A couple gets trapped in time…
Ever lose your keys, look where you left them, and then find them there a little while later…
But can you ever go back…and if you did, would anyone believe you…
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Archive for the ‘Internet’ Category
A Matter of Minutes
Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008
Blast in Pakistan Marriott
Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008It is fortunate that the truck was unable to breach the security gate. The death toll would certainly have been higher. If there are a few who are willing to go to extremes to kill many, then it is critcal that we do three things: learn how to defend against attacks and learn how to anticipate and then prevent them. The third thing is much harder and may be impossible; to eliminate these types of suicide attacks at their source.
Among the many killed were two active duty military members assigned to Pakistan.
You can see the location of the truck by the crater left in the center of this photo.
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Honda Japan – New Odyssey
Saturday, September 20th, 2008Honda Japan announced on 19 Sep (today) that they will unveil the newest version of the Odyssey. http://www.honda.co.jp/ODYSSEY/new/ If you have been following the Odyssey in Japan, you know that it has gotten lower and more stylish as it ages. The new Odyssey looks to be in the same style with minor cosmetic changes. The big news will hopefully be in the user interface. The webpage touts a new all-around view camera similar to the one Nissan has been promulgating over the last year. The camera allows you to have a bird’s eye view of your vehicle as you tackle difficult parking situations like narrow spots to back into, or parallel parking. The cameras also allow you to see down both sides of the car for narrow streets, and see into cross traffic when exiting narrow driveways or the like.
I will visit the dealer in October to let you know what I think about the new model!
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I want to live in America!
Friday, September 12th, 2008West Side Story the Movie was and is a great musical with a great Romeo and Juliet story. But the I want to live in America is a great catchy tune that I just had to hear. The link below is great, it includes the conversation leading up to that singing and dancing scene that puts Puerto Rico in the spot light…for good or for bad.
http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=Qy6wo2wpT2k
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What’s in (the pronunciation of) a name?
Thursday, September 11th, 2008Around the world, Americans can be found modifying the spelling, sound, or appearance of a country’s name. Perhaps I am being a little overstated. The practice of changing names began long before the United States of America was even conceived.
China gained its name based on one family’s rise to power (The Qin) and their succesful marketing efforts. They are still the Middle Country in their own language.
And what about Japan. Nippon is the local way to call the country.
Germany? Deustchland?
The US government doesn’t recognize Myanmar. We still call it Burma. (I’m convinced this is a dialect issue…the original country name probably sounded like something in-between Burma and Myanmar…we just can’t spell that way….) (more…)
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New Computer
Thursday, September 11th, 2008I spend a lot of time on computers. I have 4 of them in the house and usually at least 2 or 3 are on simultaneously. I upgrade my machines at about 5-7 years after I buy them. So when I upgrade, it is usually a quantum leap. My first computer was a Timex Sinclair. Next, an 8086. That was followed by a 286 and then a Pentium. I built my first computer using an Athalon 1.3 GHz chip and it slowly acquired minor upgrades here and there allowing it to function for a full 8 years. As a matter of fact, it still runs great. New power supply, Dual Monitors, 1.6TB of SATA storage, DVD burner, Wireless NIC, etc.
So the question is now what? What do I replace this venerable workhorse with? (more…)
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Command Line (or is it DOS?)
Wednesday, August 27th, 2008I used to use batch files and DOS commands when I sat down at my computer. (I’m not that old am i?) Well I got an inkling to go and do that again so I did a search and discovered that DOS is dead. I mean I knew that, I just didn’t realize that the DOS emulator I have been seeing is not a DOS emulator. It is a command line prompt. Which means the possibilties are much greater than just a dumbed down DOS. You can actually do much more. But don’t let me ramble on about this, go see for yourself.
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Georgia
Wednesday, August 20th, 2008H.D.S. Greenway writes an op-ed in the Boston Globe that says the U.S. led Georgia’s Mikheil Saakashvili to believe that he could walk in, pick up some disputed territory called South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and keep the change [pun intended]. Russia had other ideas. Namely, they had no intention of allowing further encroachment. “If you don’t like the status quo, then we’ll let you know how we really feel”, seems to be the Russian position.
So now, the U.S. can’t jump in and claim righteous battle against the Russians, they can’t support their newfound friend in the Georgians, and after a lot of hand-wringing…the rest of the world may start rethinking how much the U.S. is really willing to back their ”strongly worded” friendships. Or maybe…others will start thinking that it’s time to go grabbing all that disputed territory that has been sitting dormant under “status quo” of one kind or another. After all, the U.S. appears otherwise occupied right now and can’t come save the world.
