You start typing only to realize 10 seconds later that the focus is on the wrong window. You see a Windows notification pop out of the taskbar only to have it fade away before you can figure out what it means. You get distracted by all of Windows' pointless animations. You miss seeing keyboard-shortcut hints on menu entries and elsewhere in Windows dialog boxes.
You could spend hours hunting for the settings that will do away with these four Windows annoyances. At least Vista collects them all in the Ease of Access Center. These usability settings are spread far and wide in XP.
Mouse over a window to make it the focus
About once or twice a week I find myself happily typing away only to discover after crafting the perfect memo opener or e-mail retort that the focus had switched to another open window. Not only have I lost the data I thought I was entering, I might inadvertently purchase a Winnebago if I press Enter while focused on the wrong page in my browser.
You can set Vista to change the focus to whichever window you mouse over via the Ease of Access Center. Press the Windows key and U to open it.
I described the top four options (all carryovers from XP's Accessibility Control Panel applet) in a previous post. To change focus by hovering, click "Make the mouse easier to use" and check "Activate a window by hovering over it with the mouse" near the bottom of the dialog box. Click Save or Apply to activate the change.
The simplest way I know of to change this setting in XP is to use the free Tweak UI utility. After you download and install the program, open it and double-click Mouse in the left pane. Choose X-Mouse among the entries that appear, and check "Activation follows X-Mouse" in the right window.
Bonus tip: To keep programs from stealing the focus, choose Focus under General in the left pane, click "Prevent applications from stealing focus" in the right pane, and choose the number of times you want the window to flash when this happens.
Set Vista notification pop-ups to stay on screen longer
Sometimes the little windows that pop out of the taskbar to notify you of some event, such as a USB device you just plugged in being ready to use, disappear too quickly. To extend the duration of notification windows in Vista, click "Make it easier to focus on tasks" in the Ease of Access Center, scroll to the bottom of the resulting dialog box, and change the setting under "How long should Windows notification boxes stay open?" The default setting is 7 seconds, and the available options let you change this to 15 seconds, 30 seconds, 1 minute, or 5 minutes. When you're done, click Save or Apply.
Extend the time Vista's notification windows stay visible via this setting in the Ease of Access Center.
(Credit: Microsoft)The only way I know of to change the duration of notification windows in XP is to tweak the Registry. This is also how you disable notifications altogether. I'll describe the procedure in a future post.
Knock off the frivolous animations
Save some CPU cycles--and maybe your tired eyeballs--by telling Windows to do without the fancy-schmancy animations. In Vista, click "Make it easier to focus on tasks" in the Ease of Access Center (the same dialog I described above for tweaking notifications), check "Turn off all unnecessary animations (when possible)" under "Adjust time limits and flashing visuals," and click Save or Apply.
To tone down the animations in XP, right-click My Computer, choose Properties > Advanced, and click Settings in the Performance section. Under the Visual Effects tab, click "Adjust for best performance," or choose Custom and select the options you do and don't want in the window below. When you're done, click OK twice.
Show shortcut keys on menu items
Microsoft doesn't always make it easy for people who prefer to navigate around Windows and their applications using keyboard shortcuts. To make the key hints visible on menus in Vista, click "Make the keyboard easier to use" in the Ease of Access Center, check "Underline keyboard shortcuts and access keys" under "Make it easier to use keyboard shortcuts," and click Save or Apply.
See hints for shortcut keys on Vista menus by choosing this option in the Ease of Access Center.
(Credit: Microsoft)Add the shortcut-key hints to XP by right-clicking the desktop (or pressing Shift-F10 while on the desktop), choosing Properties, clicking Appearance > Effects, unchecking "Hide underlined letters for keyboard navigation until I press the Alt key," and clicking OK twice.
BioArts International CEO Lou Hawthorne snuggles with Mira, Chingu, and Sarang, the three clones of his deceased dog Missy.
(Credit: BioArts International)When Lou Hawthorne met Mira, the clone of his dog Missy, he couldn't have been happier. The puppy was just like Missy--and in some ways better because she mirrored Missy in her younger, more playful days.
So BioArts International, Hawthorne's biotech start-up that focuses on animal and human genomics, decided to spread the love.
Starting July 5, the highest bidders in five separate online auctions will win the opportunity to clone their own dogs.
Hawthorne, the company's CEO, said the event is the first step in making his Mill Valley, Calif.-based company's technology available to consumers.
That is, if buyers can afford the hefty price.
Each auction will run for 12 hours a day, starting at 11 a.m. PDT. The auctions will last through July 9 on live bidding Web site ProxiBid.com. The first auction has a starting bid of $100,000, and that bid will increase by $20,000 each day. Although the prices are high, Hawthorne said they would have to be considerably higher for the company to break even. Despite that fact, the company will also offer one lucky pet owner a free dog cloning.
The winners will submit DNA samples, and the company says it can guarantee a healthy cloned puppy within 3 to 12 months.
Animal cloning has come under fire since its inception. Whether based on ethical concerns or a fear of consuming products from cloned farm animals, some people adamantly oppose the practice of genetically altering animals.
But Hawthorne brushes off the naysayers, saying he's never seen a person get upset when they learned his puppies were clones. Responding to the argument that cloning pets is frivolous because so many animals wait to be adopted, he said five cloned dogs won't take a home away from the thousands upon thousdands of dogs in shelters.
"If anything this is the celebration of the mutt," he said. "This is a way to get the same mix you have in your spayed or neutered pet that you got at a shelter."
