My Slice of the Globe

Category: Tech – Software

  • Silicon Valley Pioneer Hitchikers

    It’s an art project and a history lesson! It’s GPS/Cellphone equipped cutouts of Silicon Valley pioneers hitchiking across the country! To read more about this project and see the cutout GPS locations and travelogue go here : http://www.ylem.org/Hitchhikers/ Sun Microsystems also got in on the action as HP didn’t seem to want to care for…

  • PHP5 and SOAP is making me nuts

    <geek rant> Trying to generate a soap header using ext/soap in php5 : What I need to create is : … <SOAP-ENV:HEADER> <USER xsi:type=”xsd:string”>myusername</USER> <PASSWORD xsi:type=”xsd:string”>mypasswd</PASSWORD> </SOAP-ENV:HEADER> … What PHP5 is doing : … <SOAP-ENV:HEADER> <ns1:USER xsi:type=”xsd:string”>myusername</ns1:USER> <ns1:PASSWORD xsi:type=”xsd:string”>mypasswd</ns1:PASSWORD> </SOAP-ENV:HEADER> … For whatever reason PHP requires the header parms to have a namespace which unfortunately…

  • Etc : July 6 – 13

    It’s been a little hectic at work. But here are some snippets from around the “net”. HeatSeek (link to the TechCrunch article) Yes, ladies and gentlemen, there is now a secure browser (IE based) whose sole purpose it to enable you to handle porn easier. It also encrypts everything which makes it harder for junior…

  • Essential Windows Software

    As I’m probably going to be building a computer in the near future as a gift, I figured I would go ahead and share what I consider to be the essential free software to add to a fresh windows installation. You may disagree but here it is : Documents : FoxIt Reader – Faster than…

  • Death is only the beginning

    Saw this article linked on Digg this evening. It basically show how they were able to resurrect Marlon Brando for a reprise of his role as Jor-El in the upcoming Superman Returns. Take a look it is neat and a little creepy at the same time: http://www.aintitcool.com/display.cgi?id=23646

  • Google Notebook

    Today Google launched, Google Notebook. It is essentially an extension to Firefox/IE that allows you to highlight text, images, etc on a website and add it to a “notebook”. You can then create notebooks on different subjects, annotate your snippets, and also make these notebooks publicly viewable if you choose. The best part is that…

  • ODF Plugin for MSOffice

    Massachusetts (MA) made a request yesterday for a plugin that would allow for seamless integration of ODF (Open Document Format) into Office. You can see that request here. A day later the The OpenDocument Foundation responds that they have a plugin that is compatible with current versions of Word, and going back to Word97. You…

  • Google : Calendar

    Looks like Google launched their online calendar program this evening. Seems pretty spiffy. You can find it at : http://calendar.google.com Quick Feature Rundown : Imports  from: Microsoft Outlook Yahoo! Calendar Apple iCal Notifications : Email Pop-up, if app is open SMS, text message General : You can create multiple calendars You can share a calendar…

  • Phosphor : A FPS In your browser

    As seen on HardOCP.com, ever want to play a first person shooter, in your browser. Well some one has coded up a 7MB shockwave execcutable and yes it does include multiplayer among other features. Take a look over at :  http://www.rasterwerks.com/game/phosphor/beta1.asp

  • Missing directx dlls – like d3dx9_26.dll

    So while attempting to finish far cry last night apparently somehow my directx 9.0c installation got somewhat borked. It was failing to find d3dx9_26.dll (apparently looking around the files d3dx9_24.dll, d3dx9_25.dll, d3dx9_27.dll,d3dx9_28.dll also seem to disappear randomly). Doing a quick google search I found somebody who had the dll available to download but being a…

  • The end times

    What happens when a world is about to be destroyed. This article over at Wired takes a look at the virtual world of Asheron’s Call 2 whose servers will be shut down on Dec 30th. Take a look at the article here.

  • Nintendo … gone wild

    As seen on digg. Here is a link for a Nintendo micro ad that for some reason isn’t being shown in the US. Enjoy!

  • Living in a DRM land …

    Well my computer hard disk died and among other things that I didn’t have backups for was my mp3 music collection. Luckily my music was on my iPod so I thought cool … I won’t have to re-feed my CDs to my computer. After installing XP and iTunes I learned the truth, there is no…

  • Virgin Mobile finds niche market

    I got this link from “The Really not Anon Girl in A. Town”. Apparently if you have issues controlling the urge to call your ex when you are a little drunk … Virgin Mobile has come to your rescue with this special service. All I can say … Australia must be an interesting place to…

  • Dude, you’re getting a Best Buy Customer

    A few weeks ago Best Buy made an announcement where they told Wall Street that they were putting their bad customers, those who mail in rebates, buy items on sale, and return items often, into a “bad customer” database. Apparently those customers “wreak enormous economic havoc” and they need to be rid of them. Dell…