Part of my plan: Books (Update 1)
In December I was writing about my plan of reading 16 books. Today I offer a status of the plan and my impression about two books.
From that list I read “The Inmates are Running the Asylum” and “The Design of Everyday Things”. Actually from the last one I read just 3/4 because the the book is too theoretical (psychology) and, even though I like psychology, it was a little too boring much – don’t get me wrong, the author offers valuable information about the things used every day and how simple is/should be the design, but the mix of practical and theoretical has a wrong ratio.
However, the former book is absolutely fascinating. Alan Cooper shows that whatever has a computer is actually a computer (or at least has that complexity). He also shows that programmers tend to increase the complexity of the software in order to make the development easier or, just because they can and see this a challenge. One of the main ideas of the book is that programmer cannot design simple software; they always design software that is supposed to be used by people with a lot of technical knowledge, who enjoy complicated things. Cooper’s suggestion is that developers should create software that is as simple as possible to operate, for the end user and, usually, the design must be made by a designer (a person who is able to understand how an experienced person will act).
Currently, my attention is on “Surely You’re Joking, Mr Feynman”. The book has a nice introduction about the first years of Richard Feynman’s life, but things may change as I progress with the lecture. I postpone any conclusion until I read the last page of the book.
Handy Backup Review
The worst thing can happen is to loose all you the pictures you made in the last 2 years or all the customer information you gathered in the last 5 days. These kind of scenarios can happen to anyone and unless you create a duplicate of your data (a backup) you cannot recover it. There are many ways in which data can be accidentally destroyed:
- Hardware failure
- Software failure
- Accidents (fire, water, earth quake)
- Theft
Handy Backup from Novosoft is a solution that can help in this unfortunate situations (if is used prior to those events :) ). Unlike most other backup software out there, Handy Backup doesn’t treat your data like faceless chunks of memory. It features a complete, extensible plug-in-based system and a variety of plug-ins designed to back up settings, playlists, tweaks and preferences. New plugins care be created with basic XML knowledge.
Office 2010 Web Apps
Most of you know Google Docs (GD) - the web-based word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, and form application offered by Google. Probably in the attempt to remove GD’s supremacy and to promote their new Office 2010, Microsoft is preparing a free online version of Office called Office Web Apps.
For the Technical Preview four application are available: Excel, PowerPoint, Word and OneNote. Each of them tries to reproduce the aspect and the functionally of their offline big brother. For Office 2007 users, the interface is well known. In the top side we have a Ribbon bar, the middle part is dominated by the working area and to bottom is reserved for an optional status bar.
In order to use Office Live Apps you need to have a Live ID and a Skydrive account. All these applications integrate with Skydrive and this is a curious fact because I would expect to be part of Office Live [very strange decision!].
The interaction with the live apps is not really fluid because it has a delay, especially in Excel, when you work with formulas – it takes 3-4 seconds to see the result. I understand Microsoft’s wish for adoption and interoperability with any browser without any addon, of the new product, but I think that a Silverlight interface would improve the usability or at least some drag/drop support and a right click menu.
Excel Live
Spreadsheets – this is Excel all about. The little brother of the offline version is, for the moment, limited to some basic spreadsheet operations. The are no more and no less then 3 sheets [does anyone know how to add/remove them?] on which you can put your data.
The simple tools available are: text format (color, font, size) and cell format (color, text alignment, data type). There is support for part of the formulas in Excel and one can use cell references to add dynamic data. There is some support for external data sources but it seems that data can only be refreshed if already exists – one cannot add/modify a data source.
Unfortunately there is no support for locked sheets, hidden sheets and data validation. If you try to open an uploaded document containing some of the previous you will get and error message for edit.
Excel Web Apps gets another minus because there is no support for diagrams/charts. It would be nice to have at least support for charts in a new sheet. Maybe in the next version?
I am thinking to migrate my expenses Excel document in Skydrive (Office Live Apps) even though it is quite limited.
Windows Mobile 6.5 on Toshiba G900
Before writing anything else I must warn all readers that changing the operating systems on your mobile will void the warranty. If the upgrade process fails the phone might be damaged and no service will fix that for free. Do it on your own risk and make sure the following list is satisfied:
- Ask people about the ROM you want to install. Make sure it did not brake any phone.
- The phone’s battery must be at least 50% charged (better 100%)
- Make sure you have and UPS. Or a laptop with good battery because if you cancel the process after it started the results might be unexpected.
- Make sure the USB cable is firmly connect and is not broken!
I cannot be made responsible for any damages caused directly or indirectly by this article.
Panda Cloud Antivirus Beta Review
As we emerge more and more is a Software + Services world, Panda took advantage of this new wave and released the World’s first cloud antivirus solution.
The protection model based on a thin-client agent and server architecture which services malware protection as opposed to locally installed products. By combining local detection technologies with cloud-scanning capabilities and applying non-intrusive interception techniques on the client architecture, Panda Cloud Antivirus provides some of the best protection with a lightweight antivirus thin-client agent that barely consumes any PC resources.
Of course this S+S approach has advantages and drawbacks.
Advantages:
- Always using the latest version of software and protection
- Minimum impact on local resources
- Detection of threats in less than 6 minutes (this is what Panda announced on the official blog)
Drawbacks:
- Need of permanent Internet connection
- Without Internet connection the protection is reduced
Panda Cloud Antivirus takes advantage of the cloud world and combines the information from all users in order to detect and stop malware. Using the so called Panda Collective Intelligence, a cloud-based test lab for malicious software, samples are collected, analyzed, categorized and, if needed, disinfection routines are created. Therefore the community becomes the lab. In this way there is no need for software updates, there is no virus definition database on the client computer and everyone has access to the latest protection.
