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Choices

OS and device choices…

Back in 1993, when I was having a very painful experience mousing and typing, I purchased and used a serial port touchpad to use with my desktop and WFW 3.11. It worked very well, and my pain was largely alleviated. Nevertheless, I went on to a “mouse pen”–a stylus with a tiny mechanical mouse ball–in 1994, and I stayed with that device, occasionally switching out to the touchpad, for several years.

During those times, I became very used to the desktop metaphor for a GUI and lost touch with many uses for the command line interface, although it has always remained useful for a few things.

This went on through several iterations of Windows and Linux (and even a GUI-ed BSD), and the desktop metaphor has become ingrained in my computer use. Even departures like Ubuntu Unity were too jarring and disruptive for me to maintain he kind of productivity I desire, and why use something different for just farting around on my desktops/notebooks?

Then… so-called “smartphones”. Don’t need one. I do NOT want to be “always connected” and only want a mobile phone to PLACE calls. That’s me. Tablet format? Look, I really, really, REALLY like my Kindle Fire, but manage email? *feh* Trying to type on the thing is painful–not physically, but painful nonetheless. And iPhads I’ve tried typing on? Just as bad. Mousing around while web browsing is OK–no worse than any of the mush pads I’ve used over the years, better than some. But te things I really love the device for are reading books, watching movies and streaming music from my Amazon account (where I can store just about all the mp3s I have *shrugs* Makes it really convenient). I’ve deleted 90% of the Android apps I’ve tried out. Don’t need ’em.

So, all this to say that most of my computer use–aside from watching movies, reading books and listening to music–will definitely stay on desktops and notebooks until someone can come up with a hardware/software combo that can do what desktops/notebooks do BEST now, without a keyboard/mouse(ing device) combo. A wearable computer with virtual display, WORKABLE voice and gesture commands/transcription, etc.? I’d go for that. But for writing something even as simple as a blogpost, tablets are just an inferior means… unless on were using something like one of these:

*shrugs* Even the Microsoft Surface (not yet available to ordinary mortals) has some if-yness. The RT version is a definite “NOPE!” for me. Won’t run “legacy” Windows apps? Then I don’t want it. Only runs “Windows 8” (formerly “Metro”) apps? Double don’t want it. And then there’s the asinine Metro Start Page. (UPDATED… to close the “strike” tag. *sigh*) *feh* An extra hurdle to get to a crippled desktop, where the underpinnings are almost as hidden, inaccessible and untweakable as on a Mac straitjacketed computer. Now, the more expensive x86 hardware M$ Surface tablet also comes with a built in keyboard/case and WILL run x86 apps, but $1,000 for what is essentially a netbook (with a touch screen)? They’re not as thin, but either of these would seem better for my use:

Hey! it even comes with Win7 Starter (and I have plenty of licenses to upgrade that). Touch screen, about the same size as the Surface, and a (I have no doubt) better keyboard. And… under $400. Or,

Keyboard-dock available to push the price to the range of the M$ Surface RT. Still, no Windows app use, of course. Android OS.

But, on my Windows computers, what are the compelling advantages for me–an avid, relatively advanced user of x86 apps (in various OSes)–in upgrading to something that willput me into a more Mac-like straitjacket and INSIST that I MUST be faced with a stupid, unnecessary (for me) Start Page in order to use a crippled DESKTOP APPLICATION to use the x86 Windows apps I want to use? Again, what exactly are those compelling reasons?

Well, I suppose I have found one nearly compelling reason to make one computer a dual-boot Win7-Win8 computer: people will be buying new computers (assuming The Zero and his co-conspirators and fellow travelers haven’t achieved complete success in their goal of completely trashing the economy) and some of those will be running Win8. Some of those folks won’t be calling me up to roll their computers back to a more usable OS but will call on me to solve issues they’re experiencing, so having a “reference system” (like I did with the execrable Windows XP) will probably be helpful, though actually USING the thing for my own use won’t probably be a daily experience.

Win8 seems to me, for users like me, to be a Very Good Reason to use a ‘nix OS more.

