Facebook Places

This week,  Facebook opted everyone into a new feature they call Places.  It allows you to easily post to your wall where you are. It also allows others to post that they saw you at a particular location.  I’m recommending you Opt-Out of this feature and I have created this webpage to show you how.  If you’re wondering why this is a bad idea, check out this PleaseRobMe website.

Speeding up your computer

The best and most reliable way to speed up your computer is to reinstall the operating system.  Yes, I know it is a hassle and an extreme option but it’s the best option.  You can try to manually cleanup your computer and you can make improvements but this is time consuming and no gaurantee you will fix the biggest problems.  Reinstalling the OS requires that you back everything up which is a good thing to get in the habit of.  Your computer could crash one day and you should be prepared for this anyway.

Reinstalling the OS takes a few hours but it runs pretty much unattended.  The most work will be preparing for the reinstallation.

But if reinstalling the OS  isn’t an option, here are the things you can do to improve performance:

1. Remove spyware using Windows Defender or AdAware
2. Remove viruses using Microsoft’s free scanning service or installing Microsoft’s free Security essentials  software.
3. If you are low on disk space, free up disk space using Disk Cleanup or WinDirStat
4. Defrag your disk
5. Detect and repair disk errors
6. Make sure you have enough RAM
7. Uninstall unused program
8. Remove unneeded services
9. Remove programs that auto-start
10. If your browser is causing problems use a different one.  You may inadvertently have installed many plugins for Internet Explorer which is slowing it down or causing problems.  Firefox and Google Chrome are excellent alternatives.

Router logins

Logins for some common routers:

Why you might not want to be owned by Google

I had my first bad  experience with Google software which has been remedied but it was enough for me to  reevaluate my level of commitment using their websites and software.  Everyone knows it’s not good to rely on just one company for ANYTHING.  Over time I have become  more reliant on Google for  mail and  documents.  I use their Calendering and Picassa/Web Albums, Blogger, and Google Voice service.  I also use GMAIL  for my company’s tech support and we share documents at work.

This week when I attempted to create a new document, I got a message that I may be in violation of their terms of service. I was  locked  out from ALL  accounts which was tied to my Google  GMAIL account.  I couldn’t check GMAIL or use Google Docs. Soon after that, I received a message that a blog I had setup (http://pcbestpractices.blogspot.com) had been flagged as a possible SPAM site.  Ironically, that blog I started which has 2 lengthy posts attempting to inform about the proper use of BCC,  and how to manage photos is probably the two most USEFUL posts I’ve ever created!  Here is the text of the email  I received:

Hello,

Your blog at: http://pcbestpractices.blogspot.com/ has been identified as a potential spam blog.  To correct this, please request a review by filling out the form at [linked removed]

Your blog will be deleted in 20 days if it isn’t reviewed, and your readers will see a warning page during this time. After we receive your request, we’ll review your blog and unlock it within two business days. Once we have reviewed and determined your blog is not spam, the blog will be unlocked and the message in your Blogger dashboard will no longer be displayed. If this blog doesn’t belong to you, you don’t have to do anything, and any other blogs you may have won’t be affected.

We find spam by using an automated classifier. Automatic spam detection is inherently fuzzy, and occasionally a blog like yours is flagged incorrectly. We sincerely apologize for this error. By using this kind of system, however, we can dedicate more storage, bandwidth, and engineering resources to bloggers like you instead of to spammers. For more information, please see Blogger Help: http://help.blogger.com/bin/answer.py?answer=42577

Thank you for your understanding and for your help with our spam-fighting efforts.

Sincerely,

The Blogger Team

P.S. Just one more reminder: Unless you request a review, your blog will be deleted in 20 days. Click this link to request the review: [link removed]

The only thing I can think of is that the fact my blog was flagged as a potential spam site, triggered the lockout of all my other google accounts.

It’s one thing to suspect wrong doing and I accept that there are false positives, but to turn off EVERYTHING associated with an account until  it is proven an error doesn’t strike me as not Doing Evil.  It’s like the policy of shooting first and asking questions later.

I’m not  going to stop using Google properties, but I’ve got my foot on the brake and I will no longer recommend them as enthusastically, or without warnings.  I will post a Google Best Practices ;-) at a later time.

Here are a few other stories related to being “Google Owned”

When Google Owns You

A Google Horror Story

Reading blogs with an aggregator

The blogging experience has two parts. The first part is creating and maintaining a weblog. The second part is reading and keeping track of multiple weblogs using a dedicated program that works similar to a mail program.  Often referred to as RSS readers, feed readers, feed aggregators, news readers, or search aggregators,  these programs allows you to “subscribe” to various weblogs and not have to worry about whe new information has been posted to each blog. The information will be pulled down and ready to read in the Newsreader at regular intervals, just like a mail program.  A special program is not required to read a weblog.  A weblog is always available through a browser.  But a specialized program is highly recommended.

