intro

[Guest guest]

add the response text to the email body. It ended up at the bottom. I think

it's because I was reading the threads on the web site. Here, with email, it

automatically begins at the top.

Now, I've hung around a bit, I can see that.

not stupid... just a little not with it sometimes - or just a little quirky - or

just a little 'duh' sometimes - or just a little weird, yeah, I know...

....is how i used to describe myself. Now I'm not sure if I have some new

vocabulary for this.

not stupid...just a little bit of self-diagnosed autism? hmmm...not yet sure

how THAT would go over.

Joanne

Re: intro

>> http://www.venamous .net/house/

>

> I can't figure out how to do this, but I'm assuming it will be on here

> somewhere.

do what?

> Those pics, Dave, look quite like the pics I took of a house before I

> began to fix it. The tub looks like it will clean up and be really

> lovely!

yeah, i swept it and it's pretty much just dirt. some sort of cleaner

should hopefully make it look good. at some point we might want to put

in a bigger one (there's about another foot of space which could be

used), so we won't replace it until then.

> That paneling reminds me of the paneling that I decided to replace

> with drywall. It was a good thing, because there was no insulation

> under the paneling!

we're ripping out everything in those two floorless rooms. it looks like

there was insulation, but the stuff is all decomposed. the paneling is

on top of some other wall. at first i wanted to save it, but i have now

noticed that it's very cheap paneling. we've cleaned up the kitchen and

have painted the walls a light yellow. the woodwork will be a light

green. i just had some kilz primer colored because i just want to cover

up the yuck and seal the peeling. i'll remodel the entire kitchen after

the rest of the house is livable and the windows are rebuilt, as it's

decent and i don't want to run out of cash or time before my lease is up

in may.

> Have fun, it looks like a great project!

yeah, and hopefully it will even make me a nice amount of money!

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 103 of 156:

Does expecting the unexpected make the unexpected become the expected?

[Guest guest]

> not stupid...just a little bit of self-diagnosed autism? hmmm...not

> yet sure how THAT would go over.

yeah, my self-diagnosed asperger's isn't going over too well with my

wife. she explained her reason, though, which is that sometimes her

father would say in a derogatory way to her something like, " are you

austistic? " when she'd do something wrong (which was something she'd

usually do right). plus, she has issues with her brother's ppd-nos dx

and how their parents let him use that as an excuse to get his own way.

at least she's not " normal, " and about as introverted as me, so we don't

have many of the problems that i read in " Aspergers in Love: Couple

Relationships and Family Affairs " by Aston, Maxine C. (available on

netlibrary.com if you have access). i've been reading that book tonight

and it's pretty much convinced me that i have asperger's, even though i

hide it quite well. it nicely defined what empathy is and is not, with

examples. i still don't understand what empathy is, but what it said it

is not is what i thought it was! that helps explains my low score of 9

on baron-cohen's empathy test (which i tried to give my empathy skills

the benefit of the doubt, no less!). the communication issues in the

book that AS/NT couples have have already been worked out by us pretty

much as described in the book. i think it helps that we are both willing

to accept blame, and when i felt clueless, i'd accept blame if things

would seem to work by doing so.

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 71 of 156:

Things should be made as simple as possible,

never simpler. - Albert Einstein

[Guest guest]

> The two distros I have are openSuse and Blag (Fedora). I'm sure I will

> settle on one or the other, but right now I want to keep both to learn

> on and to see which I like better (also to see which desktop I like

> better since one is configured with Kde and the other with Gnome).

kde is such a resource hog. it's great for a clueless linux user, but

gnome is better overall. i don't use either, and i try to stay away from

kde applications.

