but my mobility is now an issue. I read RSS news at work , at home, and on my laptop (which is at my girlfriends house). With the amount of feeds that I now subscribe to, manageability and synchronization of my well desired news is becoming a difficult dilemma.
Naturally, this is where Google comes in – “Searching your life.”
Since that October, Google Reader has been updated a few times — lets hope they have resolved my key issues with it. I will give it a try for the weekend
Below is a screenshot of my Google Reader account.
Miss Teen S.Carolina on Education
RIT Condones the Hacking of the iPhone
A 17-year-old hacker — bound for the Rochester Institute of Technology on Saturday — has broken the lock that ties Apple’s iPhone to AT&T’s wireless network
This is rather cool, I saw the video (link to engadget story, because youtube is down at the moment) – but I had no idea the kid was going to be a new freshmen at RIT.
On Thursday, he put the unlocked iPhone up for sale on eBay, where the high bid was above $2,000 midday today. The model, with 4 gigabytes of memory, sells for $499 new.
“Some of my friends think I wasted my summer but I think it was worth it,” he told The Record, which reported Hotz’s hack today.
RIT President Bill Destler said, “The talent of our incoming students never ceases to amaze us.”
Tip of the day: Pack before you move
So yesterday helped Jenn clean out her apartment into a 17′ U-Haul. I have never SEEN so much stuff in my life.
Lets list it.
- 2 Couches
- 1 Recliner
- 2 end tables
- 1 coffee table
- 1 folding table (computer sized)
- 1 large folding table
- 1 bed frame
- 2 matresses
- two mirrors
- 4 wooden chairs
- a computer desk
- a mini fridge
- several bags of clothing
- several bags and boxes of random stuff
This is all for one person! Holly smokes!
Thanks to Billy for helping me move her stuff.
A[another] little side project
So OS X has the cool ability to rotate your desktop background at set intervals, from a folder that you point it at containing a bunch of images. Windows has never had this, and still doesn’t have it in Vista.
I through together a quick little application yesterday that does just that… its a little rough around the edges right now obviously, so I wont post it for download yet.
But I will post some code snippets for anyone interested in doing some File I/O or background changing using the Win32API .
Pick a random file from a directory
string[] dirs = Directory.GetFiles(”npike/wallpapers” , “*.jpg”);
string tmpFilename = fileName;
if (dirs.Length > 1) {
while (tmpFilename == fileName) {
// make sure we dont pick the same wallpaper in a row
picIndex = (rnd.Next(dirs.Length)) % dirs.Length;
tmpFilename = dirs[picIndex];
}
} else {
tmpFilename = dirs[0];
}
Changing the wallpaper with the Win32 API
public class WinAPI
{
[DllImport("user32.dll", CharSet=CharSet.Auto)]
public static extern int SystemParametersInfo (int uAction , int uParam , string lpvParam , int fuWinIni) ;
public const int SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER = 20;
public const int SPIF_SENDCHANGE = 0×2;
}
// so if your image isnt a bitmap, youll have to convert it first!
if (Path.GetExtension(fileName).ToLower() != “.bmp”)
{
Bitmap theImage = new Bitmap(dirs[picIndex]);
fileName = Path.Combine(mySetting.m_settingsPath , “new.bmp”);
theImage.Save (fileName, System.Drawing.Imaging.ImageFormat.Bmp);
theImage .Dispose();
}
int nResult = WinAPI.SystemParametersInfo(SPI_SETDESKWALLPAPER,1,fileName,SPIF_SENDCHANGE);
That’s it for now folks, when I get some time (rather, IF I get some time) I will refactor and purdy up my code and post that along with the application.
In the mean time, I have a busy weekend of helping folks move, sleeping, and playing Bioshock.
Its A Jeep Thing
Bioshocked
First Summer/Fall blockbuster game for the Xbox 360 wishlist has been purchased!
5 tools every PHP programmer should know!
After working on several large scale PHP projects, and writing a lot of PHP code, I
’ve discovered a number of tools that improve code quality, streamline rollouts, and generally make life as a PHP developer a whole lot easier.
read more | digg story
Tired of Facebook profiles cluttered with useless applications?
The Facebook API is great, and has led to the creation of a few good mashups and applications, but generally its just gone over board. I am working on a new Firefox extension to block/strip applications from profiles (think AdBlock for Facebook) and am looking for testers and feedback. Install my extension, try it out – if you like it, spread it!
read more | digg story
