If you have friends or relatives who wonder how exactly computers work, here is a book to offer them which has probably the most lucid explanations that I’ve ever read on the foundations of computer science. This short book will not help neophytes distinguish between RAM and ROM-we have Wikipedia for that-but it’s hard to imagine more accessible explanations for laymen on subjects like Boolean algebra, multiprocessors and artificial intelligence. I can also imagine this book be great supplement for the general education of university-level computer science students. The real strength of Danny Hillis‘s approach is how he is able to simplify abstractions using everyday concepts and experiences to illustrate the higher-level ideas behind modern computers, hardly an easy task. The Pattern on the Stone is available at Amazon at the moment for $11.20.
Here’s a terrific gift for the geek in your life-maybe that geek in this case is you!-who is looking for a way to improve his grooming habits while spending less time in the morning shaving than he probably does currently. This electric shaver from Philips Norelco requires no shaving cream and that means the process of getting your daily growth off your face can be accomplished with a lot less mess and in less time. One huge downside of electric shavers used to be that they were difficult to clean, but not surprisingly in a new millennium we now have ways around that, specifically in the case of this shaver which has a so-called ‘Jet Cleaning’ system that charges, lubricates and cleans the razor automatically. The auto charger keeps the razor charged for about 17 shaves/50 minutes, and since the unit adjusts from 100 volts to 240 volts AC automatically it is definitely travel friendly. If you’re tired of your morning shaving ritual this electric shaver is not cheap, but as with many things that you use every day, if it improves your morning routine it might just be worth it. The Philips Norelco 1160XCC SensoTouch 2d Electric Shaver is available from Amazon on sale for $129.
While the days are starting to get longer in the northern hemisphere, there are plenty of places that still aren’t receiving much sunlight. It’s for people who live in latitudes like this that we’re pointing to the Philips goLITE BLU-Light Therapy Device, as a way of helping you combat seasonal affective disorder (SAD) or just a mild case of the blues when you know you’re getting enough sunlight after a long day of coding (or checking Facebook!) in front of the computer. This model from Phillips is terrific because it is rechargeable so you can easily move it around your home, and you can also vary the amount of light you want to receive from it. There is growing evidence that suggests that increasing the amount of light you receive can improve your mood especially during parts of the year with very short days, and a lot of people will be interested in attempting solutions that don’t involve anti-depressants. the specialized lights are not cheap but if they work for you over the next several years I imagine the price would be negligible. The Philips goLITE BLU-Light Therapy Device is available on Amazon for $139.00.
Whether you’re a runner or you’re looking for a gift for a friend or relative who is, take a look at the slick-looking GPS Powered Nike+ SportWatch from Nike. What can’t it do? In addition to giving you distance and speed info this little beauty lets you personalize the information you’d like to see on your daily run, including pace, calories you’ve burned, and track your overall running time as well. You can recharge via USB, and the manufacturer says that it’s good for eight hours of running time, which will probably outlast any daily jog time but makes me wonder about using it as a general-use everyday watch. At any rate, if you’re starting to get serious about your running you deserve a nice high-tech timepiece that will look good as it’s helping you quantify your progress, and the Nike+ SportWatch is a very nice looking piece of technology, priced at $199.00 from Amazon.
The other day I realized I had not yet activated my Privacy on a domain that I purchased via a registrar that offers free privacy for the first year. Going in to turn it on I saw that for some reason I had purchased it through another registrar with whom I have an account, Name.com (not an affiliate link!) and prepared to pay about four bucks or so per year to activate privacy on the domain.
Well good news: when it comes to hosting or domain registration I’m pretty good about–before I buy–doing a search and inserting the word “coupon” after the registrar name, and current month/year, and I have saved a lot of money over the years by doing so. For February 2012 Name.com is offering free privacy for a year on all the domains you have registered with them, simply by entering “FREEWHOIS” into the coupon code field upon checkout.
I went back and added it to about a dozen domain names I have registered through Name.com with no problems. So there is your money-saving domain privacy tip for the day from Digital Media Minute. If you have any domains registered through them it might be smart to take advantage of their offer.
As time goes on you’re aware that you’ve given permission to various apps to access information tied to online accounts you have with services such as Twitter, Facebook, Google, Yahoo, Dropbox, Linked In, Instagram and Flickr, and possibly others. If you’re like me you can name only a few applications for which you have registered using these accounts. Wouldn’t be nice to have a handle on exactly what companies have access to your information; an easy way to determine if you’d like to continue to allow them access to it?
Well now you have one. Mypermissions.org gives you a simple way to check the entire list of apps for which you have previously agreed to allow to access your information, simply by clicking on an icon on their homepage. From there you [click to continue…]
Do you need a way to hide all the icons on your desktop before you make that screencast, or for another reason? It’s easier than you think, and this little tech tip I am going to share will make your presentation much cleaner with fewer onscreen distractions.
Simply go to the applications folder in your dock, then find the Utilities subfolder. Click on it and then find the Terminal application, and click on it. Then, simply paste this text into the terminal window:
– and hit enter. After that, paste this text into the terminal window:
killall Finder
– and hit enter. All the icons on your desktop should disappear and you can present your screencast without a lot of clutter. In order to get the icons back, simply type:
– and hit enter. After that, you guessed it, paste this text into the Terminal window:
killall Finder
….and things are back to where they were. I think very few Mac users are inclined to get into the terminal because of its relatively unfriendly interface but if you read up on it little bit you will find that it’s a very powerful tool for accomplishing a lot of different things on OS X.
In fact, if you are feeling adventurous check out this article on how to create a hotkey toggle to do this for you, by making use of Automator.
There can be no better use of a single minute to make you want to travel:
I know that 2012 is coming and that I should be pretty jaded about the richness of You Tube and all the other Web 2.0 extravaganzas that surround us in a virtual river of information, but I’m not. Maybe I should even think that travel is passe when I can access the million cameras around the world or mash ups of near real-time photographs taken in every location I have ever been and 1000 others but I still don’t think travel is passé. The Internet has set before us an access that provokes further curiosity as to constant mysteries right around the corner, right at the tip of our mouse fingers.
Robert Scoble waxes damn near poetic on 40 minutes worth of audio as he describes what he calls the ‘game of games’, which is the way that Facebook and Google will encourage us to increase our involvement with them, as they get to know us ever better.
Google is building an ‘identity system’; it even calls itself an identity company. The future is starting to reveal itself and say what you want about Scoble: he has a front row seat, knows everybody and has the enthusiasm of a kid. The only question is whether or not Google’s marketing adequately describes a relentless technological march, which no one, not even Google, controls.
Here is a pretty amazing, potentially free offer that has some intrigue surrounding it as well. Dave Navarro is an Internet marketing guy who in my opinion always delivered a lot more value than most do on basically teaching you to translate whatever expertise you might have into products you can sell online, should you have the desire to do so.
I have no idea what has happened with Navarro but I’m on his mailing list and in his latest email he explains that he needs a break from the Internet for a while, and that he is going to give away 8 training modules on a pay-what-you-wish basis. He’d been charging about $1600 total for all of them so if you have ever felt the urge to quit your day job and become an entrepreneur, you might want to take a look: (not an affiliate link)
for $139.00.
