Hi,
My blog has moved to http://www.casebash.wordpress.com
Thanks for following.
Chris
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Iphone+GCal+NuevaSync+Facebook+Gmail=Awesome
I haven't posted on this blog for a while, but I intend to do so a bit more frequently. In addition to posting about the Firefox plugins I haven't had a chance to post about yet, I also intend to post what I've learned about Iphones.
Want to be organised? Then having a portable device such as an Iphone to tell you when to do what is invaluable.
Now, the Iphone calendar is good, but it is missing one key feature, the ability to add calendars managed by other people. Also, if you ever lost your phone, you'd be in trouble. Fortunately, Google Calendar (GCal) allows you to combine calendars from a variety of sources and then you can use NuevaSync to sync with your Iphone. In case you were wondering NuevaSync just doesn't cut it - 5 calendars only, seriously!
This also allows us to solve another issue. ICal and GCal are great for just in time reminders, but you often need to know whats coming up in advance. You could set up more alerts, but my preferred solution is to use the Google Calendar Gadget in Gmail Labs.
One more plus to this setup is that you can pull in your FB events. All you have to do is click on events, then export events and add the URL from the pop-up to GCal and you are done!
Want to be organised? Then having a portable device such as an Iphone to tell you when to do what is invaluable.
Now, the Iphone calendar is good, but it is missing one key feature, the ability to add calendars managed by other people. Also, if you ever lost your phone, you'd be in trouble. Fortunately, Google Calendar (GCal) allows you to combine calendars from a variety of sources and then you can use NuevaSync to sync with your Iphone. In case you were wondering NuevaSync just doesn't cut it - 5 calendars only, seriously!
This also allows us to solve another issue. ICal and GCal are great for just in time reminders, but you often need to know whats coming up in advance. You could set up more alerts, but my preferred solution is to use the Google Calendar Gadget in Gmail Labs.
One more plus to this setup is that you can pull in your FB events. All you have to do is click on events, then export events and add the URL from the pop-up to GCal and you are done!
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
The Best Firefox Addons
Since before exams I've been working on finding the ideal set of plug-ins for my uses of Firefox. This project has taken must longer than I anticipated, but fortunately most of the time I have also been watching videos at the same time. I had previously specifically avoided using add-ons until Google released their fantastic Chrome browser, which showed me how much better a browser could be.
I started from these two lifehacker posts: three_extensions_to_trick_out_your_firefox_tabs_and_location_bar and enable_chromes_best_features, trying to bring Chrome's best features to Firefox, but I added up adding a lot more functionality. Unlike a lot of other add-on guides on the internet, I'll try and advise you on configuration as well as how they all work together. I'll be innovative by using this blog in combination with a wiki to ensure that I distribute information effectively.
This post is about my favourite addons, but first here are two tricks that may help with add-on experiments. These instructions allow you to remove the delay for installing add-ons (don't forget to add it again later) and these instructions allow you to set up shortcut keys to make configuring them quicker.
I've decided to avoid experimental add-ons, as when you have a lot of add-ons installed, finding the source of any incompatibility is difficult and should hence be avoided as much as possible.
Firstly, Chromifox is the most awesome theme I could find. Note that the button for viewing multiple levels of back or forward is removed - this functionality is accessed by right clicking instead.
Context Search allows you to directly search for terms you find in web pages, just like IE8s accelerators. Download Status Bar greatly simplifies the handling of downloads by putting them in a bar down the bottom instead of a window. Easy DragToGo allows the use of dragging gestures in Firefox, such as dragging up some text to search for it in Google or dragging down to search for it in Wikipedia. Secure Log-in is really useful for bypassing annoying log-in pages. WikiLook allows you to find out the meaning of a word just by selecting it.
There are a lot more add-ons out there, with quite useful features, but if you only want to install a few, than these are the ones that I recommend. I'll have more posts with the other add-ons that I use soon. EDIT: my notes are now on Evernote. http://www.evernote.com/pub/casebash/Technology/. Just search it for Firefox.
I started from these two lifehacker posts: three_extensions_to_trick_out_your_firefox_tabs_and_location_bar and enable_chromes_best_features, trying to bring Chrome's best features to Firefox, but I added up adding a lot more functionality. Unlike a lot of other add-on guides on the internet, I'll try and advise you on configuration as well as how they all work together. I'll be innovative by using this blog in combination with a wiki to ensure that I distribute information effectively.
