Rude Blog? Blogger is OK With That Again

One morning, I was sitting in my comfy bouncy chair, living my G Rated life.  Music playing, the dog by my side, the parrot chattering.

I open up my dashboard thingy after having made a purdy pixture for you folks to look at as well as a backstory.

There are plenty of sites that are nothing more than a picture a day or a list of them.  I look at those as well, they're great to fill up your computer for when the screensaver kicks in.  I must have close to a gig of them, who knows!

There was a nag link at the top of the page.  I rarely look at them anyway, most folks don't look at nags I suspect.  Twenty years of being trained to ignore adverts or simply blocking them in my case, and you get that way.

The link pointed me to a page that was titled "An update on the Blogger porn content policy".

I laughed.  Out loud even.

I may be noisy, but I have never posted that kind of content here.  I could.  It's legal.  At least it is at this point in history, tomorrow could change that.

The original change in policy was fielded to gauge reaction I suspect.  The reality is that "rude" is in the eye of the beholder.  There are some people who look at this blog every single day, others less frequently.  I know of one person who complains about it loudly, although never to my face.  Apparently I cut a little close to the bone in one or more comments about them.

No, I won't say who.

But.

Never anything that would even be considered a Hard Parental Guidance Rating, at least in my mind.  If it would get past the censors on the big three TV networks in the more enlightened parts of this backwards sliding country that I live in, I will post it.

Apparently I can now.  Well thanks, I can let my artistic nude flag fly I guess.  It's not for me, but it is for many people.

There are plenty of blogs out there that have restricted or adult content.  Some are simply to excite the reader, for however long it takes them to finish their visit.  Others are to educate about health or perhaps anthropological issues.  After all, teenage children would keep select copies of the National Geographic under their beds for private reading back in the day.  It was actually a plot point at the beginning of the movie Porkys II.  While seeming random, the plot of that movie is strangely parallel to the whole discussion of whether rude content should be allowed in the movie or not.


That sort of excitement is easy to find.  The educational sites are more important, and that is why the internet exists in the first place - to share information among people who are interconnected no matter how distant.

There was a great amount of noise, digital ink, and whinging done in a short period of time, and Google, Inc. have decided that the Blogger policy on Porn will not be changed.

It doesn't really effect me here, I'll continue to write the kind of things that Mrs Grundy in her small town may be interested in reading, but if you need that kind of medical or anatomical information that is hosted on a blog somewhere and somehow connected with Google and Blogger, it will be safe.

Sure, I'm vague, but I don't need that sort of information right now.  The last time I went for "medical" information it was to diagnose my brake problem on my Jeep Wrangler.

Besides, the kind of excitement that the 1950s teenager found in National Geographic is so prevalent and so easy to come by these days for free online, that you just don't need me taking pictures of body parts and slamming them up in 16 million colors with my website URL hidden semi-discretely on them.

I'll remain here, G rated, for all the world to see.

You may return to your regularly scheduled rude websites now, Google's fine with it.

Getting Your SMS Texts Back on Android After Leaving the IPhone

This is something I usually don't do.  A Reblog.

I'm doing it so I have the info later on and will have to repeat it.  Now you know why I have so many recipes on here - so I can bake and not have to go digging through the "Recipe Box of Doom"!

The backstory is that when Kevin went to The Isle Of Man, I borrowed a shiny old or "new to me" iPhone 4s for two weeks.  The reason is that iMessage on the iPhone will do what passes for an international text for free.  Google's Hangouts works that way too.  But either way you have to have two people on the same hardware.  Either Android or iPhone - but not mixed.  Both systems are proprietary, and I believe that both will not play well with each other.

Since he had the loaner, I went off my beloved Samsung Galaxy S4 for two weeks.   I came back to the S4 because I use the phone like a computer and create content on it like pictures and videos mainly for my own entertainment and use here.   The camera on that iPhone has thankfully been improved in later versions, it was too saturated and too poor and grainy in low light situations.  The software was rubbish since HDR didn't work well at all, but this is also iOS 6 when the current phones get iOS 8.

Got all that?

Anyway, here are the steps - and if you're coming here and want the original, here is the direct link.  I have no pictures here since I followed the steps and it worked first time immediately.  The steps were beyond annoying when I got to iCloud since Apple wants you to stay on their services.  Removing the phone number from iCloud required hunting around in every nook and cranny of the site in order to delete the number from wherever you find it.

Steps:

1)  Before you leave your iPhone, turn off iMessage.  This is done by going into the Settings app, selecting Message, then flicking the slider to off on iMessage.

2)  Remove yourself from iCloud.  On the Mac, there is (or was) an iCloud app that you could do this from.  Since I am normally using Linux or Windows (in that order) I had to go to the website for iCloud.  Start on the settings link (icon) and go through every single aspect, link, and sublink on there.  If you see a phone number, delete it.  It also argued with me to disable "Find My iPhone" in order to proceed with some of this.  I did and chased my tail around until complete and I was dizzy.

I'm sorry I can't be more specific.  I had to go through all of the account details manually myself.

3)  Have all your iPhone friends delete and readd your contacts.   Good luck.  As annoying as the iCloud step was, this one may simply be impossible.  Luckily for me, I had few people iMessage me during the two weeks.  If your contact used iMessage to talk to you, they will not be able to recontact you until Apple's servers all realize that you have dropped off of iMessage - that could be as much as 45 days, however with me it was instant.

4)  Ask your readded friends to "Send Message as Text Message" on their iPhone.  Yes, seriously.  They're going to wonder if they really want you as friends at this point.  Hopefully you don't lose too many as a result.

5)  Wait 45 days before using your new non iPhone on this number.  I had to ask myself whether they were serious about this one, but apparently either I was lucky or this particular bullet is old news.  It was in my case.

6)  Text "STOP" to 48369 .  That's the Apple support guy's hint.  It worked for me immediately.

After running through all of this, my S4 is working fine.  I SMS Text everywhere, I am not using iMessage anywhere. 

I have read that some people on iPhones hate green text bubbles, and SMS is green while iMessage is blue.  All I have to say to that is grow up since there are worse things to hate.

First world problems, really!

1800 Posts and All Is Well!

Yeah I looked at the blog info and noticed that I had a nice round number and thought, why not?

It's been four years, 1800 posts.  Some good, some I could have done better.

How does that sound, could have done better.  Code word for "What was I thinking?"!

