Ed's Tech Tips

I have an eclectic taste in music. I like a wide variety of music including blues, jazz, rock, folk, classical and so on. I also like to discover new music, but I do not want to purchase CD's I have never heard of before. The 30 second music clips at iTunes are not long enough for me and I do not want to stand around with headphones on at Barnes & Nobles music listening stations. So what do I do? I go to Pandora.com.

Although the web site shares the same name as the infamous box, you'll be happy you opened your web browser to Pandora.com. You just need the Flash plugin (which you probably alreday have) and you are ready to go. There is nothing to download. You can create your own custom internet radio stations (up to a hundred) by entering athe name of a favorite musical artist or song. Pandora compares your entry with an extensive catalog consisting of over 10,000 artists developed by the Music Genome Project which has identified over 400 different attributes that might be assigned to a song.

The service is free with some minor advertising and links to iTunes and Amazon if you want to purchase the music it plays for you. It is great service. the music selection is extensive and right on the money in opinion in most of the selections it makes. It has exposed me to many very good artists that I had not heard of before.

If you have a Mac, check out PandoraMan. It is a small application that accesses Pandora's music player so that you do not have to keep your webb browser open.

As of May 16th I have been employed with the Alumnae Association for over a year and am experiencing my first official Alumnae Reunion weekend. Because I was so new last year I was not required to work the weekends, but I am making up for it this year. I have been commissioned to create the first virtual Global Reunion. It is a program that makes reunion highlights available online to alumnae around the world. Global Reunion’s features include a Message Board, Photo Galleries, Online Videos, Webcam and Guestbook. Images of the events are posted on line later the same day, or leat the following day.

The project is a combination of passive and interactive features that involve a variety of different applications (most of which are open source and/or free software) and technologies. I will be devoting separate articles to some of the programs I have used and the processes of getting a large number of videos and photos online in a short span of time that was not possible just a few years ago.

Welcome to my blog. I am the Technology Support Specialist for the Alumnae Association. My title is a little misleading, because it suggests that I am a "specialist", but I am actually a jack of all trades related to "technology" which has become a rather broad category. I administer the local area network at the Alumnae Association office in Mary Wooley Hall, as well as, maintain the web server; update, repair and replace computers and printers; train staff on the use of software and hardware, photograph events, and do pretty much anything else there is to do related technology.

This purpose of this blog is to offer my experience, knowledge and opinions in the form of suggesstions, reviews, how-tos, answers to frequently asked questions and discoveries regarding software, the Alumnae Association web site and technology in general. You the reader can comment on my articles and ask additional questions.

As for my background I have been using computers for a while. My first computer was the Texas Instruments TI-99/4a in the early 80's. Although I do have a Bachelors degree in Philosophy/Religion and Social Science with a concentration in Psyschology from Flagler College in St. Augustine, I have worked as a Technical Support Specialist and Knowledge Base Developer for Sony Electronics and Yankee Candle Company before arriving at Mount Holyoke College a year ago.

The Alumnae Association recieved a very nice thank you email from a parent of a graduating senior that participated in the Strawberries & Champagne event on May 9th:

I wanted to let you know how much I, as a far-away parent of a graduating senior, enjoyed the slide show of the Strawberries and Champagne event that is posted on the web.

Please congratulate the photographer and all else involved in putting it together. What a great way to use technology to allow all kinds of people, wherever they may be and whatever their connection to the graduates, to share in the joyous occasion!

Thanks again, and good job!
Joan Giglierano
Mother of Emily Giglierano '06

This is just the type of response we had hoped to solicit from alumnae, students and parents. I was the photographer for the event, but I must admit that I lucked out with very good lighting for the outdoor event in spite of the light drizzle of rain. I also had a very nice digital camera to work with, the Sony DSC-H1. Read more about at Dpreview.com. It is an excellent all around camera that I highly recommend.