This post is about my favourite addons, but first here are two tricks that may help with add-on experiments. These instructions allow you to remove the delay for installing add-ons (don't forget to add it again later) and these instructions allow you to set up shortcut keys to make configuring them quicker.
I've decided to avoid experimental add-ons, as when you have a lot of add-ons installed, finding the source of any incompatibility is difficult and should hence be avoided as much as possible.
Firstly, Chromifox is the most awesome theme I could find. Note that the button for viewing multiple levels of back or forward is removed - this functionality is accessed by right clicking instead.
Context Search allows you to directly search for terms you find in web pages, just like IE8s accelerators. Download Status Bar greatly simplifies the handling of downloads by putting them in a bar down the bottom instead of a window. Easy DragToGo allows the use of dragging gestures in Firefox, such as dragging up some text to search for it in Google or dragging down to search for it in Wikipedia. Secure Log-in is really useful for bypassing annoying log-in pages. WikiLook allows you to find out the meaning of a word just by selecting it.
There are a lot more add-ons out there, with quite useful features, but if you only want to install a few, than these are the ones that I recommend. I'll have more posts with the other add-ons that I use soon. EDIT: my notes are now on Evernote. http://www.evernote.com/pub/casebash/Technology/. Just search it for Firefox.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Why Firefox is my browser of choice
I have finally completed my build of Firefox and am now preparing to start a series of posts (promised long ago) on how you can duplicate this. However, I just released that some of you might not use it and this blog post will explain why you should
Firefox in my opinion currently the best computer internet browser in existence. Its greatest strengths are its ability to handle almost any website, and the simplicity of the default install combined with the availability of a wide range of high quality add-ons which allow you to match the features in the majority of browsers. Here is a quick comparison to the other major browsers.
Internet Explorer: Only works on Windows. Newer versions only work on newer versions of windows. Almost any site can run on it as it is the most heavily used browser on the internet and any decent web developer will test on at least a few versions before deployment. It has often been criticised for being non-standards compliant, but due to the previous point this issue is mainly one that developers have to worry about and recent versions have been better. It is the only browser that will run a few sites using active-X, but these are rare. IE plug-ins aren't well known, but while the range isn't as good as Firefox, I believe its market share ensures that some developers will ensure there are quality apps. IE was stagnent for quite a while after defeating Netscape in the browser wars, but recent versions have brought some innovation, such as Web Slices, which although they haven't really taken off yet, are a very interesting technology.
Opera: Opera is actually quite a nice browser. It has a number of useful features not present in the default install of Firefox. However, I have found a number of sites (especially new sites that rely on a lot of AJAX) which completely fail to work, plus there aren't as many plugins as Firefox. If I had to use a standard install browser, I would strongly consider it over Firefox, but Firefox can replicate most of the features with addons.
Chrome: Chrome demonstrated that there is still plenty of space left for innovation in the browser. I decided against using Chrome for a few reasons such as the possible instability and immaturity of a beta releases, the lack of immediate Linux support and an absence of plugins. I heard it was possible to duplicate the vast majority of Chrome Features with Firefox addons, which was really how this project began. While there are not yet add-ons to duplicate some of Chrome's functionality, there are a number of developers working on remedying this.
Safari: I haven't used Safari, but from what I have seen/been told it is a minimalistic, but fast and elegant browser. Like most smaller browsers the issues will be site compatibility (some sites will refuse anything other than IE or Firefox) and the availability of plugins
In summary, I Firefox is my browser of choice as its add-ons allow it to duplicate the majority of the features of the other browsers and add a number of new ones, while the base browser itself remains lightweight and simple.
Firefox in my opinion currently the best computer internet browser in existence. Its greatest strengths are its ability to handle almost any website, and the simplicity of the default install combined with the availability of a wide range of high quality add-ons which allow you to match the features in the majority of browsers. Here is a quick comparison to the other major browsers.
Internet Explorer: Only works on Windows. Newer versions only work on newer versions of windows. Almost any site can run on it as it is the most heavily used browser on the internet and any decent web developer will test on at least a few versions before deployment. It has often been criticised for being non-standards compliant, but due to the previous point this issue is mainly one that developers have to worry about and recent versions have been better. It is the only browser that will run a few sites using active-X, but these are rare. IE plug-ins aren't well known, but while the range isn't as good as Firefox, I believe its market share ensures that some developers will ensure there are quality apps. IE was stagnent for quite a while after defeating Netscape in the browser wars, but recent versions have brought some innovation, such as Web Slices, which although they haven't really taken off yet, are a very interesting technology.