> Windows is somewhat required because my modem works better under it

> than the Linux driver I was finally able to find. I will probably try

> to get a serial modem from e-bay and further end my dependence on

> Windows. I think Desktop Linux has made some great strides. I was able

> to rip some songs off a CD and load them onto my sister's I-Pod (which

> I couldn't do under Win98 because I-tunes wouldn't install on it). It

> surprised me how easy it was.

so you have one of those " winmodems " ? lots of things are incredibly easy

under linux, and there is finally an up-to-date flash player for linux

(which is only 32bit and quite a resource hog, but it's still nice to

have).

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 23 of 158:

I don't usually say anything meaningful enough to be quoted, though. - Dave

[Guest guest]

> this is why people wonder why their computers run so slow. so many

> programs are sort of running in the background just-in-case you want to

> use it and not wait the 5 seconds it takes to load. of course, you have

> to wait that 5 seconds or so for each program when you boot your

> computer.

One word (or program): svchost.exe

The program start all the services on boot-up or (in my case) when dialing

up the dsl connection (PPPoE) so essentially, when I fire up the laptop, I

fire up the connection and leave it running with the task manager open for

about 3 minutes before the laptop (Pentium-M 1.5 with 512mb of ram) is

useable and that's with a systematic defragmentation of the registry at

bootup (defrag application:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/PageDefrag.mspx )

and a thorough cleanup of the system twice a week (see www.ccleaner.com for

the app).

Sometime, I ponder installing gentoo on the laptop but to do so, I'd prefer

to have an adaptor for the hard disk so I can compile everything on my big

box (athlon64-3500 with a gig of ram), I know I can use distcc but have much

better cooling and the laptop drive will run cooler in there during the

compilation job.

Alain

--

No virus found in this outgoing message.

Checked by AVG Free Edition.

Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.4.0/760 - Release Date: 2007-04-13

20:04

[Guest guest]

> Now _that's_ interesting. Those are the two main Desktop Environments

> for Linux. I like the 'idea' of Gnome better but I've found Kde

> faster/more responsive in practice (at least in the distros I've

> tried) and that's important to me.

>

> So now I'm wondering what graphical environment you use. Surely not

> command line only? Even my Atari ST I had back in the 90's had a

> (basic) graphical environment while IBM PCs where chugging along with

> DOS. XFCE perhaps? I tried it and liked it, but I suppose I want the

> more complete working environments kde/gnome offer.

heh, no, i don't use command-line only. i use firefox and acroread too

much, as well as gv and gimp, and i watch movies with mplayer.

everything else i run from an xterm. i use the ice window manager with

the infidel2 theme. http://www.icewm.org/ " The goal of IceWM is speed,

simplicity, and not getting in the user's way. " oh, yuck... there's an

ice theme which looks like win xp! :/

here's a screenshot of my desktop. it's quite big as i am using three

monitors. http://www.venamous.net/desktop.html

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 20 of 158:

computers let you take laziness to a whole new level. - mrak

[Guest guest]

Dave wrote:

> 

>

>> The two distros I have are openSuse and Blag (Fedora). I'm sure I

>> will settle on one or the other, but right now I want to keep

>> both to learn on and to see which I like better (also to see

>> which desktop I like better since one is configured with Kde and

>> the other with Gnome).

>>

>

> kde is such a resource hog. it's great for a clueless linux user,

> but gnome is better overall. i don't use either, and i try to stay

> away from kde applications.

Now _that's_ interesting. Those are the two main Desktop Environments for Linux.

I like the 'idea' of Gnome better but I've found Kde faster/more responsive in

practice (at least in the distros I've tried) and that's important to me.

So now I'm wondering what graphical environment you use. Surely not command line

only? Even my Atari ST I had back in the 90's had a (basic) graphical

environment while IBM PCs where chugging along with DOS. XFCE perhaps? I tried

it and liked it, but I suppose I want the more complete working environments

kde/gnome offer.

-June

[Guest guest]

alain,

I went to this link

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/PageDefrag.mspx )

and it said that running any of those little icon boxes programs that appeared

in the download box would be dangerous. so i clicked cancel, of course.. tee

hee.

so- is this the right thing?

there was eula, pagedfrg, and the question mark.

