#AskZiggy

ZiggyTech needs digs like this.. Google’s New Tel Aviv Office...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:08:52 -0500

ZiggyTech needs digs like this..

Google’s New Tel Aviv Office Design Is Totally Over the Top
- Yasha Wallin wrote in in Design, Technology and Architecture

In December, Google revealed images of their brand new office space in Tel Aviv, Israel. Occupying eight floors and 850,000 square feet in the Elektra Building with stunning views of the city, this ambitious office space boasts three restaurants (non-kosher, kosher dairy and kosher meat), and an entire floor dedicated to “Campus Tel Aviv,” a new hub for entrepreneurs and developers that acts like a home base for start up companies. The entire campus was designed by Camenzind Evolution, in collaboration with Setter Architects and Studio Yaron Tal.

Continue reading on good.is

Them’s some fancy digs.

According to a source speaking to The New York Times, President...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:03:21 -0500

According to a source speaking to The New York Times, President Obama can authorize a ‘pre-emptive strike’ against a nation if U.S. national security is at risk. Closer to “SKYNET” from “Terminator”? (click image for full story)

Your Computer is S L O W (here's ur' sign)

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:45:55 -0500

You really know how old & slow your computer is when doing tasks like converting videos and your Windows Experience Index is a (1) !

Handbrake is smacking it silly at 100% CPU usage….

What is the best antivirus? - Megan

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 15:18:19 -0500

Megan,

For years, Norton or McAfee was the big names in AV.
I have always recommend Avast!

Avast! has given their free version away since the 90’s, and has very good protection. Avast covers Windows, Mac, and mobile systems.

They now have complete solutions for protection for network, backup, and passwords. Please check them out and download a free copy. Remember to remove your old AV if you have one installed.

..Ziggy

Randy Sigler added you to his circles and invited you to join Google+

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 13:35:41 -0500

Randy Sigler added you to his circles and invited you to join Google+:

Randy Sigler added you to his circles and invited you to join Google+.

Click here to get started with Google+:

Google+ makes sharing on the web more like sharing in real life.

Steve Jobs: The popular jock to Bill Gates’s nerdy Chess Club president?

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 13:19:33 -0500

Last night, Microsoft co-founder and chairman Bill Gates made an appearance on The Colbert Report last night and when the topic of conversation turned to Steve Jobs Gates admitted he was never as cool as the late Apple CEO.

It certainly seems that way. As Stephen Colbert pointed out to the man himself last night, Gates has been working tirelessly for nearly two decades to promote education and eradicate childhood death through his Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — yet the Microsoft founder has never received the same sort of fawning popular acclaim that Jobs got every time he introduced a smaller iPod.

Gates, to his credit, wasn’t bothered by the question. “He was always cooler than me,” the billionaire told Colbert of Jobs. “He was brilliant. He had his own style, he had his own approach. And mine is I guess a little geekier than his was.”

WHERE WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO VISIT ON YOUR PLANET?

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 12:02:28 -0500

Egypt, Rome, Greece

Managing Your Facebook Privacy - 01.31.13

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 10:49:00 -0500

Keeping your Facebook info private is getting harder and harder all the time—mostly because Facebook keeps trying to make it public. Two things I suggest to people right away are:

Turn On HTTPS to Lock Down Your Private Information
Turn On Two-Factor Authentication to Keep Others from Logging Into Your Account (recommended for GMail & any online accounts offering it)

With privacy-invading apps like previously mentioned Firesheep out there, it’s more important than ever to secure yourself on web sites that have personal information on them, like Facebook. HTTPS will protect you from a lot of outside attacks, especially when you’re browsing on open Wi-Fi networks.

To enable HTTPS encryption, hit “Account” in the upper-right hand corner of any Facebook page and go to “Account Settings”. Hit the “Security” section on the left hand side, look for “Secure Browsing”, and hit Edit. Check the box that says “Browse Facebook on a secure connection (https) whenever possible” and save your changes. From then on, it will automatically connect to Facebook via HTTPS whenever possible. Note that Facebook applications still do not have HTTPS support (just one more reason not to use them).

Of course, none of this matters if someone gets a hold of your Facebook password. If you want to make sure you’re the only one logging into your account, you can enable two-factor authentication, which will send a code to your phone every time you access your account from a new computer or device. That way, if someone gets your password and tries to log in from your computer, they won’t be able to get in unless they’ve also stolen your computer (or your phone).

