Desultory Thoughts

I came across Pageflakes.com today (primarily because somebody came to my site from there) and found the site very cool! The familiar Ajax loading icon that I use for my comments on this blog told me right away that it was made with Ajax. Pageflakes.com is a customizable web portal like unto Google’s Personalized Home that I’ve been using for quite some time now.

I’ll be giving this a try over the next few weeks and sooner or later I’ll make a desicion between this new option and what I’ve been using in the past. I’ll report on my decision at a later date. Things that I like already are the ability to create multiple pages, a feauture I was just wishing for tonight as I added yet another module to my Google Page. Things are starting to get crowded.

Windows Live is yet another “Ajax Desktop” but it looks cruddy comparatively to both Google and Pageflakes.  It won’t be long before Yahoo turns out their version as well.  Come to think of it, they may already be doing that with “My Yahoo”.

A quick search revealed some more options that are out there!  In fact, there are too many to choose from (listed alphabetically in addition to the three mentioned above):

• Eskobo
• Favoor
• HomePortals
• Netvibes
• Protopage
• Zoozio (most recently known as Zimbio)

If you’ve used one or more and you have a preference or opinion, please post a comment.

Yalin is a co-worker and good friend of mine at USOE and he recently posted a page using the new Google Page Creator [pages.google.com] that lists all of his favorite freeware [ykececi.googlepages.com/]. He’s pointed me in the right direction on a few things in the past, so I think this list is worth having a look at. Some of it I already use, but it’s nice to have a place to go to find some other good stuff that’s already been tried and tested.

Stuff on the list that I vouch for and currently use includes:

• Billy [sheepfriends.com] (an extremely small audio player with global hotkeys)
• Notepad++ [notepad-plus.sourceforge.net] (a great lightweight notepad program, I use it to write HTML, with a few extra frills; like numbered lines for debugging Line Number errors)
• Open Office [openoffice.org] (an office suite that doesn’t cost a dime and is compatible with Microsoft Office products.)
• Firefox [getfirefox.com] (and all its extension goodness)

Stuff on the list that I’m going to check out:

• SuperFast Shutdown (for when my ride home comes in and says “let’s go!”)
• FreeCommander
• Unlocker
• Orphan’s Remover

Stuff that Yalin should add to his list:

• AVG Free Antivirus [grisoft.com] (I’ve been using it for years on my personal computer and it’s been doing great!)
• A few in the “Video Tools” category, which category doesn’t exist on his list.  I’ll blog on those another day.

I used to use WinAmp to play my tunes on my computer all the time, but for the last couple of years I haven’t for some reason or another.  I’ve been using Windows Media Player 10, but compared to WinAmp, it really sucks.  I really miss the shortcut keys that I got used to with WinAmp.  I’m sure that if I looked around I might be able to find a plugin that would give me that functionality, but I found something cooler instead.

Billy [sheepfriends.com] is an extremely small media player with surprising functionality.  My favorite is that I have my global shortcut keys back for play, forward, pause, and soft mute.  Listed on the Sheep Friends website are also several other small apps such as a lightweight calculator, conversion tool and calendar app.  Pretty cool stuff; simple, no frills and free!

I liked seeing the things that people came up with on the new series (the American Idol spinoff…or should I say “ripoff”), American Inventor [abc.go.com]. However, they really milked it. CRYING by three of four judges when they were presented with a one-man sandbag filler was ridiculous. Heather and I thought they must be joking! When they cried over the “EZ-Ex”, we weren’t crying with them either. (Funny thing is, if my Mom watched this show, she was probably choking up with them.)

Here are some things that you shouldn’t try to invent because they already failed:

• Walking Buddy (A wand that wards off bears and attackers)
• An amp plug in the back of the guitar (amp plugs are normally in the front)
• Boot tree (holds boots)
• Pee Buddy (A suit holder that you wear while you pee in public)
• Space Beetle Farm (Spin-off from the ant farm)
• “Clothes” for your car
• Smoking Gun (For flavoring meat & potato chips with hickory smoke)
• Social Training on DVD for 3-5 year olds*
• Fresh End (a soap dispenser for your butt)
• Tizzy Tube (children can “express themselves” in an air-filled tube)
• Beddie Pouch & Beddie Sham (already on the market by a different name)
• Air Conditioner Suit Case (for a dog in a hot car)

Inventions that made it on to the next round:

• One-man Sandbag Filler (mentioned above)*
• A bicycle that pedals in the front for a handlebar rider
• Edible Snow Globe Cookie Kit
• Two-piece Bowl (to conceal your spent olive pits and pistachio shells)
• EZX (travel weight system that you put together)*
• Diaper Bag (they didn’t give us details on this episode)
• Solar Powered Generator
• Hook-n-Pull Branch Cutter

It seemed to me like they (the producers) were worried more about creating the same ingredients as American Idol contains (fighting judges, angry contestants) that they should have called the show “Angry Contestants & Fighting Judges”. Hopefully the next episodes will focus more on good inventions and not the pitch to the judges.

