VLC pulled from Apple app store

Matthew Humphries at geek.com informs us that Apple has excluded VLC player form Apple store due to supposed terms of licence under GNU (full article at http://www.geek.com/articles/apple/vlc-media-player-pulled-from-the-app-store-2011018/).

Could be for this or to avoid that the service for renting and selling films is put under discussion by the ability to read divx films inside Apple devices?

I really love iPhone, iPad and Mac, though I use mainly Linux and windows for work. But is not with this kind of things (or by trying to exclude porn) that Apple can reinforce the position against competitors.

This post as a comment also at  http://www.geek.com/articles/apple/vlc-media-player-pulled-from-the-app-store-2011018/comment-page-1/#comment-3968386

Linux is…

…like a tipi (or teepee): No gates, no windows and apache inside. (full article at geeks are sexy http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2010/11/25/linux-is-like-a-tipi and at Make use of http://www.makeuseof.com/tech-fun/linux-is-like-a-tipi/)

Really a good one! 🙂

See the picture below

linux apache

How to remove Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) from your PC

Tim Brookes at Makeusof.com writes a tutorial on how to remove Windows Nag protection.

For those who would like to understand the techie behind this kind of protection, the article is at http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/remove-windows-genuine-advantage-pc/; for all consider buying a genuine one.

The quest for technology is paved with strange things

Mike Elgan at Computer world reports ten things that he doesn’t understand in modern technology (full article at http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9190164/10_things_I_don_t_understand_about_consumer_technology).

What follows is my non serious comment, reported after Mike question (btw, his answers are very professional and worth a read, but today I’m in really bad mood and so I need to joke on something… 🙂 ):

• Why did Apple make the iPad so slippery? Because Apple earns a lot in maintenance, and so you know the most slippery the more spectacular the crash…
• Why doesn’t Twitter auto-shorten URLs? Come on, you have the limit to 140 chars in twitter, maybe they felt the need have to have something longer 😉
• Why do people call iPod Touch the “iTouch”? Because they are testing Twitter shortening service
• Why can’t Google Chrome read RSS? Because just came out from nursery; is expected to start reading in a couple of years
• Why does Windows cover the very button you need to click? Because loves joking or because someone hard coded Murphys law inside of it
• Why is iTunes for Windows the opposite of every other Apple product? Do You mean heavy and not easy to use? Well is a matter of chance and of doing something you’re not really willing to support and try to boycott windows…
• Where are those Google personal-time projects? Mmmh this is tricky. Maybe the guys at Google are experiencing gardening projects? 🙂
• Why can’t Facebook be used as an address book? And what would do Plaxo if this was like this?
• Why can’t I use Google Reader as an RSS Reader? Still mumbling on this…
• Why are driving directions so tiny on the Google Maps iPhone app? Because the developing team has undergone eye surgery and now spots a coin at 4 miles

This post as a comment also at

Backup windows home server files to an external drive

The guys at how to geek wrote a tutorial on this some time ago (full article at http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/10797/backup-windows-home-server-folders-to-an-external-hard-drive/).

Take a look

How to clean giant context menus

Guys at how to geek write a good tutorial on how to clean a too much grown context menu (full article at http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/28104/how-to-clean-up-your-messy-internet-explorer-context-menu/).

Simply the path is this:

“[…] The first thing you’ll notice is that there’s an “Accelerators” section of the context menu, and if you don’t use any of them, you can easily get rid of them all. Just head into Tools –> Manage Add-ons, click on Accelerators on the left-hand menu, and then disable any of the items that you don’t use. While you’re in here, you should also click on Toolbars and Extensions and get rid of anything else that you don’t actually need—it’ll make Internet Explorer run a whole lot faster. […]  Next you’ll want to open up regedit.exe through the start menu search or run box, and then browse down to the following key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\MenuExt

Once you’re there, right-click on the key and choose Export, and then save out the file somewhere just in case you need to revert the changes—if you do, you can simply double-click on the exported file to put everything back. […]”

Thanks guys for the hint.

Another POV of classic Windows shortcuts: a tribute to creativity

I come through a peterwut post at 9GAG (http://peterwut.9gag.com/), representing a post from annesouza’s blog (peterwut post at http://9gag.com/gag/33364/, annesouza’s one at http://annesonsouza.tumblr.com/post/955984471/foto-auto-explicativa).

No words, only a tribute to the quintessence of creativity, whoever did this.

You can find it here below.

Polarizing software

Jim Henderson at makeuseof.com reviews Poladroid for Windows, a software aimed at transforming your photos with the charm of Polaroid photographies (full article at http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/have-fun-polarizing-your-images-with-poladroid-for-windows/).

The software is simple but funny and You can get the installer at http://www.poladroid.net/

Windows web platform

An anonymous at How to Geek writes a tutorial on using web applications locally through Microsoft Windows Web Platform (full article at http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/19182/run-wordpress-and-other-web-apps-on-your-pc-the-easy-way/).

“[…] 

Many web apps today, such as WordPress, MediaWiki, and more, are open source and can be run for free from any computer with even a simple local web server.  They are often very difficult to install on your computer, since they require a number of dependencies such as PHP and MySQL.  Microsoft has worked to make this easier, releasing the Windows Web Platform Installer.  This lets you install many popular web apps and free tools in Windows with only a few clicks.

Here we’re going to look at how to install WordPress and the free Visual Web Developer 2010 Express to edit web code with the Web Platform Installer.  But, if you’d rather install a different web app or tool, feel free to choose those as the installations are generally similar. […]”

Worth a read, given the trend of putting everything on the web.

This post also as a comment at http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/19182/run-wordpress-and-other-web-apps-on-your-pc-the-easy-way/#comment-93847

Happy birthday Windows 3.0

The windows club reminds us that today is the 20th anniversary of Microsoft Windows 3.0  (full story at http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-3-0-turns-20).

Those like me that remember those “good old times” also remind that sort of religious wars between thos owning a Mac, an Amiga and a PC.

And when we read the System requirments:

8086/8088 processor or better

640K conventional memory, though 1 MB of extended memory recommended.

Hard disk with 6-7MB of free space

CGA/EGA/VGA/Hercules/8514/A graphics and an appropriate and compatible monitor

a little proud smile comes in my mind, wondering how much we were cratives doing what everyone of us did with those resources.

Now we think that Teras, Gigas and Internet are the “normal” world. Yesterday we had kilos and megas. No it’s not a century ago, just 20 years.

This post as a comment also at http://www.thewindowsclub.com/windows-3-0-turns-20/comment-page-1#comment-5273