How many regions would the U.S. ignore before this becomes the spark that triggered a world-war unlike the previous wars…numerous small enclaves all out for their own flag planting sessions. No single big, bad guy. Just a lot of noise. No combined factions. Just lots and lots of demons taking pot shots at innocents and others to redraw political boundaries, map lines, or ethnic enclaves. The U.S. would be powerless to say who was on the right, and who was wronged. This could go on for decades.
Oh wait…what was I thinking…it already is.
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Outlook Recovery
Tuesday, August 19th, 2008I use Outlook 2007 for my e-mail. Two days ago Outlook froze. It started, it loaded some of the folders, and then it just sat…twinkling my to-do list as if to taunt me. It looked like it was trying to load the page, but couldn’t. I guess it was tired of handling my thousands of e-mails and hundreds of to-do items.
It was then I realized my pst file was 2.8GB. Apparently, when the pst cruises over the 2GB limit, bad things happen (And I thought computers could work faster to make my life easier…why doesn’t Outlook keep backups, create updates, and properly allocate my pst so it doesn’t cause unrecoverable problems?)
Usually, I make regular copies of this critical file, but somehow, I had just deleted the single backup copy of this file only hours earlier. And due to its large size, the Microsoft Recycle Bin couldn’t handle it…it was deleted permanently.
No loss though, Microsoft includes a hidden file called ScanPST that checks the pst for errors, repairs it, and gets you back to work in no time at all. Or so I thought. I ran ScanPST. It found 60 errors and repaired them, but Outlook was no better. It still froze just as it did before the scan and repair.
So I searched the Internet. The hand-dandy know-all Internet. Surely, some blog, some BBS, some forum has tackled this issue and some smart geek had all the answers I needed. Most answers told me about ScanPST or even how to ask Microsoft for destructive software to truncate data from my file in case that is the problem. But none of these really solved the problem. I found no expert giving superlative pearls of wisdom on this subject. I did find several companies offering software solutions to repair my PST in exchange for my money. Of the four companies that I narrowed my selection; three had try before you buy software. One company appeared to be coming from Russia, two from India, and one had stores all over the world.
I couldn’t find anyone who had rated these software applications, so I bit the bullet, and downloaded trial versions of the software:
- PST Recovery from India dissapointingly gave me a warning error stating it could not locate my Personal Folder. This is after I navigated to the PST, opened the file and allowed the software to run for several minutes. I clicked <O.K.> and the program continued to run…and run…and run…. At least, the task bar said it was running, but it didn’t tell me what it was doing. After 30 minutes of undetermined behavior with the “processing” bar scrolling repeatedly across it’s little window, I shut down the program and uninstalled it. Scratch one.
- RecoveryToolbox, also from India quickly loaded up and automatically found my PST folder. I selected the PST in question, and clicked on Next. Within seconds, it had located my folders, and began giving me a running status on how many files, folders, sectors, blocks, etc. it had found and was in the processing of sorting out. I let it run… for several hours. It then asked if I wanted to recover the file as a PST or as .eml (for Microsoft Express). I chose PST and it converted up to 5 e-mails per mail folder (trial version restriction). I tested the sample and it all worked. I went back to the website and paid the $50 via PayPal for this software.
At this point, I expected to open up the software, copy the serial number into a field somewhere, then go back to where I left off, and just export the rest of the folders. However, once you load the Trial Version and import the serial number, you must exit and restart the program. And once you exit and restart, you must also re-import the PST from the beginning. (Remember, this alone takes several hours for a PST of gargantuan size like mine…)
So I let that process run again. And now, after many hours, it asked if I wante to export my files. I again saved them as a PST. After 4 hours, I ended up with three PST files. Each one about 1GB or less.
I figured that this was it. The perfect solution to my problem. Well…almost. I did get back what seems to be all of my e-mails and even the folder structure. What I did not get was a well laid out set of PSTs. Let me explain. Each PST has ALL of my folders and the entire folder structure. What it does not have, is e-mail in every folder in every PST. You see, in order to sort things out, the program built the folder structure, and then populated the folders until it hit the ceiling of 1GB. Then it moved on to the next PST, creating the entire folder structure, but populating from where it left off. and so on. So now, it is up to me, the human, to physically open each folder and hunt for mye-mails. And, I am likely to move them around so each folder is a continguous unit rather than an interrupted stream of thought. This lack of organization makes this program worth about $12 to me. But at least I have my e-mails back. But I’m still curious… - The International Software Company that has the 4th version (I can’t recall the company or the website…I’ll have to add that info later) charges $500 for a personal version of their software. My e-mail is not worth $500. It was worth $50.
- I found other software I’d like to try…but I think I’ll quit while I’m ahead. At $50-$70 a try, this could be an expensive experiment…
If you happen to know of a better way, or have questions…just add a comment below…
(Related: Inside Outlook Express has great information on Outlook Express.)
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