There’s a quick list of Easter Eggs over on LifeHacker… Some of them are pretty sweet (Google Earth Flight Sim!). Some are old classics.
Have a look at the LifeHacker post, and then check out these other two sites for a few more:
Tag Archives: Geeky
4.5 Ways to Pimp Out Windows Vista
As some of you may already know, I run Windows Vista on my Macbook. Not full time, mind you, I’m a fan of virtualization. 
I’ve been trying to give my ol’ Vista install a bit more of a “wow” factor recently, and I’ve come across some great tips to help make your PC unique.
1. Lively Logon
This app’s not Vista specific, but Logon Studio will allow you to completely customize the way that your login screen looks. Make your Windows Vista look like Mac OS X or Fedora Core 6. The only downside to the Vista version is that it will only allow you to change the background, whereas previous versions provided a finer degree of cotrol.
Logon Studio is maintained by the Stardock folks. For a bit more detailed review, you can check out GGP #79.
2. Gadgets Galore
Much like some other operating systems that shall remain nameless, Windows Vista has a sidebar to help you pimp-out your desktop with all sorts of fun and useful gadgetry. Everything from traffic monitors, to CPU monitors, to gadgets that will do a slideshow of your favourite Facebook pics. You can pretty much do anything with a sidebar gadget because it’s written using HTML and CSS. Microsoft hosts a site called the Windows Live Gallery which will allow you to download dozens of these great free gadgets.
3. Wicked Wallpaper
Wallpaper is the quintessential customization that nearly everyone seems to know how to do. As soon as we get our new computers almost the first thing that most people do is change their wallpaper. Popular choices are the family pet, children, or “that beach” that you’ll get to… someday.
There are tons of sites out there that produce great wallpaper. But one that most people forget about is good old photo-sharing site Flickr. A simple query for “Vista Wallpaper” yields thousands of potential wallpaper candidates. Here are a few of my favourites:
Photo Credit: wvs on Flickr
Photo Credit: janusz on Flickr
Photo Credit: spitfirelas on Flickr
Photo Credit: creativesam on Flickr
4. Spectacular Screen Savers
After the wallpaper, the next most common customization is changing one’s screen saver. Sure, Windows has a dozen or so “interesting” screen savers, but really how many more times can we watch the starfield, or pour over those same photos again and again.
A great application called InstantStorm will allow you to turn any flash file (.swf) into its own screen saver. This tool will take the flash file, and compile it into a self-installing screen saver ready to deploy on your computer. This has the added bonus of being easily distributable and makes for a great screen saver to use at trade shows, or to distribute to clients on one of those funky business card CDs.
Instant storm was also reviewed on GGP #77.
side note: I borrowed the flash file of the pug licking a monitor to do my demo. Worked out pretty well!
5. Theme Theory
This is the half-tip… I really wanted to include some detailed theme information for Vista but I couldn’t. Here’s why:
Windows themes have been a topic that for many users lays shrouded in mystery. How come there are people with better looking versions of Windows than me? Where can I get that? Well, I have some answers for you here. A theme is a way of customizing everything in your Windows UI in one fell swoop. This includes colours and wallpaper for a start, but often will include new icons, application skins or screen savers as well.
In Windows Vista theming really has a long way to go. After seven years, there are tons of great theming devices for Windows XP, but for Vista many of the third-party theme options are limited and buggy.
Plug: If you’re still using XP and like high-tech looking themes… go get AlienGUIse.
Apple Support Treats Us Like Babies… Sometimes
Please Apple, heed my call. We’re not all n00bs.
I performed a series of software updates on my computer today. Apple has learned that some of us would like to know what our update contains, beyond the simple “bug fixes” or “compatibility fixes” that it typically lists with each update.
My ask is simple, whenever there’s a software update, tell us what’s in it. This way we can assess how important it is to us, and how soon we need to apply it. If I find out that the Finder has a bug in it which will allow a malicious web-page to access my hard drive when I use Safari… I don’t care. I don’t use Safari. But if I did, I’d apply that a lot more quickly than I would an update to add the latest HP printer drivers.
Here are examples of two recent Apple updates. One is done correctly. The other is not. See if you can spot the difference.
BAD! Why? “Compatibility Improvements” isn’t very damned descriptive.
Good! Link is provided to give those who actually want to know, the information they need.
Apple has long been seen as a very easy platform for the non-geeks among us to learn quickly and easily without the configuration and security nightmares that plague the Windows world on occasion (though that’s usually due to market share… but that’s a rant for another day). Constantly focused on ease-of-use and design Apple makes beautiful and elegant products which are easy to understand, and for the most part to intuit. A little consistency in documenting things wouldn’t kill them.
Providing people with the information they need to make an informed choice and just maybe understand their computing experience a little bit more is something that all software developers should consider. It’s nice to have the option to know what people are telling me is a “critical update” so that I can decide for myself.
Twitter Rediscovery
I’ve had a Twitter account for about a year now. Until this past week, I think I’d only posted to it about a half-dozen times. But recently, I’ve started to see some value in Twitter. For some of the bloggers that I follow, something that I’ve noticed on occasion is the delay inherent in RSS. Being able to see immediately when a post is made lets me be the first commenter, or gets me some information just a bit earlier.
