Make Google Homepage Fade-In With PREF Cookie Change
October 16, 2009 00:06
Apparently, Google is testing an alternate version of their homepage, where there is only the big Google logo and the big input text field. Typing will yield auto-complete suggestions, and you can hit enter and do your search without ever seeing anything else.
Whenever you move your mouse, however, all of the other links fade in, making it look like it normally does.
You can recreate this on your own machine (not sure how long it will be possible) by manually setting a cookie for google.com. To change the cookie, you can go to the Google homepage and enter this into the location bar at the top:
javascript:void(document.cookie="PREF=ID=eccf36675ab8ad44:U=717a8deedbdd4468:TB=2:TM=1246468900:LM=1253724703:DV=AA:GM=1:S=h3uCjmCCtTlEQ2Rk;path=/;domain=.google.com");
Hit enter on that, then type in www.google.com again and hit enter. You should now get the clean version.
Different Sized Dual Monitors in Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope with ATI Video Card
May 02, 2009 21:33
I have two monitors of different sizes — a 1680x1050 and a 1280x1024. I also have an ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT card, which doesn't automatically work for dual monitors on Ubuntu 9.04. It took a little bit of searching, but I got it working, mostly from this page:
Configure dual monitors in Ubuntu 9.04 with ATI HD 2600 (It may require having a referrer of Google to see the solution).
First, make sure you are using the ATI proprietary drivers. When you install it, it should add an "ATI Catalyst Control Center" to your Applications > Accessories menu.
Then, edit the file /etc/X11/xorg.conf
sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf
And make it look like the following, except replace the resolutions of my monitors with yours (you can search for the numbers 1680, 1050, 1280, and 1024).
# xorg.conf (X.Org X Window System server configuration file)
#
# This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
# values from the debconf database.
#
# Edit this file with caution, and see the xorg.conf manual page.
# (Type "man xorg.conf" at the shell prompt.)
#
# This file is automatically updated on xserver-xorg package upgrades *only*
# if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xorg
# package.
#
# Note that some configuration settings that could be done previously
# in this file, now are automatically configured by the server and settings
# here are ignored.
#
# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command:
# sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Default Layout"
Screen 0 "aticonfig-Screen[0]" 0 0
EndSection
Section "Files"
EndSection
Section "Module"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[0]"
Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver"
Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor"
Option "DPMS" "true"
EndSection
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "aticonfig-Monitor[1]"
Option "VendorName" "ATI Proprietary Driver"
Option "ModelName" "Generic Autodetecting Monitor"
Option "DPMS" "true"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "aticonfig-Device[0]"
Driver "fglrx"
Option "EnableRandR12" "false"
Option "DesktopSetup" "horizontal,reverse"
Option "OverlayOnCRTC2" "1"
Option "Mode2" "1280x768"
Option "VideoOverlay" "on"
Option "OpenGLOverlay" "off"
Option "EnableMonitor" "tmds1,lvds"
Option "PairModes" "1680x1050+1280x1024"
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[0]"
Device "aticonfig-Device[0]"
Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[0]"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Virtual 1680 1050
Depth 24
Modes "1680x1050"
EndSubSection
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "aticonfig-Screen[1]"
Device "aticonfig-Device[0]"
Monitor "aticonfig-Monitor[1]"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Virtual 1280 1024
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024"
EndSubSection
EndSection
You'll need to reboot, then afterwards, you'll need to go into the ATI Catalyst Control Center under "Display Manager" and tell your second monitor to be a "Big Desktop right of display 1" on the "Multi-Display" tab and set the resolution on the "Properties" tab to what it should be with your monitors combined (mine was 2960x1050).
When I was getting it to work, I was trying a few other things, so I haven't tested it exactly from scratch, but those settings come straight from my xorg.conf file.
Migratory Patterns
February 10, 2009 06:40
Old Stuff: Blogs and MySpace.
New Stuff: Twitter and Facebook.
For most internet residents, actually writing that out is obvious and lame. However, it’s one thing that normal and business people need to know.
Between two years ago and now, the old saying has become even more true: “No one wants to read your crappy blog.” Everyone wants instant information. We want it boiled down and scannable, distilled and wrapped in a clean API. We don’t have time to read about your cat, unless it takes less than 5 seconds to do it.
I’m not complaining about the current state of affairs, I’m just pointing out the simple truth.
Rather than making false claims about updating my blog more, I’ll mention that if I am able to spend more time on this personal site, it will be in the form of more useful information, like setting up development environments, and random frameworks.
Internet People
May 30, 2008 05:49
“You can’t trust those internet people” she said, with an air of caution.
I gave her a blank stare.
