The truth doesn't always hurt; sometimes it amuses us

My colleagues are laughing right now, because now that we're being forced to remove whatever antivirus software we were running and install McAfee, our Windows 7 machines are reporting that no antivirus protection is installed. Me? I don't really see a joke, there.

Earlier, the guys were crying about how much slower their computers were running. I'm a little behind--currently at the stage of uninstalling the unapproved app (in preparation for installing ePO), so I will be crying in a couple of hours, I'm sure.

Waking up to tech woes

A tech-head who spends too much time playing with technology late at night needs help waking up. Sometimes, it's just hard to find good help. My mornings go something like this:

Standard alarm clock: "Howdy! I am loud, and I have nine-minute snooze intervals. In addition to beeping, I can play the radio for you!"
Me: "What can I do with nine minutes? That's entirely too short, and I don't want some radio personality blathering at me when I am trying to go back to sleep wake up!"

HTC HD7 phone with Windows Phone 7: "Check me out! I have five-minute snooze intervals, and you can set different alarms for different days of the week!"
Me: "Five minutes? That's worse than the alarm clock! Not to mention I don't like ANY of your alarm sounds; why can't I set what I want? No, no, please don't cry; your SharePoint and Office Live support is really nice, but it just won't get me out of bed."

Samsung Moment with Android 2.1: "I can set alarms for different days of the week, too! And if you choose me, you can have 10-, 15-, 20-, 25- or 30-minute snooze intervals. Plus, I can crow like a rooster!"
Me: "Annoying rooster noises aside, that would be GREAT...as long as you aren't stuck in a reboot loop...you know, kind of like the one you were stuck in this morning!"

iPhone 3G: "If you would just take me out of the backpack sometimes--"
Me: "Shhh! Grown people are sleeping!"

Lacking an extremely reliable device that has truly flexible alarm options, I almost always use the Moment as the primary alarm clock. As a backup for when the Moment is having one of its moments of FAIL, the HD7 is set to go off at the last minute, in case I'm not yet awake and getting ready for work, the workout, or play.

Thanks, Facebook, I think you botched it again

You see, I'm pretty sure I had my wall visible to everyone before your meddling. My posts were set by default to be invisible to a couple of groups of people; since permissions for individual posts can't be set from phones, this seemed the way to handle things for when I'm out and about. If I really wanted a post to be visible to all friends or a broader group, then I'd find a PC for that status update, link, etc.

Now, it seems you've gone and "fixed" things so that individuals in my default "no-see" categories can't see my wall and, therefore, the posts I intended for them. Giving them the ability to see the posts they should apparently means setting the default for new posts to a visibility level I did not desire. My friend was right, I suppose, when he said during our BSD arguments that simpler just means having fewer options.

Can you be any more annoying?

Will punctuation help you get your point across?

There’s a thread on FriendFeed that quite appropriately warns people of the dangers of failing to use a comma when tweeting. Anyone who’s given it much thought understands that punctuation can be key in getting your point across (or mangling it). However, sometimes using or omitting punctuation properly is lost on those who don’t give it much thought, and reading that funny thread made me recall just such an occasion.

Years ago, a friend and I'd had a discussion about my frustration with UNIX help files. After he'd made yet another suggestion, I went home and tried it, then emailed him to complain. His response was basically "why are you telling me about your sex life?" His suggestion? Enter "man man." In my subject line, I told him I “did a man man;” In the body of the email, I told him I received useless information for my efforts. My lesson? Sometimes the comma—or lack, thereof--doesn't help.

I no longer tell anyone I did a “man man.” In fact, I just don’t do a “man man,” just to save myself from having to explain later. If I need to know anything while working in UNIX, I just may hit Google up for answers. Almost all of us are doing Google, and like one FriendFeeder said, he tried Binging someone and got a nasty rash!

 

 

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Playing with FaceBook apps: What Element Are You?

I used to find FaceBook apps immensely annoying, but they're starting to grow on me. I'm not sure if they are changing, or if I am. I'm still not going to be in any games that glorify crime or criminals, and I'm not so much into racing, but there seem to be plenty of things out there for the RPG-lover and strategy game addict I've been known to be. The latest of the apps I've given in to is the one that determines which element you resemble. As with my Inner Nationality Quiz results, I was not expecting the answer I got. Metal? me? really?