Opera: Opera is actually quite a nice browser. It has a number of useful features not present in the default install of Firefox. However, I have found a number of sites (especially new sites that rely on a lot of AJAX) which completely fail to work, plus there aren't as many plugins as Firefox. If I had to use a standard install browser, I would strongly consider it over Firefox, but Firefox can replicate most of the features with addons.
Chrome: Chrome demonstrated that there is still plenty of space left for innovation in the browser. I decided against using Chrome for a few reasons such as the possible instability and immaturity of a beta releases, the lack of immediate Linux support and an absence of plugins. I heard it was possible to duplicate the vast majority of Chrome Features with Firefox addons, which was really how this project began. While there are not yet add-ons to duplicate some of Chrome's functionality, there are a number of developers working on remedying this.
Safari: I haven't used Safari, but from what I have seen/been told it is a minimalistic, but fast and elegant browser. Like most smaller browsers the issues will be site compatibility (some sites will refuse anything other than IE or Firefox) and the availability of plugins
In summary, I Firefox is my browser of choice as its add-ons allow it to duplicate the majority of the features of the other browsers and add a number of new ones, while the base browser itself remains lightweight and simple.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Avoiding Spam - Facebook Tips Summary 1
Spam is one of the main annoyances of Facebook. Changes to the application framework have greatly reduced the number of spam invites to an almost negligible level, but there are still a number of other sources. Here are tricks to avoid the worst of it.
1) Applications: Instead of just ignoring a single invite, you can ignore all invites from the application or the friend instead. You will generally find its only a couple of friends who send all the application invites.
2) Dating ads: Facebook uses information on your profile for targeting, so you'll obviously get more if you are down as single.
3) Events: Whenever you are invited to an event, the creator can send you messages before you even RSVP or when you say you aren't attending! If you click remove event from my profile for an event you have no interest in then you won't get these messages. Note; you won't get updates if the event time changes.
4) Email: Go to Settings -> Account Settings -> Notifications to control email notifications. For most stuff, Facebook notifications will be fine, so turn these off for everything else. I select only Messages, Wall Posts, Event Cancellations and Event Time Changes. Don't forget to de-select the options under more.
5) Facebook Notifications: To remove a notification click on the cross next to the notification and click hide all if you don't find it useful and report spam if it is actual spam.
6) Newsfeed notifications: If you put your mouse over a newsfeed story, options appears. Select more about this person if they are interesting, or less about them if they are someone you don't know well.
7) Updates: If you are a fan of something you often do it just to show it on your profile, rather than to receive updates. On the Updates window you can click Opt out or Report Spam (for spam only)
8) Chat: If you don't feel like talking when you are on Facebook click on Chat -> Go Offline.
1) Applications: Instead of just ignoring a single invite, you can ignore all invites from the application or the friend instead. You will generally find its only a couple of friends who send all the application invites.
2) Dating ads: Facebook uses information on your profile for targeting, so you'll obviously get more if you are down as single.
3) Events: Whenever you are invited to an event, the creator can send you messages before you even RSVP or when you say you aren't attending! If you click remove event from my profile for an event you have no interest in then you won't get these messages. Note; you won't get updates if the event time changes.
4) Email: Go to Settings -> Account Settings -> Notifications to control email notifications. For most stuff, Facebook notifications will be fine, so turn these off for everything else. I select only Messages, Wall Posts, Event Cancellations and Event Time Changes. Don't forget to de-select the options under more.
5) Facebook Notifications: To remove a notification click on the cross next to the notification and click hide all if you don't find it useful and report spam if it is actual spam.
6) Newsfeed notifications: If you put your mouse over a newsfeed story, options appears. Select more about this person if they are interesting, or less about them if they are someone you don't know well.
7) Updates: If you are a fan of something you often do it just to show it on your profile, rather than to receive updates. On the Updates window you can click Opt out or Report Spam (for spam only)
8) Chat: If you don't feel like talking when you are on Facebook click on Chat -> Go Offline.
New Blog
Hi, I finally decided to create a new blog to replace my old one at http://blogs.sun.com/casebash/. I'm not quite sure what topics I'll post here (its a real shame that there is no way to subscribe to individual topics, then it wouldn't matter so much. I am planning this blog to mainly be about tech stuff - if I start posting about too many different stuff I'll create a new blog.
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