About a week ago, I went ahead and did what I wanted to do for years: I purchased a Sport Utility Vehicle. Well, leased.
It's just my little way of sticking it to all of the suckers in Priuses. I seriously hate that sorry excuse for a car. I was stuck behind one of these asshats the other day. "He" was driving all slow like the hipster that he is. I went around him, and let my stable of 240 horses purr a bit just to show him what time it was.
The best part, is that I can do it all burning clean efficient home grown E85. I haven't tried burning this yet, but I am considering it. It is generally a bit cheaper than gasoline, but the mileage is worse. It would probably end up costing a bit more as a result, but I would not be sending my hard earned dollars to the middle east or some other region that hates the Greatest Country in the World.
Theoretically, you would get somewhat more power though. I'll bet that this is probably limited to the same as gasoline by though. I also don't know how well this fuel burns in the winter. I am tempted to try it though, on the next fillup.
I have been pondering over the last few weeks about once again using a feed reader like Google Reader to keep up with the multitude of sites I check on a regular basis. Part of "pondering" in this context means, I thought of it at one point during the day, and then forgot by the time I had free time. The other portion of "pondering" was whether to use such a reader to begin with. I have had some mixed feelings in the past about readers in general. One thing was the fact that I add too much crap and then don't use it. The other is that I sometimes do like the "random browsing" aspect of visiting the sites I frequent; a reader removes this. However, due to my much busier (and more structured!) life in the last almost half year or so, I decided to give the concept another shot. Also, there have been a few sites that I regularly check lately. Updates on one of these has been sporadic at times, and the others don't update every day. Basically, the sites updated less frequently either get checked several times before they update, or I forget and then remember in a week to get three updates... It seems prime time to just get a stream of all of that put together, instead of checking all of them "when I remembered".
I (re)checked out the Google Reader site on my lappy. It seems a good bit more featured than the last time I touched it so long ago. I deleted most of the the things I always skipped in the past, which should help. I remember recently looking up a version for Android, and paradoxically, they didn't have one. The paradox is especially true considering that the not only have many of the Google web apps in Android App form, they actually have a Podcast listening app that comes with the phone. This App is great, if a little buggy. Seems weird they had the audio equivalent without the text version. Anyway, there was another app out there that did do Google Reader, and I intended to install it one night, "when I remembered"...
On to the creepy part, though. As I went through the (desktop) web version, I thought, "I bet that there is an Android friendly web version", and if not, the full version might even work. I hit it up on the old Andriod, and for the 10 or so seconds I looked, it seemed usable. Then, on a whim, I googled "google reader for android". Got a news update from 30 minutes ago, stating that said app had been released. Creepy. I checked on a complete whim and was within 30 minutes of a release I didn't know was coming.
The app itself seems pretty standard, it's basically the gmail app but for RSS. I only skimmed it prior to this post, and might put up a more detailed review in a few days.
The thing I have always loved about the web version of Google Reader is that it pretty much addresses the main 2 things I absolutely hate about plain RSS. This is that the feed doesn't contain the actual content, and also only has the last couple of items. Google Reader on the web completely addresses this, hopefully so does the mobile version. In Google Reader, you get the complete article, with pictures and such and full text, formatted in a common way, even across disparate sites. This can be set up to be one long stream of every thing combined, or in groups, or in other ways I am probably behind on. It also goes back as far as you want to go -- it's not just the last 5 articles or so. I had a program idea to address both of these, by maintaining a complete list of articles locally, and scraping the site for the complete text, a few years before Google did it. Maybe I should collect my money?
Trying to figure out if these are OK or not. This is a typical example of the average Joe not knowing a thing about the topic, but posting their 2 cents anyway. I am not looking for an opinion, it is a simple question of fact. You can sift through thousands of such opinions.
My personal guess is that they don't cause any permanent damage, but could potentially mess up the calibration. This is easy to undo, just move the phone in a few complete circles away from any magnets, and it will calibrate itself automagically.