At any rate, I had a four year run and only missed one day recently. I'm still a little embarrassed about that.  I looked at the site that morning very early, got up to do "other things" and got into a shiny object.   Since I try to have something on here by 10AM I simply forgot.

I'm also doing some of these in advance, some of these on the seat of my pants.  Depends on how full my head is at.

I've been told that I can write about just about anything if I have a mind to.  That came from my own training in High School.  I was hard pressed for a book report, remember those?  I went up into our attic.  Back in the 1950s would be my guess, someone had been on that Book Of The Month Club thing.  The books got collected and the box ended up in our attic.  I can't even say it was my own parents that were members of the club, the box may have been given to them.

Taking that box, I found the most obscure novel I could find.  I remember it was titled "Gestapo".  I opened the book up and saw the chapter titles.   Writing a paragraph on each chapter would be easy, I never actually read the book.

Got an A Minus on that report too.  I guess I can tell a story if I put my mind to it.

Those who return here seem to think so.  According to Google Analytics, 27 percent of the people who read this blog on a given day have been here before.   That was over the last year or so.

(Waves hands)  Hi and welcome back!

On a planet of almost 8 billion, that's not a bad percentage.

It's not a big blog, I don't have all THAT many readers, and if someone were to send me some money saying thanks... it would be the first.

Writing helps keep my mind clear, and it is something that given a topic, is easy for me.

I guess though to close this out, I'll give you that David Letterman Top Ten List for the last month only.

1. Puns and One Liner Weekend
2. Hotmail Annoyance - Turn Off Keyboard Shortcuts
3. Parking hours discussed at the Commission Meeting
4. Gold Medal Flour - Extraordinary Buttermilk Biscuits
5. The Roof is Evil, and Must Die!
6. Goodbye Lisa
7. A Parrot and a Magician on a Ship
8. Three Men Are Walking in a Desert - Humor
9. Gnome 3 in Debian Jessie Using VMWare Workstation
10. I-95 North, Deerfield Beach, Florida

Most of those are older even if it is over this month only, and surprisingly people are coming to this blog for those jokes.  I guess I shouldn't be embarrassed at posting them.  I find them in various places.   If you want to send me some, feel free.  My own rules are that I have to be able to tell them in a business meeting - no swears, no bigotry, and not too controversial.

The other thing that got me is that there are quite a few people coming to this blog directly.  They must have bookmarked the URL.  They are also using google, specifically, and searching for it.  That's a bit circuitous, but hey knock yourself out.

You will note that number 9 is very much the tech that I know that my local readers tend not to read.  It's kind of esoteric.  I use Linux every day without fail, on the desktop, along with Windows.  It's an environment that I'm as comfortable in as my Mac OSX or Windows.  As I find things, I will let  you know.

So enough of this patting myself on the back.  The dryer is beeping, and the dog is begging for more yogurt!

I'm not going away just yet... I'll be back tomorrow.  No, really, that one is already in the can.  I pushed it aside just to do this one when I noticed that it was a round number.

Online Maps Are Going To Get Better Detail

I admit it, I'm a map geek.  I guess, I'm just a geek and maps are another symptom.  I'd be that guy sitting around in a dark office with a big screen and big wide eyes, flying around surveillance cameras and satellite feeds looking at things from outer space.

I'm fascinated with things like borders.  That feeling of "Otherness" that exists because someone drew a line somewhere and said "This is mine, that is yours" always fascinated me.  Growing up in South Jersey, state borders were irrelevant except for car number tags.  TV, Radio, and Media came from Philadelphia, and "local" was Cherry Hill which was too small to ever hit the news when I was small.

The view from the 295 near the baseball fields near where I grew up.



Franklin Square in Center City Philadelphia.  You never really "went" there.  It's kind of cut off from the rest of the world in Philly but you can hover over the place.   I don't remember that fountain from when I was last there, probably in the 90s.



These days, I can endulge my inner Cartographer by playing with either Google Maps, Bing Maps, or perhaps one of the others.  One of the first things I do when I am trying to find a place is to go online, plot the address and zoom in as tight as possible.  In cities and towns in the US, I have found very few places on a street that I can't stand virtually on the ground and look at the building and spot in question.

Other places, not so much.

When you zoom in on certain areas outside of an Urban zone, the detail gets fuzzy.  After all, from a satellite, one tree pretty much looks like the next.  You can expect a minimum resolution of 15 meters or 50 feet as a default, roughly.  That means that one of the dots on your computer screen will represent an object or area of 50 feet by 50 feet or 15 meters on a side.

Roughly.

Pretty much anywhere I was thinking to look within anything as small as a small town at random had "useable" resolution.  If I wanted to see the downtown of a small midwest farm town, Stanton, Nebraska, it was easy enough to do.



In cities it can get better.   The Czech Republic can go as high as 1/10th of a meter on a side which is 3.9 inches.   That's pretty respectable resolution all things considered.   It gives you the excuse to explore Prague from the comfort of your own easy chair.  A beautiful city, well worth poking around.



The view of the Prague Castle in central Prague is the above view, and that is without dropping that little man on the street.

The thing is that these graphics are getting much better.   Barring some self-important fool having their property fuzzed out, for the most part you can see just about anywhere from the air to some detail.

Viewing street level things are a different story.  Germany recently said "nein" to street view, and I seem to remember that they turned it off in Google Earth and Maps.

On the other hand, now I'll have to dust off my older computer that I have Google Earth installed on.  There's an inherent creepiness about Google's software that I don't care for.   You have to basically tell them what you want to look at on the map.  Part of the game.  I'm just not completely sure that all that information is something I'd prefer to share with them. 

While the software and use are free, there is one thing to consider: 

You aren't the paying customer. 
If you aren't the customer, you are the product.

So if you are comfortable being a product, your map playground has just gotten a bit more interesting.   You can always do things like walk along the Quays in Port of Spain, Trinidad for no reason at all.

Now I Know Why People Store Passwords On Post-its Under The Keyboard

I have a video.  In retrospect it isn't all that much.  About a minute of my dog romping in the back yard.

I got it off the video camera, reformatted it to the correct size.  HD Video used to be a special thing, but now... even a cheap phone will do better video than we used to get back in the square box days of TV.

Not too long ago, and yeah, get off my lawn.

I grabbed a picture of my dog, and my neighbor's dog Ellie.

Both were a lead-in.  I have done this sort of thing before, professionally.   I may be a bit rusty, but editing video is something I have done since the mid 1990s both professionally and as a hobby. 

