January 2010 Archives

Comment Spam on Increase

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Maybe it is related to the holiday season, buy the comment spam on Mac5 blogs has increased. In the past, automated spam was blocked with some special code I installed. I know there are businesses in poor countries that have rooms full of low-paid labor doing all kinds of things to manipulate Google searches. Manually posting comments with links is one such strategy

Comment-Spam-Example-1.pngI have made some changes in the spam protection settings that will, I hope, intercept this new wave of spam. The example shown here was a spam that was caught in early December. It was caught for two reasons: 1) Too many links in the comment and 2) the IP address of the commenter was listed on a spam notification service. I have turned up the scoring to be more aggressive.

Our friends and family should not get blocked when we are not including links. And even if we include links will typically get posted because we get positive credit with a known email address. Let's hope the spammers don't figure out our email addresses.

iGroove for the iPod Touch

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After much research, I decided to get the iGroove SXT by Klipsch. Someone described it as "Bose at half the price."
Klipsch-iGroove-SXT.jpg

The iPod Touch has become a well used device in our household. It basically acts as a small wireless tablet that floats around the house but mainly lives in the family room. I've been watching a growing collection of games that the kids download. Other apps used frequently:

  • Mail - quick way to check Gmail
  • Facebook - ditto
  • Time - why subscribe?
  • USA Today - I read in the morning
  • Music : Podcasts - NPR Market Place and News from Lake Wobegon
  • Pandora - streaming music based on channels you build

The challenge was keeping the Touch charged. It has long battery life, but it is awkward to hook up to one of the other computers in the house to charge, in part because each Mac wants to sync the iPod.

I went looking for a docking station, perhaps one that could sit next to our stereo and plug into it. I had a hard time finding a solution. There were mixed reviews on whether various docks would work with the newest "Gen 2" iPod Touch. So when I read about the iGroove on Apple's website, I decided that was the one.

I was able to pick an iGroove up at Best Buy for the same price as the Apple Store. Now we have a great sounding, compact speaker system that can play streaming music from Pandora. Listening to my "Banjo channel" right now. (Bluegrass.)

Order yours today on Amazon!

Note: Also works fine with the several Nano's in the house as a charging / play station.

Write Like an Architect

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I couldn't believe the author used a square to draw every vertical of every letter. He must only do this when doing formal notation on projects. The quote at the end begs the question, "Why not use a computer?"

In memory of John Horky. Wherever you are...

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This page is an archive of entries from January 2010 listed from newest to oldest.

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