Windows 8 Annoyance (part 3)

If you miss the start button and don't want to bother downloading some third party program, don't be too despair. It is still kinda there: launch it with Windows-X. Good! There are some useful links there.

Another way to get to it is to hover the mouse to the lower left corner, you will see the link to the Start page, and then RIGHT-click. Come on, Microsoft is making you remember non-obvious secret tricks.

A particular useful tool since Windows 3.1 (or earlier, I am not even sure) is the Start->Run prompt. I can launch anything there. Need to launch calculator (or some program where you know the name)? Even when Start button was there you still have to click and hover over a few things to find it, but with Start->Run you can type "calc" and hit Enter. Now you can launch it with Windows-R. But I don't want to learn ANY Windows+key shortcuts.

I want to be able to launch Run dialog without the non-obvious trick of hover the lower-left and right-click, or Windows-R. Ok, VBScript will be my tool here. There seems to be ways to simulate key pressing. Alas, but there seems to be no way to simulate the not-so-standard Windows key. Fortunately there is CreateObject Shell thing that still can be used!

Set app = WScript.CreateObject("Shell.Application")
app.FileRun

So I have another VBS on my desktop that goes to the Run dialog.

Windows 8 Annoyance (part 2)

Yikes, the Start button is gone. Ok, maybe the huge, at-your-face Start screen is even better than the good old Start button since Windows 95. Ok, HOW do I go to the plain desktop. Ah there is an Desktop icon. Ok, it looks much like Windows 7 without the Start button. Waita minute, the Windows have a flatter layout. That Aero and beveled look are gone. But I see a beef-ed up Windows Explorer (that's good news). Other than this I do not see anything too exciting yet. Ok I need to tweak things... without the Start button how the heck am I supposed to go to the Control Panel? Oh, you go Windows-C to bring out the Charm Bar. (Is it charming to you?) Charm Bar->Settings then the Control Panel. Oh, and it is looks slightly different from previous versions of Windows. Ok, let's personalize it, let's see what kind of backgrounds do I have? Just a handful of pictures... Note: If you use a colorful desktop background, you will hide the word "Desktop" on the Start page that you may not be able to find it.

What about changing the background of the Start page... oh you can only use a handful of pre-defined patterns, can't put your own image there.

Now, that Metro page... it looks like made of elementary school construction paper... flat, single color tiles. The icons can only be 1 square box, or 1x2 wide fat box. That's about all the tweaks you can do. Horizontal scroll with squares is the interface that Microsoft calls "Modern" (or "Metro"). There are some basic things such as news, weather and sports apps built in. Alas, each time I click it shows me a paper made huge icon followed by a WAIT. There are NO GAMES! Not even Solitaire or Minesweeper. Seems like you need to sign up to xbox to play anything. Now that sucks. Ok, how do you find your programs on Metro? You type, RIGHT on it! No prompt for search.

Ok, done playing, how do you turn the computer off? You'll need the charm bar again with Windows-C->Settings->Power. This is not even obvious unless someone tells you. And it is so many steps to get there. In Start button, at least there is one place to start looking for options, and the option to turn it off is not far away. Another thing, the good old Alt-F4 (since Windows 3.1 or perhaps even earlier) still works.

This is requiring people to remember keyboard short cuts. (Windows-C for charm bar, or Alt-F4). Now that's POOR design, Microsoft! There are plenty of Start button apps for Windows 8... Just why the heck people need to write such programs? Because people NEED it, Microsoft you hear?

Ok here is what I want: a shortcut on the desktop to shut down... I do not need ANYTHING on the Metro UI. Heck, the option to shut down isn't even there.

There is a DOS command you can run to shutdown Windows (since the dawn of Windows I suppose): shutdown /s /t 0. Go shutdown /? to see what else this can do. Now you can create a desktop shut cut to that DOS command.

Ok, that's nice. But that command will shut it down right away. I want to have a prompt like "Are you sure?". Batch files won't give you a dialog, good old VBScript is still available.

Here we go:

' This script displays a prompt then calls the shutdown command
' Find a nice shutdown icon in %SystemRoot%\system32\SHELL32.dll
'

Dim i
i = msgbox ("Are you sure?",vbYesNo,"Shutdown Windows 8")
if i=vbYes then
   Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell") 
   WshShell.Run "shutdown /s /t 0"
end if

Windows 8 annoyance (part 1)

Microsoft is on its path to self-destruct with Windows 8. The missing Start button is the first thing. Ok, I'll talk about the Metro interface in future.

