Hasta La Gadget!

This article was written on October 04, 2007 by CyberNet.

Tutorial Thursday

I don’t know about you but there is a whole world of news out there that I don’t read, and it’s partly because of the language barrier. Services like Google Translate and BabelFish have tried to break down that barrier one step at a time, and while they do offer sitewide translations there is still no good alternative to translate RSS feeds.

I tried passing our site’s feed through Google Translate, but the page that was shot back to me was in the same language that I sent. So there wasn’t really anywhere else to turn but Yahoo! Pipes, which is exactly what I ended up doing. Using Yahoo! Pipes I was able to send an RSS feed through a BabelFish translator, and the result was our English feed being translated to French. I’ll discuss the drawbacks to using such a service, but lets first take a look at how you use Yahoo! Pipes to translate feeds:

1. Add a feed item by dragging the Fetch Feed module over onto the grid, and then throw the site’s URL into the box.
   
2. Now go to the Deprecated menu in the sidebar, and drag the BabelFish module over (there is a Translate module under the String menu, but that doesn’t work). Select the proper language conversion that you want to do, in this case we’re translating our English feed into French.
   
3. Now you’ve got to connect the dots, litterally! Connect the Fetch Feed to BabelFish, and then connect BabelFish to the Pipe Output. When you hit the Refresh button at the bottom you should see the fruits of your labor:
   
4. Go ahead and hit the Save button in the upper-right corner of the screen, and give your Pipe a name. Then click the Back to My Pipes link towards the top, and you should see your newly translated feed listed there. Click on it, and then subscribe to it with your feed reader!

There are a few downsides to pushing a feed through BabelFish, and the most obvious would be the poor translation. BabelFish is pretty notorious for turning a perfect sentence into gibber jabber by the time it is done doing its job, but at least you should be able to get some idea of what is being talked about in the article.

The other thing that bothers me a bit is that BabelFish can have a mind of its own sometimes when it comes to translating the data. It always seems to translate at least the titles of the articles, but sometimes the body of the article is left in its native language. Hey, this is free, so don’t be disappointed if you get poor results.

Kudos to Webware for coming up with this idea!

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Helpful Tip: Use Google Search to Easily Translate WordsYour Week in Review with Sunday’s Summary2007 CyberNet Awards: Most Powerful WebsitesCyberNotes: Create a Custom Software Update NotifierGoogle Translate Introduces New Languages

This article was written on August 14, 2007 by CyberNet.

Time Saving Tuesday

It’s been about a week and a half since we became the proud owners of a Nintendo Wii. There was a lot that factored into the decision of us purchasing a Wii, and before you go thinking that we are Nintendo fanboys I’ll let you know that we own the original Playstation and the original Xbox. This is actually the first Nintendo product that I’ve owned since the original Gameboy, so I would hardly say that we are diehard Nintendo fans.

The big deciding factors in choosing the Wii was the low initial cost, exciting multi-player games geared for everyone in the family, and the games run about $10 cheaper than the Xbox 360 and PS3. Of course the graphics on the Wii are no match for the Xbox or PS3, but we were looking more for overall enjoyment rather than how real things look.

There are a lot of reviews out there regarding the Wii, and I don’t want this article to be like all of the others. So I’ll start off by telling you how we were able to get a Wii, and then I’ll point out some cool things that the system can do.

–Wii Locators and Trackers–

The journey to finding a Wii was a hectic one. It started by calling some stores in our surrounding area, all of which gave a prompt response of “we’re sold out” indicating that they receive these calls quite frequently. One store in particular even said that they hadn’t seen the Wii’s in over two-months, which gave me little hope that we were going to find one.

I started to check some stores online, but most of the ones I came across were all sold out. I then turned to some tracking services which monitor several different online stores to see if they have any of the Wii’s in stock. I found two of them that I really liked, and they even have RSS feeds available so that you can be notified quickly of places with the Wii in stock:

• XPBargains Wii Tracker/Locator (RSS)
• BensBargains Wii Tracker (RSS)

Each of those sites have logs available at the bottom of the pages, and looking at them reveals that most of the stores frequently post the console as both a standalone or as a bundle. The only thing is that they typically sell extremely fast so you have to be on top of your game (no pun intended).