For Hawthorne, cloning Missy cost about $20 million and took 10 years of hard work. Missy died at age 15, while the cloning process was still under way.
His quest to clone his beloved family pet ended in 2007, when Hawthorne met Dr. Woo Suk Hwang.
Two years earlier, Hwang and his team of research scientists at Seoul National University claimed they had succeeded in cloning a dog. There were doubts about the authenticity, after it was reported that Hwang fabricated information in a report on stem cells.
However, it was later confirmed that "Snuppy" was a bona fide clone. Hawthorne asked if the team could help him clone Missy, who died in 2002, several years after he set out to clone her. Now, Hawthorne has three mini Missys running around: Mira, the oldest, and the younger pups, Chingu and Sarang.
That successful cloning has resulted in the partnering of BioArts and the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation outside of Seoul, South Korea, to start the "Best Friends Again" project.
Hawthorne said that the company holds the only license in the world that allows it to clone dogs and have access to the "Dolly patents." Dolly the sheep was the first mammal cloned from an adult and the Sooam facility uses that cloning process, with specific tweaks, for the canine species.
"We are the only company that can do this legally," Hawthorne said. "Once we successfully cloned Missy, we realized with our partners at the lab we had a...safe project. We have finite capacity and potentially unlimited demand."
Back in the old days (like 2007), the marketing strategy for new albums included a prerelease "rolling thunder" PR campaign. First came a single, followed shortly by the video.
Then a few chosen reviewers would get early copies with "NOT FOR RESALE" imprinted across the front, allowing them to have their reviews ready slightly before or on the release date. Retail outlets would receive promotional matter, like cardboard cutouts of the band standing in front of the album cover. A few warm-up shows would feature songs from the record. Meanwhile, somebody--a reviewer, a disgruntled record company employee--would leak the entire album to file-trading services.
Jack White and Warner Bros. have decided to dispense with all this for the upcoming release of the Raconteurs' new album, Consolers of the Lonely. Today, the band announced that the entire album will be released simultaneously online, on CD, and on vinyl next Tuesday. No advance singles, no reviewers' copies, and perhaps not even a video at release (they just finished shooting it).
The band would have waited even longer, but knew that the news of the album's imminent release would have slipped out, and didn't want this quick-release strategy to be seen as a reaction.
And why not? Radio stations hardly play this kind of rock 'n' roll anymore, and fans don't need reviewers to tell them what to think: the huge Jack White fans will buy it regardless, and more casual fans probably would have formed their opinion after sampling the leaked version anyway. This way, the band saves promotional money and the release date might actually be cause for excitement, rather than the jaded "oh, I downloaded that months ago" response that greets most album releases today.
Just when it looked like Blu-ray was getting the best of HD DVD, the latter scores a combination like Paramount Pictures and DreamWorks Animation.
Both companies announced on Monday that they had agreed to release exclusively on the HD DVD format, which is battling with rival Blu-ray to become the high-definition successor to the DVD disc.
The move by Paramount represents a setback for Blu-ray. The studio has supported both formats and the tally of studios exclusively committed to each format stands at 3-2 in favor of Blu-ray.
Sony, Disney and Fox support Blu-ray, but the momentum may be swinging back in favor of HD DVD.
Paramount, owned by entertainment juggernaut Viacom, saw some sister companies, Nickelodeon Movies and MTV Films, commit to HD DVD as well.
Paramount and DreamWorks Animation citied lower manufacturing costs of the HD DVD discs and lower prices for its players as reasons why deciding to go with the format.
"I believe HD DVD is not only the affordable high-quality choice for consumers, but also the smart choice for Paramount," said Brad Grey, Chairman and CEO of Paramount Pictures, which is currently the leading studio in domestic box office.
Sea otters together at Vancouver Aquarium
(Credit: cynthiaholmes on YouTube)Forget copyrighted comedy ripped off from some cable channel. Even forget the made-for-YouTube teen fantasy. This is real video of a real-life couple, laid bare before all the world. And the world, as reflected by YouTube, seems to love it.
You may be the last person on earth who hasn't already seen the hand-holding otters. The video is years old, but it wasn't posted until March. In less than two months, nearly 6 million viewings have been recorded.
Canadian TV reports the two otters have become big celebrities thanks to the video. Here you can learn the two otters are named Nayak and Milo. Nayak is one tough little lady, a survivor of the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
Google search shows over 540,000 pages when you search "hand holding sea otters." Maybe Animal Planet and National Geographic are onto something.
If you want to see the otters in person, you gotta go to the Vancouver, B.C., Aquarium. They actually hold hands for safety in the open ocean, so the video is not a fluke.
Knut nuzzles with keeper,Thomas Dorflein
(Credit: Berlin Zoo)The world's youngest celebrity is building quite a media career. Five-month-old polar bear, Knut, is already a star at the Berlin Zoo. He also stars in more than two dozen YouTube videos, which have accumulated millions of plays. When you visit Knut's new personal Web site you'll see pictures and e-mails from adoring fans.
But today we learn that Knut and a human co-author have a book deal. One purpose of the book will be to draw attention to global warming, says the human writer. The book'll be published by Scholastic, which has a track record publishing hot books, like the Harry Potter series.
Young Knut is going to be both tech-savvy and human-tolerant, it seems. His mother, Tosca, turned her back on the baby when he was born. So Knut's being parented by zookeeper, Thomas Dorflein, who sleeps in Knut's zoo quarters.
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