AutoIt v3 - Automate and Script Windows Tasks - For Free!

AutoIt v3 - Automate and Script Windows Tasks - For Free!: "AutoIt v3 is a freeware BASIC-like scripting language designed for automating the Windows GUI and general scripting. It uses a combination of simulated keystrokes, mouse movement and window/control manipulation in order to automate tasks in a way not possible or reliable with other languages (e.g. VBScript and SendKeys)."

San Jose Mercury News - Market for doorknobs slowly losing its grip

San Jose Mercury News - Market for doorknobs slowly losing its grip: "Because few people, decorators aside, get up in the morning feeling that they simply must do something about their doorknobs, it's a slow revolution. But levers now account for 15 percent of U.S. door-opener sales for homes, according to hardware industry surveys, and double that in the market's high end."

Bare Choons - Flash Physics

Bare Choons - Flash Physics: "Wow! It's amazing what you can do with flash these days... You can even interact with it. My favorite it the 2nd experiment."

Bullet Continuous Collision Detection and Physics Library

Bullet Continuous Collision Detection and Physics Library: "Bullet is a 3D Collision Detection and Rigid Body Dynamics Library for games and animation.
Free for commercial use, including PlayStation 3, Open Source multiplatform C under the ZLib License.
Discrete and continuous collision detection, integrated into Blender 3D and COLLADA 1.4 Physics tools support."

Netgear's tiny Network Attached Storage RAID -- just right for a home entertainment/data server? - Boing Boing

Netgear's tiny Network Attached Storage RAID -- just right for a home entertainment/data server? - Boing Boing: "it's a network-attached storage box with four SATA slots that comes empty or with up to 4 terabytes of storage and is approximately the size of the little practice amp I had when I was learning to play bass guitar."

Bulk Food Distributor, Wholesale Spices, Nuts, Chocolates and Candy Online

Bulk Food Distributor, Wholesale Spices, Nuts, Chocolates and Candy Online: "the premier online bulk foods distributor"

The Optics of an Eyeglass Prescription

The Optics of an Eyeglass Prescription: "This essay is intended to satisfy curiosity about what the notations and numbers on an eyeglass prescription mean. It is about optics, not about ophthalmology."

Bacon Flow Chart

Bacon Flow Chart

Fun with Inform 7 || kuro5hin.org

Fun with Inform 7 || kuro5hin.org: "What is Inform you may ask? Well it's compiler for the old z-machine VM, that was made popular by Infocom in the 1980's."

Sinus problems? Wash them away -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com

Sinus problems? Wash them away -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com: "Twenty-five years later, she's still touting the neti pot -- and she's also using it daily to refresh her nasal passages."

more at:
http://instapundit.com/archives2/013258.php#013258

Alfred the King of Disco, Dick Hyman

Alfred the King of Disco, Dick Hyman: "There is nothing anonymous about this tune. 'Alfred, the King of Disco' is certainly not going to just blend in with the likes of 'Two Hearts in Three-Quarter Time' or 'The Way We Were.' It's not only odd, it quite likely never make it out of the sound library until someone grabbed the tape.

And then there's the music. This is Hyman solo on electronic organ with rhythm effects and some kind of wah-wah peddle. In fact, it sounds as if some demo tape Hyman recorded to showcase his skills on the wah-wah, since at one point he dabbles with it to the point that the tune almost self-deconstructs."

Paul's Ramblings: Vintage Christmas Wax: Revisited

Paul's Ramblings: Vintage Christmas Wax: Revisited: "here is a collection of vintage wax recordings from the early 1900s through the late 1930s"

Games � Bloxorz

Games � Bloxorz :
twotd

FARK.com: (3274131) Sixty-three years ago today, the Battle of the Bulge began. "Just pull your vehicle behind me... I'm the 82nd Airborne, and this i

FARK.com: (3274131) Sixty-three years ago today, the Battle of the Bulge began. "Just pull your vehicle behind me... I'm the 82nd Airborne, and this is as far as the bastards are going"

"Late on the night of December 23rd, Sergeant John Banister of the 14th Cavalry Group found himself meandering through the village of Provedroux, southwest of Vielsalm. He'd been separated from his unit during the wild retreat of the first days and joined up with Task Force Jones, defending the southern side of the Fortified Goose Egg. Now they were in retreat again. The Germans were closing in on the village from three sides. American vehicles were pulling out, and Banister was once again separated from his new unit, with no ride out.

