Digitivity » Misc

11:11 on 11/11/11: What Were You Doing?

Digitivity — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 18:11:05 +0000

Eleven minutes past eleven o’clock on the 11th day of the 11th month of the 11th year only rolls around once in a 100 years.

So what were you doing at that time?

Do you know anyone who was born on a “special” date?

If you missed the special moment this year, you can try for 12:12 on 12/12/12 next year.

Google Homepage Doodle Honors Jorge Luis Borges

Digitivity — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 12:31:00 +0000

Posted in Images

If you went directly to google.com today, you see a doodle on the Google homepage honoring Jorge Luis Borges, an Argentinian author who was a hypertext visionary. What do you think? Related posts:Google Homepage Honors Pierre de Fermat Google Homepage Honors Gregor Mendel Rogue Blogs Using Google to Offer Malware and Bogus Antiviruses Related posts:

Google Homepage Honors Pierre de Fermat

Digitivity — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 15:08:00 +0000

Posted in Images

If you’ve been to google.com today, you might have noticed the Google logo looks like a chalkboard. It’s Google’s way of honouring Pierre de Fermat, a French mathematician famous for his Last Theorem, of which the proof was supposedly to long to be able to be written in a book of his. What’s your verdict: [...] Related posts:

So You Need A Typeface

Digitivity — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 13:45:00 +0000

Posted in Images

It’s hard to decide which font to use. So somebody came up with a flowchart to help you decide. It’s linked here, and available here. No related posts. No related posts.

Do Long URLs Waste Bandwidth?

Digitivity — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 12:17:29 +0000

And now for dumb question of the day:

Do long URLs waste bandwidth?

You’d think that a few tens of bytes wouldn’t matter. But if you’re dealing with huge numbers of page accesses, and a large number of resources per page, the number can get pretty big.

The folks at o3 magazine came up with a sum of 783GB downstream and 469GB upstream per day for Facebook URLs.

Then again, some of their suggestions for what you should do to decrease URL size seem to be fairly ludicrous:

Shorten /images to /i
Shorten /javascript to /i
Shorten /css to /c
Shorten logo.jpg to 0.jpg

Resources

http://tech.slashdot.org/tech/09/03/27/2017250.shtml

http://www.o3magazine.com/4/a/0/1.html

Lenovo Getting Rid of the SysRq Key

Digitivity — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 18:53:41 +0000

Slashdot is reporting that Lenovo is removing the SysRq key.

Actually, it’s only being removed on its lower end consumer model. The story is also being followed by Computer Nerds, Witty Reads, and Boing Boing.

I think this is OK for low-end laptops used by novice-level users, and also for power users who need a smaller laptop and are willing to up with the inconvenience of not having a full keyboard.

Since the SysRq key shares space with the PrintScrn (PrintScreen) key in most keyboards, this also means people won’t be able to take screenshots (if that’s something you need to do from time to time) without installing one of those $19.99 shareware screenshot utilities. Pressing the PrintScreen key takes a screenshot in Windows and Ubuntu Linux.

Lenovo is also turning the F1-F12 function keys off by default and replacing their functionality with various laptop-oriented actions like change brightness, wifi on/off, turn off webcam, etc. You can still access the function keys by pressing the Fn key first. This is again oriented toward novice users who don’t know what the function keys are for. They don’t open menus with their keyboard. They don’t press F2 to rename a file in Windows Explorer. In fact, they can barely find files at all, much less rename them.

There are some people, such as this comment on the Lenovo blog, who question all of the following keys:

Caps Lock
PgUp / PgDn
Insert
Pause / Break
Scroll lock
SysRq (what is that?)
Half of the F# keys

So, here’s what either these keys (and some others) are for or what I use them for:

The “weird” keys on keyboards

Caps Lock Key

Like the label implies, it locks the keyboard into capitals mode so you can type uppercase letters. Since English has both upper and lowercase letters, it seems fairly obvious that you’d want a way to type both without individually holding Shift for each letter.

I use it to type headings in caps. Often certain programming code needs to be in upper or lowercase as well. Yes, we could live without it, but we could also live without heated car seats, or for that matter, computers, too, right?

PgUp/PgDn Key

What? Does nobody use PageUp and PageDown to move up and down in a browser? It’s used in almost every other program that displays a lot of text, or even lists. Microsoft Word, Windows Explorer, Nautilus File Manager, Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc.

If companies actually paid attention to what their officer “workers” did, they might find that they spend half their time picking up the mouse and painstakingly holding down the scrollbar after missing a few times, and then dragging all the way up or down, or rotating the scrollwheel about a hundred times. Ctrl+Home or Ctrl+End to go to the beginning or end of a document must seem an alien concept.

Insert Key

Changes the editing mode from insert to overwrite. Normally when you start typing, you are adding characters to the ones already there. If you’re in overwrite mode, you are replacing the characters already present with the new ones you’re typing. This removes the need to first select and delete text that you want to change.