So how did we end up getting one? Well, we had found and subscribed to the trackers listed above but that’s not how we got ours. A little later we decided to call some stores that were farther from us, but in a much larger city. A Best Buy store (which is an electronics reseller) happened to have 5 in stock that they had just received. We rushed down there and got one of the last two that they had. So if you want one really bad, it might pay to call around first.

–The Console–

The console itself is among the smallest that I’ve ever seen, although the PSOne was pretty darn small. For comparison sake I would say the Wii is about the size of three DVD movie cases stacked on top of eachother. Its small size made it extremely easy for us to stick into a tight spot that we otherwise wouldn’t use.

Here are some things you might like to know about the Wii console:

• It has a built-in wireless card with no protruding antenna. This makes it easy to connect the Wii to your router, and it was no trouble entering in a WEP key.
• The Wii cannot play DVD’s, but there is supposed to be a version available later this year that can do this.
• When there is a firmware update for the console, the DVD slot will notify you with a blue glowing effect. It sounds weird, I know, and when I saw this happen last week I didn’t know what was going on. You can kind of see this happening in the photo to the right.
• You can view and send photos to your friends by using an SD memory card (view instructional video)

–The Remote and Nunchuk–

The Remote is obviously the shining point of the Nintendo Wii. It’s what lets people interact with the video games almost in the same way as a virtual reality system. The fact that you can turn the remote on the side to make it feel like a classic Nintendo controller is pure genious.

• This is one of the coolest things about the remotes. You can actually use them to turn the system on, or to turn it off. If you turn off your remote it will not only turn the system off, but it will also turn off everyone else’s remotes!
• While playing a game you can use the Home button (located in the middle of the Remote) to reset the system. No more getting out of your seat to do that!
• There is actually a speaker located immediately below the Home button. Some of the games use this speaker to really make you feel like you’re in the game. For example, while playing tennis it will make a “swoosh” sound as your racquet glides through the air.
• The four small square lights on the bottom of the Remote indicate which player you are, with player one being the leftmost light and player 4 being the rightmost light.
• The nunchuk is a nice addition for some games, but from our experiences so far, you could easily get by without it. One Nunchuk comes with the system, but if you’re a little short on cash don’t worry about getting another one.

–Games–

The Wii came with a game called Wii Sports, which is not only a good demonstration of how to use the remote, but is also an adventure to play. We wanted to have two Remotes for our system since Ashley and myself were both planning on playing it, so we purchased the Wii Play & Wii Remote bundle (pictured to the right) that was offered for $10 more than what a standalone remote costs. Below I’ve outlined the list of minigames that are included with Wii Sports and Wii Play along with what we think about each one.

Wii Sports (Nunchuk only used in Bowling):

• Tennis – I think that this is the best game in Wii Sports. It is extremely easy to play since you don’t need to worry about moving yourself around the court…all you focus on is swinging the racquet. Be careful though, once you get going your arm will get sore.
• Baseball – This isn’t bad, but you have no control over fielding the ball. We don’t play this one very much.
• Golf – I like this because it is a little more subdued than the others. You have a lot of control over your swing, but it makes me a little better than I am in real life.
• Bowling – This is a lot more realistic than I originally anticipated it to be. You can spin the ball, angle your throw, and change the speed all with the Remote. Since players take turns it is a great one to play with a group of people when you don’t have a Remote for each person.
• Boxing – You’ll need the Nunchuk for this one, and believe me when I say it is quite a workout. You have to try and dodge punches while throwing some at your opponent. Make sure you focus because there is no time for laughing in this one.

