There have been a couple of times I needed to find stuff on my computer fast! The windows searching capabilities are terrible. Bad Microsoft! I tried Google Desktop a little while ago and I liked it but rarely ever used it. I keep forgetting I have it installed. So When I heard about the new Google Desktop I needed to try it. It now has a docking capability that has plugins that can add other benefits. I have a 19in monitor so I can give up desktop space. I actually have two monitors with two computers on my desk so I can easily give up space on one of my monitors.
I‘ve been happy with Yahoo’s [tag]Konfabulator[/tag] with it’s widgets. Some widgets from there are very useful like website monitor and a timer. One thing it doesn’t have is a way to dock them to the side of the desktop. I don’t like having to resize my windows so I can see the widgets. I don’t want to see a widget over something I am trying to read. Now if [tag]google desktop[/tag] had more plugins like the widgets from yahoo it would be perfect for me. So at this time I can see some benefits to [tag]Google[/tag] desktop but it’s not exactly what I need at this time. I will keep using Konfabulator and google desktop as just a searching capability for now.

[tags]yahoo,johnramirez[/tags]

I love [tag]Role Playing Games[/tag] and free games are the best. I remember being on a boy scout camping trip and some of us played [tag]dungeons and dragons[/tag]. That was the first time I ever learned about role playing games. Then I found the Internet where [tag]MUDS[/tag] were the big things. These were text based only. No graphics at all. When I found a local BBS with a very good [tag]RPG[/tag] I knew I was hooked. This one was called [tag]Tele-Arena[/tag] and spent days leveling up my character. The best part of most of these games is the fact you can join others to play. But sometimes I like playing by myself like [tag]Diablo[/tag].

I recently found a game called [tag]runescape[/tag]. Played it for days also and have a good character now. It’s a fun game with plenty of adventures. Some of these online games have added features by paying. I like that very much. I haven’t bought a Online RPG game or payed monthly for one yet. [tag]Everquest[/tag] would probably be fun but paying monthly to play it will just make me addicted and less willing to stop. I rather play the free games and when I find one that I love then I can pay for added benefits when I can.

Here is a link to some free RPG games. I still haven’t tried all these games but I will try them soon. Maybe I’ll write some reviews of them later.

Check this link out for a funny clip of dungeons and dragons

[tags]johnramirez[/tags]

Many years ago I found a TV Program called “Call for Help” on Techtv. This program taught me a lot and was a great show to tell others about. It’s a show that really made the complicated world of technology and computers as easy as possible. Viewers would call in to get help with their computer problems. It was a fun show even if they talked about stuff that I already knew about.
One day G4 and Techtv merged but dropped “Call for help” on their cable network. They also dropped lot of other good shows as well. I stopped watching G4techtv and never came back. Leo Laporte was the host of the show when it was on Techtv. Little after the merge “Call for help” was showing on G4techtv up in Canada but not here in America. I was glad Leo was still doing the show but really wanted to watch the show. Recently I found out the show is coming back to America and going to be shown on G4tv . This is fantastic and I might start watching G4 again but I still have a bad taste in my mouth. This show should have been in the lineup at the beginning of the merge not after all this time. Well maybe some of the better Techtv hosts and shows will be returned also. My guess would be No.

Quote From Leo Laporte himself:

Starting August 29 CFH will be on G4 weekdays at 11a Eastern/8a Pacific and weekends at 6 and 7a Eastern. If enough of you watch I’m sure we’ll be able to move to a better spot in the schedule.

[tags]techtv,leo laporte,techtv,g4techtv,call for help,television,geek[/tags]

   Couple of times I’ll go into the yahoo chats and see what is up. Recently the user created [tag]chat rooms[/tag] have been down. This action was probably because of a report on a TV station about chat rooms geared to pedophilia. I feel it is good for them to pay more attention in this area. They let things go for way too long. I remember noticing those chat rooms many years ago when my nieces were looking to chat on the internet. I’m glad the sponsors finally pulled the plug but they should have checked where their ads were in the first place.

