Notes from a Desi Geek

Recently, Google is linking to Answers.com for exploring meaning of search terms.

I kind of like the service, it’s neat; it’s fast and gets the job done.

Yesterday, I took a step ahead and installed their desktop application which allows one to click on any word anywhere on your desktop and get its meaning. They even offer integration with Internet Explorer through right click menu.

Today, I was browsing using Internet Explorer[1] and I kept going to Answers.com for no apparent reason. That’s when I realized that they have installed ‘Answers’ menu item as the first menu item replacing the default ‘Back’.

So whenever I tried to use ‘Back’ menu item using right click, I went to Answers.com! This shows how important consistency is in User Interface Design. I am so used to right clicking and selecting first item as ‘Back’ that if you replace it with something else, I will be toast! It’s a bad design decision by Answers to replace the de-facto place of ‘Back’ menu item. They should install menu item ‘Answers’ above ‘Properties’ just like everyone else. I hope somebody from Answers.com reads this and corrects it.

[1] - Yes, I am no Firefox fanatic, I use IE depending on how I am feeling at given moment.

You must be thinking about what Wetshaving has to do with bug in Firefox?

Allow me to explain.
Today, I came across article on Wetshaving on MSNBC. Everyday morning I ask to God, why do I have to shave? I find shaving very irritating and it gives me ’shave bumps’. This Wetshaving article explains how you can have a smooth shave. When I started reading the article, I thought the article would be just couple of paragraphs but the article is 7 pages long! Would you believe that? So I decided to take print of the article to read at liesure.

I click on File -> Print Preview in Firefox and what do I see? The Print Preview window is smaller than the content and scroll bars are all messed up. Vertical Scroll bar is required but is absent mysteriously. Horizontal scrollbar is ‘incomplete’. See the snapshot of how the Print Preview Window looks like. See the messed up scroll bars?

Then out of curiosity, I decide to change Print mode from Portrait to Landscape, which should ideally lead to increase in number of printable pages, but it didn’t happen. So I clicked on next page button ( with > as image) and I found that number of printable pages have increased but the count is not updated. So you can see text as Page 11 of 7! You can see the snapshot here.

Did you ever imagine that reading about Wetshaving can lead you to Firefox bug? Now let me find a bugzilla URL where I can submit this bug.

JD

Today, BoingBoing mentions an exploit which affects Firefox, Safari, Opera….all browsers except IE.

And how do the geeks react?
Simon Wilson, who earlier wrote post titled ‘Nasty new IE vulnerability’ when IE was affected by a very similar problem. This time when Firefox gets affected, he mentions it ‘quietly’ in his link blog. Interesting thing is, he doesn’t even mention that Firefox users are affected. [Title of my post should make sense now]

Paulo writes about it in post titled ‘Non-IE vulnerability’. Wow!

Overall, how many geeks have blogged about it? Technorati tells me that around 20 posts have been made on this exploit. I wonder how many posts have been made if this was an IE exploit.

What point I am trying to make?
Simple, be honest when you are critcizing/bashing and don’t be hypocrite. If you are going to make noise when security problem is discovered with IE, make the same amount of noise when Firefox faces similar problem. Overall, idea should be to make people aware that, a security problem has been discovered with product and they should be careful.

Firefox hasn’t even reached 50% market share, and we are seeing a serious exploit. Imagine, what would happen when Firefox reaches more than 50% market share? I am guessing that even Firefox will have numerous exploits, just like market leader IE has. One has to realize that it’s a herculean task to create a secure product, which is to be used by millions. So let’s work together to create better/secure products instead of bashing each other.

JD

Thanks to my college mate Vatsal, I finally got my hand on gmail account!

its dkjariwalaNO@SPAMgmail.com . I think it was more of curiousity to see gmail more than anything else. And after trying it, I am not terribly impressed.

I am back to my favourite MS Outlook!
JD

Great news for everyone who loves tabbed browsing!

Netcaptor has gone free! Now you can use the full featuerd Necaptor for FREE*.
* Advertisement supported.

I had switched to MyIE2 previously as it was the only one to support Google Toolbar. Now Netcaptor also supports Google toolbar and I am back to Netcaptor!

How do you copy folder in Windows Explorer.
You go to the ‘parent’ folder where the folder which you want to copy resides. You press Control+C

Then you go to folder where you want to copy to. You press Control + V.

Want to simplify this? How about Shortcut command named ‘Move To’, ‘Copy To’ folder on your context menu. [See image]

Then here is the way. Just change few registry settings and you are there. Click here to download registry file which makes the necessary changes.

Note: if you ever wanted to revert back to original, download following registry file and run to clear the context menu entries.

Enjoy!

Thanks to Anil, I found alternative to the extremely irritating media player named ‘Real Player’. It’s called Real Alternative. And it really is ‘real’ alternative! I installed it and it worked like charm. Installation is so transparent that the site which requires Real Player plugin will work without any hitch!

Now I can relax and listen to all great hindi songs on Raaga.

JD