In insert mode, the cursor (or caret as it’s called in Windows) which indicates the point where the current typing position is a slim line wedged in between two existing characters. In overwrite mode, it’s a solid rectangle which overlays the existing character which will be replaced when you type another. The modes are indicated in most text-editing or word-processing programs by the words INS or OVR in the status bar at the bottom.

Pause/Break Key

Pauses screen output. It also stops the execution of a program. It stops execution in a different and more forceful way than Ctrl+C does. Granted, non-programmers could probably live without this.

In Windows Win+Break is a handy shortcut to bring up the System Properties dialog.

I think the Pause function should be put to good use in games and web browsers. They Pause key could pause execution of a game. It could also pause the playing of a YouTube or other Flash movie playing in a web browser.

Multimedia programs should also use it to pause playing of movies and MP3s (but they don’t, preferring the space bar instead).

Scroll Lock Key

Activates a special mode in Excel that allows you to move the view of the spreadsheet without changing which cell is currently selected. That’s actually a function that I think should be used in more programs. When you’re editing a document, sometimes you want to view what you’ve written above or below, but you don’t want to lose your place. Without Scroll Lock, you can’t move your view without moving the caret.

Also used in Linux to stop terminal output.

Function Keys

F1 Help
F2 Rename. Also used in spreadsheet programs like Excel or OpenOffice Calc to edit the current cell.
F3 Used to go to the matching item when doing a search in many programs.
F4 Used in conjunction with Alt to terminate a program in Windows and Ubuntu. By itself, it drops down a drop-down list in Windows. It also drops down the list of past addresses or files in Internet Explorer or Windows Explorer.
F5 Used as Refresh in numerous programs, chiefly web browers and file managers.
F6 Used to move around tabs or different locations on the screen. Often used with Ctrl to switch tabs.
F7 Alt+F7 is “move window” in Ubuntu.
F8 Alt+F8 is “resize window” in Ubuntu.
F9 Alt+F9 is “minimize window” in Ubuntu.
F10 Used in Windows and Ubuntu to open the main menus.
F11 Used to go to full screen mode in a lot of programs, including Firefox and GEdit.

SysRq Key

SysRq stands for System Request, and it shares space with the PrintScrn key, as noted above. If you get rid of the SysRq key, you’ll get rid of PrintScreen as well.

As for what it does in its own right, it’s meant to talk directly to the operating system in when some kind of fault occurs. It’s used in Ubuntu and Linux to bring the system down in an ordered way without losing data.

Delete/Backspace Keys

Delete deletes characters to the right of the caret, while Backspace deletes characters ot the left. The trend is to leave out delete on smaller keyboards. I still want it on a full keyboard, though.

Home/End Keys

They go to the beginning and end of a line. Combined with Ctrl, they go to the beginning and end of a document or a web page.

Control Key

Used for numerous shortcuts. The most prominent being:

Ctrl+C: Copy
Ctrl+X: Cut
Ctrl+C: Copy
Ctrl+Z: Undo
Ctrl+Y: Redo
Ctrl+O: Open
Ctrl+S: Save
Ctrl+N: New
Ctrl+P: Print
Ctrl+A: Select All
Ctrl+B: Bold
Ctrl+U: Underline
Ctrl+I: Italic
Ctrl+Break: Stop (works in the terminal or command window)

Alt Key

Alt stands for Alternate (though I’ve never seen it spelled out on an actual keyboard). Used to access down the main menus in Windows and Linux. Also used to activate the underlined shortcuts in dialogs in Windows and Linux.

It’s part of the the infamous Ctrl+Alt+Delete which was used to reboot Windows. (In Windows XP it brings up the Task Manager.) In Ubuntu it brings up a dialog that allows you to restart, shut down, or hibernate the computer.

Windows Key

This brings up the Windows Start menu in Windows. It’s sometimes (though not always) used to bring up a similar menu in Linux. That’s how I like to set it.

It’s also used as as shortcut in Windows for various actions:

Win+R is the run command dialog.
Win+E brings up Windows Explorer.
Win+D shows the Desktop.

Should keyboards be simplified for noobs?

Well, for small keyboards for netbooks and the like, I can understand this. But not for desktops and larger laptops. I think there’s an undercurrent of feeling that many keys are truly useful only for software developers. But the trend towards removing functionality conflicts with the general geekification of society.

There are millions of blogs out there, and the vast majority are not operated by programmers. Wouldn’t Joe Blogger want to post a screenshot of a video running in his web browser for a post of his? How would he do this without the PrintScreen key (shared with the SysRq key)?

Anymore, everybody alive is going to be people who have used computers since the age of three. They’ll have had plenty of time to experiment with the Home and PageUp keys. The funny thing is, people will be terrified by the seven keys of the apocolyse (Insert, Delete, Home, End, PageUp, PageDown, and Scroll Lock), yet they’ll have no problem operating a stereo system with untold keys:

Conclusion

Drop the keys for low-end portables, but not for standard ones.

