Home & Small Office Computer Guide

Here is a handy little Internet based mapping tool I came across the other day. It’s freebie based on Google Maps and if you ever need a map this one could prove to be invaluable. You will find it at Quikmaps

This morning we tried to order a 19 inch flat screen monitor for our store-front office - which just happens to be in a computer store.

Two suppliers had none in stock and suggested that they had no hope of getting any to supply our order because flat screen monitors were being phased out in favour of wide screen monitors.

An interesting development if true.

Well I’ve finally been able to come up for air after a long and protracted period of hard work on a number of projects for various clients.

While much of our business is handled in a home based office we also have a store-front location that’s staffed three days a week. That may sound rather unusual but it does work for us but there is one hassle and that’s keeping our files on the computer at the store in synch with the files on our computers here at home. There’s nothing worse than being at the shop and finding the file you wanted is still back on your computer.

We’ve tried a couple of options, none of which really worked for us, and we had pretty much given up on finding something that would suit our situation until today.

It seems that Microsoft have a little program in beta called FolderShare. It’s free and it’s quite a small file to download too. We’re in the process of installing it now so we’ll let you know if it works for us.

It seems that Cadbury - the chocolate people - found that they had produced too much chocolate at the end of 2005. The cause - an information technology problem.

Is there really such a thing as too much chocolate?

You can read the full story here

3D computer monitors will soon be hitting the shelves in your local store.

By combining its unique multi-view 3-D display technology with advanced computer graphics and image analysis techniques, Philips Research has developed an innovative method of creating 3-dimensional images that brings a whole new level of excitement and realism to computer gaming, video entertainment and professional imaging applications.

Demonstrations of these new techniques, which combine real-time generation and rendering of 3-D video/graphics at the consumer side with Philips’ advanced 3-D display capabilities, will be shown publicly for the first time at this year’s CeBIT Exhibition in Hannover, Germany.

Although many graphics-oriented software providers such as computer games companies already model their virtual realities in three-dimensional space, the two-dimensional images displayed on standard PC monitors fail to give users a convincing impression of depth.

Scientists at Philips Research have now overcome this problem by using the graphics output of these applications to generate nine separate views of their virtual reality, each taken from a slightly different angle.

Tests have shown that emotional stimulus is increased in anyone who is watching something in 3D.

You can read the CNet report here

If you do own one of those cameras then perhaps this CNet News article will interest you. It seems that some of the cameras have a problem with overheating and can burst into flames.

Around 680,000 of the cameras have been sold world-wide.

As Microsoft releases more beta versions of their new operating system more and more people are getting the chance to look, touch amd play and more people are finding things that they don’t like about it.

Some are even going so far as to suggest that using the latest beta release was something like being a rat caught in a maze.

If you’re interested in what appears to be a fairly lengthy read then follow the link to 20 Things You Won’t Like About Windows Vista