Since it is now the holiday season, I thought we could spend this weekend making some baked goods that have mathematical patterns on them. In this post, we'll look at making cookies that have a fractal pattern based off of a modification of the pixel cookie technique.
Welcome to the closing of the second HackThisSite and programming Community Byte. First and foremost, I would like to ask that people start showing up on time to the Community Bytes. If you need help converting your time zone to PST, go to Time Zone Converter. When users do not show up on time, we have to go backwards and catch everybody up. This wastes time and will also make other users' experience less enjoyable when they have to watch and listen to the same thing 100 times. Punctuality as...
Here at Null Byte, we've spoken a lot about securing and anonymizing traffic. This is a big deal. With all of today's business taking place electronically via computers, we need to be secure when on-the-go. A lot of businesses don't even train their employees to secure their computers to protect from various threats. Here are a few things that should always happen when doing business on computers:
"Google+ is dead." How many times have you read that in the past few weeks? It seems like I can't get away from this notion that Google+, as a social network, is a total failure. Don't feel too sorry for them, though. +Bradley Horowitz isn't worried. In an interview with VentureBeat, he explains, “Six months from now, it will become increasingly apparent what we’re doing with Google+. It will be revealed less in what we say and more in the product launches we reveal week by week.” Indeed, som...
Visit the charming historical town of Quimper in Northwestern France. Enjoy ancient architecture, cobblestone streets, a stunning cathedral, and world-famous crepes..
CARRION n pl. -S dead and putrefying flesh 59 points (9 points without the bingo)
Best quotes: "A supply of tea with milk and sugar would be nice. If it is tea I really like, I like it without milk and sugar. With milk and sugar, any kind of tea is fine. I always bring tea bags with me, so if we use my tea bags, I will certainly like that tea without milk or sugar.
Social networks like Facebook and Google+ are great for staying connected with family, friends and coworkers—even fans. But sharing and communicating with practically anyone in the digital realm has alienated us from most of the flesh-and-blood beings we see everyday—our neighbors. How well do you know your neighbors?
I'm sure a lot of you like to find inspirational stories of people who by adding something to their diet lost weight or bettered their health. I know I love to search stories like that because it helps me see if I'm doing everything I can to be healthy and happy. It helps me stay motivated if I'm doing everything I should and it helps me tweak my diet if needed to get on the right track. Once in a while I experience one of those for myself, and I love to share those successes with everyone, h...
This is the first of a multi-part series on steganography techniques. Steganography, the art of hiding things in plain sight, has existed for a long time, and in many forms. When you manipulate the alphabet to have your own cipher and decipher, this is considered steganography.
Leaving your wireless router at its default settings is a bad idea. The sad thing is, most people still do it. Once they've penetrated your network, hackers will change your router settings so they'll have an easy way back in. This allows them to change your network into a shell or proxy so they can forward their traffic anonymously through you when committing other dirty deeds.
It’s been a pretty big week for Google, and Google+ itself. There were a number of articles proclaiming the end of Google+, because allegedly traffic dropped over 60% after it opened to the public. Then +Steve Yegge accidentally posted a long rant on Google+ itself, which was originally meant only for Google employees and colleagues to see. Interestingly enough, the most inflammatory content wasn’t actually about Google itself, but about the horrible work environment at Amazon. The accidental...
Last weekend the 2011 World Scrabble Championship was held at the Hilton Hotel in Warsaw, Poland. There were 106 players competing from 44 countries for the $20,000 first place prize and title of World Scrabble Champion.
Game design is sedentary work. Generally its practitioners do their work with their butts planted securely in front of a computer in an office (be it home or away) as their muscles and verbal skills atrophy. Even game journalists are prone to this condition. Not so with Colin and Sarah Northway (pictured below), the husband and wife team behind NORTHWAY Games. Not only do they make really cool indie games, but they do it with just a laptop while traveling the world meeting indie developers of...
+Nik Cubrilovic discovered last week that Facebook could track your web activities even after you logged out of your Facebook account. After some blatant denials from Facebook spokespeople, Facebook decided to fix the logout issue, but not before +Michael Arrington, on his new Uncrunched blog, made a concise post revealing Facebook's dishonesty: Facebook submitted a patent application for "tracking information about the activities of users of a social networking system while on another domain...
On October 7th, the IndieCade Conference will open its doors to some of the most innovative minds in the independent gaming industry. The three day event located in Culver City, California includes presentations by notable indie designers, workshops, galleries, and mixers. On the following day, however, the IndieCade Festival begins. Unlike the conference, the festival includes events targeted at gamers and the general public. While a $15 wristband will grant you access to keynotes, events, a...
It's been a long journey for Netflix users. At first, it was a rough ride as Netflix struggled to find its place in the homes and hearts of movie watchers everywhere. Once monthly subscriptions bumped off the pay-per-rental charges, Netflix soared to great heights, known for their flat-fee unlimited rentals without due dates, late fees, or shipping and handling fees. And it was smooth sailing when streaming services were incorporated into monthly plans, with customers being able to rent DVDs ...
In a previous article where I suggested 104 photographers to follow on Google+, I received a lot of criticism because over 90% of the listed photographers were men. While women are currently not a majority on Google+, they are a definite presence, and they are active. Today, I highlight the best female photographers I've found on Google+ so far. This time I'm taking a slightly different approach. Since the best way to get to know photographers is through their work, I've included one photo fo...
There are a lot of fantastic video games out there. Indie Games Ichiban's bread and butter is making sure that you steer clear of the bad ones and embrace the good. But really, the biggest goal here is to help everyone have more fun. To that end, today a game is not recommended, but an event. If you like games—not just video games—but tabletop, board and even hopscotch, then PAX Prime is one of the best events you could possibly go to.
