Category: software

Certainly one opinion… I’ve just found the learning curve too steep to deal with on Tinderbox. I’ve wanted to like it, but have been very happy with Notetaker.

Doug Miller: “Overall, Notetaker and Notebook appear to be solid applications for basic note taking, and were worth taking a look at in their latest versions. Neither, however, can yet measure up to the flexibility and power of Tinderbox.” [Mac Net Journal]

Interesting compared to my own experiences… I’d have to recommend Notetaker and also mention that in the beta of WordPress 1.2 (out now) UTF-8 is supported. I had not messed with xPad… and it looks interesting, though I’ve got more than enough going on at the moment for notes.

I planned to talk about note taking software, but the scope expanded…[whump.com | More Like This WebLog]

I think it’s fair to say this would be a very popular service… I know I already want it!

Now if only someone far more capable than me would just write a Firefox extension that will track and sync both my RSS history and my web page history, so that it will not only know that I’ve already seen an RSS item, it’ll also know that I’ve seen all the RSS items that have s which point to an HTML page that I’ve seen, I’ll be in infoglut heaven. [Phil Ringnalda]

Just imagine what might happen if Microsoft’s DRM gets adopted for movies, music and other media…. In addition to a lockout, Michael Gartenberg realized that the software was making unauthorized connections back to the mothership to keep itself up to date… You need Little Snitch, Michael — too bad it’s Mac only.

I was going to do some reading this evening on my computer. I had a copy of the Devil’s Banker in Microsoft Reader format. When I tried to open it though, i got a message that informed me that that the security software had been updated and that I needed to update. No problem, I go to the update page but it tells me, I’m updated and activated just fine. Except, I’m not. The e-book won’t open. I try to activate the reader again and the fun gets more interesting. I get a note saying that my acc’t only has six activations and all of them are used. Let’s see, by my count, I have two laptops and one PocketPC active. That would mean three activations left (and of course, the COMPUTER IS ALREADY ACTIVATED)… Yikes. Pulling up my PocketPC, I get the same infuriating message but it does activate again and the book opens there (but still not on my computer).

Bottom line. MS Reader is DRM at its worst. Unlike competitive solutions, like iTunes, Reader won’t let me authorize AND de-authorize a computer. Yes, you can request more authorizations from MSFT, but that’s sort of useless when you’re trying to read a book. I’m staying away from Reader at this point and going to use Palm Digital Media that has a far friendlier DRM that’s never locked me out of my content yet. Like most users, I have no objection to DRM, it’s necessary to prevent abuses but should never, ever be something a legitimate user should bump into, like i kept bumping into tonight. I better go read that book on the PocketPC before I get locked out again. If anyone at Microsoft is reading this, you guys really need some help here in terms of best practices…[Michael Gartenberg]

I had not considered this as an issue as it has yet to happen to me with my DRM-protected content. I’ve been looking at the Microsoft DRM solution as a more severe lockout… I use a Mac and it won’t work for me, period. Music, Books and Movies need to be able to enjoyed on a variety of platforms as there are a variety of computer choices in this world. I think most people would agree, though Jack Valenti (now retired MPAA lobbyist and professional Asshole) certainly thought otherwise.

Could be the solution for the web traffic issue reported by Wired… Decentralization is certainly the key.

Newswire is a peer-to-peer, fully decentralized system that brings news to your desktop, within seconds after it is published. (My apologies if you already saw this one of the first ten times I posted it.) [Hack the Planet]

This is a very simple pref pane that makes life a bit easier when the mouse is elsewhere as you click. I’ve seen this feature in advanced mouse software, but not as a stand-alone piece. It’s nice to have even with the trackpad…

LazyMouse is a Preference Pane that moves your cursor to the default button whenever a dialog box appears on your screen. In other words, it will save you time moving the mouse to dismiss dialogs. [Painter’s Picker]

I just installed a nice plugin for WordPress which forces a real email address as a simple authentication step. It’s a nice way to prevent bogus spam crap, though admittedly spam really gets blocked based on some prefs I’ve set compared to my former Moveable Type site which continues to get slammed. It’s amazing that I still have to do maintanence to clean up BS that floats in with a dormant site.

Feel free to comment here and test the system…

Update (2:48pm)– OK — TEST IS OVER. The plugin works, but there is a bug in the nightly I’m using which is causing a funky DB error. I know it works, but the details are still shaky. Soon enough though.

