It's finally done. Amidst the increasing tension of the upcoming exams, I told myself, this I had to do. I decided to record a video of both my beloved dog and her puppies and had the video encoded for the world to see.

So there, presenting Girl Girl and her 4 erm... boys? :)



Hit play and make sure your speakers are turned on!

Enjoy...

After a good 2 months of labour, our beloved dog, Girl Girl has given birth to 4 healthy puppies!

Names and genders are currently unknown. We have not held the babies yet - apparently, mummy would get over protective.

You are welcome to suggest names for the puppies in the comments section!

Girl Girl with one of her puppies right beneath her...

Girl girl and her puppies...

Close-up shots of her puppies...

More close-up shots of her puppies...

I heard over the radio today that Proton might just be launching yet another model. To me, anything new is exciting. As with anything new, there are always the trust-worthy spies armed with a spy camera or a device as simple as a mobile phone camera who would manage to snap a picture or two.

In an effort to seek for these pictures, I went online and started searching. Within minutes - there it was - staring me in the face were pictures of the code named "SRM" - Satria Replacement Model.




Pictures from autoweek.nl

If you were to ask me, the car looks pretty sleek. Proton seems to be bringing in some pretty good talents as far as design is concerned. With aesthetics taken cared of, all that is left now is quality control.

With Proton's competitive priced + great aesthetics + great quality cars, Proton is certainly heading towards a brighter future.

Apart from the SRM, there were also rumours of a replacement for the least successful "Tiara" - ironically code named - TRM (Tiara Replacement Model) - I'll keep an eye on this.

Bring on SRM and TRM!

Just returned from, in my opinion, one of the goriest movies I have ever watched.



It's blood everywhere... wax everywhere and a host of torture instruments.

So if you like Paris Hilton or Chad (One Tree Hill Dude) or simply love bloody scenes or all three, this is a must watch.

Movie ranking? 6 1/2 out of 10 - it's just too gory for me. If you enjoy gory and bloody scenes - you'll probably give it a 7 1/2 out of 10. Go watch the movie, tell me how you rank it!

If you own Apple's OS X 10.3.9 (Panther) and have been oogling over OS X 10.4's (Tiger) Widgets - fear not, Amnesty is here.

Amnesty, similar to Konfabulator (mentioned in an older post) allows you to run the infamous widgets on pre-Tiger OS Xs.

The only problem with Konfabulator was that it was unable to recognize widgets created specifically for OS X Tiger. So if you were to download some widgets from Apple's Widget site, it simply wouldn't work with Konfabulator.

The solution? Amnesty! Amnesty allows you to run OS X Tiger specific widgets on OS X Panther (10.3.9) by creating an environment similar to that of Dashboard where the widgets could "LIVE" in.



Only problem? Amnesty doesn't work with Windows nor versions of OS X older than 10.3.9 (Panther). If you are in these two categories of operating systems, Konfabulator would be the best alternative.

If you have OS X Panther (10.3.9) installed, go grab a copy of Amnesty today and start enjoying Apple's version of widgets!

The title tells one thing. I have not been spared by the Star Wars craze.

That said, this post has nothing to do with Star Wars but my phone. The incessant restarting phone. This I shall say is the second installment of my story - a sequel to episode I.

In a galaxy far far away...
Ben finally purchased the docking station / data cable which would allow him to upgrade his Sony Ericsson S700i's firmware. After a successful firmware upgrade using the newly purchasing docking station, Ben finally thought, it was all over - the incessant restarting phone will finally turn into a perfect communication device - a gadget worth every cent and worth every effort made to have it fixed.

1 week later...
The phone has been doing pretty well. No restarts, as a matter of fact, due to the firmware upgrade there were a number welcoming improvements.

Then it started all over again. The phone restarts. I couldn't believe my eyes! After all that effort, and forking out over RM200 for a docking station, the phone still restarts! I was beginning to lose faith in the phone. Immediately, a call was made to Sony Ericsson's Service Centre, from there, I spoke to a senior officer and had my problem related to him.

