Aaron's blog

Every year or so I get some incredible itch to install Linux.  I suppose it's because I read so much online about how great it is, how it is finally ready for all the desktops of the world, how Microsoft is the coming of the Apocalypse, and how the latest version of it is better than ever.

So I would download the latest ISO file, burn it to disk (the last few times I was smarter and used a CD-RW), and install.  Things like no support for SATA or an install process that required a deep knowledge of Linux file systems used to get in my way, but of course the next version always promises to fix this (and that's usually correct).

Fast forward to the beginning of January.  I get most of the way through a Gentoo install (an attempt to "learn more about the inner workings of Linux").  I don't know how much I really learned, basically I was just copying command line commands off of the Gentoo handbook.  I never finished, and the machine sat there, 3/4 complete, powered on for 2 months, until...

I figure it's finally time for me to get a Linux install that works so I can start learning some stuff.  Pop in Ubuntu CD, next next next, complete.  Pretty easy, right?  So up comes the desktop, there it is in all it's glory at 1024x768.  For all the people who criticize Windows XP for looking like a kids toy, they evidently haven't seen Ubuntu at this resolution.  It may not have blue and green colors, but there are wasted pixels and bloat everywhere, including a bar at the top AND bottom of the screen.  Efficient power user OS indeed...

My LCD supports 1280x1024, and so does my video card.  What video card doesn't right?  I figure, "It's 2007, I damn well better not have to edit a config file just to change my resolution."  To my surprise, I found the option to do it, nice point and click.  Also to my surprise, there was no option for 1280x1024.  The highest was 1024x768.

Now I wonder how to fix this.  Do I update the driver?  It seems that it should be able to support this standard resolution right out of the box.  Will I have to edit some config file?  Who knows.  I'll get to that some other day, because 1024x768 is livable for a little while.

So I look into joining our domain.  This is a VERY easy process (please click that link just to see how easy it is) on Windows: set DNS entries, enter domain in text box, click OK, and enter administrator password.  What is the Linux equivalent?  Ensure 6 packages (plus dependencies) are installed, edit 3 text files (be careful lest you make one typo and it doesn't work), restart 2 services, and issue the actual command from the command line (admittedly there are better things in place in case of failure on Linux than Windows--you can check the log files, whereas in Windows you would be left hanging).  Needless to say, I won't be joining my domain at work for a few days.  Someone please tell me how this needs to be so much harder than in Windows.

Is it unfair to ask Linux to measure up to Windows?  Maybe.  Does Linux need to be as easy as Windows to gain appreciable market share?  Most definitely.  Is it very close?  Nope.

I had a pretty good idea today.  It relates to Dream Scene, a feature of Windows Vista Ultimate.  It is a desktop background that uses videos & animations, so that you can have animated backgrounds.  The only one I've seen in action was a sunset scene of a lake, with the waves rippling, and I'll admit it was pretty cool (resource consumption aside).

So I think there should be one of these that does the Matrix thing.  You know--the water-falling green symbols.  Neo would be happy.

So I'm watching this on10.net video right now.  And I also just finished writing a paper for English 120.  With a bibliography.  And about half-way through the video, they start talking about the bibliography features of Word 2007.  I don't get that excited about a whole lot of stuff, but when I saw them demonstrating how to make a bibliography, I definitely did.  This is a killer feature.  Here are the essentials:

• You add your sources using a basic data-entry form.  Of course you can choose the type of source, such as website or book or even patent.  This feature alone would be useful for managing sources, even if it did nothing with the data.
• You type your report and use the ribbon button for "Insert Source" to select your source, and it automatically puts in a correctly formatted (punctuation and typesetting) citation.  Excitement level goes up because citing sources just got a hell of a lot easier.
• Want a bibliography at the end?  Just add it in using a document building block (sounds complicated, but after you've done it once it should be easy) and it will put all your sources correctly formatted.  I assume this also updates if you add new sources in the source manager.  Excitement level increases significantly.
• Did you enter that name wrong?  Just go change it in the sources manager, and it will automatically update it in the citation and the bibliography.  More excitement.
• Oops, did you do everything in APA format instead of MLA?  Do you spend the next 20 minutes switching underlining, punctuation, and information order just to get those 10 points back in class?  No, you have Word 2007.  Just change the selection on a drop-down to MLA (or one of 8 or so others), and all the formatting AUTOMATICALLY UPDATES.  Excitement level reaches all time high.

Now, I realize that other programs are capable of generating bibliographies, but I doubt any of them are as polished as this is.  And I really doubt any of them have such tight integration with a word processor and will automatically update all the stuff we just talked about.

So that paper that I just wrote?  Yeah, it was horribly formated, lacked data, and I didn't really care how good it was.  Will I lose points?  Probably not.  But you can be sure that my next bibliography (and citations) is going to kick some serious ass.

One annoyance that has gotten me quite a few times lately is inconsistent Ctrl+Del key behavior.  If you weren't aware, in most programs this is supposed to delete one word to the right of the cursor's current position (and usually one of the spaces).  Similarly, Ctrl+Backspace deletes one word to the left of the cursor.

Some programs don't play nice with Ctrl+Del (I have found Ctrl+Backspace to be fairly consistent).  Would Microsoft please clean up their act?  Here are some results (all tested in Windows Vista, but I know I've seen some of the same in XP also):

• Notepad: deletes entire line to the right of the cursor
• Wordpad: deletes one word
• Word 2007: deletes one word
• OneNote 2007: deletes one word
• IE7 Address Bar & Search Box: deletes entire line to the right
• IE7 Textbox: does absolutely nothing
• Windows Live Writer: deletes one word
• Start Menu Search Box: deletes entire line to the right
• Visual Studio 2005: deletes one word
• Editing File Names in Explorer: deletes entire line to the right

So we see three entirely different, largely unpredictable results, from one company.  The closest thing to a trend is that the "major" word processing tools have the correct behavior, while simple things such as text-boxes and Notepad are wrong.  At least Ctrl+Z (undo) is there to save you when that whole line disappears.

