Sunday, February 28, 2010
Win7 & Multiple Desktops

Multiple desktops on Windows is something that I've wanted [well more like needed] for pretty much ever. Well actually what I really want is an all connected scrollable cc817881.desktops2(en-us,MSDN.10)[1] workspace, but getting my hands on an app that does this, has proven even more difficult than something for multiple desktops. There is only a single working application out there that creates a scrollable workspace on Win, and it's way too old. Doesn't really work on Win7 at all. I had come across virtual desktop apps that create multiple workspaces in the past, but that was long time ago and I didn't really like what I saw then. So recently, I started searching again.... And here's my findings:

Lets just say that to my experience, out of the bazillion virtual desktop apps out there, and I mean including the free and commercial ones both, I've only found 1 that works on a 64-bit Win7. The application is called "Desktops", it's free, and it's available through Microsoft TechNet. It gives you 4 desktops that can be reached via shortcut keys or the tray icon. It has some limitations, including the fact that Aero style only runs on the main desktop, and you cant drag application windows from one desktop to the other, and a few other small issues. But at least it works, it's NOT buggy at all and it uses a rather negligible amount of memory and other system resources.

So for the moment, this is what I'm going to be using.. until either me or one of you finds something better. You can download the app here.

Labels: ,

Saturday, February 27, 2010
Diatom

Every once in a while I come across a demo that I can watch an unlimited number of times, and enjoy it. This would be one. Diatom by Andr00:

Labels: , , , ,


Lothlorien :: Favourites

Seeing how there's now about a good 2000 photos  in my Lothlorien gallery, I decided itDSC01527[1] was time for a "favourites" album.. which was in fact suggested by a few friends already. So I asked a bunch of my friends to vote for their favourites, the photos they think should be placed in the favourites album, a few weeks ago. And now I finally got a chance to sit down and go through all the suggestions, pick them and collect them in the new album. And here it is, check out our Favourites album. =)

Of course new suggestions are always welcome, so if you think that the album is missing something, let me know. There are no rules, the photo can be from any album on Lothlorien. The only semi-rule is: it's best if your suggestion hasn't already been posted to the "Me" album. But if you absolutely have to, then it's ok. =))

Labels: , , ,

Friday, February 26, 2010
Sherlock Holmes : Meet The Musicians

Look what I came across... I find this video absolutely brilliant. I'm a huge fan of both the movie and the soundtrack, and I just LUV this! =D

Oh and here's a very kool "For Your Consideration" poster! ;)

For_Your_Consideration

And you can now see a larger version of the poster as well as more Holmes related stuff on Verse.. my friend just created a page for it. =)

Labels: , , , ,

Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Mickey Mouse MP3 Player

Silly little thing I recently fell in love with, and purchased from eBay... ah... I just had to show you this! =D I'm not really into iPods or other advanced MP3 players since I usually simply use my Palm for my portable music needs. But I also felt the need for something extra small and lightweight to run around with easily [and no, I didn't consider iPod shuffle. I don't like Apple hardware at all, honestly.] ... and here it is. Introducing, my cute little Mickey player from Walt Disney. Weeeeeeeeeeeeee it's so cute! =D

 
This is actually the night we went to see Avatar. It was snowing like MAD! =P

Labels: , , , , ,

Monday, February 22, 2010
MS Office 2010 Beta & Me!

I just felt the need to quickly mention here that I LIKE this! I've been trying out the Office 2010 Beta for a few weeks now, and so far I find it to be quite a nice bundle. Nice features, not all of them new of course but everything somehow appears to be smoother.

I'm mainly impressed with OneNote 2010. It's lovely... try it.... trust me... ;)

Labels: , , ,


Indiana Jones & The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull

"They weren't you, honey!" =D

From my list of belated movies to watch, last night I finally got to see the latest IndianaIndiana_Jones_-_The_Kingdom_Of_The_Crystal_Skull__XVID___2008_-fanart2[1] Jones movie. And boy oh boy did I enjoy it! =D Having been a huge [and do I mean HUUUGE] fan of Indi for my entire childhood [including now =D], I was worried that this new one was going to not reach up to my expectations and let me down. Well, it did no such thing! I LUUUUUUUVED it!

