Don's Patch Issue #2006-03-15 from http://www.don-guitar.com First words, from Don: Q: How do you keep a geek happily busy for days on end? A: Give him a Kubuntu Linux computer to play with. Goodness, where has the time gone? I had plenty of time for the ezine a few days ago, I'm sure I did. *grin* Well, maybe I've been a little distracted, I admit it, but I've certainly had a lot of fun. I think Lisa's gotten interested enough to start thinking about equal time so I've been on the lookout for one more computer we can load up with Linux. I'm excited about learning the "works" of a different Operating System but Lisa's more into end results. She wants to begin exploring all the interesting graphics apps that are available for Linux. We actually have complementary ambitions when you think about it. She wants to do cool stuff on the computer while I want to keep it running smoothly. Enough babble... Here we go. Don's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html Lisa's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/lfefo.html Our personal news page. http://www.don-guitar.com/babbleon.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Bart Martin's Five Golden Computer Rules. http://www.5starpcservices.com/goldenrules.htm Image galleries from Paul Blackburn and Konrad Lötter. http://www.dumetier.com/photography/galleries/index.html Puzzles. http://www.allstarpuzzles.com/home.html These lecture transcripts might appear to be dated, but the subject is, after all, history. http://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/weblect/default.asp Open Content technical reading. http://www.andamooka.org/ My Win2k computer came with a Sony DVD-ROM/CD-RW drive. The drive came with NTI software which has never worked right. Every time I wanted to burn a CD I had to reinstall the software. I finally got fed up the hassles and found an alternative. http://www.cdburnerxp.se/ CDBurnerXP Pro has worked really well for me so far but I had some alternatives to try in case it didn't. http://www.paehl-info.de/cdr/ Ray Bradbury is an American SF icon. http://home.earthlink.net/~hiflyer/APbradbury/main.htm Crazy for money. http://www.banknotes.com/ A blog from the editors of Scientific American. http://blog.sciam.com/ Art critics, movie critics, book critics and theater critics are just the beginning. The world is filled with critics. Now..... http://blogcritics.org/ Wallpaper from artist Brandi Jasmine. http://www.brandijasmine.com/wallpaper/index.html Canadian bloggers. http://www.canpost.org/ Constitution Society (sounds "fringey" to me *shrug*). http://www.constitution.org/ Stupid, stupid, stupid (but cute). http://www.cowabduction.com/ I enjoy making my own simple little button images but for those who wish to get "fancy" here's a good choice. http://home.hccnet.nl/s.j.francke/deknop/deknop.htm Curious about Linux? Here's some reading matter. http://www.desktoplinux.com/ http://www.guilinux.com/ http://www.kernelnewbies.org/ http://happypenguin.org/ http://www.linux-tutorial.info/index.php http://www.linuxnewbieguide.org/ http://www.tux.org/ If you do a lot of downloading, a manager is a good tool. I'm still using DLExpert. http://www.yanew.com/ or http://www.majorgeeks.com/download447.html but there are also Open Source alternatives. http://snipurl.com/nkiq Here's a useful tool for persons using dual boot Windows/Linux systems. http://www.fs-driver.org/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This publication is only mailed to verified double opt-in subscribers, and is brought to you by me, Don Crowder, my wife, Lisa Miller, and //www.freelists.org ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This week I became a bit enchanted with bubble games. Here are a couple of games and other bubble-related links. http://flasharcade.com/bubbletrouble_game.html http://www.bubblegame.ch/deutsch/default.asp http://bubbles.org/html/professor/professor.htm http://www.typingmaster.com/individuals/bubbles.asp Multimedia gallery. Non-restricted images, sounds, and video. http://gallery.hd.org/index.jsp The Center for History and New Media. http://chnm.gmu.edu/ What is a Fallacy? http://www.fallacyfiles.org/ Wonderful glass art by Mats Jonasson Maleras. http://www.matsjonasson.com/engindexhtml.htm Resources for worldwide indigenous cultures. http://www.nativeweb.org/ Photojournal of Nixon's historic visit to