Wii Play (Nunchuks aren’t required for any of the games, but they can be used in the Tanks game):

• Table Tennis – I find this one a bit difficult to play because the distance the ball travels is so short.
• Laser Hockey – Definitely one of the best games on Wii Play. I find it similar to playing air hockey, but it’s got a slight twist to it that really makes it unique.
• Fishing – Nothing like areal fishing, but something younger kids might enjoy.
• Find Mii – Basically “Where’s Waldo” on the Wii. You’ll try to find two characters with the same face, among other things. It sounds easy, but sometimes it can be pretty tough.
• Pose Mii – You rotate characters so that they match the pose in a falling bubble. Yep, it’s as stupid as it sounds.
• Shooting Range – This is like the classic Duck Hunt game on the original Nintendo. Except now you have targets, cans, and flying saucers to shoot in addition to the birds.
• Billiards – Nothing like a quick game of 9-ball. Definitely the most realistic of the 9 games on Wii Play, but it does take some getting used to having such a small stick to hold in your hands.
• Charge! – You ride a rushing cow as it races down the tracks knocking over scarecrows. It’s not that exciting, but it’s definitely not the worst one.
• Tanks! – You move around different levels trying to kill the enemy before the enemy kills you. It can be a bit frustrating because if you die you have to start over from the first level, and so it’s hard to complete all of the missions. Supposedly there are 20 missions for you to complete, but once you complete them and receive the gold medal there will be 80 more. I haven’t gotten very far in this yet, but it is actually fun.

Some people have said that Wii Play is a horrible game, but I don’t have anything to complain about since it only costs an extra $10 with the Remote bundle that I purchased. I would say that it is worth it for the Laser Hockey, Shooting Range, Billiards, and Tanks! games but the others you probably won’t play much.

We also picked up Mario Party 8, and have played that a limited number of times. I definitely haven’t tried it enough to give a full review since this is the first time I’ve ever played any version of Mario Party. Many of the minigames it includes are very unique and well thought out, and so far it has been an exciting game.

–Overview–

So if you’re looking to get a Wii I would say that it is a great time, especially if you get a small group of people together to play it. Just make sure you use the strap that’s attached to the Remote, because injuries and accidents do happen.

Let us know of any great Wii games you come across…especially the multiplayer ones!

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryYour Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryYour Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Week In Review With Sunday’s Summary!

This article was written on May 19, 2008 by CyberNet.

Microsoft/Mac Monday

These days, it can be difficult to manually keep track of contact information for family, friends, and co-workers. Not only is there usually a phone number to remember, but often times there are multiple phone numbers, email addresses, fax numbers, pager numbers, etc. One way to solve the problem of trying to keep up with all of your contact’s information is to use an application for managing them. Luckily for both Vista and Leopard users, there’s a solution built right-in to the operating system. If you’re using Vista it’s called Windows Contacts and if you’re using Leopard it’s simply called Address Book. Today we’ll be comparing the features of both and covering some of the best features that each offers.

Finding Windows Contacts and Address Book

While this may be very basic, if you can’t locate Windows Contacts or Address Book on a Mac, they will be of no use to you! So for those who aren’t quite sure where to look…

To find Windows Contacts

Press Start key and start typing “Windows Contacts” — it comes with Vista so you already have it on your computer. This is what you’ll be looking for:

To find Address Book (Mac)

Address Book comes with Leopard and should already be located on your Dock. Just look for this icon:

Highlights of each…

One of the nicest parts of both Windows Contacts and Address Book is that they come with the operating system. It’s not that either is an extravagant way to manage contacts – it’s simple and that’s what is great about it. Both options allow you to include all of the important details you would need for your various contacts including email addresses, telephone numbers, a photo, extra notes, etc.

Using Windows Contacts

For those of you using Windows Contacts, your navigation bar is at the top of Windows Explorer. From there you can add new contacts, create a new contact group, and import or export your contacts. If you decide to export your contacts, you can select among CSV or vCard formats.

You can either have a list with all of your contacts, or you can divide them into groups by creating “Contact Groups.” Examples of Contact Groups you’d have include family, friends, and co-workers. Using the groups really helps to keep everything organized and also makes it easier if you need to email all of the members of one group and you’re using Outlook.

Another aspect that is nice is for when you’re entering all of the information for your contacts. Microsoft chose a tabbed interface which divides the information into the following categories:

• Name and Email
• Home
• Work
• Family
• Notes
• ID’s

It’s nice to have the information broken down for two reasons. First, it makes entering the information a little more organized. Secondly, it makes finding the information when you need it effortless. Take a look at the tabbed interface that I’m talking about:

For the basics, Windows Contacts gets the job done in a very simple way.