I really liked the general character reunion, and all the pointers to the past adventures. It was aaaaaaaaaaaaawesome to see "Marion Ravenwood" againe. =D The cute and goofy humour of the movie was great. I also totally loved the plot for this one. I guess it was about time Indi finally met with aliens from other dimensions, right? And of course it had to happen either in Atlantis or Eldorado. I mean do you know of any more appropriate place? ;)

I'm sure glad to see Indi's son has turned out to be as much of a bad-arse as himself. ;) That also makes me wonder, is it possible that there are now going to be sequels with new adventures for the son?? I would sort of dig that! =D I suppose my movie-buff friends would probably have an answer for that already.... ;)

 

P.S.: I suppose I should also mention that last week I finally watched "The Dark Knight". Seeing how I haven't posted anything about it, I guess you can tell exactly how impressed [↓] I feel by it. ;)

Labels: , , , ,

Sunday, February 21, 2010
Sleepthief - "Reason Why" Vid

Lovely. This is just lovely. I'm a huge fan of the track, and now here comes the new video for it. It's amazing how the 2 voices mix... and the mood and the melody and the lyrics and everything about it is just fantastic. =)

Labels: , , , ,

Saturday, February 20, 2010
Verse & OpenID

I love OpenID. =) I really do... I guess it's obvious by now. I've always been intrigued byopenid[1] the idea, so much so that a couple of years ago I started serving my own OpenID on Aasemoon.com.

Recently I decided it was time Verse supported OpenID, and after a few evenings of playing around with the PHP OpenID libraries, now it pretty much does that. The thing is, I have no idea how well this works. A lot of testing has to be done and I'm certain that there are still tons of bugs... but I guess I'll perfect it in time. =) Also, you can now use your Verse profile as your OpenID, in other OpenID enabled website. So yes Verse serves OpenIDz too now. =) Or at least as far as my testing of it goes....

Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Friday, February 19, 2010
Chocolate & Me!

Not only do I have a terrible chocolate addiction, but it's also quite well known to everyone... and who'd know that better than my mom? Here's what she did recently.... Need I say more? =P

DSC05461.JPG_802[1]

Labels: , , ,

Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Cell-phones & Recycled Plastic

I just saw a commercial about a cell-phone company on TV, and the supposed "high-light" of the commercial was that some of their cell-phone models are made partially of recycled plastic. And some teenager girl was shouting about how using the recycled material can help us "save trees". And this was the part of it when I felt a rush of blood to my brain....

So the bloody cell-phone company sells cell-phones that boil human brain cells, and they pride themselves with recycled plastic and saving trees? Giving people cancer and supposedly saving trees?

Is it just me, or is this completely bizarre.....

Hmmmm.....

Labels: , , , , ,

Saturday, February 13, 2010
Buzz: Oops Goog did it AGAIN! xP

Oh come on! I mean... seriously? You have got to be joking! NoGwitter

For the life of me, I cannot believe how fast Google is jumping from one useless project to the next! It feels as if it was just yesterday when Google gave us all a not so sweet surprise with the half baked and hardly usable Google Wave. Now here they go again, this time with the Gwitter. How many of the same thing do we need anyway?

There's about 50-billion micro blogging services out there right now, but of course Google has found a way to make the Gwitter stand out. You know what it is that all the rest of those services are missing? Well, they DON'T SUDDENLY MAKE YOUR PERSONAL DATA INTO PUBLIC DATA!! Haha, oh yes! Google's new ridiculous Twitter clone is the only one out there to have a security hole / privacy breach of such magnitude! Upon activating Da Fuzz on your Google account, your connections list is the first to go public, followed by another load of data apparently. And even though you have the option to change that, the default makes your connections list and other pieces of data public without actually asking / waning you.

Of course at the first glance you may not notice the gravity of the situation.. in that case, I suggest you read this pleasantly straight forward article, nicely titled "F*ck You Google", and you'll suddenly get a better view of exactly what's going on.

So, we have a brand new Google service, that doesn't do anything new, doesn't look anything particularly appealing, doesn't involve any sort of innovation in anything except for magnificently breaching your privacy, and yet, people are, and will be, using it. Yay to the brave new world!

