While this is only an alpha release, I'm very happy to see development on an Aqua version of OpenOffice.org progressing.

I have used the NeoOffice port as well as the X11 version, and while both have their quirks, I'm a very happy OOO user. The only Microsoft software on my personal 12" Apple PowerBook are ancient versions of Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player, and I intend to keep it that way.

Click here to learn more about this alpha release of OpenOffice.org for MacOS X >>

AOL Radio for MacOS X!

I have had the same AOL account for something like 12 years. I was working at Walker & Associates when I got my first computer, a Macintosh Classic. That was something like 1991. (If memory serves, I graduated from the Memphis College of Art in 1989 and it took me about a year before I was hired at Walker & Associates... My how time flies...)

With my trusty little 800 baud modem, I tested almost all of the online services of the day: CompuServe, GEnie, AOL, Prodigy. All of them sucked on the Macintosh except for AOL. The interface was very Mac-like, and had a treasure trove of software downloads and other services such as chat that really made the computer useful in a new way. 

I was disappointed at the time that my default username was whastings. I thought, how boring. But it was my first initial with my last name, and at least I didn't have a string of random numbers after it. And whastings has remained my primary IM identity while my Internet connection was upgraded over time from AOL dialup to a local ISP dialup, to cable modem broadband from TimeWarner RoadRunner but which is now ComCast in the Memphis area. 

In an effort to economize as much as I could, I let my AOL subscription lapse earlier this year. This wasn't easy for me, even though I was using broadband at home and at work -- my sentimental attachment had me paying something like $9.95 per month for their bring-your-own-connection plan. I held onto my screenname for use with AIM though I missed being able to use AOL Radio, their co-branded XM broadcast.

Then this morning, I listened to David Pogue's podcast and was reminded that AOL had gone free, as in beer! So I fired up my AOL client and was astounded. It had happened, and I can't be happier. Connect my Mac to the home stereo system, and I can have XM radio in my apartment without the extra monthly subscription or XM hardware!

Check out David Pogue's article on the NYT site >>

AOL also offers other Mac-specific software besides AOL Radio >>

Well this is interesting. The top searches for the major search engines have (almost) nothing common.

Google.com - Top Searches in 2006

1. bebo
2. myspace
3. world cup
4. metacafe
5. radioblog
6. wikipedia
7. video
8. rebelde
9. mininova
10. wiki

Yahoo - Top 10 Overall Searches

1. Britney Spears
2. WWE
3. Shakira
4. Jessica Simpson
5. Paris Hilton
6. American Idol
7. Beyonce Knowles
8. Chris Brown
9. Pamela Anderson
10. Lindsay Lohan 

Lycos Top 50 Search Terms for 2006

1. Poker
2. MySpace
3. RuneScape
4. Pamela Anderson
5. Paris Hilton
6. Pokemon
7. WWE
8. Golf
9. Spyware
10. Britney Spears

AOL Search Overall Search

1. Weather
2. Dictionary
3. Dogs
4. 'American Idol'
5. Maps
6. Cars
7. Games
8. Tattoo
9. Horoscopes
10. Lyrics
    

I also couldn't find a top search terms list for Ask.com, but the About Ask.com page has the top Ask.com searches for the week.

We're doing some exciting things at Graphics and Motion, including rolling out a new e-mail server. Read our December 2006 e-mail newsletter here >>

Blogged for future reference, this article in ComputerWorld looks interesting:
15 Things Apple Should Change in Mac OS X

This maximize button doesn't!

David Pogue blogs about how uncivil our civilization has become.

From http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2006/12/14/14pogue-email-2/  

The real shame, though, is that the kneejerk “everyone else is an idiot” tenor is poisoning the potential the Internet once had ... But instead of finding common ground, we’re finding new ways to spit on the other guy, to push them away. The Internet is making it easier to attack, not to embrace. 

A little humility and a little patience and a little giving the other person the benefit of the doubt may not be sexy or get you into the spotlight, but it will make you a better person and make life on this earth more pleasant for everyone.

I never considered the necessity of actually deleting a Yahoo account. I have created several over the years, and only use one daily and one or two others occasionally. But a friend asked today how to delete her Yahoo account, and I had to tell her I didn't think it was possible...

But it IS possible. Log into Yahoo then go here:
https://edit.yahoo.com/config/delete_user

Clicking that link won't delete your account -- you'll be asked to re-enter your password and click a confirmation button.

Now you know.

