Category: Tools

If I ever get around to it, this might be useful

An in-depth exploration of the art of
shell scripting. A “must-have” guide for sys-admins, web-developers and
programmers working on Unix-like systems.

This tutorial assumes no
previous knowledge of scripting or programming, but progresses rapidly
toward an intermediate/advanced level of instruction . . . all the
while sneaking in little snippets of UNIX® wisdom and lore. It serves
as a textbook, a manual for self-study, and a reference and source of
knowledge on shell scripting techniques. The exercises and
heavily-commented examples invite active reader participation, under
the premise that the only way to really learn scripting is to write scripts.

SendToAny – send any file to any app.

Here’s a cool little hack that extends the utility of the “Send To…” command on context menus in Windows.
SendToAny synchronizes your Start Menu to the Send
To… menu so you can send any file to any application, regardless of the file association you might have set up on your
system.

So, if you want to open an RTF file in WordPad for example, rather than Word, you’d simply right click on the RTF file
and choose Send To… and navigate to WordPad in the Accessories menu.

This is really helpful on a Tablet PC when working with the pen as you can click-and-hold on any file, pop up the
context menu and open the files(s) in your preferred application.

SendToAny is donationware.

Although some of this is highly Mac specific, it looks like it will
still be helpful in configuring a similar setup on my Windows LAMP
configuration as well.

I might choose to use this in the next iteration of my blog

[Curiouser and curiouser!]

Looks like some good info/input on getting DSL connnections at home and at BI streamlined and set up as correctly as possible.

The router, which I bought for around $50
after a rebate, is an amazing Linux device that's an 802.11g wireless
access point, router, and four-port 10/100 Ethernet switch. You can
reprogram it with SSH and a lot of other Linux software, turning it
into a killer pint-sized wireless ISP. Robert X. Cringley calls it “disruptive technology”:

… the WRT54G with Sveasoft firmware is all you need to become your
cul de sac's wireless ISP. Going further, if a bunch of your friends in
town had similarly configured WRT54Gs, they could seamlessly work
together and put out of business your local telephone company.

All I wanted was the router, so that I can keep a wired home network functioning and add wireless access.

The WRT54G's installation wizard
assumes an easy process: Run the wizard with your Internet connection
working to detect configuration settings, connect the modem to the
router over an Ethernet cable, plug the router into the computer, and
we all live happily ever after.

Unfortunately, as I found out after
trial and error (and error and error), the Westell modem provided by
BellSouth FastAccess DSL is actually a router. Two routers don't get
along with each other, causing connection problems, IP address
conflicts, and something ominous called double NATing. I'm guessing that my NATs, whatever they are, should remain single.

Thanks to a forum post by Tom Scales on SpeedGuide.Net, I found the solution:
Plug the Westell back in to the computer and configure it over a
browser to Bridged Ethernet mode, which delegates all routing
responsibilities to the WRT54G, then connect the Internet back into the
router.

From any room in my house, I can now waste time on the Web at breakneck speed. [Workbench]

The wonderful thing about the net is all the neat stuff you can find to play with instead of doing something productive.

Celestia: Real-Time Space Simulation.

A coworker tipped me off to this cool space simulation that allows for three-dimensional travel of the universe. From the website:

Unlike most planetarium software, Celestia doesn’t confine you to the surface of the Earth. You can travel throughout the solar system, to any of over 100,000 stars, or even beyond the galaxy. All travel in Celestia is seamless; the exponential zoom feature lets you explore space across a huge range of scales, from galaxy clusters down to spacecraft only a few meters across.

I’ll admit that I can’t even grasp everything that one can do with this. In my short travels, I got lost somewhere outside of the Milky Way, did a demo, checked out constellations, and tried unsuccessfully to find a comet to follow.

Celestia runs on Windows, Linux/Unix, and Mac OSX. Additionally, ambitious sorts can create their own scripts for customized tours.

(Word of warning: If you don’t have a great graphics card (less than 16 megs), you’ll want to download the low res version.)

Visit Site [Forever Geek]

Something else I need to get around to sooner rather than later. One more opportunity to piggyback on the work of people smarter than I am.

S5 1.1a4. Hooray, we’re up to 1.1a4! The only real change here is that I’ve added a “what do you want to hide, the controls or just the popup menu?” feature. This is handled with the following meta element: <meta name=”controls” content=”hide” /> That will hide all the controls. The default …(323 words | Tools S5 | comments and pings allowed) [Thoughts From Eric]

Something to add to the list of tools to check out. I’m slowly working
through an evaluation of new blogging tools and may even get around to
making a transition to a new tool.

New Blogging Tool : Elite Journal – Scott on Feedster. New Blogging Tool : Elite Journal – Written in RUBY [Weblog Tools Collection]