It sounds like some docks use magnets to tell the phone to stay on. While this is the exact opposite of what I'd want, that signals to me that it's OK for magnets to be near the phone.
One of the annoying things using copy and paste on windows is that the paste generally carries with it the formatting of the source. I assume that to the average moron using a computer, this is a feature, but I rarely if ever want the source formatting. This often comes up because I paste something from a document or website into an email. The formatting for the words or phrases is then that of whatever I copied, rather than the format of the email. Stands out like a sore thumb and is very annoying, with me having to take steps to undo it.
I am a big fan of style sheets, with my preference (admittedly not used since college) being Latex. Content and presentation should be completely separated. For example, you don't create a heading by saying "bold, 16 point font, centered". You mark it as "heading level 1". Then, a style sheet, separate from the text itself, defines that "heading level 1" has those properties. By doing this, every single heading in the document is guaranteed to look exactly the same. Additionally, if you choose to change the look of the document at a later date, you simply redefine the style sheet to make "heading level 1" look different. Copying the formating completely breaks this.
I should look into writing a utility that disables this by default, or look if such a utility already exists. It shouldn't be that hard, as things copied to the clipboard generally define several formats (to account for different application compatibilities) and plain text is almost always present as a lowest common denominator.
Sprint has for a short time now been offering "4G". If you excuse the fact that very few markets currently have it, it really isn't actually 4G.
4G, in technical terms, is defined as being 1Gbps or over by the ITU, and the Sprint network is nowhere near that fast. 4G was supposed to be a hypothetical super ultra fast wireless technology that could genuinely start replacing fiber and wires. It seems like it would be many years before we see that kind of speed. We don't even see that in short range Wifi.
To me, 4G should probably be defined in the 20 to 50 MBps range, and I swear I have heard this definition at some point as well. That speed range would be a clear step forward compared to what we have now.
I also remember reading when all the 3G stuff started, that 3G would peak out in the Mbps range -- don't remember the exact numbers but I thought it was still considered 3G well into the 5 to 10 Mbps range we are seeing from the latest deployed technologies. Quite frankly, the devices and networks first classified as "3G" (things like early EVDO revs) were just barely that, and furthermore, at the time, were considered to be just the tip of the iceburg of what 3G was. The ITU defines 3G as 200kbps and up, so even good old EDGE qualifies when it is maxed out. Early EVDO was 250 - 300 kbps, really not all that much better than EDGE.
What I think basically happened was that 3G got all the hype when it was 300 - just under a meg, and now marketing folk decided to throw the next number at it.
I have not used Sprint's 4G yet. There is nothing wrong with the speed range they are claiming, it will be quite speedy, but it isn't truly 4G yet, just the next step of 3G.
Fine, sprint wants to call it 4G. Annoying, because this incorrect term probably will stick, but whatever. Now, T-Mobile has followed the lead and is calling their new HSPA+ network "4G". It's about as "4G" as sprint, and I believe will actually be a bit faster (10Mbps vs 6MBps). However, in print, Sprint's network generally is just called 4G by the press, but T-Mobile's generally is called "4G", with quotes, like it isn't real. Well, it isn't but neither is Sprint's. Just made more annoying by the fact that on top of that it probably will be a bit faster.
One thing I will give Sprint's marketing department is that the new crop of Phones genuinely are a new generation from a capability standpoint.
I currently do not pay for TV. The reason is simple: other than sports and a couple of shows, I just don't watch it. Which leads me to my next point: A La Carte TV would be nice.
For people like me, who literally would only get a handful of channels, it would be great, and probably cost effective. However, many people who want A La Carte for the same reason probably don't realize that they wouldn't save money. People have a tendency to think "well I get 100 channels and only watch 15. Therefore, I should be able to choose only those 15 and pay (current price)/100 *15. This probably wouldn't be the case. I'll bet if you picked the average number of channels that people actually watch, they would want to charge you the same as you pay now. The fact is, they know you only will watch a fraction of the channels, and it doesn't cost them anything to give you a bundle. If you had the average number of channels watched - this would by definition cost the same as it does now. In that case, you would get the channels you watch and pay for it. The way it's done now, you get and pay for the channels you watch, and get a bunch bundled as well.