I have taken video that I have shot, as well as video created from broadcast sources, and I even made a giant Powerpoint project that I converted to video.  Yeah, you know the one that runs behind the stage to annoy, er advertise companies at a street party?  I did that.

I managed to get the short video, three transitions, four titles, a comment frame, and more, put together and in the right format for the web.

Time to log into youtube.  Oops.  Where's that password?

Wait, the washer was beeping.  It needs to go on another spin cycle anyway.

Back to ... where was I?

Postman arrived... I can ignore that for a little bit.   Let me tweak the titles again, I'm not too happy how things show up in motion.  I'm getting a blur.

Time to render the video again.  Crash.

Windows is demanding a reboot, I can postpone that.

Bring the project back up again.  I think I need to find a better piece of software to do that task, I'm running something from 2003 still.  At least it's not like writing a novel in an extinct word processor and on DOS.

Once I get this render done and uploaded, I'll look into Cinelerra and Ubuntu Studio again.  I have enough Linux machines around me that that shouldn't be a problem.

More distractions, this time the fifth recruiter in the last hour.  Sure, you're from New Jersey.  Right, and I'm living on the Moon...

Ahh, render is done, now back to that old youtube account I have... Ramblingmoose.   What was that password again? 

Fail.  No such luck.  Should have written that thing on the bottom of a Post-it and stuck it on my desk somewhere.  It's not in the emergency file either.

Oh well.   Time to drop back five and kick.   Write about the experience, curse at Google with my best might, and put up the original video of Rack licking peanut butter out of the Kong.  

*sigh*

Wow, that was only a month after I got him? Long time ago...

Weird Browser Stats

There are Lies and then there are Statistics.

I'm sure we've all heard that before.  I was going through statistics on this blog.  Not really sure why, but occasionally I do check it.  Other than realizing that people in far flung parts of the US, China, The Ukraine, and others like to look at recipes, pictures from the Florida Keys, and read cute stories about cute dogs, it does help inform me as to whether I should continue this exercise of writing something each day.

Even if it is a copy and paste exercise on the weekends.   Bad Joke Saturday and Bad Joke Sunday have to get their Bad Jokes somewhere!

All statistics are approximations, your mileage may vary...

Some of the hits are obviously false, such as those from crawlers and the like.  I've been told to ignore those, and I won't be even saying who they are here because I don't want to encourage them.

Yes, it's like the misbehaving child at the family table - ignore your bots and they'll behave.

If you do look at your statistics and see something coming from a Vampire or a Zombie site, ignore it or you'll get spiked as well.  Google Analytics is correct, Blogger is not.

But within that stat page, I also get reports on what kind of technologies that are being used to look at the blog.  

Someone is using something called "NS8" to get here.  I had to follow that one up.  I mean, it's not like it's one of my Linux readers, or someone using their iPhone or Mac to surf here, I can tell what that is.  I know that when someone surfs me with Iceweasel, they're on Debian Linux since that is what I use on my Linux Machine.  Stability, thy name is Debian.  They really should use the slogan "Debian, It Just Works!".  Even on your 10 year old computer...

Anyway...

Not having ever heard of NS8 I looked it up.   NS8 is "most likely" a copy of the old Netscape Browser version 8.   To give you an idea, that's equivalent to Firefox 1.0.   Firefox is on version 25 at this date. 

Congrats, you are using the latest version of Firefox!  is what you should see when you click on that Firefox link.

PSA - Upgrade your software when you can.   Or some blogger will be waggling a finger at you for not doing so.

I'm looking at you Windows XP People.   You're almost as bad as I was when I got my Mac - it had OSX Leopard on it, and I immediately upgraded a month later to Snow Leopard.

My Mac Peeps will know what I'm talking about.   How's your Mavericks?  Kewl?

Immediately, a month later.   Er... well they do say that Macs have no viruses and well...

Not content to just wonder about this NS8 thing, I also got a visit from someone using something called "OS;FBSV".

Er, wha?

The best I can tell is that somehow, someone, is using their iPhone in Facebook to follow through. 

Hey, it may not matter to you, but I am a curious type.

I did after all have a person surf my blog from something called "Windows NT 6.1".  Most likely someone got bored while working on a server somewhere in a noisy server room and surfed my page.

I just hope I didn't bore them or the rest of you too much with all that.

Browser Basics - Where Do I Type The Web Page?

Some of you will look at this discussion and wonder why someone would do what I'm going to describe.

I was looking at the statistics for this blog and thought I'd lend a helping hand.

Most browsers, when you start them, will put you at a search page.  Typically that is Google for Firefox and Chrome.   I think Safari drops you onto www.apple.com on the Mac.  I try hard to forget anything connected with Internet Explorer these days.

So you get a big helpful page with a box to type in your search query.  You typed in Ramblingmoose.  Hit enter.  It gives you a list of articles I wrote.  It should have the base web page at the top - http://www.ramblingmoose.com .

You used your mouse/trackpad/trackball to move the cursor to the link and clicked on it.  

If you did all that before I put this article up on the web page, you would see the picture, minus my writing and the little yellow box.

We all start somewhere, and if you aren't told how to do something basic, you will figure it out the best you can, and repeat it until someone whispers in your ear an easier way.

That would be me.

The little yellow box is where you should be typing that address, unless you really did mean to do a search.   It is called the Address Bar, generically, although I've heard other "Marketing Friendly" terms used.

In Firefox, at least, if you type in the majority of the name, it will try to "make" the most likely URL for you.   URL is the web address like www.ramblingmoose.com or some other website. 

So if you just type in ramblingmoose in the address bar, you may get here.  At least I just did when I tried it out on Firefox 25.0.1 on Windows 7 on this day in 2013...

Why is that important enough to warrant a blog posting? 

It saves you time.
About 10 percent of you do a search each day to get here.
I wanted to help.
That's why you came here.

Now I'll go back to finding Just The Right Font for this blog and annoy everyone with changes every couple minutes until I'm satisfied.  I just don't like Arial or Helvetica.  Bleah.

Dealing with Facebook Annoyances Using Adblock Plus

Audience is either Firefox Users or Chrome Users.


Facebook is the website you love to hate.

Teens are leaving it, adults can be addicted as a time sink, marketers think they can buy the world's information at a song.

You can tame the beast some. 

