shahine.com/omar/

Graffiti CMS is a pretty awesome blogging tool published by the folks at Telligent. I started playing with it a few weeks ago and immediately fell in love. I knew that others would as well.

Of course I knew that there would be a lot of folks running dasBlog who might want to move to Graffiti, after all, Graffiti 1.1 has built in import for dasBlog posts.

When I learned of this I contacted the folks at Telligent and got a pre-release beta version to play with. After exchanging a few dozen emails with Jayme at Telligent I sent them some fixed up import code that would allow a dasBlog user to import all their posts and maintain their dasBlog permalinks as well as categories. Moving from one blog engine to another is generally a PITA so my goal was to make it pretty painless and since I've spent a few years working on dasBlog I figured it would be pretty easy for me .

Moving from dasBlog to Graffiti is a two step process:

1. Import your posts using Graffiti 1.1 (sorry, if you imported earlier the plugin won't work).
2. Install and configure the plugin I wrote.

You can get the dasBlog301 plugin from CodePlex.

Enjoy!

Wohoo! At long last there is now a DNG Codec for Vista! Thanks Trevin for the pointer.

What does this even mean Omar?

Glad you asked.

Vista supports a "pluggable" system for Camera Vendors to produce codecs (code that understands a proprietary file) and represents it inside Windows Vista like a file that Vista understands (Jpeg, PNG, Tiff, BMP).

Why is this important?

Digital SLR cameras have a superior method of capturing photos called RAW format. Think of this as a sort of digital negative. It is usually a Lossless (no compression) and unprocessed version of the Photo which allows you to make significant changes to the image (think developing) without any loss in the original image after the changes are made. With JPEG (the typical format most digital cameras take) you are in a compressed format already and any changes typically result in information being thrown away.

Shooting RAW has some big advantages over JPEG (and some drawbacks). Mainly:

• Uncompressed Images
• Unprocessed
• White Balance can be altered (if you screw it up or want to change it)
• more data, typically 12 or 14 bit color (vs 8 bit for JPG)
• Can correct exposure

DNG is a format Adobe invented to create a sort of universal RAW format. You can convert images from many camera vendors into DNG. The benefits are that DNGs can often be compressed more than the native RAW files (my Panasonic Point and Shoot created 16MB RAW file and in DNG format they were under 7 MB) and you can alter the images in programs like Lightroom, Photoshop without the need for "sidecar" files (I'm not even going to go into that).

The benefits of having a Vista Codec are that any applications written to support the Windows Imaging Component (WIC) can no read/edit those files. Examples of this are:

• Windows Vista Shell
• Windows Photo Gallery (Vista only)
• Windows Live Photo Gallery (Vista and XP)
• Expression Media (Vista and XP)
• any .NET 3.0 application (Vista and XP)

This is great news. Thanks Adobe for finally doing something useful . Now if you would just fix Adobe Reader so that thumbnails consistently render in the Vista Shell.

I’m pretty excited that a feature my team worked on recently just launched. Hotmail now supports the i’m Initiative that was previously limited to Windows Live Messenger.

You can read all the details on the Hotmail blog.

What is the i’m Initiative?

The i’m Initiative is a Microsoft program where Microsoft shares a portion of their advertising revenue for everyday activities – sending IMs and emails. Hotmail and Messenger have ads, like all free web services, and Microsoft makes money when a customer sees an ad. The i’m Initiative has successfully raised over 1.4 million dollars since it got started in 2007. It used to be available only in Windows Live Messenger, and now the Hotmail team is glad to say that you’ll be able to raise money for the cause of your choice each time you send an email.

How do I get started?

Go to http://im.live.com to join. You can choose to participate in Messenger, Hotmail, or both and you can pick a different organization for each service or dedicate all your efforts to one cause – it’s entirely up to you! This program is currently available only to customers in the United States. Once you’re set up, you’ll raise money for your favorite cause every time you send an email or IM. It’s really easy. Once you join, there’s no extra time out of your day, you don’t have to pay any money, and you get to know that you’re taking a step towards making the world better. The power of the collective can be huge – think of the difference that could happen if everyone swapped out a few plastic grocery bags each week for a reusable bag or took one less car trip a week.

If you are a Hotmail user I hope that you sign up.

PS – once nice side affect of joining the i’m initiative is that if you are a free user, we no longer append the little tag-line at the bottom of your email. Instead we place a small graphic and text letting folks know you are participating in the i’m initiative.

