Google Chrome Extension Recommendations
Dec 9th
Recently, Google opened up its Chrome Extension Gallery for use with the Google Chrome Browser. The beta channel and dev channel versions of Chrome have had extension support for a while, but with the opening of Google’s official gallery, many new extensions have been made public. In my opinion, extensions are the main thing Chrome has been missing in comparison to Firefox so far. Here is a list of several extensions I recommend. These extensions get Chrome very close to feature parity with Firefox for my uses, with the one glaring exception of a replacement for Firefox’s NoScript.
AdThwart – AdThwart is an ad blocker that ports parts of Adblock Plus from Firefox to Chrome. It’s still early in its development so it still doesn’t compare to Adblock Plus, but so far this seems to be the ad-blocking system with the most potential on Chrome.
Bit.ly Shorten Url – If you use Twitter much, you’re probably familiar with URL shorteners like bit.ly. This extension puts a button in your address bar that shortens the current page’s URL with bit.ly. Simple and effective.
Chromed Bird – A simple Twitter client that sits in the toolbar. It updates you with new tweets and allows you to tweet without going to the Twitter website.
ChromeMilk – A great client for Remember the Milk, the online to-do list software, that sits in the toolbar.
One Number – Addicted to Google? This extension keeps you up to date on GMail, Google Wave, Google Reader and Google Voice.
XMarks for Chrome – Chrome does incorporate Google Bookmarks, but I find XMarks gives much more control on what is synced and where, plus it works on more browsers. Just like XMarks’ extension on other browsers, this one syncs your bookmarks online for free and lets you choose which bookmarks are which computers.
youTagger and YouTube HTML5-ifier – Don’t like Flash, but like YouTube? No problem! These extensions replace the YouTube Flash Player with YouTube’s new HTML5-based player. The HTML5 player improves performance of YouTube videos and makes them less likely to crash the browser. I’m currently listing both extensions because each has an issue that could bug you. youTagger works everywhere but loads the low quality version of the video. YouTube HTML5-ifier loads the highest quality version of the video, but only works when directly on a YouTube video page, not on embedded YouTube videos or on YouTube User Channels.
Hopefully, proper high-granularity content blocking will be implemented soon so that real equivalents to Adblock Plus and NoScript on Firefox become possible.
Back to the Blog
Dec 9th
Wow, it’s been almost 11 months! Far too long to leave this website dormant! To be fair, it’s been an eventful year for me, though that won’t be discussed here at this time. I plan to get this thing back up an running over the next month and I’ve already started with a new theme and new sidebar widgets (Twitter, Last.fm, new links). I plan to better integrate what’s going on here with Twitter and Facebook so everyone is kept informed no matter where they are. That’s the current plan anyway. YMMV
A few of the things coming in the next week or so:
- Google Chrome Extensions Recommendations
- Real updates to my eBay page and new auctions
- Zork Guides website update and discussion on that topic
- Discussion on some of the recent computing-related topics I’ve been tweeting about
More topics to be featured here long-term:
- Android discussion (and maybe even an app I develop!)
- Google discussion (Chrome browser, Chome OS, Google Wave, etc)
- Operating Systems (recent releases, current trends)
- My 2010 Projects: Cleaning/Fixing my Xbox 360, Building a kitchen pc, a new desktop pc, other cool household projects, MAME cabinet (maybe)
It’s exciting to be working on the website again. I’ve had the web design itch for a while now and though this isn’t real web design (it’s manipulating Wordpress and it’s themes/plugins to do my bidding), I may do some real web design again at some point in 2010. It’s a new decade after all!
Edit (12/11/09): Also, FYI: I’m cleaning up some of the old posts including the ones that are merely links to outdated eBay auctions, or posts that are no longer or any relevance.
Zork Guides Website Updates
Jan 16th
About 7 months ago, I posted a new website related to running Zork games on modern operating systems. Over these last 7 months, I’ve been compiling feedback to the guides and working on making the website a better tool for users. The first of those changes are complete and there’s more to come.
One promising lead is that ScummVM has a work-in-progress port of the MADE engine, so Return to Zork can be played. It’s currently only available in their daily SVN builds, but once the engine is more stable, I’ll write up a guide for it. Because of the consistency of ScummVM cross-platform and the ease of use of the software, this guide will be appropriate for Windows XP/Vista, Linux and OS X without much difference between each version. A second development is the continued growth of Wine. Recently a patch was created that addresses one of the big bugs that get in the way of playing Zork Nemesis and Zork Grand Inquisitor on Linux and OS X. That patch isn’t in the main wine codebase yet, but once it is, I’ll revisit writing a guide for Zork Nemesis and Zork Grand Inquisitor on Linux. Mac OS X continues to be a problem because I can’t test on that system, but I have researched a few options that may allow for the games to be played on OS X and placed those links in the table of configurations on the website.
Lastly, I want to bring up a real piece of news in the Zork universe, probably the first real piece of news in a decade. Activision announced Wednesday that they’re working on a new Zork game called Legends of Zork. It will be a multiplayer adventure played through a web browser and will target iPhone so it will likely be JavaScript-based. More info can be found at Gamasutra and Forumopolis.
eBaying again
Jan 3rd
Now that I have moved into the new house, I’ve been organizing things and finding old stuff that I’ll never use again. What good is that stuff for? Selling on eBay! Today I’ll add things to the eBay page as I find things to get rid of. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll start the first auctions based on that list. As always, if you see something you want, you can make an offer directly to me before the auction starts. If the offer is reasonable, I’ll sell it to you.
And happy new year to everyone!
Summer Cleaning
Jul 31st
As you can see, I made some changes to the website. I was starting to get tired of my theme, so I found a new one. It’s not made by me, but I like it enough to use it anyway. It’s called PhoenixBlue. I just made some small modifications to add support for the Quoter plugin.
I also upgraded to the latest version of Wordpress, upgraded some old plugins, and installed some new ones. The main new thing you will notice are social links below each post. If you like what you’ve read, you can submit the article to one of the social media websites listed. I currently have buttons for Digg, Del.icio.us, Facebook, Google, StumbleUpon, Twitter, Pownce and Reddit. If you would like another website added, let me know. The plugin I use has a ton more options, but I only added the most common social media sites.
The Curious Case of the Wii
Jun 15th
After 19 months, the Wii is still hard to find. I’m not aware of any stores nearby that have stock for long after getting a shipment. There is economics at work here, plus the allure of a popular, hard to get item, but there’s more to it. Nintendo is making tons of Wiis. With worldwide sales of above 27 million, they’ve sold more than twice that of the PS3 and even about 50% more than the Xbox 360, which had a year head start in sales. (Source: vgchartz.com) Something is different about the Wii and its sales.
My Hero
Jun 6th
I can’t not post this. iamchris4life has finally done it. He FC’ed Through the Fire and Flames in Guitar Hero III on expert, the first person ever to do so. (That means he finished the hardest guitar hero song ever, perfectly, no missed notes and no extra notes) He’s been working on this for several months now. The Guiness Book of World Records needs to update it’s 2008 book now that iamchris4life destroyed his previous score. The necessary proof follows. The freaking out after finishing is priceless.