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Greg Hughes Profile |
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July 4th Fireworks show in Anacortes, Washington - Video
Greg Hughes
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As many know, I shoot public fireworks displays and that means some big show each
July 4th. This year I was with the crew in Anacortes, Washington – a town located
between Seattle and the Canadian border. We shot the show out over Hidalgo Bay, and
it was a good time. The people of Anacortes are terrific, and the show went off without
a hitch. For a while earlier in the day the winds were pretty bad, but they died off
before the show started.
[read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 6th '10 |
A couple great info resources for Sprint HTC EVO 4G owners
Greg Hughes
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I've recently run across a number of great resources while researching my Sprint EVO
4G phone, which runs the Android operating system and is quite tweakable.
/p
p
strongOne of the top resources I've found is called /strong
a href="http://www.goodandevo.net/" target="_blank"
strongGood
and EVO/strong
/a
strong,/strong a blog that answers in patient detail lots
and lots of great questions. Anyone who has the device and doesn't know wh [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 22nd '10 |
How Facebook is able to serve such a huge user community
Greg Hughes
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Facebook is huge. It serves hundred of billions (literally) of pages a month, and
1.2 million photos every second. Wow. It's generally considered the world's largest
web site. I'm waiting for an episode of Build it Bigger to air talking about Facebook,
but I doubt they'll do it. Software scaling is hard to show in TV (but data center
pictures are exciting to some, I suppose).
/p
p
Operating software, databases and infrastructure at Facebook [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 21st '10 |
My view on the EVO 4G and Sprint after the first few days
Greg Hughes
p
The other day I decided I'd had enough pain in my relationship with ATT and that a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/DearATampTYoursquoreFired.aspx" target="_blank"I
was going to make a move/a. I looked at my various options, and a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/DearSprintAndHTCAndAndroidYoursquoreHired.aspx" target="_blank"landed
on Sprint and the EVO 4G/a Android-based smart phone. I've spent a few days with
the new service and device, and I thought I would write up some early thoug [read].
Posted: Sat, Jun 19th '10 |
Congrats on WordPress v3.0
Greg Hughes
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Just a quick note to say “way-to-go” to a href="http://ma.tt/" target="_blank"Matt
Mullenweg/a and the whole WordPress community team on the new a href="http://wordpress.org/development/2010/06/thelonious/" target="_blank"release
of WordPress 3.0/a – This is a huge release!
/p
p
The merger of single- and multi-user versions is great. So cool to watch WordPress
grow over time. I remember eating lunch with Matt at a couple of the Gnomedex [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 17th '10 |
Dear Sprint and HTC (and Android): Yoursquo;re Hired.
Greg Hughes
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As I a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/DearATampTYoursquoreFired.aspx" target="_blank"explained
in my last post/a, I made the decision over the past few days to move away from
ATamp;T for mobile phone service, which necessitated a change in the smart phone
hardware I use since the iPhone is exclusive (for now, anyhow) to ATamp;T in the
United States. I did some research, got some advice from people I know, read a lot
of reviews, and hear [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 17th '10 |
Dear ATamp;T: Yoursquo;re fired
Greg Hughes
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emAnd to Apple: I’m sorry, but as good as you make me feel about the world of technology,
I just don’t love you enough to endure ATamp;T’s a href="http://gizmodo.com/5564262/"bad
habits/a anymore. So, the iPhone has to go, too. And that makes a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/DearATTYourefired_148DF/IMAG0002_2.jpg"img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 15px 0px 15px 15px; display: in [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 17th '10 |
Send an Android phone into space! The Astdroid project takes shape
Greg Hughes
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a href="http://kck.st/dujciJ"
img style="margin: 0px 0px 15px 15px" border="0" align="right" src="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dannypier/astdroid-lets-send-a-smartphone-into-space/widget/card.jpg"/img
/a
p
a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dannypier/astdroid-lets-send-a-smartphone-into-space" target="_blank"Dubbed
Astdroid, a new project by Danny Pier/a hopes to raise a small amount of funding
between now and July 7th to laun [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 15th '10 |
Apple Store app released
Greg Hughes
a href="/rant/content/binary/BlogNet_Apple-Store-app-released_image_62404630.png" target="_blank"img src="/rant/content/binary/BlogNet_Apple-Store-app-released_preview_48567344.png" style="float:right; margin:10px" alt="Apple Store app released" //aWell,
Apple has released their iPhone app version of the Apple Store, available in the app
store now.
p
I tried to reserve an iPhone 4 through it this morning, but each time I enter and
submit my phone account info, the app crashes and I'm returned t [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 15th '10 |
To iPhone, or not to iPhone? That's the question.
Greg Hughes
p
Ah, dilemas...
/p
p
Yesterday as I was sitting on one of my favorite chairs with my iPad in hand, I found
myself browsing the latest iPhone 4 news and rumors online. After all, the new Apple
smartphone will be released to the wild in a week, and pre-orders start on Tuesday
(tomorrow). So I had to get my fix of the excitement.
/p
p
But as I sat there for a while and hopped back and forth from the web browser to this
app and that app on my iPad, it occurred to be: emMaybe I don't really need an [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 14th '10 |
Testing Facebook's account deletion process
Greg Hughes
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There's been a bit of a stink recently around whether or not Facebook's account deletion
process works the way they say it does. The number of people pontificating in the
tech blogger fishbowl has been rather amazing, but I have yet to see someone actually
take the time to create, delete and reactivate an account, log on via a third party
tool after an account was deleted, see what happens, etc.
/p
p
So, I did just that in order to find out [read].
Posted: Sat, Jun 12th '10 |
Open Message to Google: We want Google Voice as a desktop app and we want it from you!
Greg Hughes
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Google Voice is a great service, grown up from the acquisition of Grand Central a
couple years ago. When Google acquired Gizmo 5 last year, many of us who use Google
Voice and benefit from its features got excited: Maybe they were on the cusp of bringing
Google Voice to the desktop.
/p
p
And the masses began to rejoice.
/p
p
Well, unfortunately a href="http://techcrunch.com/2010/06/11/google-voice-desktop-app-launch-delayed-may-be-scrapp [read].
Posted: Fri, Jun 11th '10 |
ATT wireless upgrade eligibiity moved up - and here comes the new iPhone
Greg Hughes
Last week I logged onto my ATT Wireless account and checked out my account's upgrade eligibility there. At the time the site indicated it "Could not determine your upgrade eligibility." That was a little weird.br /
div
br /
I logged back in today and looked again. With the bid Apple announcements expected
today I figured it would be good to know if ATT planned to make me wait until two
years had passed on the calendar. When I asked in a store a few weeks back they'd
told me late June.br /
/div
d [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 7th '10 |
Good bye to unlimited wireless data on ATamp;T ndash; How will it affect iPad 3G owners?
Greg Hughes
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I bought my iPad 3G just a month ago, and at the time I signed up for the ATamp;T
Wireless unlimited data plan for $29.99 a month. I’m glad I did, and should point
out to anyone on the 250MB plan who wants (or thinks they want) a truly unlimited
plan, strongyou have until June 6th to sign up for that plan./strong After that
date, the unlimited data plan won’t be available anymore.
/p
p
a href="http://www.att.com/gen/press-room?pid=4800a [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 2nd '10 |
Learning some DSLR Time-Lapse Video Technique ndash; Day and Night
Greg Hughes
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I decided yesterday to start using my Nikon D200 digital still SLR camera to do some
interval shooting, and then took the series of images to make a time-lapse film. It’s
something I’ve messed with before a little bit, but for some reason I decided I wanted
to dive right in.
/p
p
I made a couple so-so quick and dirty videos yesterday, and then shot some night clouds
moving across the star-lit sky last night. The nice thing about living w [read].
Posted: Sat, May 8th '10 |
Come shoot a big fireworks show with me on July 4th ndash; in Anacortes, Washington
Greg Hughes
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Once again this year, I have been asked to shoot an Independence Day fireworks show
for a href="http://westerndisplay.com/" target="_blank"Western Display Fireworks/a,
and this year it will be in beautiful a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?oe=UTF-8amp;ie=UTF8amp;q=anacortes,+wa" target="_blank"Anacortes,
Washington/a up on Fidalgo Island, next to the San Juan Islands. I’ve never been
there before, and am looking forward to the shoot. There [read].
Posted: Thu, May 6th '10 |
iPhone-controlled flying helicopter drone uses accelerometer and streams video
Greg Hughes
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img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 15px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="image" border="0" alt="image" align="right" src="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/iPhonecontrolledflyinghelicopterdroneuse_9FC4/image_3.png" width="240" height="105"/img Okay,
file this one under super-cool. A company called Parrot has built and demonstrated
a flying model helicopte [read].
Posted: Wed, May 5th '10 |
Initial thoughts and experiences with the iPad 3G
Greg Hughes
p
On Friday evening last week I stood in line for about an hour along with a slew of
geeks and even a few nerds at the Apple Store in Tigard, Oregon to get one of the
first Apple iPad 3G models. There were about 35 or 40 people ahead of me in line,
and a few more than that in line behind me by the time the 5pm release clock rolled
around and the Apple staff came screaming down the hallway in the mall.p
Within only 15 minutes I was already on my way back out the door of the store with
a 64GB 3G m [read].
Posted: Mon, May 3rd '10 |
Syncing iPhone with iTunes via WiFi -
Greg Hughes
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I’ve received a number of emails this morning complimenting me on a YouTube video
showing a href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/26/wi-fi-sync-wirelessly-syncs-the-iphone-with-itunes-in-your-d/"a
new app that syncs with iTunes via the WiFi connection/a. The only problem is, I’m
not the same Greg Hughes that wrote the app.
/p
p
To see what all the geeky excitement is about, watch the video below.
/p
p
The Greg Hughes in question is ac [read].
Posted: Mon, Apr 26th '10 |
Outlook hangs and communication errors ndash; Caused by wrong authentication option
Greg Hughes
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img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 15px 15px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="image" border="0" alt="image" align="right" src="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/OutlookhangsandcommunicationerrorsCaused_FEF7/image_7.png" width="186" height="244"/img I’ve
been fighting a bit with my installation of Outlook 2010 (beta) for the past several
days. Don’t get me [read].
Posted: Fri, Apr 23rd '10 |
The wecorl.a virus alert for McAfee users today is a false-positive - Bad DAT update file is the cause
Greg Hughes
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Many users of McAfee's virus scanning products are experiencing some real pain today
due to a false positive virus alert (for the wecorl.a virus) that is resulting in
dcom error reboots and in many cases the removal of the valid Windows svchost.exe
from affected systems.embr/em/p
p
emFirst of all, if you're affected by the problem described below, information about
a workaround fix and an update is here:br/em
/p
p
/p
ul
li
emhttp [read].
Posted: Wed, Apr 21st '10 |
Where to go to buy Scentsy home fragrance
Greg Hughes
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a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/WheretogotobuyScentsyhomefragrance_1478A/image_2.png"
img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="image" border="0" alt="image" align="right" src="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/WheretogotobuyScentsyhomefragrance_1478A/image_thumb.png" width="240" height="240"/img
[read].
Posted: Sat, Apr 10th '10 |
iPhone OS v4 to add multitasking, multiple Exchange servers, unified inbox and a lot more
Greg Hughes
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a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/iPhoneOSv4toaddmultitaskingmultipleExcha_A60C/image_2.png"
img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 15px 15px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="image" border="0" alt="image" align="right" src="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/iPhoneOSv4toaddmultitaskingmultipleExcha_A60C/image_thumb.png" width=" [read].
Posted: Thu, Apr 8th '10 |
Desktop App for Google Voice in the Works?
Greg Hughes
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TechCrunch reports today that Google is dog-fooding (using and testing internally) a href="http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/07/google-testing-google-voice-desktop-app-internally/" target="_blank"a
desktop app that lets you make Google Voice calls/a.
/p
p
Google a href="http://googlevoiceblog.blogspot.com/2009/11/google-welcomes-gizmo5.html" target="_blank"announced
the acquisition of Gizmo5/a last year, a company with an app that provides Intern [read].
Posted: Thu, Apr 8th '10 |
Interview with the guy who killed Clippy ndash; Nick Simons talks about Microsoft Office Web Apps
Greg Hughes
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a href="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/InterviewwiththeguywhokilledClippyNickSi_DDD0/image_4.png"
img style="border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 10px 15px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px" title="image" border="0" alt="image" align="right" src="http://www.greghughes.net/rant/content/binary/WindowsLiveWriter/InterviewwiththeguywhokilledClippyNickSi_DDD0/image_thumb_1.png" width [read].
Posted: Wed, Apr 7th '10 |
Office 2010 To-Do Bar Displaying the Wrong Calendar ndash; and a Quick Fix
Greg Hughes
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I have two different a href="http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/" target="_blank"Exchange
Servers/a and associated accounts open and active at the same time in my copy of a href="http://blogs.msdn.com/outlook/" target="_blank"Outlook
2010/a. That’s a new feature in the new version of Outlook, by the way: multiple
Exchange accounts visible in one profile – Quite a great change over previous versions!
/p
p
I’ve had a problem ever since in [read].
Posted: Wed, Apr 7th '10 |
Checking out the iPad
Greg Hughes
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I drove down to Best Buy with the family today to check out the iPads they had on
display and for sale. It was about 1:30 p.m. when we arrived and they still had quite
a few in stock, but only the 32GB and 64GB models. The 16GB iPads had sold out just
before we arrived.
/p
p
My impressions of the device were this: It was a little heavier than I thought it
would be, and a little thicker feeling, but a nice size. It has a great display and
is [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 4th '10 |
Wish-List Item: Google Voice Dialer Plugin for Outlook
Greg Hughes
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I’m a power user of both Google Voice and Microsoft Outlook (currently using the 2010
beta version at home). One of the interesting little speed bumps that accompanies
the Google Voice service is the fact that, in order to have a phone call to one of
your contacts appear as if it’s being initiated from your Google Voice number, you
have to dial out to a custom phone number that the Google Voice service provides/assigns
to every number you d [read].
