Archive for the 'tech' Category

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System Tray Audio Device Switcher

Published on March 30, 2006 in reviews and tech. 17 Comments

I actively use both a Bluetooth headset (a Logitech® Mobile Pro™) and a Rode NT1 microphone on my computer. The headset I use for making and taking Skype calls and listening to podcasts at home, while the microphone I use for narrating video tutorials and recording podcasts. The problem is, switching between these audio sources is a minor pain (which becomes a major pain through repitition), requiring a trip to the Control Panel every time.

Thankfully, I’ve found this free utility called, in various places, System Tray Audio Device Switcher, SysADS, SADS, and System Tray Audio Device Manager. It lives in my Windows system tray and allows me to select my playback and recording device with just a couple of clicks. The program hasn’t been updated since its release in 2003, but it works on Windows XP SP2 just fine (I’m not holding my breath that it’ll work quite so well in Vista, however).

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3D Cutaway Illustration

Published on March 22, 2006 in snippets and tech. 1 Comment

This makes me want to go on a cruise. (via Boing Boing)(1)

Flickr is starting to suck

Published on March 20, 2006 in geekdom, rants and tech. 1 Comment

I’ll admit I haven’t jumped whole hog into the whole Flickr thing. I do have a Pro account, and yet most of my photos are still in my private gallery.

One of the main reasons, I think, is that, while I enjoy the whole idea of Flickr—a world of photographs naturally organized by keywords and shared (or not) between communities of like-minded people—a lot of the actual implementation kinda sucks. Oh sure, I was dazzled along with the rest when their AJAX-powered interface first came on the scene, with slick edit-in-place functionality and plenty of taggy goodness to explore. But whenever I actually want to do something with Flickr, the site quickly begins to get in my way.

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Free WiFi in Ottawa?

Published on March 13, 2006 in Canada and tech. 3 Comments

Just got off the phone with mom and dad, who have just bought their first post-retirement home in Ottawa. Mom happened to mention she was connected to the Internet via a free wireless Internet service that was apparently available to all Ottawa residents. My envy quickly turned to skepticism, however, when she mentioned the SSID (network name) of the service she was connecting to was “netgear2″.

NETGEAR is of course a well-known manufacturer of network hardware, including wireless routers. I suspect that neighbours of my parents’ simply have their home network (and associated Internet connection) sitting wide open without any security. If that’s their informed choice, then great. If not, well I hope it’s an old router, because there’s no reason current wireless networking hardware should allow inexperienced users to expose their networks like this.

Mom, if you wanted to be a good neighbour, you could probably stroll around the block with your laptop and get a good idea of which house was hosting the network you are connecting to based on signal strength. A note in the mailbox advising the occupants to configure their network more securely would certainly qualify as your good turn for the day.

Installing IIS after Service Pack 2

Published on March 6, 2006 in rants and tech. 60 Comments

I’m preparing to record one in a series of video tutorials for SitePoint, for which I’ll need a copy of Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS), the web server that comes with Windows XP Professional, installed on my home computer for the first time since I installed Windows.

The usual way to do this is to launch Add or Remove Programs from the Control Panel, click Add/Remove Windows Components, pick IIS from the list and then go from there. But if, like me, you’re working with a copy of Windows that has been updated to Service Pack 2, you’ll just get this error:

Copy Error: Setup cannot copy the file staxmem.dll.

Microsoft helpfully offers a solution to this in its online knowledge base. Problem is, the solution (which will most often require “Method 2″ in that article) requires you to have a Service Pack 2 CD on hand, and Microsoft’s web site does everything it can to talk you out of getting a copy of that CD.

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