Inspiration for Palm OS

Inspiration for Palm OS - Business applications

Inspiration is a venerable software package put out by a small company. It started life as a business/productivity application for mind mapping and graphical thinking then found a niche in K12 education.

One of its peculiarities is that the Mac version can import MORE 3.1 files.

Now they have a version for the Palm. I'm not sure what to make of this. This is one application that seems well suited to a 30" LCD, not a 2" LCD.

Inspiration/Palm syncs with Inspiration Windows. Not sure about Inspiraton Mac. There are very few apps that have versions for Mac, Windows AND Palm.

There is a free trial. I'll give a try. You can download the Palm app for EITHER Mac or Windows.

Quantum Teleportation across the Danube -- Hacking God's Computer

Science & Technology at Scientific American.com: Quantum Teleportation across the Danube Demonstrated

Scientists report today in the journal Nature that they have successfully teleported photons more than 600 meters across the famous waterway.

Rupert Ursin and his colleagues at the Institute for Experimental Physics in Vienna fired a laser through a barium borate crystal to generate two pairs of photons. One pair is entangled, which means that if something disturbs the state of one, the other feels the effects as well--even when they are not physically connected. By separating the entangled pair, the scientists successfully transported information about the state of one photon to the other. Using fiber-optic cable laid under the water in sewer pipes, together with microwaves sent across the air above the water, three distinct states were teleported across the Danube. Over the course of a 28-hour experimental run, the system was correct 97 percent of the time.

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I think this is incredibly freaky. We're hacking God's own computer.

I feel about quantum teleportation and entanglement the way my great aunt felt about electric lights. Utter magic.

New Lost iPod Service - LostiPods.com

New Lost iPod Service | iPoding | What's that in your pocket?

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The service allows one to register an iPod by serial number.

I liked the suggestion of using one's email address as the iPod name!

I do follow the other suggestion, I have a "note" with my personal information on the iPod.

Center for Cooperative Research: Generating history as it happens

Center for Cooperative Research

The Center for Cooperative Research seeks to encourage grassroots participation and collaboration in the documentation of the public historical record using an open-content model. New technology developed during the last decade has changed the nature of information production and distribution in two very important ways which are both fundamental to the Center's objectives.

Firstly, new technology has decentralized the processes of information production and distribution, allowing the public to exert greater influence over the content and direction of the published historical record. Control of the production and distribution of information has slipped from the exclusive grip of large media conglomerates and is being appropriated at an increasingly fast pace by people at the grassroots level, whose previous lack of access to the means of information production and distribution prevented their ideas and knowledge from reaching the masses. This historically significant restructuring of the relationship between the producers and consumers of information is due to the fact that the dissemination of information to a large audience no longer requires large amounts of capital investment. Consequently, this process can no longer be easily monopolized, controlled, or filtered by a small elite group.

Secondly, Internet technology has created an environment where public collaboration in the production of information can take place at a level of efficiency comparable—if not superior—to that of the capital-intensive efforts of hierarchically-structured, private enterprises. This collaborative “open-content” model is politically and economically significant because it enables grassroot efforts to compete on a near equal footing with private industry while contributing to and enriching the intellectual commons.

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I came across this site while pursuing an Agonist thread on the Feith/Franklin/Iran/Israel/Pentagon/Rumsfeld scandal. This site made an interesting contribution.

So there's something here.

Fascinating. Another emergent phenomena.

Rhythmic Gymnastics

RG - Information

Dave Barry mentioned something about an olympic sport that involves waving a ribbon on a stick.

I thought he was joking.

He's not.

And I though skijoring was exotic.

Beach volleyball and inline skating are utterly traditional by comparison.

A bug in Microsoft word: history and consequences

Anatomy of a Software Bug

The story of this problem begins with a basic design decision made when Richard Brodie was Word’s primary software architect. Brodie came to Microsoft along with Charles Simonyi after working at the Xerox PARC where he’d worked on Bravo—their version of the GUI word processor. A number of the ideas used in Word came from that early effort. Brodie joined Microsoft in 1981, began work on Word in the summer of 1982, and finished version 1.0 in October of 1983. You can read about much of the story in Microsoft First Generation by Cheryl Tsang.

