Cheat Street

That’s what ESPN subtitled their article about last week’s happenings at NASCAR’s UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400.

OK, I guess I better explain what the word NASCAR is doing here. I recently worked with a fellow (actually, I should say ‘fella’, I guess) that was a huge NASCAR fan. Me, not one, but just catching snippets of the action on and off the track, I find myself becoming an addict of the soap opera that apparently accompanies this sport…plus apparently my parents were at this race; I almost flipped out when I heard my Dad had always wanted to go to a race in-person. What??! Never saw that coming…needless to say I’m living proof that rarely was a NASCAR race on TV in our household growing up. Somewhere along the way though, NASCAR pulled him in, making me suspicious; is there some mindwashing going on in those adverts?

So, to my NASCAR-lovin’ friends, I bring you my first NASCAR entry; heck I even included it as a separate blog category on this site. But don’t expect tons of updates, as I’m a passive observer right now….

Back to the article, though, how about this cheater’s response!:

And if NASCAR officials weren’t already angry, their patience was tested when Berrier showed little remorse after being caught.

“If I had to do it again, I’d still play it to try to get away with it, because I know how I got caught,” he told NASCAR.com.

Needless to say I’ll never be a fan of NASCAR as a sport, especially with stuff like this, but the behind-the-scenes stuff? Priceless…

Opera 8.0 beta 3 released

Opera has just released beta 3 of Opera 8.0. Actually they don’t call it 8.0, they’re ‘rebranding’ the browser with a new name when it does release….

Anyway, they just keep making more and more tweaks that make it even faster…see all the changes here

BTW, I’m about ready for another Opera vs. Firefox rant here soon…look forward to that in a couple days…

Job update…

Well, things at the new job are going really well…just got a new laptop for work last week, a new Dell Latitude D810. Needless to say it’s pretty darn sweet! Only downfall is the 7200rpm Hitachi drive has this annoying ‘click’ sound that perks up every 2-3 seconds while idle (it’s apparently the drive heads parking/unparking). I found a post on the Dell forums about how to ‘soften’ the sound, and alot of mention is given elsewhere to updating the drive’s firmware. Will have to try it out and let you know. But I hope since the drives are still being used and/or not recalled, they’re just annoying and not failing. Needless to say, though, I’ll still be installing some imaging software, as my work laptop has alot of software on it that takes days to install.

So what’s the next thing after getting a new laptop that a techie gets excited about? Shopping for a new bag, of course! (I believe also one of the signs you might be becoming a metrosexual?) I had to go buy a new bag at CompUSA right away to protect my investment, and I had to get one in-person since I don’t like buying one from Dell I can’t put my hands (and eyes) on first. The first one I picked out was a Kensington Contour model that was rather nice. Unfortunately I got it home, went to put my new laptop in it, and it got stuck halfway down. Pulled it out, tried again, still no luck. So I took out the sleeve insert that the laptop fits into, and I kid you not it was in the shape of a trapezoid. The top part may have fit a 17″ laptop initially, but not even a 15.4″ Dell was getting to the bottom. So being a stickler for being able to zipper the bag shut, I took it back, where the girl at the counter couldn’t have cared less; I tried to relay there was a major design problem here, no way in hell a 17″ laptop fits in there, but to no avail.

Oh well, went back in the same store and tried to find another bag, as CompUSA is one of the few places with good bags on-hand. Since I had spent an hour the last time probing all the ones there and only found the one I had bought originally, I wasn’t thrilled with my prospects. And mind you I need one with space, I need to carry a lot of cords and accessories, plus paperwork, etc. without needing rollers on the bag. But then I noticed a bag there I had brushed aside quickly before: a Targus CityGear. Let me tell you I highly recommend this bag; it’s got so many compartments and so much space, yet doesn’t weigh a ton, it’s super easy now to lug around my laptop, PDA and MP3 player, and their cords, without much fuss….check out some of the other images on that page. The CD holder (actually a sleeve) is wickedly smart….

Ok, enough techie raving….otherwise, as far as work, I’m just doing some minor billable work, waiting for the first big project here hopefullysoon. But it’s still a very nice change, the environment, the people, etc. I don’t know why I ever left…well, actually I do remember why, and I was a moron back then….