When I started the process of buying a home, I knew only two things regarding the subject:
- You need to find a place
- You need a loan
Even though I’ve made two separate websites for Realtors in the last few years, the knowledge that home buying begins with a Realtor was foreign to me. So I turned to the internet, as I do with everything else.
I had a set of criteria for what I’d want in a home, but I needed to know if I could afford it, and whether I could get a loan for it.
I began looking through homes on Trulia that met my criteria, and I came up with a rough estimate for how much I’d need to borrow. I was familiar with that site because I generally keep up with “Web 2.0” sites, and I work at an apartment-finding website where we look at other implementations while deciding how to build ours.
As far as finding a loan, I resorted to a site I had seen advertising on television — Lending Tree. The concept of websites advertising on TV seems strange to me, but it apparently worked in this case, cause I entered my personal financial information into it, and found a lender almost immediately.
By this time, I had pretty much already found the house I wanted, judging from the description and the pictures, so it seemed to me that I satisfied all of the requirements to buying it. Little did I know that the pain was about to begin.
The Lending Tree connected me with a real estate company, Coldwell Banker, who matched me with a Realtor of their choosing. Unfortunately, this lady:
- never once pronounced my name right, despite many, many corrections
- repeatedly listed off properties other than the one I wanted, which were obviously out of my price range
- continuously tried to convince me to buy a new home, where she gets a much higher commission
- insisted that I let Coldwell Banker provide the loan, at a higher interest rate
- made suggestions in writing the contract that had to be overwritten multiple times
- insulted “internet people,” even after I told her that I work in the internet industry
Now, I normally don’t get offended by anything, and I never even really thought of myself as an internet person. But for some reason, when she spoke poorly of people on the internet, it really struck a nerve. The rest of the day, I was thinking about it, even going so far as to quoting to myself “Slimy? Mudhole? My home this is!”
The next day, rationality set in, and I could once again analyze things objectively. It occurred to me that she was right, in a way. You can’t, by default, trust people on the internet. There are so many scammers, cheaters, and marketers that you learn to watch yourself, and are forced to find ways of verifying the honesty of others. Another quote came to mind,* but this time it may have been more accurate: “You will never find the more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.”
The thing I love the most about the internet is that it’s open and free. This freedom comes with a price, however, a big warning label telling users to watch themselves. But for those brave enough to delve into the spaceport, there are many people willing to help, and the rewards can be very beneficial — like finding the right house with a low interest rate mortgage.
Anyway... Hello, I’m Micah. Welcome to the neighborhood.
* I realize that having two gratuitous Star Wars quotes in one post puts me over the line, but I’m willing to accept the penalties.
City in the Clouds
April 14, 2008 23:43
Buzzwords on the web have often been a good indicator for pointing out people who don’t know what they’re talking about. Before this happens, however, there is a special time when they are a smoke signal, rising from a spreading wildfire in the industry.
One of the most recent buzzwords, building in the last year or so, is “the cloud.” In essence, it’s the idea of content or digital property being stored or managed in a huge network. This idea works for data as well as processing time, though the concept of cloud storage has been around longer than cloud computing.
Rather than storing your data on a harddrive at home, putting it in the cloud would mean that your data is out on the internet, easily accessible from anywhere you have an internet connection. Security and encryption ensures that you have control over it, but it does require that you place your faith in others.
Cloud computing is similar to this, in that instead of owning or renting one server or machine, you can rent out time in a large network of machines. If one of them goes down, you start up another instance on a different one. The only thing you own is the information you put on the computer, which can be pretty much anything.
Both of these concepts lends credence to the idea that computers are becoming simple appliances — the portal to your data and applications, but never actually saving information to whichever terminal you happen to be using at the time.
The most popular and useful examples of these concepts in action are the Amazon Web Services. It’s strange to think that a large book store would become host to the future of the internet, but most people would not have believed that a search engine could be the biggest company on the web.
Speaking of Google, another large-scale example of the cloud in action is the recently announced Google App Engine. Although it hasn’t officially been released for primetime yet, it takes away another level of server management in that it doesn’t require any configuration at all, as long as you don’t mind writing your web application specifically for their setup.
Of course, interaction with the cloud is normally facilitated through the use of a web browser. And although Firefox isn’t the most used browser yet, Mozilla understands the need for easily accessing your data and interacting with web applications. Because of this, they’ve also begun making a cloud of their own, known as Weave. The benefit to this would be the reliance on open standards, which would only aid in portability and, in effect, increase usage.
Each of these services (as well as ones I didn’t mention) are addressing needs that we didn’t know we had a few years ago, but will be vital in the future. And naturally, there will be many more clouds coming as the buzzword takes hold and more businesses try to start cashing in on it. Eventually we’ll be overrun with the word (like in this post), but for now we can just enjoy the excitement of looking at what the future holds for us.