Here is how the graphic appears:

It's been almost 18 months since I first learned (and blogged) about Bisphenol-A (BPA). There has been a lot of press about this chemical recently as Canada has come close to banning the chemical from a number of products, most notably baby bottles.

Shortly thereafter a number of interesting things happened.

1) Nalgene, famous for their clear lexan polycarbonate water bottles, phased out all their polycarbonate products. Nalgene is probably responsible for exposing millions of adults to BPA due to their trendy and popular water bottles. I had half a dozen of these in 2006 (all replaced by SIGG bottles).

2) Wall-Mart announced it would pull all BPA bottles from its stores

The Today Show aired a report that basically said that all plastics with the #7 on them contained BPA. This is just wrong. #7 is a catch all for all plastics not covered by codes #1 - #6. While, BPA does generally carry the label #7, so do BPA-free alternatives made from bio-plastics like Polyamide. In fact, the #7 is so confusing that Camelback has removed it from their BPA-free products.

NPR wrote about this a few weeks ago.

"I think the writing's on the wall for this chemical," said Aaron Freeman, policy director of Toronto-based Environmental Defence Canada. "You've got major retailers with huge market clout pulling BPA products ... and you've got consumers in droves who are opting for alternatives. They're a bit late to the game, but they are responding to that consumer demand."

The key word here is "consumer demand".

Nalgene cites consumer demand as the reason for pulling PBA products.

Question: Why is Nalgene transitioning from polycarbonate to other materials?
Answer: Nalgene’s principle goal is to create reusable containers for a wide range of consumers; from hikers and outdoor enthusiasts to commuters and kids on-the-go. We are always looking for new materials and products that help us meet that goal. Our decision to phase out production of the Outdoor line of polycarbonate containers is in response to consumer demand for products that do not include Bisphenol-A (BPA).

Today I was in REI with my wife and noticed that all the Polycarbonate bottles are gone. Instead they have been replaced with Bottles from Nalgene and Camelback that proudly say "BPA Free". I purchased a Camelback Better Bottle. These bottles are made from Eastman Tritan, a copolyester. Eastman developed Tritan due to consumer demand for a BPA-free plastic and announced availability on October 2007.

“CamelBak’s success comes from delivering consumers innovative products,” explains CamelBak CEO Sally McCoy, “Eastman partnered with us to create a BPA free CamelBak®  Better Bottle using its new Tritan copolyester. This ground-breaking polymer allows us to better meet the needs of our customers by giving them a BPA free choice in re-usable bottles.”

Eastman Tritan™ copolyester is also easy to process and can be used in molds designed for polycarbonate. This feature allowed CamelBak to switch materials with minimal production changes. “Eastman Tritan™ copolyester is easy to work with. Only minor tooling and temperature adjustments were required to manufacture the CamelBak® Better Bottle with this new material, which facilitated the transition for our staff,” says Mike Crook, CamelBak’s Vice President of Operations.

“With its optimal combination of durability, clarity and BPA free construction, Eastman Tritan copolyester will enable us to accelerate the growth of our CamelBak® Better Bottle business using consumer desired innovation,” comments McCoy.

What I find amazing is that capitalism is at work and the market is responding to customer demand even if BPA has not been identified as harmful to children or adults by any government agency. Got to love it.

CamelBack proudly states on their homepage that they have an arsenal of new products that are BPA-free.

Do a search for BPA on Google and you'll see advertisements from:

• REI
• BornFree Bottles
• Nalgene
• Camelback

Amazon.com even has a BPA-free product store.

So where should you be on the lookout for BPA? Here are some obvious places and products I like.

Water Bottles

Recycle any of your clear Lexan water bottles and replace with BPA alternatives like:

• Camelback BPA-free (.75L, 1L)
• Nalgene Everyday
• SIGG bottles

Baby Bottles

• Born Free (this is what my wife and I have been using for 18 months and we could not be happier)
• Green to Grow
• All Glass Bottles
• most Glass bottles are narrow body and we preferred the wide neck or wide body, Born Free does make a Glass wide neck bottle.

Sippy Cups

• Born Free
• Avent (these truly rock and are spill proof)
• SIGG

French Press

• Glass - most French Presses these days are Polycarbonate.

Food Storage

• Bodum Yohki
• Pyrex Glass

Check out Z-Recommends for lots more product related BPA info.

