HowTo: Photo Frame to Info Screen July 8, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Geeky, HowTo, Images, Internet, Photos, Tools.add a comment
Digital photo frames are the ideal gift for many people; they’re elegant, they show photos without hundreds of physical albums, and they’re easy to use. But for some people, their gets a point where seeing the same pictures over and over seems a little pointless.
The more geeky among us will be glad to know that digital photo frames can easily be extended using their RSS capabilities into an Info Screen, allowing you to flick through image ‘channels’ that keep you updated with what you want.
How we do this? Microsoft’s tool, Windows Live FrameIt. Here’s a rundown of some good ideas for ‘channels’ that I use with my frame.
Weather Channel
FrameIt already comes with a tool for weather forecasts. Simply enter your location in the world, and FrameIt will make an RSS feed of a graphical forecast.
News Channel
Enter the RSS feeds of your favourite websites to receive the latest news headlines. Whilst I’d personally opt for Google Reader for blogs and websites, creating a News Channel on a photo frame can be used to quickly check local news & sports.
Mail Channel
Some email providers allow access via RSS to new messages in the account; whilst you can’t send any messages using it, it’s useful to be alerted of new emails without having to fire up a computer. GMail uses a secure RSS feed, but you can follow this guide from MakeUseOf to create an unlocked feed, which can then be loaded into FrameIt.
Art Channel
deviantART offers a feed of its popular daily art, which can be found here; you can add it as a Photo RSS feed to have different art displaying each day.
Social Channel
Friendfeed works wonders for aggregating social feeds, so you can use it to create your very own social channel to deliver your updates on social networks. Also, FrameIt has a tool to display photos from Facebook that you’re tagged in.
Other Channels
You can essentially create a channel from any website with an RSS feed, but for those without, fear not; FeedYes will create one for you, and you can tweak your channel to your liking with Pipes, trimming down the info in a website to make it graphically friendly for use in a photo frame.
A photo frame can actually be quite useful with a few simple tools, and you can still use it to display all of your photographs. Got any more creative uses for a digital photo frame? Scribble it in the comments.
[http://frameit.live.com/]
[http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/read-your-gmail-in-a-web-based-rss-reader-with-freemyfeed/]
[http://www.feedyes.com/]
Summer Enrichment May 23, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Life.add a comment
Now that High School is over, this is the longest summer that I’ll probably ever have. The question is, what shall I do with it?
Apart from the obvious, yearly necessities, such as a hot days spent in the shade of the woods, taking the train to the beach, and afternoon celebrations based on the fact that it isn’t raining, I’d like to expand my horizons this summer, ameliorate myself. I want to use these 15 weeks before I start college to focus on gaining new experiences, turning what’s usually a lazy holiday into a summer that I won’t forget.
So what should I do?
- I’m going to read a lot more. Constant studying of texts that I hate has given me little time for reading for pleasure, and there are lots of books that I need to get through.
- I’m going to work on writing more. I really should, because I enjoy crafting worded masterpieces. I should write more poetry and more blog posts, perhaps branching into journalism as well.
- Exercise. I’m not an unhealthy person, but I realise that I need to exercise more. Perhaps early morning runs before the heat kicks in? Swimming to cool off? Or, my favourite sport, Tchoukball, which I find that very few people know about it – perhaps I should spread the interest.
- I’ve discovered I have a passion for capturing moments through photography; as such, I could combine photography with creative writing and web design to make an online portfolio of creativity. I find that my skills generally lack an artistic side, as I focus on foreign languages and computer science, but by spending the summer honing my creativity, I could really benefit from it.
- Science used to fascinate me, but constant molar equations has put me off it. When the exams are over, I’m going to re-embrace science, not from a study perspective, but I’m going to pursue it as an interest. I’m carrying on Physics in college, so I can use this summer to brush up on my understanding of ‘real world’ science.
- Unfortunately, having free time isn’t cheap, as I’m prone to wasting money in the summer. I’m considering the possibility of a summer job to bring in some money and give me some more experience of work, and I’m also committing myself to putting a little bit of money in the bank each month.