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A fantastic essay. I'm subscribing to this guy's blog.

Word is about 22 years old. It has followed the usual path of software, reaching its apex of power and elegance by age 10 (1993) and then descending into senescence and beastliness. Even unto old age, however, it inherits the consequences of decisions made in its earliest days.

A fascinating discussion of mind mapping and productivity software

ResultManager - the GTD mind mapping tool

I have a longtime love of this type of software, but I look at file formats first. I don't like closed source file formats for data management.

Tricks of the Trade - for all trades

The Morning News - Tricks of the Trade

Juggler

With any routine under seven minutes (which is almost all of them), you only really need one thing: a good closer. And there are only two things you really need to know about a great closer. First, it needs to be impressive. That sounds obvious, but most beginning jugglers think “difficult” and “impressive” are synonymous. Your closer must look hard, but there’s no real reason it has to be hard. Secondly, you should intentionally blow your closer on the first two tries. If you get it on the first try it looks too easy, but if you “miss” it a few times it looks harder and builds tension.

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A few of these tricks are very specific to unusual trades, but most of them are either obviously useful (use a potato to remove the base of a broken bulb) or contain broader lessons -- such as the juggling example. Well worth studying!

The Elder Geek on Windows XP

The Elder Geek on Windows XP

One of a bazillion of reference sites. This one has useful entries such as this services guide.

Desktop access to Microsoft's indexing service

Google Groups: View Thread "Local query tools on Windows 2000 Professional?"

Are there any query tools I can use on Windows 2000 Professional
to query an IS catalog?

I find "My Computer / Manage / Services and Applications /
Indexing service / catalog / Query the catalog" somewhat clumsy.
Is there any way to make a shortcut to this query form?

I'm not running a web server, I just want to search for
documents on my own laptop. "Start / Search / For files or
folders" doesn't seem to actually use the IS catalog (it's
painfully slow).

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There are a number of great responses to this question. This is a rare find.

Exotic features in windows xp search engine: incorporating 3rd party filters (PDF)

Because of a change in the way filters are loaded in Windows XP,
third-party single-threaded filters do not load. The Acrobat PDF iFilter is
an apartment model filter. Here is a workaround, but make sure you backup
your registry before attempting this.

1. Click Start, click Run, type "Regedit.exe" (without the quotation marks), and then click OK.
2. In the left pane of Registry Editor, right-click HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, and then click Find.
3. In the "Find what" text box, type "pdffilt" (without the quotation marks).
4. In the right pane, right-click the ThreadingModel key, and then click Modify.
5. In the "Value data" text box, type "both" (without the quotation marks), and then click OK.
6. Locate the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemcurrentcontrolset\control\contentindex.

7. In the right pane, right-click the DLLsToRegister key, and then click Modify.
8. In the list of DLLs, select pdffilt.dll, and then press the DELETE key.
9. Click OK to close this window, and then click the Close button.
10. Restart Indexing Service.
11. Force a full rescan of the directory with the PDF files.

Jack Blalock (MS)

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I haven't tried this, but it's worth remembering. Microsoft's indexing service is very raw in XP SP1.

Boing Boing: Bad moods boost memory

Boing Boing: Bad moods boost memory

... grumpy individuals expressed better critical thinking and communication skills

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I suspect the communication part applies only to didactic communication -- not persuasion.

Those who know me will appreciate that I am now awaiting their plaudits.

Marxism -- look for a reinvention ...

Marginal Revolution: What is valid in Marxism? (Five things)

The author is hardly a raging Marxist. He was rising to meet DeLong's challenge. I've thought for a while, however, that the pendulum was swinging from the triumph of capitalism in the 1990s. (Ok, this is not an original observation. Tony Blair's "third way" etc.) I wonder if that will start to reach the US.

Sprint PCS Info - Content - an alternative web site for sprint info - firmware page

Sprint PCS Info - Content

Interesting site! An alternative to sprint. This page lists all their firmware upgrades.

Flickr: Organizr: works on firefox, safari ...

Flickr: Organize your photos.

I read it's a Flash application. Seems to work as well on Safari/Mac as on Firefox/XP. The controls don't have the elegance of native aqua controls -- but that's a tiny nit.

Wow.

Flickr has won my heart. Now Google will buy them ...