Toggl Redesigned, Less Functional

A redeign should be as much about functionality as it is about the looks and feels of the pages. I meant to pluralize those words. Yesterday, Toggl, the insanely functional time tracker I use to track all my clients and projects and hours of web consultantcy redesigned their easy-to-use site into a monster of esoteric navigation and idiotic back pedalling in terms of editability and ease of use. I can no longer recommend Toggl.

I Loves teh Emacs

Sorry for the LOLCats speak. I’ve had some difficulty getting GNU Emacs to work properly in Windows XP. The version I downloaded here, so far works the best.

iPod Hacks

A few weeks ago, my aging 5th Generation iPod Video stopped playing video. I decided, therefore, to start messing around with it out of spite. Using this file, placed in this program, you can mess with some fun stuff. You can also completely destroy your iPod. Today, I learned a new button combination never before encountered: hold down the middle button and the play/pause button, after plugging in your iPod to the computer, and it will boot into disk mode directly. This enables many other options, such as reformatting (which I’m doing as I type this). It’s also great news for when you bork the iPod trying to install the classic theme.

Teh Internets

One evening while wondering along the streets of Dubrovnic, Croatia, my friend Chris happened upon a sign and took a picture of it. As you can see, they really do have “internets” in Croatia.

 

 

Free Idea #1: Local Leftovers

Last night, with the help of epicurious, I made some pretty tasty calzones. They are huge. Enter the new social networking site for foodies: LocalLeftovrs (just playing on a theme). Here, one can sign in, register for a square mile radius and “order” other people’s leftovers.

Pros: this would be really quite cool if it worked. It would be especially good for smaller families and single people who cook too much.

Cons: health, insurance, liability, etc. Also, not everyone is as talented a cook as the next person. Perhaps a rating system like ebay for your past dishes.

Read more free ideas>>

Tai-Jut-Su: Where Dicks and Sticks Abound

I know how difficult it is to write a word correctly like Tai Kwon Do(e) or Taikwondo; I know that the difficulty lies in a phonetic trans-literation from an original language to English. Tonight, I’ve encountered a different ilk of “trans” problems (you know, translations, transliterations, transcendental-izations). We’ll call the issue at hand a Tech-script-unrealization. Yeah, I like that because it’s long and doesn’t mean much.

Previously I’ve mentioned a service that I use called Jott (Jott.com). It’s great. To use it, you sign up, they give you a phone number, you call that and speak what you want to remember, what you want jotted. Now I can always remember facts from NPR I hear while driving or upcoming concert dates when they fly by me in the audible world. Just to be fair, I’ve confused certain aspects of Jott before. Tonight, though, Jott is the one who’s confused.

You see, my brother is a member of the small personage in the DC area who enjoy the martial art of Tai Jut Su (I figure title caps will solve my ‘trans problems’ thus far). He’s also knowledgeable of computers. So, knowing that he drives hours from WV to DC in order to train with other Tai Jut Su people, instead of phoning him and potentially interrupting, I did what any good 21st century brother would do and ‘texted’ him. Although, I don’t text, I jott.

I called my trusty Jott number, I spoke slowly and clearly: “Call me if you are not busy hitting people with sticks” which is what he calls Tai Jut Su.

Jott, on the other hand, decided to ‘Tech-script-unrealize’ my message as “Call me if you are not busy heading people with Dicks.”

An interesting choice, no? Also, why the Dicks and not dicks? Surely somehow the proper noun is less pejorative but hey, if you’re going to mess up, why not head all the people with dicks!?

Internetting from the right-side of the brain: DVD Decrypter

I’ve been using DVD Decrypter for months and months now and I haven’t created a coaster yet. Many people are familiar, perhaps, with DVD Decrypter’s role in RipIt4Me, or as a stand alone ripper, but little known is the program’s ability to burn an image file (.iso). That’s it. Rip your DVDs and compress them however you want (try DVD Shrink — and sometimes DVD43 allows DVD Shrink to overcome a shortcoming) and rip / compress your DVD to an .iso file, then burn with DVD Decrypter. Oh yeah, and they’re all free (as in beer) programs.

Internetting from the right-side of the brain: Yodlee

A long time ago, in a money management crisis far far away…

I switched from a credit union (whose https site was powered by Washington Mutual anyway) to the monolithic US Bank for my everyday banking needs. Why? Easy, US Bank updates its information every minute. That means: I get up from the computer to purchase a coffee, I sit back down and check my balance, it says “purchase of coffee pending $1.25″ nice, eh?

Tonight I took the next step and consolidated my accounts into one account to rule them all. Yes, that’s right — sky miles, email (even!), bank, stocks, savings, checking, credit cards, student loans, paypal and the like — all from one site. My brother had this very same great idea a few months ago, but someone beat him to it. Yodlee, I say tonight, “thanks” for your money center, and goodnight.

Internetting from the right-side of the brain: Library Books and picasa2flickr

I add a few new programs and add-ons to the computer(s) in my world every day or week; I’m trying to keep track of them.

“Library Books” is really nice for its simplicity and integration into the menu bar of OSx. I use Picasa for simple edits to photos in XP Pro and this plug-in will send your photos directly to Flickr from Picasa.

I Can See Your Thong From Here

You need to read this article on Google’s Street View.

Internetting from the right-side of the brain:

Tonight I’ve upgraded to version 0.3 of Texter, 0.9.6 of Democracy Player (apparently the last before they change their name), installed VMware 1.0.3 build 44356, to which I plan to add Ubuntu 7.04, and realized that the “sounds like” funtion of Jott.com is not an alternative (like I wrote up in my last post) but rather a phonetic sounding out. One has to wonder if they are amassing a large database of voice recogonition, along with a seriously large amount of cell phone numbers (read: unlisted until now). Still, Jott’s services are currently unparalleled. And, yes, I do know about Loopnote. In fact I used to work with, and drink beers among, the guys involved. Best of luck.