A Stick Is Just a Stick

..and sometimes a stick is something much more.

 A stick is just a stick…until it’s rubbed against another stick to spark a fire - then it becomes a source of heat.

A stick is just a stick…until it’s rapped against a rock – then it becomes a percussion instrument.

A stick is just a stick…until it’s used by a primate to scoop out ants – then it becomes a tool.

A stick is just a stick…until one end is notched and one end is pointed – then it becomes a weapon.

As I came into work this morning, I came up with this metaphor and I realized that this concept works just as well with our current computer based technology.  The very general point to this article is that the true driving force behind the tools is the thought process behind the tool – even more-so than the physical attributes of the tool.   As the context of a stick can be changed based on its intended purpose, such is also the case for our modern technology.

A computer is just an object manufactured of plastic, metals and other components.  What drives the success of our technology is the thought and the imagination of what tools we need; how the tools will be used and how they will need to be designed by their intended use.

As much as the physical components of our technology are critical, they are really just the ends to a mean – a way of delivering the creativity to fruition.  Without this creative process and the need and ability to solve problems, none of this technology would exist.

To continue on with the stick, I imagine that way “back in the day” before there were primates, then a stick truly was just a stick.  The broken off branch on the ground was just that and nothing more, there were no ancillary uses for it.

I can’t imagine the revolution or the process that started off with the realization that rubbing two sticks together caused a spark which can be used to start a fire.  The course of our history was changed with that one innovation.

In the same ways, as we speed down the technological path of our modern times, we too are starting those branches, the divides where the future historians will look back to 2012 and say “Look !  This is where it all started!  This is where _____  all came from”.

The challenge that we have as a society is how do we ensure that the path that we take is best?  How do we ensure that our collective brains create new technologies with minimal disadvantage?

I would hazard a guess that “most” scientists and visionaries keep this in mind as they think through possible solutions.   However, even in the most innocent situations, the intended use of a technology can be bastardized to create harm.

It would be too idealistic to expect that all technological advances are good, but that’s not necessarily the case.

The best solution that I can think of is to always remain a skeptic – to say to one’s self “gee, that’s a really interesting technology, but what happens IF…?”

Perhaps the problem is that we all have our own motivations – our own agendas.  

It was said that Thomas Edison grew his company for one reason and one reason only – to raise capital so that they can invent more technologies, to raise more capital to invent more technologies.  

Sadly, that type of a technological philosophy is not always the case.  Not that there’s anything intrinsically wrong with a company creating new technologies to increase the return on investment for investors or to create profits for whatever reason, but can we at least not pretend that at the very least that there’s a fundamental common good that we’re aiming for?

If we’re going to find uses for sticks, then at least let’s try to find more good uses for it than bad ones.

OtherInBox and Yahoo and Me!

I posted about this groovy add-in to my Yahoo inbox last year.  It continues to be a marvelous tool to sort and organize my inbox. 

Certainly, the same type of functionality can be mimicked with filters in Yahoo, but I find filters to be a bit limiting, and I like the fact that I can "train" OtherInbox to send similar types of emails from different sources to the same folder. 

Where I find this especially useful lately is really using my Yahoo inbox as a virtual filing cabinet.  I have many OtherInBox folders setup and when I find a particular article of interest on the web, I'll email the article to myself from within the web page.  Where the website in question allows, I'll add a little blurb in the subject line so that it's a bit easier to navigate and sift through the myriad of emails in one OIB (Other Inbox) folder.

Nice work, guys!  I'm a big OIB fan and will continue to looks for ways of managing my email better and sharing tips along the way.

Hard Disk Fragmentation

You might have noticed that it takes your computer longer to launch programs or load your files? One of the reasons for this is because of something called fragmentation.

The user of the computer would never notice, but your hard disk is actually logically divided into small chunks called sectors. During the life span of your hard disk, you will have added files, removed them and made changes. When you are installing a new program, the computer will need to determine where it should be located. It will look for a group of sectors that are free and will start installing the program (or saving the data file) in the first sector. As that sector is filled up, the computer will then look for the next available sector. Once it has determined the best second sector to use, it sets a pointer at the end of the first sector which indicates the physical location on the hard disk where the second sector is located. Large programs can take up many sectors with the first pointing to the second which points to the third, and so on.

When you have a new computer, the computer is able to find large numbers of sectors in the same physical region and as a result, the program will be installed in sectors that have a close proximity. The problem arises as your hard disk fills up. If it needs to find a second sector and there’s not one near the first then it will look for the next available sector which might be on the exact opposite end of the hard disk. Thus, in this scenario, you could have one program file where the sectors are scattered throughout the hard disk. Although the computer keeps track of this seamlessly, the reality is that the sensor that reads the hard disk needs time to move back and forth and the hard disk spins like a record player (cd player?) to bring the right physical location to the read/write head. When the file is split up like this, this is known as fragmentation.

To combat performance slowdown caused by fragmentation, Microsoft Windows includes a utility which can be located by clicking on the start button and then selecting Accessories followed by System Tools and then System Defragmenter. You can think of this utility as a “spring cleaning” tool for your hard disk. Once you run it, the utility will go through and temporarily move sectors to empty areas and then organize the sectors that belong together sequentially. When you first run the System Defragmenter, it will do an analysis of your hard disk to determine how much your hard disk is defragmented. 