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Rubber

No, get your mind outa the gutter. LC Aggie Sith recommended Rubber as a movie that’s “so bad it’s good,” so… I watched it. Mini-spoilers, perhaps, follow:

Little things give it a “fail” in the supposed American ambiance the director was going for. Example: kid, when asked “Don’t you have some homework to do?” responded, “I’m on holiday”–not typical Americanism (which would’ve been “vacation” not “holiday”). It’s replete with other failures of detail (“Sheriff” morphing to “Lieutenant” etc.) that would probably pass with a European audience but any semi-conscious American viewer with more than two active brain cells would immediately recognize this as the product of a foreign mindset.

Still, as an attempt at absurdity, it’s almost successful. Enjoyed it somewhat. I loved the scene where the “sheriff” removed a tire from his vehicle and… the wheel was magically gone; only the tire remained. There are so very many of these minor little things that the primary disconnect from a rational world seems trivial by comparison.

If you’re in the mood for some senseless gore, it’ll do the trick for you. You’ll likely recognize at least one B Movie actor (there are a couple or three *heh*) in the whole flick, and no he doesn’t play “Robert”. *heh*

Continue reading “Rubber”

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About That Most Recent Set of Lies From the Obama Campaign

By now, anyone with more conscious brain activity than a bowl of coleslaw has heard about the scurrilous ad from an Obama-promoting PAC essentially accusing Mitt Romney of being a murderer.

It’s a pack of lies, built by selectively stating a few highly slanted facts… and omitting any truth. And those who presented the ad KNEW they were crafting a slander.

“[They] did enough research to find Mr. Joe Soptic. They did enough research to craft an ad from the man’s sad story. They did enough research to know that Mrs. Soptic died seven years after Romney left Bain, they know that Bain tried to save GST, and they know that an Obama [campaign finance] bundler was the person who ultimately shut GST down. They did the research, they brought the ad forward, and they know more than any of the fact-checkers know, that the ad is a lie.”

They AND the official Obama campaign that introduced Soptic to them also know now AND knew then that Soptic was offered a buy-out, got another job, didn’t put his wife on his insurance–even after she left her job in 2003–and that no insurance under the sun could have saved his wife’s life, since she was symptom-free, was diagnosed during an unrelated illness and passed away 22 days after diagnosis.

And the Obama campaign knew all this back in May, when Stephanie Cutter, deputy Obama campaign manager, hosted a conference call with reporters featuring Soptic and his now infamous story. And yet, of course, the Obama campaign–including Stephanie Cutter, from her own mouth–denied knowing Soptic’s story when the SHTF about the lies in the ad and denied as well any connection to Soptic or the story told in the ad.

Lying about their lies. Oh, well. I guess it’s common enough in this administration to be just another “dog bites man” ho-hummer of a story.

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THIS Is Why America Is Currently in Decline

Well, it’s part (a large part) of the reason we’re in trouble. The following is a partial response to a tech site article, written by a professional “reporter” of tech news, if you can believe it. No, I won’t link it. The parts I don’t point out are as badly-written (or worse) and would only serve to improperly influence anyone not as thoroughly inoculated against linguistic drivel as I seem to be.

    • “At the time there were many different OS’s [sic] on the market…”

    Good Godfrey! Is there no editorial staff? No proofreading? No literate person to put an end to atrocities like this? An apostrophe IS NOT USED TO FORM A PLURAL!

    Apparently, there are no literate gatekeepers between writers and publishing; witness, earlier:

    “Common users also were quite skeptical to [sic] this new fancy gadget called a ‘Mouse’.”

    Not “to” but “about”. Learn the meanings of words!

    And,

    “IBM they [sic] named it PC-DOS and it quickly became a popular and widespread system.”

    WTF?!?

    And, “While back in their ‘lab’ secretly developing their new battleship, that would grow to conquer the world.”

    sic-sic-sic-sic-sic-sic-SICK!

    Sentence, please! Make a sentence! And what’s with the quotation marks around “lab”? And the comma between “battleship” and “that”? It’s just plain stupid, quite apart from being completely, totally and absolutely uncalled for.

    And the hits just keep on (and keep on) coming:

    “Windows 1.0: changing computers for ever…”

    No! No! No! Not “for ever” but “forever”–ONE WORD.

