Google spreadsheets - keeping portions private

This is a handy Google Spreadsheet feature. You can now share just one worksheet in a files. So if you're using Google Spreadsheet for your baseball team you can share the page that has positions, but not the page with phone numbers and email addresses.

Now if only I could figure out how to use the Lookup function to reference a range on a different worksheet ....

OS X annoyances: user switching and the iPod

Apple does some things well, but it has its share of persistent defects and annoyances.

A search of Apple's kb on "user switching" iPod iTunes doesn't find any articles as of 5/07, but anyone who's switched users (accounts) on a machine with a connected iPod knows bad things can happen. The iPod is bound to a user account, not to a machine. When a new user takes over, the connected devices is passed to the new user -- and the OS offers to fix the corrupted device.

Yech.

This is a non-trivial problem to fully solve, but Apple could have done a lot to mitigate it. The OS should suggest dismounting connected iPods on logout or switch, and iTunes should be smarter about how it responds to a connected iPod post switch. Apple hasn't fixed this because only a small minority of their customers have multiple users on a single machine. In other words, they don't have enough family customers.

Grrr.

Update 9/9/08: iPhone/iTouch 2.0 finally fixed this problem! They are fast-user switching safe on OS X.

Shimo a GUI for the Cisco OS X VPN client

Shimo is an OS X app that constructs calls for the Cisco VPN command line client.

JavaScript: a modern update

Coding Horror reviews JavaScript. The links are particularly interesting for up-to-date sources. CH is somewhat Microsoft friendly, so I'm surprised they missed the chance to point out that Microsoft (gulp) made two very large contributions to AJAX. They established the asynchronous XML data exchange and they forced JavaScript into the standards world.

It's one of the great ironies of computing history that Microsoft's actions, which were in part efforts to torpedo Netscape, instead enabled Gmail.

Google on the move: Flash slideshows and way better book search

The shredding and digitization of a 2025 UCSD library was one of the central events in Vinge's recent novel, Rainbows End. In the book Vinge refers to Google's digitization efforts, and today the Memex company ("all knowledge all connected") has another big book announcement.

Note especially that Google Book Search is now integrated with local library services. Wow, what a slick way to mollify librarians ... (I'm now subscribing to Google's book search blog.)

Also, Flash slideshows -- which I'll certainly be playing with ...

Official Google Blog

... Now when you search you'll get both digitized book results as well as records for millions of other books that still just exist in the analog world.

When you view these new added [jf: analog] book records, you can often read reviews, a summary, or see what other people had to say about the book around the web.... we offer links to buy the book or find it in a library near you.

To find out more, check out our post on Inside Google Book Search.

and on another Google front today

... You can use our free photo sharing service, Picasa Web Albums, to create nifty portable Flash slideshows that you can easily embed in any blog or web page.

I tried the book search on my son's favorite book "So Others May Live", but our local libraries are not onboard yet. I'll have to see if I can encourage them to participate.

How to move a domain name

Moving a domain name from Network Solutions to the OpenSRS service used by my service provider (Lunarpages) was surprisingly complex. For the sake of anyone having to do this, these are the key steps:

1. Go to Network Solutions and login in to my account there.
2. Find the domain name, click on it, and find the control that locks the domain. Unlock it.
3. Now there's another obscure link on the same page that, confusingly, says "lock" or get "transfer code". Click on it and request the code. It's emailed out.
4. Now to to Lunarpages and fill out their form. They needed all kinds of things, including my credit card info (for verification - yes, it's stupid), domain information, copy of domain record, password for my cpanel access, etc.
5. Now it should hopefully transfer ...
   

Google search views: map and timeline

Google has opened their Experimental Search to the public. The cool ones are timeline and map, and you can use them for any Google search (they work best for people, organizations, places):

timeline: use the search term "view:timeline"
map: use the search term "view:map"

Try these:

"dark matter" view:map
"bill clinton" view:timeline

The standard view is "list view" but view:list doesn't work. I tried some other views but didn't find any easter eggs ...