So, maybe not “religious,” but anyone who has used Firefox for more than a week and has a mouse with a scroll wheel middle button may attest to the convenience of closing a tab with a single click anywhere on the entire tab.  Since I have found it, I have been inadvertently middle-clicking just about everything in my OS trying to close, delete, end, and any other stop-action you can think of.  Of course, this has been widely unanticipated by my OS and thus, quite in vain.

What I’m trying to get at is wouldn’t it be nice if we could at least translate some of that middle-click to close goodness into our OS just a little bit?  YES!  I have found a great solution this week that I’d like to share.  Keep in mind who is writing this - someone who can’t yet use OSX (for whatever reason).  I am writing you from my Lenovo x61 tablet PC, and I will most likely be perusing the final edit on a Vista machine in my home office.  As such, this tool is available for Windows only.  The good thing is that Windows has the most obvious application and visually translatable functionality compared to FF - the taskbar.

The taskbar (when it’s full of open software buttons) has a curious resemblance to a nice band of tabs.  If you don’t believe me, throw your windows taskbar up to the top of your screen, open Firefox, and tell me you don’t want to middle-click to close those open windows.

I’ll get on with it, then.  The software is called Taskbar Shuffle.  When installed, you immediately have the ability to

• rearrange your taskbar’s open program buttons by simply left-clicking and dragging
• auto arrange those buttons by type and age (ordering common buttons from longest to shortest time open)
• the coveted middle-click to close

You can find the software here:

http://www.freewebs.com/nerdcave/taskbarshuffle.htm

I am currently using it on both Vista and XP and have added to my personal library as a “must have” for every install.

Today I’m headed from Oklahoma City back to San Francisco. Before I arrived at the airport, I downloaded the User Agent Switcher for FireFox and added a profile for the iPhone. A lot of airports allow free wifi access for iPhones, and the User Agent will allow you to pretend that your computer is a iPhone. And it works perfectly.

I tried connecting to the airport’s wifi without the User Agent addon enabled, and I was promptly asked to pay for access. I turned on User Agent, selected the iPhone profile, and viola! Free wifi. After 15 minutes I’m asked to watch a 15 second add, and then access continues.

Knowledge is glorious.

Here are the iPhone Agent settings you need to use once you’ve downloaded the User Agent addon:

• Description: iPhone
• User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en)
• App Name: AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko)
• App Version: Version/3.0
• Platform: Mobile/1A542a Safari/419.3

Note: For those of you looking for a way to import Xanga posts in to Wordpress without reading techno mumbo-jumbo, then scroll down until you see the heading “Downloading and Using”.

Fixing the Xanga Archive Importer

I’ve used Xanga since April 2003, so when I started up www.popeonabomb.com as a mirror to the blog, I of course wanted to import Xanga posts in to wordpress. I looked around for solutions, and eventually I discovered the Xanga Archives Importer (list at the Wordpress).

I imported my posts, and I noticed that the Importer failed to properly handle some comments. Specifically, it decided that the majority of comments were Anonymous. I started poking around, and I discovered the problem only existed for posts from mid-June of 2005 and newer. The import code determines the author of a comment by the URL embedded in the comment. During June of 2005, Xanga changed the way they linked to a commenter’s blog.

Prior to mid-June of 2005, the URL had the format: http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=the_users_name

After mid-June of 2005, the URL has the format: http://www.xanga.com/the_users_name

The import code hasn’t been maintained in a while, and when it encounters a comment with the new URL format, it fails to distinguish the name of the commenter. The name isn’t found so the import decides the comment is anonymous.

I am not sure why this bug had never been addressed. I found 5 versions of the original code (with the last update occurring to the original on May 13th, 2007) and each contains this error. And the error has been around since 2005.

Either way, I updated the code. Now if a comment is found to be anonymous, the code will attempt to process the author’s code using the post-June of 2005 URL format. Since Xanga does allow anonymous comment, if the author is still found to be anonymous, it is presumed to be an accurate result.

Downloading and Using:

Note: The importer requires that you have a premium Xanga account. If you do, then download an archive of your blog. (When logged in to Xanga, go to the private view of your site, and from the settings menu choose “Webblog Archives”)

Download the updated version of the importer here.
Extract the PHP file, and upload it in to the /wp-admin/import directory.
In WordPress go to Manage -> Import -> and select “Xanga”.
Choose the file you’d like to import from your achive, and hit “Upload file and Import.”