The camera is a 5 megapixel model with a 12X optical zoom which allows me to zoom in for close-ups. I was trying to capture the emotions on the students' faces as they celebrated the completion of their careers at Mount Holyoke College. I purchased a 1 GB Memory Stick for the camera and some extra rechargeable batteries. I took over 150 photos, out which I selected the 50 that are in the gallery. A secret of good photography is taking a lot of photos and only selecting a few of the best ones.

Hopefully, I'll have the same level of success with the virtual Global Reunion, which will not only feature numerous photos, but video and message boards as well.

We are featuring a new screen saver, titled Spring 2006 in our new Virtual Cafe which is a new area on the web site that will feature interactive and multimedia content including photos, video, audio, wallpaper and screen savers. This particular screen saver features numerous full-screen images of plants in bloom and campus buildings. It also features a songtrack consisting of the College Alma Mater and Bread & Roses, performed by the M&C's a cappella group. They did a very nice performance, but after the 32nd unexpected playing when your computer automatically turns on the screen saver while you are tyring to talk on the phone, it might start to get old. Therefore the music volume can be lowered in the screen saver settings options tab. I created a Flash tutorial to show you how to easily adjust the sound if you are using Windows XP. The steps are similar for other versions of Windows and Macs as well. Click More to the view it.

Help2Go is a community committed to offering free computer help, technical support, tutorials, and spyware removal in a way that everyone can understand, not "geek-speak". It's free, no strings attached. (Note: you must have an account in order to ask a question). Volunteers maintain the site. There is a forum, newsletter and tutorials on a wide variety of subjects. There are some very helpful tips on this site.

If you have problems with your PC locking or going to sleep, Caffeine will keep it awake. It works by simulating a keypress once every 59 seconds, so your machine thinks you're still working at the keyboard, so it won't lock the screen or activate the screensaver. I found this program helpful when I am listening to Internet radio or a podcast while working on something else other than my computer. Without Caffeine I had to disable the power saving features which required multiple clicks and screens.

The icon is shown above - it's the leftmost one in the task tray, and this is all you see. Double-clicking the icon empties the coffee pot (that's what the icon is) and temporarily disables the program. Double-clicking it again refills the pot, and will keep your machine awake.

Windows 98: Caffeine works by simulating left shift key down and up events every 59 seconds.

Windows 2000/XP: Caffeine works by simulating a left shift key up event every 59 seconds. Of all the key presses available, shift is probably the least intrusive, and least likely to interfere with your work.

The download is only 11kb.

Stickies is a PC utility written to try to cut down on the number of Post-It® notes left stuck to your monitor. It is a computerised version of those notes. 3M offers a digital version of its very popular Post-It® notes as well, but it costs $19.99, whereas Stickies is free. The design goal behind Stickies is that the program is small and simple. Stickies will not mess with your system files, or write to the registry. Stickies stores all information in a single text-based ini file.

Stickies will never support animated dancing figures, or play "Greensleeves". They are instead yellow (or any other color you prefer) rectangular windows onto which you can put some text notes. Once created, they will stay on screen until you take them away. Just like a real sticky piece of paper.

Main features:

• Once on screen, stickies will remain where placed until closed, even through reboots
• Stickies appearance can be customised; fonts, colours and buttons may be changed, and styles saved. Stickies can be resized.
• Stickies can snap to each others edges to keep them lined up
• Stickies can be transferred from one machine to another either over a TCP/IP network connection, or by using an SMTP mail server or MAPI client: Hierarchical friends list, which may be automatically transferred from other friends; Play a sound file on receive; Signature for transmitted or emailed stickies; Favourite friends, and custom lists can be made
• Stickies can be hidden for a certain period, until a specified date and time, or to wake every day, week or month, to act as reminders.
• Stickies can have alarms set to ensure you notice them at a point you choose
• Stickies can be transferred to and from your Palm or PPC PDA.
• International language support
• Stickies is small and simple, it writes to a single text file, and does not touch the registry
• ...and Stickies is completely free!

You may also want to check out the optional Stickies add-on tools, such as the Sticky Store and Sticky Server if you would like to use the notes at work.