What’s Good Podcast about Why Macs Are Better Than PCs

Digitivity — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 22:34:43 +0000

The John Chow blog featured a guest article by the writers of a new blog for 20-somethings called the What’s Good Blog.

Their most recent blog entry is a podcast about the “Top 5 Reasons Why Macs Are Better than PCs“.

Somehow or another, it ended up being more than five items.

Here’s what they say:

No need to scan for viruses. I have iAntiVirus, didn’t really use it. Macs = small market share so virus writers don’t target it.
Never seen a blue screen of death on the machine. Worst case is an app has to be killed.
Plugin hardware: wireless keyboard, etc. Automatically starts working or downloads it.
Had to find drivers manually for a networked computer for Windows, but Mac had already installed drivers without prompting.
Little reason for an external firewall. Apple has a firewall. Prompts to allow or disallow programs from accessing the Internet. Windows 7 has a good firewall for incoming, but not outgoing communications. You have to manually set it.
Great for multimedia and communications. Artists prefer it, and the Mac works better for this stuff. iChat, iMovie, Garage Band.
Overall quality of the product. Apple puts higher quality in their products.

My comments

Generally, I think their points are OK. For #4 I would say, you should still have a cheap Netgear firewall/router/switch, though the OS itself should protect itself too.

As for #2, the reason Macs rarely totally crash is simply because Apple controls the hardware and software. PCs give you the freedom of choosing your own hardware, and with that comes the price of risk.

Regarding #1, that, of course, is the reason I moved to Ubuntu (after cleaning a virus infection on Windows).

VLC Reverts to Normal Without the Santa Hat After New Year

Digitivity — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 14:23:22 +0000

I wrote a few weeks ago about VLC sporting a Santa hat icon for Christmas.

Look like things are back to normal again after New Year’s Day:

VLC About Screen Without Christmas Santa Hat Icon

Whereas, before, the hat showed up on the VLC icon in Help: About:

VLC About Screen with Christmas Santa Hat Icon

The Controversy Over the VLC Santa Hat

Although most people who wrote about the topic on the Internet seemed to like the holiday cheer, others, who don’t celebrate Christmas, weren’t so happy:

Rob Whelan posted the following message to the VLC development mailing list:

Greetings.

Is there a way to remove or disable the Christian holiday Easter egg? Many
users (myself included) are not Christian and feel that this icon is
probably not a good idea. We do not see similar Easter eggs for high
holidays of other faiths (Ramadan, Kwanzaa, Hanukah, Buddhist and Hindu
holidays etc.) and wonder if VLC is positioning itself as ‘anti’ other
faiths since its development team is mostly European and American.

It is a shame to make users who have supported the project feel as though
they are less valued than other users.

Is there a way I can remove this icon from my viewer without having to
recompile my own copy which is something far beyond the average user’s
ability?

Pierre Ynard responded:

My personal opinion is that the majority of our user base is positively
receptive to the christmas spirit, and that the majority of those who
aren’t positively receptive, aren’t receptive at all, i.e. just don’t
care.

What do you think? Would you accept a VLC that had Hindu, Druid, Muslim, or pagan symbols?

Rogue Blogs Using Google to Offer Malware and Bogus Antiviruses

Digitivity — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 18:58:16 +0000

The Unmask Parasites blog has uncovered a devious method being used by a particular network of malware sites. Maleware purveyors are creating subdirectories in legitimate blogs where they host their own illegitimate blogs.

The illegitimate blogs are targeted toward very specific and unpopular Google search terms, such as “blue mustang picture”, “upstate ny photos”.

Interestingly, the malware isn’t presented if you go directly to the site, only if you go through Google. The malware is presented in the form of bogus anti-virus software, but not directly. Rather, obfuscated Javascript redirects are used to prevent blacklisting.

Unmask Parasites cites this as another reason to be running the Firefox NoScript plugin, which allows Javascript only for specified sites.

Another plugin for this purpose, much simpler than NoScript, is QuickJava, which allows you to turn Javascript on and off with a single click.

It’s also another reason to keep WordPress (or whatever blog software you’re using) updated and to regularly check your installation for problems.

Read the details of the malware network at Unmask Parasites.

The E-mail @ Sign Wasn’t Invented Yesterday

Digitivity — Fri, 15 May 2009 18:44:09 +0000

Ever wonder where the “@” used in e-mail address formats came from?

Well, it’s not as if the inventors of e-mail came up with a new funny character first, and then it started showing up on computer keyboards. In English, the “@” is known as the “at” sign, derived from “at the rate of,” being used to indicate prices of commodities. But the earliest recorded use of the sign wasn’t in England.

Rather, reports Wired, referencing a The Next Web article, the earliest use of @ outside a monastery was in a letter written in 1536 by a Florentine trader named Francesco Lapi. It was used to mean “amphora,” a unit of measure.

At Sign

Via the Bits blog at the New York Times.