The solution?
Has yet to be found. I shall now wait patiently for something "GREAT" to happen. As Master Yoda would say, "patience it is, my young padewan".

Keep an eye on this post. I'll update the moment I get a "GREAT" response :)

Since my vow not to step into campus, I have been left in quarantine mode - leaving myself and my Shingles (which, is going away pretty rapidly).

I am not so much of a TV person. I am more of a gadget person. I need buttons to press... not the ones on the remote-control that is, buttons on devices such as mobile phones, mp3 players, iPods, digital camera's, keyboards - you get the idea.

Aside from completing my last assignment this semester, I have been thinking of changing the face of my blog. At first, I thought of redesigning the entire template all by myself. With the design out, I found that it was way easier to design the template than to actually implement it. Blogger has some specific rules and tags which seems completely alien to me.

What I did was to scour the web for a template, found one from Blogger Templates, got it implemented onto my blog and from there, I had the coding modified and added a nice little picture of myself, Stella (my girlfriend) and our dog (girl girl - who is incidentally pregnant and should be giving birth to 3-4 puppies in the next 1 week or so).

So there! You hate it? You like it? Post your comments! This is version 1.0, so please, bear with me :)

Cheers!

It's been 3 days since I had myself diagnosed of having shingles (if you don't know what I'm talking about, read the last few posts).

It's been healing. The little "pimples" have semi-dried up and I trust that it would be time to return to campus. I haven't been to classes for the past 2 days - I miss campus... OK to be really honest - I feel guilt.

So there I was heading for campus early this morning, arrived, fresh environment of people moving around (you see, I have been "caged" or shall I say "quarantined" in my home and all I see is my dog, my room and Stella - when she's not out and about).

I headed for my first tutorial of the day. Since it was nearing an assignment dateline, the tutor gave students some time to roam about and work on their individual assignments. Everytime a student came near me I would say "WAIT! Have you had chicken pox???" - and they would go "Erm... Yes/No, WHY?" and I would go "erm.. nothing...".

You see, the word Shingles sounds REALLY SCARRY. It sounds like a life threatening virus. A virus which would kill. The fact is, yes, it could kill, if not taken cared of - and can spread, causing chicken pox to those who have not had chicken pox.

After conquering the first class, I felt that I was prepared to move on and this shingles thing will not hinder me from the rest of the classes.

As I have missed Monday's and Tuesday's classes, I decided to drop by a lecturer's room to hand him my Medical Certificate and inform him of my condition. Immediately, he took a seat back, GASPED, and went "you shouldn't be in campus, its CONTAGIOUS. Maybe you shouldn't come for the tutorial class later. You could be spreading it to everyone...".

What he said was true, I could be spreading it to those students who have never had chicken pox. With examinations nearing, I do not want to jeapordize anyone's ability to study and sit for the examinations.

Thanks to Moral Studies - I learned the word - Utilitarianism - that is, to perform an action for the greater good. In my case, if I were to decide not to attend my classes for the rest of the day, I might feel more guilt but then, since I'm doing it for the hundreds and thousands of students in Monash University Malaysia - it will be a noble, right and moral thing to do. :)

So there, Ben has spoken. I shall now return home, back into "quarantine" mode.

The world is going crazy about searching. From Yahoo, Google, Microsoft then Apple. A couple of months back, Google released their desktop search and Microsoft followed with it's Beta version of MSN Desktop Search.

The idea of searching files within the computer is nothing new, but the speed and the accuracy in which these applications offer is way superior than the aging search methodology which literally searches through each file and folder on the drive.

I was one of the early adopters of both Google's and Microsoft's offering. The verdict was that Microsoft's offering with better integration into the operating system and support for more file formats is more superior than that of Google's.

It has been a couple of months since Microsoft released their beta version of desktop search. I found that the search product has left it's beta stage and is now ready for general public use.

