Category: internet

Power Searching with Advanced Google Search Operators

Ashley BischoffLeave a comment

Some friends and I were talking about Google’s advanced search operators over dinner at Mia’s last night (for example, with the operator “site:”, you can limit your search results to a single domain, such as “site:metafilter.com pancakes”). In any case, that’s just the tip of the iceberg and I’ve found them to be fantastically helpful toward my Google-fu.

I wouldn’t say that I’m a Google samurai, but I know my way around a handful of these search operators and I’ve found them to be remarkably helpful toward finding what I’m looking for.

KMFDM is on MySpace?!

Ashley Bischoff6 Comments

To me, MySpace is the online equivalent of a mall’s Hot Topic store. In case you're not familiar with them, Hot Topic is a self-described “punk” styled clothing store. However, when that includes Aerosmith and Lynyrd Skynyrd merchandise (no joke), I dare say that their punk-cred would appear somewhat compromised, to say the least. (I’m not casting judgement on Aerosmith or Lynyrd Skynyrd’s musical abilities — they’re just pretty much the opposite of punk.)

All the same, plenty of Generation Y poseurs like to shop at Hot Topic, thinking they’re edgy and counterculture when in reality they’re lining the pockets of The Man. And that’s where MySpace fits in. Sure, many users think of it as their private treehouse for them and their closest friends, but when your treehouse is home to 72 million other people, your exclusive club isn’t so exclusive, now is it?

To be sure, I have nothing against capitalism. Yes, I’m the kind of guy that buys beverages at Starbucks, and happily — hey, if a given company happens to be profitable due to an effective business model, I’m ok with that. (Well, as long as said company isn’t evil; see also Clear Channel.) Having said that, if you like MySpace because it’s a a website offering “photos, blogs, user profiles, groups, and an internal e-mail system”, that’s fine. It just doesn’t mean you’re more 3l337 for the sake of doing so.

Getting back to KMFDM, I enjoy their music and I’m on their online mailing list (so far, so good). However, in the mailing sent out today, they proudly announce the 1-year anniversary of their MySpace page. Well, what’s the use in having a MySpace page if you have a perfectly good actual domain name? All right, the maneuver be excused if they’re merely trying to make their music available to more listeners. All the same, a part of me is worried a bit that KMFDM could be somewhat HotTopicifying itself — making ventures based on marketing perception rather than substance.

Preventing AIM Disconnects with DD-WRT

Ashley Bischoff7 Comments

If you have a Linksys WRT54G router, then you may be familiar with the DD-WRT firmware. Or, in case not, here's a quick recap — the Linksys WRT54G runs Linux and, by its GPL nature, they’ve released the source code for their firmware; building upon that, many others have created firmwares with extra features.

The real deal is what the WRT54G can do, with the right replacement firmware, that you’d only expect to find on a commercial-grade router costing several times as much.

You could use the WRT54G as a repeater or a bridge. Create a wireless distribution system (WDS) or a mesh network. Run a VPN server. Or a VoIP server. Or a managed hotspot with a RADIUS server. Manage bandwidth use per protocol. Control traffic shaping. Support IPv6. Boost antenna power. Remotely access router logs. Operate the router as a miniature low-power PC, running a variety of Linux applications.

[…]

In any case, I’ve been running DD-WRT for several months now and it’s been working great. My favorite feature may be the static DHCP set up — you can define a MAC address for which it will alway receive the same ip address. (That can be pretty handy to ensure that port forwarding always works as intended.)

While the firmware is well coded, there are some circumstances where the stock configuration runs into trouble. The first major one is Bittorrent; apparently, the high number of connections can overwhelm its poor little mind. However, if you set “Maximum Ports” to 4096 and both “TCP Timeout” and “UDP Timeout” to “120 seconds”, Bittorrent should be back on track. (All of these options are under Administration → Management.)

However, I found that AIM still became disconnected from time to time. Well, to say that it was “disconnected” probably isn’t fair; rather, it would occasionally have a connection blip where it’d disconnect and then immediately reconnect. It was mostly only an annoyance, but I had wanted to get to the bottom of it.

As a first step, I installed the beta of v23 SP1 as I had recalled reading on the forums that a few connection-related bugs had been squashed since the v23 release. I followed the upgrade steps on the wiki, but I’d still occasionally see AIM disconnects.

After some further reading on the forums, though I read a recommendation for setting both “TCP Timeout” and “UDP Timeout” to “600 seconds” to remedy AIM disconnects. I gave it a shot and, sure enough, it worked. I’ve not had any AIM disconnects since then — and Bittorrent has continued working fine as well :).

FeedLounge is Teh R0x0rs

Ashley Bischoff7 Comments

My chum Chris Griego recently turned me onto FeedLounge as an alternative to Bloglines. As a user of Bloglines for several years, I was a little skeptical at first, especially since FeedLounge isn’t free (it’s $5/month or $50/year). However, after trying it, I was convinced — I’ve ditched Bloglines in favor of FeedLounge.

FeedLounge, in case you haven’t heard of it, is a web-based RSS reader created Alex King and Scott Sanders. If I were trite, I could say that it’s “Bloglines + Web 2.0” but even typing that sentence makes me wince. In plain English, here're a few of FeedLounge’s advantages:

  • Tags — This one made the most difference to me. Down the left side of the screen are various categories, or, in this case, tags. And, like other tagging applications, items can be assigned any number of tags. So, for instance, I could put A List Apart in both “css” and “xhtml” if I wanted to.

  • Background Updates — Because it's all Ajaxy, most of the interaction requires no explicit server hits. So, as feeds gain entries, those entries just appear and the count next to the feed name is updated. Of course, this is all done without interrupting the rest of the screen; any entries which you may be in the middle of reading remain just where they are.

  • Granular Feed Reading — One of my big gripes with Bloglines was that if you clicked on the feed from the left side of the page, all of the entries from that feed would appear on the right side of the page (and they would all be marked as read). Naturally, that type of interface is available in FeedLounge as well, but there’re others from which to choose as well. The one I use is a 3-pane layout, similar to what you see in many e-mail clients. And, just like an e-mail client, the individual entries are only marked as read as you move from one to the next.

  • Full Keyboard Control — FeedLounge’s documentation summarizes their keyboard support saying that “what you think should work, does” (or words to that effect). And, indeed, that’s pretty much been the case. For example, when viewing entries in the 3-pane view, the up and down arrow keys move from one entry to the next (just as you’d expect).

In all, I’m really pleased with FeedLounge. Were I less convinced, I might have signed up for a month at a time, but I’ve paid through for the year.

Four Things: The Meme

Ashley BischoffLeave a comment

Another Internet meme has walked along and Andy tagged me — let’s see how this goes:

Four Jobs I’ve Had in My Life:
Newspaper Delivery
Library Page
PC Support Technician
Front-end Developer
Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over, and Have:
The Matrix
Return of The Jedi
Equilibrium
Lost in Translation
Four Places I Have Lived:
West Chester, PA
Blacksburg, VA
Alexandria, VA
Dallas, TX
Four TV Shows I Love To Watch:
Mythbusters
Six Feet Under
Space Ghost
The Daily Show
Four Places I Have Been On Vacation:
San Francisco
Cape Town
Düsseldorf
Boston
Four Websites I Visit Daily:
Google News
Slashdot
PalmInfocenter
Ask MetaFilter
Four Favorite Foods:
Chocolate Cake
Avocados
Pancakes
Blue Cheese

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, yes, I coded that as a definition list :). And, sure, I could tag four people with the meme, but do we really need more propagation of this one across Teh Intarweb?