   The only sad thing about this is other non sexual chat rooms were shut down also. It’s been over a week now and haven’t seen any changed yet. Hope they will bring the chat rooms back. Was a good place to chat with others instead of going through [tag]IRC[/tag]. IRC has been around for years, ever since the internet was born. It’s a good chat interface but not a lot of every day folks find it. When the MSN chat rooms closed a couple of years ago, everyone went to the yahoo rooms. They are perfect because it’s on the Yahoo messenger. Easy to access. That was the problem because it allowed children easy access and the predators came as well. Yahoo should just have a couple people checking rooms all the time. People who create bad rooms can get banned. It’s easy. I use to help out on a family oriented board and had to be always aware of who is who. I’m sure Yahoo can hire some people to check the room names at least.

[tags]yahoo,chat,chatroom,johnramirez[/tags]

   Lot of places on the internet want you to sign up with an email address. There are far too many places that use the email address as a way to spam! You’ll find all the details in their TOS so that’s how they get away with it. I do understand why an email adress is important because it gives the perception that there is an actual human being signing up. But I actually got fed up getting so much [tag]spam[/tag] so I started to look for other ways of dealing with this problem. There are places on the internet called disposable emails.
   One such place is called Spambob.com. I used them a while ago signing up to a newspaper from another state. I just recently found Spamgourmet.com and find them very useful. You can have email addresses that you can just forget about it after using it once or you can keep it as your email for spam. It’s a great idea and wanted to share it with everyone. Another site is KasMail.com and Spamex.com which actually has a browser install also.
   Of course you can always use the regular free email services on the internet like yahoo.com, gmail.google.com, and hotmail.com. But the [tag]disposable email[/tag] are a lot easier to use for signing up to something you just want to use for a day or so.

[tags]johnramirez[/tags]

   [tag]Synergy[/tag] is a [tag]software[/tag] that I recently found which allows me to use two computers with one keyboard and mouse. A sort of [tag]KM switch[/tag] without the wires. It works over your home network passing the mouse and keyboard info to the other computer via network. When I move the mouse off one screen it switches to the other computer. Exactly the way it works with two monitors on one computer if using windows XP. In theory one can have more than 2 computers. In the management area it has 4 possible positions for the monitors. I was all ready to buy myself a KM switch but this works even better than the ones I was looking at. I can easily copy and paste text between two computers. NOW that’s impressive!

Get Synergy Here

[tags]johnramirez[/tags]

   This is a great example of a news story that looks real but it’s not. I fell for it until I did some research. Here is the link that started it all:

Link

   The page looks authentic. The story seems so extreme that my first reaction this has to be a joke. Then it looked so real that I figured it must be true. With all the happenings going on around the world I thought this could be true. Some will believe completely a story from a person and not even question it. For me I’ve always been skeptical about things. Especially now I can look up almost anything on the Internet to find out if it’s a myth or real. I was checking out the urban legends page and found the story about the lion story I saw before.

Lion in Wait [tag]False Story[/tag]

   With the disclaimer recently put on the page it’s obvious a fake. By looking at the URL you can come to the conclusion that this might not be true. Doing a search on the [tag]BBC news[/tag] site might have been a way to find out if this story was true also. So remember this next time you see a story that seems hard to believe on the Internet. Phis-hing web sites should be a reason to ALWAYS check that the site you’re at is the REAL one! Now I saw the story link on a forum so I didn’t visit it by accident or from a reliable source. Still I wonder how did it get spread in the first place…

[tags]johnramirez[/tags]

   I like trying new things out so when I heard about a new [tag]yahoo messenger[/tag] I had to try it. Now there are many things I hate about it and some interesting things. They are trying to get into the phone calling area. Now I haven’t tried there net2phone or the Call Computer stuff just yet. I’ll try the call computer when I can find someone who installed the beta version also. That is the biggest problem I found. All the added features are not compatible to the older versions. I can’t use the voice capability anymore. Their is a cool feature that one can drag and drop pictures in the message window and it will transfer it to the other person. Now that is cool but I of course can’t try it unless the other person has that capability. Now I am all for more features but please give the capability to work with the older versions. I have to go back to the older version so I can use voice chat. ugh. I’ll try it later when more people update or when they have every feature in the current version working in their beta version.

[tags]johnramirez[/tags]