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Archive for the ‘Tech Fun’ Category

If you need to edit some video away from your home, free web-based video editor JayCut will likely get your project going, whether you need simple cutting and pasting or text, transitions, and impromptu audio recording.

JayCut is a remarkably full-featured video editor for the web, comparable to something like iMovie or Windows Movie Maker (as opposed to the more advanced Adobe Premiere or Apple Final Cut). You have two tracks, to which you can upload and add video clips, audio, and add text and transitions. You can also record audio straight from the webapp with your microphone, as well as video from a webcam. After you're done, you can publish your video to YouTube or export it to your computer as H.264 Flash video, H.264 MPEG-4, or an Xvid AVI.

There are definitely a few quirks that threw me off at first—for example, transitions need to be placed between videos on separate tracks overlapping one another, and you can only preview your movie from the beginning instead of placing the playhead somewhere—but overall, it's pretty incredible for something that runs in your browser. If you want to save projects and come back to them later, you need to create a free account, but for one-shot video edits you just need to fire up the demo. Also note that I had some weird issues in Firefox trying to export my video—it wouldn't let me input my information—so you might want to run a quick test in your browser of choice before editing a 3-hour masterpiece. Hit the link to check it out.

HP has reached an agreement with Phoenix Technologies (BIOS-programmers) to buy their instant-on Linux-based Hyperspace
platform for a cool $12 million. Hyperspace is not a full-on OS and is
meant to be used in conjunction with another operating system, i.e.
slow-booting Windows. The instant-on capability of Hyperspace is its
most-intriguing feature; with just the touch of a button the OS boots
in a few seconds, giving the computer user near instant access to the
internet, their music, and a few other basic tasks.

While it’s
more than likely that HP will use the purchase of Hyperspace to further
differentiate their laptop products, we can’t help but wonder what this
might mean for soon-to-be-purchased webOS.
HP was mum on what exactly they intend to do with Hyperspace, but we’re
cheering from the sidelines for at least some of the technology from
the instant-on OS to find its way into painfully-slow-to-boot webOS,
which is also based on Linux. Additionally, since the two operating
systems are Linux-based, there’s the intriguing possibility of
Hyperspace being leveraged to quickly and easily add webOS to HP’s
other portable products. Imagine a dual-booting HP tablet running webOS and Windows 7…

Ever
wanted to upload a folder full of photos to Picasa from a command
prompt? We did, a lot, last summer. It made us want to say:

$ google picasa create --title "My album" ~/Photos/vacation/*.jpg

So we wrote a program to do that, and a whole lot more.

GoogleCL
is a command-line utility that provides access to various Google
services. It streamlines tasks such as posting to a Blogger blog,
adding events to Calendar, or editing documents on Google Docs.

For example:

$ google blogger post --blog "My blog" --tags "python, googlecl, development" my_post.html
$ google calendar add "Lunch with Jason tomorrow at noon"
$ google docs edit --title "Shopping list" --editor vim

GoogleCL is a pure Python application that uses the Python gdata libraries to make Google Data API calls from the command line.

Read more at the GoogleCL project page, or jump right to the examples.
Along with a standard tarball, we have a .deb package ready for
download, and hope to have it included in Debian and Ubuntu
repositories in time for their next releases. We’re adding features all
the time, so check in frequently. Or better yet, contribute.

GoogleCL brings cloud computing to your fingertips, literally!

We’re huge fans of Dropbox,
the amazingly fast online file sync utility, but we’d be even happier
if we could natively add it to the Windows 7 Start Menu, where it
belongs. And today, that’s what we’ll do.

Yep, that’s right. You can add it to the Start Menu… using a silly
hack to the Libraries feature and renaming the Recorded TV library to a
different name. It’s not a perfect solution, but you can access your
Dropbox folder this way and it just seems to belong there.

First things first, head into the Customize Start Menu panel by
right-clicking on the start menu and using Properties, then make sure
that Recorded TV is set to “Display as a link”.

Next, right-click on Recorded TV, choose Rename, and then change it to something else like My Dropbox.

Now you’ll want to right-click on that button again, and choose
Properties, where you’ll see the Library locations in the list… the
general idea is that you want to remove Recorded TV, and then add your
Dropbox folder.

Oh, and you’ll probably want to make sure to set “Optimize this library for” to “General Items”.

At this point, you can just click on My Dropbox, and you’ll see, well, Your Dropbox! (no surprise there).

Yeah, I know, it’s totally a hack. But it’s a very useful one! Also, if you aren’t already using Dropbox, you should really check it out—2 GB for free, accessible via the web from anywhere, and you can sync to multiple desktops.

If you’d like help setting up a Dropbox account on your home or office and are located in Gwinnett County or Metro Atlanta – Especially: Lawrenceville, Snellville, Loganville, Lilburn, Centerville, Norcross, Duluth, Dacula, Winder, Buford, Suwanee, Flowery Branch, Stone Mountain, or other local cities – Please don’t hesitate to contact 678PC for a free estimate (678)404-1001

Previously mentioned web service Clicker.com aggregates tons of streaming television sources online, and an app has already been released for Boxee. But if you're not using Boxee on your media center, Clicker.tv provides a remote control friendly interface through your HTML5-compatible browser.

While the Hulu plug-in for Boxee and XBMC got shut down, there are a few other options for watching streaming television on your Media Center. However, with the release of Clicker.tv, a remote-controllable interface for Clicker.com, you can browse through Hulu and other networks' online selections without having to get out your keyboard and mouse—and no matter what software you're using.