Posted: Fri, Apr 2nd '10 |
Why Irsquo;m not buying an iPad ndash; yethellip;
Greg Hughes
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I decided the other day that I won’t be in the lines on Saturday morning when the
iPad becomes available at Apple stores and Best Buys around the country. Cory Doctorow a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2010/04/02/why-i-wont-buy-an-ipad-and-think-you-shouldnt-either.html" target="_blank"also
says he won’t buy one/a, but for different reasons. He goes so far as to say you
shouldn't get one either. Interesting arguments. I’ve discussed before [read].
Posted: Fri, Apr 2nd '10 |
How to find and download the latest version of Blackberry Messenger
Greg Hughes
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A guy named Chad contacted me today and asked if I knew how to get the newest version
of Blackberry Messenger (which, as of the time of this writing is v5.0.0.57) on his
Blackberry device. He was having problems finding it because his BB Desktop Manager
software would not find the update, he said. After some questions and answers, I found
the page linked below on the Blackberry support web site, which allows you to send
a link to your BB so you [read].
Posted: Thu, Feb 11th '10 |
A complicated tale of the not-even-yet-released iPad: Lack of openness is very iBad
Greg Hughes
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You could argue that one shouldn’t complain about a product before it lands in your
hot little hands, but a common theme over the past few days among the pundits on the
web has been the newly-announced iPad and it’s apparent lack of openness. a href="http://al3x.net/2010/01/28/ipad.html" target="_blank"as
Alex Payne comments/a, “Apple has decided that openness is not a quality that’s
necessary in a personal computer. That’s disturbing. [read].
Posted: Fri, Jan 29th '10 |
Why the Apple iPad Tablet will find a home in my airplane cockpit (and in my life)
Greg Hughes
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Apple is a href="http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/live-from-the-apple-tablet-latest-creation-event/?sort=newestamp;refresh=0" target="_blank"taking
the covers off/a a new “tablet” style device today – a href="http://www.apple.com/ipad" target="_blank"called
the iPad/a (link to Apple’s new product site, with video) - in a much-hyped announcement.
I rely on my iPhone in so many different ways nowadays that I have a hard time thinking
wha [read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 27th '10 |
Google Voice Accounts - Want an Invitation?
Greg Hughes
body xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
p
I shave/s had strong(SORRY - ALL GONE!)/strong two Google Voice account invitations
for anyone who wants one. First come, first served.
/p
p
If you want to know what Google Voice is, check out their a href="http://www.google.com/googlevoice/about.html" title="" target="_blank"videos
that do a good job of describing what it does and how it works here/a. For now it's
available by invitation only, so you can either get one from someone who has [read].
Posted: Sat, Dec 5th '09 |
Thanksgiving, loss, and finding ourselves again...
Greg Hughes
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I spent the afternoon and the better part of the evening with my friend Dave the other
day. We're close friends of ten years, both pilots and generally good buddies. We
spent the day keeping each other company and - although we only briefly spoke about
it - supporting each other through the anniversary of a difficult, life-changing day.
It's so hard to believe it's actually been ten years - Both an eternity and a blink
of the eye, all rolled in [read].
Posted: Thu, Nov 26th '09 |
Flying around Mt. Hood
Greg Hughes
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The other day I went flying in the plane with my friend Dave. We went a few places,
including the avionics shop at Aurora and an early dinner at the Mulino Hangar cafe.
Then we flew around Mt. Hood as the sun was going down. It was a calm, clear and beautiful
day, much improved over the recent rains. You could see all the mountains clearly,
from Sisters and Jefferson to the south, to Adams and St. Helens to the north, and
even all the way up to [read].
Posted: Thu, Nov 26th '09 |
Cloud Security summit offered free on September 30th
Greg Hughes
One of the upcoming online summits at BrightTalk is the Cloud Security Summit, which
consists of a bunch of web conferences on September 30th.
You can visit
the summit overview and schedule page here.
Lots of topics around security, legal issues and compliance in the context of cloud
computing. Good stuff. Recently on RunAs Radio we have have had a couple discussions
where cloud computing came up, too.
RunAs Radio #126: Steve Riley
is Up in the Clouds
RunAs Ra [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 25th '09 |
Whats the best design for interconnected Internet family calendars?
Greg Hughes
For a single mom with three kids, two of them teens, keeping a schedule is complicated
enough. Add someone like me to the mix and things get out of hand pretty quick. Because
that's the situation my soon-to-be-wife Laura and I have created, I've been asked/directed
to figure out a good, friendly, reliable and especially non-geek-usable way to do
shared calendars where everything just works. I think the term Wife Acceptance Factor
is about to have very real, personal meaning in my life.
[read].
Posted: Mon, Sep 7th '09 |
Upgrading to Snow Leopard, Native Exchange support in OSX, Outlook on the Mac, and Entourage Web Services Edition (oh my!)
Greg Hughes
I’m an Exchange 2007 user. It’s terrific, works great and is truly the standard by
which others are judged when it comes to business email, calendaring, contacts and
other key business productivity features.
Being both a Mac and a PC guy, I’ve been the tester, owner and user of a variety of
different applications to interface to Exchange. Outlook 2007 on the PC is a pretty
obvious choice, and again it’s a standard by which others are often judged. But on
the Mac I have been us [read].
Posted: Sat, Aug 29th '09 |
Fireworks show – Des Moines, Washington – July 4, 2009
Greg Hughes
Here’s a video of the fireworks
show we operated for the people of Des Moines, Washington this past weekend. It
was both Independence Day and the celebration of the city’s 50th anniversary. It took
an afternoon plus the better part of a full day to set up, and we shot it off in about
17-18 minutes.
The camera angle is a bit of an unusual one. In this video you are looking straight
up at the sky, and the camera is fastened to a bench on the pier where we fired the
show. The three [read].
Posted: Mon, Jul 6th '09 |
How to get a Yamaha WaveRunner with a new battery to start
Greg Hughes
I’m going to file this one here for my own use, and hopefully someone else will benefit
in the process. I bought two new batteries for my late-90’s Yamaha WaveRunners because
the old ones were dead. I got the batteries all prepped, charged them per the instructions,
and went to install them in the watercraft.
I hooked them up and tried to get the Wave Runners to start, but both were dead as
a doornail. I checked fuses and electrical connections and all was good. Hmmm. But
somethin [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 2nd '09 |
What we need next from Google Voice: MMS support and multiple SMS recipients
Greg Hughes
Google Voice is awesome.
It's the greatest
service you can't get yet today. One number for all my phones, for life, replete
with text messaging capabilities and a whole slew of cool features.
But, as much as I love Google Voice, I will stand on my soapbox here for a few moments
to yell into the ether about a couple of glaring omissions in the current release
that I think Google should address sooner rather than later: MMS message support,
and support for sending a mobile message (whether SMS o [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 24th '09 |
Here comes the AT&T 3G Microcell femto launch - well, kind of...
Greg Hughes
The
latest news via Unstrung's Michelle Donegan is that AT&T's 3G Microcell, which
has been in a limited and private beta in the United States for a few months now,
will be available in a sort of public beta in the coming weeks, in select (and as-yet
unnamed) cities. The 3G Microcell is a device that you plus into your broadband connection
at home. It has a 3G transceiver built in, and allows you to create a small cell area
of coverage (hence the name "microcell" of course). I've written abo [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 24th '09 |
Why I might just skip the iPhone 3GS - for now at least
Greg Hughes
Today Apple
announced the next rev of the iPhone, the "iPhone
3GS." It has beefed up processing power and some cool new features like a better
camera, more storage, etc.
Normally I'd be ultra excited about getting one as soon as its available. But this
time around, I'm having a hard time getting inspired.
It has nothing to do with Apple's hardware and software. In fact, the processing power
boosts and other changes are very, very tempting, and in a world where all else was
equal it would be [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 9th '09 |
What's old is new again
Greg Hughes
After a year and a half of doing some fun security and IT consulting (along with taking
some valuable personal time off), last week I returned to work full-time at the "parent"
of the company I used to work for. Fiserv acquired CheckFree last year, shortly after
CheckFree acquired Corillian - which was the company I at worked for about eight years.
My new responsibilities involve working on enterprise security strategy for the company
as a whole. I'm excited to be back working with a b [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 8th '09 |
Spring Flowers (It's not all about computers, you know)
Greg Hughes
Here's a non-technical post. I shot a few pictures in my yard this morning as the
sun was coming up. We've certainly been blessed with some incredibly nice weather
recently, after a whole bunch of rain. There are a zillion wild irises blooming across
my property. Click each image for the full-size version, if you like.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2009 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Thu, May 28th '09 |
De-TXT-er: A tool for parents who want to know what their kids are saying
Greg Hughes
Shorthand used to be reserved for stenographers and people who
took dictation or a lot of notes. But for the vast majority of us it was
never fun. Remember those days? Now shorthand is cool again, but in text messages
sent and received on cell phones. And it seems as if everyone under 25 is
doing it (as well as some of us old people).
Parents, if you're lost in the world of texting because the abbreviated vocabulary
is confusing, no worries. Mobile phone manufacturer LG has release [read].
Posted: Wed, May 27th '09 |
Exchange Server 2010 Webcasts Start June 1st
Greg Hughes
Exchange Server 2010 is just around the corner, and Microsoft is gearing up to present
a month of webcasts starting June 1st to introduce the new version to us. The webcast
schedule is below. You can get
the beta of Exchange Server 2010 here.
6/1/09 - 9:00am PT: TechNet
Webcast: Exchange 2010 High Availability
Welcome to the future! The future of Exchange high availability, that is. In this
webcast, we reveal the changes and improvements to the built-in high availability
platform in Exchang [read].
Posted: Wed, May 27th '09 |
Fireworks fan? Come shoot a big show with me on July 4th
Greg Hughes
Many people already know that I hold fireworks display operator/pyrotechnician licenses
in both Oregon and Washington. So, every year I "shoot" a few (or more) large public
display shows. In other words, the professional shows that cost quite a bit of money
and make big noises and splashes of light.
Every year I invite people to come help me with the operation of the show on July
4th. It's a fun and exciting way to spend Independence Day, and it's not often that
people get a chance to set up, [read].
Posted: Tue, May 19th '09 |
Portland Code Camp is Back! May 30th at Reed College
Greg Hughes
If
you're in or anywhere close to Portland, Oregon and you care about software development
from a coder's perspective, there's a terrific (and FREE) event coming up on May 30th
that you should definitely attend: Portland
Code Camp 2009.
If you're interested in learning from cool, smart people or if you have some area
of code passion you'd like to share with others (no experience necessary - seriously!),
then go check it out and sign up now.
The 2009 Portland Code Camp is a f [read].
Posted: Wed, May 6th '09 |
Water damaged iPhones now exchangeable (and I thought they already were)
Greg Hughes
I recently took advantage of an in-store offer to replace my water-damaged 16GB iPhone
3G with a 8GB version for $199 with no contract extensions, just paid the money and
walked out with it. And in my case I got to keep the old one, which makes a great
WiFi-enabled MP3 player.
Apparently (according to reports) it's now official policy/program now for Apple stores
to allow problematic iPhones where the water damage sensors (there are four of them)
have been "tripped" (discolored do to [read].
Posted: Tue, May 5th '09 |
Converting HD-DVDs to Blu-ray discs
Greg Hughes
When the now-long-forgotten HD disc format wars were just barely getting started,
I jumped on the bandwagon early and bought the HD-DVD add-on drive for the Xbox 360
(at the original higher price, even). I also purchased a number of HD movies in the
"Red" (HD-DVD) format and soon discovered the wonders of 1080p movies at home on the
Xbox 360.
Ultimately, Blu-ray won the battle to determine which of the two competing formats
would survive to become the industry standard. Today I rent N [read].
Posted: Tue, May 5th '09 |
Easter Eggs - Some Favorites From the Past for Your Geek Holiday
Greg Hughes
Tech Crunch posted a
list of Easter eggs - little hidden
software treasures you have to search for inside a program to find. It's a good
list, and has a few that I had forgotten about. Among those is what some say is the
original software Easter egg (I beg to differ, it might be the first video
game Easter egg - but we can save that for another day), from way back in 1979
in the Atari Adventure game (wow, I remember playing that one when it was new!).
[read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 12th '09 |
Why mobile developers don't write for the "other" plaforms
Greg Hughes
I had breakfast with a friend the other day. He's been writing some really cool iPhone
apps and mentioned that he's wanting to focus for the future on apps that can be written
and maintained cross-platform. He'll prefer to leave out the platform-specific "extra"
functionality, he said, in order to be able to do the bulk of the work once and maximize
the deployable surface area.
I got to thinking about this the rest of the day and came up with a whole list of
questions for my friend. I [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 12th '09 |
SQL Server 2008 SP1 released
Greg Hughes
For anyone who follows the "I always wait for the first service pack" method of deploying
products, your excuse for waiting on SQL Server 2008 disappeared this past week, because SP1
for Microsoft SQL Server 2008 is now available.
Among the features, I like the slipstream install capability (install SQL server and
the service pack in the same installation process), and the ability to uninstall the
service pack separately.
Service Pack 1 for SQL Server 2008 is now available to customers. The [read].
Posted: Sat, Apr 11th '09 |
Beta test opportunity: Help us test a cool security application for notebooks
Greg Hughes
I'm working with a software company to test some cool software that's currently in
the early beta stage of development. The software is of a security nature and will
be of interest to IT and security folks as well as individual computer users. We're
looking for people with netbooks and notebook computers,
especially ones with webcams built in, to test the software and provide
feedback.
You'll be provided a test key and the beta software, and will need to honor the confidentiality
pro [read].