Compared to other antivirus solutions, Panda categorizes local files from “real security risk” to “minimum security risk” and by this criteria the scanning engine prioritizes it’s tasks. There are three types of automatic scanning (as mentioned on the official blog):
- On-Access Scan. This is the maximum priority resident scan that is applied only to objects which are truly a security risk in a specific point in time: files which are being executed or used. The file is intercepted, prevented from running and disinfected if found to be malicious.
- Prefetch Scan. There are other elements such as files downloaded from the Internet which, while not being executed at a specific point in time, have a much higher risk and probability of being executed at any time. These files should be watched more closely than files which have barely any activity, as we can expect them to be executed, unpacked, copied or moved shortly. A Prefetch Scan basically launches an asynchronous local & cloud query on the file to scan it “as soon as possible” without impacting performance. Of course if any of these files is called to be executed, the file will be intercepted and an on-access scan will be applied to it.
- Background Scan. Lastly a normal PC has hundreds of thousands of files in its hard drive. Most of these files are not executing normally and simply just “sit there” until either the use double-clicks on them or they are called upon by another process. These are considered the least dangerous files from a security perspective. Panda Cloud Antivirus will continuously run Background Scans on these in an asynchronous manner while the PC is idle, without impacting performance at all. Of course if any of these files is called to be executed, the file will be intercepted and an on-access scan will be applied to it.
In my opinion Read the rest of this entry »
What I read/write
Happy New Year!
Everyone has some favorite places on web – games, communities, forums, blogs. Today I want to share the Top 10 websites/forums that I follow, write on or just find useful:
1. Google
I bet this is the first time you hear about it. This is the place where you should start anything ;)
2. PdfChm
From here you can download almost any technical book.
3. Geek Hero Comic
Geek Hero is a comic about Randall (friends call him Randie), a hardcore geek with the sweetest heart.
4. Assembla
Assembla provides tools and services for accelerating software development. They offer tools for collaboration and management of software projects. Also, for student projects they offer free tools. There are tools like: wiki, SVN repository, tickets, milestones, etc.
5. CHIP.RO Forum
The first forum on which I have wrote. I am still writing there. (Is a Romanian web forum)
6. docs.torrents.ro
A torrent tracker with tutorials, videos and e-learning stuff. The content includes many domains: PC, medicine, architecture, history, biology etc
7. Reuters Pictures
The most impressive pictures and they are updated daily. I think they can be sent by anyone and people from Reuters choose the best.
8. Microsoft How Do I
Microsoft’s Video Learning Center. A lot of video tutorials about Microsoft technologies.
9. Windows Live
Microsoft’s Live suite that includes mail (Hotmail), storage space (SkyDrive), online document repository (OfficeLive), calendar, events and more.
10. MSDN Regex Forum
I just like regular expressions :)
Google Chrome Review
Google released their first browser: Google Chrome.
Below is a quote from Chrome’s website about their motivation of building a browser – probablly is just a nice invented story, most sure it is marketing behind :-)
At Google, we spend much of our time working inside a browser. We search, chat, email and collaborate in a browser. And like all of you, in our spare time, we shop, bank, read news and keep in touch with friends – all using a browser. People are spending an increasing amount of time online, and they’re doing things never imagined when the web first appeared about 15 years ago.
Since we spend so much time online, we began seriously thinking about what kind of browser could exist if you started from scratch and built on the best elements out there. We realized that the web had evolved from mainly simple text pages to rich, interactive applications and that we needed to completely rethink the browser. What we really needed was not just a browser, but also a modern platform for web pages and applications, and that’s what we set out to build.
So today we’re releasing the beta version of a new open source browser: Google Chrome.
Even though it is a beta version it is quite stable and it has some interesting features. Some of them are described below.
Toshiba Portege G900 Review
Some people want small/fancy looking phones, others want powerful phones, while others want both. I belong to the second category – I want a powerful phone and I don’t really care about the aspect. If you want a fancy looking or small phone, Toshiba G900 is not for you!
After almost two months of research I finally decided to buy a G900. I needed a new mobile phone but I also wanted some big screen in order to be able to navigate on the Internet without carrying the laptop with me. So what I was searching was:
- Big screen
- Wireless network card
- QWERTY keyboard
- Touch screen
- GSM support
Toshiba Portege G900 has all this and even more but with some costs.
Wordpress 2.6
A few days ago a new version of Wordpress, the popular blog publishing system and the one that is behind this blog, was released.
The new 2.6 version brings some exciting new features:
- Word count
- Image captions, so you can add sweet captions like Political Ticker does under your images.
- Bulk management of plugins.
- A completely revamped image control to allow for easier inserting, floating, and resizing. It’s now fully integrated with the WYSIWYG.
- Drag-and-drop reordering of Galleries.
- Plugin update notification bubble.
- Customizable default avatars.
- You can now upload media when in full-screen mode.
- Remote publishing via XML-RPC and APP is now secure (off) by default, but you can turn it on easily through the options screen.
- Full SSL support in the core, and the ability to force SSL for security.
- You can now have many thousands of pages or categories with no interface issues.
- Ability to move your wp-config file and wp-content directories to a custom location, for “clean” SVN checkouts.
- Select a range of checkboxes with “shift-click.”
- You can toggle between the Flash uploader and the classic one.
- A number of proactive security enhancements, including cookies and database interactions.
- Stronger better faster versions of TinyMCE, jQuery, and jQuery UI.
- Version 2.6 fixes approximately 194 bugs.
Here is a video preview of the new features:
Also, the complete release article can be found here: http://wordpress.org/development/2008/07/wordpress-26-tyner/
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