Messenger 8.0 BETA … Thumbs up :)

Just a quck post on my first impressions… 13mb download?! I understand to most people this is no big deal but thats not the point, why does it need to be so big? It’s a messenging program! I’d consider 5mb large! The improvements on the GUI are welcomed, much smoother looking.

The annoying tabs on the side can be turned off (first thing I looked for), You can’t turn off the websearch at the bottom of the screen or the “find a contact” search box. The filter contacts is a nice feature, I set mine to show only online contacts. Best of all, You can send offline messages and can apper offline and still talk to people!, although (of course) they will know you are appearing offline. These are two features I have wanted since everyone switched from ICQ years ago, still not sure why they did?

Finally, if you do not have a virus scanner you can download a free virus scanner for messenger to automatically scan transfers. I have yet to try out the sharing folders feature.

I like it.

I’m in!

I have been sent an invite to Windows Live Messenger but havn’t had the chance to download it yet. Had to fire up IE to get the download to work though , it’s been a while!

I have a project in Java coming up so I’ll be evaluating some java IDE’s within the next week. In the meantime I came across two interesting sites today:

Daily WTF – Happy (Belated) Jed Day!

// if the expression is true then the result will be true, otherwise (since the
// expression couldn't be true) the result will be false.  There are no other
// mathematical possibilities
begin
if (Expression=True) then
begin
Result:=True;
ResultHasBeenSet:=True;
end;

if (Expression=False) then
begin
Result:=False;
ResultHasBeenSet:=True;
end;
end;

Machinima.com: Anna “The life of a flower in a gothic fairytale. Won ‘Best Technical Achievement’ at the Machinima Film Festival 2003″ A short film made utilising the ID graphics engine. Created by Fountainhead Entertainment. Very impressive.
Messenger 8.0 BETA Now installed (I’ve taken my time writing this!) I have a bit to do before going to sleep so will have a good look tomorow.

GUI toolkits for web apps?

Everything seems to be moving to the web and online servies, take for example Microsoft Live and all the new highly featured and interactive services; Gmail, Flickr, 30boxes, Box.net.

Building a GUI

A limitation, or area in need of improvement in web application development seems to be the development of the GUI. This is why Ajax based interfaces which update browser pages and communicate with the server without the need to refresh are becomming so popular. It is not a new idea or technique but has been coined Ajax. The technology has had alot of interest in the community and people are becoming aware of the XMLHttpRequest object (the object used via javascript to communicate Asynchronously with the server). This is fine, however it would be nice to have an extensive GUI framework available to work with for use in web applications. In the client side GUI the choices seem to narrow down to DHTML, Java and Flash based implementations.

Flash and Java?

Although GUIs can be created quite easily with technologies such as Flash and Java one of the limitations is that indexing services such as Google cannot index the metadata (or even obtain it) to the same extend as DHTML based solutions. Another is they require browser plugins. Many people disable flash and a higher amount do not even have the JRE (Java Runtime Environment) required to run java applications or have the desire to install it (and who could blame them with the way it is currently distributed/integrated, but that’s another story!)

XUL is a framework based on the mozilla engine using XML and javascript to create web-based thin client applications, I admit I do not know much about this so will have to have a look, however I do know it is limited only to firefox in terms of browsers. SongBird is an excellent example of how XUL can be utilised.

What does this leave us with? DHTML? Are there any toolkits,frameworks or builders for creating DHTML web apps?

Adobe Flex 2.0 Beta looks interesting…

Is there something that I am missing?

MSBOB lives!

I downloaded MSBOB late last night after reading it will still run on Microsoft operating systems.

It’s not too bad really, The idea didn’t catch on but its an interesting alternative to the Windows 3.1 program manager! If you want to install it do a google search, it wasn’t too hard to find.

Computer Art

I saw this on Slashdot sometime last year I think and came across it in my images folder. Sandy Smith uses old computer hardware to create structures of art. Check out her website.

Graphical User Interface Gallery A very good collection of user interface images from many different operating systems. The good the bad and the … really bad (well, maby not that bad!)
Microsoft BOB lives! Think I might have a play!

Links

I’ve been going through my bookmarks and adding the interesting ones to my del.icio.us account. Heres a few (they are all tech/geeky ones)

Call an apple an apple Very good read on ajax, a new name for an old technique.

Standards and specs: Not by UNIX alone An article at IBM developer works on API standards, good unix history run down.

Understanding the Recycle Bin – Basics What really happens when a file is sent to the recycle bin.

Lego USB JumpDrive 256 MB Very cool step-by-step guide to re-shelling a usb stick!

How to transfer/move all your Email from Hotmail (or Yahoo!) to Gmail Once upon a time I was using hotmail, I used this tutorial to my entire mailbox from hotmail over to my new gmail account, very useful and much better than forwarding every email as it keeps the original sender and does not add forwarding tags.

Thats all for now!

New Rims

The new rims I brought for my car arrived today, I’m very happy with them!

Might have to wait for some tyres though, I want an LCD!

First computer program

The first computer program I ever wrote went something along the lines of this:

10 PRINT “Hello World”

This was written on the VTECH Pre Computer 1000 my parents brought me. The pre computer was an educational toy for kids, it had text based games and a typing tutor but the coolest feature was it had a BASIC interpreter! This allowed the computer to be programmed in “PRE BASIC”, a very trimmed down version of the BASIC programming language. I still have the computer but lost the user manual so I’d like to find that on the net somewhere.

Also, I wonder if google will add more functional labeling to Picasa? If I click an image there is no easy way to view what labels are assigned to it.

WordPress Layouts

I’ve been trying some different layouts because my last one started to look a little boring. I was surprised to see the Hemingway theme was listed! I changed to that but the layout isnt what I want. I’m using the Dusk theme. I like the darker colours (what attracted me to Hemingway) as well as designs with a side bar and full post content (Hemingway didnt have). I still want to design my own layout sometime but this one gets the thumbs up!

30boxes

I’ve been playing around with http://30boxes.com. It’s an online calendar that you can share with friends and has integration for services including flickr, live journal and myspace. I’ve added a couple of friends and connected my flickr account to it, the only thing it is missing is import/export options, It would be good to sync it with outlook. This has been described as the gmail of calendar applications so there are lots of features I haven’t mentioned. Worth a look.