I however think people should be given the choice. In most cases, you get no such choice currently. For me, I would probably come out ahead.
I certainly am not a fan of the cable industry. Comcast is pure evil. There service is absolutely disgusting. Name one other utility that makes you wait a week before getting an appointment, and then gives you a 3 HOUR WINDOW in which to show up?
Another thing. People talk about all the variety and huge number of channels, including many "niche" channels. Really? You certainly get a ton of channels, but how many really deliver anything unique, or "niche" in any way. Channels were far more "niche" back when you got only 35 of them. Most channels especially the niche ones lately, seem to fill their schedules with horribly stupid reality TV. Not really niche anymore when your entire lineup consists of reality shows having nothing to do with the channel's "topic". For example, with the History Channel (one of the last holdouts), you used to really get documentaries about history and nothing else. Now, "Ice Road Truckers" is in the lineup, and the new tagline is "History made every day." How stupid is that? More like "reason I don't watch that any more made every day". Maybe that crap gets higher ratings, but that is one of the precise reasons I don't want to pay for it. Actually, I'd probably enjoy watching about the Ice Road Truckers if it was presented as a documentary instead of a reality show with crappier camerawork and a bunch of BS drama I couldn't care less about.
This is from Gibson's Top 50 Guitarists, and is a minor followup to my previous post. This geezer hits the nail on the head
Rock’s sorcerer supreme, Jimmy Page took the blues, rockabilly and folk and fired it out of a cannon with the release of Led Zeppelin’s eponymous debut in 1969.
I have always considered Zep to be a mixture of Folk, Blues, and 50s Rock, played more intensely and loudly than normal music. 3 Out of 4, guess what Rockabilly is? A sub-genre of 50s rock.
Again, it has always bothered me that Zep is considered "metal". Not that there is anything wrong with that, but they just aren't. Besides inventing metal when they wrote "Immigrant Song", they are hardly the "definitive metal band", as one review read.
I salute you, man who has listened to the albums you write about.
I always used to be under the impression that most apartment complexes did not allow pets. Presumably, this was done for the obvious reasons in the eyes of the management of said animals micterating and defecating all over the place as well as making noise. In addition to this, I always figured it was because not all residents would want to live next to such creatures. In fact, I always assumed that aside from the pet owner, many people would specifically NOT want to live near these animals.
Today, many if not most places I have looked at boast being "pet friendly." In fact, all of the apartment finding sites that give you a choice in the matter have choices such as "cats, dogs, both, no preference." What the hell if my preference is "no pets"? I have yet to see this option.
The more I look into things such as this, it becomes clear that the desires of the minority overrule the needs of the majority. This is often done under the mantra of "anti discrimination". For example, did you know that it is illegal to have an apartment that excludes children? Under the banner of anti-discrimination. Oh, my bad, if it is a retirement complex, it is cool. Not talking about nursing homes here, I am talking about apartment / condo complexes for "seniors." How that is acceptable but having an adult only complex is considered discriminatory, I will never know. Just in case anyone is wondering, I am NOT against the old folks only residences, I am against the fact that if I want to not live next door to a potentially noisy kid or filthy animal, I have no right to do so. I am not sure about pets, but it is actually illegal for landlords to purposely separate families and adults.
I see this characterization often in writings about them. The bio on Pandora that came up a few minutes ago went as far as to state "Led Zeppelin was the definitive heavy metal band".
I must admit that my knowledge of "metal" is fairly limited, so perhaps the title would be better as "Led Zeppelin do not fit my idea of metal".