This time next year I would not be surprised if BPA was a thing of the past. Unfortunately there are many places where we as consumers don't have a choice yet with respect to BPA (formula can liners, canned food liners, polystyrene coffee lids).

According to Google, they fixed a complaint I had with their Calendar Sync Add-in for Outlook.

Previously, your Google Calendar email address needed to be the organizer or an attendee of your Microsoft Outlook events for the Outlook events to sync to your Google Calendar. Now, when you choose to do a 2-way sync or a 1-way sync from Outlook calendar to Google Calendar, all of your Outlook events will be synced to your Google Calendar.

Well, I just tried it, it sync’s more events, but still not all of them. And it’s completely random which events it syncs.

I don’t get it. How hard is it to ask Outlook for every event on the calendar? I’m baffled that this didn’t even work the first time they released it. Programming for Outlook is pretty hard and stuff, but sheesh.

I think, at the very least, they don’t handle exceptions to recurring meetings correctly.

I’ve written in the past about how badly behaved applications pollute user space with clutter.

Well it seems that a number of apps are never going to “do the right thing” so I’ve devised an effective solution.

I make the folder/files hidden.

This has the effect of reducing the annoyance, and making me feel better .

I’ve done this for a number of folders, some annoying and some useful that I just don’t need access to (but still like in my Documents folder since FolderShare syncs it to all my computers)

I have been a happy customer of American Airlines for over a decade. It’s been my preferred carrier of choice. I’ve flown them so much, that I’ve achieved Lifetime Gold Status by earning 1,000,000 miles in about 7 years of flying and buying stuff on my Citibank Credit Card.

And my loyalty is nothing compared to the folks who achieve Lifetime Platinum (2,000,000 miles) or qualify for Executive Platinum each year (100,000 miles but in seat).

But this morning I too awoke to a story of a disabled woman who had to physically go to the airport with her 7 grandchildren because American would not re-route her over the phone.

The NPR story is just a testament to the pain some folks are experiencing.

"They said that we had to come here to the airport to get everything straightened out, that they wouldn't do it over the phone," she says. Carter's flight to Austin, Texas, was canceled Wednesday. She's sitting in a wheelchair, with her infant, 2-year-old and 4-year-old grandchildren all hitching a ride.

"Even when I told them I was handicapped, and I said my daughter's going to have to come and she has seven kids, a newborn baby, she said she was really sorry but that was all they could do," says Carter, one of tens of thousands of passengers that American Airlines has been apologizing to this week.

This brought chills to my spine and vivid memories of how Alaska Airlines abandoned us in Mexico back in January.

Jeff Jarvis believes we’ve reached a tipping point. I think I’d agree.

You simply can’t treat people this way and survive. We all hate the airlines. We hate the experience on the plane and in the airport. We should fear for our safety, given American’s shoddy (and, one wonders, fraudulent) maintenance work. (As the Times said this morning, at least the FAA is doing its job.) The airlines never see themselves as our advocates, friends, servers; no, they are our prison wardens and enemies as they fight down legislation that mandates they should give us the crudest amenities a prisoner would get: clean water, air, and a toilet. The economics of the industry as it is being run today are unsustainable. And apart from the all-business-class airlines I try to fly every time I can (Eos, Silverjet, and there are more coming), there is not one visible bit of innovation — not one attempt to get out of this mess — visible in the industry.

This is borderline criminal on the part of the airlines.

Right now American is focused on fixing their planes to make them airworthy. It might not matter in the end, cause my guess is the relationship with their customers will be broken for a long time.

BTW, American does MD-80 maintenance for many carriers that have MD-80s, so I suspect after they inspect all their planes, the international carriers will get hit with the same problems (those that have MD-80s).

For the past several years it has not been possible to get your Windows Live Hotmail, and Contacts on your Windows Mobile 5/6 Phone.... unless of course you were a Microsoft Employee in which case you just downloaded the bits and installed them (or you are a TMobile subscriber).

My wife, sister and father all have Windows Mobile phones, so I have been waiting for the day I could get them all set up.

Well, as of today, this problem has been fixed. Kudos to the folks on the Mobile team that made this happen.

The download has support for:

• Hotmail "push" access (your mail is "pushed" to your phone, you don't have to go get it)
• Windows Live Contacts synchronization
• Live Search bar for the home screen
• One-click photo upload to Windows Live Spaces

You also get access to all your folders in your Hotmail account.

If I were to describe Virgin America this is what I would say.