 
This process is safe to run, and there should never be any data loss, but of course, we all backup our hard disks on a regular basis in case of emergency. Right? :)

The defragmenter can also be setup to automatically defragment on a schedule that you define. How often you should defragment depends very much on how often you install or change files, how quick your hard disk and how big it is, but probably a monthly defragmentation would be sufficient. If you run the utility and see that it appears to be fragmented past 25%, then you can always just run it manually or adjust your schedule so that it’s defragmented weekly.

Waiting on The World To Change

This month’s article steals the title from a snappy John Mayer ditty and is somewhat of a departure from my usual articles. I have a particular rant with regards to technology not progressing fast enough for my liking.

Usually, I’m a little bit cautious with regards to technological advances, but in a case like this, I’m a big proponent and am anxiously waiting for the advances that I believe are (or at least technically could be) around the corner.

My biggest gripe is about this authentication process of who we are. I touched on a subset of this issue with my article titled Multiple Locks - One Key but it goes beyond this.

Not only are we expected to remember passwords for the gajillion websites that we visit but where this also impacts us in our wallets. I’m referring to this literally – at how many credit cards, debit cards, customer loyalty cards and identification cards that we’re forced to carry.

It might seem like a minor issue but I know for myself personally, I am convinced that how thick my wallet is, has affected me physically. I started noticing that when I was driving longer distances that I’d be getting a pain in my right hip. I didn’t really think much of it at the time, but as the symptoms progressed I tried to figure out what was causing the pain. I came to the realization that I carry my wallet in my right rear pocket and I noticed when I was sitting that the thickness of the wallet forced my right hip to be slightly out of alignment.

As an experiment, I started carrying my wallet in a jacket pocket when driving and the symptoms seemed to be much alleviated.

This caused me to question why on earth do I need so many separate cards. Certainly technology has advanced to the degree where at least for our loyalty cards, there could be one master card and my copy of this card would link to whatever programs I belonged to.

Same thing for credit cards and government identification cards. Why do I need to have so many pieces of identification? I guess that there must be logistical or privacy reasons in some cases, but cheese and crackers – I really should be able to have less than a half dozen cards in my wallet.

One of the arguments might be that if you someone gets access to this one “master” then they have access to everything (same issue as I noted in the Multiple Locks - One Key), but where we need a physical presence to use these cards, there must be a possibility of using biometric identification such as fingerprints or retina scans to prove that the card belongs to me – it’s really not all that complicated.

I would guess that the biggest problem is that this would be an absolutely huge infrastructure change on how our data is stored and our identity is authenticated, but I’m also quite certain that in the long run it would save companies significant amounts of money with reduced manufacturing/maintenance of these cards, let alone a (theoretical) reduced fraud risk.

At present I now have TWO wallets, one that I keep with me with just the cards that I might need on a semi-regular basis and a second wallet at home with the rest of my more infrequent cards.

As a society we managed to figure out how to replace trade and barter with a cash and credit system. Surely over this period, we’re ready for that next monumental step.

Hitting the High Notes

From a personal perspective, one of the things that I love about our technology is how it has provided me the tools to sample and listen to music.

The most obvious of these is the iTunes revolution.  I don't know how many albums that I've bought on iTunes, but it's been a ton of them.  Many relaxing weekend mornings are spent in the iTunes store either looking for new releases from old favourites, or sometimes just trying something totally off the wall.  It's with the latter that I have discovered some new favourites such as Swell Season and Angus and Julia Stone.

I'm also getting very hyped about satellite radio and am at present listening to my 7 day free trial of Sirius - something that will likely be turned into a paid subscription soon enough!

This ability to listen to music on demand, to explore, to listen to one specific genre on satellite radio - this has been a big part of my life and this isn't going to change anytime soon.

My only regret is how this has affected the brick-and-mortar music stores.  There was as much of an enjoyment physically flipping through albums in a store as it is pleasurable to walk into a library and walk up and down the aisles.

Still - onwards and upwards I suppose.

Now - you'll have to excuse me - I have to check on iTunes to see if there any new Christmas albums.  I'm currently sitting at approximately 125 albums of holiday music and I've only added 1 to my collection this year - any recommendations are always welcome!

The Good of Technology

I've alluded to this in the past...but as much as I slag technology sometimes, I have to admit that from a very personal perspective, technology has aided me immensely over the past few years as I've researched medical and legal issues.

The biggest problem that I can see in this research area is that there is a total plethora of resources out there and even within one specific site that I've used frequently, there's easily 50 years of history to sift through.  What this means is that it's important to develop techniques between sites and within sites as you're looking for information.

Having said all this, my primary piece of advice is that it's fine to look towards the Internet for information and resources - but to question everything that you read and to realize that (as I mentioned in previous blog entries), a slick and professional website doesn't necessarily mean that the information is correct, valid an impartial.

Of course, this caveat applies to more conventional sources like newspapers and radio news articles.  There is always some form of bias - conscious or unconscious.

Due diligence is the key - yesterday, today and tomorrow.

Blog Traffic

Just had a hit from what I gather is probably a spider...out of curiosity, I went to the site and it apparently had tips for using embedded tags and optimization and such to increase traffic.  I think that I will bookmark this page and come back to it, it would be a very interesting exercise in how to increase traffic.  Maybe then I'd make more than the massive $0.29 that I've made so far.

Serious people, click on some ads - papa needs some revenue!!