To me, when I think metal, I think bands like Metalica or Godsmack. If people asked me to name a couple of metal songs, the first two that probably would come to mind are "Enter Sandman" or "Whatever". These are bands with overdistorted midrange scooped leads, strongly strummed, palm muted power chords in a simple head banging friendly rhythm, vocals bordering on yelling, an overall dark tone and theme (near ubiquitous use of minor keys) -- well you get the idea. I doubt many people would consider these bands to not be metal, however given my relative lack of knowledge of all things metal maybe my idea of this genre is too narrow, and Zep fits better than I realize.
The only song I can think of that I would classify as metal by Zep is "Immigrant Song," The live version a fair bit moreso than the album version. This song has many of the ingredients I listed for a metal song. Maybe the main thing not there is the scooped mids, but this was not popular until much later.
Certainly, Zep was an important precursor to the metal genre, but I think saying that they actually fall within this genre is a bit of a stretch. Zep probably has more in common with 50s rock than metal. I mean seriously, is "Hot Dog" even remotely metal?
Of course, this is all a matter of opinion. Normally, it wouldn't make that big of a difference. The thing I don't like about the characterization is that many people have a very wrong idea about what Zep sounds like. I'll admit, many years ago before I started enjoying them, I was in this camp. A great many people unfamiliar with the band seem to think that they are an older version of Metallica. Case in point: I was recently on a camping trip and some women asked (borderline begged) me to repeat "Fool in the Rain" on a playlist. I replied that "you don't exactly have to twist my arm to repeat a zeppelin song". The reaction of one of the girls was basically "this is Zeppelin?!?" Certainly not their harder stuff, but it does demonstrate that people not into the band don't really have a good idea of their sound. This is not the only time this has happened either. Most people have only heard "Stairway" which they assume is a power ballad and seem shocked that the rest of their songs don't sound like Metallica or something in that vein. On a side note, the other girl knew who John Bonham was, which is commendable.
People who live near me no doubt know what these are, even if they don't know them by name. I am talking about the old skool Air Raid / Civil Defense / Tornado sirens that are used during storms and tested the first Saturday of every month in this area. These sirens, made by Federal Signal, were pretty common between the time they came out in 1952, until they ended production in 1990. There were three major models, the 1000, the 1000T, and the 1003. Now, they seem to be a dying breed, and there is a good chance that they will eventually go extinct given that parts are no longer made for them.
The 1000 is a single tone, the 1000T two tone, and the 1003 is a two tone that allows individual tones to be played.
These sirens, specifically the 1000T, has the most glorious siren tone known to man. Hearing one of these babies leaves you little doubt that the world will be coming to an end soon. If my city was under nuclear attack, I wouldn't want to be warned any other way. Hell, using these things for tornadoes seems to be an insult to them.
The reason I am writing this is that they are thinning out. The siren closest to my house thankfully still is a 1000T*, but who knows how long it will be there. Given that parts are no longer made, it seems like if it dies it would be replaced with a newer model, probably the 2001 series (which are being made and seem to be quite common in the surrounding area). These new sirens have some advantages, but they just don't have the tone.
Even going back quite a few years, I always thought "our sirens sound better". The sirens in surrounding areas have been the newer variety, which generate a laughingly annoying high pitched shrill sound. I would not even acknowledge a coming nuclear holocaust via these things.
The way most of these sirens work is they have a decent sized air compressor (hence a "supercharged siren") that feeds a "chopper". The chopper is two concentric cylinders, one fixed, one moving, with a row of holes in both. As the moving cylinder spins, the holes alternatively line up and are blocked. Air from the compressor is forced through the holes when they are open, and blocked when they are not. The speed of rotation of the chopper determines the frequency. The Thunderbolt design uses 3 motors. One for the air compressor, one for the chopper, and one to rotate the horn. The air compressor is the fairly large box halfway up the pole. The frequency can be adjusted, and because of the separate air compressor somewhat independently of the output. This is in contrast to non supercharged designs, where lowering the frequency might reduce output (because the pressure is reduced as well). Sirens in a given area will not generally match up unless someone went out of their way to tune them. This just adds to their character, in my opinion.
