Beat Purdue’s System: Portable Apps

In class Tuesday I mentioned using Portable Firefox to enable me to install the MEL toolbar and use same from my Purdue account. As I mentioned, Portable Apps were first designed for the U3 system  to enable users to plug their U3 Smart Drive into any computer, use  their own PortableApp software loaded on the USB Thumbdrive, and leave no personal data behind. There’s quite an assortment of software available. I’ve used Nvu portable (html editor), FileZilla, a full-featured FTP client, VLC to play video Purdue’s computers aren’t setup to stream, and Firefox. Take a look here for what’s available and enjoy. Works for me. Hank

icloud now ucloud

icloud is a free URL that turns your web browser into an online computer.Their site states: “Open http://icloud.com in your web browser, log in, and your very own desktop will emerge in seconds. The desktop is the starting point of
your icloud experience. Here you’ll keep your most frequently used files and applications. To the right, you have a sidebar where you can keep small useful applications, e.g. clock, calendar, weather updateetc. To the lower left you’ll find the start menu for easy access toall features in icloud.”

So I followed the bouncing ball. First stop – I generally run Firefox as my browser of choice because of the many addins available. I was informed that icloud for FF is very much in Alpha and recommended I switch to Explorer which I did. After that, and choosing a UN/PW, I was vectored to http://os.icloud.com and we were off to the races. While operating systems running from browsers are certainly not new, this is one of the first I’ve seen that actually run in the cloud. 50gigs of free online storage BTW. What’s to lose? Hank

Magnetic Refridgeration Coming To Your Casa Soon

Various sources are reporting a big breakthrough in refrigeration technology, magnetic-based cooling. Sciencedaily reports:

Magnetic refrigeration technology could provide a ‘green’ alternative to traditional energy-guzzling gas-compression fridges and air conditioners. They would require 20-30% less energy to run than the best systems currently available, and would not rely on ozone-depleting chemicals or greenhouse gases. Refrigeration and air conditioning units
make a major contribution to the planet’s energy consumption – in the USA in the summer months they account for approximately 50% of the country’s energy use.

A magnetic refrigeration system works by applying a magnetic field to a magnetic material – some of the most promising being metallic alloys – causing it to heat up. This excess heat is removed from the system by water, cooling the material back down to its original temperature. When the magnetic field is removed the material cools down even further, and it is this cooling property that researchers hope to harness for a wide variety of cooling applications.

In general, a family’s refriderator uses about 8% of the total electrical power useage, so the magnetic refrigerator, might  reduce  this to 6% or so, a decent cutback in electricity consumption. How soon they will be in retail stores remains to be seen, or automobiles, or space craft, or computers? Hank

Breaking Through The Clutter: Naked Advertising

Ok gang, this is from Down Under courtesy of jaunted.com: “Those Kiwis at Air  New Zealand have always had a strong team of advertising executives thinking up some pretty unique ideas. It’s not surprising then that they’ve got another new and similarly salacious campaign up their sleeve, and this one lets everyone know that their staff has nothing to hide (as well as some hot bodies).” The lesson for entrepreneurs? You’ve got to get above the noise and really stand out (no pun intended). Obviously, Air New Zealand’s approach does just this. Hank

Great Companies Are Built On Great Products

Knowledge@Wharton recently interviewed Elon Mush, the dude passionate about several things. The article states: “Entrepreneur Elon Musk has three passions: the Internet, space
exploration and clean energy. The first paid off handsomely for him in 2002 when he sold PayPal to eBay for $1.5 billion in stock. The second is fueled by SpaceX, a company that makes space launch vehicles. Musk’s third passion is Tesla Motors, which makes the Tesla Roadster, an electric sports car that claims to go 244 miles per charge and sells
for $101,500 or more. In the first of a two-part podcast with Wharton Entrepreneurial Programs and Knowledge@Wharton, Musk speaks with management professor John Paul MacDuffie, co-director of the International Motor Vehicle Program, about electric cars, hybrids, the Tesla and the mysterious ways of Detroit.“

The Podcast download link is here: Good stuff! Hank

Have A Happy Friday: She Didn’t

The Stockdale Paradox for Entrepreneurs

Bambi Francisco of vator.tv recently interviewed MySQL CEO Marten Mikos on faith over optimism. “Mickos advises entrepreneurs to seek wisdom in the words of Admiral Jim Stockdale, the highest-ranking American prisoner in the Hanoi prisoner of war camp from 1965 to 1973, who through  unwavering faith believed he would one day be set free from prison. In Jim Collins’ book “Good to Great,” he introduces the notion of the “Stockdale Paradox,” which is to “retain faith that you will prevail in the end, regardless of difficulties, and at the same time, confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.” ” Great advice! Hank

Fire Wood Innovation

Thanks to my Brother-In-Law Jerry for the video embedded below. For about five years when I was working on my Ph.D. we heated our home with fire wood. At this time in my life, all of us, wife, two sons, and me were full time students. I learned first hand that cutting down trees, splitting firewood, and feeding the wood stove indeed heats you many times. Hard, often dirty, and dangerous work, I’m glad it’s a thing of the past.

See how one man’s innovation makes the job so much easier and faster. BTW, there is also a device for a tracked hoe that grasps a tree, cuts it off at ground level. rotates it 90 degrees, then cuts lengths while skimming off branches. The only way to travel! Hank

Farmers Using Technology to be Innovative

Yet Another Netbook – My Third

Saturday I purchased one of the latest netbooks from Asus, the eeepc 1000HE. I update from the 8.9″ Acer I have been using for a couple of reasons. The 1000HE is slightly larger @ 10″, and the memory is easily upgradeable to 2 gigs. The battery is supposed to last 9.5 hours while the Acer consistently clocked in at over 5. Oh, and Best Buy had them on sale for $349.99

The 1000HE only had Norton as crapware at boot, but if you did not know how to run taskmgr from XP’s Run command you would have had a difficult time getting it off. I replaced it with Avast, and loaded it up with “stuff” from www.filehippo.com plus Office 2007. So far nothing out of the ordinary. I also setup PAL2.0 for Purdue’s network.

I downloaded Ubuntu Netbook Remix and flashed it to a 2 gig thumb drive. This version of Ubuntu is based on the full version of 9.04. After I figured out how to change the boot order to included USB as the first device looked at in the boot sequence [hit F2 as booting] I’m up and running in Ubuntu off a USB/thumb drive. It even found the wireless netbook out of the box. Skype was preinstalled and worked fine, as did the 1.3 mega pixel camera under Cheese in Ubuntu. Sweet. Now to do real work with it. Hank