There is a minor glitch in Firefox that makes using the Mambo CMS problematic. Some people are receiving a warning when they try to copy-and-paste content from other sources into a Mambo editor. This is a bug in Firefox, but the workaround is to either use Shift-Insert instead of Control-V to paste, or to use the browser's menubar Edit --> Paste instead of the keyboard.

From Wired News today:

Windows Vista will have a major impact on the personal computing experience of millions of users worldwide during the coming years, but that doesn't mean Microsoft's latest operating system is a killer product, nor something you necessarily need or want.

I highly recommend anyone considering moving to Windows Visa read this article first.

From news.com

Before politicians go home for the year at the end of the week, the U.S. Senate may vote to generally prohibit telephone "pretexting," a stealthy and usually fraudulent investigative technique made famous by a high-profile probe of media leaks at Hewlett-Packard.

Why is pretexting not already illegal? Requesting someone else's phone (or other) records by pretending to be them, using personal information such as their social security number is theft, identity theft. And should be treated as such.

Maybe pretexting hasn't been considered illegal because it is more of an ethical issue than a crime issue, because information and not actual belongings or money are involved. But we live in an information economy, and data about me is a valuable commodity -- I don't want just anyone to be able to know what I'm doing, where I spend my money, or really anything else that I don't explicitly publish for public consumption. 

Lets all hope this legislation passes into law soon. 

If you're having trouble getting your computer to do something, always try rebooting before you do anything else. Many of my customers who have trouble with e-mail call for tech support that is solved when I tell them to try restarting their computer.

If you're still having problems, make sure you have a live Internet connection. You can't get e-mail if your cable or DSL connection is down, or if the cat chewed through your ethernet cable. Launch your Web browser of choice (Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc.) and try to visit a site you don't usually go to -- www.cnn.com or www.digg.com or www.news.com are sites I know are going to be up at any random time. If you can't get one of these to come up, chances are you don't have a live Internet connection.

This is basic stuff, but these types of issues take up the majority of phone tech support.

Danny Sullivan is has left SearchEngineWatch.com and is heading a new project at SearchEngineLand.com

You can read his farewell blog post at blog.searchenginewatch.com 

I have always used this site to test how the search engines react to content updates and other SEO tweaks. And this site redesign is just another opportunity to learn more.

I submitted this site to Google, Yahoo, and MSN on Dec. 3. MSN displayed updated content in their organic search results on Dec. 6, and Google has begun displaying updated content the morning of Dec. 7.

Manual submission pages for the big three are here:

Google
http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl

Yahoo
https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/submit

MSN
http://submitit.bcentral.com/msnsubmit.htm
http://search.msn.com.sg/docs/submit.aspx?FORM=WSDD

As a test, I installed the Joomap component and submitted the XML sitemap file to Google and Yahoo this morning. I haven't used this feature before, and will be curious to see what if any effect this has on the Google and Yahoo systems.

Joomap
Link>>

This site's XML feed as generated by Joomap:
http://www.hastingsinteractive.com/index.php?option=com_joomap&view=google

I need to spend more time reading the official search blogs from the big three, so I'm blogging these for future reference:

Google
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/

Yahoo
http://www.ysearchblog.com/

MSN
http://blogs.msdn.com/livesearch/

Patrick Haney has an interesting use for the flickr photo site: he takes screen captures of sites he likes, and has collected them into an album he calls Web Design Inspiration.

http://flickr.com/photos/splat/sets/981332/

(Thank you to Chet for passing me that one.) 

Do most MySpace pages hurt your eyes, assuming the pages don't crash your browser from all the graphics, Flash, and embedded music and videos? Do you want to participate in the community and not have a butt-ugly page to represent you?

Rejoice, because there is a better way!

Hit the Mike Industries website -- he did all the ugly CSS hacking for you!

http://www.mikeindustries.com/blog/archive/2006/04/hacking-myspace-layouts 

By default, Joomla only syndicates RSS for items assigned to the frontpage. If you want to syndicate a RSS feed for a page or section other than the frontpage, you have to use a replacement component. This is what I've been testing today (2006 Dec. 3).

At this moment, I'm using this combination of component/module to syndicate my Blog:

RD RSS (component)
RSS Feed XTD (module)

This combination is going the direction I want, I believe, because these modules together make it possible to create a number of feeds out of any content section or category. This way, one site can host multiple RSS feeds.

I'm still tinkering ;-) 

In developing this site, I chose to go out on a limb and select Cambria as the preferred font in my CSS. If you're not running Windows Vista or Office 12 -- and why would you unless you really like being out on the bleeding edge -- you can get the Vista fonts here >>

Wayne does website design and development, interactive marketing, and occasional blogging.

This site is my personal site, design portfolio, and weblog.

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