Viola.

Today a co-worker summoned me to fix a Microsoft Office problem. She had opened a PowerPoint 2007 .docx file and needed to save it as an earlier PowerPoint file format, but when she received the following error:

“You are attempting to save a file type that is blocked by your registry policy setting,”

I won’t go in to the details behind the error, because Microsoft already has, but it can happen to any Office 2003 or Office 2007 program that is trying to open or save documents made in the opposing version. (I consider Office 2003 and Office 2008 opposites, because the programs are filled with compatibility issues).

Microsoft gives the following solution:

In PowerPoint 2003, there are no trusted locations. You can create an exempt location to override the registry policy settings. To create an exempt location, follow these steps:
1. Exit PowerPoint 2003.
2. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
3. Locate and then click one of the following registry subkeys:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Common
4. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click Key.
5. Type OICEExemptions for the name for the key.
6. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click String Value.
7. Type a string name, and then press ENTER. For example, type ExemptDirectory.
8. Right-click the string name that you typed in step 7, and then click Modify.
9. In the Value data box, type the path of the directory that contains the file, and then click OK. For example, if your document is in the C:\My Documents folder, type C:\My Documents in the Value data box.
Note You must create the folder. Any subfolders are not automatically exempted. For any additional folders that you would like to make exempt, repeat steps 6 to 9 by creating string values such as “ExemptDirectory1″ and “ExemptDirectory2.”
10. On the File menu, click Exit to exit Registry Editor.

At work I converted a Toshiba Satellite A135-S2386 from Vista to Windows XP. Initially, the A135 didn’t run Vista at an amazing speed, but after I took the time to remove the excess of startup programs, 3rd party vendor software, and all the other useless bells and whistles that came pre-installed, the machine ran Vista to my satisfaction. (Though heavy multi-tasking might have pushed the system had I tried it).

The only problem with switching from Vista to XP on the A135 is that the Toshiba never offered it as an XP machine. Therefore, the only drivers offered on the official product support page are Vista drivers. I went through countless forums and hundreds of dead links to XP drivers before I managed to get a working set together. So, in an effort to save other people time, here is a driver set that won’t be disappearing any time soon.

If you have problems with the set, please let me know. The installation order is marked in the file names.

Note: In order to get the video driver to work, extract the drivers to a folder. Then select the video card from the Device Manager, and manually select the new driver from the extracted driver folder. (It has been a while since I did this, but I do remember the video driver installer not working properly).

Download the drivers.

Note: A few of the comments ask about the password on the .ZIP file. I find this puzzling, seeing as there is no password on the file. If you’re prompted for the file, you’ve either downloaded the wrong file or you need to download a more up-to-date ZIP utility.

I hated to leave behind my OSx86 machines as I headed to San Francisco. On the other hand, my new employers have provided me with a MacBook Pro. I will miss dabbling in OSx86 (and nothing trumps hands-on, under-the-hood experience. On the other hand, I love OS-X in its true, brilliant glory.

In my Prescott v Northwood run down of OSx86, I tried almost every distribution except for iAtkos. At the suggestion of a reader, I obtained a copy, and viola - the installer and the OS worked. Of course, Murphy’s law dictates that of course iAtkos would work, because it was the only flavor I didn’t try an installing. However, I’m a bit disappointed in the outcome. Whereas I managed to get Kalyway to recognize all of the hardware with perfection, iAtkos looked at the same hardware and turned in to a snob.

iAtkos didn’t recognize the on-board sound, the built in LAN, the WiFi card, or my graphics card. It did recognize that my machine has USB ports, but that didn’t begin to make amends in our relationship. The WiFi and graphics card epic failures resulted because iAtkos made an executive decision and decided that the machine didn’t have any PCI slots. Needless to say, I didn’t have time to fight a bitter battle with iAtkos before I headed to SF, and I had to leave the lovely but crippled OS-X installation, in my home state until a later date.

Though I’m pleased that iAtkos worked (to a degree), it left much to be desired. On the other hand, each distribution can’t please all of the computers all of the time.

Recently, my parents started to suffer the following error any time they tried to view an image in Firefox (note: not an embedded image, rather just the image by itself):
“The image cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.” Turns out, the nasty little error is caused by Skype’s Firefox extension (my parents had recently installed it). The solution is to disable the Skype extension for Firefox under: Tools -> Add-ons

The newest version of G-Mail has a brief loading screen.