Posted: Mon, Mar 23rd '09 |
Google Voice – Making multiple phone management simple and usable
Greg Hughes
Since my last
post, in which I predicted the newly-minted Google
Voice service would be a real positive impact in my world, my Grand Central account
was enabled for the upgrade to the new application and I have migrated to the service.
Greg’s One-Line Review: It’s pretty darned awesome.
But you probably want a little more detail than that, so here we go…
First of all, I should explain that I’ve used Grand Central for the past couple years.
Grand Central was the cent [read].
Posted: Mon, Mar 23rd '09 |
New tech I’m anxiously awaiting: Google Voice and the at&t 3G Microcell
Greg Hughes
I live in a remote location where you can barely get wireless service. I have to place
my mobile phone on a window sill in just the right spot, and if I do that I will often
get marginal service – enough to receive text messages most of the time, at least.
Depending on the weather and atmospheric conditions, I sometimes get no signal at
all.
There are two pieces of forthcoming technology that I plan to use to improve my situation
as soon as they are available: Google Voice and the a [read].
Posted: Sun, Mar 15th '09 |
Can you get a web page removed from Google search results?
Greg Hughes
More than once someone has asked me if there is a way to get Google to change their
search results to exclude mean, inaccurate, defamatory, rude, or otherwise hard-to-swallow
web pages. Often the desire motivating the question is legitimate, as someone has
been smeared unfairly or - even worse - in a completely fabricated and malicious fashion,
sometimes by anonymous online personalities.
The short answer is, "Probably not."
Now, before you think the proper solution is to have Go [read].
Posted: Wed, Mar 4th '09 |
I'm officially a private pilot!
Greg Hughes
As of this evening, I am among the ranks of those who call themselves licensed pilots.
"Wow, what a day! I woke up this morning and started in on some non-flying related
stuff that I had on my list, and at about 8:45 this morning my instructor, Kelly called
me. Turns out one of the local FAA examiners that conducts check rides for private
pilot candidates had today open and so he wanted to see if I could be at the airport
for my FAA check ride at 1pm today. It wasn't quite where my [read].
Posted: Tue, Mar 3rd '09 |
Mac DHCP wireless connection broken with self-assigned IP address (with solution)
Greg Hughes
I dropped into a Starbucks this afternoon, all prepared to get some emails written
and to get some work done between my Sunday afternoon and evening commitments. Everything
was fresh in my mind and ready to go via the keyboard and onto the screen. I fetched
my grande two-pump sugar-free vanilla skinny latte and sat down in the chair, opened
the laptop and watched it wake up and connect to the AT&T wireless access point.
But much to my dismay nothing would load over the network. The AirPort [read].
Posted: Mon, Feb 9th '09 |
Reply-All Case Study: Don't try to solve people problems by throwing technology at them
Greg Hughes
Good or bad, we live and work in an increasingly binary world.
More and more I notice our collective bipolar mentality. Everything is completely
one extreme or another, with no time or thought put into the idea that there might
be something much more realistic and reasonable in-between. It's black or it's white.
You're conservative or you're liberal. It's all the way on or it's shut completely
off. It's awesomely great or it's despairingly terrible.
What happened to the various [read].
Posted: Sat, Jan 31st '09 |
AT&T's 3G In-Home MicroCell Coming Soon? New Details
Greg Hughes
Although
there's not a specific release date or price available yet, AT&T has posted some
information on their web site that points to the future release of their new, in-home
3G cell station, which
I mentioned here a couple weeks ago.
Engadget has some details about the device from the
AT&T web site (details since removed from att,com, copied below), and images
(like the one above) have started to show up on AT&T's site, as well. The pictures
show two manufacturer names [read].
Posted: Tue, Jan 27th '09 |
The Windows 7 Public Beta - available for the first 2.5 million participants
Greg Hughes
Microsoft has turned loose its Windows 7 Beta release to the public, and
you can download it now. The beta times-out in the fall (it is a test version,
after all), and is apparently limited to 2.5 million installs (product keys). You
can learn more about the Windows 7 Beta release in our
interview with Microsoft's Stephen Rose on RunAs Radio.
As of 11:45 a.m. Pacific time, the "profile.microsoft.com" servers responsible for
the first phase of getting the new software were - not surpri [read].
Posted: Fri, Jan 9th '09 |
Interview: Microsoft releases Windows 7 Beta to the public
Greg Hughes
The CES
Keynote is over, so now you can listen to our exclusive Windows 7 interview with
Microsoft Sr. Community Manager for Windows Client IT Pros, Stephen Rose, available
at these links:
RunAs
Radio Web Site
| Download
MP3 file |
Download
WMA file
Alongside
a core message of stepping up expectations in technology despite the economy, Microsoft
announced this evening that it's releasing its Windows
7 Beta (build 7000) to the public for open testing [read].
Posted: Thu, Jan 8th '09 |
AT&T to offer in-home 3G base station? I need one of these.
Greg Hughes
Unfortunately, I'm not one of the customers that AT&T has apparently been reaching
out to in their testing of in-home micro wireless stations. I wish I was, since I
live in the sticks and barely get service at all on my AT&T wireless phone. This is
exactly what I need: A broadband-connected device that gives you local 3G coverage
in your home.
Ars
Technica reports that AT&T has described the device this way:
"AT&T's new product is a small, security-enabled cellular base stati [read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 7th '09 |
Big news in the SD card world - SDXC and EyeFi's new WiFi video uploading
Greg Hughes
SD cards have become a de facto standard format for media in most devices, with a
couple holdouts (namely Sony, which predictably uses a proprietary format). As such,
the format has grown and there's been quite a bit of innovation effort focused in
the SD arena.
A couple of announcements made this week at the CES show in Las Vegas are worth paying
attention to. In one announcement, we learn that the SD format will support massively
larger storage. In the other announcement, a popular [read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 7th '09 |
How the TV people put that magic yellow line on the football field
Greg Hughes
Ever wonder how they put that amazing magical yellow line on the line of scrimmage
and at the first-down point on the college and NFL football games we watch on TV?
It's a terrific technology and has in many ways made watching football very different
since it was adopted several years ago.
Well, for those of use who have wondered exactly how they do it, here's a video via
FANDOME that explains in some technical detail how the magic TV line on the football
field works:
[read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 7th '09 |
Wrist Phone from LG seen at CES
Greg Hughes
This
is pretty cool. Not completely new, but interesting for the future.
LG will (eventually) be shipping a wrist-wearable
cell phone that they just showed at the CES show in Las Vegas. I'm just pointing
it out because this might just be the first watch I'd be willing to actually wear.
Maybe. I'll probably hold out for a little thinner and smaller. Regardless, it's pretty
cool.
There's an Engadget video of it at: http://www.viddler.com/explore/engadget/videos/116/
Would you want [read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 7th '09 |
Pandora 2.0 for the iPhone - available now
Greg Hughes
I've written
here several times in the past about Pandora,
the slick Internet music app that streams music it determines you'll like based on
a starting point you give it (like a specific artist, for example). You can refine
the channel by voting up or down, song by song. Based on your votes and the "genetic"
makeup of the music you rate, it determines what other music to put into the channel.
The greatest aspect of using Pandora is discovering some truly great music and artists,
many of [read].
Posted: Wed, Jan 7th '09 |
Cloud Computing? Windows 7? Hear Mark Minasi's take on them.
Greg Hughes
Mark Minasi is a true character, and always a fun guy to have a conversation with.
While in Las Vegas at the Connections conference Richard Campbell and I had a couple
fun discussions with Mark, including one on the concept of Cloud Computing, and in
the context of Microsoft's recent Azure announcement.
Mark's take on the whole cloud-computing thing is an interesting one. You can listen
to our conversation with him via the RunAs Radio show link (Site|MP3).
While you're at it, you [read].
Posted: Sun, Jan 4th '09 |
I won't take electricity for granted anymore - Power's out and it's cold outside
Greg Hughes
Yesterday
evening I hooked up a new generator, freshly purchased from Lowe's in Longview, Washington
because the electricity has been out at my house since about 6:00 p.m. on the 24th.
In my neck of the woods (which, by the way, is a fairly literal description), we have
two utilities: electrical and telephone service. Internet is via a wireless
broadband service and an antenna on my roof that points to a mountain over in
Washington. I don't get standard phone service, since I use a VoIP-ov [read].
Posted: Sat, Dec 27th '08 |
Track Santa online in 3D with NORAD
Greg Hughes
Got the kids all set for Santa's arrival? You can help them track the jolly ol' elf's
progress via NORAD's
Santa tracking service on Christmas Eve.
There's
also a Google
Earth feed that you can use to track Santa's progress in 3D - Way cool for all
the younger geeks among us! They also have cameras
positioned around the world to allow us to see Santa's progress on Christmas Eve!
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons Lice [read].
Posted: Wed, Dec 24th '08 |
Blackberry 8800 outperforms iPhone on EDGE network
Greg Hughes
I'm stuck at home during this incredible and unusual snow storm. I quite literally
cannot drive my four-wheel-drive truck out of my driveway due to the wet and icy layer
under the two feet of snow that's accumulated, melted slightly, and then refrozen
over the past week. Unfortunately, when the storm is at its worse, my iPhone has lost
it's connection to AT&T's network. "No service" has become its full-time status. I've
tried both enabling 3G (which we don't have out here) and restricting it [read].
Posted: Mon, Dec 22nd '08 |
First snow of the Winter
Greg Hughes
I know, it's not in any way tech-related but when it snows for the first time each
year, I just have to write about it. It always snows and sticks where I live before
it does in the city of Portland. We got a couple inches of snow overnight.
The
snow started last night at around 8pm and that's what I woke up to. The power went
out three times last night, but each time came right back on. It's been snowing off
and on all day and the forecast is for more tonight an [read].
Posted: Sun, Dec 14th '08 |
Isn't the world confusing enough without our help?
Greg Hughes
Try explaining to someone that you're thinking of flying a route into the State of
Washington from Oregon that will take you close to Rainier. It's not quite as simple
as it sounds...
"Where are you?"
"I'm near Rainier."
"Ummmm..."
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Sun, Dec 14th '08 |
2-for-1 Parallels offer - Run Windows or Linux or ?? on your Mac
Greg Hughes
There
are a few different options out there for running virtual machines on your desktop.
One of those available options is Parallels,
and an electronic-delivery special offer lets you get
two copies of Parallels v4.0 for the price of one. That's $40 per copy, quite
a deal. So, if you have a need to run Windows apps on your Mac, or you want to run
any other PC-based operating system, you might consider grabbing a copy. You could
give the other one away as a good, geeky Christmas gift. Li [read].
Posted: Fri, Dec 12th '08 |
Rwanda's Internet Revolution - Video
Greg Hughes
15 years ago Rwanda was the scene of massive genocide. Today the country is working
to transform itself become an Internet hub of the African continent.
This is a good video by Internet Evolution, and shows that the Internet's not just
about big companies and catch-phrase ideas like Web 2.0. You can't really see or know
the extent of the Internet and it's impact without going places to see the impact
for yourself. Since most of us can't do that on our own, Internet Evolution's Web
Wi [read].
Posted: Wed, Dec 3rd '08 |
Audio podcast from my flight lesson Saturday
Greg Hughes
Just a quick note to mention that I've been posting a lot to my flight blog at http://coordinatedflight.blogspot.com/,
which I started in order to document my lessons and experiences as I work to become
a private pilot.
My latest flight, which I made to Salem, Oregon on Saturday, is documented both in
text and as a podcast MP3 file. Let me know what you think. The
entry can be found at this link.
I'm truly enjoying learning to fly. I'd say "I should have done this years ago," but
i [read].
Posted: Sun, Nov 30th '08 |
Linux on the iPhone
Greg Hughes
Not that you'd actually want to do it (or at least I don't think I would), but you
have to admit it's pretty cool that you can now run Linux on the iPhone. It's really
basic so far, but no doubt it will get better and have more and more hardware/feature
support. Maybe a dual-boot option would be cool though, after all...
Details
are here and Engadget
has info, too. Video showing it off below. What would you use it for?
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under [read].
Posted: Sat, Nov 29th '08 |
Where did nine years go? Grief and Gratitude on Thanksgiving
Greg Hughes
It seems like just yesterday in many ways, but it's actually been nine years - An
eternity and the blink of an eye, all rolled into one. So much has changed in that
time, yet so much seems the same.
My son died suddenly on November 24th so many years ago, and while much has happened
and changed in the intervening time, there's a slice of me that was sort of put on
hold back then - almost as if one dimension of time simply stopped still while another
kept on moving along. I miss Brian [read].
Posted: Mon, Nov 24th '08 |
Shizzow grows up, expands into California
Greg Hughes
Portland's Shizzow,
a thankfully-simple service that you can use to "shout" to your people and let them
know where you are, has announced they're expanding into the California market. The
service got its start here in Portland, Oregon and the team has methodically built
it out and run it in the home market up until now.
The basic idea of Shizzow is this: A quick and easy social networking service that
lets you quickly and easily communicate to your friends about where you are so you
[read].
Posted: Wed, Nov 19th '08 |
Flying lesson update: Flew solo for the first time
Greg Hughes
I wrote all about it on my flying blog, but Sunday was an exciting and cool day, because I
flew an airplane solo, all by myself with no one else in the plane, for the first
time. This whole flying thing might work out, after all!
The full story is
documented on my "Coordinated Flight" blog, should you care to read all about
it.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Mon, Nov 17th '08 |
Microsoft's Security Assessment Tool - Check your organization's security stance
Greg Hughes
While at the TechEd EMEA conference is Spain this week, I had the opportunity to visit
with Thomas Dawkins from Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Group. He's the guy responsible
for the Microsoft
Security Assessment Tool (or MSAT for short). The MSAT is a tool that's been around
for a couple of years, but it was recently updated by Thomas with some great new enhancements,
including a new user interface and a stronger, more complete set of back end information.
MSAT is a free tool that [read].
