05.08.06

About Snopes

Posted in Rants at 10:42 am by spryken

Bobster has posted “8 Ways to Destroy America“. In the post, he mentions Snopes. In passing he says, “Snopes seems to think it is legitimate”. This implies that Snopes is an authority, but does not explain what exactly Snopes is.

I realize that most of our readers are pretty “Internet savvy”, but not everyone knows Snopes. And that is a shame.

According to their Home Page, Snopes is an “Urban Legend Reference Page”. They research and debunk urban/internet legends.

I, for one, am so tired of my Inbox filling up with forwarded stories and schemes. I know that everyone believes they are doing a good thing. Warning me of the dangers of one thing or another. Most of the time, the stories have been going around for years. I always go to Snopes to check out the veracity and validity of any story I am tempted to forward.

If everyone knew of and used Snopes to research these stories before forwarding to everyone they know, we would significantly reduce the bandwidth being consumed by email. It probably wouldn’t be close to what the spammers generate, but still would be significant.

Think of the save productivity. There would be a lot more time to send/forward all of those old jokes and cute e-Cards.

PLEASE, think before you forward. RESEARCH, before you try to warn all your friends. You won’t have to apologize after you send it to me and I research it and debunk it - replying to everyone you sent it to.

BOOKMARK Snopes and use them!!

04.14.06

Regarding Krugle’s First Look

Posted in Rants, programming, technical at 8:03 am by spryken

So Bobster has taken a look at the new Krugle Search Engine.  He is not too impressed, but he lives in the .NET world.  His main complaint is that Krugle returns primarily Java Code.  I assume that is because it searches Open Source Repositories and a lot of the code in them is Java.  I hope that as Krugle grows, it will find more sources and types of Open Source Code.

My rant differs a bit though.  Even though I pointed out the site to Bobster, and I signed up first for the beta, and I am the Java programmer; he gets the first Beta ID.  Sigh!

Still waiting until I get a chance to test drive.

03.24.06

Protect Your Privacy in MS Office XP and 2003

Posted in Rants, programming, technical at 1:10 pm by spryken

Whether you realize it or not, MS Office is keeping track of all the changes in your documents. When you send the document to someone else, if they are savvy enough, they can see all the changes you have made. This is not really a big deal, and indeed adds value to the MS Office line. You can undo edits and view modifications made to your work.

But, and there is always a but, suppose you are starting to compose a status report for your boss. You have several co-workers that are dragging their heels on the project. You start the report and as a way of safely venting your feelings you use some inappropriate terms for the hypothetical co-workers. As you continue with the report, getting it into more presentable form, you edit the part about the hypothetical co-workers to more politically correct language. You then send the report to your team and boss. Guess what, if any one really wanted to pry they could see the original report. Not a good thing!!

Microsoft has a solution, the Remove Hidden Data Tool. It is not included with Office, but is available as a download. The RHDTool is intended to be used when you publish a document for public consumption. It removes all the hidden data that Office saves by default. One exception is if you had turned on the “Track Changes” option.

I suggest you get and install this Add-In. According to Microsoft it works with the following Office Products:

  • Microsoft Office Excel 2003
  • Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003
  • Microsoft Office Word 2003
  • Microsoft Excel 2002
  • Microsoft PowerPoint 2002
  • Microsoft Word 2002

Save a backup of your original document before cleaning it, just so you can have all of that history. Send the cleaned document to your receipients. Know that what you send is actually what they see.

02.27.06

Life is a Cabaret….

Posted in Politics, Rants at 11:17 am by spryken

Saturday a few friends and I went to see Cabaret. It was a great show. I had forgotten how dark it ended though.

What really struck me, and struck me hard, was the movement from tolerance to intolerance. Here we saw a very tolerant German culture (at least at the Kit Kat Klub). Homosexuality was accepted, abortion was accepted. Tolerance was everywhere. Some could argue that it was a modern day Sodom. But changes were in the air. Very quickly the tolerance faded. As the Nazis rose in power, religious hated also arose. In the play this occured in a few short months. In real life, I’m sure it was a slow building.

The funny thing is the different viewpoints presented. The German Nazi talking about the Jewish merchant…. HE IS NOT A GERMAN, HE IS A JEW!!! While the Jewish merchant says…I am a German, we are all Germans.

Is there lessons here for the U.S.? After 9/11, we “profile” possible terrorist. We have to be careful to NOT become so intolerant of others, that we go down the same path. It is too easy to say, “they are not REAL Americans”. Let us remember what happened in our own country during World War II with the Japanese Americans being relocated to camps.

The struggle between tolerance and security is a difficult one, but we need to remember who we are. And what has made this country great. And that is our acceptance of vastly different cultures. America is not so much a “Melting Pot” and it is a Stew. Understanding is difficult to come by, but it is the glue that holds us together.

Each of us has the responsibility to stand up for everyone’s rights. We also have the responsibility to protect ourselves, our familes and each other.

Tolerance is the key. We not ever completely agree with each other, but we can tolerate the differing viewpoints.

I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend your right to say it.

02.22.06

Number of the Beast

Posted in Rants, Religion, amusements, comics at 10:16 am by spryken

Revelation 3:17 so that no-one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.

Some have claimed that the National ID will fulfill this scripture. I am not convinced that the Book of Revelation is prophecy as we understand prophecy. That is the foretelling of the future. Prophecy, strictly speaking, is Forth Telling or proclaiming, not predicting. And the Book of Revelation is actually Apocalyptic Literature, which is a separate genre’ of writing. The basic message is “Things are bad, they are going to get worse. But hold on to your faith, because we win in the end.”

The National ID is a scary proposition. Just think George Orwell and Big Brother. Now, with all of that said, a friend sent me this link, a fun, amusing and yes, scary view of that future(Audio Warning). It may be closer than we think.

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