This is fine (though part of me finds it a cumbersome burden), except at times the loading screen can get caught in an infinite refresh. Thankfully, there are two easy solutions.

1.) Completely clear your internet browsers cache and cookies

• Firefox: Tools -> Clear Private Data
• IE7: Tools -> Delete Browsing History
• IE6: Tools -> Internet Options - > General)

2.) Surf to the HTTPS version of G-Mail at https://www.gmail.com

I haven’t encountered the problem in a few days, so perhaps it has vanished. But in case you run in to it, I hope this helps.

Background Story:
In preparation for my move to San Francisco, I’ve had to start selling some of my excess computers, because I can’t justify bringing 9 desktop PCs to a city where a studio apartment will be between 400 and 500 square feet. Since I have four GX-270s, I sold the 2.8ghz GX-270 that I had been using to run OS-X. I took out the OS-X harddrive, installed Windows XP Pro (a legal copy - the new owner has his own legal license key for the OS), and sold the machine. Why? Because I figured that I could put the OS-X harddrive in one of my other GX-270s without any problems.

Being a computer tech, I should have known to test my theory first. After completing the sale, I returned home, put the OS-X harddrive in my 3.0ghx GX-270 and viola! It failed to boot. By failed to boot, I mean it resets the machine. So, I ventured over to a friends house (he has a 2.8ghz GX-270 and a 3.0ghz GX-270) to test OS-X. The 2.8ghz machine ran OS-X fine, but the 3.0ghz machine failed.

Experiment:
In an attempt to discover why the GX-270s with 2.8ghz Prescott chips have no problem with OS-X, and why the GX-270s with 3.0ghz Northwood chips won’t boot OS-X (from either a harddrive with OS-X already installed or from any of the available installers) I performed the following test:

Prescott 2.8ghz machines use the Dell Computer Corp 0Y1057 motherboard.
Northwood 3.0ghz machines use the Dell Computer Corp 0DG284 motherboard.

If you’d like to compare specific information between the processors you can check out the side-by-side Northwood v Prescott screenshots.

Machine #1 - Prescott - 2.8ghz
Step 1.) Booted the machine with its normal XP harddrive. Viola. No problems.
Step 2.) Swapped the harddrive with the OS-X harddrive. Machine booted without problems.
Step 3.) Tested the Kalyway 10.5.1 and 10.5.2 install DVDs. Machine had no problems with either.

Machine #2 - Northwood - 3.0ghz
Step 1.) Booted the machine with its normal XP harddrive. Viola. No problems.
Step 2.) Swapped the harddrive with the OS-X harddrive. Machine failed to boot.
Step 3.) Test the Kalyway 10.5.1 and 10.5.2 install DVDs as well as the Leo4All, Leo4Allv2, and Jas. All DVDs and the harddrive failed to boot the installation or OS. By fail, I mean the Darwin Bootloader comes up, but when the installer is launched the following text appears on the screen followed by an immediate reset of the machine:

“Using SMBIOS table found at 0×0 (hex value here)
Using ACPI RSDP revision 0 found
Starting Darwin/x86″

I believe my experiments this weekend show, that though both motherboards use the same chipset and southbridge…

The 0Y1057 (Dell’s motherboards for the Prescott) have the following LPCIO: “SMSC EMC2700P”
The 0DG284 (Dell’s motherboards for the Northwood) have the following LPCIO: “”

In the end there are two differences:

The LPCIOs are different.
The Prescott chips support MMX, SSE, SSE2, and SSE3.
The Northwood chips support MMX, SSE, SSE2, but not SSE3.

However, I’ve found instance on the forums of people with OS-X running fine on either chip. The Prescott supports MMX, SSE, SSE2, and SSE3, whereas the Northwood supports MMX, SSE, SSE2, and NOT SSE3. In theory this should not make a difference because the OSx86 projects should work on any chip that supports SSE2 or SSE3 (both do not have to be supported). That leaves the culprit to the LPCIOs.

Bottom line:
GX-270s with Northwood chips and the 0DG284 motherboard cannot run OS-X. This is after overall testing on two Prescott machines and five Northwood machines.

To make sure this is the actual case, I’ve ordered a Prescott chip (which should arrive in the next few days) to test in the 0DG284 motherboard. I’ll post the results once the new chip arrives.