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Archive for February, 2011|Monthly archive page

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The Informant: Free or cheap clipboard managers to improve your productivity

In Hardware, Technology, The Informant on February 15, 2011 at 12:51 pm
Huggy Bear, Informant

When you think informer, you think Huggy Bear, now don't you?

If, like me, you do a lot of typing to produce content or code on your computer, then the clipboard is your friend. We all know how useful it can be to take a phrase that you’re going to be using often (especially long, difficult-to-spell phrases) and just drop it into your document or form with ease. But your clipboard can help you a lot more than that and you can probably add useful features for free!

The main thing you’ll probably want in this type of program is some sort of copy history. The great limitation of the standard clipboards on Mac and Windows is the ability to hold only one item. If your clipboard could remember, oh, say, the last ten items you copied, it would be easy to store several chunks of text that you’ll be using over and over. Plus, no copying over an important piece of data by accident. Several programs can also handle images and other data as well. Many offer additional features that make them even more useful. Here are some ways to get started.

On my Mac, my clipboard manager is ClipMenu. This free program adds a memory for up to ten copied objects and can be accessed by a simple icon on my menu bar. It also has the ability to store several chunks of text that you use frequently as “Snippets.” You can group these by topics and give them convenient titles so you can remember them. I’ve only been using it about two weeks but it does exactly what it’s supposed to do, with no conflicts with other system resources. Some other popular free programs include Jumpcut and Clyppan. Also, no mention of clipboard managers on the Mac would be complete without mentioning CopyPaste — this grandaddy of Mac cliupboard managers will set you back $30, but it boasts a wide array of features that may benefit power users.

I haven’t explored the clipboard manager offerings for Windows but, during my research, I did encounter an article at organization and productivity website LifeHacker that listed several free Windows options — CLCL, ArsClip and Ditto. ClipMate is pay software, at $34.95, but offers a much larger set of features.

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Who wants to be poet laureate of Tacoma? You know you do!

In Arts, General, Government, Media on February 9, 2011 at 8:30 pm

The Tacoma Arts Commission is now accepting applications for the 4th annual Tacoma Poet Laureate program.

The individual selected as Tacoma Poet Laureate will hold the position for two years, from May

Tacoma logo

Hint: It rhymes with "aroma"

2011 to April 2013, and will receive a $2,000 stipend for providing a minimum of two free poetry related workshops each year, reciting his/her original work at various public events, participating in Art at Work: Tacoma Arts Month in November and helping produce the 2013 Tacoma Poet Laureate ceremony to announce the next Poet Laureate.

Applicants must reside in Tacoma, be a practicing poet who is dedicated to producing work on a regular basis and at least 18 years of age. Other eligibility requirements apply; see the application for full details.

The Tacoma Poet Laureate program was founded in 2008 by Urban Grace Church as a way of focusing attention on Tacoma ’s literary talent by organizing and hosting public readings and workshops in local schools and at community events. The program transitioned to the City of Tacoma’s Arts Program in 2011.

The application deadline is Feb. 22, 2011. Information about the Tacoma Poet Laureate program and the application are available on the Tacoma Arts Commission website at http://www.tacomaculture.org/arts/PoetLaureate.asp. Requests for hard copy applications can be directed to Cultural Arts Specialist Naomi Strom-Avila at nstrom-avila@cityoftacoma.org or (253) 591-5191.

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Computing pioneer Ken Olsen dies

In Hardware, Society, Technology on February 8, 2011 at 12:20 pm

On Sunday, computer industry pioneer Ken Olsen died but I really didn’t start thinking about it ’til yesterday. I was suddenly reminded that Olsen was one of my first big interviews when I got into journalism.

I was a young associate editor with InfromationWeek magazine. This was boomtown Boston of the “Massachusetts Miracle”-era and running the New England bureau for a somewhat influential technology magazine was not a bad place at all for a young man to be.

Olsen’s Digital Equipment Corp was pretty much the big dog in those days — more influential in that region than any company except maybe Lotus. DEC made minicomputers — computers much smaller than classic IBM-style mainframes. They were still pretty big and expensive by later standards but Olsen was a primary force in putting more computing power into the hands of actual workers, instead of a data center. He was also the force behind getting computing into the hands of mid-sized and even small businesses.

Some of those computers even found their way into the hands of individuals, helping spark the PC revolution — Bill Gates and Paul Allen are said to have written some of their first code hacking a DEC PDP-10. Sadly, Olsen vastly underrated the impact of the PC and DEC eventually fell behind the pack.

I was thinking today about the day I drove out to one of DEC’s estate-like campuses. I think it was Northampton, MA. They had originally floated the idea of sending a helicopter down to get me but the New England bureau of InformationWEEK magazine consisted of a couple of offices in a tiny professional building next to a Waltham, MA strip mall. We had no place for a helicopter to land.