A tank destroyer rolled by; somebody waved him aboard and Banister eagerly climbed on. They roared out of the burning town. Somebody told Banister that he was riding with Lieutenant Bill Rogers. "Who's he?" Banister wanted to know. "Will Rogers' son," came the answer. It was a hell of a way to meet a celebrity.
An hour later they reached the main highway running west from Vielsalm. There they found a lone soldier digging a foxhole. Armed with bazooka and rifle, unshaven and filthy, he went about his business with a stoic nonchalance. They pulled up to him and stopped. He didn't seem to care about the refugees. "If yer lookin for a safe place," he said, "just pull that vehicle behind me. I'm the 82nd Airborne. This is as far as the bastards are going."

The men on the tank destroyer hesitated. After the constant retreats of the last week, they didn't have much fight left in them. But the paratrooper's determination was infectious. "You heard the man," declared Rogers. "Let's set up for business!" Twenty minutes later, two truckloads of GIs joined their little roadblock. All through the night, men trickled in, and their defenses grew stronger."

Top 15 Weird Gadgets You Never Thought Existed

Top 15 Weird Gadgets You Never Thought Existed: "Innovation has brought us many amazing gadgets. However, there are some weird gadgets that were born as the result of the wildest imagination by their inventors. Here are the top 15 weird gadgets that you never thought existed."

Now THAT is a Christmas dinner! | Samizdata.net

Now THAT is a Christmas dinner! | Samizdata.net: "The surge in popularity may have something to do with TV chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's creation of a ten-bird roast on his show two years ago. He stuffed an 18lb turkey with a goose, duck, mallard, guinea fowl, chicken, pheasant, partridge, pigeon and woodcock - producing a remarkable Russian doll-like dish."

Diana Walker: The Bigger Picture Gallery (December 2007) - The Digital Journalist

Diana Walker: The Bigger Picture Gallery (December 2007) - The Digital Journalist: "STEVE JOBS AT HOME IN 1982 — “This was a very typical time. I was single. All you needed was a cup of tea, a light, and your stereo, you know, and that’s what I had.” —Steve Jobs"

Phone Recording Archive

Phone Recording Archive: "Here are a bunch of phone company recordings that I have recorded off of my phone. The files are available in .WAV format and also in .MP3 format"

Faith Central - Times Online - WBLG: Advent calendars

Faith Central - Times Online - WBLG: Advent calendars
Daily manger sets!

success_large.jpg (JPEG Image, 1155x1330 pixels)

success_large.jpg (JPEG Image, 1155x1330 pixels)

Datamancer.net -- Datamancer's Steampunk Victorian Laptop

Datamancer.net -- Datamancer's Steampunk Victorian Laptop: "This may look like a Victorian music box, but inside this intricately hand-crafted wooden case lives a Hewlett-Packard ZT1000 laptop that runs both Windows XP and Ubuntu Linux. It features an elaborate display of clockworks under glass, engraved brass accents, claw feet, an antiqued copper keyboard and mouse, leather wrist pads, and customized wireless network card. The machine turns on with an antique clock-winding key by way of a custom-built ratcheting switch made from old clock parts."

inside looking out � What You Need To Know About Amazon SimpleDB

inside looking out � What You Need To Know About Amazon SimpleDB:

"What’s cool about SimpleDB
* Really large data sets
* Really Fast
* Highly Available - It’s Amazon. Running Erlang. Whoa.
* On demand scaling - Like S3, EC2, with a sensible data metering pricing model
* Schemaless - major cool factor for me here; items are little hash tables containing sets of key, value pairs"

Plushie:An Interactive Design System for Plush Toys:

We introduce Plushie, an interactive system that allows nonprofessional users to design their own original plush toys. To design a plush toy, one needs to construct an appropriate two-dimensional (2D) pattern. However, it is difficult for non-professional users to appropriately design a 2D pattern. Some recent systems automatically generate a 2D pattern for a given three-dimensional (3D) model, but constructing a 3D model is itself a challenge. Furthermore, an arbitrary 3D model cannot necessarily be realized as a real plush toy, and the final sewn result can be very different from the original 3D model. We avoid this mismatch by constructing appropriate 2D patterns and applying simple physical simulation to it on the fly during 3D modeling. In this way, the model on the screen is always a good approximation of the final sewn result, which makes the design process much more efficient. We use a sketching interface for 3D modeling and also provide various editing operations tailored for plush toy design. Internally, the system constructs a 2D cloth pattern in such a way that the simulation result matches the user's input stroke. Our goal is to show that relatively simple algorithms can provide fast, satisfactory results to the user whereas the pursuit of optimal layout and simulation accuracy lies outside this paper's scope. We successfully demonstrated that non-professional users could design plush toys or balloon easily using Plushie.