- Unplugging the internet, I intend to write more letters to faraway friends, especially those in France, as it’ll help me out with my language practise.
- Speaking of the French language, I love foreign ‘art-films’, and it’d be nice to have some more cultural experience from such movies.
I’d really like to use this time I have as an experimental self-improvement time; I want to deepen my academic skills, but at the same time expand on the normal sociable summer experiences. Thank goodness for 43 Things to help me along!
Twitter Proxies? May 11, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Clippings, Internet, Twitter, Websites.add a comment
Many people may find that Twitter is blocked by their corporate network, as I did today, and it got me thinking; most proxy sites are already blocked by my network, and I don’t have the privileges to install software (such as Tor) or change proxy settings in the browser, so how can I tweet?
And then it dawned on me – there are numerous websites which use the Twitter API to send messages, so why not harness one of them?
Twuffer, which is used to send delayed tweets, is a good one, as you can tell it to send the message now, but you can’t read tweets, only send them. I also had a look at TwitterGadget, which can be integrated into any gadget site that isn’t blocked (GMail, iGoogle, NetVibes etc.) so you can tweet from a website you know, and read your own tweets, too.
Has anybody else found good Twitter proxies? Does there need to be one developed just for Twitter?
Windows Live Call on the New menu? April 20, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Clippings, MSN, Microsoft, Windows.1 comment so far
I just found a bit of an oddity within Windows concerning the Windows Live Call feature of Windows Live Messenger (that’s an awful lot of Windows) and wonder if anyone can shed some light on it.
Basically, Windows Live Call seems to have embedded itself within the ‘New’ menu in the OS for no apparent reason – screenshot below.
Why would someone need to create a call in a folder? Even weirder, when clicked, I get a message box telling me that “Some features may not be available in this conversation”, regardless of whether I’m running messenger or not.
Now, I don’t use Windows Live Call – Skype is far superior – but I’m baffled by the failed attempt at tighter Windows integration. C’mon Microsoft, get with it.
HowTo: Read your Google Reader feeds in Thunderbird April 18, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Email, Extensions, Google, HowTo, Mozilla, Websites.2 comments
As an avid user of both Thunderbird and Google Reader on multiple computers, I’ve searched high and low, all over the internet for a solution to synchronise Thunderbird’s RSS feeds with Google Reader; adding my feeds into Thunderbird’s reader would be no good, as I’d have double updates on both of my machines.
Lifehacker had already posted a way to do this in Outlook, but Thunderbird doesn’t have the folder home page functionality that its Microsoft counterpart does, so that route was a dead end.
Fortunately, inspired by Lifehacker, I’ve discovered a way to embed a mobile version of Google Reader into my favourite email client, and it is simple and clean to use, and does not overtake the user interface. Here is how it can be achieved.
- Firstly, download and install the Thunderbrowse extension and CS Lite into Thunderbird; Thunderbrowse is a tool to embed a web browser into Thunderbird, and CS Lite is used to manipulate the cookies from Google Reader.
- Next, open your Thunderbird preferences on the ‘General’ tab. Make sure the box labelled “When Thunderbird launches, show the Start Page in the message area” is checked, and that the location field points to http://www.google.com/reader/i/. If you are unsure, check out this image on how it should look.
This tells Thunderbrowse that the page it should load on startup is the mobile interface for Google Reader, which a streamlined version of its full web counterpart. - After configuring Thunderbird’s start page, it’s time to set up Thunderbrowse to make Google Reader work. Navigate to the Add-ons menu, and open the preferences for Thunderbrowse. On the ‘Content’ tab, make sure that “Enable SmartJavascript?” is checked, and click Ok to save; this allows Thunderbrowse to run JavaScript which is used in Google Reader.
- Similarly, open the preferences for the CS Lite extension, and on the ‘Global’ tab, select “Allow cookies globally” from the drop-down box. If you don’t do this, Google Reader will complain that it can’t set cookies and it won’t work, so don’t skip this step!
- Restart Thunderbird. You may need to log in to Google Reader in the window that’s presented to you, but after doing so, you’ll have a section like this, displaying your new feeds in the message pane.
