• Category Archives Computers

  • Imagine a life with no computers……ahhhh……bliss…..

  • Video editing……

    Posted on by beno Comment

    Its not super clear, but probably well known to people that are into video editing……Windows XP has a built in video editing program.
    You cant get to it on your start menu (least not in the 2-3 computers I have checked), but if you ‘explore’ your computer, and look in your ‘C’ drive, under ‘program files’ there is a sub-directory called ‘Movie Maker’ and in there you will find a program called ‘moviemk.exe’.
    If you run that (double click it), you get what looks to be a pretty good movie editing program.
    I have never done any of it before, its been on my to-do list, but never had the need….. Last weekend in Uranquinty with Matt we spliced together two little remote control helicopters, had a bunch of fun, and Terry took a heap of video footage.
    Not all of it was very good quality, in fact, there was only a ‘few’ seconds in each clip that were really useful. Hence the desire to splice it all together and make something of it.
    The cream was to add a bit of music, and some titles…..in about half an hour, I had the following video clip hosted on YouTube……

    https://thebaldgeek.net/html/webpages-stuff/rc-choppers.htm

    About two weeks ago I found my video cassette of when I drove my Range Rover across the Simpson  Desert, I am looking forward to getting it onto the computer and seeing what we can make of it (its about 2 hours long, so it needs some real brutal editing!)
    Also I am keen to get some video from the Goldwing as we travel around the place……
    heh,hehe, just what I need, another thing to spend some time on….
    Still, I am looking forward to getting some more of my videos on my site, and now, thanks to this new program, it will look better that it would have.


    Computers

  • How many iPods?

    Posted on by beno 1 Comment

    For years I have been warning friends off ipods. I just have read a lot of negative things about them, and did not feel comfortable giving them the thumbs up as an MP3 player.
    A few weeks back I had the chance to swap a computer for an ipod nano 1st generation (1gb). I took the chance because I wanted to see what they were like…….Sadly, they were worse than I had read……
    They are very unfriendly. The click wheel is quite literally a pain to use. You can not just drag and drop music or photos onto it from either Linux or Windows.
    Terry had a bash at it for a few days (probably something like 5-6 hours all up) with Ubuntu. He was really trying hard, and I thought it was just his inexperience that did not get it to ‘fly’. He was pretty disappointed when he gave it back to me, he really wanted it to work. He was very confused how something so nice to hold could be such a pain to use.
    Next up was Dan. He is my Linux guru so I was sure he would nut it out in no time. He came up with gtkpod, it was better, but after some 4-5 hours, Dan too gave it back.
    I did not have the time, but could not believe that it would ‘stump’ two people that I look up too. I downloaded a few free windows applications to try and get it working. All to no avail.
    As a last resort I looked at Podzilla and Rockbox. The latter was the quickest to put on, and thats as far as I got. The ipod now ‘works’ as an mp3 player. You still are stuck with that silly invisible wheel thing, but at least its drag and drop under any OS and it now sounds a whole lot better!
    I have read a blog about how to tri-boot the thing, if I had some time, I would be doing that, but I just need an mp3 player, not a time sink!
    I suspect that I will be putting it on the bike and just letting it rot there.

    I wonder how many ipods are sitting in draws collecting dust because their owners have lost patience with them.
    Hats off to Apple for selling them so well.

    We will stick with our Irivers and no name players……..

    Edit:7th Nov 2007. Was reading the news headlines on Slashdot this morning, and came across a story about Apple making a tablet PC. Slashdot had this to say about the question of whether Apple even have the ability to make a tablet PC……
    “The short answer is ‘yes’. Any company that can make a mobile phone with no buttons, no picture messaging, slow Web access and no video capture into the most desirable phone on the planet can easily make tablets popular.”

    Sounds like two things to me, 1. I need to do some reading about the iPhone, looks like it might be another iPod, and 2. Sounds like I am not the only one that thinks that the advertising department of Apple has more money and clout than the R&D department.


    Computers Music

  • Frequency of blogs

    Posted on by beno Comment

    My one regular reader has asked that I blog more often…..I don’t know….to me it would lead to me talking to myself, and thus the posts would get a little rambling and probably more personal….I’m not sure I want to go there….I’m not sure I want to take the 2-3 readers that I know about there….what do you think?
    The sad part is that I would probably need to do it for a few weeks to see what it ends up like before we can make a decision.
    Have I really got something “interesting” to say every day? Have you really got the time to read it every day (I would hate to have to read a week or mores back blog!)????
    Yeah, I think I will stick with the now and then style that it has been….


    Computers Other

  • There must be some mistake…….

    Posted on by beno 1 Comment

    I am nerdier than 97% of all people. Are you a nerd? Click here to find out!

    I took the above test because I wanted to test my internet connection after changing the main switch in my computer rack (I guess that should tell me something right there), its the second result when you put the word ‘test’ into Google…..there is no way I am THAT nerdy…..

    I beg you, please click the above link and take the test and prove that its ‘broken’ and that I am not a ‘nerd god’…….. 97% nerd…..there must be some mistake……

    So, what I need you all to do is after you take the test, email me your results. beno.id.au at gmail.com (remove the anti spam at and replace it with @) Or just post them in the comments. (email is probably better).
    Let me know if you DONT want your results posted, other wise the world might find out your a bigger nerd than you thought!

    Update 1; 26th Oct. First results are in…….

    Terry (my son) got 37% (Forgot to note what it said).
    Matt B got 47% (Somewhat nerdy).
    Amanda (Matts wife) got 23% (Not nerdy, but definitely not hip).