I  recommend:

FeedDemon for Windows
NetNewsWire for Mac
GoogleReader for a  web-based reader.

There are even Microsoft Outlook plugins that can download and place new posts in Outlook.   Newsgator,  owner of FeedDemon and NetNewsWire offers one, though it is not free.

The iPad is here

Yeah, I’m pretty sure I want one.   I did not run out and buy an iPhone.  I never thought it was worth the price of the monthly cell + data plan.  For sometime now, I have been watching TV shows and movies on my MacBook Pro; Cassidy has too.  She is always borrowing it on weekends to catch up on the network shows she doesn’t have time during the week to watch.  We settle in, in our favorite place on the coach, or in our bedroom, put on some headphones and have a close-up immersible experience on the laptop.  So the iPad is in effect, our second “laptop” but in a form factor that is better tailored to that personal intimate experience on the coach.  It’s not a small laptop, it’s a big iPod Touch (oh, we have 3 of those in the house).  It does not run Mac desktop software, but instead runs iPod apps plus the software that comes on it.

A pleasant surprise was the price!  I feared it would start at $1000 but the WiFi-only model starts at $500 for the 8gig model, $600 for 16gig and $700 for 32gig.  It will be available in March. In April the Wi-Fi + 3G version comes out and will be priced $629, $729, and $829.  Again there’s that data plan for 3G which I feel I can live without.

Gmail Tips

I have a Gmail account that I use to login to Google properties such as Google Docs.  Gmail  is not  my primary email  account.  I’ve started using it more;  for LBJ class reunion stuff for example.   I’ve used it quite a bit as a “throwaway” email when sites ask for an email address but I don’t want to give them my personal email.  I highly recommend it to anyone as either a primary or secondary address.  There are  two main things I like about  Gmail that I think everyone should take advantage of.

1.  Have Google forward all mail to your primary address.  That way you don’t ever have to login to Gmail and for all  practical purposes, you can use your primary mail to receive and reply to people using your Gmail account.  Of course if you  don’t want people knowing your primary account, they you would login to Gmail  and respond from there.  Setup forwarding by clicking Settings in the upper right corner…select the Forwarding and POP/IMAP  tab…Select forward a copy of incoming mail  to…enter your primary email address…choose what to do with the mail that arrives in your Gmail  account.

2. Take advantage of a little known feature that allows you to create NEW email addresses on the fly!  My email address is alankley@gmail.com.  I can give out alankley+facebook@gmail.com, alankley+anything@gmail.com and those email addresses will be delivered to my Gmail mailbox.  I’ve created quite a few like that when I’m asked for an email address. That way I can turn them off if I start receiving spam or I can setup filters to file them away or forward them.  Not all websites accept an email  with a ‘+’ in it but many do.  Here is the Google Help page on the subject:  Using an Address Alias

If you are concerned about the safety of your information using Google Gmail and Docs, I wrote this post on what I think of that.

How to backup your Google Docs

I’ve been using Google  Docs for sometime now.  Both at work and at home. Google didn’t initially make it easy to download or backup your docs but now they have.  Here’s what you do:

From the main screen,  select all…More Actions…Export.   See some screenshots here.

How to stop programs from auto-starting on Mac

Skype has no option to turn off auto starting on startup on the Mac.

There are two ways to remove auto-start options on the Mac:

System Preferences:
System Preferences -> System -> Accounts -> select your account -> select Login Items -> select Skype -> click the “-” box below to remove it from the list.

A quicker method:
Hold down the mouse button on the Skype icon in the dock. (Or right click on it).
Uncheck “Open at Login” from the menu that pops up.

“Cannot connect to itunes store” “Invalid argument”

Kristen’s iPod Touch started acting up when attempting to go to the iPod store.  The following message would appear:

“Cannot connect to itunes store” “Invalid argument”

Suggested actions from the Internet included rebooting the router or simply Renewing Lease in the iPod Wi-Fi settings (Settings…Wi-Fi…NetworkName…[Right Arrow button]…scroll down and select Renew Lease)

The IP address should begin with 192.168 but if it begins with 169.254 this indicates it doesn’t have a good IP address.

Finally, I did a cold boot (held down the power button for several seconds) . This seemed to help in reassigning a good IP address.  I’m guessing Renew Lease would normally work.