Imagine if the Airlines never stopped innovating in the mid eighties, and the flying experience got better. If you fly Virgin America you are getting an end to end flight experience that represents what flying is supposed to be like in 2008.

or

If Apple started an Airline the experience would be Virgin America.

Do I really need to say any more? Virgin is simply the best domestic flying experience I’ve had, both in First Class and in Coach. Let’s examine the experience.

But first, if you are short on time, here are the bullets:

• Great airport terminals at both SFO/SEA
• AC Power in every seat
• Nice Friendly Employees
• Good Food and Drinks  with on-demand ordering
• Fantastic in-flight entertainment
• Comfortable seats in First Class and Coach

The Airport

When you fly Virgin at SFO you are leaving from International Terminal A. There are very few airports in the world that are nicer than flying the International terminal at SFO. Built in 2000, it’s pretty much a fantastic terminal, from the attached parking garage with reasonable short term parking rates, to the amazingly short security line, to the great food offerings and plenty of seating.

On the SEA side of things you are flying out of Concourse A, which is also brand new, and not crowded. Comparing this to the mayhem of Terminal C and D where Alaska flys is not fair, but it’s an amazing contrast.

The Plane

Virgin has a fleet of brand new Airbus A320 and A319s. the Airbus narrow body fleet(A319, A320) are equivalent to the Boeing 737 series (737-700, 737-800, 737-900) and the Airbus A321 is equivalent to the Boeing 757.

Personally I like Airbus planes. My favorite plane to fly is the A340-300 which is equivalent to the 767 but 20 years newer. The smaller Airbusses are comfortable, quite and have all the latest and greatest technology. The cockpit is impressive.

Since the plane is brand new, it has a leg on everything anyone else flys domestically. Continental, Delta, American, United have increasingly aging fleets, and you can get stuck flying a 20 year old plane that has never had a cabin refresh.

The first thing you will notice is the cabin. The best way to describe it is the lobby of a W Hotel. There is pink and purple mood lighting, white leather seats in first class and black leather seats in coach with white iPod like plastic everywhere.

There is no carpet on the walls, no carpet dividers, no curtains, nothing that can get old and crappy worn out looking.

Instead of a "no smoking light" next to the "seatbelt" light, there is a "no portable electronics" light. Why hasn't every single airline replaced that stupid no smoking light with a no electronics light? I mean Hello, how many years has it been since smoking was allowed domestically?

All the seats have little steps for folks to place their bags in the overhead bins. This is a nice little touch.

BTW, all the airplanes have names. I flew to SEA on Jefferson Airplane. Virgin has always had an awesome sense of humor.

First Class

There are 8 First Class seats. Buying a first class ticket is reasonable compared to say American or United, but you’ll pay a few hundred dollars one way for one. I upgraded to First Class during the checkin process for $50, which was well worth it IMHO.

The seats in first class rival the Business Class seats on International Carriers (albeit no lie-flat). You have a motorized seat with presets like “Take off”, “Comfort” and “Relax” as well as massage functionality.

The seats have 55 inches of seat pitch. Compare that to Alaska's 37 inches and you feel like you are actually in First Class.

There are nice little touches like numerous pockets in the seat in front of you for your iPod, magazines, books, laptops as well as an AC outlet, USB outlet and Ethernet port in each seat (Ethernet is not lit up yet).

When you take off you get an appetizer served in trendy containers, followed by drinks and a hot meal with silverware. My breakfast was a stuffed tomato with potatoes. It was yummy.

Coach

The coach seats have 32 inches of seat pitch, which is not bad, but not great. Many airlines actually have 31 inches of seat pitch, which for a 6 foot 3 inch person is knee crushing. 32 inches is tolerable but short of Jet Blue’s 34 and 36 inches throughout their cabin. Luckily you can pay $15 more for a reserved exit row seat (or in my case the lady who checked me in gave me one). You get about 4 more inches in the Exit Row.

The A320 is noticeably wider than a 737 so the seats are a bit more comfortable (19.7 inches wide vs 17inches on A Boeing 737). Also, the seats have a physically smaller, thinner skeleton which actually increases the amount of room in the row. If you fly an old United plane with those ridiculously thick fat coach seats (which are not more comfortable) then you know what I mean.

The Coach seats also have power, usb and ethernet in each seat. The tray tables have little built in cup holders when they are folded up so you can, you know, go the the bathroom and allow other people in your aisle to do so without spilling crap. Thoughtful touch.