Dave, if you are reading this too, will this hurt to do this if I had taht DLL

error (which by the way, has not appeared again since then)

Joanne

RE: Intro

> this is why people wonder why their computers run so slow. so many

> programs are sort of running in the background just-in-case you want to

> use it and not wait the 5 seconds it takes to load. of course, you have

> to wait that 5 seconds or so for each program when you boot your

> computer.

One word (or program): svchost.exe

The program start all the services on boot-up or (in my case) when dialing

up the dsl connection (PPPoE) so essentially, when I fire up the laptop, I

fire up the connection and leave it running with the task manager open for

about 3 minutes before the laptop (Pentium-M 1.5 with 512mb of ram) is

useable and that's with a systematic defragmentation of the registry at

bootup (defrag application:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/PageDefrag.mspx )

and a thorough cleanup of the system twice a week (see www.ccleaner.com for

the app).

Sometime, I ponder installing gentoo on the laptop but to do so, I'd prefer

to have an adaptor for the hard disk so I can compile everything on my big

box (athlon64-3500 with a gig of ram), I know I can use distcc but have much

better cooling and the laptop drive will run cooler in there during the

compilation job.

Alain

--

No virus found in this outgoing message.

Checked by AVG Free Edition.

Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 269.4.0/760 - Release Date: 2007-04-13

20:04

[Guest guest]

> I think I need to learn about registry stuff. Editing a registry to me sounds

like well, a brain exercise that will drive me nutziod!

The only two problems with registry editing is that there's no

" undo " feature and the registry is one of the control functions

for the Window OS.

That said, it is possible to backup the registry, and most

registry entries are not critical.

The best way to start is to either go through it with someone

else or follow specific instructions for a specific registry

entry. Here's an example:

Here, you will look at the registry and not change anything.

Open the registry editor by going to <run><regedit>

Select <HKEY_CURRENT_USER>

Select <Software>

Select <Microsoft>

Select <Windows>

Select <CurrentVersion>

Select <Run>

This will display certain programs that automatically run when

you start Windows. Mine shows three entries:

default

StrgSync.exe (an external storage volume used for .mp3 backups)

Taskbar Display Controls (allows on-the-fly display controls)

If you see something you don't recognize, write it down, and run

a google search on it after you close the registry editor.

Now close the registry editor.

The " run " entries are often used to launch spyware, which is a

reason to look at them.

Another reason to edit the registry is if a program won't

install. This is common with palmpilot, which often will " see "

an old registry entry and not attempt to perform what it

interprets as a second installation.

Registry cleaner software has a reputation for causing more

problems than it cures. If you use one, find one from a trusted

source and only remove what you feel is safe to remove.

- s

[Guest guest]

I have:

s-

I have:

default

ctfmon.exe

msnmessenger

TOSCDSPD - toshiba something .exe

Yahoo pager.

does anything look weird to you? i don't use the yahoo pager thing - unless

that has to do with my email rogersyahoo....

Re: Intro

> I think I need to learn about registry stuff. Editing a registry to me sounds

like well, a brain exercise that will drive me nutziod!

The only two problems with registry editing is that there's no

" undo " feature and the registry is one of the control functions

for the Window OS.

That said, it is possible to backup the registry, and most

registry entries are not critical.

The best way to start is to either go through it with someone

else or follow specific instructions for a specific registry

entry. Here's an example:

Here, you will look at the registry and not change anything.

Open the registry editor by going to <run><regedit>

Select <HKEY_CURRENT_ USER>

Select <Software>

Select <Microsoft>

Select <Windows>

Select <CurrentVersion>

Select <Run>

This will display certain programs that automatically run when

you start Windows. Mine shows three entries:

default

StrgSync.exe (an external storage volume used for .mp3 backups)

Taskbar Display Controls (allows on-the-fly display controls)

If you see something you don't recognize, write it down, and run

a google search on it after you close the registry editor.