Welcome to DropZone, home of SCAD diving in the UK

Welcome to DropZone, home of SCAD diving in the UK: "SCAD Diving is a new, unique thrill ride. It is the only system in the world, that allows unattached, controlled free fall. The rider gets to the release level at 150 feet height by using a special elevator or the stairs outside the tower. Mobile operations use buildings or cranes."

Megan McArdle (December 11, 2007) - How can markets be efficient if people are such morons?

Megan McArdle (December 11, 2007) - How can markets be efficient if people are such morons?: "There is, of course, a bit of a puzzle in finance. To wit: how can markets be so efficient that even very smart people with PhDs in finance cannot (on average) outperform a diversified index, when so many of the people buying and selling the stocks are so stupid that they think they can beat the market?"

Handbook of Applied Cryptography

Handbook of Applied Cryptography: "CRC Press has generously given us permission to make all chapters available for free download. "

Desktop Tower Defense

Desktop Tower Defense: "Desktop TD is a fun flash based puzzle / strategy game where you have to protect your desktop from invaders by spending money on attacking pieces and building a maze for them to follow. A strangely addictive yet stress relieving game... how many levels can you survive?"

CAPTCHA CAPTCHA DECODER CAPTCHA DECODE

CAPTCHA CAPTCHA DECODER CAPTCHA DECODE

The Programmer Dress Code

The Programmer Dress Code: "I really want to know what it is about programming, or computers in general, that makes people want to grow a beard, have long hair, and dress like a slob."

Johnny Chung Lee - Projects - Wii

Johnny Chung Lee - Projects - Wii: "Since the Wiimote can track sources of infrared (IR) light, you can track pens that have an IR led in the tip. By pointing a wiimote at a projection screen or LCD display, you can create very low-cost interactive whiteboards or tablet displays. Since the Wiimote can track upto 4 points, multiple pens can be used. "

Vertical Wind Tunnel / Indoor Skydiving

Vertical Wind Tunnel / Indoor Skydiving: "iFly SF Bay is vertical wind tunnel where almost anyone can learn to fly. iFly by SkyVenture is the most exciting activity around!"

Starting Forth by Leo Brodie

Starting Forth by Leo Brodie: "This classic Forth tutorial is available in its entirety here as an updated online edition. Updates to the original text include code examples that run on iForth and SwiftForth systems. Aficionados (and detractors) of the original book's illustrations will find most of them restored in this online edition by FORTH, Inc."

What's a File?

What's a File?: "What's a File? Mark Dominus Plover Systems Co."

Monospace/Fixed Width Programmer's Fonts

Monospace/Fixed Width Programmer's Fonts: "Becoming frustrated with source code not aligning in my favorite source editor I decided to hunt for the best font. In particular, I began to hunt down the available fixed-width or monospaced fonts."

SAGE: Open Source Mathematics Software

SAGE: Open Source Mathematics Software: "SAGE: Open Source Mathematics Software / 'Building the Car Instead of Reinventing the Wheel' "

PROBABILITY THEORY -- THE LOGIC OF SCIENCE

PROBABILITY THEORY -- THE LOGIC OF SCIENCE: "Fragmentary Edition of June 1994"

Developer's Guide - Google Chart API - Google Code

Developer's Guide - Google Chart API - Google Code: "The Google Chart API lets you dynamically generate charts. To see the Chart API in action, open up a browser window and copy the following URL into it: http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=lc&chs=200x125&chd=s:helloWorld"

Favourite System 80 Books

Favourite System 80 Books

TRS-80 Assembly Language by Hubert. S. Howe Jr.

Basic faster and better and other mysteries by Lewis Rosenfelder


with downloadable pdfs!!!

Jason Corso - Vi Input Manager Plugin

Jason Corso - Vi Input Manager Plugin: "This bundle patches the Cocoa Text System to add a Vi-like command mode. After entering command-mode (typically, by hitting escape in Vi), ordinary Vi commands can be typed and the text field will be updated accordingly. Essentially, this add Vi command functionality (albeit a small subset) to any (and all) text editors that use the Cocoa text system; e.g., Safari, TeXShop, XCode, etc. Note, however, this does not work for other programs that do not use the Cocoa system.