Do you have any idea how useful it is to have AC Power in every seat? It means I can use my laptop on the flight and arrive for work with a full battery, or that I can use my laptop on the plane and not run out of juice.

Food

In Coach you can order Drinks, Food and Snacks

Snacks are priced from $1 to $2. My options were:

• Buffalo Wing Chips
• Snack Mix
• Breakfast Oat Bar
• Chocholate Chip Cookie
• Organig Cranberry Nutbar
• Strawberry Fruit Leather

Meals are priced from $8 to $12. My options were

• Antipasto Salad
• Turkey Bacon Wrap
• Half Caprese Sandwich with Salad
• Fruit and Cheese Plate

Drinks are priced free to $6 and you get:

• Water
• Soft Drinks
• Beer & Wine
• Vodka, Rum etc

I placed an order for a snack and a bottle of water and it arrived in 3 minutes. I swiped my amex card into the remote dongle and it processed it immediately. Virgin is cashless, so you have to pay with a credit card. No waiting for the host to get you change any more.

Entertainment System

Both Coach and First Class have the same entertainment system. You have a physically large wide screen LCD touchscreen display to interact with called “Red”. You can also control the screen via the remote control dongle.

Red allows you to:

• Listen to Local Radio stations (similar to what you can listen to on virginRadio).
• Listen to a local collection of music (good stuff actually)
• Watch TV
• Watch a Movie
• Play Games
• Order food and drinks from your seat
• Chat with your passengers via chat enabled keyboard.

In the future you’ll be able to surf the web. The sound quality of the music is great, a far cry from what you experience on any American carrier (no hissing, low volume, or static).

There is plenty to keep you busy. And this is key. When are delayed 30 minutes during a ground delay at SFO you don’t care cause you barely notice.

While flying I noticed a bunch of friends sitting in different seats on the plane all chatting with each other. I thought that was pretty cool.

The Crew

Everyone that works for Virgin America is HAPPY. That’s right, they are smiling… most of them are young, energetic, polite, helpful and not patronizing or annoying. And who can blame them… they haven’t spent years working for an Airline that has gone bankrupt a few dozen times and has managed to screw them out of their pension, health benefits or whatnot. I do not believe any of Virgin’s employees are unionized.

On our flight we had about 20 folks connecting to LA in SFO. The flight crew busted their ass to get folks off the plane and to their connection by moving folks and their bags in the overhead bins to the front of the plane where possible and helping people with their luggage. I can't remember the last time I saw a airline employee go above and beyond like this.

During the flight the pilot was also awesome about being honest about our delays, how long we should expect to be on the runway, holding and so on.

The Schedule

For the SFO <-> SEA traveler, the schedule could not be better. 9:10 am flight in the morning, and 5:10 pm return flight getting me home for dinner with my wife.

Suggestions for Virgin

Some ideas for the future:

• Remember everything I listen to on the flight and store in with my eleVAte membership
• Preload my playlists and favorite radio stations when I board the flight.
• Follow the JetBlue route and assign a certain number of rows more leg room

Final Thoughts

I don’t know what else to say. Virgin is the best airline in the country. There is little to complain about, and a lot to love. My college roommate is a pilot for Virgin having spent years working at United Express and America West (now US Air). He loves his airline.

I salute Virgin for bringing some dignity back to domestic air travel. Now if they could just do something for the TSA run security line.

How do I know that a product is getting the proper amount of care and feeding?

When they fix and implement the little touches that make a difference.

I've been using IE 8 for a few weeks now and noticed that something that has always bothered stopped bothering me.

What is this feature?

The search box in the upper right corner now updates based on the searches that you do in Google, Live Search etc.

Let's day I fire up the web browser and hit control-E (the shortcut to take you to the search box).

I then type "Ryovac AAA" and get some results. However, I now want to refine my results by clarifying the search a bit.

So in the search page I type "Ryovac AAA Hybrid" and hit search. Now I open a new tab and want to issue that same search so I can browse a different page. Uh oh, the IE search box says "Ryovac AAA".

Well in IE 8 it says "Ryovac AAA Hybrid".

Thanks IE Team!

This feature is actually more useful when you are searching some error message you are getting on your PC and you are constantly refining the search over time and have like 5 different tabs open as you continue your research.

To me this feature is just like the one where IE finally started matching text in menus the way it's supposed to. This feature has saved me countless frustrating minutes.