There are a couple of factors in the secret to the sound of the 1000T. Perhaps the biggest is the fact that the 1000T is dual tone. It is a minor third in Just Intonation, certainly not a cheery pair of notes. Also, these sirens seem to be a fair amount lower in frequency than most newer designs. This significantly limits the shrillness, and to me, gives them far more authority. Another thing is the horn design. It is a long, slender exponential horn. Apparently, the throat of the horn is overloaded, distorting the base waveform which gives the sirens the brassiness they are known for. Annoyingly, you would almost think that most of this could be implemented in the modern sirens.
The newer models are a few DB louder, but I'll bet they can't be heard as well inside a building due to the higher frequency. Some might argue that the annoyingness of the newer models increases the chance people will react to them. I say that the erie tone of the Thunderbolts is much better; the new sirens might have a higher chance of being noticed, but the Thunderbolts have a higher chance of being noted. The newer models are supposed to be better on maintenance, which is why they are used. However, I see no reason that the improvements made to the newer models can't be made to the Thunderbolts. Alas, this was attempted in the 80s, and didn't sell.
Well, I think I have made my point. The Thunderbolt sirens are in fact glorious, and hopefully will be around for at least a little longer.
*I believe, it could be a 1003 but I have never heard separate tones from it. These were generally used as a separate signal for volenteer fire depts, which we do not have here in the city.
To those I consider friends, it's no secret that Led Zeppelin are one of my favorite bands ever, certainly in the top five, and probably in the top two or three (my favorites do change over time and with my mood). And let's be frank, right now they are probably in the number one spot. I also think they are one of the greatest bands ever, regardless of anyone's personal taste for them. Whether you like them or not, you are a fool if you say they are not excellent at what they do. Actually, taking that into account, they probably are in my number one spot for both best band and greatest band. Some of the other artists I like are solo, like Jimi Hendrix, and while his band was certainly great, as a whole I think Zeppelin were better.
I strongly believe that Zeppelin should do at least one more major tour. Why? Well, the obvious is what I just stated, I love them and would kill to see them live. But it goes deeper than that. They broke up 2 years before I was born, and have performed minimal times since. As such, I have had virtually no chance of seeing them live, ever. If I had tons of money AND was lucky enough to win the ticket lottery, yes, I had a remotely minute chance of seeing them in 2007. I would like them to perform one last time, so that a new generation can enjoy their music in a live setting. But, the biggest reason is their age. They ain't exactly young, and won't be around forever. They could still do a tour at the present time. Yes, John Bonham is dead, and that is tragic. And yes, I suppose it isn't "really Zeppelin" without him. Filling his shoes is a challenge. But frankly, his son has shown himself to be a capable substitute, and it would be a great tribute to his father to take his place. And it isn't like John died a fighting cancer or anything, he literally drank himself to death. But the point is, three of the four original members are still around, and going strong. Jimi Hendrix's band? All three of the original members dead. Only one member of his second lineup (Band of Gypsys) survives at the moment. All fairly recent if memory serves. Robert and JPJ, on the other hand, have both been touring, and Jimmy wants to. JPJ and Jimmy both want to reunite the remaining members, but Robert is being difficult. I can see his side, but see mine.
The concert they did in 2007 was awesome. Yeah, they weren't as good as the old days, but they still rocked. FAR better than some others of their age (cough cough The Who) and better than many current bands. Robert's voice ain't half bad considering. He can't quite hit all those high notes anymore, but really he sounded pretty good. Jimmy frankly sounds 100 times better than he did in the early 80s before he got clean.
Jimmy is the brains behind the group, and my favorite member. I would honestly settle for him touring with a Robert Plant sound-alike playing old Zeppelin tunes. If JPJ is in on it, even better. I'd really like to see Robert get off his damn high horse, but that doesn't look like it is gonna happen.
Warning, the following contains spoilers of last night's episode and possibly earlier episodes/seasons.