I downloaded a copy from MSN Desktop Search's official site and got the application installed - overriding my beta copy.

So what's new?

Aesthetics

• The Desktop Search Bar (sitting on the taskbar) looks more sleek and refined
• The little MSN Desktop Search icon on the system tray resembles more of a magnifying glass
• There is now an official application in the start menu called - "Windows Desktop Search"

Features

• More intuitive
  The search results are now more intuitive - in a way where a preview of the file/picture/contact/appointment/e-mail etc. is shown when a file is selected
  
  
• Quick access to programs
  It now indexes programs! Just type "Word" hit the "Down Arrow Key" hit "ENTER" and voila! Microsoft Word launches! Imagine, no more going through the super duper long list of programs from your start menu. Just type, arrow down or up and hit enter... SWEET!
  
  
• Shortcuts
  You can now add shortcuts to desktop search. If you have a couple of files which you open pretty often, simply type "@shorcutname,c:\documentpath" hit enter and the next time you type "shortcutname" and hit "ENTER", voila... out comes the file...
  
  
• Better integration with MSN Network
  Apart from emphasis of shortcuts for the desktop, Desktop Search, thanks to it's affiliation with MSN Network allows you to search MSN Content such as Encarta, MSN Movies, Expedia etc all from within the desktop search interface
  
  
• Extensibility
  If Microsoft Desktop Search doesn't support a specific file type by default, simply get to Microsoft Desktop Search's site and chances are, you'll find a plugin to enable support for the file type of your choice.
  

A note for Beta users of MSN Desktop Search
If you have got a Beta version of MSN Desktop Search and have performed the indexing, the new copy of Desktop Search will require you to re-index the entire drive - it's still indexing as I type this blog.

What about performance?

• In the past, what I didn't like was the fact that desktop search requires an "initialization time" which can take anything from 5-10 minutes after Windows have completely loaded.
  
  Update: 1:57pm - it's been fixed! Yay!
  
  
• Also, new files added or created were not indexed immediately. Thus the search results were not as up-to-date as I would like it to be.
  
  Update: 1:50pm - the same as before.
  
  The solution?
  Leave your computer on all the time. Desktop search indexes the new files you added while you are away from your computer. That way, the next time you return to your machine, the new files would have already been indexed and thus results will be up-to-date.
  
  If your machine cannot be left switched-on all the time or if you saved a file a couple of minutes ago but completely forgot where you saved it, simply right click on the "magnifying glass" icon on the system tray (the clock area - bottom right corner), hit "index now", give it a minute or two and try searching again.
  

So should you download this?
Absolutely and most definitely YES! Microsoft's Desktop Search with it's improved features is, in my opinion, the best Desktop Search Engine available for the Windows platform. It's free, it's useful, it's FAST! - you'll never go "where did I save that file?" again... :)

Grab it now from MSN Desktop Search's official site

My last assignment this semester is to create an XML file along with it's corresponding DTD. I tried a tool which my university uses, HTML Kit - a pretty comprehensive free tool for web development but in my opinion, its pretty crappy when it comes to XML. Troubleshooting my DTD was a nightmare... the built-in validator would identify error locations which simply doesn't exist!

I decided to scour the web for the best XML editor I could find. The keywords were "FREE XML editor" but I kept getting XML editors offering FREE Trial of their XML editors. Finally, I came to a link (actually one of my few stops for web development resource, w3schools.com) and under the XML section, they recommended this application called XMLSpy.

I downloaded the app (a hefty 17MB) and got it installed. I launched the application, and the moment I opened my XML files, they were validated against my DTD instantly! This time, errors were shown with pin point accuracy... immediately, I got it corrected and whoala... I was done.

The second bit of my assignment which also involves the creation of a DTD was completely done through XMLSpy. It was a charm to use. It's one of those applications that you begin using and almost immediately, you feel so at home - everything is within reach, the relevant buttons, relevant features, great shortcuts...

