Sephy’s Platzish

You’d think that I’m talking about food here, but nope; I’m talking about my browser - the vernerable Firefox 1.5.0.11. I’ve been using version 1.5 since it was in the Beta 2 stage, in last 2005. However, the introduction of version 2, along with some policy changes, means that Mozilla have terminated support for version 1.5. I have this sneaking suspicion that I will have to adapt sooner or later to changing the look of my browser.

You see, in 2005, I had made a choice to save some space on my screen by removing the Navigation toolbar, removing buttons that I hardly ever used such as Reload, Stop and Home. Included in the things that I removed from my toolbar was the Search Box. A really neat feature that occurred because of that is that when I hit Ctrl+K to start a search, this pops up -

Pretty simple and neat, no? Add that to the fact that, combined with the tabbar, the top area of my window covers the same real estate as if I were to have the “proper” arrangement of toolbars and such (never mind the fact that the whole space next to the menu bar is wasted space in that configuration).

However, it was decided to remove this feature on the basis that it was a) something most users don’t see (fair enough, I wouldn’t have known about it if I hadn’t hidden the search box myself) and b) buggy (something that the developers probably had a good reason to declare it so, and, most likely, if they were to explain the reason it was buggy, it would just kinda float above my head and blow by. :)).

I had said in October that this was the only thing keeping me from upgrading. As it is, I have a widescreen monitor (1680 x 1050 resolution at that) and horizontal space isn’t that big of a concern. There are also extensions that will allow you to make the size of the search bar so I can always sort that out after installation.

Considering that there aren’t any plans to release any additional security upgrades for version 1.5, it’s best for me to just build a bridge, donate a little screen space to the search bar, and keep my hopes up that someone will be innovative and come up with an extension to bring back the search dialog (considering that 7 months have gone by without one coming out, it might just be nearly impossible for it to be fixed without breaking the browser).

Update: I’ve upgraded to version 2 now. So far everything is going well; the only minor issue now is that new tabs from searches focus instead of load in the background.

Well, I’m guilty of it again

I’ve been checking the keywords people are using to get here. The latest entry in that contest is someone searching for ESPN’s Thursday Night Thunder on tapes. They of course found this post about YouTube and copyright. I must say that this is something that you don’t see a lot of people having tapes of anymore. (It’s not to say that there are folks out there with it on tape, it’s just that I haven’t seen anyone with it out there.)

However, there is another type of racing that is even rarer to have on tape - broadcasts of local auto racing action. About 17 years ago, one of the local independent stations decided to do a trial broadcast of racing at one of the racetracks in the region. Personally, I think it was a great thing, but I’m guessing that there were not enough viewers to sustain such a broadcast every week. Also, it’s hard to squeeze advertisements into a program such as the main feature race of the evening. Maybe they ought to try it again, but I’m not sure people would watch considering the tons of extra choices out there nowadays.

In related news, I have a working VCR and hopefully I’ll find good stuff on my videos. Unfortunately, the tapes of that racing are quite literally lost, with not much hope of it coming back, but it’d be cool to have it again.

Lastly, to the person in VIC who searched for pictues of sephiroth - there’s probably a better way to find those pictures - Google Image Search…

I spotted this on Google Operating System, so all blame thanks should go to Ionut

He mentioned that at the headquarters of Google in Mountain View, CA, there is this display of what users are searching for, but they don’t put it out there in public because of privacy concerns (though why are they concerned about privacy when they’re foisting upon most users this “Web History” thing that keeps track of all of your searches, supposedly to improve your search results - something that I’ve turned off; I’m sure y’all are keeping track of it anyway).

Anyway, apparently the folks at Dogpile aren’t as concerned about privacy as they do have a live search page, available here (note that this is the direct link to the unfiltered version, so you’ll see everything).

I think the best thing is that they give you *everything* - no matter if it’s spelt right or not and no matter if it’s proper or not. Here are some of the searches that have caught my attention -

homemade sex vidios
carbelas
walmart checks*
kelloog advertisements of the 1920’s
kellog advertisements of the 1920’s
pamala anderson
best torrent client
fotos chicas linda desnudas
fuck

the list could go on and on, but there’s only so much you can list before you start to get a different type of traffic to your site, if you know what I mean.

*I’m assuming that they’re looking for information on checks that you can get from Wal-Mart, but I know that scammers have sent out Wal-Mart checks to victims in the hope that they cash them and send the scammers money out of them. Unfortunately, the checks are counterfeits and if you were to cash it, you would wind up responsible for the amount of the check and likely wind up in legal issues as well. The best advice would probably be to report the check to the police, destroy the check, or frame it on your wall.

The other night I was watching ABC’s Nightline and saw this story about how we’ve become a society of changing photos to reflect what isn’t in the photo - i.e. making a picture not blurred, or putting people into a photo that weren’t there. There’s of course something that the Russians were known for - taking people out of photos (search for photos of Leon Trotsky, and you’ll find a few old examples).

The main point is that we’re losing the imperfection that we used to be subject to with film cameras. As for me, I have well in excess of 20,000 photos taken over the last 4 years; some of them are on CDs, but the majority of them are on this computer and taken with the same camera. There’s a reason to save all these photos - it’s so that I have a record of where I go and what I do, even if it might not be the most interesting (such as the completely white images that resulted from my forgetting to set the exposure to something more appropriate for daytime than the maximum allowable for the camera). However, I will admit that I am not unwilling to edit my photos, if only for things such as color balance and other minor adjustments. I have tried my hand at photoshopping images together, and they came out alright; i’ll have to look some more for some examples that I’d done.

However, the point of the matter is - if you have a photo you don’t like - keep it anyway, or make some minor adjustments, but don’t go adding people into the shot (unless it’s for a contest on fark or somewhere else :))

It’s not everyday that this kind of thing happens.

The oddest things seem to happen at the oddest times. For example, on Saturday, we were on our way to pick up a dollar that is to be used later in the summer for a promotion that a local radio station is holding. Part of this involves standing outside waiting for them to start distributing the dollars; an opportunity to get to know some folks around you.

This came to some use on Saturday when we wound up with a flat tire; first off, a big thanks to the person who noticed it and honked the horn at us to point it out. Having pulled off onto a side road that hasn’t totally been built yet (aside from the entryway onto the main road), we went about fixing the problem by changing the tire. It would have been going well if we could have figured out how to get the jack out. This is the point where the person who recognized us from these radio things came onto the scene. They graciously stopped by and changed the tire for us and in return we showed them how to get to the place that the event was at as they weren’t sure of its location.

After that, the rest of the day went quite well, except for forgetting to get ice at the store twice, which leads to the other interesting thing that happened.

We had to stop at the gas station to actually get the ice. When we parked, a comment was made about the person who parked next to us - basically that they were a moron. However, as I walked into the store, it became obvious that the person who parked next to us was someone who I went to school with; someone who, in fact, I had not seen for almost six years. The conversation lasted maybe ten seconds, and consisted of me saying that I stay out of trouble (and I do :)), but it was kinda good to see someone who you knew, and to see that they really hadn’t changed.