Thursday, May 28, 2009

My Firefox Add Ons

Believe me when I say I have done a LOT of testing with Firefox addons.  After considerable experimentation this is my current stable of Firefox addons that provide such incredible functionality that I have yet to see a web browser that approaches this setup.  I'll publish a series of discussions about each of these in the future and what I find so useful about each of them but for now, here is my list:


Saturday, May 23, 2009

Firefox and the "Awesomebar"

A Little Something Awesome about Firefox 3 :: The Mozilla Blog
A Little Something Awesome about Firefox 3
Posted by Mary Colvig

April 21st, 2008 · Mozilla News, Tips & Tricks

Deb Richardson, author of the about:mozilla newsletter, wrote one of the better explanations I’ve seen on the “AwesomeBar,” Firefox 3’s revamped URL bar. It’s not the most humble of names, but if you check out Deb’s post you’ll see why it’s earned it.

In Deb’s words, here’s a quick snapshot of what makes Firefox 3’s URL bar just so awesome:

Dubbed the “AwesomeBar”, it lets you use the URL field of your browser to do a keyword search of your history and bookmarks. No longer do you have to know the domain of the page you’re looking for — the AwesomeBar will match what you’re typing (even multiple words!) against the URLs, page titles, and tags in your bookmarks and history, returning results sorted by “frecency” (an algorithm combining frequency + recency).

Thursday, April 30, 2009

Only in South Florida

Iguana problems tackled at Palm Beach County symposium -- South Florida Sun-Sentinel.com
Leapin' lizards. Literally.

More than 100 people showed up at the Palm Beach County Cooperative Extension Service building west of West Palm Beach on Tuesday to learn about everything iguana. There was information ranging from what plants are most vulnerable to an iguana palate to how to harass and euthanize them if they become a nuisance.


Saturday, April 25, 2009

Cooliris for Firefox

I love this addition to Firefox.  It is a stunningly beautiful way to browse photos and videos by category or on any web page.  This is one of my recommended Firefox add ons.

Cooliris :: Firefox Add-ons
Full-Screen, 3D -- Cooliris is simply the fastest and most stunning way to browse photos and videos from the Web or your desktop. Effortlessly scroll a "3D Wall" of your content from Facebook, Google Images, YouTube, Flickr, and hundreds more.


Wednesday, April 22, 2009

The future of browsing, at least with Firefox our favorite browser.

From "ReadWriteWeb" a glimpse into the future of web browsers.  We currently use Firefox with several add ons that give our browser customized power.  One of these is called Ubiquity and another enhances tabbed browsing.  The add ons that we find useful to us seem to be useful to others too.  The future of Firefox seems to incorporate all of them into the browser itself.  We find this article innteresting and perhaps you will too.

The Future of Firefox: No Tabs, Built-In Ubiquity - ReadWriteWeb
Thanks to its extensibility, Firefox quickly became the favorite browser for most power users. But while extensions are a great way to make Firefox more functional, Mozilla's designers are also currently thinking about a complete redesign of the way the browser looks and feels, in order to keep up with changing usage patterns. The most radical proposal we have seen so far would do away with the standard browser tabs, and replace them with an interface that looks more like iTunes than Firefox.


Sunday, April 05, 2009

Earth Trainer Tomato Growing


This is a great set of instructions for growing tomatoes  hydroponically in plastic storage containers.  The link is here.  Complete instructions including videos are available.  Just continue through the article to the bottom.  I've always had an interest in this and will probably give it a try this spring.  I used a hydroponically watered feed tray to start some Amaryllis seedlings.  They are all doing well.  One of our lilies produced big seed heads and just as an experiment we tried germinating them by using what is known as the "California Method.'  It involves floating the seeds in glass containers until they germinate.  I used some big glass casserole trays and it worked.  I would say we got about a fifty percent germination rate.  The method of growing described in this tomato article might also be a great way to continue growing those seedlings.  I am definitely going to give this a try. 

Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Nice Orchids For You..

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Plug-in Vehicles for Clean transportation

This this technology is far off in the future?  Watch a video about a family who has driven for 7 years and 70,000 miles with no gas and using only the energy generated from their solar panels.  This could have been implemented almost a decade ago and was not.  Our own house generates excess energy during the day.  We could use it to charge up a plug in vehicle.

Watch this fascinating video right here.

New things in Gmail

Gmail has served us well as a web based email client.  The developers are always coming up with new things to make it even more appealing.  Here are some new features that I really like:

YouTube previews in mail
by Stanley C and Braden K

Shows a video preview whenever you receive a YouTube link in an email. You can watch the video right inline!

Picasa previews in mail
by Dan, Stanley, Mark & Umesh

Shows photos previews whenever you receive a Picasa link in an email.

Flickr previews in mail
by Dan P

Shows photos previews whenever you receive a Flickr link in an email.

...and this one is especially nice.  It is still under development but works well.  The delay needs to be a bit longer or user configurable.  But, this is very nice.  We used to have an undo in our email at work and it saved me many times when I sent something and then had second thoughts about it.

