Gmail Backup
<1 min read
[@893]
Gmail Backup
Want to backup all of your mail to a Gmail account using procmail?
Simple. Add the following rule at the top of your .procmailrc:
:0c
! [email protected]
Ankle & Hamster
2 min read
[@979]
Erik's Pulse has been published.
ClearType Tuning
One thing that I really like about Mac OS X is the system-wide font smoothing. Everything looks so much better. I just found out that you can turn it on under Windows XP, and/or customize it to your liking using the ClearType Tuner. Neat.
I
Charlie
I'll probably post a review of my new Nokia 6630 in a week or two, once it's been fully road-tested. But so far, I really like it. The performance and new features are hitting all of the right notes.
I'm not too wild about the look and feel though. It really feels toyish, especially compared to the sleek 7610. Which, btw, is on its way back to Helsinki.
Ankle Update
Last Friday we went to the doctor to follow up on Vik's broken ankle. Everything is healed quite nicely. She's off the boot now and just needs to wear an aircast for a little while.
Needless to say she feels great.Six
Last Thursday we went to the vet because our hamster, Six, was not doing very well. About 3 weeks ago she fell into a very deep sleep (somewhat resembling hibernation) and we had one hell of a time to get her out of it. She did the same thing a week ago, which worried us quite a bit.
Nevertheless, her regular vet gave her a clean bill of health, which didn't register with us. The vet really had no answers to our questions which prompted us to look for a second opinion. We were able to find a local vet specializing in small critters which immediately spotted problems. Six was seriously dehydrated, had loss extensive muscle mass, even though she had what appeared to be a full belly.
She spent three days at the vet, while they took her through an extensive set of tests, including xrays and ultrasounds. They finally discovered that her liver was full of liquid (polycystic liver) which is not uncommon with geriatric hamsters. The vet was able to drain most of the liquid out.
We brought her back home yesterday.
We now have to give her a set of oral medications twice a day, as well as perform fluid (hydration) therapy every other day, not unlike what we had to do with Max.
Erik's Pulse has been published.
ClearType Tuning
One thing that I really like about Mac OS X is the system-wide font smoothing. Everything looks so much better. I just found out that you can turn it on under Windows XP, and/or customize it to your liking using the ClearType Tuner. Neat.
I Charlie
I'll probably post a review of my new Nokia 6630 in a week or two, once it's been fully road-tested. But so far, I really like it. The performance and new features are hitting all of the right notes.
I'm not too wild about the look and feel though. It really feels toyish, especially compared to the sleek 7610. Which, btw, is on its way back to Helsinki.
Ankle Update
Last Friday we went to the doctor to follow up on Vik's broken ankle. Everything is healed quite nicely. She's off the boot now and just needs to wear an aircast for a little while.
Needless to say she feels great.
Six
Last Thursday we went to the vet because our hamster, Six, was not doing very well. About 3 weeks ago she fell into a very deep sleep (somewhat resembling hibernation) and we had one hell of a time to get her out of it. She did the same thing a week ago, which worried us quite a bit.
Nevertheless, her regular vet gave her a clean bill of health, which didn't register with us. The vet really had no answers to our questions which prompted us to look for a second opinion. We were able to find a local vet specializing in small critters which immediately spotted problems. Six was seriously dehydrated, had loss extensive muscle mass, even though she had what appeared to be a full belly.
She spent three days at the vet, while they took her through an extensive set of tests, including xrays and ultrasounds. They finally discovered that her liver was full of liquid (polycystic liver) which is not uncommon with geriatric hamsters. The vet was able to drain most of the liquid out.
We brought her back home yesterday.
We now have to give her a set of oral medications twice a day, as well as perform fluid (hydration) therapy every other day, not unlike what we had to do with Max.
The AT&T Wireless Guys...
2 min read
[@968]
Erik's Pulse has been published.
[@849]
The AT&T Wireless Guys…
So, yesterday afternoon I went back to the AT&T Wireless store to try to get a newer SIM card for my new 6630.
Of course the store is now a Cingular Wireless store.
Walked in, got the usual ho's and ha's. Let the guys fondle the phone, while I explained my situation.
"Not a problem."
Except they no longer have "blue" SIM cards in the store, everything is Cingular now.
Solution? Call 611. So I did, and as usual got bounced around to one clueless person after another.
Back in the store.
"I can't get anywhere with 611, can you guys call them?"
And they did. Got bounced around too.
"You want a bluetooth SIM?"
"No, a blue SIM card, the same as the one for the 6620…"
The Cingular sales and tech support people know nothing about AT&T Wireless.
After an hour on the phone, we finally reach someone willing to put a little bit of effort into it. They still don't get it, making all kind of weird requests.
"What's the phone IMEI?"
"What's the phone ESN?"
Brandon, the store employee handling the call, almost goes ballistic.
"There's no ESN on foreign GSM phones…"
"Okay, fine. I'll just grab one from another phone…"
Meanwhile, Tommy, another store employee, heard from the store manager that there are a few used/returned "blue" SIM cards in the back. He found a couple of them, and we proceed to see if they work in my phone. The first one doesn't. The second one does. Tommy is going to try to attach my phone number to it. He does, and SUCCESS, it works.
Brandon hangs up the phone.
"Thanks, we figured out a way in about 30 seconds."