All the text windows, will initialize in 'input' mode (standard cocoa text input). You invoke the Vi-command window (exit the input mode) by hitting ` (the back-apostrophe key, this is customizable, see installation instructions) and then key in your favorite Vi commands. For example, move down a line 'j', move right 'l', delete two lines 'd2d', and so on. You enter back into 'input' mode by typing the 'i'. You get the idea. Right now, you should be thinking -- 'you mean the editor in XCode will behave like Vi?' Answer: Yes."

Creative Destruction's Reconstruction: Joseph Schumpeter Revisited - ChronicleReview.com

Creative Destruction's Reconstruction: Joseph Schumpeter Revisited - ChronicleReview.com: "Schumpeter pointed out that that wasn't how market economies really worked. The essence of capitalist economies was, as Marx had recognized before him, the entrepreneur and the innovator: the risk taker who sets in motion new and more-efficient ways of making old or new products, and so produces an economy in constant change. Marx saw that the coming of capitalist economies destroyed all feudal, traditional, and patriarchal relationships and orders. Schumpeter saw farther: that market capitalism destroys its own earlier generations. There is, he wrote, a constant 'process of industrial mutation — if I may use that biological term — that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one. This process of Creative Destruction is the essential fact about capitalism. It is what capitalism consists in, and what every capitalist concern has got to live in.'"

Index of /sugar

Index of /sugar: "xubuntu-sugar-live-2007-12-02.iso"

email from Jani Monoses:

now that the browser activity is working[*], I have modified a Xubuntu
7.10 liveCD to include the existing .deb packages of Sugar. They are up
to date as of git master, equivalent of current joyride.

TamTam and Etoys are not yet packaged.

It boots in plain Xfce and the emulator is in the applications menu,
'Other' section

Starting in native sugar can be achieved by relogging in and choosing
the sugar session. User is 'ubuntu' and there in no password.

It can be installed to the hard drive as any Ubuntu derived liveCD, by
using the install icon on the desktop.

There's a script in the download directory which puts the ISO on a
bootable USB stick for easier testing.

http://startx.ro/sugar

SkyandTelescope.com - Interactive Observing Tools - SkyandTelescope.com's Almanac

SkyandTelescope.com - Interactive Observing Tools - SkyandTelescope.com's Almanac: "The almanac window will expand to list detailed information about the Sun, Moon, and five naked-eye planets. "

Ken Jennings - Blog

Ken Jennings - Blog: "Maybe I wouldn’t notice so much if so many of the koans weren’t in service of Brad Bird’s weird Objectivist leanings of late."

London Free Press - Food - Colourful peppers stuffed with ratatouille tasty sidedish

London Free Press - Food - Colourful peppers stuffed with ratatouille tasty sidedish

RATATOUILLE-STUFFED PEPPERS

(Makes 8 servings)

4 large bell peppers

1/4 cup (50 ml) olive oil

1 small eggplant, diced

1 sweet onion, thinly sliced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 large tomato, coarsely chopped

1 cup (250 ml) sliced fresh mushrooms

1/2 tsp. (2 ml) each dried basil, oregano and salt

Black pepper and hot pepper sauce, to taste

1 zucchini, sliced lengthwise and cut into 1/2 -inch (1-cm)) chunks

1/4 cup (50 ml) grated Parmesan cheese (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 180 C (350 F). Cut peppers in half lengthwise. Remove seeds and membranes without cutting through shell. Place halves in a 13-by-9-inch (3-l) rectangular glass dish, cover with vented plastic wrap and microwave on high for 4 to 5 minutes or until peppers are crisp-tender.

2. Immerse peppers in an ice-water bath to stop cooking process; drain and set aside with cut sides up.

3. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add eggplant and onion and continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until soft, about 10 minutes. Add garlic, tomato, mushrooms, basil, oregano, salt, black pepper and hot sauce and cook, stirring, until mushrooms are tender and mixture is fragrant, about 5 minutes. Add zucchini and cook, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes more or until crisp-tender.

4. Spoon mixture into prepared pepper halves and sprinkle each half with about 1 tsp. (5 ml) grated cheese, if desired. Bake for 15 minutes or until mixture cheese is begins to bubble. Serve.

Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft - Catalogue - BACHJS:GOLDBERG VARIATIONS

Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft - Catalogue - BACHJS:GOLDBERG VARIATIONS: "JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH Goldberg-Variationen Goldberg Variations Variations Goldberg Variazioni Goldberg, BWV 988 Trevor Pinnock, harpsichord "