Lately Facebook has made some changes to the way they present information.  It's all about getting you to opt into more things - you know, to "Like" them.   That helps them build a profile about you.   Since you tend to give up that information freely, it's pretty valuable.

But lately it got to be a bit much.  Since I manage a number of websites, and a number of social media presences online, I have to be on Facebook - all day.

First thing is you really need a good ad blocker.   The reason is that those ad services may be entertaining but they are watching what you do everywhere.  You may not have a problem with it, but I do.

I went to Firefox years ago and installed an adblocker.  The latest iteration of it is called "Adblock Edge".  It will block both intrusive and non-intrusive advertising.   The distinction between that and "Adblock Plus" is that Adblock Plus has been paid by Google and perhaps others to not block their text ads.  That raises the question of what else are they not telling you.  Supposedly Adblock Plus is making the decision as to whether something is acceptable, and I'm not comfortable with that.

• Simple, get Adblock Edge instead.  Adblock Edge will allow you, once you learn how to use the thing, to block any advert as well as things like frames and those reprehensible "Fancybox" and "Lightbox" things that seem to float over a web page.

I'll let you look into that whole learning process.   It's best that you look into it yourself, but the default settings on Adblock Edge are pretty good to begin with.  The simplest explanation is that you can right click on an ad, Select "Adblock Plus: Block Image" and tailor what you see.

The next step is to import something into Adblock Edge that works with Facebook itself.   There's a big long list of things that they added that annoy me, as well as clutter their interface.  Frankly I don't have time for most of it, but a long list of that stuff can be found in this article. 

Those annoyances are the "You May Like" or the "You May Know" genre of items.  They got to the point where they were more than half of what I would see on Facebook.   So when I saw the article, I followed the simple instructions:

• First Surf this page.  It gives you a graphical representation of things you don't want to see.

• Second, select the link you want.  I selected the Block All in the first column but that may be a bit too much.  You can see the graphic and select the one you want by clicking on the green "+ add" button.

• Third, add the rules to your Adblocker.  When you click on the "+ add" button, it will pop up the Adblock dialogue box for "Add Adblock Plus Filter Subscription".  Click on the button to "Add Subscription".

You're done.  Facebook will be less cluttered - until they break that by changing things.

You can always hide those people or businesses by unfriending or unliking them, but that is a bit of a Nuclear Option.   This keeps the friends but loses the "chaff".

It just got too hectic, so thankfully Technology came to the rescue.

Your Android Is A Little Safer With Google's Changes

Ok, fair enough, Android is pretty popular.  It's 68% of the Chinese Market for whatever that's worth.  Since people tend to do what their friends like, it may just get better since that means more people writing apps for the platform.

You know, that whole social aspect of life right?   Facebook?  Blogging?  Asking that nice teenager down the block what he uses to do things on his computer, once he crawls out of Mom's Basement that is.

The problem is that Android has always been more open to viruses because the whole software experience has been less rigid.  Apple forces a developer to submit their software so it can be deeply analyzed.  Google hasn't required that yet.

What they have done is to lay out new guidelines that say basically if we don't think you're playing to the rules, we'll pull your software.  No Rude stuff, No Hate speech, no spammy apps, no illegal apps.  

I guess that Chic-Fil-A App should go...

It doesn't say that they are forcing the backyard programmer to hand over the source of their work.  That's that code review thing that Apple does on their iPhone and iPad.  But it does say that they're watching what goes up on the "Google Play Store" now. 

Who knew they weren't?

Well for you and I, the safest way to get a new app is to wait for it to be a bit older and make sure it has a lot of positive reviews.  Make sure your virus protection is up to date.  Have fun...

If you want to read their guidelines, and they read like guidelines to me instead of hard and fast rules, click on this link. They do seem to do a good job of writing things people can actually read instead of something intractable.  Some of the technical documents that I have read in the past to do my web development work have been amazingly clear even when my mind wasn't focused on the task.

Now if I could find a decent free web alarm clock, it would be easier for me to wake up at 5:59AM.  A little BBC World Service News with the Pips at the start of the hour while I prepare to step over the dog on the way to the bathroom...

A Little Simple Security Makes an Android Go Further

Android is a strange beast.  

It's produced by Google, an advertising company, so you know that has it's own pluses and minuses. 

It's widely used, and widely rejected since many people get their first experience with Android, are confused and send it back for something like their kid is using. 

It is more configurable than anything Apple produces out of the box for the most part.  My phone announces that "You've Got Post!" by Joanna Lumley whenever my Yahoo email account gets something.  Can't do that without jumping through hoops and installing special software to do that on an iPhone.

It has about the same amount of free software as you would find on an iPad or iPhone.  Plus or Minus.  Roughly.

This is just my personal experience.  I have both Android and iOS here.  I'm currently listening to a Funk and RnB channel on an Android tablet using TuneIn, and that is available on your iPhone or iPad too.  Highly recommended.  In fact I was setting up a Linux Server and wishing TuneIn was there.

It's that new software thing that can be a wrinkle.  With anything with that half eaten Apple logo on the back running iOS, you have one place to get your software, iTunes.  Your software has been analyzed and is therefore expected to be safe from snoops and trojans and viruses.   Although it isn't warranted to be so, it is a pleasant little walled garden that has few of those weeds.

On the other hand, Android is more like a Nature Preserve.  You can install software pretty much from anywhere you like with a few clicks, you can unlock the device, "root" the device to gain full and complete control like a Mad Scientist (Boo!) and generally run wild.  Think "Jailbreaking" on iOS.

I will say that when I had Jailbroke my iPhone, shortly thereafter I installed an app that grabbed hold of the phone and began to do wonderful things for me like serve out spam.  It's unlocked but no longer jailbroke.

Every one of my Android devices are rooted.  It gives me complete control and allows me to use a program called Titanium Backup to completely back every last bit of that device up to a chip.  In fact I spent last night upgrading my tablet in order to have the latest software because it was nagging me to do so.

Am I on that proverbial Tightrope without a Net?  Why hasn't my tablet become a server for Russian Marital Aids?

I am not completely sure but I do practice some very basic security measures.  Those Security Measures are basic and form my safety net.

• I have a scanner on the thing called "Lookout Security".  It will even tell me where the machine is if lost and completely lock it down if stolen.  There are others, such as Sophos Mobile Security.  Check them both out and see which one is for you.

