I had two things I wanted to accomplish tonight

1. Go to the store and get sympathy cards for my friends on the loss of their pet.
2. Watch The Imitation Game, which I have as a DVD out from Netflix right now.

Instead, I fell asleep, oh, about 6 or 7 pm, and didn't wake up till a friend called me tonight around 10 pm. Uncharacteristically, I went on out, even though it was late, to get the cards. I also found a beach towel that (Heaven help me) matches my swimsuit, a bright pink. They were working on the pool today, getting it ready for Memorial Day weekend. :) I haven't watch the movie, and probably won't tonight, although I'd like to. But it's already 11:30 or so.

It's been a sad day. I'm taking the poor dog's passing harder than one friend, who, secure in knowing it was time, is comforted by that. I am, too, I guess, but I'm just more emotional, or at least don't keep quite the control of emotions that he does. I tried putting a picture of her on my desktop, but it was too soon. Instead, I put up a theme of playful puppies cavorting and playing from the Microsoft website. It cheered me up. My favourite picture of the slideshow looks like this:



A friend surprised me by showing up at work for lunch today. He's got a lot on his mind, and wanted to get out of the house. We'd been in a meeting when he showed up and I didn't hear the page. My boss bought us lunch from Salsarita's food truck today, and I was going through the lunch line for a drink when the cashier said a friend was here. He joined us and we had a pleasant lunch. There was so much food in the Salsarita's order that I split it with him. The chips and burrito bowl were very good, and the poquitos were excellent. I wasn't so much into the queso, though, but maybe it was an off day.

I forgot to take a couple of books back to the library today, so I'll get charged a day of fines. I'd been doing so well! Oh, well, 30 cents or so won't break me. But I'm definitely going to try to run them by on the way to work tomorrow. I have another due tomorrow that I'm going to try to renew--the one on the Medici family.

Okay, I think I'll get those cards ready to send. I can't find my stamps (again); no doubt I put them in a safe place, but not the postal box. I'll have to pay tomorrow at work for them to run through the meter. Oh, well.

So did anyone actually get Windows 10 today?

Not me. On one computer, I have an error explaining that my graphics card isn't compatible, when it probably is, but even though I put in another graphics card, the compatibility report doesn't refresh for up to a month, according to their FAQ. A month? Really? I went through the Microsoft website and found a way to make the compatibility program run under task scheduler, but it didn't change anything. So it keeps telling me I can't upgrade because of a card that isn't active. The other computer keeps saying that it hasn't run the report yet, but will get around to it eventually (isn't that nice, and maybe two weeks ago it would have flown, but it's release day and it won't even tell me if my computer is compatible?) Both computers have the necessary update to have the program run a report correctly. It just isn't updating it's compatibility information, and so no upgrade.

It has thus been an extremely frustrating day for me, Microsoft. You suck majorly at times, and this is one of them. Of course, Best Buy offered to upgrade my computer for $30 a pop. The whole point of Windows 10 is that it is supposed to be a better operating system, and oh, yeah, free. It's not supposed to be this difficult. I'm not a tech genius, but I'm competent enough to handle many software issues and install/configure some hardware. But right now, in this moment, I am almost too irritated to sleep. Thank you, Microsoft.

Have you tried the #HowOldRobot by Microsoft?

One of my Facebook friends from high school posted a link to Microsoft's age-guessing website, How Old Do I Look?, and I put a picture of myself through it, and it guessed 36, which was 12 years younger, but hey, I'll take it. :)

I happen to have

a Microsoft laptop mouse, so I thought I might try to put that on the desktop, change the button to left, and then see if the mouse settings stayed for my normal, non-Microsoft mouse, but no, they didn't. I have two mice for the laptop, the Microsoft one, which is corded, and a Logitech wireless mouse. I will not be putting the cusotmisation center onto the laptop, as I don't want to invalidate the settings on my wireless mouse. Which by the way, was set up with left-handedness from the get-go, so maybe that was a function of being signed into my Microsoft account. If that's the case, it may have actually reverted to the right hand due to all this. I'm going to go check. Grrr....

Well, the good news is that the Logitech mouse works fine. Perhaps it's a function of which side I put the transmitter on. But I'm going to keep things as is on the laptop. The keyboard for the desktop really does require the program to be used correctly, so I may have to get another mouse if I want it left-handed. That is annoying. Well played, Microsoft. I didn't realise I was going down a dark road when I bought this keyboard. I will say it does take some getting used to as far as typing on a slanted and decompressed keyboard, but my wrists do feel better, so maybe it will be worth it. Maybe. My keyboard tray also will not slip back in because the keyboard is too high. I am not going to go get another computer desk due to that. Sigh.

I know the idea of open letters is rather laughable

As it's not like the big companies ever read little blogs like mine, so what's the point of writing such a letter? So I won't. I'll just make a complaint.