Posted: Fri, Nov 7th '08 |
In Barcelona all week - TechEd IT conference
Greg Hughes
Well, we're getting going full swing for a week of TechEd conference in Barcelona,
Spain. video, audio and stage presentations will be keeping us busy all week. If you're
here, please let me know, or drop by and say hi at the "fishbowl" or TechEd stage.
The weather when I flew in yesterday was bumpy and wet, but today it's beautiful and
sunny outside - more like the Barcelona I remember. Not that well be out in the air
much, this week - but it's nice to look outside and see sun. The ho [read].
Posted: Mon, Nov 3rd '08 |
Sneak Peak: New Arcade Hockey game for the iPhone/iPod Touch
Greg Hughes
I
had the opportunity today to spend some time chatting with Ben Jackson, who's the
owner and technical director of Brainjuice,
LLC. His company created Blogo, the app I use on my Mac to write posts like this
one.
But today we weren't talking about Blogo, we were discussing a new iPhone game Brainjuice
is in the final phases of completing called Arcade Hockey. It's just about done and
will appear in the iTunes App Store in early to mid November. It's a table hockey
game and it's a lot [read].
Posted: Fri, Oct 31st '08 |
New Business Cards from Hugh's place
Greg Hughes
I ordered some new business contact cards since I ran out of the old ones some time
ago. They arrived today. Rather than going the standard route or reordering the ones
with my mug on the front, I decided to shop over in the UK via the Internet.
I ordered one of Hugh MacLeod's designs from over at gapingvoid.
He's made a bunch of his designs available
for online ordering at Street Cards. The quality of the cards is great (I ordered
the coated cards), and I received them just in time f [read].
Posted: Fri, Oct 31st '08 |
Greg's List
Greg Hughes
I got a call this morning, a variation of the same call I get around two or three
times a month. Someone saw my phone number over in the sidebar and called me to find
out about posting items for sale or rent on "Greg's List."
Each time the call comes in, I explain that the site they're looking for is actually Craig's
List, which is on the web at http://www.craigslist.org.
So, if you happen to be looking for Greg's List, it's actually called Craig's List,
and there's the web address fo [read].
Posted: Thu, Oct 30th '08 |
New iPhone stuff - Griffin iTalk recorder and Google Earth for the iPhone
Greg Hughes
It's been an interesting and exciting few days in iPhone land.
In the just past couple days, Google Earth and a voice recording application from
Griffin have both been released for the iPhone. Add to that the news that iPhone owners
now have access
to AT&T WiFi hotspots for free - nice! Google Earth is - of course - free,
and Griffin iTalk is free for a limited time, along with it's Mac client (for syncing).
Google
earth on the iPhone (iTunes app store link) is p [read].
Posted: Thu, Oct 30th '08 |
Entourage won't sent meeting invitations or responses after Office Mac 12.1.3 update
Greg Hughes
I've been wrestling with a problem for a few days after applying the latest Office
2008 for Mac update (v12.1.3). Everything works well except for sending and responding
to meeting notices.
After the update, when Entourage tries to send a meeting notice or response, it throws
the following: "[Error] Unexpected data was encountered. [Explanation] Mail could
not be sent. Account name: 'Exchange - Greg' Error: -17997."
On my Windows machine, which is running Outlook 200 [read].
Posted: Sat, Oct 25th '08 |
Headed to TechEd in Barcelona, Spain and DevConnections in Las Vegas
Greg Hughes
The fall conference season is upon us, and I'll be off to Barcelona on the first of
November for a week at the Microsoft TechEd Europe/Middle East/Asia conference. I'll
be joining my friend and colleague, Richard Campbell, there for the week. If by chance
you'll also be there, be sure to let me know ahead of time!
Then, the following week Richard and I will both be traveling to Las Vegas for the
Connections conference, where we'll be doing a live RunAs Radio recording session.
Should [read].
Posted: Wed, Oct 22nd '08 |
"I crashed perfmon"
Greg Hughes
My friend Richard Campbell and I spent the morning recording a couple episodes of RunAs
Radio for publication in the near future. One of our guests (whom we shall reveal
when the show is published) provided some amazingly great information about using
Performance Monitor, or "perfmon" for short. He's a perfmon Ninja, really. I'm excited
about that show because I think when it comes up I think people will be able to learn
something quite useful, as it includes some desktop video (perfmon is, [read].
Posted: Fri, Oct 17th '08 |
Third Presidential Debate - Streamed live right here via Hulu.com
Greg Hughes
Want to watch tonight's final presidential debate live on the 'net? Everyone should
watch, and please don't skip your opportunity to vote in the election. It's just too
important.
Hulu.com is again streaming this debate, and you can watch it right here. Who needs
a TV, anyhow?
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Thu, Oct 16th '08 |
The next version of Windows will be called... "Windows 7"
Greg Hughes
Dumping the warm fuzzy naming convention ad not returning to date-based names, Microsoft announced
today that the next version of Windows, which will replace Vista, will be called
simply "Windows 7."
Good idea.
It's the seventh version of Windows. It makes sense. Returning to a solid, basic,
fundamental naming convention helps, I think, in helping to focus purpose on ensuring
the fundamental requirements are met, that a solid, simple (from a usability standpoint
at least) produc [read].
Posted: Tue, Oct 14th '08 |
Crop the Vote!
Greg Hughes
Space Aliens for McCain or Obama? Could be... Someone's trying to get the vote word
out, that's for sure.
I had a flying lesson this morning and on the way back to our
home airport, my instructor and I saw an unusual crop formation in a corn field
from about 1000 feet above the ground. You'd never see it otherwise. You think someone
out there is trying to send us a message? I captured it for you to see with my new
Kodak Zi6 pocket HD video camera. You can get the higher-quality
versi [read].
Posted: Tue, Oct 14th '08 |
Gartner: IT spending outlook for 2009 maybe not too grim
Greg Hughes
Analyst and research company Gartner revised its IT industry projection figures and
- as reported
this morning by ZDNet and released
by Gartner themselves - presented them during a symposium keynote at the company's
big annual IT conference, which opened this morning. In a nutshell, Gartner analyst
Peter Sondergard says they still expect growth, and that even in the very worst case,
IT spending next year will fall about 2.5 percent. From ZDNET:
Gartner had expected budgets to grow [read].
Posted: Tue, Oct 14th '08 |
Educate your self about our financial times - Listen to these two audio shows
Greg Hughes
Over and over it's obvious that the vast majority of people I speak with have no real
idea what the current financial situation is all about, how it happened and how it
works.
It's not often I'll ask people to take the time to listen to an audio show, no matter
what. But in this case, I think it's important enough. With all the media discussion
about the gloom and doom of the current economic mess, there's been little or no meaningful
education about what caused it and where we are now [read].
Posted: Fri, Oct 10th '08 |
I bought a Chumby on eBay today. Why? Pandora's available.
Greg Hughes
The Chumby is a cool little Internet-enabled
device that sits pretty much wherever you want and does all sorts of cool things.
You can check it out here. Today
it became even better that before, in a way that I especially appreciate, so I jumped
on eBay to see if any were available there (you can buy them online new, too).
So
what's this new cool thing that makes it even better in my eyes? Pandora -
the Internet "radio station" app that I already use on
my computer as well as [read].
Posted: Wed, Oct 8th '08 |
DirectTV DVR glitch - You might need to reset now
Greg Hughes
DirecTV had an unusual technical glitch sometime in the past 48 hours, and as a result
customers with either standard or HD DVRs might experience issues with a "frozen remote"
or similar behavior. DirecTV Has emailed customers to let them know (see below).
This is important because if your DVR is in the hung state they describe, you need
to reset it, or your scheduled recordings will likely not be recorded.
I had the issue exactly as described the night before last on my HD-DVR, an [read].
Posted: Wed, Oct 8th '08 |
Ad revenues in a down ecomomy - We might be surprised
Greg Hughes
Larry Dignan posted
some interesting charts, graphs and figures today over at ZDNet looking at advertising
revenue for the first half of 2008, compared to previous periods. He also asks what
will happen to advertising revenue in the faltering economy. Good question.
What I know best is my experience, which is undoubtedly unique since this site is
not exactly huge (about 750K pageviews/month). However, over the past few years I
have watched my revenue trends from contextual advertising [read].
Posted: Tue, Oct 7th '08 |
Hulu will introduce live streaming tonight with presidential debate
Greg Hughes
I've lately come to enjoy the relatively new video site, hulu.com,
for catching up on television shows I've missed. Decent quality and easy access offered
by the site are great. The other day they posted the Saturday Night Live spoof sketch poking
fun at Joe Biden and Sarah Palin, and quite literally everyone I know must have
gone there to view that specific clip in the past few days.
Tonight, Hulu takes it to the next level with the real candidates by introducing
live streaming to the [read].
Posted: Tue, Oct 7th '08 |
Quick flying update
Greg Hughes
It's been a fun and challenging week learning to fly. I found a couple good podcasts,
and have posted a couple new detailed entries to my new flying blog, Coordinated
Flight.
The podcasts I found are The
Student Pilot Podcast, by Bill Williams in Arizona, and Uncontrolled
Airspace, which Bill recommended. Good stuff.
I have four flight days scheduled next week. I hope the weather cooperates!
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Comm [read].
Posted: Sun, Oct 5th '08 |
I missed my own 5-year birthday (of this blog, I mean)
Greg Hughes
Well, true to my own distracted form I realized about a month too late that this weblog
turned five years old last month. I didn't get a chance to wish it "happy blogday,"
so I'll do so belatedly. Five years is quite a bit of time, yet it also seems as if
it was all that long ago that I started this thing.
The site has gradually changed in terms of how I "use" it over time. Recently I've
written less frequently than at times in the past, but when I do write I tend
to write more in o [read].
Posted: Fri, Oct 3rd '08 |
TBot - Live translation for instant messaging between people who speak different languages
Greg Hughes
I speak English natively. My friend that I want to chat with in IM speaks German.
A chat-helper service called MTBOT (Microsoft Translation Robot) allows me to type
in English, yet my friend sees and reads what I wrote translated into his native German
language. Likewise, when he types in German, what I see is his messages machine-translated
into English.
If you use Windows Live Messenger, you too can add mtbot@hotmail.com to your
buddy list. When you want to chat with someone who spea [read].
Posted: Sun, Sep 28th '08 |
Call your Congressman for Pandora - H.R. 7084 needs to pass
Greg Hughes
Call your Congressional rep now (202-225-3121) and ask them to support H.R.
7084, the Webcaster Settlement Act of 2008. Pandora
and other similar services need your help.
I called last night and left a message for my Congressman in Oregon, David Wu. If
it's your first time, calling just know it's easy: The operator will answer the phone,
you ask for your congressman by name, and they transfer you to the correct office.
I left a message for Wu last night stating that I wanted him to [read].
Posted: Sun, Sep 28th '08 |
I'm Flyyyyin'
Greg Hughes
The past couple days I've spent a little time down at Twin
Oaks Airpark, a small private airport located on the far west side of Portland,
Oregon. Yesterday I spent an hour there, and today I went for about two hours. Both
days I learned and flew with my
new flight instructor, Kelly. I've always wanted to learn to fly and over the
years I've spent quite a bit of time in small aircraft. But now I'm going to put the
time and effort (and expense) into learning and practicing everything one ne [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 26th '08 |
Learn About Vista Performance
Greg Hughes
On Wednesday morning (September 24th, that is) at 9 a.m. Pacific time, Ed
Bott will be joining Microsoft Technical Fellow Mark
Russinovich and others for a live IT Springboard panel online discussing Windows
Vista performance, a topic of interest to many and (based on my observations) understood
by few.
You can ask questions live or email them to the panel ahead of time. The panel should
be located here when it happens.
The Springboard Virtual Roundtable Series is a great IT resource, [read].
Posted: Wed, Sep 24th '08 |
Google Like a Pirate
Greg Hughes
It's Talk Like
a Pirate Day (as happens every September 19th), and Google's jumped into the fray
with Pirate search. Try
it here. Enjoy.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Sat, Sep 20th '08 |
Microsoft's new Commercials and the PC Guy: Sean Siler (a real, live Microsoft employee)
Greg Hughes
I wasn't going to write anything about the new
Microsoft commercials, which I really like, despite the fact that I wrote about
the two Seinfeld/Gates commercials.
But
then I realized that the PC Guy in the commercials is Sean Siler. He's a real tech
guy who actually works at Microsoft for a living - as opposed to being a professional
actor. Here's his TechNet blog.
In fact, Sean epitomizes the "I'm a PC" message. We interviewed him not too long ago
for RunAs Radio on the
top [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 19th '08 |
A case study in poor authentication: Palin's Yahoo! email account
Greg Hughes
It's really the classic case study in information (in)security and the need for
strong authentication. With all due respect to the good people at Yahoo!, this opportunity
to review Internet security mechanisms is too good and too useful to pass up.
By now, we all know Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah
Palin's Yahoo! email account was broken into on Tuesday night (read the link to
get the details). Apparently (and fairly obviously), access was gained via the forgotten
p [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 19th '08 |
Wave 3 of Windows Live apps now available to download
Greg Hughes
The third wave of official beta apps under the Windows Live name have been made available
a bit early for download. Full information and download links are located over at liveside.net.
The updated Windows Live apps are:
Messenger v9
Windows Live Movie Maker
Mail with Calendar synchronization
Writer
Photo Gallery
Family Safety
Outlook Connector
There are also non-English versions listed on the site and a few individual reviews
posted at liveside.net:
[read].
Posted: Thu, Sep 18th '08 |
Powershell and SQL Server - working together
Greg Hughes
The latest version of SQL Server implements several object models through Powershell
to let folks manage SQL Server without using the SQL management tools.
We've just published a new episode
of the RunAs Radio podcast with Michiel Wories, in which we dive into SQL Server
2008's Powershell features. Michiel is certainly the one to know and share about these
features: He joined Microsoft 7 1/2 years ago in the role of Senior Program Manager
for Microsoft SQL Server and is currently working as a [read].