China. http://www.gmu.edu/library/specialcollections/nixon_in_china.html Don bought Note Tab Pro to support the company because he loved their products, but has gone back to the costless NoteTab Light, preferring its features. Look at all the goodies and support! http://www.notetab.com/index.php http://www.notetab.com/ntl.php http://www.notetab.net/ For fans of weird signs. http://notquite.net/photos/do_jump_signs/ The New York Stock Exchange. http://www.nyse.com/ The New York Academy of Sciences. http://www.nyas.org/ The New York Historical Society. http://www.nyhistory.org/ The official New York City web site. http://www.nyc.gov/portal/index.jsp?front_door=true ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª At the time this issue was posted, the current subscriber count for this publication was 294. ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This issue's collection of news/magazine/informational sites (these are chosen for maximum diversity regardless of "spin" ). http://abcnews.go.com/ http://www.abc.net.au/ http://www.abqjournal.com/default.htm http://www.ananova.com/news/ http://hosted.ap.org/specials/bluepage.html http://www.blufftontoday.com/ http://people.ku.edu/~jbrown/bugs.html http://www.cp.org/ http://canyon-news.com/artman/publish/index.php http://www.cato.org/index.html http://www.bongonews.com/ http://www.ciij.org/ http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª A family oriented portal site. http://www.familyfirst.com/ Costless utilities. http://www.faststone.org/ Audiophiles with a DIY urge should like these sites. http://www.pvconsultants.com/audio/frdgroup.htm http://www.linearteam.dk/default.aspx?pageid=winisd http://www.speakerworkshop.com/ http://www.audiogrid.com/audio/ For frugal persons. http://www.frugalfinesse.com/index.htm Paul Tomblin's image gallery. http://xcski.com/gallery/main.php He calls himself the Guitar Guy and he has his own ideas about classic songs. http://www.theguitarguy.com/home.htm Games and fun for kids from UK museums, galleries, heritage and science centres. http://www.show.me.uk/ Online games offered by a commercial site. http://www.absolutist.com/online/ Quite literally pointless, useless, in fact, false, news. http://www.newzoid.com/ Disquieting images. http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/holocaust/photoessay.htm Informal science education resources from the home of NASA's Hubble space telescope. http://hubblesource.stsci.edu/ Javascript resources. http://jsmadeeasy.com/about.htm J.A.I.L. claims to be a single-issue national grassroots organization designed to end the rampant and pervasive judicial corruption in the legal system of the United States. http://www.jail4judges.org/ A lot of interesting applications were once costless. http://www.321download.com/LastFreeware/ Catalog your books online, keep a reading list, or more. http://www.librarything.com/index.php Music, art, and more from Manu Cornet. http://www.manucornet.net/ Mark J. Jordan's Windows utilities. http://snipurl.com/nkmp Terrific images of Melbourne, Australia. http://educationdownunder.com.au/melbourne_photos.htm A piece of American maritime history. http://www.monitorcenter.org/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª If you'd like to help promote this non-commercial publication, please forward this ezine to anyone you know who might appreciate it. To spare them the forwarding carets (>>>>these things) I suggest you copy/paste the ezine to a new email window, or save the ezine as a text file to be inserted, or copy/pasted to a new email. If you've received this publication as a forward and wish to subscribe you may easily do so from online forms in these two locations: http://www.don-guitar.com/subsmanager.html //www.freelists.org/list/donspatch ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Little-known facts of Nova Scotia history. http://www.littletechshoppe.com/ns1625/histindx.html Association for the development of e-business standards. http://www.oasis-open.org/home/index.php Resource for understanding major oilfield activities. http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/ Very nice site for Outlook Express stationery and more. http://www.okiedee.com/ Old versions. Because newer is not always better. http://www.oldversion.com/ The Oneida Indian Nation. http://www.oneida-nation.net/ Information for the pro-wrestling fan. http://www.otherarena.com/ Purdue University's online writing lab. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/ Paint.net, similar to premium image editing programs. http://www.eecs.wsu.edu/paint.net/ The Online Parallel Bible. http://bible.cc/ A stand-alone RSS newsreader. http://www.wildgrape.net/ An interesting, multi-talented person. http://www.nicholasjohnson.org/ David Eppstein, photographer and much more. http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/pix/chron.html Harvard Center for Health Communication. http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/chc/ Reinventing aging. What a good idea! http://snipurl.com/nlki Learn more about reverse mortgages. http://www.reversemortgage.org/ Sterling Ball: Rockin' on without Microsoft. http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html Central point for GNU software. http://savannah.gnu.org/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª My feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html I welcome all comments, suggestions, or criticism. The form doesn't access your email client (it's a CGI form), so your privacy is assured. If you know of a website that would be a good candidate for this ezine, please pass it on via our online feedback form (link above). ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Thrift store art. http://www.thriftstoreart.com/ The artwork of Tim Williams. http://www.twillustration.com/ I decided that this page is too interesting to list as just another media site. Check out half a thousand newspaper front pages. http://www.newseum.org/todaysfrontpages/ Raising livestock in a small way. http://www.ifad.org/lrkm/region/pa/tg_431.htm Interesting reading from the early 1980s. http://www.rheingold.com/texts/tft/ Touched by an angel. http://www.touched.com/ Mainly about muppets. http://www.toughpigs.com/ I think Lisa listed a lot of parodies a famous American painting called "American Gothic" in our last issue. Here's another take on the subject which I enjoyed. http://snipurl.com/nkpc Translate "web lingo" to and from English. http://www.transl8it.com/cgi-win/index.pl A resource for persons travelling to, or from, the U.S. http://www.travel.state.gov/ World images. http://www.trekearth.com/ Humorous teaching resources from the English Teachers Network. http://www.etni.org.il/farside/ Desert photos from Arie Bar Lev. http://mydesert.co.il/slideshow_eng.html I found the site above "hidden" on this site http://www.boker.org.il/english/ and there's much more there if you wish to explore. Open-source disk encryption for Windows XP/2000/2003 and Linux. http://www.truecrypt.org/ "Tux" is the name of the Linux penguin so it's obvious that these apps didn't come from the Windows community but they are available for Windows and my grandkids like them both. http://www.newbreedsoftware.com/tuxpaint/ http://tuxracer.sourceforge.net/ A TV resource. http://www.tvacres.com/ This is just an image that made me laugh. http://www.flexbeta.net/forums/uploads/av-11411.jpg An image site from the UK. http://www.ukexpert.co.uk/photopost/index.php ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Archives for this ezine are available online here: //www.freelists.org/archives/donspatch/ The current issue is also available on my website. http://www.don-guitar.com/currentissue.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Another talented, multifaceted person, Simon Ho. http://www.simonho.org/ Spaceship radio. http://spaceshipradio.com/ Organization for the reform of drug laws. http://stopthedrugwar.org/index.shtml Image management tool with editing goodies. http://snipurl.com/nllq Teachtime encyclopedia. http://www.teachtime.com/en/wikipedia/m/ma/ Technology-related information for everybody. http://technology-sleuth.com/index.php Telephone enthusiasts rejoice! http://www.telephonecollectors.org/ http://www.museumphones.com/ http://www.tones.plus.com/ http://www.thg.org.uk/ http://atcaonline.com/index.html The newest stuff on the Web. http://www.technorati.com/ Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. http://www.emmys.tv/foundation/archive/ The first 75 years in television. http://www.tvhistory.tv/index.html The British Museum's top 10 treasures. http://snipurl.com/nln2 All kinds of personality tests. http://similarminds.com/index.html Internet Archive of Texts and Documents. http://history.hanover.edu/texts.html This site makes companies more aware of their image. http://www.thisisbroken.com/ Thoughtcrime, or is it? http://deoxy.org/tcrime.htm ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Websites everyone should know about. These aren't sponsors, they're the best of Internet publications and I highly recommend them all. http://askTCL.com http://www.langa.com http://www.tourbus.com http://www.lockergnome.com http://www.neatnettricks.com http://www.scotsnewsletter.com http://www.tricksandtrinkets.com http://marylaine.com/neatnew.