Now close the registry editor.

The " run " entries are often used to launch spyware, which is a

reason to look at them.

Another reason to edit the registry is if a program won't

install. This is common with palmpilot, which often will " see "

an old registry entry and not attempt to perform what it

interprets as a second installation.

Registry cleaner software has a reputation for causing more

problems than it cures. If you use one, find one from a trusted

source and only remove what you feel is safe to remove.

- s

[Guest guest]

> > ctfmon.exe

>

> Alternative user input, this usually come with office and serve for

> handwriting purpose

Then that must be the purpose of ctfmon.exe being active - the

Toshiba laptop may have a handwriting function. You are right

that ctfmon.exe is related to Office -- at least according to

M$.

Typically handwriting runs through Versipad, which suggests that

her Toshiba has a pad as well as the button.

- s

[Guest guest]

> Dave, if you are reading this too, will this hurt to do this if I had

> taht DLL error (which by the way, has not appeared again since then)

i have no clue whatsoever. heh... an apt quote below in my sig:

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 36 of 158:

I'm hoping that my system has enough bugs to ward off other ones. - Roxanne

[Guest guest]

> HI Dave,

> Nice to mee tyou. The picture on my site is, as far as I'm concerned,

> pretty old. I seem to remember it's from tenth grade so that would

> mean four years old.

yeah, you look younger in it.

> Computer programming seems interesting, too. I've never been into

> computers all tha tmuch (except for surfing the web with them and

> doing stupid things so they'd crash and my father who is a system

> manager would have to fix them), but at universzity computer

> programming will be a mandatory course in linguistics - hoping it will

> be somewhat accessible to the blind.

it might depend somewhat on the language, and on the editors available

for that language. many editors put different aspects of the code in

different colors, depending on if it is a comment, or a quote, etc.

i don't know how much that might help you. they all have particular

syntaxes which must be followed correctly. some will do their best to

tell you exactly where the error is, while postscript will not. but as

postscript is a language designed for printers and making things look

nice (i draw with it), i don't see why you would want to learn it. in

fact, not many people do learn it. i love the control i have with it,

though. there is one language, i think python, which does not use the

normal style of punctuation that other common languages such as c, java,

and perl use. instead it is very strict on a statement being on one

line, and is also very strict about the indentation. i don't know if

this would be a good or a bad thing for you. there is also a linux

distribution for the blind: http://leb.net/blinux/

i can completely control just about anything in linux without using my

mouse, so linux seems more open to blind people than windows or os x. my

email program, text editor, and instant message program don't even

understand a mouse (although the operating system can copy and paste

into those programs with the mouse). also, certain distributions (like

gentoo) use only text files you must open individually in order to

configure the system, while others want you to use fancy GUI

applications (os x does the same, making it seemingly impossible for me

to configure things on the command line which normally are able to be

configured on the command line). in general, those fancy GUI

applications make linux more accessable to the general population, but

they make it quite inaccessable to those who favor the command line,

like me. you wouldn't even need to run any GUI at all on your computer,

which would free up a lot of resources for whatever need you have. i

think i could keep going on about the benefits of linux for the blind,

and all by giving only my non-blind personal experience.

oh, and i bet you are a fan of noam chomsky both academically and

politically.

-dave

--

(intp) 55.22682% - Extreme Geek 17 of 158:

There it is again....we do not have the answer so we will decree that

our followers should not even ask the question. - Lyra

[Guest guest]

it does...

Joanne

RE: Intro

> > ctfmon.exe

>

> Alternative user input, this usually come with office and serve for

> handwriting purpose

Then that must be the purpose of ctfmon.exe being active - the

Toshiba laptop may have a handwriting function. You are right

that ctfmon.exe is related to Office -- at least according to

M$.

Typically handwriting runs through Versipad, which suggests that

her Toshiba has a pad as well as the button.

- s