Posted: Wed, Sep 17th '08 |
Upgraded my DirecTV HR21 HD-DVR to 1TB of hard drive storage
Greg Hughes
I
enjoy the fact that my DirecTV DVR (model HR21-200) records HD content for me. The
quality is generally pretty darned good (it does 1080i video now and 1080p is coming
via a software upgrade), and it beats the heck out of anything else available to me
in the boonies. The unit comes equipped with a 320GB (give or take) internal drive,
which allows something like 30 hours max of HD recording. I found that when recording
full seasons of a few shows like The Office or Lost in HD (and most of [read].
Posted: Sat, Sep 13th '08 |
The Bill and Jerry Show - Part 2
Greg Hughes
Seinfeld and Gates are back at it again, somehow advertising Microsoft Windows. It's starting to make at least a little sense. Kind of.
If nothing else, it's getting funnier. I know most people said they didn't like the
first commercial much. I liked it, though. This second one pretty long. Enjoy:
(via Brier
Dudley at the Seattle Times)
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 12th '08 |
Privacy flaw or useful feature? Your iPhone is "watching" you
Greg Hughes
Over at Wired's Gadget Labs blog, Brian
Chen writes about information discovered during a webcast presentation on Thursday
covering the recently discussed iPhone security weaknesses having to do with bypassing
the password-protected lock screen.
Jonathan Zdziarski, a data forensics expert and author of the forthcoming book "iPhone
Forensics," did the presentation for law enforcement personnel and anyone else who
might have a need to access an iPhone to discover information. During the [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 12th '08 |
9/11 Expeditions to Remember the Fallen
Greg Hughes
Each year on September 11th, an organization I am proud to be a part of called Cops
On Top undertakes memorial expeditions to the highest points of the 50 United
States. The purpose of the expeditions is to remember those law enforcement officers
and public safety personnel who have lost their lives protecting ours.
Today teams from many states are again on the way to their respective summits. Those
teams that are able will be calling in to the Cops on Top web site publishing systems
w [read].
Posted: Thu, Sep 11th '08 |
Gates and Seinfeld - a funny, good marketing ploy
Greg Hughes
The first commercial in Microsoft's new ad campaign with Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates
is out. I thought it was pretty funny and smart. Subtle, very subtle.
This made me laugh out loud: Gates' "Shoe Circus Clown Club Platinum Card" picture
is actually his
mug shot from an
arrest for traffic violations in New Mexico, way back in 1977. Classic, and funny.
Here's the new commercial. I like the idea of starting out really vague and (we have
to assume) building from there. Very Seinfeld-ish. [read].
Posted: Fri, Sep 5th '08 |
Unified Communications - The intersection of voice, email, instant messaging and other technologies
Greg Hughes
As is the case with more and more technology
in the modern age, it's when you start to combine the power of two or more technologies
that you realize the full potential of each. Such is the case with Microsoft's Unified
Communications products. Sure, Exchange and Office Communication Server are both great
on their own, but when you use them together (and potentially integrate with your
VoIP phone system), you realize the greater value of your investments.
Jeff Goodwin works at The VIA Gr [read].
Posted: Wed, Sep 3rd '08 |
Poll: What do you think of Google Chrome after the first day?
Greg Hughes
Chrome has been available for about 12
hours. What's your point of view and experience with Google's new browser?
/* */(function(){try{var c=function(){setTimeout(function(){var t=document.createElement("script");t.src="http://widgets.ask500people.com/embedded_map_widget/edge.js?k%3D42vfsg0l%26q%3D25100";t.src=unescape(t.src);t.type="text/javascript";t.charset="utf-8";document.body.appendChild(t);},1);};window.addEventListener("load",c,false);} catch(e){try{window.attachEvent("onload",c);} ca [read].
Posted: Wed, Sep 3rd '08 |
More on Chrome: Official Google announcement and screen-shots
Greg Hughes
As
mentioned earlier here and everywhere else on the 'net, Google's Chrome web browser
is coming. Today Google put
an official release notice on its Official Google Blog, and they tell us it will
be made available for you and me to download and try on Tuesday.
Over at
Google Blogoscoped there's a whole bunch of screen shots you can check out if
you can't wait until tomorrow. Screen shots are a bit hard to come by today, but tomorrow
it'll be in-person for everyone, and you can probab [read].
Posted: Mon, Sep 1st '08 |
Google's Dream Broswer, Chrome: Coming soon to your computer
Greg Hughes
Google seeded a paper
comic book to some people recently, to present and describe their future web browser
(or you might just think of it as the web browser of the future), which is called
Google Browser or Chrome.
So, what's the story? Making the browser more stable, more usable, more secure. At
first glance, it looks like a strong starting point for the future of Internet browsers.
Written from the ground-up from scratch and with the experience of several years of
past b [read].
Posted: Mon, Sep 1st '08 |
LinkedIn launches new groups features - Adds discussions and membership search
Greg Hughes
As mentioned the
other day, LinkedIn today released
their new Groups features. Groups are one of the most popular features on LinkedIn,
despite the limited feature-functionality provided for groups on the web site in the
past.
The new features include a searchable contacts roster (search by name, company, or
other keywords such as specific areas of expertise), which is accessible to all members;
and discussions with email-digest notifications (which are configurable by individual
gro [read].
Posted: Fri, Aug 29th '08 |
Vidoop Labs launches Identity in the Browser IDIB) dream project
Greg Hughes
Vidoop Labs has a dream:
The dream is to see Identity baked into all browsers.
Just imagine opening your web browser and then selecting your Identity Provider (IDP)
the way you select your default search provider. The benefits are numerous; never
type in a username, never look for a login button/page (you are authenticated when
you land on a domain), no phishing/MITM (the browser can do domain and SSL cert
validation
).
You fire up your browser and authenticate (or login) s [read].
Posted: Fri, Aug 29th '08 |
iPhone connection woes - More evidence AT&T's 3G network is to blame (and an iPhone software flaw is, too)
Greg Hughes
I thought I'd present some casual observations I made throughout the day Wednesday
on a trip from Portland to Seattle, as well as some newly reported information about
the AT&T 3G network that's hit the 'net over the past 24 hours or so.
The back-story here is that I - like many others - have found the reliability and
consistency of the iPhone 3G to be less than satisfactory while on the 3G AT&T
network.
First of all, it became clear to me over the course of several hours [read].
Posted: Fri, Aug 29th '08 |
Fixing a Dead Nikon D70 - Green Blinking Light
Greg Hughes
My first-generation Nikon D70, which I bought the day it was released to the market
a few years back, died on me a few months back. Without a card in it, it won't start,
and when you insert a CF card in the slot, the green data-access indicator flashes
on and off. If I hold down the Menu button, the menu flashes on and off along with
the green LED.
As
it turns out, this is a known problem with the original Nikon D70 cameras, and Nikon
USA has a service bulletin out on the camera body [read].
Posted: Thu, Aug 28th '08 |
NASA shoots a computer virus into space
Greg Hughes
Well, this
is a little embarrassing. Intergalactic malware has made it's way into the news.
A computer virus on the International Space Station. No AV software on the laptops
they use, nor (apparently) is there a process of security checks on personal computer
equipment like USB thumb drives carried by astronauts being rocketed to the International
Space Station.
Granted, the virus in question in this case is pretty innocuous, and apparently other
viruses that have made it into space ab [read].
Posted: Thu, Aug 28th '08 |
My favorite commercial of all time: Right Field, Pizza Hut, and Peter, Paul and Mary
Greg Hughes
Now and then I think back to an old song,
a not-quite-as-old television commercial, and a little league baseball "career" that
happened years before. In each of our lives there's that song, that toy, that event,
or what have you - Something from our past that somehow pulls us back, and returns
our minds directly into a piece of our past that has some real meaning.
For me, one of those timeless reminders is a song and a Pizza Hut commercial from
the early 90's. I recall seeing the commerc [read].
Posted: Wed, Aug 27th '08 |
LinkedIn to upgrade Groups features with Discussions
Greg Hughes
LinkedIn has
started sending owners of certain LinkedIn Groups email letting them know that on
Friday they'll be enabling a new discussions capability for group managers and members.
A friend received the information for his LinkedIn group today, but I have not yet
received it for the one I co-manage, PDX Tech.
So, it's not clear whether this is rolling out to all groups or just some.
The addition of this new Groups functionality is a great move. To date, people who
manage LinkedIn grou [read].
Posted: Wed, Aug 27th '08 |
iPhone 3G Tests: Antenna passes, networks fail
Greg Hughes
A couple of small, independent evaluations
of the iPhone 3G's performance, which has been much maligned by many of it's customers
(including me from time to time), have been published in the past day or so. The results
are interesting to consider, especially side-by-side.
In the first test, Swedish tech site GP took
their iPhone 3G to a super-fancy antenna test chamber at a company called Bluetest,
where they ran the iPhone through the highly technical paces along with a few other
3G ph [read].
Posted: Mon, Aug 25th '08 |
How to: Create a Play-in-Background Pandora Widget for the Mac Dashboard
Greg Hughes
I like to listen to my Pandora "stations"
in the background while working on my laptop. I get frustrated when I accidentally
close the web browser (often its in a hidden tab) or, even worse, click on a link
soewhere and Safari, in all it's awesomeness and wisdomness, re-uses the window and
kills the audio feed.
In hopes of finding a better way, I started searching for a Pandora widget for the
Mac Dashboard (the layover-page that you can put any of a number of downloadable mini-apps
o [read].
Posted: Wed, Aug 20th '08 |
iPhone Software v2.0.2 this afternoon
Greg Hughes
Boy Genius says
iPhone software v2.0.2 is on it's way out the door this afternoon. In fact, I
just checked in iTunes, and there it is.
All 248.7MB of it. The description in the iTunes UI says it contains bug fixes, and
that's it. Here's hoping the performance and stability issues - especially related
to 3G network performance and switching - are what they fixed in this release. I almost
returned my phone the other day out of sheer frustration, and that's saying a lot,
real [read].
Posted: Mon, Aug 18th '08 |
FeedBurner update to RSS feeds
Greg Hughes
I just made a change on the blog, so my
main RSS feed links now point to FeedBurner. You should not need to do anything
to use the new feed - it's automagical. As a result of this change, some people might
see duplicates of past entries. It's a one-time change (I hope), so thanks for putting
up with it.
If you happen to subscribe to the feed for any single posting category here, that
feed URL is unchanged.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creat [read].
Posted: Fri, Aug 15th '08 |
The Rules of Jinx
Greg Hughes
My knowledge and social integrity was called into question this evening (in an instant
messaging group chat session) about a rule-related fact I declared to be true based
on the Rules of Jinx. I've always considered the rules to be pretty straight forward,
and we all know they are unflinchingly rigid, but I'm willing to accept that evidence
is the best proof when someone questions you.
And what better evidence than an encyclopedia of "facts" made up by pretty much anyone
who says they know wh [read].
Posted: Thu, Aug 14th '08 |
SQL Injection attacks in the wild - why they're working and what to do
Greg Hughes
A bunch of IT and web-app teams have lost a lot of sleep lately...
Over the past several days, a significant number (in the thousands) of web applications,
some of them well-known and well-used, have fallen victim to a distributed SQL injection
attack that takes advantage of weak or non-existent input validation to inject malicious
HTML code that then performs a drive-by malware attack on unsuspecting visitors. Since
visitors to your site trust it, if your site has been hacked they are more l [read].
Posted: Tue, Aug 12th '08 |
DataCase iPhone app lets you wirelessly move files from desktop to iPhone
Greg Hughes
There are a lot of so-so iPhone apps out there, fun to use once or twice but not killer
applications that you simply must have. DataCase is
a candidate for that latter classification. (Available via
the app store for iPhone and iPod Touch, $6.99)
The DataCase app allows you to copy files from your PC or Mac to the iPhone via the
wireless network using a drag-and-drop method. Once on the iPhone you can view and
use the files in mobile mode. There's support for MS Office formats, PDF, text, com [read].
Posted: Tue, Aug 12th '08 |
HughesNet satellite service with 5 mbps download speed coming this fall
Greg Hughes
I'm a rural-living person who often consults people on how to get broadband Internet
connectivity to their middle-of-nowhere homes. There's some good news for most of
those people. HughesNet, the big guy in the satellite Internet service space operated
by Hughes Network systems (no relation), has
announced that later this month they will begin offering what they're calling the
ElitePremium plan, with download speeds available as fast as 5 megabits per second
(mbps). That's up there speed-wise wi [read].
Posted: Wed, Aug 6th '08 |
Shazam and Pandora on the iPhone - Your chocolate is in my peanut butter!
Greg Hughes
Every now and then you'll discover a couple or few smaller apps that work well together,
or alongside each other. The type of situation where you get the 2+2=5 effect. Individually
both apps are great, but when used together they becomes something even more. "Two
great tastes that taste great together," to borrow an old marketing phrase.
That's been the case for me with two iPhone apps - Shazam (iTunes
store page) and Pandora (iTunes
store page). Today I use them alongside each other. It's my [read].
Posted: Sat, Aug 2nd '08 |
How to succeed as a tech exec in five easy steps
Greg Hughes
My title for this post sort of spins the title of the article I want to point you
to, aiming for the positive side of the coin. The article, which is entitled "The
Top 5 Reasons Tech Execs Fail," provides a set of bullet-pointed thoughts that
can be read as a list of what tech execs need to do in order to succeed. I
happen to agree with the authors' assessment.
Here's the short version of Marty
Abbott and Michael Fisher's five points, slightly altered to read as a list of
positive attributes [read].
Posted: Sat, Aug 2nd '08 |
Review - invisibleSHIELD "case" by Zagg for the iPhone 3G
Greg Hughes
You should listen to your online friends. They often have great ideas, like in this case. I was recently turned onto a simple but effective alternative to bulky plastic cases and leather holsters for my new iPhone 3G. It's called the invisibleSHIELD .
