eugene gordin

I would like to introduce Mike Mieler who has a new blog called Mike Went West devoted to all things music – concerts, artists, shows, reviews, etc as well as a promised regular podcast with new music recommendations as well as his favorites from back in the day.

I like to consider Mike the go-to guy as far as getting the newest and best music out there. He is the person behind my Music to My Speakers post, who introduced me to emusic.com, as well as countless artists that I am now obsessed with (despite shrugging them off when first hearing them as he will tell you :)). So go visit Mike, and bask in the glory that is musical good taste.

Okay, so the title doesn’t make as much sense as it could, but basically I just wanted to rhyme. Today’s topic is all about instant messaging, and the better way to do it. There are two programs that I would like to talk about specifically – AdiumX (Mac OSX) and Trillian (Windows). In concept, both programs are very similar:

Both Allow:

• Chatting on multiple chat networks – AIM, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, etc. without the individual programs
  
• Logging all conversations for later reference
• Customizing of the user interface
• Renaming of contacts
• File Transfers

Most people that I show these programs to are surprised that you can be on AIM without having to use crap from AOL, but I assure you that you can, and, in fact, should :).

Here are some of the features that I love best about each program.

AdiumX:

• The buddy list syncs with your address book (Real names are listed instead of screen names)
• Extremely customizable look and feel
• Tons of plug-ins, skins, message windows, etc

Trillian:

• Audio/Video Chat
  
• Tons of skins and plug-ins
• Multiple identities for multiple users

If you use any instant messenger, I highly recommend AdiumX and Trillian over the original programs.

P.S. If you would like your AdiumX contact list to look like the screen shot above, download this, unzip it, and double click on each file to install.

Though the majority of my posts have to do with some type of software, technology, or, for lack of better words, interesting find, this post can probably be classified as a tech tip. Today I would like to heed a warning to all of those people that like to live on the bleeding edge of technology, or those that just like brand new shiny things.

New tech hardware that is released on a massive scale – whether it be computers, music players, entertainment systems, whatever – is bound to have problems, bugs, and glitches whose tried and tested counterpart just simply doesnt have. Let me offer a simple example.

I purchased my Macbook Pro 1.83Ghz on the day that they were released, and my Macbook arrived in America from China in the very first batch. As content as I am with my MacBook Pro – which is amazingly content – it has had 3 major problems, all of which have now been fixed (for monetarily free) in both mine, and all new MacBook Pros. I say monetarily because although all three repairs were completely free, two week were spent without my MacBook, which was quite a hassle (thank g-d for my mini). In fact, apparently, with my Macbook, I got relatively lucky.

My point is basically this: if you buy a new model, or pretty much any new technological innovation, you immediately assume not only the inherent risk that all technology brings with it, but also the fact that you probably will run into first revision problems that all can and will be smoothed out after some time.

For some people, this inherent risk is worth having the latest and greatest gadgets out there. However, for the majority of consumers, its exactly these bugs/problems/hassles that need to be avoided, and therefore, this information should be kept in mind.

As a side note, I was thinking of creating a website devoted to offering people advice as far as when a good time to buy a new computer (mostly Apple Macs) would be based on the large amounts of facts, information, and speculation in the computer (Mac) world. However, since I don’t foresee myself creating this type of site anytime soon, if any of you are considering purchasing a new Apple product, let me know because now might be a good time to wait just a bit for the newest version/model/revision which very well could be less problematic, buggy, and hassle-ful. 🙂

As most people know, both Windows and OSX have tons of keyboard shortcuts built into them, all for the sole purpose of speeding up remedial tasks. Instead of listing all of the keyboard shortcuts that are out there, which you can find here (Windows) and here (OSX), I thought I would list the ones that I use on a daily basis.Global Shortcuts (windows users should use ctrl key instead of apple)
apple+c – Copies highlighted item
apple+x – Cuts highlighted item
apple+v – Pastes copied/cut item

apple+a – Selects all items
apple+s – Saves document/webpage/etc
apple+p – print document/webpage/etc
apple+w – Close current page/document/etc
apple+n – Open new page/document/etc
apple+q – Quit current program

apple+b – Bold highlighted text
apple+i – Italicize highlighted text
apple+u – Underline highlighted text
apple (hold) +click multiple objects – highlights multiple objects (not necessarily in a row)
shift+click – Highlights multiple objects in a row

Personal Favorite:
apple+t – open new tab in Mozilla Firefox (I use this one hundreds of times per day)

Apple OSX Specific:
apple+shift+3 – Take screenshot of entire display
apple+shift+4 – Take screenshot of sizable window
apple+option+esc – Force Quit Unresponsive Application
apple+tab – Switch between open windows
apple+delete – Send item to trash
F12 – Bring up dashboard (10.4 Tiger & later)

Microsoft Windows Specific:
windows – Bring up start menu
windows+e – Open new explorer window
alt-tab – Switch between open windows.