Using Address Book

After using Windows Contacts, using Address Book on a Mac was pretty different because there’s more to it and the interface is completely different. It’s integrated with Mail, iChat, and other apps which means accessing your contact’s information from those apps is simple. Here’s an example of this integration. I created a contact group labeled “Family” and it has all of my family members listed. When I went to Mail to send a message, all I had to type was the group name which was “Family” into the “to” field and it pulled in all of their email addresses.

The Address Book is divided into 3 panes (you can also switch to a “Card Only” view), and to add a contact, you just click the “plus” sign in the 2nd pane. In the 3rd pane you’ll see all of the information. There are no tabs, you just scroll to come across all of the information. Like Windows Contacts, you can add a picture and if you have any extra information you’d like to add, there’s a “notes” section.

Extra features that Address Book offers that I really like include the option to print a “Pocket-sized” version of your contacts list as well as the option to create a “Smart Group” which will update itself “if any contact fits the same search criteria you set for a Smart Group.

Wrapping it up…

Overall I’d say Apple did a better job with Address Book than Microsoft did with Windows Contacts, but both get the job done of providing a simple way for people to keep track of their contacts.

So far we’ve taken a look at the following Leopard vs. Vista comparisons:

• Vista and Leopard Search Features Compared
• Apple Front Row vs. Windows Media Center

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryMac OS X 10.5.3: Sync Contacts with Google, But Can Cause ProblemsNew Windows Live Contacts GadgetCyberNotes: Easy Online Contact ManagementGet Your @Live.com Address

This article was written on February 06, 2008 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

We love getting our hands on some free software, and when it comes to antivirus protection there are pretty good scanners available at no cost all through your browser. Most of them do take advantage of Internet Explorer’s ActiveX technology, and for that reason you must be using IE. Aside from that these scanners look wimpy on the exterior, but boy can they can dig up some dirty viruses on your computer.

We grabbed six of our favorite free online virus scanners and listed them out below with the best ones first. They’re not ranked by anything technical like virus detection rate, we just did it by how easy it was to setup and how good their reputation is for their desktop counterparts.

–NOD32–

• Website: ESET Online Scanner
• Browser Requirements: Internet Explorer 5 or better
• Operating System Requirements: Windows 98/ME/NT/2000/XP/Vista
• Notes: Fast setup/scanning, and the interface looks really nice. It also includes an option to remove “unwanted applications” such as malware.
• Screenshot (Click to Enlarge):
   

–Kaspersky–

• Website: Kaspersky Online Scanner
• Browser Requirements: Internet Explorer 6 or better
• Operating System Requirements: N/A
• Notes: The initial time to get it setup was quite lengthy. It had to download 16MB of virus definitions which took 15 minutes by itself. What is nice though is that you can select a specific location/file to scan.
• Screenshot (Click to Enlarge):
  

–Trend Micro–

• Website: Trend Micro HouseCall
• Browser Requirements: Internet Explorer 6 or better; Firefox 2 or better
• Operating System Requirements: Windows 2000/XP/Vista; Mac OS X
• Notes: This is an interesting alternative since you download and run a small program that will setup your browser for scanning. I’m guessing this is necessary since it works in both Internet Explorer and Firefox. You can also specify an area on your computer to scan.
• Screenshot (Click to Enlarge):
  

–BitDefender–

• Website: BitDefender Online Scanner
• Browser Requirements: Internet Explorer
• Operating System Requirements: N/A
• Notes: This has an option to scan only certain areas on your computer, and the virus signature downloads went pretty quick.
• Screenshot (Click to Enlarge):
  

–Panda–

• Website: Panda ActiveScan
• Browser Requirements: Windows 95/98/Me/NT/2000/XP
• Operating System Requirements: Internet Explorer 5 or better
• Notes: This wouldn’t even let us through to scan our Vista machine since it’s not supported so we weren’t able to test it out. However, Panda is well known for providing great antivirus protection.
• Screenshot: N/A

–Norton–

• Website: Symantec Virus detection
• Browser Requirements: Internet Explorer 5 or better
• Operating System Requirements: N/A
• Notes: Setup was pretty fast, but it lacks any configurability.
• Screenshot (Click to Enlarge):
  

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryOnline Anti-Virus Solution From SymantecScan a File for VirusesCyberNotes: New Computer Viruses – Beware!JS/SNZ.A Virus is False Positive

This article was written on November 29, 2006 by CyberNet.