In terms of ratings, I give this application - 9 out of 10!

If you are undergoing an XML course, you simply LOVE working with XML or you are just looking for something to download - XMLSpy is it!

For those who are notepad loyalists when it comes to XML, once you use XMLSpy, you will no longer be loyal... :)

Oh well, have fun and start downloading XMLSpy NOW!

It all started a week ago. Remember the time I got my OS X Tiger from Low Yat? I was having a meal with my parents and there was a sudden numbnest on my right side of the waist. At first, I thought I must have sat down too long. I ignored it.

The numbnest then turned into a sudden pain. Again I brushed it off telling myself I walked too much today.

The following morning, the numbnest was still there. This time, it had spreaded towards my back and a little towards my groin area. It felt wierd... but interesting.

Numbness + Absolutely nothing on the skin - no red spots or lumps.

3 days later...
The numbness is getting a bit bothering. I started thinking of wierd thoughts, like I'm going through some symptoms of heart attack or something. Still... there is nothing on the skin. Just pure numbness and perhaps occasional pain (feels like someone is constantly pushing).

3 + 3 days later...
The red spots develop. It began to itch. As a person who is prone to itch due to my sensitive skin, I decided to drop by a pharmacy and requested for a "rash" cream. I was being dispensed - Betnovate. In my opinion, Betnovate works wonders... so I applied on the infected area, hoping that the numbness and the rash would disappear.

Sunday (today)
I woke up early this morning and discovered that the spots have developed into little lumps. At first, it looked like pimples so I decided to continue with Betnovate and see what happens in the next couple of days.

Later during the day I told my mum of my little "pimples" on my waist, after showing her - she went "aiyah... lei sang SEH ah..." - translated as "oh no! you've got a snake!".

I was like WHAT? SNAKE? You see, as person born in a typical chinese family, there are many names of illnesses which sounds completely alien in the western medical world. There was shock in the entire family. Stella recalled that she heard of such illnesses and that if this "snake" wraps around a person's body - that person will DIE.

I had a problem - and yet, I didn't know what the problem was. If I were to go through the Chinese methods of healing, I'll be sent to this "snake catcher" who would literally burn the little "pimples" on my waist and be given some strange chinese concoction to drink. Inside me was this voice saying "there are millions of people in this world - I'm sure if it exists in Malaysia, it would exist in the Western World... there has to be a cure without going through the snake catchers".

I decided to find out more about this "snake", but if I were to key in "snake disease" in google, I'll start getting results related to diseases which snakes can catch and the various types of snakes in the world today. I didn't need literature on snakes, I need to know what is this "snake" that my family talked about.

Stella got off the phone from her mum and I was told that the western term is "shingles".

Some facts on Shingles

• Looks like chicken pox
• It hurts
• It itches (hurts more than itch)
  
• Comes from the chicken pox virus a.k.a second outbreak of chicken pox
• How does it come about? Well, when you had chicken pox when you were young, the virus stays within your body and is not completely destroyed. The virus stays forever - within the nervous system and will create an outbreak (shingles) when it feels like it (mostly when your body is weak)
  
• Can only happen to those who have had chicken pox
• It's only contagious to those who have NOT had chicken pox - confused? Well, if you have had chicken pox, you can't get Shingles from someone who is having Shingles... however, if you haven't had chicken pox, a person with Shingles (essentially the chicken pox virus) can be transmitted to you causing you to have chicken pox.
  

Now I've got facts on this "snake" - so why did the chinese call this snake?
Shingles is a virus which spreads (not through touch - for the host) but through the veins. Wherever your vein goes, it will spread. It commonly spreads in a form of a belt, around the waist, making it look like a snake.

Back to my story...
My family and Stella's family have gone high and low, looking for the best doctors for the "snake" or Shingles.

They came up with a number of chinese and western doctors. To save myself from the fire, I decided to head for a western doctor.