Cheers! =)

Update: Thanks to my good friend Knarfoo for sharing this interesting article. Another good description of the current state of Gwitter.

Labels: , , , ,


Facebook Chat + XMPP

Nice, really really nice! =) Facebook finally did it. FB chat supports XMPP now, and with the latest Trillian release, you can now use Trill's Jabber / XMPP plug-in to connect to FB chat. All you have to do now, is to first make sure you have the XMPP plug-in added to your Trill, then introduce a new Jabber account, and log on with yourusername@chat.facebook.com. And by the way the username part is case sensitive... as in you have to enter everything in lower case for it to work. I set this up yesterday, and it works like a charm. =) Yaaaaaay!

Labels: , , , ,

Friday, February 12, 2010
Me & Caprica

Long story short: It turns out I _DISLIKE_ Caprica just about as much as I _DISLIKE_ BSG. Ahemn. Yeah. =P

Labels: , , ,

Thursday, February 11, 2010
Supernatural HaHa...

"6 degrees of heaven bacon" - Dean Winchester

Hahahahaha I found that quote from this week's Supernatural pretty darn amusing! =D

Labels: , ,

Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Avatar : I Cried A River!

Avatar-Movie

So as usual I'm pretty late to the whole movie gig, but oh well, I guess it's better late than never eh? Specially when it comes to a movie such as this.. I couldn't possibly miss this one. =)

So we went to see Avatar last night... and I can't begin to put into words how impressed and moved I am by this movie. Would you have seen me in the theatre though, you'd have been able to tell for yourself. Specially if you would touch the scarf around my neck... lets just say that if was completely wet. I had tears all over my face for the bigger half of the movie. So much beauty, so much emotions... ahhhh.... [And I have to add, it wasn't just me.. the company was weeping too! ;) ]

This movie sends so many deeply meaningful messages through. There's so much to think about here. And I have to admit, even though I knew I was watching a movie and not something real, there were times that I just wanted to explode with emotions. I couldn't help totally falling in love with the "Na'vi" people.  And there were times I really wanted to punch that sodding "Colonel Miles Quaritch" hard enough in the jaw to completely redecorate his face. And guess what... finally someone managed to picture a race of alien beings that are in fact prettier than humans. Much prettier that is. =D I mean.... oh man.... BLUE..... =D ;)

Now I'm going to wait for the Blu-ray, and the soundtrack CD. It's certainly a completely different experience when you're watching it on IMAX 3D, and feeling like the tree branch is about to splash you in the face... but the Blu-ray would still be quite welcome, and better than nothing. ;) But what I really wish for, is a couple [or more] of sequels. Not that it seems very likely at all...but it's still ok to wish for it, right? =P

Aaaaaaahhhhh..... So dreamy.......

Labels: , , , , ,

Sunday, February 07, 2010
LabVIEW Package for Robotics Design

This is something that I'm very much looking forwards to getting my hands on. It could very well be a life saver for me.

1493928[1] 

"On Monday, National Instruments announced one such platform. It's called LabView Robotics. In addition to LabView, the popular data-acquisition application, the package includes a bunch of tools specific to robotics. It can import codes in various formats (C, C++, Matlab, VHDL), offers a library of drivers for a wide variety of sensors and actuators, and has modules for implementation of real-time and embedded hardware. NI says engineers could use the package to both design and run their robotic systems."

IEEE Spectrum: National Instruments Introduces LabVIEW Package for Robotics Design

Labels: , , , , , ,

Friday, February 05, 2010
Office 2010 :: The Movie

Hahaha.. look what I just found on Channel 9 forums. This is pretty amusing. =D And, well, self explanatory.

Labels: ,


LOST Seaon 6 Premiere, and Sayid's IRANIAN passport!!

So I just watched Lost season 6 premiere on Space channel, and it was simply mind blowing. =) LOOOOVVVEED IT! As I expected, it caused much more questions than giving any answers... and that's exactly what we love about Lost, isn't it? ;)

At the end of season 5, after Ben's trial, I knew with a 100% certainty that John Locke the new, the smoke monster, and the black dude were all the same. It was very clear given how he manipulated Ben to kill Jacob. But I'm wondering, what the heck is his name? =D And where's "home" that he wants to go to? And what happens no that Jacob's dead? And what did Juliet mean by "it worked"? And .. and... and... and... I could go on forever.

