Yes, Virginia, There is a HarpShot

Some people have asked, HarpShot? What the heck is a HarpShot? If you have to ask, you don’t need to know.

Browser Update Reprise

Apple recently released Safari 4 beta. Wow, it’s fast. It’s a real pleasure to browse sites and pages using it. It’s about as quick as flipping pages in a book or magazine, even with images displayed. I expect Firefox will pick up on Apple’s technology and use something like it to speed up Firefox. Meanwhile, if I want to look at pages fast, I go Safari; if I’m developing web pages, Firefox is still the choice, due to certain very helpful plug-ins. Most people, I think, would find Safari a real joy as their primary browser.

My Laptop Gets a Blow Job

My laptop was getting more obnoxious by the week. Progressively getting slower, taking longer to boot up, taking longer for pretty much everything except aggravating my temper. All the symptoms of a STD. But my battery of free security programs found nothing. I caved in and bought Spysweeper. It found nothing, either, and just made things even slower.

I started noticing it felt hotter than it used to under my right wrist. Well, okay, I thought, it is over five years old, after all. Probably getting ready to blow the power supply or something. Before it could do that, though, it started just shutting itself off. They’re made that way, y’know, to automatically shut down when the internal temperature gets too high.

Of course, by now I was primed to use the imminent demise of the machine as an excuse to get a new one. Even started checking the BestBuy ads every Sunday. But, the damn thing wouldn’t die; just kept after my goat. Last weekend I asked my wife if it would upset her if I got out the .38 and shot it. She said it would. So, I scrapped the notion of putting it out of my misery.

Today it shut itself down before I could print a letter I needed to get out. So I turned it over to have a look at the fans. A busted fan could certainly cause overheating. Couldn’t tell anything from squinting through the tiny holes except the blades looked kind of dusty. I grabbed a can of Dust-Off and shot a blast at each fan. The first result was a major cloud of dust flying out the vent. The second result was one of the fans didn’t spin. It occurred to me laptops maybe store up dust as well as desktops, despite what seems to be a fairly enclosed structure. And it occurred to me I might need to replace a fan. Fans are what I’ve had to replace the most on all my computers.

I can see you’re about to fall asleep so I’ll cut to the chase. At home after supper between Olympic events I removed as many panels as I was comfortable removing and used about half a can of Dust-Off blowing into strategic crevices. In the process, I not only blew out more clouds of dust but also dislodged a major dust-kitty that I had to slowly work out with tweezers from behind one of the fans. Yup, it was actually keeping the fan from spinning. Got it all back together and the difference is incredible.

Sounds way better, stays way cooler, runs way faster, hasn’t shut off. Keeping fingers crossed, of course, but it’s looking (and sounding) like I’ll have to spill a cup of coffee into the keyboard if I’m gonna get me a new laptop in the near future.

Stinkin’ dirt, anyway.

Bandolero and HarpShot Love Those Jayhawks

So while watching the NCAA Championship game HarpShot’s amigo Bandolero upgraded his WordPress Blog to version 2.5. What a weird thing for El Bandolero to be doing. But, if not, Bandolero would be jumping out of his boots and holsters from the excitement and anxiety. In fact, game not over yet; it’s in overtime. Will Jayhawks pull it out? El Bandolero says: Rock Chalk! And HarpShot seconds that.

Stick It

In the Chappells Blog I recently wrote about Knoppix on a stick, and mentioned winPenPack where you can get a whole collection of portable apps installable on a USB stick, a/k/a flash drive. In the Knoppix article I wrote about having/escaping the Linux wireless connection conundrum. The evening I wrote the article, it connected with ease. The following evening, however, I just couldn’t find the right sequence of clicks to get a wireless connection.

Being frustrated with the inability to get Linux connected to the internet, I went back to Windows and went to one of my favorite hangouts — the Sourceforge site. Sourceforge is essentially the home of the Open Source Community. It’s more than just a place to get free programs. It’s a place infused with the energy and mindset that made the internet what it should be. A person could write a lot more about that, but I’ll save it for another time.

While perusing Sourceforge I came across the Portable Apps Project, also to be found at its own Portable Apps Website. I think Portable Apps might even be better than winPenPack. I downloaded the standard suite and installed it all on one USB stick, and then downloaded a bunch more portable apps to add to it. Having already done a couple of installations of winPenPack and, therefore, being already familiar with how much can packed onto one little USB stick, I was nevertheless again amazed at all the stuff I put on it, and how much space is still left. I was hard pressed to think of anything more to add, that I might conceivably want to have on it. Yet, a visit to the PortableApps website just now revealed several new additions to the list of available apps, particularly, several new games.

Like winPenPack and Knoppix, PortableApps is all free stuff. BTW, I’m back on Knoppix/Linux this evening, while also watching a little March Madness, though I’ll likely be paying more attention to the TV and less attention to the monitor tomorrow, when KU will be playing. Rock Chalk!