• I only install software from the Google Play store.  Think iTunes, but it is all web based.  There's a little shopping bag icon with a couple of abstract triangles that you tap.  Once launched, there goes a half hour as I'm looking for new "toys" and shiny objects to play with.  Amazon also has its own software library.  I'm avoiding that one since there are problems with changing devices using Amazon.

• I always, let me repeat this, ALWAYS check the reviews on the app.  If there are few reviews or the reviews are all positive I skip the app.  Here is a place it is best to step back and let "the other guy" take the bullet for you by testing the software out first. 

Like I said, Basic.  You can use a tablet just like your laptop, many do.  It just takes a little forethought to make sure that you're doing so safely.  When you're through you can relax, go play, and have a bit of fun with these things and not fret.  After all, making your life easier so you can have fun is what they're all about.

Typing With Your Voice using Google Voice Typing

This would be the first time I've ever tried to write a blog posting without ever typing. This is also third time that I've ever tried use Google Voice Typing. It's all a little bit like 'Star Trek'.  Instead of sitting at a keyboard, you are staring at a small screen speaking clearly to the program, I'm sorry everyone calls them apps see that didn't work omation point delete. See it's not quite perfect yet.

That was because for about 5 minutes while I try to convince this machine to do some basic editing that I could of done with keyboard. Still, all in all, it works fairly well. It has a little bit of trouble with my accent, whatever accent it is that I have at the moment.  I have found that I can't speak in a normal fashion, I'm doing what the Voice of America used to call Special English.

For those of us who didn't have a shortwave radio, Voice of America had programming where they would speak slowly. Each word would have an audible gap between, and sentences would be spoken in discrete words, one after another. It made for a slow listening experience, but it would make for an easier learning experience for a non English speakers.

I can't say that it's perfect but it's better than nothing. I'm finding that Google Voice Typing is good for getting rough text in that I have to go backwards and re-edit.  It also works better with some programs than others. Having seen voice recognition software progress through the years as programs got better and computers got faster I could say that this would be a lot worse in your situation certainly would of been a lot worse a few years back.

It also would help if I had the documentation so I could read the manuals and figure out how to make it do simple things like a new paragraph or a blank space, you know very basic editing. I think this is basically the pig has already been taught to sing but not terribly well, like in the Robert Heinlein quote: “Never try to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and it annoys the pig.”

Or something or other like that.  Clearly the pig that has to be trained is the one trying to make it sing, in this case, me.  I will have to go into the settings and tell the program to try to learn my voice.   It should be an interesting exercise of reading nursery rhymes into it and speaking. slowly. into. the. microphone. one. word. at. a. time.

If you do have an Android device, find Settings, then click Language and Input, Voice Search, Personalized Recognition.  That promises to make it a little better at predicting your "turn of phrase".

I'm rapidly learning that I'm not going to be able to do list without hitting the keyboard here and there, and this text will have to be edited on a different machine. I never learned how to use on screen keyboard with any efficiency.  I am a touch typist and I'd strongly would prefer to use a clicky key keyboard that annoys the neighbors in the room any day to touching a dead cold glass service. If you saw some of the errors this was making you be laughing along with me.

I've been told that it's better on an iPad then it is on my Android tablet. I'm not that concerned about the comparison since I don't have an iPad, and the software will only get better as time goes on.  I was told that by an Apple fanboy (you know who you are!) that Siri on the Apple platform is pretty much hands free and you can do anything you wish simply by talking to the machine but that Android is not there yet.  Android is fairly good at what it's doing here, that is other than an occasional mistake it is able to put in text. I'll learn how to use the software better as time goes by.

After all I never did find that manual!  I guess they really haven't replaced the good old keyboard yet for some of us.  I see people hunting and pecking on their smartphones all day long, it just seems slow and a kludge for me, but then again I don't have to use that.  I can be entertained by talking at my phone and my tablet and when I make a mistake I can also watch the tablet type in a dirty word.  Remember, the first words you learn in a foreign language are typically the swear words!

Is your Android Smartphone Serving Up Steaming Spam?

Ok, if you've got an Apple iPhone, this isn't for you.  You have a product that is made within what they call a "walled garden".  Basically one company controls the hardware and the software that gets onto the phone - Apple.   If you want your software to be on the iPhone, you the developer have to submit your software to a review by Apple so that it's not going to do anything naughty.

You know, like serve up a steaming spam sandwich.

Android is a different beast.  Google isn't really reviewing the software that gets put onto your tablets or your phones as thoroughly.  As a result, there is a lot of software that is written by "some guy over a weekend".  That's great, given the right guy.

The problem is that when you have a spammer out there who has a desire to make money through criminal methods, they'll do all sorts of things.

The trick is that you really don't want to be the first person to install a program.  Sometimes, you don't want to be the 1000th person. 

There are a lot of apps on the "Google Play" store that are hacked versions of the real software.  That is how you get your virus installed.   You see two versions of an app and one says it's the full version and its Free! so you install the app.  Open it and now you're a spammer too.   If your device is a tablet computer using Wifi to get to the internet, it's a nuisance.  If you are using a smartphone and have a limited data contract, it's a very expensive nuisance.

So here are a few helpful hints:

• First, make sure that you aren't installing apps that are questionable.  
• Read the reviews for the apps.  
• If there are few reviews or there are a lot of low ratings (1 or 2 stars) don't install it.   
• Check the permissions and make sure that you're not giving away full access.  Most free apps are actually paid by flashing ads on the screen and will require internet access.
• Consider if you really do need that new game.
• Remember, you are safest if you don't install any apps, but if you do you have to take responsibility and do the research.

Furthermore, install an antivirus program and make sure it is updated frequently.  Just like on Windows, you need to make sure that your antivirus has the latest updates.   I use Lookout Security on Android because it was suggested to me by an Android Guru and I have seen reviews outside of the whole Google Play scene saying it was worth using.  Granted there are some bad reviews, but 23 to 1 in favor of the app.

You also should find where to check for your data usage.  On my phone, the T-Mobile app will do that for me, as long as I am not on Wifi Calling.  On newer operating systems such as Android 4.0 "Ice Cream Sandwich" (or ICS), it is in your Settings at the Data Usage tab.  There's a handy graph there that I miss when I go back to the phone.   It will tell you which programs are hogging up your bandwidth.   If your newest game is now your biggest data user, you have a problem there and consider removing that program via "Google Play" immediately. 

They just put out a newer version 4.1 called Jelly Bean, so now I'll have to wait for an update if one ever becomes available.   Older devices will never run it, newer ones may or may not, it depends if the company that made it will support the older hardware.

