txt :: Firefox Extensions

In one of my comments I mentioned that I use a lot of different extensions for Firefox. But why and what are they? Here I'll share the ones I use and give a short description on what they do.


Search engines [To add click on "Add Engines" in search box drop down menu]:

-- gahooyoogle - This search engine shows google and yahoo search results side by side so that you can access them both at once.

Extensions:

• Forecastfox - Shows weather right in the browser [can have several locations].
• AdBlock - Blocks annoying ads [has a default filter but you can add by right clicking on an ad and setting to block it].
• Adblock Filterset.G Updater - A nice updater for adblocks filer list.
  
• Flashblock - Blocks all flash from playing and allows you to manually tell what to play [Still doesn't work with Firefox 1.5 :(].
• Gmail Notifier - Needles to say more.
• ColorZilla - Must have for web designers, view RGB values of colors in your browser window with one click.
• Sage - RSS aggregator, for those who are lazy to use bloglines [like me].
• StumbleUpon - Stumble on different pages suggested by other users. I found a lot of very cool and useful sites [Warning: can get addictive].
• Download Statusbar - Bring your downloads to your statusbar.
• GooglePreview - Allows you to see preview of webpages in Google results.
• OpenDownload - Allows you to choose whether you want to let the OS open the downloaded file [Not supported in Firefox 1.5 yet :(].
• CustomizeGoogle - Let's you customize google's search results page [delete ads and etc].
  
• Disable Targets for Downloads - Doesn't open extra tab/window when downloading zip/jpeg/mp3 and etc files.
• Mouse Gestures - Allows you to use mouse gestures to controll your navigation through the web [back/next/reload/go-to-homepage and etc].
• FlashGot - Allows you to download files with external programs like FlashGet/ReGet/GetRight and etc.
• IE View - Allows you to launch IE with current page [if it's not supported but you really want to see the page].
• HashColouredTabs - Colors tabs with no icon in different colors based on domain [ex.: google - red, yahoo - blue].
• Dictionary Tooltip - Double click/Ctrl+Double Click on a word and see it's meaning from a dictionary.
• Tab Mix Plus - One of the best tabs extentions [even supports restoring closed tabs].
• FasterFox - Speed up your Firefox so it flies through pretty much any page.
• PDF Download - Allows you a choice between downloading PDF or viewing it in a browser.
  

That came out kinda long. Ups... Of well... Firefox is great and I encourage everybody to use it.

Note: Post in the comments if you're using other extensions (I focused on those supported by Mozilla Foundation).

link :: Firefox 1.5!

Well it's out! Not fully official, but it's out (:

Firefox 1.5

Spread the fire!

-bla

txt :: Daily News [Nov 28, 2005]

Very interesting article for those who uses iTunes. It describes how to supercharge the program and bring some of the needed features of Winamp.

• Supercharge iTunes
  

This link gives 18 different tricks on how to do stuff to your body. Mostly targeted at men, but usefull for others too.

• 18 tricks for your body

For those more advanced in computer world. If you use run command in windows to launch stuff on the regulr basis you need to read this list.

• 99 most useful run commands
  

txt :: Happy Thanksgiving !!!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of your friends !!!

I hope that all of you spend a great evening among friends or family and enjoyed the good meal with juicy turkey.

link :: Want to drive without speeding tickets?

Speeding tickets are pain and you never know where the cop is going to pull out from. Well... Now you kinda know :)

Police Radio Scanners

txt :: Something to do when you're bored at work...

Here are some links to more or less intellectual games online that you can play while you're at work and feed a little (or a lot) bored.

• InstantChess
• CrosswordPuzzles
• WebSodoku
• Yahoo Word Games

Any additions post in the comments.

link :: Google maps with ratings

These guys decided to add ratings to google maps and add separation into categories for most commonly searched/needed services.

Now they have restaurants, Night life, shopping and many more. Check it out for yourself.

Yepl Map-Tastic!

link :: Turn you iBook 12" into PowerBook 12"

iBooks are actually pretty popular among students because of their price. 1000$ or somewhere around there.

Here is tutorial on how to turbo charge your iBook. :)


Put your iBook on steroids.

txt :: Daily News [22 Nov 2005]

There is an interesting site that I accidently found that talkes about how to handle long flights.
Second link is a site that tells about seating in different airplanes of some famous airlines (very usefull in my opinion).

