Bidi’s World

A little over a week ago I discovered I qualified to upgrade from my Razr V3m.  I’ve been a Sprint customer for a long time now and really prefer their network.  Being that I have family, friends, and work on the network makes the free Sprint to Sprint calling priceless.

I had been marginally interested in an iPhone.  I’ve seen them in action and found them to be highly functional devices. There were more than a few draw backs I considered to be show stoppers though.  So I had set out to explore the Centro by Palm instead.

As luck would have it, the Samsung Instinct was premiering the day I arrived at my local Sprint store.  The Instinct is not a PDA like the iPhone or Centro are but it is what I would consider a “smart phone”.  It also bears a lot of similarities to the iPhone when it comes to functionality.  I knew a lot about the Centro so as I started comparing features between the two devices, I found myself increasingly impressed with it.

The first thing about the Instinct that stands out is the highly efficient interface.  It’s backed by a decent processor so not only are applications easy to find but they start up quickly too.  A great example of this is the 2 megapixel camera.  Press a button on the side of the phone and the camera, or camcorder if you press and hold the button, starts up and is ready to use within a second.  Compared to my Razr which could take five to ten seconds just to activate the camera this is huge.  And when you take a picture, no long wait times before it’s ready to take another.
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I had to post this because it is a feature that has driven me nuts for years. Microsoft Office has a feature called the language bar. This is a series of buttons that sit on your task bar to facilitate various accessibility features that come with Microsoft Office. Personally I don’t care for the Microsoft Office line of products in the first place let alone having them put buttons where I don’t really need them without asking. To make matters worse, if you disable this toolbar the “normal way” it just keep coming back when you log back in.

I did a search for more information on the Language Bar and the results were interesting. Almost all of the Microsoft official or unofficial support sites were talking about what the Language Bar is and how to use it. Nearly everyone else was talking about how to get rid of it or how they couldn’t.

It puzzles me why Microsoft would make a product that integrates into their operating systems features but doesn’t follow the same standards for use set by the operating system. When I right click an item in a Windows application I expect a menu. When I click the button in the upper right corner of the screen I expect the program to close. And when I deselect a toolbar from my task manager I expect it to stay deselected.

Unfortunately, that isn’t the case for the Language Bar. To that end, I was elated to find an article on the How-To Geek that explains how to make the pesky thing go away for good. The instructions are fairly simple. Apparently, if you right click on the Language Bar while it’s visible there is a “settings” option. In there you’ll find a setting to banish the language bar once and for all.

See the instructions over at the How-To Geek for full details.

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I was over at Techie Diva’s blog today checking out her article on the iSlide when I noticed she added a new feature to her site I hadn’t heard of before. By the way, the iSlide is such a cool device. It is a sort of skateboard that rolls on one big wheel in it’s center. Rock the board forward and it starts moving. Rock back and it stops. Can you say Christmas?

I digress though. The new feature is Odiogo’s text to speech system. This is an equally cool toy. Their service will convert a blog post into a sound file with some of the best text to speech I’ve heard in a long time. Then it will serve the sound files through streaming or even as a podcast feed.

To hear this feature in action click on the “Listen Now” button at the top of the post or visit the Odiogo Bidi’s World podcast page. I’ll work on getting some links and such added to the page for subscribing as we move forward.

For the moment though, leave a comment and let me know what you think. Personally I’m quite excited about this feature. Heck, it might even get me to post more often. LOL

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I’ve been looking at a new service called Tumbr the last couple of days. It’s pretty cool. They describe themselves as a sort of scrapbook. It works similar to how a blog works but the difference comes in they are geared for light content. You can add links, quotes, headlines, even microblogging entries from other services. I’m finding it to be quite fun to participate in.

If you are ever curious in what I’ve been up to you might want to head over to http://bidimus.tumblr.com and check out my Tumblr. If I keep it up I’ll be moving it to a different address at some point but I’ll update here if I do.

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It’s been a very busy month fighting various computer problems. First I had a motherboard failure which resulted in having to gut my computer and replace most of it. Technology is changing so fast that even though many of the components in my computer were fairly new they weren’t compatible with my new motherboard.

As a result of the hardware change I had to reverify my Windows XP installation with Microsoft many times throughout the process. Every time you make major hardware changes (with only a hand full of exceptions) to a Windows XP box (the hardware, not the software) they wan’t you to check in with them to verify your installation. This is a process I find personally offensive. It reminds me of Fry’s Electronics where after you make your purchase you have to stand in line to wait your turn to have your purchases verified by the correctional officer standing at the exit door. If they didn’t want me to walk out the door with something in my shopping bag they didn’t want me to have they should not be putting anything in the bag that doesn’t belong there. It isn’t even like they are stopping shoplifting because they are just checking the bags their own employees pack.

When I installed Windows XP I registered the software and was on record as having a valid installation. While I understand why they are doing this I don’t think it’s the best approach. I haven’t changed my software and it was running on the same hard drive where I originally installed it. If I upgrade my PC that is my business and I should not have to let Microsoft know when I do.

To this end I’ve decided to migrate all my productivity to Linux. My plan is to only keep Windows XP around for gaming and solely because at the moment too many game companies aren’t writing for Linux yet. They are missing the boat if you ask me.

So now I am running Ubuntu Linux on my system and I’ve replaced 98% of my regular applications (sans games) with either Linux versions of the same software or comparable software. Still on my list of apps to run under linux are iTunes which I like for it’s iPod management though as a music player I have a better solution under Linux I like better.

This Friday will be the first episode of JD’s Musical Alchemy I’ve recorded under the Linux environment. I’ve been reviewing it and I’m very impressed with how it came out. Keep an eye open for Episode 15.

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