For example, I expect "TuneIn" to have high usage since I leave it running playing music all day from a few select web radio stations.  I do NOT expect Solitaire to have high data usage at all.  It basically is a judgement call, it expects you to watch what's happening and control your own data usage.

Remember that smartphone in your pocket is a computer.  It needs to be looked after from time to time, just like the desktop or laptop computer at home or work.

Time to Change Your Password

Yeah, yeah, yeah, now Bill's on that Password kick.

Today, it was LinkedIn that had their passwords compromised with a leak.  There is an announcement of that sort of thing every day.  If it isn't a website, it's someone's bank, or even something as simple as a padlock on the shed.

Yes, that last bit happened to me.  I was in the backyard opening my shed and someone was watching me over the hedge.  Very Creepy, and thankfully they have moved on.  However I was muttering the four digit code while I was setting the lock and the "individual" actually repeated it back to me.   I slipped at that point and lost the combination.  The lock is long gone.

It has been said that for safety's sake you are supposed to change your passwords monthly.   If you work on a computer, and who doesn't these days, you can be subject to that being enforced.  You walk in on the first day of the month for example, and up pops a window demanding you to change it.

Now lets look at this.  You just changed work's password.  You're reading this that I'm hosting on www.Blogger.com .  Blogger uses its own password.  It's linked into the www.Google.com suite of sites so that means I have a www.gmail.com account.  Add to that the email accounts that I have for each of the companies and charities I consult for, my professional account, the various stores like www.jcpenney.com that I shopped at just this morning to buy a sauce pan, and you see the point...

It Gets Ridiculous.

I don't know what the solution is.  If you write it down on a sticky and place it somewhere it can get lost or stolen.  I have a file that has password hints on it, but I couldn't tell you the last time I changed it.

I'm guilty too and I deal with this Security Stuff every day.

The worst case scenario is where you have company websites that insist that you use a strange code that isn't meaningful for a password.   Randomly generated.  Just pick a password by slamming your hand down on the keyboard - I just flat out don't remember those.  That particular annoyance is at an HR site run by a large company that uses SAP for their internal software.  Not only is my password random, but my username is too.  I don't even bother trying to remember.  Just click on the button that says "I Forgot" because that's useless to try to remember something like 9ea4b1c and pretend it is meaningful.

At least think about it.  I'm going to try to come up with something new since too many of my own passwords have been gravitating toward something I've been using for a while now.

Oh yes, it is a bad idea to have all your passwords be the same thing.   If you're doing that and saving that password in your browser, I personally want to congratulate you on making a huge mistake.  Go into your browser, Now, and delete all those passwords.  In Firefox Click on Tools, Options, then the Security Tab.  Click on the Saved Passwords button and then Remove All, then close.   You also should have the check box next to "Remember Passwords" and "Use a Master Password" unchecked. 

For other browsers, you're on your own.  I used Firefox almost exclusively.

The benefit of doing things this way is that you are forcing yourself to remember the passwords.  The problem with that method is that you end up gravitating toward a few passwords - like I have.

It sounds paranoid, but that's basically what "they're" telling you to do every month.  Every blasted site.  More than 100 in my case.

Well, no time like the present... I'll get back to you.

What To Do When The Website Is Down

I guess you could always fire off Solitaire, make Coffee, or talk nice to those around you, but this is a very different story.

Over the weekend I had a quest.  It started on Friday when I had gotten the call that I was wanted to come in for an interview.  The company is one that I have been targeting for a while, would be a great opportunity, and I'm looking forward to getting to see the place. 

There's only one problem.  Directions. 

I was given the company website for their maps, thanked the person who I was speaking with, and went on my merry way.

Typing in the website, I waited... nothing happened.

Realizing it could be my own laptop, or some of the security software I run here, I twiddled around with settings, used a different browser, then tried it on another computer since all were available at the touch of a mouse click.  After all, I had been to that very same website just earlier that day for a different reason and it was happily up and running.
 
Still nothing.

Oh great, another "challenge".

One thing I remembered is that there were websites that you could check to see if someone else's website was running.  So I keyed in the URL into the link on the website box for www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com and it said helpfully that "It's Not Just You" and it looked down to them.   Helpful site for this sort of thing.

It remained down all weekend.  Someone needed to "Feed the Squirrels" as we would say, and get that server back up again.

Ok, so now what?

We all have our favorite web search sites, some like www.google.com  others like www.bing.com or www.yahoo.com.  Lately I've been going to www.startpage.com since it uses Google for its searches, but doesn't have the IP Reporting thing since I don't really like being watched.

Clicking on the helpful "Images" link up top, I was able to find my map in two clicks.   I was also able to find an Org chart for the department and some other background information.  Very helpful.

Success!  The map is printed out, my directions are printed out, and I have my resume on some very nice "palm fiber" paper.   I always did like high quality paper, it's something that nobody else may notice but it makes me feel better and isn't that what it's all about when you're going to that important interview?

I'll let them know their map site is or was down when I get there.

Tweaking your Android Tablet or Phone for Speed with Cyanogen Mod

All the sudden I have ended up with an Android Phone and an Android Tablet.

I got the phone when I realized my old phone was a year past contract and beginning to fail.  Two more years with T-Mo, actually at this point around 18 months, and the phone was "Free".  So far, T-Mobile has been good to me, so I'm perfectly OK with that.

A friend in Atlanta was shopping.  Made an impulse purchase of a Nook Color e-book reader and didn't like it.  He was commiserating with me about it and I suggested he try to load up the full Android operating system.  That was a challenge that took him about three afternoons of "playing around".  Once it was over, he had the idea of "Ok, now what do I do with Yet-Another-Tablet".   It ended up on the shelf, then in a box, and now resides in my house.

The reason why he gave it to me was that he has a newer Motorola Xoom that runs much faster.  It's a much smoother experience because it's like a V8 to my little Nook's 4 Cylinders.   The Nook is fine for what I do with it, and it was a nice surprise present.

Lately I had been reading up on the thing.  Seems like the hardware you have in a Nook Color is fine if you're just reading a book.  I'm using it with the full operating system and not something pared down.  Having loaded Cyanogen Mod 7 on the thing with all the Google Apps, it was doing what everyone seemed to notice, it was a bit laggy.   You'd swipe your finger across the screen and it wasn't quite as responsive as you'd like.   It felt like someone had slowed it down and I wasn't sure why.  Start the Browser and a Weather App and it would be almost painful to use.