Well, it has finally come to an end. Last night, the last televised episode of 24 aired. I have been a fan of this show for some time now. Seasons 6 and 7 were kind of weak, especially season 7. I did make some fun of the quality of these seasons, but honestly, season 8 wasn't half bad. It started a little slow, but picked up towards the end.
The show has come a long way since it's beginnings. For the first couple of seasons, you literally were at the edge of your seats, wondering what would happen next. These seasons were very well written. One of the things I think constitutes good writing for this kind of show is good willing suspension of disbelief. I can really get into this kind of show if I am sitting there thinking "there's NO WAY that would have happened that way". It actually doesn't even have to be perfect, just good enough that the errors or ludicrous scenes don't take me out of the "world" of the show. The first few seasons had this. During later seasons, it sort of broke down. Season 7 was particularly bad in my opinion, as I find it so hard to believe that commandos were able to take over the white house. I would like to think that this would be nearly impossible in real life. The thing that was really absurd, though, is that they entered through a crappy secret door with minimal guards. It was bad enough they took over what almost certainly is one of the most heavily guarded buildings in the world, but did so through a completely absurd security hole. That is the point I started to lose interest in continued watching. I must say though, that for the most part, all of the seasons had reasonably unpredictable plotlines. I actually suspect that the whole White House thing was supposed to be a gut-wrenching twist, but didn't really work sue to absurdity.
Season 8 seemed to do a lot better in the believability department. And it really picked up the pace when Jack went on a rampage. After all, all anyone watching this really wants to see is Jack Bauer kicking ass.
24 of course is known for killing off major characters. This is part of the appeal of the show; you never know who is going to live or die, unlike most shows where everyone usually lives happily ever after. In fact, the cast from season 1 to season 8 had changed significantly from year to year, which also serves to keep the show fresh. There were rumors (going back years) that Jack would eventually die. I am very glad they did not do this. Yeah, it would serve to demonstrate that no character is sacred from death, but honestly, Jack has been anything but mortal over the last 8 seasons. All killing him now would do is piss people of without really accomplishing anything. What plot purpose would it serve? So while it certainly would have been more edgy to do so, I am glad they did not.
They say that a 24 movie is in the works. Here's hoping that it is as good as the show. I'd hate to see it ruined by going crazy over the top. I do like it when a successful TV show that ends spawns a couple of movies. It's like "the bulk of it is over, but you get an additional little bonus chunk of the story every few years". I'd point to Star Trek for a good example, although admittedly some of the movies were crap. But I think it was pretty cool that they were still making TOS based material in the 80s to early 90s and we basically got a couple new TNGs up to 8 years after the show ended. Plus, since they are movies, they have a broader storyline and overall scope than a TV episode. Anyhow, I was initially skeptical because a movie wouldn't be able to be in realtime. I even think the initial treatment ideas weren't realtime. To me, this would ruin it. However I guess the plan is to make the first half "movie time" and the second half realtime. That actually wouldn't be a half bad way to have your cake and eat it too.
So, for now, I am patiently waiting for the movie to come out, and wondering what I will be watching on Monday nights from now on...
I am trying to understand the point of these services. Some people always or often use them whenever posting a link. I mean, I get what the services do, but to me they don't seem that useful. Posting a URL as http://bit.ly/9DCTik is definitely shorter than http://detnews.com/article/20100427/BIZ/4270396/1361/Peanuts-gang-sold-to-owner-of-Joe-Boxer-for-$175M#ixzz0mIwGTiAa, but who cares? If someone posted either as a link, what difference does the length make? Usually, links are posted to a blog or something, and you just click it without caring what the URL looks like. In fact, the full URL gives some clue as to what the link is, and I consider that an advantage for the long one. Many CMSes will make the URL relevant to the topic somehow in this day and age. I will admit that the long URL is a mess in this case. Now, if you were entering the link manually for some reason, there is obviously a huge advantage with bitly, but how often is that done to necessitate always using bitly? The bitly URL is easier to remember than the long original URL, but still not easy to remember. Bitly appears to be case sensitive, and this is what would screw me up. Even if it wasn't case sensitive, the 6 character hash it uses isn't all that memorable imo.