Undo Send
by Yuzo F

Oops, hit "Send" too soon? Stop messages from being sent for a few seconds after hitting the send button.


Thursday, March 19, 2009

First Ever Whale Sedation

A right whale was sedated in order to remove entangled fishing gear.  About 90 percent of the gear was removed.  Read more.

Federal Tax Credits for Energy Efficiency

Here is a list of all the new tax credits for energy efficiency.  There are a lot of them.

Solar systems thirty percent off. Buy now.

Solar stuff that Obama will help you buy.

The new tax credits amount to thirty percent off for photovoltaic and solar water heating systems.  If only we had the money.  Well in Florida you also get $4 a watt for photovoltaic systems and $500 for solar water heaters.  So, for photovoltaic systems that is almost another thirty percent off.  Wow.  Wish the tax credit cap had been removed when we installed ours.  We would have saved a LOT.

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Mozy Backups


After years of using external hard drives and all sorts of other backup schemes for my computers I took the plunge and decided to give Mozy a try. This site is a good summary of the service. I gave up thinking I could be a reliable support service for my own computers. First I switched to using Google Mail when it first came out. I admit that much of the decision was based on the functionality I saw in their calendar and the way it integrated with email. So, we have used Gmail and Google Calendar for years now and have been extremely happy with it. I won't go into all of the reasons because this post is about Mozy. You can read the excellent review of the service at this site. I'll post more about my use of this service as time goes on. Our two computers, a Mac and a PC, are in the initial backup stage right now. That is a bit time consuming but once the first backup is completed all others are incremental so that they should take only a short time. I was satisfied with the security and privacy protections at Mozy. Thanks Nick Barardi for an excellent overview and review of Mozy.

Thursday, March 12, 2009

Energy Panel Discussion

This is an insight into what the future holds for energy management and monitoring.

Thursday, March 05, 2009

They sail on pink oil, the strangest sailing club in the world.

Sail World - Powerboat-world: Sail and sailing, cruising, boating news

I found this article to be fascinating from a sailing viewpoint and from a geographical viewpoint.  I might also add that anyone with an interest in water management would find the story about this transient lake in Australia intriguing as well.  Sailors are indeed some of the most interesting people in the world.


Wednesday, March 04, 2009

My Favorite Firefox Addons

These are the Firefox add on applications that I have installed.  Extensive testing and evaluation have demonstrated that these are most useful for every day web browsing and file manipulation. 



Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Greem Tax Credits In New Stimulus Bill

How You Can Green Your Home and Cash in on Stimulus Money | Environment | AlterNet
Hampton Falls, N.H. -- Energy-saving systems for the attic, basement, and in between have effectively gone on sale, courtesy of the United States Congress.


Thursday, February 12, 2009

The Mothership Media Center

This is the media center in the Mothership, my Iphone in Ipod mode with a Belkin FM transmitter that sends the music to the FM radio. This puts our huge library of music into a very small package with a great graphical search interface. This makes owning the Iphone worthwhile if none of the other amazing functions and applications were available. The music quality is better than the speakers we have in the Mothership. We can listen to hours and hours of our favorite music this way. A real plus is that the power consumption is extremely low.

Google Maps or Mapquest? Vote here.

Reader Poll: Google Maps or MapQuest?
Here at Lifehacker, most of us made the switch to Google Maps in its early days—back before MapQuest had added any of the AJAX map scrolling and zooming that made Google Maps stand out. Still, when it comes to getting directions, I'm always surprised when I hear people use MapQuest as a verb the same way they use Google (i.e., "I'll just MapQuest it."). So we're curious to hear which you're using for your mapping and directions needs:


LED, CFL or Incandescent? Ask Pablo

LED lights | Salon Life
A 10W CFL, available online for $6.90, has an expected median lifetime of 10,000 hours. While this is about 10 times longer than the life expectancy of an incandescent bulb, it is only one-fifth the expected life of the LED. So LEDs have the potential of cutting down on ladder time by a factor of 50 over incandescent bulbs! At about 25 cents apiece, the incandescent has by far the lowest upfront cost, which is why many people still use them. If we normalize the cost of all the bulbs over a 50,000-hour period, the incandescent bulbs cost $12.50, while CFL bulbs cost $34.50, and the LED bulb costs $59.95. But, as you may already know, the upfront cost of a bulb is by far the cheapest part. It's the electricity required to operate the bulb that adds up.

Over a period of 50,000 hours, a 40W incandescent bulb will use 2,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh). At 15 cents per kWh, this will put $300 in the pocket of your local utility, bringing the total cost of the incandescent bulb, over 50,000 hours, up to $312.50. The CFL bulb only uses 500kWh over the same time period, or $75, totaling $109.50. Finally, the LED bulb will use 350kWh for $52.50, with a total cost of $112.45. So, in this example, the LED light does cost a few dollars more but the difference is negligible. Think of the time you will save by not running to the store to buy bulbs and climbing the ladder to change them.