But you know what? I also have another really BIG question that I really have to bring up here... Sayid Jarrah is supposed to be Iraqi right? Then can somebody tell me, why on earth he has an IRANIAN PASSPORT????????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm half Persian. I was born in Iran. I have an Iranian passport. I know what an Iranian passport looks like. Below is a screenshot of the scene showing Sayid's passport [thanks to YouTube!], right beside a photo of the first page of my Iranian passport. As you can see, it's exactly the same. [Click to see the full size.]

LOST_Passes

Something tells me that this is not a part of the Lost mystery plot. So I'd say... it's a rather sad mistake. Iraq and Iran are 2 different countries.. a fact that SOOOO many people seem to not realize.

Anyhow... aside from the above booboo, I really enjoyed the first episode, and I can't wait for more.... ah... please... moooorrre.... moooorrrrrrr Lost... MOOOORRRRE... =))))))))))

Labels: , , , ,

Tuesday, February 02, 2010
Google Code Blog: A proposal to extend the DNS protocol

On one hand, I find the ideas here extremely interesting. On the other hand, I'm not feeling to well about the kind of information Google can have on a user's every single move. Hmmmmm..... still a very intriguing proposal. 

"Today a group of DNS and content providers, including Neustar/UltraDNS and Google are publishing a proposal to extend the DNS protocol. DNS is the system that translates an easy-to-remember name like www.google.com to a numeric address like 74.125.45.104. These are the IP addresses that computers use to communicate with one another on the Internet. By returning different addresses to requests coming from different places, DNS can be used to load balance traffic and send users to a nearby server. For example, if you look up www.google.com from a computer in New York, it may resolve to an IP address pointing to a server in New York City. If you look up www.google.com from the Netherlands, the result could be an IP address pointing to a server in the Netherlands. Sending you to a nearby server improves speed, latency, and network utilization."

Google Code Blog: A proposal to extend the DNS protocol

Labels: , , , ,


Grammy Awards 2010

Oh... boy oh boy.... I'm about to make myself a few enemies....

Given the kind of relationship that I have with music, I often get asked a lot of music related question... "How do you like this singer? How do you like that album? What do you think of blabla's latest track? What's your current favourite?" and... you get the picture. So in the past couple of days, quite a few people asked me what I thought of this year's Grammy Awards. And I said... "let me think about it a bit, I'll tell you...". Mainly because I just wanted to have enough time to "defuse" first, before saying something that would possibly offend anyone. But it looks like no matter how much time passes, my opinion on this does not, at all, change. So I may as well say it... I'm sorry if I'm offending anyone's opinions, I absolutely do not mean to... this is JUST my personal opinion.

So here's what I think... I think that the day this year's Grammy winners [with the exception of perhaps 1 or 2] win the Grammy Award, is the day I stop watching Grammy. Permanently. Good music has officially left the world's popular music scene. [Again, with a few exceptions... too few I'm afraid.] And that about sums it up.

Of course good music still very much exists... but you have to dig pretty deep and pretty hard to find it. And for the larger part, it's NOT on the shelves of the music stores. And even if it is, it nearly never wins any awards. Can anyone tell me, when the last time was that Mike Oldfield won any awards? [Well as far as I know it was 1975 Grammies. He has released a gazillion albums since then.] And how about Amethystium? And how about Craig Armstrong? And how about all the ingenious "Creative Commons" musicians? Who's supporting those?

Would it have been up to me, this year's Grammy Awards would have gone to: Sleepthief, SinQ, Brian Culbertson, aMUSiC, Röyksopp, Massive Attack, Keiko Matsui, Mosaik, Brian Tyler, Schiller, and may more....

So now I'm going to go and enjoy listening to SinQ's "Hyperism" series... ingenious electronic music....

Labels: , ,

 

Ahoo "Aasemoon" Pirsoleimani, 1998-2014