One thing I did notice is that people seem to use this when posting to twitter. Perhaps its just because of twitter's length limitation. Also, it appears you can track how many people click a link in bitly. Question answered?
This comes up every time I get a new drive. To this day, I don't have a definitive answer on which is "better".
Many people seem to think that the full format is better. I have read a variety of supposed reasons, and a variety of anecdotes.
The quick format has a huge advantage: it is fast. Is it really inferior to the full? MS includes both options, with one taking way longer. Logic seems to indicate that if the quick was as "good", they wouldn't have the option for the full. I think people assume that the full is the "good" way that has a drawback in speed, and the quick is the "halfass" way. However, I have never seen any empirical evidence that the quick is any inferior to the full. By the same logic that the full is the "good way", we can make an argument that if the quick was really that bad, it wouldn't be included at all. Which leads me to believe that, while there are some advantages to the full, in most cases, it is not worth the wait.
One of the problems is that most people don't format very often. When people have to do this, they often will figure they came this far, and the full format is "better", so they just spend the time waiting for it to complete. Then, they start using the computer and forget about it.
Many of the arguments for the full format are anecdotal. In other words, they are of the form "I always full format and I have never had any problems". That's nice, but that doesn't mean you would have any problems with a quick format. I can guarantee if you did a full format and started having some disk issues soon after, no one will blame the format. If you did a quick format, there is a good chance it will be blamed if there is no other obvious reason. But here's the kicker: say the problem happened one year later. Would you blame the format then? Some might, if they remembered that it was quick formatted, but most probably would look for other issues. Most also would have likely forgotten the kind of format they used. In my opinion, if it worked fine for a year, the format is probably not the problem. It wouldn't magically start causing problems one day a year later.
Microsoft has this to say about the choice: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/302686
The way it is worded: Full Format = all files deleted + check for bad sectors Quick Format = all files deleted
For a quick format, I know that the files are deleted by removing the file allocation table (or whatever ntfs calls it). This is a table on the disk that tells which sectors are used by which files. Without this, there is no way to tell which files are what; the disk just looks like it is full of formless data. In fact, there are programs on the market capable of rebuilding most of the drive by looking at this data. However, the point here is that without the FAT, the OS has no way to "see" any files. Put in a "blank" FAT, and it looks just like a blank disk. When a file is deleted in normal operation, all that happens is that the FAT entry is removed. Based on the wording in the MS article, the quick format would then delete and create a clean FAT, the full format would do that followed by a bad sector check. It in no way states or even implies anything about overwriting all the data on the disk, something I have heard from full format supporters but have never seen any evidence of windows actually doing this.
Lets go back to the idea of disk problems after a quick format. Based on what is said in the Microsoft article, a disk with some sort of issue could get through the quick format without problems, allowing the problems to pop up later. For a full format, this is less likely to happen, because the problem would have been caught. I haven't seen any evidence either way for this.
Based on the Microsoft article, I think from now on I am always going to use the quick format. The only reason not to is if you suspect the drive has a physical problem. If I suspected this, I would run a separate scan, mostly likely with something reliable like SpinRite, rather than letting the format command deal with it.
There are apparently web browsers for the venerable C64. Most people would probably wonder why such a thing would ever be done. Well, I will stand tall and say "because it's there". I am tempted to bust out my old C64 just to try it.
However, I am pretty sure there is a catch. If I am not mistaken, at least one of these browsers requires the user to set up a (more) modern machine to be a gateway for the C64(s?) in question. As I understand it, the C64 genuinely is not powerful enough to render the web, even in the primitive form offered by these browsers. The gateway actually receives webpages and simplifies them to a form the C64 can understand and display. I am not even sure how much processing really goes on in the C64, I think it is mostly just a fancy bitmap viewer (which on the C64 is actually a fair amount of processing). I am not sure of this, however, and will find out. The C64 certainly is not winning any speed races and I think it would have trouble rendering even simplified pages. Moreso, it has almost no memory by today's standards, so even if it could slowly chug through the data a little at a time, it simply does not have the storage to hold all the data.