• Long Flights
• Airplane Seating

And ofcourse the XBox is out today. This site has a lot of links to different reviews.

• Xbox Reviews

Here is a listing for defferent [all or almost all] google offered services.

• Google Services

This product is a must have for those that host parties and things like that.

• LaserVibe

txt :: I HATE Jerry Springer !!!!

Sorry for bluntness and roughness but you'll understand why....

I have that mofo! He with his stupid white trash show showed to the world how low the humans can fall and not just on the show but those that are actually watching it.

Today I had a clip send to me by a friend who wanted me to translate what people were saying from Russian. The popularity of the show mentioned above pushed TV channels to create similar shows in other contries.

To tell you that I'm mad right now is to tell nothing !!!

[No kids allowed! I'm not kidding about this one! No nudity. Unbearable to watch.]

Here's the link

I'm just sad that rather than bringing something good the western culture brings violence, Sex in The City, Jerry Springer, Reality Shows (such that the only thing that is more stupid that these are seasons 2,3,4...), drugs and many other things to our cultures. The forms these evils take differ but all of them with no exceptions are extremely unecceptable.

I hope this brings a lot of reaction out of you guys because it defenitely did with me.

txt :: A new "Daily News" (not Daily Universe!!!) rubrick

I was thinking it would be a cool idea to post some interesting news, gadgets or whatever else is new so that people can check it and then maybe follow the links and make comments :) I'll try to make it daily or so but it all depends on how you guys will respond to the initiative.

So todays roundup of cool gadgets:

• Inflatable Human Beach Ball
• Laser Guided Pool Cue (looks very cool)

Anything cool that you guys find just post in the comments. I'll post normal news too, but this is intendent to be easy and light, not serious.

pics :: Scooter accident [UPDATE]

This is what I got for crashing my scooter - Infinity FX35 :D

A friend of mine said that he is gonna but scooters for all his money and then crash them all just because he wants to drive this car so bad.

The only problem is that it eats gas like a kid would eat candies. But who am I to complain it's a good car after all. 

txt :: Posting name change...not sure why

Just wanted to let you know, I'm changing my posting name to Maximus as in "Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next."

-R

Brothers, what we do in life... echoes in eternity.

txt :: What do people REALLY think?

Ok, I want to talk about the abortion and see what you guys really think about it. Not what other people say, not what world says is right, but what you really think. Even if it may come contrary with your beliefs or traditions and you feel comfortable expressing it, please do.

The other day at work I was reading the Daily Universe (this is the only thing we can read at work except scriptures and LDS literature) and I found a debate between a democrat and a republican representative. The issue they were discussing was abortion. The girl represented the democrats and a young man represented republicans (I personally think that two representative of the same gender should take part in this kind of debate)

The opening sentence for the democrat argument was:

Our Church [LDS] teaches us... and she pursued with her comment. She presented a comment (which I very much agreed with), but it did not seem like it was coming from her, it was like she was pogrammed to say what was proper to say in the kind of the newspaper she was writing it for, which is BYU newspaper.

The guy's point of view was not very clear, but by the time I got to his point of view, I was already puzzled by the quesion that I am expressing here. What do people really think?

Here is my opinion. I think that each person has agency and they are to do with themselves whatever they wish. I also think that we cannot choose the consiquences of our choices. For example, if I were in the position where I got pregnant without a husband, I would NOT get an abortion for several reasons:

1. If I was blessed with a child I should give him/her life, raise him/her and be loving mother to him/her, because it was intended for me. I think that everything happens for a reason.

2. Health reasons. If a young woman who has not had kids before gets a first abortion she may never get pregnant again.

The only circumstances under which I would consider abortion is if I became a victim of rape. I personally think that it would be hard to raise a child and be reminded of a terrible thing that had been done to you.

Also, I think that again for the medical reasons, for example, one cannot give birth to a baby (either life of a baby or a mother is in danger) it is appropriate to get an abortion.

Again, we all know that adoption is very encouraged and probably would be the best answer but it is never easy to give away a baby.

I do not know what it is like to have someone inside you and then give it life, but I certainly think that parenting is one of the most amazing gifts given to men and women.

I am looking forward to your comments, guys. I know that there are single and married people and people with kids on this blog. I would really like to know what you think about this issue, what you really think.

txt :: The real HACKERS are back!