To enable this feature, head to your Account Settings and hit “Security” in the left hand sidebar. Under “Login Approvals”, check the box that says “Require me to enter a security code each time an unrecognized computer or device tries to access my account”. That way, you’ll get a notification every time a new device logs in as you, and if it’s you, you can plug in the code to get access.

The more Facebook apps you approve, the more you lose control of privacy. I do not use any of 3rd party Facebook add-ons.
Remove and stop logging into other sites using your Facebook account.
Change your password at least monthly

A very good up-to-date write up is on LifeHacker by Editor-in-Chief, Whitson Gordon @ http://goo.gl/na8vG

http://goo.gl/J8fl7 Apple on Wednesday sent out official...

Wed, 23 Feb 2011 12:39:27 -0500

http://goo.gl/J8fl7

Apple on Wednesday sent out official invitations for a media event next week on March 2 in San Francisco, presumably to show off its second-generation iPad.

WDTV Live Plus Price: $98.54 & this item ships...

Sat, 05 Feb 2011 11:01:00 -0500

WDTV Live Plus

Price: $98.54 & this item ships for FREE with Super Saver Shipping. (Amazon)

I have had the WDTV Live Plus for about 6 months. Very nice media hub. Will do 1080p where Apple TV goes 720p.

The WDTV Live is pretty feature-packed as far as set-top boxes go—unlike the Apple TV it streams Internet channels such as Pandora and YouTube, and unlike the Roku devices it also streams your local media. But even though the WDTV Live series natively supports more features than other set-top boxes do, it can still benefit from hacking. ALl you need is a flash stick wiped to FAT and include 2 files. (watch video).

Set-top box hacker B-RAD is a well-known figure in the WDTV Live hacking community for his WDLXTV enhanced firmware software. WDLXTV is for the first- and second- generation WDTV boxes, not the WDTV Live series.
(B-RAD has released WDLXTV-Plus for the WD TV Live Plus box, but it’s currently available only to people who donate at least $5 to the cause.)

http://b-rad.cc/1295/wdlxtv-plus-for-wdtv-live-plus/

I do not have the readme, but the WDTV series had these add-on features:

Features included in WDLXTV-Live:

Movie Sheets
external dvd drive capability with cd-manager-0.7
psychodad’s auto framerate/resolution switcher
thespecialists WMAPro audio support
Web Server
Perl and PHP
rtorrent Bittorrent client w/ web interface
nzbget NZB downloader w/ web interface
SSH server
Telnet server
FTP server
NFS share mounting in local folders and Network Shares
sshfs for mounting a remote server as a local directory
curlftpfs for mounting remote FTP server as a local directory
unionfs for consolidation of multiple directories/locations/servers/etc as one entity
ffmpeg & mediainfo
patched samba configuration for better detection of Windows shares
user customizable background & screen saver images (3 backgrounds to choose from)
extra subtitle size options of 44, 48, 50, 56, 60, 64, 68, 72, 76, & 80
selectable 4/8/10/12/21 video thumb view (see Changelog)
selectable 4/6/8 file list view (see Changelog)
sleectable 10/15 photo/music thumb view (see Changelog)
ext2 & ext3 filesystem support ** (un)officially supported now **
device hotplugging
all media (including network shares & optical devices) can be viewed in ‘All Videos’
USB Hub support
mounting of app bin packs (if available) at boot, for plugNplay addtional functionality
mounting of OSD overlay (if available) at boot, for full theming
user customizable init.d scripts for full os customization
emergency flash recovery

Just a wee bit more Captain than any of the other media servers and under $99

….Randy

( http://www.pcworld.com/article/218494-2/hack_your_streaming_settop_box.html )

joleine: Hanging out with daddy at...

Sat, 05 Feb 2011 10:04:45 -0500

joleine:

Hanging out with daddy at work!

http://www.carbonmade.com/

Forbidden Planet One of my all time favorite scifi movies...

Sat, 22 Jan 2011 23:33:43 -0500

Forbidden Planet

One of my all time favorite scifi movies growing up…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forbidden_Planet

n November 2010, Leslie Nielsen died in his sleep, due to complications from pneumonia.

Should I wait for the iPad 2 & iPhone 5?

Sat, 22 Jan 2011 13:12:17 -0500

I have had SO many ask about buying an iPad for Christmas. I replied that IF the features are all you need, then get one. IF you can wait just a couple of month’s, the new iPad 2 will be out. You could then pick up a good used iPad 1 on the cheap, or buy the new iPad.

Now, I am getting the same questions on buying or moving from AT&T to the new Verizon iPhone! Wow you have to appreciate marketing don’t you?