I am all about the C64. I had one growing up, and learned to program on it. Obviously, by today's standards it is crap, but I think it was a huge milestone in the 80s. IIRC it remains the best selling computer ever made. Which sounds surprising, but you have to remember that computers back then were designed and marketed as identical but unique appliances. As I write this, I am using a Compaq Presario C700. Does that mean anything to anyone? Probably not. I am sure the C800 (if it exists) is just an upgraded version, with a better processor, Ram, etc, but 100% compatible. Actually, I think this is actually a C700-xxxx or something, a specific computer in that line. If you go to Dell today, they have 8 different basic models to choose from. Even without customizing, no single model will sell the way to C64 did, and these models change every year. The C64 was made for more than 10 years. It was not compatible with other makes, although there was some compatibility between it and newer Commodore machines (only after commodore made a few incompatible machines that didn't sell at all). In this way, computers back then were like game consoles. They attempted to build up a following so that there would be a lot of software for that model, but were incompatible with anything else. Consoles today and then have followed this paradigm.
Anyway, back to the C64. It is always interesting to look back at technology in this way. In every possible way, the laptop I am on now is significantly better than the C64. It probably has as much processing power as a decent percentage of all the C64s ever made (and this is a pretty cheap computer). But, from a conceptual standpoint, the Commodore was a bigger leap. It was not the first, but it was early in the timeline of home computers. Before this, computers existed (for many years) but only as large machines that businesses and government could use. For the first time, individual users could own a computer and have it in their homes. Many common computing tasks today were possible then. Word processing, spreadsheets, games, and even internetish activity. It wasn't nearly as pretty, or as fast, or as good, but it was there. The "internetish" activity of which I speak was in the form of early services like compuserve. Quite expensive and very limited by today's standard, but they existed. To further illustrate my point, Compuserve in those days had a chat program. Just like today. Of course, they called it the "CB Simulator" which reflects the timeframe. To me (in some ways), it is a bigger step to go from nothing to being online than it is going from very primitive online to today's sophisticated computers.
I started to get into the Commodore in the early 90s. My dad had an old one lying around, and he hooked it up for me after I begged him to. I never had most of the peripherals. Only a couple of joysticks and a tape drive. The only prewritten software I had was on cartridge. At the time, I thought this was vastly superior compared to disk due to virtually instant loading. Maybe I worked at Nintendo in the mid 90s :) But I did use that tape drive a fair amount, to store programs I wrote and stuff I typed. Can you imagine typing in a program today? I always dreamed of having all the peripherals, especially a disk drive and modem. I never got them. A couple years later, we got a 486. It was thousands of times better, and I even dabbled in qbasic. Coming off the C64, and my complete lack of software for it, I thought that Real Men only wrote their own software. I actually thought qbasic was limited compared to the C64, although today I am not sure it was. Not too long after, a neighbor, who was quite the commodore enthusiast, gave me all his old stuff. Computer, disk drive, about 200 magazines, a huge number of programs, including the monthly disk from some of the magazines to save you from typing the progs in, to a lot of commercial software. It would have been a dream come true had it been 3-5 years earlier. However, the 486 trumped it so hard that after a few days or weeks of messing with it, I put it away never to look back. I still have all that old crap. Anyone wanna make me an offer?
This is a while back now, but it pisses me off. I was telling my uncle a story, and I used the word "like", as in "it was like 150 pounds". He felt it necessary to correct me upon this word choice, telling me "it was 150 pounds, not like 150 pounds". Uh, no. The word "like" in this context signifies that I was not 100% sure of the exact quantity in question, and was therefore an appropriate English sentence construct. Interestingly enough, I am a college graduate, and therefore able to form sentences without help or corrections by overzealous relatives. Even more interesting, I am not your 16 year old daughter, who undoubtedly used the word "like" in every sentence.