Those are the keyboard shortcuts that I use regularly, and can reallys speed things up when you are working. I also use a program called SizzlingKeys for OSX, which allows me to program my own keyboard shortcuts for controlling iTunes. That way, no matter what program I am in, I can play/pause/move to next track in iTunes with simple key combinations. SizzlingKeys is free, but if you want to enable the Pro features such as searching your library and playlists with shortcut keys, it’ll cost you $4.95. On my Macbook Pro, I have sizzling keys programed for:

apple+F11 – Play/Pause
apple+F12 – Next Track

If you can remember any of these, it will really speed up some of the repetitive tasks we all often have to do. Hope that helps!

So today I had a good friend call me with what turned out to be quite a typical situation. She was working tirelessly on her computer (a brand new macbook, for the record), and for some reason did not click save inside Microsoft Word. Low and behold, when she came back to her computer, the file was no where to be seen and all of her work was gone.

We have all lost work like this, and, although at the time its terrible, its actually (for the most part) preventable. Microsoft Word, as well as all of the other Microsoft Office applications have built it security options for situations just like this. Basically, Word can save your documents for you automatically at any time interval. These settings can be found in Word (or Excel, or Powerpoint) preferences, under the save tab. Just make sure to change the AutoRecover time interval to one minute and to check the box that says Always Create Backup Copy. Below is the screenshot of the window on a mac, though it should look very similar in Windows.

Also, while youre at it, make sure under the File Locations tab you add a location for AutoRecover files. That way, if you do lose a document, you will know where Word automatically saved it. Hope this helps!

Though my music collection these days can neither be described as large nor small, I often find myself with a slight fear of musical stagnation – in fear of the day that I stop looking, liking, and exploring new music and grow too comfortable with the music I already have.So, being the unyielding believer in the advancement of modern technology that I am, I faithfully set out on a mission to find new sources of music that I would like, using a system hopefully a bit more advanced than using Amazon’s “Customers who bought this item also bought” system (though this system is surprisingly accurate and helpful most of the time). In my search, I stumbled upon three sources of information that have not only helped to expand my iTunes library significantly, but also have served to assuage my fear each time it arises.

My first such source is also the most rudimentary one, and though I berated Amazon.com above, the site actually is quite helpful in this regard. There is no substitute for user opinions, and it is Amazon’s customer reviews of albums I already have that I use in order to find similar artists. While reading through the vast amounts of album reviews, I run into people comparing the artist to others and accusing the artist of copying the style or genre of someone else. And from there I take those other artists, and see if I like them or not. Quite rudimentary I know and thus my second source.Throughout my music collection, and only in the last three years, I have many non-mainstream artists that seem to not get the attention they deserve (such is life). But despite not getting their much deserved recognition, it seems that finding them proves difficult as well.

Fortunately, for ind(i)ependent artists and independent record labels, emusic.com serves as a collaborative site that catalogues millions of artists and allows song downloads at relatively cheap prices ($0.25 each with a subscription model) without any DRM (digital rights management) included. Personally I have not purchased any music from them, but the articles, recommendations, and polls help to serve as a guiding light for emerging independent artists. If you have not check this site out I highly recommend it.

The third and final source of new artists (to me) is called Pandora. Pandora is the child of the Music Genome Project, a project who’s aim was to “capture the essence of music at the most fundamental level” by “assembling literally hundreds of musical attributes or “genes” into a very large Music Genome. Taken together these genes capture the unique and magical musical identity of a song – everything from melody, harmony and rhythm, to instrumentation, orchestration, arrangement, lyrics, and of course the rich world of singing and vocal harmony.”

The Music Genome Project is a pretty amazing achievement on its own. However, Pandora utilizes the genome project’s findings in order to, once you enter songs or artists that you like, offer you song suggestions not only with text, but also in a radio station type form. This allows you to hear the recommendations and let the station know if you liked the song or not, and Pandora based on your preferences, will tailor the station programming to your liking. The technology behind Pandora amazes me to this day, and the simplicity of use is unparalleled (each recommended song includes purchase links to the iTunes store and Amazon.com (in case you want to hear the song again and make it yours). Below is a screenshot of Pandora’s user interface. Enjoy!

I wish you all the best in your search for new music, and hopefully your will find these three sources helpful along the way 🙂