Article: Use RSS To Avoid Reckless Web Surfing

This is from the latest Tux Magazine,

“Most of us like spending some time studying the Internet for our daily dose of information. Yet easy access to information becomes a slippery slope, consuming time and efficiency. Internet browsers enable reckless web exploring and can be addictive time killers. Ten years ago, this was hardly a concern. Everyone read newspapers conveniently organized into sections of interest. So, paper kept the allure of information surfing minimized.

Today, using the Firefox browser to inject your brain with a daily dose of news is often fatal to productivity. You read a story with two embedded links and unwittingly find you have visited five more stories before you’re aware of the time!”

The article goes on to talk about RSS as being the cure to this problem. I suffer badly from this. Distractions! I go online to do a certain task then I check my email. Big mistake. I visit a few web pages and I might find something interesting to blog about then read some more emails and visit any interesting links I find there and before I know it several hours have gone by and I still haven’t done the original thing I set out to do 🙂

The article also explains to people how to use a news aggregator.

I will have to try using Liferea news aggregator more and see if this does help fix the problem…. ha ha somehow I don’t think so.

Anyway this was a good article. If you know any Linux newbies who don’t read it I’d encourage them to start also I’ve got back copies on CD, which I was giving away at Software Freedom Day, if anyone would like one.

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Unusual Evolution (Email) Happenings

I’m running Ubuntu Dapper on my laptop. I copied the .evolution directory from my desktop machine (Ubuntu Hoary) to the laptop a few weeks ago. Everything was fine when I did it. I don’t know if this is causing these problems now though.

It started with some emails with embedded graphics, when I open them they are instantly at the bottom of the email and I have to scroll back up to read the message or see the graphics however it won’t allow me to scroll up it just keeps jumping back to the bottom of the message. I went into the preferences and removed the tick from ‘show image animations’. That seemed to stop the problem but I’m not sure why, it was a shot in the dark. Now, however, the messages still start at the bottom and some are scrolled as far as possible horizontally to the right. I can scroll back up but it’s a real pain that all these messages start at the bottom. Evolution is also crashing at random times too. Emails with attached graphics are okay.

I’ve sent this query to the LinuxChix, NewChix email mailing list to see if anyone can shed some light on this problem.

I’ll post the answers here. I like posting the tech problems I have and the results then if I need to I can refer back to them easily.

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Happy Birthday Dad

I took my Dad a birthday present today, though he said he wasn’t really celebrating his birthday this year. I got him a potted ranunculus but I think I came home with more than I took 🙂 I got a bag of lemons, several bags of sawdust for my chook, tips on how to improve the soil in my veggie garden and a Jackie French book to borrow. Wow!

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Materialism

Our society is becoming so money oriented it’s almost as if you can’t do anything without it. You can HAVE if you can pay. You can LEARN if you can pay. You can EAT if you can pay. You can WATCH TV if you can pay (see previous post). Are we doing anything to change this or are we adding to it? If we are artists, musicians, teachers, computer programmers or developers are we charging too much for our art, music, lessons or software? Are we providing free content to our communities? As I’ve said before, “What are we sharing?”

The South Australian government’s current budget may mean that school music and swimming lessons may no longer be subsidised by the government. Parents will have to pay the full amount for their children to have these lessons. Music and swimming may only be available to those who can afford them. Will we loose our future musicians and swimming stars? What if Ian Thorpe’s parents couldn’t afford swimming lessons for him? And the same for parents of musicians and singers?

If you can help at a school or community centre, do it! If you can provide free or low cost programs to schools maybe during school time or in an after school program then the schools can put money into areas which are lacking in funding. Are we helping to fix this or are we part of the problem?

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savemysport.com.au

I’m not a big sport watcher but I do love tennis and I usually only get to watch it on TV. More and more sport is going to pay tv. Free TV Australia have launched the Save My Sport campaign and are urging people to contact their local member of parliament to let them know that they don’t want to have to pay to watch their favourite sport on TV.

Should sport on TV only be available to those who want and can afford pay TV? I don’t want Pay TV but I still want to be able to watch live sport of TV. Is this going to be another case of the haves and the have nots?

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The Amazing Race – The Grand Finale

You travel now to another mystery destination. Use the following clues to determine the destination.

Indigenous people were the first people to live there and still live there today.
It is approximately 78 kilometres from your current location and is approximately 26 metres above sea level. You may not find this answer in Google but it is worth a try if you can’t guess it.

Check with the Race Judge that you have the correct destination. When you have the correct destination you will be given a travel pass to continue in the Race. Your transport will leave at 1:15pm CST. (All transport so far has been virtual, this transport is physical/actual)

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Please write your answers neatly on another piece of paper.

This is a place where people go to find out information about Murray Bridge and the surrounding areas. Go there to receive information to answer the next questions. Give your name at the counter and you will be given some brochures. If the answers aren’t in the brochures you’ll need to use other means to find them.

When was the Local Government Centre opened at this location?

Which building in the main street was originally the Lyric theatre?

In the park near the traffic lights what war is the cannon from?

Get a catalogue from a washing machine retailer with a two word name.

Where do people receive income support payments (pensions etc) from? Get a brochure of theirs to bring with you.

What was the Arcade (burnt down in 2002) in Bridge St called?

In Bridge St there is an employment agency which starts with W, what number Bridge St is their building?

Go to the Town Hall. The foundation stone was first laid by whom?

This next place used to be a fodder store and real estate agency. Its now used for- recycling second hand items, raising money, helping. It is near a place where returned soldiers go for sport and relaxation. It is on the ‘South’ side of Bridge Street. It’s current occupants have been there for nearly four years.

Both contestants answered all the questions and provided the same amount of extra information. Their questions were equally neat and well written. The decider came down to a quiz of questions from throughout the race. Douglas won the quiz and the whole Amazing Race.