Recently the word "hacking" and "hacker" started to appear in internet media more and more.

Is it related to some virus/worm epidemic or somebody hacking pentagon once again? The answer surprisingly enough is "NO"!

With the rise of Web 2.0 and appearance of things like blogs, and other types of freely available way of expressing yourself on the internet, the meaning of the work "hacker" began to change. It started to redefine itself from the negative image that media gives it into something new, or maybe we've already seen that good old new?

Originally the word "hacker" meant somebody who likes to find new innovative ways to use existing technologies that these things were not meant to do by their creator/manufacturer.

That sounds awfully familiar. Right now we hear more and more of the hackers that figure out new ways to use gadgets, computer programs and pretty much anything around us that they can get their hands on. But they don't do it to harm the almighty "Big Brother" or to start a nuclear war with one phone call. No, they do it because they are interested in how things are working and what will happen if they push these three buttons together, or maybe one by one.

The world is finally waking up from an informational oppression by ruling parties. We finally have a right to be vocal and have the whole world that IS listening and waiting for our scream, whisper or maybe it's just a wink. Finally we can set definitions right instead of believing in everything that the big talking box [TV] tells us.

I love Internet and think it's one of the greatest inventions ever made that could stand side by side with Newton's Gravity and Einstein's Relativity and hold its head straight and high!

movie :: Goblet Of Fire Pre-release Review

I found this on wired today: Goblet Of Fire Review

I personally love the series and the movies so I'm very anxious to see the next one.

txt :: These weird people creatures...

I started noticing one interesting thing lately, people are very self centered.

All people ever talk about is themselves. It's hard to find a person who is not your close friend, or not interested in gaining something from you, who will actually listen and have a normal conversations without referring to some heroic thing (at least that's how they portray it). I'm not talking about the times when it's just some normal experience but rather about times when the person blows up some minor thing that happen to him when he was a kid or even earlier so that they could feel significant. All sales people [Randall knows that very well] know about that and use it very successfully.

I guess I'm just a little bit annoyed that people can't really be altruistic and always search for some gain. One of my professors recently said that there are only three emotions that people base their decisions on: greed, sex and greed. Yes, we have a double dose of greed in us. Only that and nothing else. I wish people could be people and not just search for gain (respect, money , power and etc.) and be human like rather than predator like.

Your thought and comments are more than welcome...

music :: HIM - The Ultimate rock band

Intro:

HIM is a Finnish band that sings in English. They are very popular in Europe but unfortunately still didn't come to US because people are not that interested in European music down here.


Style:

The style is calm rock with a very significant emphasis on vocal. In reality the melody sometimes even goes in the background because the words and the meaning of them is what brings power to their songs. Lyrics are very interesting even though they can be called a little bit satanic by some.

Link:

http://www.heartagram.com/

Note:

They just released a new album and it is very much in tune with the overall style of the band. If you like the style then I really recommend you check out their older work too (Razorblade Romance is one of the best ones in my opinion).

pic :: Siberian "Ushanka" hat !!!

Not all is lost in Provo, there is still light in the end of the tunnel. Guess what I found in one of the stores. Yes, a Russian style "Ushanka" hat. Of course it's not as nice but still...

Now, I can call myself a real Russian.

link :: Best of What's New 2005

(That's not a radio controlled toy! It's a real car!)

This is a report that was done by popular science that goes over many new technologies (not just computers) that were developed in 2005.

Best of What's New 2005

Note: Interesting to note that Hydrogen and Fuel Cells in general got a lot of attention.

pics :: Bleeding Edge Technology

You know how it goes... Always bring you the best of the best technology advancements!

app :: The coolest calendar + todo + events keeping program ever

I found this program and it turned out to be not just useful but also light and very easy on resources. Another thing that I also really like (or want) is good looks (the reson why i'm still not on Linux, I know I suck) which this little app definitely got the edge in.

It has costomizable skins and a lot of plugins. One of the plugins that comes prebuilt is the Outlook Plugin. So useful if you have a Windows Mobile PDA because the only thing the calendar can sync is Outlook (Todo list can olso be taken from there).

Anyway, enough talking just get and see for yourself.

Rainlendar

radio :: Tired of Yahoo's Launch, try this....