News aggregators may be the best new tools to appear on the Web since the browser, but as the programs and the underlying RSS standard grow more popular, some question whether the Internet will be able to handle the traffic. [Wired News]

While it works well as a screen saver, there is also an included mini-app which is nice for low-light situations you might find yourself in. I like the white text on black effect, which is really great when sitting and reading in the dark as I do sometimes to keep the light from disturbing anyone (like a sleeping baby or wife).

What is Black Light? Well, basically it inverts the color on your system. It allows a fair amount of customization in the settings for exactly how it does this, how frequently, etc. In short, it makes your screen look like the light source is a black light (with options to randomly shift the colors). The effect is pretty cool, especially if, like me, you are on the computer a lot at night in low light and don’t like screen savers that make the screen real bright. [Apple-X.net]

Something fun to try…

Panic is pleased to announce Stattoo, a brand new li’l app that “tattoos” system information right onto your desktop picture.

[~stevenf]

WOW – quite a few updates today…

Cocktail 3.4.6 – actually updated yesterday, but downloaded today
iTunes 4.5
iMovie 4.0.1
Palm Desktop 4.2.1
ecto 1.1

AirPort Update 3.4.1 is here… but I’m waiting this one out until a few days of posssible bugs get reported.

There are a variety of ways for blogs to communicate and even publish information with simple protocols in semi-automated as well as manual ways. The great thing is that they all offer ways to let the original author/poster know you thought what was said was worthwhile. As I am sure I’ve mentioned previously I am not a developer so the definitions and interpretations are purely from a user perspective. I am far from an expert on these topics, but was thinking about how it all works and truly find it intriguing. One of the more fascinating things about maintaining a blog is checking your traffic patterns and discovering how people are finding you – and then what they might be saying about you.

Referral

Referrals are the most basic way you can see that someone has linked to you and requires you check your traffic logs to see that in fact people are coming to your site from another. You can see whether it’s a straight link or even whether someone has searched for specific terms in a search engine which led to you.

You can use a tool like Refer to track referral traffic to your site without pouring over the logs, but you’ll find (as discussed below) unfortunately people know how to take advantage of this system.

Comment

Many blogs include a link to comments which let you leave your thoughts about what you’ve read right there connected to the post. In most cases, the blog system allows the author to be notified via email when someone has left a few words for them.

Trackback

Trackbacks are where things start to get interesting. If I see something on a blog I find of interest and the system is in place I can refer to the post on my blog and send a trackback over to the original blog. The trackback will post a comment directly on the other blog — assuming that is how things have been configured. This is similar to a comment except you post simultaneously on your blog as an original post with a cookie trail back on the referred site.

You can find Trackback development information here

Pingback

When I started using WordPress, I noticed something called a Pingback, which can be activated and used on any post you make with a referenced URI. From what I can tell, the pingback basically says “Hello” to the referred author and does not post anything on the other site as a comment, though I am pretty sure it can be configured to work that way. This seems to be more like a private comment, between you and the person you have referenced on your own site.

The spec is published here. I am not sure what happens or who wins if a post received a pingback and a trackback. UPDATE – I now know that Pingback and Trackback both publish on the noted site (see below) which now has me believing that they are really competing bits of technology. Probably to move things to a more open platform, beyond Moveable Type where I think things started with Trackback.

Caveats

Unfortunately just like in email, people have figured out ways to take advantage of the system to promote sketchy enterprises – generally spam engines and porn – by utilizing automated systems to leave comments on (primarily moveable type) blogs. A comment spam blacklist was designed to delete and then block attempts to do this. The main reason for referral and comment spam seems to be much more than just getting whatever traffic happens to be on a site to see the post for viagra or whatever the porn site du jour happens to be.

Behind all the blogs is an amazing system of sites culling what’s being said and creating smart directories so users have a way to search the conversations. You can check out Technorati, Feedster, Daypop, Popdex, Blogdex and Blogosphere to get yourself started … What you will find is that this spam collects enough traffic by referral to create it’s own buzz. The more links to a site there are, creates more notice and therefore more alleged priority.

The SixApart people, who developed Moveable Type have created a new way to stop comment spam called TypeKey which is a universal registration system for blogs (primarily MT sites) which will allow you to comment without saying who you are each time and for the authors to believe you. We’ll see if it works. There are plenty of people for and against this.

WordPress was smart enough to create some rules for filtering comments which on my site so far has allowed for no comment spam. My older site which is based on MT still gets a fair bit of comment spam and unfortunately requires I run the blacklist plugin to manually delete it each time this happens.

This article should explain how to use the Feed on Feeds server-side RSS aggregator to create a page on a WordPress powered blog. [C A R T H I K . N E T]