Olsen was an imposing man, stocky and bald; he seemed bigger than he was. He was piercingly intelligent and, even while spearheading his company’s attempted charm offensive, it was still clear he didn’t have much patience for stupid questions. Still, he was unfailingly gracious — a CEO out of a more civilized age. He gave me about an hour — remarkable for Olsen at the time. Although we met a few other times, this would be the only time I was able to speak to him in any depth.

Ken Olsen was one of the most importing people who isn’t widely known. Good-by and godspeed.

Computer pioneer Ken Olsen dies

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Western Digital MyBook hard drive, we hardly knew ye

In Hardware, Mac, Technology on February 2, 2011 at 2:38 pm

Disenfranchised in my most recent studio upgrade, it sits forlorn at the end of my table, not connected to anything — a Western Digital MyBook Premium 750 GB external hard drive. It was meant to be a key piece in my new setup — a nice, big drive to hold my Time Machine backups. Instead, it is less than a paperweight. Right now, it’s a brick.

Western Digital is a pretty respected name in the business and the MyBook got more than adequate reviews when it was new. The thing probably came out in about 2007, about the time I got mine. It is moderately small, about the size of a trade paperback book, and stylishly designed.

WD MyBook Premium

WD MyBook Premium

But its first, immediately-obvious problem is that the drive was slow — even for that day and age. Now, four years later, it’s positively pokey. Second was that the included EMC Retrospect Express Backup software was atrocious. Instead of me being able to run nice, consistent, overnight, versioned backups, I too often got processes that froze and crashed my machine, corrupting backup data. I tried other solutions, which were better, but still didn’t provide robust, affordable, reliable backup within my budget (i.e. incredibly cheap or free). Finally, with my new Mac Mini and Apple’s built-in Time Machine, I thought the time had finally come to put this brawny mother into the game.

No go. The Mac Mini could only recognize the drive intermittently. I couldn’t consistently read or write large files to it or format it. It obviously couldn’t be used for backup. I checked a variety of forums to find out why this might be. There were no shortage of people complaining about similar issues — there were just few effective answers. I tried a bunch of software-related fixes but nothing helped. I saw a lot of folks complaining about cheap hardware used in the hard drive enclosure. Many people just yanked the drive itself into a new enclosure and had success with that. Hardware is not my core competency, so that’s a stunt I’ll try some other time.

Western Digital has discontinued the drive so what little support still being done for the model is sporadic and desultory. In several forums, users who wrote Western Digital quoted e-mail responses indicating that WD didn’t much care, if at all. Apple was no more helpful. The only people deeply motivated to solve this issue were us poor schlubs who were affected.

Anyway, the brick sits there, unusable. All in all, it was never particularly useful, given the cost. And I, as a customer, feel ill-used. There are other prominent manufacturers out there like Seagate and LaCie. I’ll try one of them next time.

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Biomass Bloviations

In General, Government, Media, Society, Technology on February 1, 2011 at 9:07 pm

There has recently been a fair amount of controversy in my city — Olympia, WA — concerning the topic of Biomass Gasification. The Evergreen State College (TESC) has forged ahead with plans to build a biomass gasification plant on campus, while much larger, commercial operations are slated in nearby Shelton and Port Angeles. I learned a little about this topic doing research for a local newspaper so I figured I’d share.

Briefly put, biomass is organic stuff like wood which is broken down for energy. Only, instead of burning, the biomass is heated to very high temperatures in an oxygen-starved environment. The biomass can be heated past its burning point and broken down to release a gas that works much like natural gas, to hear some tell it.

There is still the issue that biomass still release a fair amount of particulate matter. It’s vastly cleaner than smokestacks from a wood fire, but residents are still concerned about air quality and the environment.

This week, two notices caught my eye. Tomorrow, TESC Office of Sustainability is hosting an open house on the topic. Everyone is invited to “stop in to a campus community information session on biomass gasification this Wednesday evening. We will have an open house format to allow people to drop in at any point. We will be sharing information about why we are considering this technology, as well as details about the technology itself, and some of the results from our feasibility study so far.” The open house is Weds. Feb. 2, 4-6 pm, Seminar II, A1105.

The scond is from local activists who are fighting newly introduced state legislation — Senate bill 5228 and House bill 1081. Michelle Morris, Director of Concerned Citizens of Thurston County writes, “These two bills were introduced to two weeks ago to strip county commissioners and other county planners of their authority over biomass facilities and,  if passed, they will usurp the Thurston County biomass moratorium.”

The group announced a phone call and letter writing campaign from concerned voters. For more information, visit Concerned Citizens of Thurston County.