After poking around under the hood, I noticed that Google Search, Tune In, and a few other programs were running from earlier after having dismissed them.  So to be fair I restarted the machine and noticed that Google Search and Tune In were back. 

If you have an Android Phone or Tablet, you probably have some of these "Widgets" running on your desktops.  iPads have 1 desktop, Androids have multiple, My tablet has six as does the phone.

A Widget is basically a program that runs on the device and on the desktop that does something someone felt was useful.  In the case of Android, they all have Google Search on the desktop and because it is a Widget, It runs constantly.  I got rid of that.  Hold your finger on a Widget for a few seconds and you can move it.  You can also drag it into the trashcan that appears helpfully on the top or bottom of the screen.

Google Search App went into the trash.  It's still there in my icon list of programs, just not started. 
I did the same thing for the TuneIn Widget and the Clock. 

Sure, search is useful, but I do have a browser for that and in the Post PC Era, we're all working from the browser anyway.  That's what Steve Jobs said, and many other "experts" did as well.   I'm repeating them here, if you live in a browser it doesn't matter what kind of computer you use to get to the web, does it?  That computer can be a clunky desktop, a sleek tablet, or a versatile laptop - it simply doesn't matter.

So now instead of having all those Widgets blinking at me, I now have a bare desktop that looks like something out of the box when you start Windows or Mac OSX.  A few icons, and a little control strip at the bottom of the screen.

Oh, it runs markedly faster, and markedly cooler.   You see if you aren't using the software, you don't need it eating up your battery or your processor. 

So the Helpful Hint is, if you don't need it, don't run it.  Drag the Widget off the screen and gain back some speed.  In my case it felt like another half speed on top of what I was doing.   I say felt because I'm not really interested in doing the whole benchmarking thing.

I tried the same thing on the phone, and not everything will drag off.  T-Mobile decided that the LG MyTouch needed all sorts of T-Mobile-centric software.  On a PC we call it Crapware.  I'll be searching for a way to uninstall that stuff later.  For now, Search is gone as well as a few other pages worth of "Chaff".

Remember, Touch and Hold brings up your pop-up menu and you can drag that Widget away so it won't run constantly on your tablet.

Playing with Microsoft Surface Globe

If you want to show off, and you have a tablet computer running Windows 7, and you can connect it up to a big screen, Microsoft Surface Globe is how to do it.

I do demos of software, videos, websites, and graphics here in my house.  With my little 12 inch "convertible tablet", it's fairly easy to do.   Turn on the TV, wait for it to come on to being a TV instead of "starting up".  Then plug in the HDMI cable to the spare port on the set and my laptop and most of the time they'll just "come on".  I'll see my laptop in full screen on the TV, in this case it's 46 inches.

Without getting into the technical stuff behind the scenes, today's cheaper TV sets blow away the best of the old school boat anchor computer monitors that we used to be amazed at.  I managed to have a 21 inch thing that made the desktop bow downward and still didn't have the resolution of the laptop I have here.  Now a "consumer good" that is "off the shelf" will cost less than that old thing did and just work better.

Plus I could hang it on the wall if I didn't get static from people about wanting to do that.

(Yeah, yeah, yeah) You Know Who You Are.

But I'm getting away from this software and showing off. 

See Microsoft has been working on bringing the whole iPad and Android tablet experience to the desktop computer and laptop computer scene for quite a while, but it never really gelled.  Windows 7 on a tablet is usable, but if you have a keyboard attached, the touchscreen will leave you hamstrung.  Sure you can use a stylus to write, touch something to select it, or even have an onscreen keyboard but you're left feeling like you're talking to a "C-" student.  Ok, you can do better, now come back when you've tried again.

Surface Globe is one thing that shows the promise of the technology that they're working on. 

Instead of using your mouse on a tablet computer or the track pad on this HP Touchsmart tm2 that is truly abysmal, you can use the fingers you were born with and leave wonderful fingerprints on your laptop screen.   Hooked up to my TV set I can get fully immersed in the maps that I used to read as a kid when I was bored.  Just wash your hands first.

I'll dig deeper into that link later.  It looks like I may be able to do some upgrades...

Completely familiar gestures to the iPad user and Android Tablet folks, you can pull and stretch the map like you're kneading dough and drill down to where you want to see.  The one thing I wish it had was street view.  That's a Google Earth thing since they sent the cars around and Microsoft didn't.  

Remember, Surface Globe is a "Proof of Concept" app.  It works incredibly well, I'm a fan, but there are things that you can't do with it that other software can let you do. 

Trying to use Google Earth like you would on an iPad didn't work on the version I have on this machine.  It's older, and perhaps I should check into an upgrade, but for now, it's useful the way I use it. 

Since I'm adding links to this article for my own memory - here's the download link for Earth.  Just remember you don't need Chrome and to click on the Advanced Setup.  When there on that web page, click "off" the boxes that say allow Google to automatically upgrade since you don't want that extra spyware on your computer.

All of this has me looking forward to Windows 8.  Sure, my machine works incredibly well on Windows 7.  It has been rock solid and stable.  If there have been problems with the laptop it is from manufacture (the trackpad is terrible) and from applications that just go mental.   We've all got stories like that.

Oh and removing all that crapware like Norton and going with Microsoft Security Essentials certainly helped here. 

I'm skeptical about the whole "Metro" look and feel.  Sure, Apple would sue them if they dared to come too close to their iPad iOS interface.  Then again, Xerox was the one who invented the whole icon on computer way of doing things with a Graphical User Interface so it really is revisionist in my eyes for Apple to claim it's theirs. 

In trying not to look like the iPad, Windows treads carefully with Metro.  Things look blocky and all the pictures I've seen of Metro look like they were built in a rush.  Squares and Rectangles in rigid rows done with primary colors look primitive.   I'm all about the way things work, but they could have done a little more work with that "look and feel". 

There's so much promise in Surface that Windows 8 will be something I'll get very quickly on release.  I'm trying to figure out now how I can get the beta installed on this machine and run it beside my current Windows 7.

Until I figure all that out, I'll be flying around the world kneading my way through maps.  I'll also be looking forward to the next version and if it is compatible.

Now that I have Google Earth's latest version here, I'll have to play around with that.   Mrs Dog has been taking me around for some rather odd walks lately

Google's Privacy Changed, Worried Yet?