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Maybe I'm just too skeptical, but this site makes me think "yeah, right". http://www.unclaimed.org/ A short jog through a long memory. http://www.utahphillips.org/ If your computer Operating System is Windows 95 or soon-to-be-obsolete Windows 98/98SE/ME and a new computer is simply out of the question, Vector Linux might offer you a viable alternative. http://www.vectorlinux.com/ The Virtual Vietnam Archive. http://www.vietnam.ttu.edu/virtualarchive/index.htm Visual Math Learning. http://www.visualmathlearning.com/ Hi-res 3D desktop wallpaper and background screens. http://www.visualparadox.com/ Vnc2swf is a cross-platform screen recording tool. http://www.unixuser.org/~euske/vnc2swf/ A semi-commercial exploration of generations. http://www.wgeneration.com/ CSS, HTML, and XHTML tutorials, graphics tutorials, articles, tips, information and resources to build or improve your Web site presence. http://www.websitetips.com/ What about cats. http://www.whataboutcats.com/index.html An oddity and mystery. http://www.toynbee.net/ I think this is a game. Is this little guy ugly or what? http://www.wikgame.com/ The Lockergnome File of the Day. http://windows.fileoftheday.com/ A collection of goodies from someone named Woolham. http://www.sjwfreeware.flyer.co.uk/ Michael Quinion's site is always worth another mention. http://www.worldwidewords.org/index.htm Study the world. http://www.worldstudy.gov/ A blogging resource. http://www.xanga.com/ Xiaoyu Wang is a second year math PhD. student at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. These are his photos. http://www.math.nyu.edu/phd_students/xiaoyu/album/album.html Here's a math site he recommends. http://www.ams.org/mathscinet/ Another Linux desktop. http://www.xpde.com/index.php Some online games. http://www.freecell.com/f/c/cinco.html http://www.freecell.com/f/c/play.html http://www.jezzball.net/ Some games you can play online, or take with you. http://www.linearteam.dk/default.aspx?pageid=dicegames ============== Humor ============= Musician's Humor, Final A jazz pianist dies and finds himself in heaven. He runs into an old friend and says "Bob, you made it too, that's great." "Yeah, turns out God's a big jazz fan. All of the cats are here, and every day is a non-stop jam session with a never-ending supply of wine, women and food. There's just one drawback." "What's that?" "Well, God has a girlfriend, and she's a singer." ============== Tips =============== http://www.danheller.com/techfaq.html http://pclt.cis.yale.edu/pclt/ http://www.pcstats.com/ http://haug.hrdy.net/tip/lookgb.php?changeval=0 http://www.scantips.com/ ======== Reader Contributions ========= Australian Barry Thompson sent this link to Crocodile Hunters, Steve and Terri Irwin's site. http://www.crocodilehunter.com.au/ Jo-Ann Burton is a wonderful friend. We didn't grow up together, and we've never met in person but she's my sister. I harvest links that she posts to her Yahoo group (to which I belong). http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sharinglinks2/ Here's a few, from Jo-Ann: Baby stuff. http://www.babynamesworld.com/ http://ssa.gov/OACT/babynames/ http://www.thinkbabynames.com/ http://new.babynameindex.com/ http://babynamewizard.com/ http://www.babynames.com/ http://www.baby-names-plus.com/ http://www.celebrity-babies.com/ http://www.babycenter.com/ http://www.babyzone.com/ http://www.usatoday.com/life/lifestyle/2005-09-25-babynames-side_x.htm Eternity travel. http://www.mos.org/quest/et/ Haunted travel in America. http://www.ghostinmysuitcase.com/ Classic film pages. http://www.moderntimes.com/ The 46 Best-ever (costless) Utilities. http://www.techsupportalert.com/best_46_free_utilities.htm Ugly money. http://www.johnnyburrito.com/uglymoney_drawn.htm This issue's contributions from reader and friend John Lepse. American WWII Orphans Network. http://www.awon.org/ Common-place. http://www.common-place.org/ Wild mood swings. http://www.wildmoodswings.co.uk/ Words can heal. http://www.wordscanheal.org/ Mp3 files of his latest album tracks are available on Neal Young's website. http://neilyoung.com/prairiewind.html This issue's contributions from reader and friend Patrick Barden Abilon is an RSS aggregator and blog tool. http://www.snapfiles.com/get/abilon.html Role Playing Games. http://www.battleon.com/ http://lotgd.net/home.php http://www.shalkith.com/index.php Identify those mysterious file extensions. http://filext.com/ A nice guide to (costless apps). http://www.freeware-guide.com/ Mix and match email stationary/website decor. http://www.jumbo-psp.com/Mix-n-Match.htm a movie review site. http://www.smart-popcorn.com/ Patrick, Lisa has had a simply wonderful time reading this woman's blog. http://holymama.typepad.com/holymama/ Irving Stein is a subscriber and regular contributor to our ezine, a friend when he's not driving me nuts, and he's one of the online computer experts at http://www.allexperts.com where his identity is "Irving S". You might also enjoy his thought provoking website: http://www.irvings-info-page.cityslide.com Here are a few sites that Irving sent me: Cloudeight, the email stationary people, have a nice start page. http://www.thundercloud.net/start/ This multimedia presentation is called "The Good Earth". (it will take a while to load if you're on a dial up connection) http://www.frontiermultimedia.com/the-good-earth.htm The 18th Edition of The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy (online). http://www.merck.com/mrkshared/mmanual/home.jsp Optical Illusions, ambiguous images, hidden pictures, upside downs. http://www.planetperplex.com/ These folks are perhaps the web's leading authorities on (costless apps). http://www.pricelesswarehome.org/ A place to store all sorts of media files. http://www.putfile.com/ Barry, Jo, John, Patrick and Irv, thank you all very much. ================================= Last words, from Lisa: Once again, it's been an interesting couple of weeks. We try to spend some time tooling around the net looking for links every day. I've decided if we read every site in detail and remembered everything, we'd be geniuses. Fortunately, this hasn't happened yet. Fortunately, you ask? Well, remember the legend that Albert Einstein had to be checked every morning before he left the house to make sure he was wearing the requisite amount of clothing. There is apparently only so much you can think about at one time. And most of us look much better clothed. Adios Lisa's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/lfefo.html Don's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html Our personal news page. http://www.don-guitar.com/babbleon.html Don Crowder and Lisa Miller Tuesday, March 14, 2006 10:42 PM CST - Buchanan Lake Village, Texas, USA Served by the U.S. Post Office in Tow (rhymes-with-cow), Texas ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Privacy: We will never share, sell, or otherwise compromise your email address. Privacy Policy on our website. http://www.don-guitar.com/privacy.html Freelists.org Privacy Policy. //www.freelists.org/privacy.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª The most important people on the Internet, for you and I as computer users, are software developers. The world's coolest computer, without software, is like a car without fuel. It might look great, but what can it do? It doesn't matter who produces the software you love and use regularly, the developers of that software need your support. A bit of advice from Internet veteran Bayard J. Fox: New computer users are often in awe of the things you can get without cost on the Internet. There can be hidden costs for the unwary. Use a "throw away" email address to register, and be constantly on guard against giving away personal information. Use a firewall, and provide only the barest minimum of information on questionnaires. ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This is a reader-supported publication. You can show your support by making a contribution in any amount you choose. No contribution is too small. http://www.don-guitar.com/donations.html ___________________________________________________________ Subscription management for this publication is available online here: http://www.don-guitar.com/subsmanager.html or here: //www.freelists.org/list/donspatch