For at least the past year I've had "blog about rechargeable batteries" on my list.

When we had Sarah, the number of things we own that use batteries increased an order of magnitude. I also noticed that rechargeable batteries have gotten CHEAP. Also, regular batteries, like CFL bulbs, contain heavy metals and need to be disposed of properly. If you throw them in the trash, well, you are breaking the law in California.

Up until February 8, 2006, California residents were allowed to throw away any 'spent' battery in the trash. However, Since February 9th, all batteries have been prohibited from every solid waste stream in the state due to those toxic materials.

I first purchased my rechargeable batteries in 1999 on my first trip to Japan. I marveled at the compactness and convenience of the Japanese Sony rechargers. More specifically my Sony recharger had a "wall plug" and could work anywhere in the world. Here in the US we were stuck with huge contraptions that barely worked. I picked up 8 AA batteries and a charger and still have them. In fact the only two gadgets I purchased in Japan (in Akihabara) were this charger and batteries and 2 sets of Sony headphones.

One of the items we used heavily for the first 6 months of Sarah's life was the Fisher-Price Nature's Touch Baby Papasan Cradle Swing. This thing ate D batteries at a rate of 4 per 3 days in some cases. I was not about to make Duracell and Energizer a big part of my monthly budget.

That's when I loaded up on lots of rechargeable batteries. I power every single battery operated device in my house now with rechargeable and I have about a dozen spare batteries waiting to replace others. There is no reason not to.

Well there is really no point in writing a post now, because Jeff Atwood has done it in his usual awesome kick ass style that you can only admire as a geek.

It's posts like these that keep his blog at the top of my list. It feeds my inner geek.

I plan on purchasing the La Crosse Technology BC-900 (use the link on his blog to purchase) right now. I have been looking for something like this. Thanks Jeff!

PS - Speaking of batteries, what ever happened to the "A" battery and the "B" Battery?

I wrote about this in the past, but CFL bulbs have a dark secret. It's near impossible to find a "safe" way to get rid of them.

CFLs contain a small amount of mercury, and well, there is already too much mercury in the water, hence the Tunas getting all loaded up with it.

In my area I've identified 2 places I can take my CFL bulbs for disposal.

1. IKEA
2. The local recycling center

CFLs are considered hazardous waste.

IMHO there should be curb side recycling or at least force everyone that sells CFLs to also support disposal.

But really, millions of CFL bulbs are still going to make their way to our landfills cause people are lazy or ignorant of the hazard.

The solution of course would be to have an energy efficient bulb that did not utilize mercury.

While I have lots of CFLs in my house (see my post on which ones I recommend) I also have lots of halogen and incandescent bulbs. I'm a big fan of the new Philips Halogena Energy Saver. Looks like Osram (aka Sylvania) is also getting in the game.

I expect LEDs and low energy incandescent bulbs to get better and more practical over time.

Bottom line is that CFLs have amazing energy savings benefits, but they are a major step down from incandescent and halogen bulbs. Hopefully CFLs will be a thing of the past in a few years.

I tried using my USB Wireless Lock again the other day, but it's just too dammed flaky. My PC would lock it self randomly even when my FOB was close by.

Then I came across this post on lifehacker about a program called Blue Lock that will use your Bluetooth phone and Lock once the phone is outside of the visibility of your PC.

I've been running it for a few days and it works flawlessly. So well in fact that sometimes it won't lock if I am around the corner because the range of bluetooth can be pretty substantial.

The program works best when your machine is using the Microsoft Bluetooth Stack. I have a Microsoft Laser Mouse 8000, which of course uses the MS Stack. But my Lenovo Thinkpad uses the Broadcomm stack (you can still use the MS one if you uninstall the Lenovo software).

Quick note. If you want your machine to automatically lock again after you unlock your PC (it doesn't do this) you need to go into the configuration file in the bluelock folder and change:

clearLockDeviceFieldOnLock=true

to false:

clearLockDeviceFieldOnLock=false

and definitely pay attention to the warning. I set my timeout to 30 seconds.

A few months ago, Torres sent me this link and told me not to watch this at work or I'd cry.

I watched it at work, in the teaming area of our floor actually... and tears did form.

Once a month I watch this video, for no other reason than to remind myself how lucky I am.

I spend a lot of time searching boutique web forums finding the answers to obscure questions.

It's a bit like searching the internet before there was Google (painful).

Enter Twing.

Pretty awesome.

[via lifehacker]