So we all know about the User Access Control feature in Windows Vista.  It keeps unwanted programs from doing unwanted things.  However, it is a major pain in the butt for power users, who regularly like to change the type of settings that UAC is designed to protect.  So of course I promptly turned it off on both of my computers running Vista.  I kinda feel guilty about that.  And I don't really think UAC is that bad of an idea.

And yesterday I got a bad idea.  I thought, "Hmm, I should see if it really sucks that much, and share my experience."  Yes, I got to thinking that I should re-install Vista just so I could keep blog entries detailing each of the times that I was confronted by UAC (what it was for, was it quick, did I understand the need for it, etc.).  I imagine the encounters would number near 50 to get the system configured as desired, which really isn't that bad--especially compared to the amount of time to clean just one piece of spyware off of a computer.  Of course I would expect to be bothered by it maybe 3 or 4 times per week (or maybe less) after that as I do occasional installations and adjustments.

The bad idea part of this is because it would mean re-installing Vista (and the ensuing 8 or so hours to install all my programs).  And I have about 60GB of data on my HDD that I don't have a convenient method of backing up right now.  But maybe I'll figure something out.  Because I really think it would be an interesting experiment.

1. Install Vista.
2. Join Domain.
3. Reboot.
4. Perform Installs As Domain User (And Put Up With UAC).
5. Disable UAC.
6. Move Desktop Offsite.
7. Enjoy lack of priviledges to make any further changes, as the domain administrator account was never logged into on the computer, and hence its credentials aren't cached for Windows logon.  Can't re-enable UAC either (on the off chance that THOSE credentials are cached), as you don't have the privileges.
8. Surf the internet without flash or PDF support until reformatting the computer.

2019-10-25 - I remember that a library staff person somehow found this rant and replied with a decently helpful/explanatory comment (on the long gone site).

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If there's one thing I hate about the library, it's that the search functionality you can use to find books REALLY SUCKS.  In fact, when I think of the Bismarck Public Library, the foremost image in my mind is the island of computers, all with that dreaded search interface displayed on the screen.

Anyone remember the days where if you entered "Ernest Hemingway" you would get no results?  That's right, you would only get a list of the books he wrote if you entered "Hemingway, Ernest."  Just one of the many things that contributed to the general poorness of the system.  While this seems to be fixed now, it is representative of the silly things one must put up with.

Another frustration of mine is searching for the books in a series.  I used to read a lot of Star Trek and Star Wars books, most of which are part of a series.  Sometimes these series number well over 100 titles.  One would think a library would have an easy way to find out which book is next in the series (maybe to encourage more reading--just a thought).  Nope.  Go ahead, try it: http://www.odinlibrary.org/ Basic search has no drop down for searching for a series, but advanced search does.  Does it possibly return a list of the "Star Trek" series which the Fargo Public Library (for example) has?  Would I then be able to click on the name of one of the series (maybe "Star Trek: Voyager") and view all the titles of that series in numerical order?  Nope.  It returns a list of all the Star Trek books the library has, inconveniently ordered by title, alphabetically.

So, as I did almost weekly between the ages of 12 and 17, one has to go to the library, find a book towards the end of the series, look inside the front cover, note which book they haven't read yet, and go search by title.  Which may or may not work, because the search doesn't automatically look for "Conquerors" when a search for "Conqueror" is entered.  At least NDSU search (which is a whole other case of poor functionality) does this.  It can be quite comical actually, especially if you enter 4-letter words that start with "f".

As it is, searching for things on the Internet is WAY easier than in the library.  Probably that's because webpages are structured in a fundamentally different way.  Or that web designers customize their sites to be more searchable.  But there is definitely room for improvement.  If I were some sort of search engineer working at Google right now, I would be dedicating my 20% time to figuring out a better system for this.  Then Google could sell this to libraries across the world, much like their Search Appliance.  Or even give it to them for free, and display ads next to the results.  I'd be willing to look at ads if I was able to find what I wanted.

So, later today I'll be heading down to the library, in search of a book that has all the others listed inside the front cover.  Hopefully I can check out a book on the same day that I get a new library card...

Apparently Microsoft has chosen to not include the three default IPSec policies in Vista.  You may recall that XP and Server 2003 included ones for the client to request security, the server to request security, and the server to require security.  Those built-in ones sure made things easier for the beginning user (me).  I guess now I will just have to actually know what I'm doing in order to configure IPSec.

There is now a HDD protection driver for Toshiba computers (mine's an R15 tablet PC) running Windows Vista (and it's in Windows Update--nice touch).  Now, I just wish they would come out with one that enables the auto-rotation of the screen when I convert to tablet mode.  I'll take this as a good sign that it might be coming.

Well, I probably should have posted this earlier, but I did make it home safely on schedule on the 28th.  Grandparents and my family were there to meet me, but my luggage wasn't.  I suspect they didn't make it on the plane out of Houston after I took them through customs, as it was a short lay-over there.  Fortunately they were delivered to my house the next morning.

It's good to be back, and while I had a great time in Mexico, of course there were things that I missed.  It's going to be nice to have more possessions than those that I could fit in two suitcases, for one.

As for the future of this blog: I don't think I'll be posting here anymore, but I'd like to keep the content around for others and especially myself to look at in a few years.  Likely http://www.axvius.com/aaron will turn into my own landing page when I move this blog, but I will be sure to have a link to all of this from that page.

And here are the visitor stats from the middle of August up until now: 836 total visits, 2,571 pages