Upon arrival, the doctor inspected my infected area and immediately, she confirmed it was Shingles. I was prescribed anti-viral medication, some cream and some pain-killers.

* OOohh.. pain * sorry, sudden pain while typing this blog.

I've had my first dose. It's time for rest. Let's hope Chicken Pox 2 will end soon...

Oh by the way, the cure?
Just keep your body healthy. Have multivitamins and lead a healthy lifestyle. :)

By now, if you have been keeping yourself updated with the latest craze and technologies, you wouldn't have missed the latest craze on the Mac OS X's Tiger (see my last few blog entries) and it's features.

Apart from the Spotlight technology and the many other interesting add-on's in Tiger, there's this new thing called the "Dashboard" which is some desktop application which can host mini applications called widgets.


Widgets in OS X

The only problem is that you will have to own a Mac with OS X Tiger installed; which brings about a problem... what about those running Windows (which holds 86% of the market) or older versions of OS X?

The solution? Konfabulator!

Konfabulator works for both older versions of OS X and the infamous Windows operating system. As Konfabulator was developed a number of years before Tiger's Dashboard, expect to see LOADS more widgets compared to Dashboard.

The only drawback? This application is shareware, so you'll probably have to fork out USD25 or approximately RM95 to remove the nagging message boxes reminding you that its a shareware and that the company needs support and bla bla bla... but hey! If you don't mind the nag, the software's pretty much free. If you can't stand the nagging, get it registered, it's way cheaper than a brand spanking new copy of OS X Tiger @ the retail price of RM499!

Just imagine, a day with all these cool widgets on your Windows or Mac OS (pre-Tiger) desktop.





and loads loads loads more...

Get a copy of Konfabulator today!

The world is getting more interesting day after day. From the creation of dolly to thoughts of cloning human beings; which is still debatable today due to its ethical concerns, human beings have thought of another form of cloning... though non-genetical... the creation of robots that can clone itself!

This article simply reminds me of iRobots (starring Will Smith) where robots started manufacturing themselves and started taking over the world... scarry? very.

Check out some photos of this self-replicating robot - here

From my last post - on OS X Tiger, I mentioned something about some cable which I purchased wrongly.

Here's the story. If you have been following my posts or at least have met me recently, my latest phone in my ever increasing collection of over 50 different phones (no... I don't have all of them... I have OWNED them, its the past - and yes... I am should I say - a cellular phone freak) is the Sony Ericsson S700i.

Ever since my ownership of the phone, it has been giving me plentiful problems, from non-stop restarting to self vibration for no apparent reason. What I did was to send it to my faithful Sony Ericsson Service Centre in Berjaya Plaza and the kind Technical Supervisor would help sort it out for me.

After the first software upgrade, the phone did it's crazy antics once again. Annoyed, I decided to return to the service centre and requested for a change of phone - which they happily did for me.

Its been quite a number of months since I had this phone. After the software upgrade and the swap of phones, it still has its crazy antics. According to my pal at the Service Centre, he mentioned that the fault lies with the network operator's SIM Card - Maxis. I then decided to purchase a prepaid card from a different network operator and ONCE again it did it's vibrations and restarts.

I have given up. According to Soo Jin, since I have changed the SIM card, changed the phone and did the firmware upgrades, the only thing left to be changed is ME! Obviously, there's nothing I can do about that. The solution? Live with it.

It's been months now and this annoyance has got to stop. The restarts and vibrations are getting on my nerves. The worst bit of this is that it restarts whenever I receive an SMS or a phone call, rendering the idea of having a phone for communication completely USELESS!

After tracing back, I did notice one thing. After swapping the unit with a brand new one, I never actually upgraded its firmware. The firmware was only upgraded on the older unit. In my opinion, its not Maxis' fault nor is it me, its the PHONE! It's the PHONE's firmware!