Behavioral ad targeting companies are diving deeper into the realms of your subconscious with a new approach to serving adverts to you online—and they're using your television.
Gone are the good old days of McNally Maps and Thomas Guides. When you have something as powerful as Google Maps, why bother with anything else? Plus, you can have way more fun with Google's version compared to its paper counterparts. You can find cool things, create a fake chase sequence, and even prank the whole world into thinking you're dead. I imagine the only enjoying thing you can do with those paper maps is make paper airplanes, maybe some decoupage.
To make things a little more fun here on Scrabble World, I've decided to start a weekly feature for word freaks to ponder about it... a challenge. No, I'm not 'challenging' any of your words... I'm challenging your brains. See if you can figure some of these Scrabble puzzles out. You can print this page or hand write the questions out to play at home (or wherever).
The whole world is connected to the Internet, which means bank for advertising companies who track your every move online. Most of the content you see on the web is free, and that's because of advertisements. If there were no ads, none of us would be addicted to the Internet because none of us would be able to afford it.
It's only been a few weeks, and already there are a lot of misconceptions and myths floating around Google+. Let's take a deep breath, and tackle some of the more prominent ones.
How much money do you think you're worth? Hundreds? Thousands? Millions? Think again. In the world of shopping centers and barcodes, you may only be worth a few bucks.
Carpe Fulgur translates to something along the lines of "Seize the Lightning" in Latin. Sometimes that is enacted with golf clubs by idiots. But the three intrepid indie video game localizers who work under that name are trying to do it the right way: metaphorically. They are translating and publishing Japanese games for the Americans market—games that have seldom been seen before because every other company thinks it's mad to release them here.
No matter if you've used one or not, you've got to admit that 3D printers are pretty darn awesome, especially the self-replicating ones that extrude molten plastic and the shoebox-sized versions that use mesmerizing stereolithography to build tiny objects layer by layer. But what's even cooler? A solar-powered printer that uses the sun's energy to melt sand and make 3D objects out of glass.
Netflix may be killing its competitors, but they're losing fans thanks to their reputation for rolling out interface updates without user knowledge or consent. PlayStation 3 owners were upset at the Netflix interface change earlier this year, and now nearly 5,000 diehard Netflixers are irate at the website's new look for its Watch Instantly section.
ARGs have taken the concept of video games to some odd and wonderful real-world places. Socks, Inc. might not be the first ARG, and LittleBigPlanet might have defined the sock-puppet-based game archetype, but it is the first game to combine ARG and sock puppet elements into one package.
Android devices are becoming more and more popular with each passing day, so why is it that Google has yet to design a software program that allows users to manage their music and video libraries on their computers? Apple's iTunes offers iPhone users an easy way to control their media files, as well as effortless syncing capabilities. But where's the option for Android smartphones? Is there no easy way to synchronize your media library with your DROID?
Giveaway Tuesdays has officially ended! But don't sweat it, WonderHowTo has another World that's taken its place. Every Tuesday, Phone Snap! invites you to show off your cell phone photography skills.
Solar Shades Looks like it's going to be another hot summer and this time of year, I always get questions about the best kind of Shades for the home! I may be a little bias in my opinion because I'm going through a more minimalist "less is more" style in my life right now. Taking the more modern design approach that is very popular right now, I wanted to talk a little about Solar Shades for the home.
There are a few different types of Apple iPhone and iPad users: general household users who largely consume media—e.g. surfing the web, watching movies, listening to music. Other iPhone and iPad owners use their device(s) to produce stuff—written documents, edited movies, blog posts, music tracks, and the like. And then there are those who are very mobile with their devices. They commute to and from work on a regular basis with their iPhone or iPad. Some users may travel a lot on business, or...
Introduction to KVM KVM is a free and open-source Kernel-based Virtual Machine using the Linux kernel for virualization and is very similiar to a hypervisor like Xen or VMware's ESXi. It is based on Qemu, a processor emulator. Any virtual machine created on or working on KVM can work on Qemu also, but with a great reduction in speed.
With over 60 commercials, chances are you've seen one of the Get a Mac spots run by Apple, which brands Mac as intuitive and hip, compared to their boring and clunky PC counterpart. You also probably saw Microsoft's response in their I'm a PC campaign. But who are Mac and PC users really? Do jeans and hoodie-wearing yuppies really use Macs? Are the suit-and-tie types strictly operating PCs?
Tired of seeing all of those ads in your browser? The flashing ones make for a terrible browsing experience, and those rollover ones are just downright annoying. If you don't want to be bothered by them again, you've got a few choices, depending on what web browser you're using.
If you already have your basic keyboard shortcuts under control—we're talking classics here, Control-C (copy for PC) or Command-C (copy for Mac)—it's time to load up your memory bank. There are endless shortcuts available (truly endless—since you can customize them yourself), but you don't need to memorize them all, only those you expect to use most. Below, two cheat sheets for upping your keyboard maneuvering status from "basic" to "intermediate" for both Mac and PC users.
We've all done it. You're sick. You don't want to go to the doctor so you just Google it. Soon, you've perused dozens of websites with conflicting information, you're no better informed than when you started, and your confusion makes you feel worse about your predicament. Would you have been better off not Googling in the first place?
Youtube.com is one of the most visited websites in the world, and has been for years now. Ever since it's creation in 2005 people have been making videos for every purpose, including the infamous "How to Boil Water" video. But how can one make money from posting videos on Youtube? Well, it all comes back to Google Adsense. Yes, I know, nowadays it's hard to make money on the internet without using Google Adsense here and there, but Youtube is a great medium to attract people to ads that gener...
Fads, Fiascoes and Good Stuff in FrontierVille This Week The second in a series of weekly columns.
