Hey, that's Delicious!

I have just become informed of a very useful website. Its called Delicious!

Delicious is a website that saves your bookmarks for you, which is very nice for me. I have several computers that I use: a home desktop, office desktop (with dual boot, which makes it like 2 computers), home laptop, work laptop -- all of which contain web browsers that I use (for example Firefox, or in case of Linux, Opera seems to work better). I found myself emailing links/bookmarks to myself so that I can revisit those pages on another computer/browser and then bookmark it there if I want. I also noticed that I have hundreds of bookmarks that get lost in the shuffle. Delicious saved me from this bookmark/link hell!!

Since Delicious allows for quick access to my links from any browser, I don't see why I'll ever bookmark again! Hoooray!!

Another "benefit" is that you can share your links publicly. This is imagined to be a public service of information resource sharing. Each link can be tagged which allows for easier access. You can also specify some links as private if you just want to keep that info to yourself.

My Delicious is under the code-name "mjb888": http://delicious.com/mjb888

Hey, did you know Envy can be a good thing?

Just the facts please.

First: my current position requires some learning of several basic computing languages, of which I have little or no prior knowledge.

Second: computer programmers (a.k.a. geeks) prefer an operating system called Linux. This OS is open source and free. Its based on UNIX and so is more similar to Mac than PC. There are also seemingly hundreds of distribution types ("distros").

Third: I use Linux Mint as my distro (currently Mint 6: Felicia).

Fourth: computer "geeks" in my field also like having dual monitors. I like this too.

Fifth: A good thing about Linux is that since its all open-source, there is less "junk" in the OS. I'm sure all my fellow Windows users can attest to how XP or Vista likes to assume what we want and/or need. I'll add my Apple disclaimer now: Macs combine properties of PC and Linux...that, overall, make it worse than both...the "whole being less than the sum of its parts" so to speak. The details of this statement are not necessary for this post.

Sixth: referencing my 4th and 5th points, some of the proprietary drivers (e.g. for dual monitors) are not included and can be more of a hassle (than say in XP) to install and manual configuration is often necessary.

Seventh: OK. On to my real issue here. My dual monitor settings would reset to single monitor (simply turning one monitor off) after each restart of my computer. Very annoying!! The search for the solution began!!

Eight: I remember having this problem when using Mint 5 (Elyssa). Having just installed Mint 6, I had forgotten how I solved this monitor issue. All I could remember was that there was a download package that fixed it and it had a short one-word name that was somehow ironic or cute.

Nine: it took me several hours to find it in Linux forums (most of the "geeks" manually program the files themselves to fix it and so its much more complicated to do it their way...Linux users seem to really love doing things the more complicated way). But I found it!! And now I'm posting this info on my blog so if I need it again, I can find it fast! Maybe I will go back to all the Linux forums and post there too because its really a much simpler solution.

Ten: The solution is to download ENVY. its a program by an Italian dude. This is ironic/cute because the Italian word for "envy" is "invidia" and the video driver that this works with is the NVIDIA driver. Thank you Alberto Milone!! You rock!!!


ENVY
LINUX MINT

*image created using GIMP (GNU Image Manipulation Program)...basically a free photoshop.

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**UPDATE**

I spoke too soon! ENVY does not work with Mint 6! Therefore, I'm taking this opportunity to try out some other Linux distros. I will try PCLinux2007, PC-BSD, OpenSUSE 11.0, and Dreamlinux. I really like Mint though, so I might just revert to Mint 5 since I know it works. One final note: I have a dual-boot system, so my Windows is always ready!

Hey, did you know good nutritional information isn't on the darkside of the moon?

My grandmother gave me a very old medical book (approx. 100 years old) and one of the chapters gives the cure for obesity. You may be surprised to know that the cure is: balanced diet and exercise. Believe it or not, through all the fads, that is still the best treatment.

Sometimes, we feel like we should try this "balanced diet" thing. But does the info on the side of the package really tell us all we need to know? What about things without packaging, like fruits and vegetables and raw meats? I found this website that gives a nice breakdown of food nutrients and has several tools to help you make sure you are getting what you need. In addition to the "raw" foods, it also has many popular brand name foods which contain the ingredient you search for. I haven't checked that part out yet. There seems to be several levels to check out here...including good foods to "match".

Check out: Nutrition Data*

*I am in no way compensated for directing you to this website, though I wish I was.