Today I decided to get a new keyboard, one that is more ergonomically designed. I chose the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic 4000, which includes a lot of programmable buttons that can be used for things like zooming, spell-check, calculator, opening mail, favourites, printing, various things. To use these features, you install a program called Microsoft Mouse and Keyboard Center. I've used the same program when installing a friend's mouse, and didn't think twice about it. Turns out that in doing so, it reset my mouse buttons, on a non-Microsoft mouse (it's my original one that came with my computer to the default, so that it became a right-hand mouse. Now, although I am, indeed, right-handed, I use the mouse with left-handed settings both at work and at home in an effort to reduce strain on my wrists (hello, the main reason I bought an ergonomic keyboard, and since my right wrist is worse and the number pad is on the right, I balance with the mouse on the left). I thought, fine, I'll go back into the mouse settings and change them back. That is no longer possible, as any attempt to use the mouse settings through regular Windows 8 brings up a box that says 'change mouse settings' and it goes straight to the Mouse and Keyboard Center, which, since it is not a Microsoft mouse, is useless as the hardware does not appear as an option. So, it overrode the button settings I had, then took away my way to make things better. This leaves me with the choice of getting a Microsoft mouse, or reverting to right-handed use. The latter would not be particularly bad, except every other computer I use is set to left-handed use. On the other hand, at the moment, inconvenienced as I am, I'm not feeling the urge to go out and buy a Microsoft mouse. Now, I doubt Microsoft did this on purpose to irritate left-handers and righties who happen to be somewhat ambidextrous, but it still stinks. I've left a comment on one of their forums. Maybe if enough of us do, they'll update the software in some fashion to alleviate the issue. Unfortunately, I don't really believe that.

Okay, Microsoft is pissing me off

I paid for and downloaded the Windows 8 upgrade. I then tried to install it. Although the compatibility was supposed to be fine, it got all the way to the end, said there had been an error (but didn't explain what) and then restored (thankfully) my Windows 7 operating system.

So I went to Microsoft, and signed up for an MSN ID so that I could get live tech support, signed in, and it kept looping me right out of the support area and back to square one.

So basically, I just paid $39.99 (plus tax) for something that doesn't work and can't get the help I need from the manufacturer, because their system is apparently screwy. This does not give me faith in Windows 8. Oh, well, I'll keep looking for a solution.

Success!

We are now Windows 7 Ultimate +. Now--the question is, can I get my data back off my external drive to access my documents and settings?

Google's getting into the operating systems business, but Microsoft fires back by making Office online...free?

Microsoft Office to go online — for free

It’s too early to say Microsoft has checkmated Google in online documents – the latest version of Office hasn’t shipped yet. But the sleeping giant in Redmond has clearly woken up to the Internet threat.

Get this: Microsoft – the king of paid software – will announce today that it is going to give a version of Office away for free online. Both the online and desktop versions are scheduled to arrive in the first half of next year. Yes, you read that right. The latest version of its ubiquitous productivity software, dubbed Office 2010, will come as both a piece of software you can buy for your computer, and as a service you can access in your browser. [UPDATE: Microsoft says it will support the Firefox and Safari browsers as well as IE.]

For free. From Microsoft.

Great new technology

As Great Western Dragon puts it in the LISNews post, 'think of it as microfilm 2.0'.

This Technology Will Blow Your Mind.. (click to watch a great video)

Microsoft is working on something it acquired in February called Seadragon. It allows the user to browse visual information quickly. As they put it in their blurb:

If this sounds a little vague, consider the following four "promises" of Seadragon:

1. Speed of navigation is independent of the size or number of objects.
   
2. Performance depends only on the ratio of bandwidth to pixels on the screen.
   
3. Transitions are smooth as butter.
   
4. Scaling is near perfect and rapid for screens of any resolution.
   

Basically you can read a newspaper shown as a small image on the screen by zooming to as large a size as you need, in incredible detail. Plus, when married to Photosynth, pictures can be grouped to show panoramic views. The video even uses flickr images that people have taken of Notre Dame and arranged them in a browsable '3-dimensional' model of the cathedral itself.

It really is mind-blowing. Be sure to watch the video.

And this is cool beyond words

YKWIA showed me this, too. This blows Macs out of the water...it's a true virtual lightbox and more. I give you surface computing from Microsoft.



For more information go to Popular Mechanics' article on surface computing.

Cleaning out my to-blog list

Google and Microsoft Look to Change Health Care

How would you feel about being able to easily search all your health information and have it at your fingertips? Sound good? Well, yes and no...what about privacy. Two juggernauts are heading towards changing health care.

Is Parental Age Related to Autism Risk?

Oddly enough, maternal education, when adjusted for age and other factors, correlated with increased autism in children. Paternal education had no significant effect.

Democratic hopefuls grilled on gay rights

Kucinich still has my vote, at least through the primary, because he's for gay marriage. I'm not impressed with the Big Three's take on civil unions being adequate and Richardson really flubbed his chances with me with a slur which he then tried to backpedal out of.

Library Time Line

Did I post this already? It's a cool site, giving important dates in the history of libraries.

Here Come the Cyberchondriacs

More people are looking up medical information before seeing their doctor.