That's what I call service, spending 2 hours with a customer, going way beyond the call of duty. So, please, if you're in the Seattle area and are looking for AT&T/Cingular service go talk to Brandon or Tommy, they deserve your business.
Erik's Pulse has been published.
[@849]The AT&T Wireless Guys…
So, yesterday afternoon I went back to the AT&T Wireless store to try to get a newer SIM card for my new 6630.
Of course the store is now a Cingular Wireless store.
Walked in, got the usual ho's and ha's. Let the guys fondle the phone, while I explained my situation.
"Not a problem."
Except they no longer have "blue" SIM cards in the store, everything is Cingular now.
Solution? Call 611. So I did, and as usual got bounced around to one clueless person after another.
Back in the store.
"I can't get anywhere with 611, can you guys call them?"
And they did. Got bounced around too.
"You want a bluetooth SIM?"
"No, a blue SIM card, the same as the one for the 6620…"
The Cingular sales and tech support people know nothing about AT&T Wireless.
After an hour on the phone, we finally reach someone willing to put a little bit of effort into it. They still don't get it, making all kind of weird requests.
"What's the phone IMEI?"
"What's the phone ESN?"
Brandon, the store employee handling the call, almost goes ballistic.
"There's no ESN on foreign GSM phones…"
"Okay, fine. I'll just grab one from another phone…"
Meanwhile, Tommy, another store employee, heard from the store manager that there are a few used/returned "blue" SIM cards in the back. He found a couple of them, and we proceed to see if they work in my phone. The first one doesn't. The second one does. Tommy is going to try to attach my phone number to it. He does, and SUCCESS, it works.
Brandon hangs up the phone.
"Thanks, we figured out a way in about 30 seconds."
That's what I call service, spending 2 hours with a customer, going way beyond the call of duty. So, please, if you're in the Seattle area and are looking for AT&T/Cingular service go talk to Brandon or Tommy, they deserve your business.
Nokia 6630 vs. 7610
1 min read
[@937]
6630 vs. 7610
Look what the cat drug in…
Just about the same size.
Seems like I need a newer SIM for the 6630. Going to AT&T Wireless store later on today to see if they can get me one.
6630 vs. 7610
Look what the cat drug in…
Just about the same size.
Seems like I need a newer SIM for the 6630. Going to AT&T Wireless store later on today to see if they can get me one.
New Year Cleansing
1 min read
[@967]
Erik's Pulse has been published.
[@433]
New Year Cleansing
I re-installed XP on my main desktop machine last weekend. It had become too unstable and painfully slow. It's been a year since I had to do this. I guess I can't complain too much.
Anyway, I tried to be smart about it, and it worked…
Before reformatting I used nLite to make an up-to-date WinXP SP2 CD. I backed up the drive to an image using Acronis True Image. I keep copies of all applications, so I didn't worry about that too much.
I was back up and running in a couple hours. Not bad.
I only re-installed the basics. I'll deal with the rest as needed. It's the best way to weed out the crap. Here's what I've installed so far:
Erik's Pulse has been published.
[@433]New Year Cleansing
I re-installed XP on my main desktop machine last weekend. It had become too unstable and painfully slow. It's been a year since I had to do this. I guess I can't complain too much.
Anyway, I tried to be smart about it, and it worked…
Before reformatting I used nLite to make an up-to-date WinXP SP2 CD. I backed up the drive to an image using Acronis True Image. I keep copies of all applications, so I didn't worry about that too much.
I was back up and running in a couple hours. Not bad.
I only re-installed the basics. I'll deal with the rest as needed. It's the best way to weed out the crap. Here's what I've installed so far:
UtilitiesThat's about 1/10th of the applications that were previously installed. Yet I'm able to do everything I was doing before. There's something to be said about being forced into doing some cleaning. I should do it more often. Well, maybe not.Internet
- AVG Anti Virus, a non-intrusive virus checker.
- Cygwin, mostly for ssh and cvs.
- Microsoft AntiSpyware which seems to do a decent job, so far.
- Nokia PC Suite to sync my phone.
- Password Manager to store my online passwords, etc.
- PowerToys for XP customization.
- PrintScreen to take screen shots.
- WinRAR for dealing with archives (zip, jar, etc.)
- ZoneAlarm, as my personal firewall.
Editors/Viewers
- Azureus to download torrents.
- FileZilla for FTP sessions.
- FireFox as my browser.
- LimeWire for the occasional hard to find music.
- Thunderbird for mail.
- NewzCrawler as my RSS reader.
- SecureCRT for SSH/Telnet sessions.
- Trillian for instant messaging.
Development
- Adobe Reader to view PDFs.
- IrFanView to edit/view images.
- UltraEdit/UltraCompare for all of my text editing needs.
- OpenOffice to deal with MS Office documents.
- Picasa to manage photos.
- Dreamweaver to edit my web sites.
- Fireworks to manipulate images.
Audio
- BeanShell to quickly execute/test Java code.
- Cavaj to decompile Java classes.
- IDEA as my Java IDE.
- JDK 5.0, as well the latest 1.4 JDK.
- JRC-Editor to view/edit Java properties.
- SmartCVS to access CVS servers.
- AudibleManager for managing eBooks.
- Doppler to download podcasts.
- Rio Music Manager for the Rio Carbon.
- WinAmp to listen to MP3s.