    How about,

    “Windows 1, [sic] was not the first of its kind but it introduced several improvements, among others were [sic] multi-tasking.”

    Dude! Lose the extraneous, meaningless, WRONGLY PLACED commas! They only serve to make you look stupid. And it just makes me sick to read the rest of the sentence. I gag just contemplating that abortion.

    The whole thing continues with one egregiously stupid comma, subject-verb disagreement and word mis-usage after another. *gag* And the guy actually does this for his day job.

    Thief.

    And unwitting subliterate products of “public education” (AKA “prisons for kids” and “remedial failure academies for young adults”) will read this dreck and have their subliterate ignorance reinforced. It’s evil, I say, just evil.

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    “I’m Givin’ It All She’s Got, Cap’n!”

    OK, 105(+) degree weather. Roofing gig on hold. Why? Oh, not the temps so much. No, worn out right now from cutting up and removing a tree that fell last night. Oh, the tree removal’s nowhere near complete, but it’s cut up enough to get it off the house (no damage to house) and moved out of the way enough to be able to get back to work on the roof… when I’ve rested up a wee tad.

    Still, looks like no actual roofing today. Have 65% of the roofing done. The heat allows just spurts of activity, so it’s been slow going, but getting done.

    Interesting project.

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    Harry Reid Should Prove He’s Not a Pederast

    Ever since Class A Jackass Harry Reid has started making undefended, unfounded, unsourced accusations of tax avoidance against MittRomney, unsourced allegations by unnamed, anonymous, redundant *heh* “sources” have surfaced that Harry Reid is a pederast. So far, Harry Reid has refused to offer any proof that he is not a pederast, raising “serious” questions among those who are willing to embrace his complete lack of ethics as to whether these allegations are true.

    Just see for yourself. Type “Harry Reid” into a Google search bar and see what it suggests as possible terms to search for. I did.

    *heh*

    Take that, Jackass Reid.

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    Well, This Sucks

    *sigh* I was saddened to hear of Ric Locke’s illness, and sadder still to learn just now of his passing. I had just read Temporary Duty and was spurred to search out more web info on him… and was struck by the poignancy of his circumstances: first published novel doing well; lung cancer. He seemed to be the kind of guy I would have enjoyed meeting. Someone needs to do a Sci-Fi adaptation of W.H. Auden’s lil ditty for cases like this:

    “As poets have mournfully sung
    Death takes the innocent young,
    The rolling-in-money,
    The screamingly funny,
    And those who are very well hung.”

    R.I.P, Ric. I never knew you, but after having read your novel, I feel as though I could have known you, at least a bit.

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    “…The Age of Knowing How to Do Things”

    The post title is the “hook” of a commercial I just saw for some sort of erectile dysfunction drug I’ve forgotten (never even saw) because of the hook and the setting. You see, the premise was that the featured guy in the ad knew how to get his truck out of a mud wallow he’d driven into. Problem was, he didn’t know jack shit about how to drive his truck, hauling the horse trailer, because he drove right into the mud wallow he got stuck in instead of driving on the high spots on the two-track he was on.

    Ignorant dumbass. The hook should have been, “The age of not even knowing jack shit.” Knowing how to cause oneself to get stuck in the first place trumps knowing how to get oneself out of a mud wallow once one screws up–out of ignorance and stupidity–and gets oneself stuck.

    Anywho… The huge disconnect between the ad’s hook and the circumstances completely destroyed any suspension of disbelief, killed any hope of me actually watching enough of the thing to actually hear the name of the drug.

    (Of course, it’s the stupid ad writer who doesn’t know jack shit.)

    BTW, if one doesn’t already KNOW to avoid driving a vehicle–especially while pulling a trailer–it helps to not be stupid and to actually think about one’s driving…

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    Oh, Yes You Did, Odumbo

    [Roofing work takes a brief blog break 🙂 ]

    So, Odumbo, The Mighty Zero is now claiming, “I didn’t say that!”

    Yes, Odumbo, you did, and, quite apart from all the YouTube hits on the video that proves you did, even your own White House web site says you did:

    Mostest brilliant prexydint evah. And his little dog (“Soup”) too.