It's not as clean as a native plug-in might be (because it still has to run in your browser), but it also works with any setup you have. There are still a few missing features, especially in cases where you're directed to outside sites like Hulu instead of watching within Clicker.tv. Since other sites aren't made to be used with remotes, there's not necessarily an easy way to jump to full screen or go to the next episode. Clicker.tv is still in beta, though, and they say they have some plans on working out these kinks in the future. Hit the link to check it out.

For advice or lessons related to Media Center PC's or Video Streaming and are in the Gwinnett County area ( Lawrenceville, Snellville, Lilburn, Duluth, Dacula, Norcross, Buford, Suwanee, Loganville, Stone Mountain, and surrounding), please dont hesitate to call 678PC at 678-404-1001 for a FREE estimate!

Computerrepairdirectory.com

So, you just upgraded your old Wi-Fi router to a shiny new model and you're reveling in speedier wireless transfers. But what should you do with the old router? While you could install a third-party firmware on it, then upgrade it for use as a bridge, that's a big pain in the ass and the performance will only be as good as your old router is capable of. If you're upgrading your router from 802.11g to 802.11n, the bridge will be limited to 802.11g speeds.

So, what to do with the old router? I've converted it to an access point, and am using it to fill a dead spot, in the furthest corner of my house. By flipping a few settings, you can turn pretty much any router into an AP, you don't even need to install any fancy third-party firmware. All you need to get started is an old router and a connection to your new router–it can be old-school wired Ethernet or you can use powerline networks to bridge the wireless divide. (We'll have more on powerline networks later this week.)

Interested? Read on and I'll walk you through the process. Assuming you've got the wired connection to the dead room in your home, it should take less than 15 minutes.

Connect to your old router

The first thing to do is connect a PC to your old router. You're going to need to do a few things to make the switch from router to AP, but if you do it in the wrong order, you could end up with the router in a state that makes it difficult to connect to. Don't worry though, even if you make a mistake, the worst thing you'll need to do is perform a hard reset on the router and start over–you can't do permanent damage to the router by adjusting settings.

The easiest way to make sure you're working on the right router is to disconnect your laptop from Wi-Fi and plug it directly into the router's LAN ports. Then go to your router's IP address and log into it–typically the router's default IP address is printed on the bottom label of the router, but you can find it by going to your network control panel and browsing to the address listed as the default gateway–usually it's 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.1.1.

This is the setting on our router, note that it's set to use the 192.168.0.1 IP address and DHCP is on.

Match the access point settings

Once you're logged into the router's administration settings, the first thing you'll want to do is adjust the SSID, WPA settings, encryption type, and passphrase so that they match on both your new router and the old router that you're converting into an AP (see below for an example). If the security settings don't match up, you'll have trouble moving between the two different wireless networks. The channel can be the same, or different–use a tool like InSSIDer on a laptop to find a lightly populated channel for each room.

Disable DHCP on the access point

Next, you need to disable DHCP on the AP's LAN interface. You can do this by browsing to the network or LAN section in configuration and disabling DHCP. This is really important, if you fail to disable DHCP on the AP, then you'll cause serious configuration problems on your network and all the computers connected to it will stop working properly. DHCP is what allows your router to assign local IPs to computers connected to the network. Since the new router is taking care of all the IP assignments for devices connected to it and the old router, DHCP needs to be disabled on the old router/access point.

These are the settings on our access point, which uses a fixed IP address outside the DHCP range of the router.

Give your access point a private IP

Once you've disabled DHCP, you can reconfigure the LAN interface to use a private local IP address that won't conflict with the router. It's a good idea to do this so that you can easily log back into the AP later to adjust settings. To find out what the reserved range is for your new router, you should go to another computer and visit its configuration screen. Typically Linksys and D-Link routers use a range of 192.168.0.2 to 192.168.0.99 for the reserved IP addresses. It is very important that the address you choose for your AP is outside the range that your new router assigns to DHCP clients. It's worth logging into the new router to check; if you get the IP wrong, it will make your network very unreliable. You'll also need to fill in a few other settings to tell your new AP how it can connect to the Internet at large–namely DNS server, default gateway, and subnet mask. If it's required, you can use your ISP's DNS servers, or simply point the AP toward 8.8.8.8, which is Google's DNS server. Your default gateway should be the new router's IP address–typically 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1. Subnet mask is typically 255.255.255.0.

Soft reboot and enjoy

That's all there is to it. Reboot your router/access point and plug it into your LAN using the router's LAN ports. (Do not use the WAN port, which is sometimes labeled Internet.) Enjoy having Wi-Fi in an otherwise dead portion of your home!

IF you would like to have this, other home or business networking jobs, or any other computer or web design work and are in the Metro Atlanta Area – Including: Lawrenceville, Snellville, Buford, Duluth, Lilburn, Norcross, Suwanee, Grayson, Loganville, Centerville, Stone mountain, Gwinnett County or surrounding areas- please dont hesitate to call 678PC for a free quote 678-404-1001

Remote-Start Your Car with a $10 Cellphone

Hardware enthusiast Dave Hacks read about the Viper SmartStart system, capable of remote starting your car from anywhere, all for $500. He loved the idea, but not the price, so he rolled up his sleeves and made his own on the cheap.