Web Browser Wednesday

A few weeks ago I made a post about Google services that don’t work properly in Opera. I was happy, yet surprised, to see that Opera Watch had linked to the article in a post that they made which sparked me to do some searching around to see what Google problems I might be able to make Opera-compatible. I am far from being a JavaScript programmer so my main goal was simply to get around the browser compatibility checks.

One of the main things that most Opera users always try when a site doesn’t work properly is to mask the site. By doing that it will force the Opera to identify itself as another browser, like Internet Explorer or Mozilla. It isn’t always the most effective thing but it works fine a majority of the time.

Over the summer I wrote a quick article that showed how you could use masking to get Google Talk to display in Gmail. It wasn’t anything extravagant but it got the job done. There is actually a way that you can prevent Gmail from trying to identify which browser you are using. All you have to do is visit http://mail.google.com/gmail?nocheckbrowser and Opera users will get all of the features that you would have in Firefox and Internet Explorer. There might be some incompatibilities but from what I can tell the Google Talk almost works perfectly in Gmail when using Opera. Just change your bookmark to use that URL and you’ll be all set.

Okay, that wasn’t anything too special because it is just a URL. Unfortunately Google didn’t put that in every service that they offer so to get around the prompt in Google Calendar it took a little more work. What’s the end result? Google Calendar will load completely without ever displaying the annoying prompt that Opera users have suffered with for a long time:

It is time to stop that popup using a bit of our own JavaScript that I whipped up. It took me a few hours to write this up…okay okay, it really only took a few seconds after I looked at the Google Calendar source code but a little exaggeration never hurt anyone.

Here are the steps you need to take to eliminate the prompt in Google Calendar:

1. Find a folder that you can place a JavaScript file in and try to make it a place that won’t get deleted, otherwise you’ll have to do this again. Also, you should try to make sure that there aren’t any unintentional JavaScript files located in that folder otherwise Opera may get confused. By that I mean that there shouldn’t be any other files in that directory with the extension .js and have nothing to do with your Opera installation.
2. Right-click on this JavaScript file and save it to that directory from Step 1.
3. Go to Tools > Preferences > Advanced > Content > JavaScript options and into the User JavaScript files box enter in or browse for the directory from Step 1.
4. That’s it, pull up the Google Calendar homepage and the prompt will be suppressed.

There is really only one line of code in the file that does anything. Basically it stops all JavaScript confirmation windows from appearing on the Google Calendar site only, which is essentially the same as pressing the Cancel button. What about deleting an event from the calendar then? That isn’t a JavaScript confirmation prompt so it will be displayed just like it is in other browsers.

So far I have been able to confirm that everything works in Google Calendar except for the Settings screen. For some reason I can’t adjust any of the settings in Opera but as long as you get everything configured in another browser you can switch to Opera and it should all work okay. This is somehow a result of using my script but I don’t see how blocking confirmation dialogs affects this. Everything appears to render okay on the main screen though:

These surely aren’t a solution to the compatibility problems but they are a workaround that should please most people. The best part about both of these tweaks is that they don’t involve any sort of masking so websites are not going to throw any IE or Mozilla specific code at Opera that it can’t handle. Of course using Google Calendar in Opera via masking wasn’t really an option because it would render terribly. I do hope to see more of Google’s services becoming Opera-compatible in the future so that these fixes won’t even be necessary.

P.S. If someone knows how to block the specific dialog box using the JavaScript please let me know and I will update the code on this site. Thanks!

Copyright © 2010 CyberNet | CyberNet Forum | Learn Firefox

Related Posts:

Helpful Tip: Get Gmail 2 in Opera 9.5CyberNotes: Your Week In Review With Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Google Services That Work With Opera?Get Ready To See A Google Calendar And Links Bar In GMailOpera 9 Beta Has Finally Been Released