I stumbled upon it by complete accident. A very good radio site that just went free (don't we all love free stuff).

Anyway, the coolest thing is that you give it a song or an artist and it finds everything in it's database that's similar in beat, melody, vocal contents and etc.

www.pandora.com

txt :: Where do you get your news?

Hey guys! As I came to work today, I did what I usually do every time I come to work:

1. Check all emails


2. Check the blog ;)


3. Check on news of all sorts.

Now as you all know I'm a big nerd that's in computer science hehe AND so naturally Slashdot is one of my top choices every day. I love the content they have, even though the website itself doesn't look like it (: Well as I'm about to leave work, I checked slashdot once again and then the thought came to me... I wonder where my friends get their news every day?! So this goes to all of you just out of curiosity and also just to learn what your interests are! The sources don't even have to be on the internet... so for our BYU friends it can be the Daily Universe (ain't no shame in it), and so on and so forth! (:

-bla

txt :: Yet another administrative yadi yada

Ok guys. Yes this is another one of those hehe, but these administrative changes are great! When fake posted the previous post he asked for some opinions, and based on the replies we got, we created a mailing list through google groups and now every time someone posts something to our blog, all the people on the member's list on google groups will receive an email with the content.

Now based on the amount of people that post, we're not even sure how many read the blog! So instead of adding all of you to the google groups (and then getting you all mad at us because you feel like we're spamming you) we decided to let you, our fellow bloggers and friends decide if you'd like to receive emails with the posts and comments. If you're interested then leave a comment and we'll add you to the list. The awesome thing is you can go and change the settings NOT to receive the emails... This is all done in google groups. Our google groups address is:

http://groups.google.com/group/nikak

Please let us know by either commenting to this post, or sending an email to nikak.com@gmail.com and we'll add you to the mailing list.

We appreciate all of you joining our blog and helping us keep in touch with you. We added you all to our blog because we value your friendship very much and would love to keep in touch.

Thanks!!

-bla & fake

txt :: The best download manager ever

I've used this program before but for a while there was no devoplemnt on it so I kinda switched to browser default browser and forgot about it. Well now it's back!

... Today I was trying to download some mp3's from a web site of some russian band ("Gosti iz Buduiushego" wor those who know) and it kept breaking on 60 or persent. End every single time like that, so annoying. If you restart the download it sometimes gets higher percentage done, but sometimes not. So I desperately needed some download manager so it could resume bacause firefox, explorer, free download manager and many many others didn't support resume on this site. It just simply sucked. All of them gave the maximum speed of 60-90KB/s

Then I remembered about Flashget. So I tried it. Holy crap it was fast!!! The first file was done in some 10 seconds with speeds of 250KB and more !!! ...

Anyway, the new version is absolutely free and very very fast. There is an extension for firefox that works with it seemlessly that's called FlashGot. Here is the site for the actual program.

http://www.amazesoft.com/

[Technical crap: It splits the file into many pieces and launches separate downloads for each one which gives it great speeds, I think it even launches them through proxies so that the site that limits to 2 connections a time can go very fast.]

P.S. No adware or spyware. Enjoy. :)

link :: Stupid movie physics

Ok, this is one of the funnies pages I've seen for a while (of course it comes only in the second place after insanely messed up egg song but anyway). If you scroll to the bottom of the page it gives some very funny reviews about some widely known movies.

Insultingly stupid movie physics

txt :: Another administrative yada-yada...

Thanks for everyone who is actively posting or making comments, we really appretiate this since it relies on all of us to keep this little pub, for the friends to gather and discuss what matters or just share news, alive and pumping (or pimping, whichever you like best).

There are some changes that were made to the layout of the blog. It seems that noone cares exactly how many members are on the blog and what are their names so I took it out and instead put "Previous posts" as the first item on the right. To see other changes look on the right side of the page. Tell us if you want it back.

We're also asking you guys as those that are actually visiting and constantly using the site for any suggestions/comments on what you like or dislike about the blog. We will look at each suggestion and try to improve upon it at the best of our abilities (And yes, even wild ideas like putting a picture of a martian in the intro will be considered, probably not satisfied, but considered).

For those who are more technically inclined and are taking advantage of the Web 2.0 technologies we do have a working Atom feed:

http://nikak.blogspot.com/atom.xml

Waiting for your comments...