After so long, there has to be a few versions of the firmware released by Sony Ericsson. To remove the hassle of having to go down to town every few months to get my phone upgraded with the latest firmware, I decided to use Sony Ericsson's Web Update service which allows end-users to perform the update by themselves - the catch? You need some form of a data cable.

On the day which my dad purchased OS X Tiger (refer to my last blog), my other reason for going down to Low Yat Plaza was to purchase this cable which supposedly allow me to perform the upgrade.

The cable cost me RM85 bucks - which was hefty but since it was going to save me from all the trouble of getting to town simply to get my phone's firmware upgraded, it was well worth it.

I brought the cable home and logged on to SonyEricsson.com to begin with the firmware update. After an hour and a half getting the cable installed, getting to the right site and getting everything configured, the procedure failed - the reason, WRONG CABLE! - ARRGGHHH!

I decided to return to Low Yat Plaza and asked for a change of product; but before doing so, I started Googling for information on this supposed "end-user performed firmware upgrade". It turned out that I need a specific docking station or a cable with some speaker stand which I do not have. With the specific product models in hand, I left for Low Yat and informed the sales personnel who sold the cable to me of my recent adventure with the WRONG CABLE.

The docking station turned out to be RM 230! What a slap on the face. As the shop had a no cash-refund policy and I have no other products to purchase from that shop, I had no choice but to purchase the product.

Earlier today, I went to the shop and picked up the docking station (they didn't have it in-stock the other day) and topped up an additional RM 140 (they gave me a RM 5 discount).

I am now at a pretty popular Hong Kong styled restaurant in Low Yat Plaza. The upgrade was finally completed just minutes ago. I'm now with an RM 225 docking station which I would treasure for some time; and hopefully, with all the trouble that I have gone through, these the phone's crazy antics will finally end...

If you have a Sony Ericsson and requires a firmware upgrade, you know who to consult :)

Since the day Steve Job's introduced the Mac Mini, iPod Shuffle and a preview of Apple's latest operating system called OS X 10.4 Tiger, I have been oogling over the operating system. Since then, it was relentless scouring over the internet, in crave for more information about the latest operating system. The more information I found, the more I want Tiger!

The arrival
Finally, after a gruesome 3-5 months of waiting, the operating system was finally launched on the 27th of April 2005. The operating system arrived at Malaysian shores; but there was one issue - the PRICE. At RM 499 with no educational discount available in Malaysia, purchasing the operating system would mean burning a BIG whole in my pocket.

The wait continued...
On the 7th of May, my family decided to drop by Low Yat Plaza - and there it was, standing tall in the Apple Stores were boxes of Apple's latest operating system. Realizing the fact that I wouldn't be able to purchase a copy, I left for the higher floors and roamed around some stores and see if I could pick up anything.

The lunch
After picking up some items, a USB cable for my phone (which I later found was the wrong cable - long story) and some Pau's, my parents, Stella and I had lunch at this Hong Kong Restaurant (forgot its name - it's right across from Coffee Bean) which is popular for it's HUMONGOUS "Ha Kows". My dad and I was chatting and there I was, ranting about the fact that I couldn't purchase the operating system because of its super high price - and then a magical moment, he said "Why don't we buy a copy now! :)". I was shocked. I gave this grin and 20 minutes later, we found ourselves in an Apple Store, holding a brand spanking new copy of OS X Tiger... joy!

The return of the Tiger
From the point of having Tiger in my hands, all I had in my mind was to get this cat installed into my Mac Mini. The time finally arrived. It's 9pm. Some of my most important files ie. assignments etc were backed-up to my server. 20 minutes later, I was ready... time to bring life to the cat stuck in that beautifully packaged, black glossy box.

The Installation
Upon inserting the installation disk, I was prompted to restart the machine. After numerous clicks and a wait of 40-50 minutes... behold... OS X Tiger.

The feeling inside me for excruitiating. It was a blend of excitement and an anxiety, exciting to see the brand new OS X installed into my beloved Mac Mini but anxiety due to concerns if the new OS will meet my expectations.