But now I want to address one thing. You can't play a DVD anymore on Windows 8. See here. Windows 7 lets you do that. Come on! Fortunately your machine probably comes with a third-party DVD player.

Ok, here is one thing I like about Windows 8... it boots up faster. I hope I can find more on the Like list.

Mayan Doomsday and its math

Ok, the world is supposed end today according to the Mayan calendar? Just how the heck did they come up with this day beats me. Yet the Mayan civilization is a remarkable part of human history... How they collapse remains a hot topic of study for some scientists.

You probably heard that the Mayans know a lot about math and astronomy, which makes some people believe they can predict the end of the world. Their base-20 system (see here) looks interesting. Their symbols is quite intuitive: dot = 1, bar = 5. But we are so used to the decimal system that this may seem a bit awkward. That bar = 5 notation we use too, as in, ||||, and in the abacus. But I guess the most important invention that they have is the zero. Not a whole lot of math can be done without the zero. And I wonder how the Mayans add numbers. Do they line them up and add them (and remember the carry) like what we teach elementary students today? Do they do fractions? Ok, a base-20 number system is better than some others like the Roman Numerals, but is that it? Do they know the Pythagorean Theorem or other things that modern elementary school students know nowadays? (When my children learn the Pythagorean Theorem I want them to be able to prove it and not just remember it)

The Mayan people has studied quite a bit about astronomy. So this more-advanced-than-most-other-civilization made that doomsday prediction seems believable.

Really, if a doomsday is to come, you won't know about it. (and I am not going to bother quoting the Bible since you may not be a believer anyway). NASA folks were so confident the world won't end by asteroids today because they didn't see any in their radar. What about somehow there is space-bridge like hyperwarp things that they don't know about transporting asteroids or other invaders? You just don't know, ok?

Ok, maybe a doomsday is not a 1-day event, it may come gradually as there are some evidence suggesting the Mayans eventually disappeared as there were not enough rain fall. Look, we pollute the world so much that eventually we are destroying ourselves.

Will this world last forever. If I understand correctly, no, it will NOT. The sun will eventually run out of fuel, but don't worry it won't be in a long while.

Play with Surface in Best Buy or Staples and see for yourself

Now you can play with an actual Microsoft Surface machine at Staples or Best Buy. See here.

This is Microsoft's last hope of being relevant in modern computer/tablet market... and ALAS I am not thrilled with it.

First it is kind of a heavy rectangular block with an odd dimension. Not as nimble as the Kindle or other tablets. A first look of it tells me it isn't even looking as good as other Android tablets in the store. This is intended for landscape view only, not portrait. Even a $1 photo frame can hold a picture in 2 ways but the stand doesn't do that, and the screen doesn't turn 90 degree when you turn it around. Ok, that's fairly minor. But I would imagine it will be hard to read a PDF novel on this thing.

Ok, more about Windows 8 itself later. It needs at least a few things to become less annoying...

The keyboard! Yikes it doesn't feel good. I am afraid the virtual keyboard of the IPad works better. It doesn't click like a real keyboard should do. But there is another one in the store that feels better. Alas, you have to pay extra ~$150 for that?! This is overpriced. How can you be competitive that way?

The Metro interface... doesn't work so well with the traditional desktop, which is now a hard-to-find icon on the tiles. This is poor replacement for the good old Start button. Sorry, this won't fly. I am sure that Palm WebOS thing and the Blackberry thing work a lot better and they didn't fly either.

Microsoft is going to be LESS relevant... The reign will soon be over as alas, soon people will get used to some oddity of the Mac and switch when their Windows 7 machines grow old.

Microsoft has been a formidable company... In the past it won against Wordperfect, Netscape, even Sony and Nintendo on gaming consoles... but sadly they will LOSE because they chose idiot Metro interface and can't design a better tablet.

Another tragic shooting, but why are you surprised?

Another school shooting, another American tragedy. This time at innocent 6-and-7-year-olds and their teachers, and in non ghetto neighborhood.

Young kids and great teachers robbed of their lives, hearts broken, all because of some "socially awkward" confused young man with plenty of guns and bullets.