The product, simply put, is pretty darned terrific. You hardly know it's there, and
it protects like crazy.
Now, let me tell you right up front that when it comes time to "install" the shield
on your phone, you'll need a clean work surface, a li [read].
Posted: Sat, Aug 2nd '08 |
Windows Vista Tuning Guide
Greg Hughes
I especially appreciated the Mojave Experiment that Microsoft recently shared with
the world (where Vista-negative opinions were tested with a "new" version of Windows,
code-named Mojave; it was then revealed to the participants after seeing the new version
that what they were looking at was actually Vista). I've been using Vista since
well before I came onto the market, and I can hardly stand to use WIndows XP computers
anymore. Anyhow, check out http://www.mojaveexperiment.com if
you haven't s [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 31st '08 |
IT Risk Management - an interview with my friend Simon Goldstein
Greg Hughes
Last week we
published an interview that Richard and I did on RunAs Radio with my friend and
former co-worker, Simon Goldstein. Simon's a real pro and is good at explaining complicated
business relationships and processes.
We cover risk management for IT professionals: What is it, what do you need to know,
and why does it matter? As with all of our weekly RunAs Radio shows, it's about 30
minutes long and we cover a lot of ground in that time.
RunAs Radio, Show 67 - Simon
Goldstein on IT Ris [read].
Posted: Mon, Jul 28th '08 |
What will it take to get OpenID adopters to be relying parties?
Greg Hughes
Over on
the Internet Evolution site I recently wrote an article discussing the fact that
MySpace is becoming an OpenID provider. Of note is the fact that they will be provider-only,
and not a relying party, at least initially. This is a trend we've seen with other
big companies like Yahoo!, and many of us are not-too-patiently waiting for these
companies to start trusting and relying upon other organizations, so the utopia of
user-controlled Internet single-sign-on can become a reality.
That [read].
Posted: Sun, Jul 27th '08 |
DNS exploit now in the wild - 52% of DNS servers vulnerable today
Greg Hughes
The DNS
vulnerability discovered earlier this year by Dan Kaminsky, and recently patched
by DNS software providers in an unprecedented cross-vendor cooperation, has graduated
from vulnerability to exploit-in-the-wild.
According to Kaminsky, 52% of
the DNS servers on the Internet are still vulnerable, better than the number of exploitable
systems just a few weeks ago when the patches were released by all the vendors.
Kaminsky has written up a
plain-language helper guide to explain the probl [read].
Posted: Sat, Jul 26th '08 |
How big is the web? More than a trillion pages - but how much is that really?
Greg Hughes
On the Google blog, Jesse Alpert & Nissan Hajaj posted an article today called "We
knew the web was big..." which indicates Google engineers recently noted that
the number of web pages on the Internet passed the one-trillion mark. That's 1,000,000,000,000
pages. For those who don't process the impact of adding that many groups of zeros
at a time, think about this:
Take 1,000 pages.
Multiply that 1,000 times and think about just how big that is.
Multiply that amount another thousa [read].
Posted: Sat, Jul 26th '08 |
iPhone 2.1 beta with additional GPS features in testing
Greg Hughes
Apple has released a version of the iPhone 2 software (v2.1) to beta programmers along
with an updated SDK. The firmware release supposedly includes additional core GPS
features that allow computation and use of direction of travel and speed. This is
good for those of us waiting patiently for turn-by-turn direction software for the
phone.
Apparently there's also some functionality that enables apps to process push notifications
in the background, as well. I, for one, hope for more background [read].
Posted: Fri, Jul 25th '08 |
Will the iPhone 3G blend - twice as fast?
Greg Hughes
Dunno about twice as fast, but will it blend? Blendtec (of course) decided to find
out. Found via
the Google Mobile blog.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 24th '08 |
Open Web Foundation announced
Greg Hughes
Over at OSCON just a short time ago, the Open Web Foundation was just announced. Eran
Hammer-Lahav just
blogged about it at the OWF site. This is great news, and should go a long way
to enabling better community development of standards and specs in a non-proprietary
fashion.
This morning at OSCON,
David Recordon announced the creation of the Open Web Foundation. The Open Web Foundation
is an attempt to create a home for community-driven specifications. Following the
open source model similar [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 24th '08 |
AdMob - Advertising on the iPhone that doesn't suck
Greg Hughes
What would Steve click?
It's not often you find advertising that doesn't just bother you. I try to keep the
ads on this site relevant, minimalist and out of the way. But on a limited-size device
like the iPhone, not to mention it's a device that has that "cool usability" vibe,
the need for ultra-careful advertising design is critical. Acceptance is important.
Enter
AdMob. They've created advertising blocks for the iPhone that are - well - pretty
darn cool. Hopefully the advertisements tha [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 24th '08 |
Live Mesh on the Mac? Soon, and previewed by jkOnTheRun
Greg Hughes
First, a big congrats to the guys at jkOnTheRun for their acquisition
by GigaOm and their continued full-time blogging careers. Great people,
and a great deal.
Kevin at jkOnTheRun posted
a preview article the other day that I somehow missed until now, describing the
Microsoft Live Mesh client for the Mac. It's not available yet, but Kevin was able
to try it out. Previously he'd reviewed the mobile client for Live Mesh.
I've been using Live Mesh for a few months now in a limited fashion be [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 23rd '08 |
San Fransciso's network security woes - Everyone to blame?
Greg Hughes
In the
case of Terry Childs, a network admin who gained notoriety recently for locking
the City of San Francisco and his managers out of their own critical network, comic-book
style progress has been made, with Childs' attorney inviting the mayor of SF to a
secret meeting at the jail, where Childs handed over the passwords he'd previously
refused to disclose.
Childs' lawyer, again in typical comic book fashion, has also come out saying that
Childs' actions were essentially noble and that he wa [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 23rd '08 |
Knol: Google's new place to expland your knowledge of - well - everything
Greg Hughes
Google has opened up their beta of Knol, a web
site written by people who know things for people who want to know more. In a nutshell,
it's a place to share knowledge. And I like it.
I just finished reading "How
to backpack, starting from scratch," by a software engineer named Ryan Moulton.
He's in his 20s and has been backpacking since he was eight years old, so he has some
real, personal knowledge to share. And it's very useful knowledge, at that. Ad added
plus of the article is that it con [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 23rd '08 |
Is your DNS server safe? Major security hole needs to be patched right now
Greg Hughes
DNS has a hole in it. Bad guys are working on exploits right now. Patches are
available right now. Anyone responsible for a DNS server needs to exercise that responsibility.
Right Now.
Dan Kaminsky found
a security hole in DNS recently, the details of which he was keeping quiet so
providers could fix and release patches and DNS server owners could get those patches
deployed, in order to avoid security breaches on the Internet. His intent was to release
the gory details in a couple weeks at t [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 23rd '08 |
Identi.ca service now available in Twhirl with push support
Greg Hughes
A couple weeks ago I mentioned
the release of Identi.ca, a social networking/microblogging site built on an open
platform and allowing federation. Today, a beta release of Twhirl, one of the more
popular clients used on the Twitter microblogging service as well as a couple others,
adds support for Identi.ca and includes "push" support. Many of us who have come to
like Indenti.ca are very happy.
That means Twhirl doesn't have to pole (read: overwhelm) the Identi.ca servers to
see if you have a [read].
Posted: Mon, Jul 21st '08 |
Call to action: What's your IPv6 threat profile look like? Are you protected?
Greg Hughes
Chances are, if you're reading this around the time I am writing it, that your computer
is not exposed to an IPv6 network. You're most likely on an IPv4 (classic) network.
You can easily tell by trying the quick IPv6
test on this page.
Even if you're not on the new network stack yet, change is happening, and systems
have to be adapted to make sure not only that the new network works (most - but not
all - modern hardware and software "understands" IPv6), but also that when you do
actually st [read].
Posted: Mon, Jul 21st '08 |
Terrarium 2 - The great developer game and learning tool is back
Greg Hughes
Several
years ago I remember when my boss at the time, Chris
Brooks, and others at work set up and ran Terrarium, a .NET v1.0 app that allowed
peer-to-peer networking of machines running code with "bugs" (not the defect kind)
in a virtual environment. It was a sort of a survival-of-the-fittest-bug kind of game,
and they used it at work to build some fun learning into the process.
Fast-forward a few years, and the team at Microsoft that originally built the Terrarium
app has scattered to the w [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 17th '08 |
Netflix on your Xbox 360 coming soon (and lots more XBox news)
Greg Hughes
There's some great
news out of the Microsoft Xbox crew at the E3 conference - NetFlix
integration with your XBox 360:
Microsoft revealed that beginning later this year, Netflix subscribers would gain
access to the entire Netflix digital library through their online XBox 360's.
Gold membership is required to take advantage of this partnership, but the newfound
capacity represents a large step forward in increasing the XBox 360's appeal as a
living room media box. The present Netflix digital [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 16th '08 |
He makes a good point: On Apple's closed nature, demands of Microsoft by the community, and apparent hypocrisy
Greg Hughes
On TechCrunch IT, in a post called "The New Apple Walled Garden," author Nik Cubrilovic
makes a good point...
TechCrunchIT
» The New Apple Walled Garden
Geeks and enthusiasts wearing Wordpress t-shirts, using laptops covered in Data
Portability, Microformats and RSS stickers lined up enthusiastically on Friday to
purchase a device that is completely proprietary, controlled and wrapped in DRM. The
irony was lost on some as they ran home, docked their new devices into a proprietary
media pl [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 16th '08 |
JibJab: It's Time for Some Campaigning
Greg Hughes
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
Send a JibJab Sendables® eCard Today!
JibJab does it again, in it's classic style. Well-done. Unicorns and everything else,
just perfect heh.
>
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 16th '08 |
Gary Busey on Business - Finally, someone who knows what they're talking about (and a phone-handling system to boot).
Greg Hughes
You can spend literally minutes (many of them) watching Gary Busey comment on various
aspects of business and entrepreneurialism, and laughing in the process. Awesome.
Highly recommended, since Gary is one of my favorites.
And by the way, the gotvmail
service this video series is meant to virally market is pretty great, too. You
might want to check that service out if you need a more-formal call-handling system
for your smaller-sized business but don't want to shell out the money to buy all [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 15th '08 |
Installers that patch their software before first run - Smart security move
Greg Hughes
I know this isn't exactly a new thing, but as I was installing the IE8 Beta 1 for
x64 architecture on a computer today to do some testing, I felt a warm-fuzzy sense
of appreciation for the fact that more and more we are seeing software that checks
for patches and updates before installing and running for the first time. It makes
for more-secure system, which is nothing but good.
No matter what you think of Internet Explorer (and for the record/what it's worth,
I like it quite a bit these d [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 15th '08 |
iPhone 3G battery life - Analyzed by nine sources - "We suck less"
Greg Hughes
Gizmodo
has a good article highlighting the analysis of the iPhone 3G's battery life (some
loose methodology, and some only slightly more formal) by nine industry pundit sources.
All I can add to the info is that it's good to burn the batteries in for a week with
full charges and discharges (even in the modern battery world) before one can really
experience accurate results (batteries tend to need a couple good cycles to provide
optimum output).
The general consensus? No 3G phone on the market [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 15th '08 |
Intel quad-core mobile processor next month
Greg Hughes
I know a couple people who run so many programs at once on their laptops, they might
just be able to take advantage of the new quad-core mobile processor from Intel, which
is apparently coming next month. But I have to wonder - since those are the same people
that will scream about battery life - how practical it would be. It will be interesting
to see how they perform.
At any rate, looks like it's coming in August (and it ain't exactly cheap - see the story for
more info).
"We're bringing q [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 15th '08 |
One Million 3G iPhones sold and 10 million apps downloaded first weekend
Greg Hughes
Wow. The numbers are really huge. Apple has released figures
for it's "opening weekend" box office smash, the iPhone 3G. One
million units sold in the first three days. It took 74 days to sell that many
of the original iPhone last year.
No wonder activation in the stores was so sluggish (or at times just broken). Big
uptake in the USA, plus 20 other countries on opening weekend.
A quick note about analyst reports that preceded Apple's announcement. "There are
three kinds of lies: lies, dam [read].
Posted: Mon, Jul 14th '08 |
Hosted Exchange 2007 and iPhone 2.0/3G - An amazing, perfect system
Greg Hughes
This morning I signed up for a hosted Exchange Server 2007 account with the 4iphone.net service
provided by 4smarthone.net, an early provider of push-iPhone service using the ActiveSync
capabilities of Exchange. I'm up and running with my new iPhone on their Exchange
server now with my own domain name, and I can tell you already I am just a couple
steps away from migrating my email from Google Apps to 4smartphone.net.
To put it simply, Exchange
Server 2007 rocks, and so does the new iPhone an [read].
Posted: Sat, Jul 12th '08 |
Got my iPhone 3g - after 4 hours of activation failure waiting at the store
Greg Hughes
I'm officially the proud and happy owner of a white 16GB iPhone 3G. I'm about to head
out to the store to take care of all the other stuff I need to get done today, so
I will have a chance to check out the GPS and 3G network stuff shortly.
I arrived at about 7am at the Apple Store at the Flat Iron Crossing mall in Broomfield,
Colorado. About 150 people were already there by the time I arrived, and the numbers
just kept on adding up as the morning wore on.
There were a lot of first-time-i [read].
Posted: Fri, Jul 11th '08 |
Apps for iPhone: Pandora's app is sweet usable simplicity
Greg Hughes
I arrived in Colorado this afternoon, plugged in my iPhone, backed it up, installed
iTunes 7.7 and grabbed the iPhone v2.0 software from Apple's servers (it's out there,
although iTunes is not yet advertising it here). I found the Apps listings in iTunes
and decided it was about time to upgrade. So, I hooked up the iPhone and promptly
fell asleep on the couch while it did it's thing upgrading.