My reply on the Verizon iPhone 4 is, have you checked your AT&T contract, and would it be worth it? It is the same phone as the AT&T model (AT&T will have hotspot function with iOS 4.3 soon). If you are a new customer or out-of-contract, it may be your worthwile, as in Central KY for example, Verizon has more connection capacity with Bluegrass Celluar (who owns the wireless space almost).

I myself waited out the urge Christmas to see the new iPad 2. Most tech circles say it will be a major upgrade with a new Apple A5 CPU (a Cortex A9-based, multi-core chip), a Qualcomm chipset that does triple duty as the CDMA / GSM / UMTS baseband processor, capable of playing 1080p HD video, as well as a high-resolution Retina display. The new iPad is also expected to include dual (front and rear) cameras. This is a MAJOR hardware upgrade, as well as having a dedicated SD slot built in.

iPad 2 will have better graphics, but the screen resolution of 2048x1536 pixels—four times that of the current 1024x768 iPad, may or may not happen until the iPad 3. It would be a bonus if Apple did, to compete with all the clones about to appear on the scene. Most only have 720x480 going toward 1024x768 of the current iPad.

What about 4G? Sorry, Verizon iPhone will still only have 3G speed. Other tech circles are saying (or hoping), that the iPad 2 (as well as the iPhone 5), will have LTE 4G for both Verizon and AT&T.

From a leaked Best Buy memo, it looks like Best Buy will be not only shying away from the Verizon iPhone 4, but going as far as to not recommend it to would-be customers. LOL

(http://www.slashgear.com/best-buy-shying-away-from-the-verizon-iphone-4-19127291/)

It’s possible that Apple has decided not to include the 4G on the Verizon iPhone to avoid hurting current users of AT&T iPhone (or 3G iPhone 4), and to avoid mass cancellation of AT&T contracts… LOL

I myself will wait on the iPhone 5 and iPad 2. For others, it may be hard to avoid all the commericals that will be hammering away to sell the current iPad and iPhone 4. I may just wait and pick me up a super deal on a used pair! ;-)

The WD Livewire Powerline AV Network Kit is arguably the best...

Sat, 15 Jan 2011 21:22:22 -0500

The WD Livewire Powerline AV Network Kit is arguably the best powerline adapter kit for homes to date. It’s fast, comparatively affordable, and offers plenty of network ports

http://reviews.cnet.com/bridges/western-digital-wd-livewire/4505-3304_7-34161837.html

Read reviews.. looks like a solid 100M to 200M connections

Does iPhone 3G run iOS 4.2.1 or should restore down to...

Thu, 13 Jan 2011 22:00:22 -0500

Does iPhone 3G run iOS 4.2.1 or should restore down to 3.1.3?

Comments welcomed.

Security Problem - Cloud Password Cracking

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 11:25:34 -0500

Security Problem - Cloud Password Cracking:

Example showing WPA-PSK broken in 6 minutes … Hackers had started using video GPU, but cloud services give anyone a “super computer” for cheap.

Really bad in the wrong hands.

NCAA: The No Consistency Athletic Association

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 20:51:59 -0500

NCAA: The No Consistency Athletic Association:

* Reblog of CBSSports.com

Posted by MATT JONES

The NCAA on Friday reaffirmed its previous ruling that Enes Kanter will never step foot on a basketball court for Kentucky….. (click link for entire post)

http://college-basketball-blog.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/26283066/26901783

Morality - Caprica

Mon, 03 Jan 2011 22:32:56 -0500

Morality - Caprica

Y2K11 iPhone Alarm Bug

Mon, 03 Jan 2011 17:13:53 -0500

Gotta love a Baby Ben!

Our son Mike said he had a designer friend that panicked because it meant they were late checking their sons blood sugar at 2 AM…

——— FIX ——- (other than keep your Blackberry for real work ..haha)

A bug in Apple’s official Clock app on the iPhone caused some alarms to stop working in the New Year, and that the company’s prediction that the alarms would start working again on Jan. 3 was wrong.

Over the weekend Apple reps told some media outlets the company was aware of the problem, and that it should fix itself by today, which was clearly not the case. Apple hasn’t responded to our requests for comment yet today, but there appears to be an easy fix to the issue of alarms that don’t go off: just delete the alarms and create new ones.

Reports all over the Web say this fixes the problem.

Awesome job son! michaelsigler: Morgan’s first Christmas...

Sun, 26 Dec 2010 23:41:38 -0500

Awesome job son!

michaelsigler:

Morgan’s first Christmas morning time lapse.