On March 1, today, Google unified it's policies toward privacy.

Basically, if you use any of their sites, they're going to use that information to build a "better profile" of you so they can serve ads that are better targeted to your experience.

From their side of things, it makes sense.  If you're worried about that, then stop using their sites.  All of them.

Go ahead, we'll wait.

You see they've got quite a few of them.  This blog is hosted on Blogger, and that is one of their sites.  Obviously, I'm not moving this along any time soon, so there are a few things you should be aware of.

First you're too late.  If you do searches on Google, you have a web history.  I don't that I know of since I turned mine off ages ago.  You can do that by surfing http://www.google.com/history and poking around.  Mine is empty, and I did that by clicking the box to pause web history.

Why do I say it's too late?   Think of it this way.  You have an "IP Address".  Don't switch off here, think of it as your "Internet Telephone Number".  Every time you use that desktop computer your number says "Hi, here I am, Gimme Stuff".  Web pages for example.  You surf, then the page starts to load.  If you're like 99% of us out there, you don't have much security enabled.

Second: Consider your cookies.

Most of us don't understand what a Cookie is.   Simple, it's a little file with your preferences.  Some people think it's a good idea to use a cookie to remember their passwords.   Do you shop online?  It's helpful not to have to remember your passwords and the cookie will do that.

Now, lets see, most of us will get broken into at some time in their lives.  That PC you're reading me on right now?  It's one of the most likely things to get stolen.   Your cookies will let that person get into your favorite websites and buy up a lot of crap for you... er them.  You really don't want to have cookies stick around.

Now there are two types of cookies.  One is from that web page.  You go to a website, and it saves your preferences.  Most people have ads show up on their pages.  I block that as a rule, ads are distracting, but they also give you something called a Third Party Cookie.

That is a cookie that is not from you, it's not from the website, but it is from the company that puts ads up on the screen.  That company puts ads up on many web pages, it's just the way it's done... but they can read those cookies on the second and third and fifth website that you hit and build a profile of what you're doing.

How to fix that?  Well I use Firefox.  There are ways to set it on Internet Explorer and Chrome, but I'll leave those browsers to you.   The steps are simple on Firefox:

1. Start Firefox
2. Click on Tools, Options, Privacy
3. Un-Check the box under "Tracking" that says "Tell websites I do not want to be tracked"
4. Un-Check the box that says "Remember Search and Form History"
5. Un-Check the box that says "Allow Third Party Cookies"
6. Check the box that says "Clear History when Firefox Closes"

It will be less convenient for you to use Firefox now, but it won't remember what you did basically forever.

Mind you, that internet "telephone number" thing?  You really can't stop people from saving information on their own servers that say that "you" came to their site.  It is Their Site after all, it isn't yours.  Anything you type into Their Site is basically Their Property.

All that cookie stuff?  Well it's only going to slow them down.  It's also good practice for you not to have that info stored on your PC.  Write your passwords down if you can't remember them - but don't put the web site name next to the password, it is just as bad as storing the passwords.   Stick that piece of paper somewhere nobody will look like in the "Family Bible" or inside an old VHS tape of "The Speeches of Estes Kefauver" or something like that.  Much safer.

Now if you really are concerned about having all your searches show up in a database somewhere linked to your "Internet Telephone Number", there are other things you can do.

Install an ad blocker like Adblock Plus and use it.   It speeds up your surfing too.

Make your home page a different search page that doesn't use Google.  Use that new one to search.  Suggestions are:


http://www.startingpage.com
http://www.msn.com
http://www.msnbc.com
http://www.yahoo.com
http://www.bing.com

I'm still using Google for now.  That may change, but since I use Gmail, google sites for web development, Google Analytics, and other sites I may as well.  They're going to get you one way or another but at least you know to think before you type.

After all, you really didn't mean to go to that X Rated Site did you?

Firefox 7 Upgrade - One Day Later

In a sentence, So Far So Good.

I was having considerable problems lately with Firefox 6.  When I load my morning web pages, all 170 of them, I would get into "the middle" of the list somewhere and notice that things were bogging down.   It would slow.  Then it would just "stop".

I would have a shock as I would now be looking at my desktop and a "helpful" bug reporter saying that it was time to restart my old session or just start over from scratch.   Since I would typically be looking through quite a few web pages all at once in a programmed order, of course it was time to restart.

Now granted it is only One Day Later, but so far so good.  I downloaded and upgraded Firefox 7 by going to their www.getfirefox.com link and clicked on the helpful green button.  I then launched the upgrade by clicking on the program from the download manager window within Firefox.   That is to say I clicked on it around 3 times since I got three windows starting.  Why I did that was because Firefox 6 was getting sluggish again and it was preparing to crash.  I don't have proof that it was going to crash but it "felt like it was". 

Not very scientific I know.

Having gone through my 170 pages plus other open links and a day of emails and other web silliness I can say it feels much more stable.  

Again, not scientific, but I was used to Firefox 6 crashing twice a day during that exercise.  

Firefox 6 was better than version 5 at returning memory to Windows 7.  Version 7 has returned more memory so that when I am through with my pages and I've spiraled down to the usual 20 tabs I keep open, I'm well below 1GB of memory in use.  Specifically I'm watching Firefox 7 use between 15 and 35% of the machine, 840Meg to 880Meg of memory on a Core 2 Duo.

I promise not to be so tech for my normally non-technical reader base.

Bottom line is that it seems like a solid improvement - so far.  I run a lot of Firefox extensions while the browser windows and tabs are up.  A weather watcher called Forecast Fox, an ad blocker and some others are always running.  I can't live without "AdBlock Plus" and highly recommend it, and I have to check radar before the dog walk since I go far enough away in that half hour walk that getting soaked is a regular occurrence in the Wet Season.

I am happy I did it.

Some will insist on using Internet Explorer or Chrome.   I would uninstall Internet Explorer if I could, it just feels bloated and pudgy and with every version that comes out it introduces new annoying tweaks to the way things work.   Chrome may run faster but I have questions whether it isn't phoning home to Google every time it runs.  It's like driving through a part of town you don't know with Chrome - you're always looking over your shoulder. 

If it works for you, either of them, enjoy.  For now, I'll stick with Firefox.   I am just more comfortable with it, I know what to expect and I'm enjoying the improvements.   It's free and a painless upgrade - and it may actually be "pushed" out to you users of earlier versions of Firefox.