The experience
After the restart, the only noticeable thing which I saw, vastly different from the startup screen of the old OS (Panther) was that the fluid blue background behind the login screen had a bit more lines - more refined in fact.

I clicked on my face, keyed in the password and hit "enter".

The OS took a number of minutes to load. First, it was my personalized wallpaper which I crafted with my Adobe Photoshop skills to give me words of encouragement, then it was the revealing of the dock, the desktop icons and finally, the loading was over.

Perhaps it was because I chose the option of "upgrade" instead of a "clean install", as such, the impact wasn't that great. Most if not all of my personalization in my account was retained, so was my personalized Hard Drive icon, compliments of iconfactory.com.

One of the more noticeable changes to the operating system is the menu bar - to be more precise the right most section of the menu bar where the clock resides. There is now a little magnifying class icon symbolizing the "spotlight" technology Steve Jobs have been ranting about since the public preview of Tiger.

Upon clicking it, a dropped down menu revealed - stating - "spotlight is indexing the drive". My first response was WHAT? Does this mean that I will always have to wait for Spotlight to index my drive prior to searching for newly added files? That would be very similar to Microsoft's Desktop Search! Then why bother? - Before I give you - the reader negative perceptions on Spotlight... please keep those negative thoughts away and keep reading.

Minutes later, Spotlight completely indexed all my assignments, PDF documents, manuals, e-mails, music, videos - literally everything meaningful to me in my drive. This is when the test begins. I keyed in the letters "Monash" and out comes a list, arranged by file type showing me the various e-mails I have sent and received, assignments which I have written, contact information of Monash coursemates and loads loads more. To ensure that Spotlight has a seemless integration with the Operating System with every file indexed the moment it enters the drive with ZERO waiting time - as promised by Steve Jobs, I took the liberty in creating a Word Document containing the word "baby". After saving the file, I went to Spotlight, keyed in "baby" and Whoala! Out comes the file I saved seconds ago! So there... the upgrade was worth it after all!

Smart folders
One feature I really really really love about the new cat is it's smart folders! Imagine a world where you save your files anywhere, in any drive and in any folder and just FORGET about where you left them. After all that, you create "smart folders", these are basically folders that reveals documents, images... and everything else that is related to a particular keyword. For example, if I have got pictures of my dog "girl girl" and essays about her life history lying all over the place, smart folders provide a one stop solution in consolidating everything and anything that has to do with the keyword "girl girl". The next time I write another bibliography on my dog, no matter where I have the document placed, Spotlight will detect it and have it listed in the smart folder which I created for "girl girl". Smart!

Widgets...
Ooh.. the name sounds so similar to gadgets that I feel like I'm already drooling all over it! :) Widgets, or should I say mini applications which are installed and used in a sub-environment called "Dashboard". "Dashboard" is a place where you'll find all these mini applications such as mini-calculators, miniature version of iTunes, a miniature calendar, package trackers, flight trackers, language converters, dictionaries... and the list goes on and on and on. The whole idea is that these mini-applications run in the background and whenever you need to say, check the time and weather in Nebraska or get up-to-date information on specific flights such as current speed and altitude, all these are accessible by as click of a button. Since Tiger's launch, many developers such as Amazon with it's Amazon.com have jumped on the Widgets band wagon.

Spotlight integration is seen EVERYWHERE!
Just imagine, you open up your favourite application such as Word or Adobe Photoshop and the thought of just saving the file into that particular folder you created, requiring you to dig deep within the countless levels of directories to to save that masterpiece you created with Adobe Photoshop is giving you a headache - then you thought to yourself, wouldn't it be easier to just search for the directory, click on it, type in your Masterpiece's file name and click save? The solution is available today. Spotlight is intergrated into the "open" and "save" dialogue boxes of literally every application there is made available for the Mac platform...