I woke up to the sound of "bliiihdeep!" from the phone and a little "thunk" as it
slid on the cou [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 10th '08 |
Hyper-V is now available for Windows Server
Greg Hughes
Microsoft has released Hyper-V
for Windows Server 2008, which is the company's hypervisor virtualization platform.
With it, you get multi-OS, highly-configurable and performant virtualized hardware
capabilities on the Windows platform.
Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, the next-generation hypervisor-based server
virtualization technology, allows you to make the best use of your server hardware
investments by consolidating multiple server roles as separate virtual machines (VMs)
running on a single p [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 10th '08 |
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year: "w00t"
Greg Hughes
In the past we've seen many computer-focused terms become words of the year and find
placement in the dictionary, and this year is no different. Remember last
year when "truthiness" (a Stephen Colbert-ism) made it in, along with "google?"
So, here it is, Merriam-Webster's #1
Word of the Year for 2007 based on votes from visitors to their Web site:
w00t (interjection)
expressing joy (it could be after a triumph, or for no reason at all); similar in
use to the word "yay"
w00t! I
won the con [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 9th '08 |
Make you think: Top 10 modern business information security risks
Greg Hughes
You have firewalls and anti-malware system, video surveillance and monitoring systems
for network traffic to and from the Internet. But look
at eWeek's semi-smart list of the top ten infosec risks workers pose to your business
today, and you may need to rethink your plans.
I call this a "semi-smart" list because it's practical and real-world, and doesn't
assume the "standards" out there cover all the bases. But, at the same time it doesn't
offer much in the way of solutions, which always frus [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 3rd '08 |
Google Talk for iPhone released
Greg Hughes
Google
Talk is now available on the iPhone in the Safari browser. At the Google Mobile
blog, the details are laid out. If you use Google Apps for your domain and have the
Talk app activated there, word is you can access it, too using this URL syntax:
http://hostedtalkgadget.google.com/a/yourdomain/talkgadget/m
"We've just released in the US a new version of Google Talk designed
specifically for the iPhone and iPod Touch browsers. In addition to sending your friends
Gmail messages from your i [read].
Posted: Thu, Jul 3rd '08 |
Indenti.ca launches - Open-source social network microblogging
Greg Hughes
Tired of relying on well-funded commercial software companies testing their software
on you while you come to truly rely on it, with little to no control?
Well, the world is (potentially) changing.
If you're - for example - a Twitter user, you might be interested in checking out
Identi.ca, a brand-new open-source platform for microblogging. Press release below.
I can be found at http://identi.ca/greghughes -
Check it out.
Control Yourself, Inc. launches Identi.ca, the Open Microbloggin [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 2nd '08 |
Don't be a clueless CIO
Greg Hughes
CIO.com has posted a
great opinion article by Mike Gualtieri offering nine ways to make sure you're
not labeled as a "clueless" CIO. I must say, the list is excellent and one that should
be taken to heart by executive managers in general, and information/technical execs
in particular.
Among his observations of a good CIO: "He gets opinions from his experts but there
is never any question about who will make the final decision. And, if you never watched
Star Trek then you shouldn't even be a C [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 2nd '08 |
Office, OneCare and a slew of other apps on up to three computers for $70 per year? It's coming.
Greg Hughes
Microsoft will soon be selling it's Office suite, along with security protection software
(OneCare) and a slew of other applications for a $70 annual fee under the name "Equipt"
this month. This is the first time a consumer has had the option to pay-as-you-go
for the Microsoft productivity software, and will likely open up the possibility of
a more budget-affordable option for many. When you consider an annual OneCare subscription
runs you $50 a year and a copy of Office Home and Student Edition [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 2nd '08 |
AT&T video: Details about buying the iPhone 3G on July 11th
Greg Hughes
AT&T has released an informative video with details about when, where and how to buy
the iPhone 3G. Prepare to qualify!
In addition, a press release outlining all the details for various types of purchasers
describes the in's and out's of contracts, upgrades and whatnot:
>
AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) today announced iPhone 3G pricing for new and existing
AT&T customers, several attractive voice and data plans, and tips on how to be “iReady”
when iPhone 3G goes on sale at A [read].
Posted: Wed, Jul 2nd '08 |
Would you trust Twitter to handle money payments?
Greg Hughes
Nate Westheimer of The Silicon Alley Insider has this to say:
Twitter should take full advantage of their messaging platform, user
base and user disposition to lead in the P2P mobile payments space, where, despite
years of hype, no one has much of a head start.
Link to the article: How
Twitter Could Be Worth A Billion In A Year [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 1st '08 |
Trying Blogo - a decent blog authoring client for the Mac
Greg Hughes
I've
really missed Windows Live Writer since I starting using my Macbook Air so much. Even
though I have it in a Fusion virtual machine running Windows, I find I rarely use
it since it uses the VM's filesystem (not the Mac's), and copying stuff onto the Mac
clipoard and then pasting into a Windows virtualized app is not what one might wish.
I was pleasantly surprised to run
across a Mac app called Blogo, which I am using to write this post. It's nowhere
near as feature-rich as Live Writer, bu [read].
Posted: Tue, Jul 1st '08 |
Reducing the email tax on life - Take a lesson from Luis Suarez
Greg Hughes
For the past several months I have had the pleasure of improving my communication effectiveness while at the same time reducing my reliance and the massive amount of time I used to spend on email. Tools like Twitter,
blogging, and - yes - actively making sure I am using the telephone (remember that
thing?) have all contributed to my big picture of improvement: Use better tools where
they make the most sense, rather than relying on the cumbersome and often ineffective
email medium.
What prompt [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 30th '08 |
Use Wordle to visualize text
Greg Hughes
Trevin pointed to a cool
site called Wordle, where you can enter a bunch of
text and the web app then creates a visual image representation of the text, where
the most commonly used words are larger. You have control over many aspects of the
visualization, such as font, colors, layout direction, removing common words, how
many words to display in the image (default is 150), etc.
I copied the text from the home page of my blog just before posting this and used
Wordle to generate the image belo [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 26th '08 |
Hilarious IT admin scenario - "The Web SIte is Down"
Greg Hughes
Everything
about this video - The Website is Down -
is so sarcastically and stereotypically hilarious. Josh
Weinberg (the creator) is my new hero.
A mashup of true and mostly-true stories from IT hell. If you've ever
called tech support and wondered what the hell they are doing down there... well,
this should answer some questions for you. Starring Apache, Windows XP, Linux and
Halo (among many others).
Note: There's some very NSFW language and visuals. You have been
warned.
I'm not going [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 25th '08 |
Avoiding high international carrier fees with your AT&T iPhone overseas
Greg Hughes
I've traveled to Europe with my iPhone before, and despite activating an international data plan I ended up spending a bit more than I wanted to (by about $100). But Raven Zachary came back home to a $800+ bill, and there are many tales of others having even worse experiences.
Raven
wrote a blog article offering some tips to keep your costs down, all of which
are good. So, if you are traveling out of the USA with your AT&T iPhone (and yes,
that DOES include to Canada or Mexico, so do your [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 24th '08 |
New LinkedIn group for Portland Oregon technology people - join us!
Greg Hughes
Jeff
Martens had an idea,
one I had been thinking similarly about - but he vocalized it first (or "tweeterized
it" might be more accurate). I jumped right in and created a new LinkedIn group called
"PDX Tech," a networking
group for people in the Portland, Oregon general area who work in what we will loosely
define as the technology marketplace.
If you'd like to join the group and you meet the above requirements (which are not
too restrictive), just
click here and sign right up.
In the f [read].
Posted: Sat, Jun 21st '08 |
Ice on Mars? Scientists say yes.
Greg Hughes
The
Mars Phoenix crew has just announced they've discovered ice on Mars. There will be
more tests soon, and ones that should be more direct in their analysis. Today's discovery
is based on the visualized disappearance of some white material from the surface over
the past few days. From the
Mars Phoenix web site:
June 19, 2008 -- Dice-size crumbs of bright material have vanished
from inside a trench where they were photographed by NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander four
days ago, convincing scientists t [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 19th '08 |
My New Old Mustang Has Arrived
Greg Hughes
Today the trucking company showed up with my oh-so-cliche-midlife-crisis mobile, a
1969 Mustang convertible that I recently
purchased from a good guy in Pennsylvania. I made a trip back east a couple weeks
ago to hand over the check, transfer the title and drive the car a bit, and then painfully
left it there to wait for a vehicle transport company to pick it up and deliver to
Oregon.
The car made a long and round-about trip all over the country, and it got pretty grungy
while in New Mexico th [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 19th '08 |
Top five things you didn't know you could do with your Media Center PC
Greg Hughes
Microsoft's Steven Lindsay posted
a video a couple months ago showing his top five things you didn't know you could
do with your Media Center PC. Cool tidbits for people who want to get deeper into
using a few more of the capabilities of Windows Media Center. Worth the viewing time.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 18th '08 |
Trial period for a new look and feel
Greg Hughes
Apologies to web viewers for the temporary disruption here - I have changed the design template for this blog to a new one (thanks to Anthony Bouch at http://www.58bits.com/ for
letting me borrow) and plan to leave it live for 24-48 hours to see how it impacts
visits, clicks and retention times in the stats.
I want to make a change since my old template is, well, old. And because Scott harasses
me for it a couple times a year. But the template I have been using for a few years
now works ver [read].
Posted: Wed, Jun 18th '08 |
Forefront Security + NAP Delivers a More-Complete Network Security Picture
Greg Hughes
Last month, Microsoft released
the Microsoft Forefront Integration Kit for Network Access Protection, a solution
accelerator that enables their Forefront Client Security products to interoperate
with the Network Access Protection (NAP) capabilities included in Windows Server 2008.
In a nutshell, it allows an integrated system of policy compliance and real-time checking
of the status of a computer's Forefront security status, as well as remediation and
access protection for machines that fall or [read].
Posted: Tue, Jun 10th '08 |
See you at TechEd this week
Greg Hughes
I'm in warm and sunny Orlando for the IT week of Tech Ed. My cohort Richard and I will be interviewing, making the speaker contest happen, and generally staying busy through Friday. If you are at Tech Ed this week, be sure to drop by the Tech Ed fishbowl in the exhibition hall, or send and email and let me know. It would be great to meet new people and catch up with others.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Mon, Jun 9th '08 |
Invitation: Want to help me shoot a big fireworks show on July 4th?
Greg Hughes
Most of my friends know that every now and then I operate public fireworks displays - as in the big ones with hundreds or thousands of shells, way up in the sky and loud as hell. It's a fun side gig, and I am licensed in Oregon and Washington to run the displays.
This year for the July 4 celebration, I am once again operating the Walla Walla, Washington
show. I ran last year's show and am headed back. But I certainly can't do it alone,
and so this is an invitation to anyone in the area (meani [read].
Posted: Sat, Jun 7th '08 |
Even more iPhone 2 geek-out stake-out details and excitement fodder
Greg Hughes
A
reporter from Forbes
Magazine, Brian Caulfield, has been sneaking around a bit, asking questions, and
taking pictures from various public-domain locations where he thinks Apple's next-gen
iPhone (or APple Tablet, or next-gen iMac, or all of the above) are being dispatched
from.
Tons of boxes overflowing a large warehouse, courier service trucks in drives coming
and going, no-label boxes and warehouse workers being cagey but saying basically nothing.
But when you start to stack up so much [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 5th '08 |
Here comes Gmail Labs - tonight
Greg Hughes
TechCrunch is reporting that Google is releasing Gmail Labs this evening, and is
also outlining some of the details as they hear them.
Gmail engineers come up with new ideas all the time. Gmail Labs is
our place to try them out and get your feedback. None of these features are really
ready for prime time yet, so they might change, break, or disappear at any time.
Very cool. You can choose which ones you want to use, turn them on and
off. Check back in a little while - all Gmail users will be [read].
Posted: Thu, Jun 5th '08 |
How to exclude a domain from your Google search results
Greg Hughes
If you're like me, you rely on Google a lot to help you though your day. There are a few sites out there that - much to my frustrated chagrin - include their content in Google's index but won't let you see the content when you click the search results link - unless you sign up for an account (sometimes you even have to pay). I know there are some ways around the blocked access (Google can see the content, so there are open
doors), but what I really want is a way to avoid seeing those sites in my [read].
Posted: Fri, May 30th '08 |
Octagon Global Recruiting - The latest "Lost" Internet venue
Greg Hughes
If
you saw the season finale episode of Lost and happened to be paying attention to the
commercial breaks near the end of the two-hour episode, you might have noticed the
"commercial" for Octagon Global Recruiting, with a note to visit the web site octagonglobalrecruiting.com for
more information.
"Octagon Global Recruiting is currently seeking volunteers to contribute to an important
new research project." And it's "on behalf of the Dharma Initiative."
So if you happen to need something to [read].
Posted: Fri, May 30th '08 |
Sysinternals Live tools - available online, access them anywhere
Greg Hughes
The Sysinternals
tools are a whole slew of great troubleshooting and analysis utilities for Windows.
Microsoft acquired Sysinternals some time ago. The tools are now available online
for anyone that needs or wants to use them, via a web page (http://live.sysinternals.com/)
or direct UNC link to each tool.
The simple web page lists the latest version of each tool, where you can click to
execute. This is a terrific and eleganly simple resource. No more maintaining thumb
drives or CDs of utiliti [read].
Posted: Thu, May 29th '08 |
New-to-me yet classic car: Should I ship or drive?
Greg Hughes
I recently acquired a restored 1969 Ford Mustang convertible in an eBay auction, and now I'm trying to decide which method I should use to get it across the country, from Pennsylvania (where the person I am buying it from lives) to Oregon (where I live).
I have some flexible time right now before and after the Tech-Ed conference, so one
option is to fly there and drive it back. It turns out I have family
very close to where the car is (within about 30 miles), so I could visit with them
while [read].