* Indicates that one or more judges cried.

Early this year I received a shiny, new SanDisk 1GB Titanium Cruzer USB Flash Drive for use at work. Synonyms for USB Flash Drive include “pen drives”, “chip sticks”, “thumb drives”, “USB drives” and “jump drives”, but in the case of the Titanium Cruzer it’s “defective piece of dung”. Mine worked for about a day and then stopped working.

Ok, no biggy, right? There’s probably a fix out there somewhere and if not then I was the unlucky one and I’ll get a new one. Afterall, they come with a 5 year warranty! (Nothing says stability like a 5 year warranty.) So I go a googling looking for something that will bring my flash drive back to life. Here are just a few of the encouraging comments I found about the SanDisk 1GB Titanium Cruzer:

“flip a coin”, 2006-01-23
“My workplace has been using these for a year or so, and we’ve had about a 50% failure rate within a year of use. One day the little blue light just decides not to illuminate and the key is not recognized by any PC. The things are simply not reliable.”

“Plug & Play?? HARDLY!!”, February 17, 2005
“Pros: NONE….can’t get the thing to be recognized by any PC….Windows XP or 2000. We followed all the troubleshooting guidelines and contacted tech support, but to no avail.
Cons: PC won’t recognize the drive. The PC knows the drive is there, but nothing shows up in Windows Explorer when you want to use the thing. Taking it back!! What a pain!”

“I’ve had 2 that failed”, November 29, 2004
Pros: looks good, fast, neat access to connection
Cons: My first one broke so that the exposed connector would not ‘lock’ open and took 2 hands to insert, my second one is so loose fitting that the connection is rarely established (=not recognized). Don’t recommend this usb at all!

Not reliable at all I bought and own 10 of these things.
5 of them are already death after less than 6 months of use. They were working properly and then for no apparent reason stopped working. Fortunately I had most of my date backed up, but I still lost some valuable info.
The company has changed 2 already and I Hope they replace the remaining 3. Dealing with them takes a looong time.

I guess this is the reason why they have become cheaper, they are just a pile of trash into a nice titanium case. So, avoid these things by all means.

So it is for me as it is with these reviews. I just shipped back my second flash drive today, so we’ll see if third times a charm.

The thing that really set me off today about SanDisk was their trash support. I was using their online request system to add comments to the RMA and report problems, but they never responded which forced the dreaded phone call. So I press the number corresponding to the “Check on RMA Status” option.  I talk to some guy who trys to read my comments from the online system on the fly, but it sounds more like he’s trying to wing it on a palm reading.  He’s also reading comments from the first return and not the second so I try to get him on the right track.  But he doesn’t see the comments relating to the second RMA.  He suddenly decides that my problem is one that Technical Support needs to hear, so he transfers me.

After a long wait I hear, “Thank you for calling SanDisk, my name is Jay.  And before we get started today, let me just say that we have a very bad cold today so your patience with us would be greatly appreciated as we continue this call, OK?”

WHAT THE????  We?  Us?  As in SanDisk has a very bad cold?  Or you and your multiple personalities have a very bad cold?  I said, “Ok.”

He continues, “Ok, so with that in mind, what can we do for you today.”

I explain my problem and he immediately tells me that I shouldn’t have called technical support and that I should have called the RMA people.  That’s when I just about reached through the phone, but luckily for him I was at work so I had to keep my cool.  I explained to him that I was transferred to him and that I was just on the line with the RMA people and that they are the people that transferred me to him!  I couldn’t believe it.

So after some more extreme control of my temper, I finally endured the call and received an email with a prepaid FedEx label to return the second defective Cruzer.  I’ll keep you all informed of the outcome in the comments.  Maybe I’ll get another defective one.  I’m counting on it!