So there, it took me almost 3 days to get this out. It's been saved as draft many times due to the inherrent workload which has been placed upon me. Now that I'm 75% done with my assignments, I can finally complete this post.

Should I discover more about Apple's new Cat, I'll have it posted.

In the mean time... if you have the opportunity, go experiment with this brand new Cat... :)

My cousin from Singapore is my main source of these hillarious links...

Here's another. It's not scarry. It's just plain HILLARIOUS!

Check it out here!

You have probably heard of David Blaine, the guy who does street magic and performs the infamous "levitation" stunt.

Here's something new, in one talk show, he had his heart taken out infront of the audience... check it out here!

If you ask me, I think he's not pure human. He's of human + alien descent <- previously "decent" - kudos to Soo Jin for pointing it out :).

During my free time today, I dropped by the computer labs. With nothing much to do, I decided to start up Internet Explorer and started poking around Google's website.

After much clicking, I discovered Google Labs; this is some place you can call Google's playground where visitors get to explore and play with some of Google's "under development" products.

Below are some of the few notable services...

• Google Web Accelerator
  It's pretty much a plugin which you can download into your computer, have it installed and whenever you start surfing the net, I suppose it pre-caches the content of the links within the page you are currently viewing. One interesting feature to note is the "time saved" counter which is built into the toolbar
  
  
• Google Ride Finder
  This service literally maps the exact locations of taxi's around parts of America in real-time! Just imagine, you've got this map in-front of you with various "dots" representing taxis. If you need to know the taxi's exact location, clicking zoom will bring you all the way down to street level! Cool! Unfortunately, the service is no use to Malaysians :(
  
  
• Google Compute
  Works a little like the SETI service where you download a tool and participate by giving some of your computer's precious idle time for processing data which would assist in Protein research and various projects supported by Google.
  
  
• Google Suggest (My personal favourite)
  Once you logon, it looks just like the Google search engine. The beauty is when you begin typing keywords for your search. Just imagine typing "Monash" and outcomes various combination of keywords in a little "auto-complete" drop down box such as "Monash University", "Monash University Australia", "Monash University Malaysia" and so on... this is a MUST TRY!
  
  
• and load, loads more such as personalized web search, google scholar for looking up journals - useful for assignments, video search... and the list goes on...
  

So give it a shot and logon to Google Labs! It's loads of fun - in my opinion of course :)

More later...

Here's an e-mail I received from "Paypal" which I found to be placed along with my spam mails.

This supposedly "Paypal" e-mail was sent to alert me of someone with a strange IP address attempting to hack into my Paypal account and that I should follow this specific link which will require me to verify myself with my Paypal and Credit Card details.

With the Paypal logo, IP address and all, it does sound rather convincing... then came this GLARING HUGE BANNER right above of this message coming from Gmail which states:

Warning: This message may not be from whom it claims to be. Beware of following any links in it or of providing the sender with any personal information

It looks like Gmail has a built-in algorithm to check if mails are trying to initiate a "phishing" attack. One "phishing" mail down. Millions to go!

Fear not! Gmail is here... :)

I've got the perfect place for you. It's a game...

Some specs..

• It's an online game - short and easy
  
• Very addictive
• So addictive that you'll pass it to everyone you know
• It requires speakers (sound effects)
  
• Requires good mouse skill
• Requires Macromedia Flash plugin (which you should already have)
  

Okay, enough of me yabbing, here's the link.. the game

Enjoy!

I was surfing the internet and discovered this link through a VOD service...

Google Statistics revealed!

Have fun!

What does a 2 megapixel camera, auto-focus, sleek black body, bluetooth, great colour screen, expandable memory and the ability to make phone calls spell to you? My NEXT DREAM PHONE!

This is what I currently have...



The Sony Ericsson S700i

and this is what I WANT to HAVE :)




The Sony Ericsson K750i

Doesn't it look soooo pretty???

Ben's gonna get ya! - soon... :)