Old posts being uploaded

Don’t be alarmed! No, you’re not going back in time, I am simply uploading my messages from my previous blogs. Unfortunately I haven’t figured out how to redo the timestamp on the messages, so their dates will be all messed up, but could be a couple years old…

But since one of my friends noted recently this site has become all technical, I am uploading these to save face and show I do have a normal side….so stay tuned for those…

Belated: Opera 8.0 betas released

Wow, I’m behind the times rather quickly…about a week and a half ago, Opera released a new beta version of its upcoming 8.0 browser, which among other things provided their temporary solution to the aforementioned IDN problem. Since then they’ve added IMAP support to some of the recent preview releases. Very cool stuff, if they’d just get rid of the popup alert that notifies you a popup window was just blocked…have no idea why that’s there, even Microsoft figured that one out eventually….

You can always find the latest beta/preview release builds of Opera on their site.

Firefox 1.0.1 Released; Breaks Lektora

On Thursday the Mozilla Foundation released Firefox 1.0.1, mainly a security upgrade for its now-infamous browser. It includes another temporary fix for the IDN spoofing issue I mentioned before.

Users of the first beta version of the new RSS aggregator Lektora should note this upgrade breaks Lektora’s Firefox extension. Simply uninstall the extension and reinstall the Lektora program in Windows; or, grab the new beta version of Lektora coming out today, which you should pry do anyway since the current beta expires this Tuesday.

Fair and balanced…

Wow, has CNET news had suddenly gone nuts? IE7 is the doom of Firefox? Did you hear that?

Thankfully an interview with Salon regarding this recent claim at least shows CNET allows other points of view…

I’m sorry, Molly, but you’re just plain wrong! Just because the biggest software company releases their version of a product, doesn’t mean we should necessarily cower and use it or abandon other alternatives. Market share shouldn’t dictate what I as a free-thinking user should use…the power of choice is monumental to society….

And that’s not even getting into the real reasons why…

Whew, I feel like Will Ferrel during his debate in Old School…what happened, I blacked out?

New Job

Normally I don’t get too personal in the blog, at least blurring out the names in the appropriate documents. To protect the innocent and not make this into a personal diary where all I do is vent and rave. Usually not appropriate in this case…

But I had to just let those who really know me and follow me only thru this blog that I just accepted a new consulting position with a ‘large’ Twin Cities company. I qualify ‘large’ as one of the premier consulting groups and larger local presences; not necessarily meaning the size of a big 5 company overall. But they get alot of excellent work in the Microsoft arena, and I couldn’t pass up a chance to work for them again (yes, I previously worked with them in a previous life (for both of us)).

But I can’t wait to start on the 28th and will share any interesting news I can related to this later…

Don’t Ask

This is kind of self-explanatory, but I’ll explain what this tool I wrote is for soon…just wanted to get it ‘public’ for people to use. Please excuse any bugs, as I know there are some tweaks I need to make it work nicely in most browsers..

UPDATE: OK, here’s the scoop on this tool…I was recently in a job search and needless to say I surfed the same sites over and over, day after day. I got the idea from another website that provided a similar service, albeit in a different format. But basically you can search for jobs by entering the search criteria once, and then it’s submitted to the different sites.

Right now it only searches in the state of MN, for computer jobs. I’m considering making it truly flexible, with different states and occupations…

IDN Phishing ‘Solved’

Heard of the latest ‘bug’ to hit the browser world? Well unless you know what IDN is, probably not. There’s a problem with IDN that results in a certain combination of characters ‘morphing’ themselves into what looks like a valid English site. (I’m stepping outside my realm of knowledge here, so forgive the crazy talk)…. Anyhow, it’s a way for someone to perhaps fool you into thinking you’re on Paypal’s website when you look at your browser’s address bar, but you’re actually redirected elsewhere….

The only fixes right now are to either:

  • disable IDN support, not a nice option for those who need IDN (go here for Firefox, Opera has no such capability, and only IE doesn’t support IDN natively),
  • install/configure a proxy like Proxomitron which will work for everyone and warn you of ‘questionable’ URLs, or
  • a workaround for Firefox using the AdWatch extension. Another non-ideal option for those who need IDN