Computerjargon.com

It all started when I fell madly in love with your Google Apps for Domains. My mail has never been so organized and spam-free! When I discovered the ability to check my mail on my mobile I was ecstatic.

Next, I started using Reader to manage all my RSS subscriptions. You have made sense and organization out of a closet full of wires and dirty clothes! I love you Google Reader, I really do.

But today you have truly topped yourself. I can now view my GCal through my mobile. Thank you Google, thank you so much. No longer must I be tied to stupid Outlook to manage schedule.

I can carry my online life where ever I go. You have centralized all my data. You have made sense out of the nonsensical.

From the beginning I have been obsessed with putting my life online. I believe though, that I have found the Mecca for uber-life-connectivity: Twitter. I didn’t get Twitter for a long time. I tried it a few months ago and couldn’t figure out why I would want to use it. After the Vegas trip, though, I realized that Twitter allows me to write a “small blog” from anywhere using my cellphone. That means where ever I am, and whatever I’m doing, can be documented.

To top Twitter though is Jaiku , an aggregator of all my various online-going-ons. It will organize my online “stuff” by date, truly tracking everything I do.

So if you’re twittering, you can find me at http://www.twitter.com/brokenindu . For everything, all at once, and overflowing, check out my Jaiku feed at: http://breakdown.jaiku.com/.

I’m in an organizing mood. When I get like this I typically shift whatever I’m trying to organize around for awhile until I get bored. Take for instance my past attempts at alphabetizing our CD collection. I typically get through M before I just give up and move on to something else.

Today 2 things got my goat today:

1. Categorizing my blog posts – I have over 500 posts on CJ dating back to 1999. The Wordpress software makes it a sinch to assign categories to each blog post. Unfortunately, I have to go through each post and select the appropriate categories. You’ll notice there’s one category named “Imported” that contains an over abundant amount of posts. Its the default category, so any posts not properly organized exists there for the time being. Over time the number diminishes as I find time to walk through each post. I try to do at least 10 posts a day.

2. Organizing my digital files – I have 4 hard drives at home that are full. The problem is, I don’t know what their full with. I had a tendency to make a backup of my “Documents” folder, which may be gigs in size, because I fear losing my most important documents. I’ve done it so frequently though, that now I can’t find anything. Is it in my 20040112 back up or my 20040620 backup? I plan on breaking down my documents into logical types instead of date based. All of this, of course, is backed up as frequently as possible. I’ve already learned that lesson the hard way.

I once read an article regarding self-organizing manila file folders. It’s basically a way for your most important or often used folders to float to the top of the pile. At work I have a wire stand that I keep all my manila project folders in. As I work/reference the folders I always return them to the front of the stand. That way my most used folders are always in front. This also forces the lesser referenced folders to the back. When the stand gets full I remove the files from the back, since they aren’t referenced anymore, and archive them (either in a drawer or in the trash). It’s a simple but effective technique that I couldn’t live without.

A few weeks ago I signed up to receive a free FON wifi router. FON’s concept is simple, build a community of users willing to share their bandwidth through an open Wifi connection. The only problem is it requires purchasing a $30 wifi router from FON. Well, that was until they ran a promotion to hand out a few thousand free routers. I filled out a form and didn’t expect much. FON literally asked me for only my name and address.

To my surprise I received a little package this week. Sure enough, I had been sent a little FON wifi router. The router itself is nothing too impressive. It’s small enough to fit in the palm of my hand and has three LED status lights on it. All I needed to do was to plug it in to my existing wired network.

The router uses the OpenWRT firmware originally created to run on Linksys hardware. I thought this was pretty ingenious of FON. By utilizing existing software they are able to provide some pretty slick functionality. The router has a public and private side. The private side can be used for a secure internet connection like any other wifi router. The public side, though, is a proxy into the FON community.

When I first set up the router I was redirected to FON’s website to configure the router to work with the community. I had to choose what type of node I wanted to be. My choices were either 1. be free and then be granted access to other community routers or 2. charge people $3 to connect to my router. Being in a suburb and right next to a Caribou with free internet connectivity I can’t imagine making much money off of it. I choose to be a free node.

So, if you’re ever cruising the streets of Crystal looking for free wifi, check out my drive way. It’s got the best there is to offer…in a driveway.

After 8 years of vowing to write my own blogging software I have given in and admitted that I will never complete the project. After reading about Jamie’s successful Wordpress conversion I decided to give it a shot myself. A few hours later I was up and running with all my old content ported over. All in all, I’m quite happy with the Wordpress software. It’s very slick and easy to work with.

Because of this, Puckwucker.com received a facelift as well. Courtney no longer has to put up with my rudimentary design skills. She can finally have a decent looking site.

Yesterday I read an article on Digg proclaiming the release date for the new Nintendo handheld had been broken and it was available at Targets and Walmarts across the country. Up until yesterday I had little to no interest in getting a DS Lite. Prior to yesterday the only games that even peaked my interest were the new Mario Bros. game and one called Brain Age (it’s supposed to make you smarter). But after hearing that I could procure one 10 days before the official release date sent me into a tizzy.

Court and I went to our local Target to pick up a few necessities for the weekend. I casually RAN to the game isle in hopes of scoring one at my first store. No luck. In fact, it looked like they had stocked them, then pullled them because their shelves were mysteriously very empty. The hunt had begun!

