The other day I was looking for a way to keep a window on top while entering its values in another window, and laying both windows side by side wasn’t the best option for one of the windows. So, I started searching for a Stay on Top utility.

PowerMenu adds a right click menu to each window’s title bar, adding the following features:
Priority
Transparency
Always on Top
Minimize to Tray.

Under Win98, the Transparency control is not supported.

While the Stay on Top feature was what I was looking for, I was surprised to also find a solution to an organization issue that has bothered me for some years: the inability to reorganize the order of the items in the task bar. When Firefox 2.0 added the ability to move the sequential ordering of tabs, it was a real breakthrough for users who wished to organize their browser’s windows.

With PowerMenu, by minimizing the various program windows to the tray, then strategically clicking on them in the order you wish them to reappear in the task bar, one is able to reorder task bar items!

This is definitely one of the handier utilities for Windows that I’ve seen: PowerMenu by Thong Nguyen.

In my last post I wrote about one technique proofreaders use when checking their documents, and offered simple instructions regarding how to modify a WordPress 1.5.2 wp-admin.css file to help bloggers use the technique. Unfortunately, the 2.x versions require changes to post.php to achieve the same effect.

This post shows how to have more than one Post Preview section on the Write Post page in 2+ versions. It involves slightly altering the /wp-admin/post.php file with a small portion of ever-so-slightly altered code that was originally included in the same file from the earlier 1.5.2 versions. If you decide to try this, any WordPress upgrade you perform will overwrite these changes, and the programmers occasionally make changes to this file (version 2.0.5 to 2.1.2 had changes), so saving it from version to version is not a very good idea. You’ll also want to make sure you save a backup copy of the original file so you can easily undo these changes.

These instructions are specific to WordPress 2.1.2. This has also been tested to work in WordPress 2.0.5. (read more . . . )

One of the techniques used by proofreaders when checking their documents is to change the font from proportional to non-proportional and read again. I’m no great proofreader or writer, however, this is a known technique. In reading, I’ve noted that I often look quite quickly at the whole word, or several words, instead of focusing on each separate character in each word. Changing from a proportional font to a non-proportional one, and increasing the line-spacing as well as line-height, helps me to see each and every letter in each word.

Therefore, I wanted WordPress to show me the post text in several different fonts on the Write Post page as a proofreading aid. The following How To applies to WordPress 1.5.2. This will not work in the newer 2+ series because the Write Post page, specifically post.php, has been completely reworked in the newer version. It is possible to recode post.php to do this (I’ve tested it in 2.0.5); however, that goes beyond the scope of this post which is limited to a simple CSS formatting change.

This was first implemented as a project on another 1.5.2 blog that I participate in as co-administrator, and it seemed like it had been quite awhile since I had posted anything here, so I thought why not share the template modification. (read more . . . )

Alternate title: My first experience of voting on a Direct Recording Electronic or DRE device.

On Nov 7, 2006, upon arrival at the polling place with completed sample ballot in hand, unfamiliar voting machines were visible from the doorway. I asked the poll workers if paper ballots were available. They were! They asked me if I would like one. No, I decided, I wanted to experience the computerized system first hand.

Most elections I’ve participated in over the years have used the punch card machine, the one made infamous by the hanging chads of the presidential contest of 2000 between Bush and Gore. Since that time, our district of San Diego County has sometimes used a paper ballot and pen that was optically scanned as a last step before the voter left the polling location. This time, and for the first time, our district used DRE machines made by Diebold.

I don’t intend to vote using one again. (read more . . . )

Recently I added a plugin named Sociable to another weblog. While perusing the blog of Sociable’s developer, one post caught my attention. Peter Harkins asked his readers if they could recommend a good feedreader for Linux. Unfortunately, not having yet made the switch to Linux on our personal machines, it’s not possible to fully answer his question from the perspective of that operating system.

Recently I looked around for a newer feedreader for Win98SE, either one that runs under Firefox as an extension, or as a standalone program similar to FeedReader, and had some success. After finding some that didn’t work quite in the desired way, and others that had promise but unfortunately were still quite buggy, what I eventually settled upon was BottomFeeder, a standalone cross-platform Atom and RSS reader. It appears open-source and released under an Artistic License.

From the BottomFeeder front page:

“BottomFeeder runs on Linux x86, (also FreeBSD), PowerPC Linux, Sparc Linux, Windows (98/ME/NT/2000/XP/CE 4), Mac OS8/9, Mac OS X (PPC), AIX, SGI Irix, HP-UX, and Solaris (SPARC and x86).”

I have no intention of critiquing the program, as they all seem to have shortcomings and strengths of one kind or another; in the case of BottomFeeder, its feature set is impressive. This may imply it isn’t the simplest feed reader out there. I’m currently watching just under 100 feeds and have noted no big issues, but then I’m a simplistic user with basic needs who has always been attracted to the usefulness of powerware.

While it’s not perfect, you might like it — try BottomFeeder.

Now that Microsoft is no longer supporting Win98SE, where will people get security patches as they become necessary? Via cnet.com, one such third-party Win98 security patch source is calling themselves the Zero Day Emergency Response Team, or ZERT.

I noted this hardware firewall via a digg.com posting with a title that suggests it is designed for Windows XP, which in turn leads to a linuxdevices.com entry, which in turn references the portal where the Yoggie Gatekeeper will be sold.

I don’t see any information regarding a particular operating system required, presumably this device would work for networked computers of different OSs because it seems independent of them. The company’s PDF brochure doesn’t seem to make or infer any similar OS dependency claims. Whether it does or not is something to check out before a purchase.

Linuxdevices.com says the pro model will cost about $220, and the site selling the product claims it will be available by the upcoming winter holidays.

I wonder if the firewall can be secured from the Yoggie Management Server, a separate device marketed to corporate IT departments. The brochure claims “proprietary patent-pending developments”.

Antivirus protection is generally one of the must have software products if your computer is connected to the Internet. Commercial programs vary in their effectiveness and cost, but there are also some reasonably good free anti-virus programs available, if you look for them.

There are several organizations that test and rank these programs, one is http://www.av-comparatives.org/ and another is http://www.av-test.org/. It takes some time to study the comprehensive reports at av-comparatives.org, such as this anti-virus test PDF (their latest test as of the date of this post). Another series of anti-virus tests was journaled by pcworld.com in affiliation with av-test.org.

The other day I noted a link titled And The Best Antivirus Is…. The article is based upon a recent AV test report at http://www.virus.gr/.

As an aside, it’s curious to note the disparities between all three sets of AV software comparisons linked above. Back to virus.gr’s comparison.

Kapersky Lab’s product is listed as number one, and I’m not particularly surprised based upon previous test results I’ve seen, but the second best ranked product with the same percentage rating is AOL’s Active Virus Shield (AVS). AOL?

As another aside, here’s a different set of free security tools from AOL. Back to AVS. . . . . AOL’s End User License Agreement should give one pause regarding privacy. Will Active Virus Shield’s tool bar contain adware functionality at some point in time? If so, then my read of the EULA suggests the use of certain types of strict port-blocking stateful-inspection firewalls, unless they’re configured to allow AOL’s potential future ads, would be prohibited.

I decided to give AVS a try. (read more . . . )