Not too long ago we heard about some shopping mall shooting. We shrugged and lives go on. Not too long ago that Joker rampaged the theatre. Though he was caught (though general pattern should be that he would have been killed at the scene), the meaningless trial (is it over?) is probably only going to give him a life sentence for each person he killed. We also shrug. Even a congresswoman is hit by bullet though miraculously survived, news still says "guns laws won't change." Obama said he wanted some action taken back then but nothing happened. Would something happen after this time? I DON'T THINK SO.

And there was assault weapon ban for a decade, and gosh statistics did not indicate an decrease of crimes in that decade. Yikes, this is to say gun laws don't work(!) See here for details.

There are just news about concealed weapons being more legalized. In this nonsense nation, to solve the problem of guns, the solution is everybody carry their own guns. The judges interpreted the amendment to say, your rights to carry weapon should not limit to your house.

The Supreme Court has decided that the amendment confers a right to bear arms for self-defense, which is as important outside the home as inside

Now what sense is this to for someone to have such high powered weapons, hundreds of rounds of bullets for self-defense purpose? That really is something to ponder, dear fellow Americans.

It is the rights that Americans cherish. Even this can mean death! death! death! to innocent and not-so-innocent people. We cherish rights over lives.

Is hunting that much fun? Even if you hunt you don't need powerful weapons. Get a copy of Duck Hunt from Nintendo and let's play. I can probably beat you in this game.

ENOUGH. Quit this gun ownership. It is dangerous and nothing to be excited about owning a gun. Only law enforcers need them. Every American ought to have conscience and destroy their guns. You don't need this right. If there is a right to have guns, can I make bomb? can I make a nuclear weapon? The answer is apparently no right?

The ONLY way to stop this is to NOT have a weapon, especially if you have someone with questionable mental health issues at home.

Yes, crooks will always have guns. But let's make it harder to buy guns even for law abiding citizens.

I am doubtful if ANYTHING will change. Every gun owner toss their guns out? No way... Even if someone shoot at elderly homes or baby centers. Perhaps it may be effective if someone starts shooting at a NRA convention... UNTIL we are like the rest of civilized world where regular citizens do not have guns. I am setting a counter on how many days WITHOUT mass shooting. There WILL BE ANOTHER ONE. I just hope you're not the next victim.

We should perhaps follow the Japanese model: see here

Instant hit item if you can build this

A device that keeps a distance between a kid and the TV. All kids ignore "Don't stand too close to the TV" when their favorite show is on.

Here is an idea: you give your kid a cool watch with a device inside that calculates distance between it and the TV. It turns TV automatically OFF if the kid is too close. Back off? turn the TV back on.

If GPS devices can be made, this technically should be a piece of cake. Unfortunately I don't have a clue how to create something that sends infrared signal to TV. Perhaps it can be integrated to xbox or something, that is connected to a TV and has a sensor...

Every parent in the world would want this watch+sensor device. This can be an instant hit.... get it patented... sell a ton of these and collect $. (dream on)

Chess on front page of WSJ

I saw this article about chess Armenia on the front page of the Wall Street Journal yesterday. There are places on earth where the stars are not movie stars or football players... but chess champions. I also must admit I do not know exactly where Armenia is without looking for it in google map... Makes me want to move there until I read that some of these folks are so poor that don't have $ for gasoline, parking, or eat at restaurants.

Chess is compulsory in their elementary schools. Wow, now is that getting too far?

It is a game, although a very educational one... that teaches patience, strategies and all that. I hope they have other items on their economy. I hate to see great players who knows all the pros and cons of various openings and stuff end up suffering from hunger. No $ is a checkmate. I hope there are other means to make money over there.

I hope Armenia discover the fun of other games, such as the even more ancient, but even more difficult game of Go, or other variants of chess. Or perhaps some video games. :)

Know your CSS?

Stylesheets sure looks easy. You specify a set of font sizes, padding, etc to a name and then you specify your HTML elements to use that. Easy enough? Nowadays stylesheets can get a lot more tricky.

In one job interview, I was asked. "What does 'div > p' means? How is it different from 'div p'". A sweat came down my spine. I just don't know. I have not seen this.

How do you react when someone ask you something you don't know may be difference between get job or not get job. I think I eventually guessed something close to the correct answer.

This is a CSS Selector. Glorious details: here. Nowadays CSS can even do manymore interesting stuff. Of course you need to watch for browser compatibility. How the heck do you expect people to keep up?