Hooray! Obviously, the mobile version lacks some of the functions as the full version, but it’s too cluttered to embed it into Thunderbird, and the menus overlay each other, making it almost impossible to use. Essentially, any webapp could be added to Thunderbird, so lovers of Google Calendar or Remember The Milk can take full advantage of their mobile versions in Thunderbird.
[http://lifehacker.com/283634/embed-outlook-on-the-desktop]
[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/5373]
[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/5207]
Facebook for LDAP? April 6, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Theoretical, Websites.1 comment so far
Once you get past all the pokes and the photos, Facebook could actually have a ‘real world’ use in both home and business computing.
Consider this: your personal (or business) network all use Facebook and are friends with you. They can chose to share their contact information with you and you can with them, so it’s easy to log into the site and check any details. However, people like me, that live inside Thunderbird, would find it useful to be able to lookup friends’ details on the fly when composing emails, so an LDAP system around Facebook would be an interesting project to pursue.
Privacy implications? Each user authenticated to the LDAP server with their own Facebook login, so as long as that’s secure, you won’t have access to people that you shouldn’t, and users can control who sees their details & how much, so in theory it should be a good model.
Je ne peux pas écrire April 5, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Life, Uncategorized.1 comment so far
I think I’m having writer’s block, and not just with my blog. I can’t seem to put together a creative piece, a discursive essay, not even a letter to one of my far-away friends. Why? What’s holding back the power to write?
In all fairness, I have been using my Twitter account a lot more recently, but that’s hardly writing, merely posting my thoughts as they come and not turning them into something more developed. But is there some malign thing in my life, preventing me from stringing together words that are actually meaningful? I think I may have lost my artistic ability with the literary canvas temporarily whilst I focus on exams, only I’ll need to be able to write well to gain good marks; and the vicious circle continues.
Reading has also become quite a stint too. It’s taken me several weeks to not even read a third of ‘War of the Worlds’, why? It took me a month to read all four books in the Twilight saga so it’s not a case of my ability. And I’ve got plenty of topics to write about – David and I recently had a very deep conversation which I can’t wait to write an article about. I’ve thought of an interesting tutorial to post. I want to finish writing up my new software concept. But there’s something holding me back from actually opening up my blog and just writing.
I love writing, I love reading. Have I become too much of an apathetic teenager to really care any more? I sincerely hope not. Hoodies and heavy metal may have become a little too prominent in my life at the moment, maybe I need to get things in balance again, including writing to my blog more. Perhaps I need to realise what needs focus at the moment.
In setting out to reason with myself why I’ve not been writing, I think I’ve accomplished getting over my writer’s block.
Webapps Extending Uses March 8, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Articles, Clippings, Internet, Software.add a comment
DesignM.ag has posted an article on unorthodox uses of WordPress – that is, not using it as a blog. For example, WordPress can be turned into visual bookmarking database, an email newsletter hub, a contact manager and even a wiki; Design.mag links to all of the tutorials and plugins so it’s easy to adapt your WordPress installation, and if you don’t already have hosting for WordPress, hop on over to DreamHostApps for no-strings-attached webapp hosting.
This article got me thinking; what other applications do we use that could work for us in different ways? I’ve tried to think of some myself.
- It’s not a secret that Google Calendar can be used to book resources and equipment but I don’t see it being implemented as often as it could be.
- A CMS like drupal could be turned into a portfolio or note-taking application.
- GMail has been transformed into a ‘Personal Nerve Center‘ which is used to store information, bookmarks, to-dos, news updates and blogs.
- I’ve used GMail + Thunderbird as a cross platform, offline sync’d note-taking system.
- Twitter can be used to run a link blog (article to follow)
It’s harder than it looks to think of uses for online software. Perhaps in the future, we’ll see more plugins and tutorials on adapting well-known internet applications for other uses.
[http://designm.ag/design/11-non-traditional-uses-of-wordpress/]
Helping a fellow blogger February 18, 2009
Posted by CLibra in Uncategorized.1 comment so far
Dan, the blogger at UneasySilence, has had is laptop stolen.
He gives more details in his blog (link below), but I’m helping to spread the word so that he can get it back soon and write more awesome blog posts.