Posted: Sat, May 24th '08 |
188 shipping containers of 3G iPhones?
Greg Hughes
The Import Genius blog has a new
article describing their examination of shipping manifests for Apple Computer,
and they have found an unusual and very large set of shipments over the past couple
of months that they suggest is imports of the heavily-rumored next version of the
iPhone. I geek out over this stuff, simply because I really like my iPhone and I'm
looking forward to the next version and the capabilities we all assume it will have.
According to the Import Genius people,
Since mid-M [read].
Posted: Fri, May 23rd '08 |
Small Business Server - An interview with the SBS Diva
Greg Hughes
Susan Bradley is often referred to by her compadres as the "SBS
Diva," and for good reason. Richard and I had the opportunity to talk about Small
Business Server with her recently for an episode of RunAs Radio (our weekly IT podcast
talk show). We talked about what SBS is, where it cames from, and also about SBS 2008.
It always surprises me how afordable and complete SBS is.
If you run or operate (or do IT for) a small to medium sized business, I think checking
out SBS via this interview wi [read].
Posted: Wed, May 21st '08 |
3G iPhone on June 9th - Gizmodo says so
Greg Hughes
Get ready to get in line. Gizmodo
tells us June 9th is the date for the 3G iPhone.
Looks like someone might be in luck for my old iPhone eh? :)
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Tue, May 20th '08 |
Pages on the Mac is not a good enough replacement for Microsoft Word
Greg Hughes
I've spent the past couple days, off and on, editing a manuscript on my Mac using the Pages application that is part of iWork '08. I've been editing a Word .doc file, which pages can open and deal with. Sort of. In the end, the way Pages handles Word docs... FAIL.
Formatting issues have resulted in a badly-hacked mess of a document that probably
barely passes for acceptable when I return it with edits. I feel pretty terrible for
the recipient.
So, frustratingly it's time to buy a copy of M [read].
Posted: Thu, May 15th '08 |
Use your mobile phone as a airline boarding pass?
Greg Hughes
I'm going to have to try this one next week when I fly...
Apparently Gerald Buckley was able to successfully scan his boarding pass bar code,
which was displayed on his iPhone screen as a PDF image. I have to assume the scanner
was most likely an image-scanning type since a laser scanner like you see in many
places probably wouldn't "see" the barcode. Although, I have noticed in bright sunlight
that the iPhone screen almost looks like the text is printed on the surface right
under the glass, [read].
Posted: Thu, May 15th '08 |
Top-Notch app for iPhone: IntelliScreen (beta) released
Greg Hughes
Those
of us with a "jailbroken" iPhone can take advantage of a new beta software release
from Intelliborn called "IntelliScreen."
Intelliborne is the same company that brought us Vonagent, which is another app I
have on my iPhone for voicemail integration.
The app allows you to have a single, quick view from the standby screen of news, email,
your text messages, the weather forecast, your calendar - lots of great info, all
on one screen and scrollable.
Each of the sections are finger-scrol [read].
Posted: Wed, May 14th '08 |
Amazing animated graffiti wall film
Greg Hughes
An artist named BLU has created what can only be described as an amazinly interesting and fun short film using stop-action animation and walls on public buildings. Check out more information about the film at
the artist's BLUBLU.ORG web site.
MUTO a wall-painted
animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.
Found via
Jeff Atwood on Twitter - thanks!
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Tue, May 13th '08 |
See You at the TechEd North America 2008 IT Pro Week
Greg Hughes
In June I'll be attending the Microsoft
TechEd IT Pro week in Orlando. the TechEd conference has been reworked into a
two-week event this year, much like they have done in Europe in the past. The first
week is focused on developers and the second week on IT professionals.
I'll be working that secpnd week with my RunAs
Radio podcast co-host, Richard Campbell. We're going to be running some panel
events and speaker contests as well as putting together some new shows.
If you're there, please [read].
Posted: Tue, May 13th '08 |
I have a dream: The perfect gigabit wireless router with VPN and QOS
Greg Hughes
I'm pulling my hair out (what I have left, anyhow) trying to find a good home/home
office wireless router that includes all the features I need. Granted, I'm a bit of
a power user, but I'm honestly a bit surprised I can't find what I want out there somewhere.
You'd think someone would build it. My list of features and performance requirements
includes:
Gigabit WAN and LAN ports - and needs to have four LAN ports
VPN capability that I can use cross-platform - an SSL VPN might be the best op [read].
Posted: Sat, Apr 26th '08 |
Fixes for MacBook Air glitches in VMWare Fusion 1.1.2
Greg Hughes
Last week I wrote about an issue in VMWare Fusion on my MacBook Air. Well, looks like VMWare has
released an update in v1.1.2 with enhanced MacBook Air and Time Machine support.
VMware Fusion 1.1.2 addresses two MacBook Air-related problems. Previously,
MacBook Air users would encounter a crash if a virtual CD/DVD drive was connected
to the virtual machine but a CD/DVD drive was not connected to the MacBook Air. This
update fixes this issue. Also, this latest VMware Fusion update adds the abil [read].
Posted: Thu, Apr 24th '08 |
Tutorial: Remove letterbox and pillarbox bars from video with QuickTime Pro
Greg Hughes
If you haven't seen the Tech-Recipies site yet,
you should check it out. Nice compact, useful and interesting posts about how to do
useful and cool things. I found it via
my Twitter account feed. I'm finding lots of good stuff via Twitter these days.
I just finished reading a post at Tech-Recipies that describes how to use QuickTime
Pro to remove the dead space often seen in videos that are letterboxed or have the
side curtain bars (pillars). Essentially you use a simple image mask to define [read].
Posted: Thu, Apr 24th '08 |
Fact and Myths about IPv6 - Interview with Sean Siler
Greg Hughes
IPv6 has been around for something on the order of 15 years, yet it has yet to see widespread adoption. It was recently enabled on Internet core DNS infrastructure, and had been adopted in some network like those operated by certain mobile carriers. The current IP addressing and allocation scheme, dubbed IPv4, will eventually run out of IP addresses. There's been a sort of boy-called-wolf debate over whether we're really going to allocate the entire IPv4 address space anytime soon or not. But ev [read].
Posted: Fri, Apr 18th '08 |
Mystery Solved: MacBook Air, VMWare Fusion and the Windows virtual machine that won't start
Greg Hughes
One of the main reasons I decided I would buy the MacBook Air recently was that I
knew I would be able to run Windows on it, either in a bootable install or in a virtual
machine. In fact there is really one main app that I use all the time on Windows that
I just can't get for the Mac, but that's a topic for another post. I'm quite
happy with the Air - It's a great machine and I have to admit that OS X
has grown on me.
I bought a copy of VMWare Fusion after doing my required research. Compatib [read].
Posted: Thu, Apr 17th '08 |
Your custom photo design on your Capital One card
Greg Hughes
I'm not a huge fan of using credit cards, but with that caveat I discovered something last night that I thought was a great idea and service offered by Capital One for their US-based customer's credit cards: Use
your own images.
Under the program, every 30 days you can create a replacement card using your own
pictures (provided your account qualifies and you have the rights to the images you
use, of course). You go to the web site, provide some information, upload your picture
(or choose from [read].
Posted: Mon, Apr 14th '08 |
Hyper-V and Virtualization on Windows Server 2008
Greg Hughes
Richard Campbell and I sat down and discussed virtualization with Anil Desai. Released
in beta with Windows Server 2008 and soon to be released in it's final form, Hyper-V
is an interesting and worthwhile technology that leverages 64-bit computing and allows
you to run different virtual OS'es on the server with full symmetrical multiprocessor
support. Virtualization is a primary role of Windows
Server 2008. The release candidate of Hyper-V is available
now.
You can download and listen the MP3 [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 13th '08 |
Twinkle - a great iPhone native Twitter app with pictures and geolocation
Greg Hughes
I downloaded a new iPhone native app this morning called Twinkle, which is a terrific
Twitter client with integration to the iPhone's camera and the radio geolocation abilities.
Even without those two enhancements, Twinkle would be - by a long shot - the best
option for the iPhone when it comes to Twitter. To get Twinkle, you need to install
it via the Installer.app program for jail-broken iPhones (see below for some more
info).
Twinkle automatically figures out (approximately) where you are u [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 13th '08 |
Playstation 3 and all this integrated media stuff
Greg Hughes
Since I "needed" a new high-def disc format player (specifically Blu-Ray Disc) to take the place of my suddenly-antiquated HD-DVD hardware, and since Thursday was my 41st birthday, I decided to get what is arguably the best Blu-Ray player out there. The Playstation 3. Ah mid-life and gadgety toys, heh.
As luck would have it, my dad called me and asked what I'd like for my birthday. We
go through the same conversation each time, and it's really kind of funny. I say I
don't know and we end up i [read].
Posted: Sat, Apr 12th '08 |
PDX Webfoot event this Saturday in Portland
Greg Hughes
A technical event for the whole family? Yep. With content for technical and non-technical people alike. This weekend. Passing along some info here...
Load up the whole family (seriously) and get your geek on this Saturday, 1 p.m. at
the OGI School of Science and Engineering at the PDX Webfoot event. The registration
page is here and the PDX Webfoot
site with all the info is here.
From the site:
On April 12th, we'll be participating in the first Webfoot event in
Portland. Webfoot is a we [read].
Posted: Tue, Apr 8th '08 |
Got my Best Buy HD-DVD Funeral $50 Gift Card
Greg Hughes
Today
in the mailbox I received a letter from Best Buy with the previously-promised $50
gift card to help compensate for the fact that the HD-DVD player I bought from them
is a no-longer offered format. Cool stuff, and well ahead of the "expect it by May
1st" timeframe they established in their original communications.
Great service on this one, and again kudos to Best buy.
Some interesting trivia from the letter in the mail: "Customers will get a gift
card for each player or HD DVD attach [read].
Posted: Mon, Apr 7th '08 |
Cleaning Malware on Windows - A lesson by Mark Russinovich
Greg Hughes
Mark Russinovich, a Microsoft
Technical Fellow, presented a very good session at the TechEd IT Forum last year on
the topic of advanced eradication of malware on Windows machines. It's a great session
and has some useful advanced techniques for removal. It is also a very good resource
for those who want to better understand how malware infects and what some of the risks
are. Lots of practical information and how-to's in this one.
Fortunately, the
session was recorded and is available online f [read].
Posted: Mon, Apr 7th '08 |
Ever have one of those days?
Greg Hughes
˙ʎoɾuǝ ˙ǝɹǝɥ ʇı ʇǝƃ uɐɔ noʎ 'ƃuılǝǝɟ
ʇɐɥʇ ʇsnɾ ɹoɟ ƃuıʞool ǝɹ,noʎ ǝɔuɐɥɔ ʎq ɟı ʇnq ˙ƃuılǝǝɟ unɟ ɐ ʇou
¿noʎ uo ɹǝʌo pǝlloɹ pɐɥ ʇı ǝʞıl ʇlǝɟ plɹoʍ ǝloɥʍ ǝɥʇ puɐ pɐǝɥ sʇı uo pǝddılɟ sɯǝǝs
ʇsnɾ ƃuıɥʇʎɹǝʌǝ uǝɥʍ 'sʎɐp ǝsoɥʇ ɟo ǝuo ǝʌɐɥ ɹǝʌǝ
(via Guy Kawasaki on
Twitter)
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 6th '08 |
Will there be a 3G iPhone in 60 days? Walt Mossberg says so.
Greg Hughes
Count me in as one of the people who will line up to get a 3G iPhone - whenever it comes out. It looks as if the community has determined via tear-down methodology that the chipset inside the current iPhone is not 3G capable, so a software upgrade doesn't seem likely (something I had hoped might be possible based on early information, but ah, oh well...).
The most recent oh-by-the-way rumor/news about a 3G iPhone comes via Walt Mossberg,
who says it will available in 60 days. And Walt is cer [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 6th '08 |
Coming Soon: Next Generation, Super-Fast Grid Internet
Greg Hughes
A super-fast, new global network's controllers will turn it on sometime this year, but exactly when it will be available to you and me, in the same way the Internet we know is today... Only time will tell.
As is practically always the case, the new technology driving the "Grid" network was
borne out of need. The
Times Online published an article discussing the new network:
"Cern, based near Geneva, started the grid computing project seven
years ago when researchers realised the LHC would gen [read].
Posted: Sun, Apr 6th '08 |
Great article about how to trim down a Windows install for a Virtual Machine
Greg Hughes
Over at Lifehacker, Adam
Pash has written an article describing in some very useful detail how
to use a couple freeware apps to trim down a Windows XP installation so you can
create a lighter-weight install disc for whatever purpose you may have.
I'm interested in this because I plan (at least at this point) to use a Windows Server
2003 install disc as the starting point for a VMWare
Fusion virtual machine on my Macbook Air, and I want to keep it as lean and mean
as I possibly can. That way I [read].
Posted: Sat, Apr 5th '08 |
Wet, wet snow and slush kills satellite signal, almost kills me...
Greg Hughes
I woke up this morning, put on the coffee to get ready for the first round of conference calls, and then went to switch on the TV to catch up on the news. Both DirecTV satellite receivers in the house indicated they were not receiving a signal. I checked the signal meters on both, and sure enough, zero signal received.
After a reset of the boxes, I looked outside and realized a heavy, wet, slushy snow
was falling. I went outside briefly and saw a small amount of wet snow on the dish
up on the [read].
Posted: Fri, Mar 28th '08 |
Photoshop in your browser: Photoshop Express launched
Greg Hughes
Quick post: I just saw Josh Bancroft tweet
about Photoshop Express, which you can go
and try out here.
Online photo editing, storage, galleries for sharing - Not a completely unique
idea but this is all in your web browser and it uses a clean, well-put-together FLash
UI. Pretty cool.
greghughes.net weblog - copyright 2003-2008 - licensed under a Creative
Commons License. [read].
Posted: Thu, Mar 27th '08 |
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