I was able to post something to my Twitter account this week to give me some ideas for an issue I was having in my life. By allowing a few more people to give me some feedback, I was able to get an answer and set up a post about it.
My Twitter client of choice (at the moment) is Twhirl, which I covered for this week’s Global Geek Podcast.
So over the next while, I’ll be giving Twitter a good run and trying to see who I can follow, and what I can learn. Nuggets. It’s all about nuggets… er tweets.
Reminder: Take-Down your MySpace Account Tomorrow!
Just a reminder that tomorrow is the official “Delete your MySpace Account Day”. If you have a MySpace account, and you don’t use it, cut down your Bacn and join in the movement.
I’ve been thinking about deleting my Myspace account almost since the day I got it but always opted out of doing so because of the few friends I have who don’t have Facebook accounts. But by remaining on Myspace, I realize, I’m becoming an enabler. I’m giving those friends no reason to switch over from Myspace by giving them access to my Myspace profile.
Originally posted by Simon Owens.
Visit the originating website, or join the Facebook group.
January 30th: International Delete Your MySpace Account Day
I’ve just been directed to a post over on Simon Owens’ site Bloggasm that January 30th is to be International “Delete Your MySpace Account Day“.
As a MySpace member who only ever logs in to check on someone else’s profile about once a year, it just isn’t worth getting all the Bacn from MySpace. I completely understand where Simon’s coming from on this and have decided to join him in supporting this initiative.
So if you have a MySpace account and you don’t use it anymore, join in on International Delete Your MySpace Account Day.
If you’re a Facebook member, you may want to take a moment and join the associated group as well. Thanks to Tom for setting that up!
Bloggers Rule! – CBC’s Test The Nation
Last night the CBC, Canada’s national public broadcaster, aired a quiz show which pitted six different groups from all walks of life against one another on a show they’ve called Test The Nation.
This time around the groups were: Chefs, Cabbies, Celebrity Impersonators, Backpackers, Flight Crews and Bloggers. Members of the blogging team included Vancouver’s own Buzz Bishop, and Rebecca Bolwitt from Miss604 and the Crazy Canucks.
At the end of the day, the Bloggers prevailed winning all three of the available prizes. Check out Rebecca’s post on the victory and the official Test The Nation website for more.
Dave Brubeck, “Take Five”
Thank you Wil Wheaton.
For several years now I’ve wondered what the name of this song is. It’s been used in countless soundtracks, commercials, movies, well the list goes on. And I’ve never been able to find anyone who knows who wrote it, performed it or what the name of it was… until now.
I found this post through my RSS reader tonight (I’m a bit behind on some of my blog reading….). As I was catching up on the latest from “wwdn: in exile” I found a post entitled joe morello is a god.
[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=DDOgYw5-pNs&feature=related]
Now I know that the song is called Take Five, from an album called Time Out. The YouTube clip pictured above is the Dave Brubeck Quartet from 1961. I was trying to find different clip from the one Wil already posted, but it really does appear to have the best audio of all the original Dave Brubeck clips.
iPod Touch: Unboxing
Over the last several months, my 20GB 4th Gen iPod has been giving me some trouble, mainly because I’m hard on my gadgets and this one’s been battered about a few too many times. With hard-drive based media players this usually means that the device is as good as bricked. I’ve been hanging in there with my 2GB iPod nano that I got as a freebie with the Macbook, but 2GB really isn’t enough storage for me. I carry around about 400-500 MB of podcasts on a regular basis, and my favourite four playlists add up to about 2GB. So the nano-diet has meant much more frequent re-synchronizing with iTunes. Enough was enough.
I finally took the leap and picked up a 16GB iPod Touch. The price is a bit steep compared to that of some of the more traditional media players, but after having played with it for just a couple of days, I’m completely convinced.
The battery life (albeit on a brand spankin’ new unit) has been quite impressive so far. It easily handles a full work day with a mix of audio and video.
The multi-touch interface is near to the holy-grail of modern-day UI design. Everything moves as I expect it to, and reacts as I expect it to (a couple of 3rd-party apps notwithstanding). The UI does a great job of emulating how objects would move or scroll if they were in the physical world.
Third party software is widely available for the iPhone, and luckily for those of us who bought an iPod touch the device can be cracked (Jailbroken) to allow you to place the installed (and myriad other applications) on it. A wonderful feature to make use of the available wifi.
I’ve got lots more to say about this device in the coming days and weeks, including some examples of some great software and hardware iPod Touch hacks.
SimCity Source Code Released Under GPL
Bil Simser has posted an article on his blog about the release of the source code for the original SimCity under the GPL. The GPL’d version has been renamed under the original working title Micropolis to protect the trademarks of Electronic Arts who currently own the intellectual property for the Sim* franchise. If the original title had stuck I wonder what they’d call The Sims these days….
The source code for Micropolis has been published on author Don Hopkins’ website. He has also included a bit of history about this branch of the SimCity project including some technical detail behind this iteration of the code. The GPL version has also been ported to the version of Fedora Linux being run on the OLPC. A great way to spread this brilliant game to those who are just getting a computer for the first time.
I love the fact that older software continues to be released to the public domain. I’d love to find a copy of Wing Commander… If there’s anyone out there from Origin (or EA) can we see a GPL’d version of WC1 so that we can play it on our Macs!!