We returned home. I threw on a more comfortable outfit and told Court I was heading out for a Geek Hunt. I needed to find a DS Lite. I invited her along fully expecting her to turn me down. To my surprise she was game. We hopped in the car and started driving.

We ran around to a few more Targets and one Walmart but I wasn’t able to find a DS Lite on sale. The best I found was a demo unit at Walmart. Although I never found one I still enjoyed the thrill of trying to. Being the first nerd on the block to have one is always fun. Of course, most of the time I’m the ONLY nerd on the block.

Will I get one when its finally released on June 11th? Maybe. By then, though, I bet I’ll be on to the next greatest thing. But until then I’ll continue to check the local Target hoping to score one. Today rumors are floating around that Nintendo moved the date to June 1st. My hunt continues…

“Do you want some ice cream?” I asked Court last night.

“Sure,” she responded.

“Okay, I’m going to swing out to Shinders and then by Cold Stone for some ice cream.”

“What’s at Shinders that you need?” she inquired.

“Um…uh…Comic books”

I had just read an article on Slashdot about the latest issue of Captain America. In a sudden rush this boyful glee came over me as I was completely possessed with the thought of reading this comic book. It’s a feeling I haven’t had since I was 15, when I first collected.

This all stems from a recent conversation I had with a co-worker. We got to talking one day about comics and such. I try not to let my nerdy side out too much but I couldn’t help but reminisce about the good ol’ days of my childhood when I’d spend the week trying to convince my mom to take me to Shinders on Saturday so I could pick up the latest X-Force. The co-worker brought in some recent books to wet my appitette a bit. The art and storylines were great and I feared getting hooked again.

I came home with 5 new comics from Shinders. I threw them on the table while Court and I ate our ice cream. After our dessert I picked them up and started thumbing through them. Court asked to see them so I showed her my new pride and glories.

“No,” she exclaimed.

“What?” I knew what she was getting at.

“You get crazy with this sort of stuff.”

“What do you mean I get crazy?” I figured my best defense was denial.

“Remember the Simpsons toys? We still have a stack of ‘Experience’ magazines. You have to own EVERYTHING when you collect stuff”

“No..No I don’t,” I said. The truth is: yes, yes I do.

“Can we throw out the ‘Experience’ magazines?” She asked. I figured it was a fair trade so I agreed.

“I promise, Court. I won’t get crazy. I’ll keep them in a box so they’re not in the way”

“What good are they going to do in a box?”

Chad declared yesterday that I need to clean up L1R1, the affectionate name for my computer room. After thinking about it I thought, “How DARE he pass judgement on the cleanliness of my computer room! Who does he think he is?!” I realized that for as much grief and heckling I give to Chad, Tina, and their dog I shouldn’t react so harsh.

…I still plan on slashing his tires after lunch.

I’ve fallen in love with an application called Hamachi. It is a peer-to-peer tool that allows anyone to create secure “private” networks (VPNs) over the internet. Typically VPNs are only used by businesses and the super-nerdy. Hamachi allows the common folk to easily create one.

You’re probably thinking, “That’s great, Jason, but why do I need this?” Well, you probably don’t. But I do. It allows me to create a small, personal network of computers over the internet. Whether I’m at home or at a friends house I can access my computers as if I’m at my house. VPNs can be created without Hamachi but it’s complicated. Very, very complicated.

Even better, Hamachi allows me to create more than one private network. I can create a network of friends and/or family. We can easily share our (legal) files. No more monkey business with torrents, FTP, and email box quotas.

I recently went to visit my grandparents who live on the Mississippi River in La Crescent, MN. For the longest time their neighborhood has been comprised of cottages and cabins. 20 years ago their river-front property wasn’t more than a weekend get-away for most. But over the course of the last 8 or so years builders have moved in, bulldozed most of the cottages, and built monsterous houses that span entire property lots.

I don’t typically bring my laptop with me when I go to visit. My grandparents use dial-up for internet. This time I decided to, just to have something to occupy my time. Before I left I had installed an application called NetStumbler that does a pretty good job locating and listing wireless access points. I fired it up at the grandparents and was surprised to find someone in the neighborhood had a Linksys router. Gitty with excitement I got to work.

The signal was weak and seemed to come and go. I spent the better part of a night trying to figure out where the signal was coming from. After a little “war-walking” (That’s what Courtney calls it) I found that it was coming from a house to the south. The signal was still too faint for my to get solid communication to the DHCP server on the router. I attempted to set my IP address manually guessing the network default was either a 10.0.x or 192.168.0.x based network. I had no luck and gave up for the night.

The next morning the fog was hanging a little lower than before and the clouds were moving in. Perfect for bouncing a wifi signal my way! I fired up my laptop again and started away. After letting my Intel wifi card do its thing for a few extra minutes I was finally able to retrieve an IP address from the DHCP server, on the 192.168.1.x network. I was sooo close! Damn! The signal was still very weak and I had a hard time doing much of anything. I pulled up a web page and showed off my trimuph to the family. They were less than impressed but it solitified my nerd status.

So I did it. I accomplished getting on to the internet through a wireless connection no faster than my grantparents dial-up connection that already existed. But it was fun nonetheless.