    All this came from a comment that Matt B made one time while I was visiting at his place….I was riding a skateboard on his back deck, and he just blurted out “I didn’t know nerds rode skateboards”.

    At the time (and ever since I have to add), he claimed not to know that there was a difference, and that it could be even a little bit ‘offensive’ to call a normal person a geek, or worse, to call a geek a nerd!

    So, what is the difference?
    Well, there are a lot of differences, but here is a cut, paste and edit from the web;

    Nerd; are people of above-average intelligence who place little importance on their appearance or social skills.

    Geek; are the people you made fun of at school and end up working for as adults. The focus is on their techo-employability.

    I other words, geeks know about stuff and are handy (fun?) to have around. Nerds know everything about something, but are ‘hard’ to talk with.

    I think that is breaking it down and generalizing too much, but it gives the flavor.

    It also gives you some idea why I was so ‘disturbed’ with the 97% ‘nerd god’ status, and why Matt B will never live down the fact he called me a nerd!

    Update 2. (Afternoon of the 26th).
    Rob A got 27% (Nerd wanabe).
    Terry D got 49% (somewhat nerdy)
    Nick S got 74% (Mid-ranked Nerd).
    Tony S got 10% (Definitely not nerdy, you are probably cool).
    David L got 75% (David did not supply the ‘quote’ from the site).
    Dan H got 67% (Low-rank nerd)
    Brittany C got 41% (some what nerdy)
    Jason C got 31% (Not nerdy, but definitely not hip)
    Sue W got 1% (Cool – no where near nerdy)
    David T got 82% (high level nerd)
    Gary C got 83% (high-level nerd)
    Gillian O got 25% (Not a nerd, but definitely not hip)
    NJH got 98% (Nerd God)
    Steve O got 14%
    Bob O (Bens Dad) got 62%
    Graham J got 48% (Some what nerdy)
    Bryce N got 81% (high-level nerd)
    Mark S got 79% (Mid-level nerd)
    Sean P got 54% (Somewhat nerdy)
    Gordon P got 36% (Wana be nerdy)
    Cathy P got 4% (despises nerds)

    There is a disturbing trend appearing…. I took the test again, and got 98% this time, so thats no improvement.
    Then I noticed that there was a version two test. Its a longer test with more questions, so I thought it would set things right….here are the results from that one;

    NerdTests.com says I'm a Highly Dorky Nerd King. What are you? Click here!

    Highly dorky nerd king……????
    Ok, so I’m not into comics and Si-Fi TV shows, I’m Ok with that, but the rest?? I’m starting to think that the test is just about less common knowledge, and they rank you high for having knowledge thats on the very edge of ‘common’ (like how to find your IP address, and how to surf the web just using IP addresses (two of the questions of the ver 2.0 test)), and then they link that knowledge to being a nerd, where in reality, I think its more about Geekiness.

    No, really, I’m not taking all this too seriously…….

    3ed and final update; (30th Oct).
    Thanks to all those that took the test and were happy enough to share the results…… Sadly, it would seem that the people behind nerdtest.com have done some thinking and have some up with a pretty good list of questions. They really can pick ’em. Those that scored high really are those that I would consider leaning tword …..errrr…. well, being a little more technical…….

    I think the test really is about detecting levels of ‘geek’, it would be too hard to know how some one dresses via questions, the bizarre thing for me is that I have no idea how you could answer the questions any other way….I mean, how can any any one ‘rig’ the answers to only score 1%???? (My sister)
    Anyway, in conclusion, I (stupidly?) decided to take the test on last time, this time thinking about the answers, not just rushing though it, and here is the final word to this blog entry……

    I am nerdier than 99% of all people. Are you a nerd? Click here to find out!


    Computers

  • Thinking out side the box, take 2

    Posted on by beno 2 Comments

    Had the chance to catch up with an old friend on the weekend, Tony and I go way way back.
    Some how it came up that the younger generation is not as switched on as the conditions they are growing up in should allow.
    Tony mentioned that they had a guest speaker come in and talk about “Generation Y” (Broadly speaking, those under 30).
    He was able to shed some light on my ‘thinking out of the box’ concerns, it would seem that my read and repair experiences are not isolated. Tony gave some over views from the guest speaker, Gen Y’ers are hard to get into the job interview unless there is something in it for them (ie free lunch). Once in the interview room, the bulk of the questions from them are about what the wage is, what the perks are, what the car is they will be given and so on. Once in the job, they want lots of flexibility and freedom to change the job to suit their lifestyle. According to the guest speaker, a lot of comanys are waking up to this, and looking for older people to employ, ie, people they can rely on to get the job done.
    This web site here, has a great summery with what we are seeing.
    This pretty much is the same angle I am seeing in the technical world. Those following behind us don’t feel the need to fix anything, just throw it out and buy another is their mantra. They feel they are so computer savvy, if the computer is broken, and they cant fix it in 5 minutes, then its clearly so broken as to be useless, again, toss it out and get another. Technology has laid the world at their feet, they feel its unnecessary to work at too much for long, things come easy to them, why should they have to think too long on any one subject.

    Speaking with my school teacher friend about things on the same line, she was saying how she has to break her classes into 20 minute chunks, any longer on one task and she has lost the class. They simply can not sit still and think for longer than 20 minutes, they would rather brag about how they can do three things at one. The trouble is, the three things are shallow and of little lasting value.

    Anyway, I think I have made my concerns pretty clear. It was just interesting to hear from a different angle the things that I have only just resonantly started to see in my very small world………..

    I suspect I will come back to this topic from a “where is the world going to end up when these people come to power”  angle. Time, as usual, will tell.


    Computers Other