Thunderbird, Firefox, and Backups, October 10, 2007

Continuing from excerpts taken out of my "private journals" written back in October of 2007.

On the internet side of things, I've started taking advantage of Mozy, a free online backup tool that gives you 2 gigabytes and a program that automatically backs up certain file types and folders you specify. I'm not a huge fan of adding more background running programs, since I was already running google desktop, but I couldn't think of any other way to make sure the backups are made... I think I'd just forget. I might learn Windows Scheduler if I can use that somehow, but for the moment I need to start referring friends to it so I can get the free gig per referral.

With my being given a huge external hard drive for backups by [the production], hopefully the inevitable hard drive crash won't be nearly as overwhelming now, although there is a lot more data at stake the next time it happens.

On a related note, I researched remote desktop utilities on the hope that should I forget stuff at home, I can always connect to my home computer and look it up. Unfortunately for the moment I wasn't able to find a full featured freeware option that was also secure enough right out of the (digital) box. I'll have to shelf this idea for the moment until I can find the time to devote to it.

For Firefox, as with the others, it was all about tweaking the most performance out of it, uncluttering the desktop as much as possible, and using extensions that take those extra windows and mouseclicks down. I was also able to find a program that made backups of my extensions and tweaks, as by this point I'd made so many changes to the program that I wouldn't remember how to restore it in case I have to start over.

One extension [Searchwords] involved adding keyboard shortcuts as substitutes for using the search window. Now I can just install a search engine, give it a code letter like "g" for google or "y" for youtube, and just type "y jurassic park" into the address bar and it searches youtube for jurassic park clips. This took down the number of input bars on Firefox from 3 to 1, and gave it so much more room.

Online wise, I've started using iGoogle, which is a customizable home page portal where I was able to get notifications and previews of my email and yahoo mail, weather, and other gadgets like dontbreakthechain and a calendar.

(editor's note: Dontbreakthechain is the web application I used to keep track of my exercises and other daily routines, like making my bed)

Most importantly, though I was also about to put an RSS reader into the igoogle page, namely Google Reader. Now I'm able to keep up to date on all my favorite blogs in one place, saving me having to do a lot of typing and clicking. I'm excited whenever I get to bookmark yet another interesting blog, knowing that I'll never forget to check it in the future.

Thunderbird went through the same treatment of extensions and consolidation and purging of unnecessary buttons. Most importantly, though, I finally went super nuts on putting everything into categorized folders. I'd done this to my laptop back when I was in Jersey but importing the organization into my desktop did not handle very well. I still need to reinstitute all the filters I had to put them all in the right folders, along with probably having to create folders for the "Sent" folder as well.

Finally, I've started using Autohotkey, a batch process program to let me open and close multiple programs in one doubleclick. Eventually I'd like to learn to write batch programs myself, but for now this is an excellent choice.

The preceeding wasn't changed much from the original entry back in October, other than adding links to the respective applications. As such, many of these tweaks have become obsolete (upgraded or removed altogether).

Don't fret though, cause I plan on catching up real soon. I just wanted to really let you in on the process by which I got to my present configuration.

Google Desktop and Trillian, October 4, 2007

This was the second entry taken from my "private journals" back in October of 2007 when I began my earnest optimization effort.

Last entry I spoke about finding a desktop theme that among other things, matched the satin black look of Google Desktop search's sidebar and gadgets. Now I'll go into Google Desktop search.

Most of my cravings had come from Lifehacker, which I'd become addicted to of late (I still need to read the archives and check out the other software tweaks I've been missing)

First I tried using a program called Launchy that was supposed to streamline launching apps and folders by having me type in a shortcut of the program name. But it didn't index files nearly fast enough, and I couldn't find a suitable skin for it (this was even before I got desktop themed out). Then I saw Rainlendar, a calendar app, that looked promising, and for a while I had both of them running.

Then it turned out Google Desktop search could do all of these things, and have a more unified look. I never used it before because it seemed like a huge tax on computer resources, but with most of the hard processing work being done here at TO, most of the stuff I do at home has been just moderate. Immediately I fell in love with the little gadgets it offered, and eventually rearranged the entire 2nd monitor to maximize information (currently a big clock, a run program launcher, weather, calendar, and a scratch pad for notes).

Desktop search itself hasn't been that revolutionary for me yet, but I don't think it's done indexing. I'll give it a few more days and see if it does indeed make it easier for me to find stuff I want, but I've heard its database can grow to be gigantic, and if it becomes an impediment, then I might jettison it and keep my gadgets.

Finally, I switched over from AIM finally to Trillian, which I'd tried before but found to be TOO full featured to be worth replacing AIM with, but since I'd been using deadaim for logging, I couldn't skin it, due to DeadAIM not being compatible with the newer AIM versions that supported skinning (the newer versions of AIM also look awful and slow).

Skinning was important because with all the black in my screen now, the huge white buddy list window stuck out like a sore thumb. The new versions of Trillian are great because they offered skinning (and I found a good black skin) as well as a more full-featured logger. I'll have to get used to not being able to immediately search logs from the past few years via DeadAIM, but otherwise it looks like I'll be sticking to Trillian Pro (Trillian Basic was pretty crappy, so I went with a cracked version of Pro).

Next I'll get into backups, remote access (which I haven't set up yet), and Firefox and Thunderbird.

From the beginning, October 3, 2007

The following was written in my "private journals" to keep track of the earliest parts of my progress.

My desktop is almost indistinguishable from its former self just a few days ago. First and most noticeable change is using Windowblinds to use custom desktop themes. Clearly I want something sleek, and takes up just as much if not less of a footprint as the stock XP Silver theme. But it was still a lot of switching back and forth from bright and dark themes. Dark looks so much cooler, but there are parts of XP that are just inevitably bright (most backgrounds of windows), where the contrast from the dark borders to the bright backgrounds takes your view away from the most important thing, the data. Meanwhile, bright can be both obnoxious and bland at the same time, and runs the awful risk of making my PC look like a Mac (you know, equal but separate).

I settled on a theme that was dark and glossy but had a nice gray base that made the transition from bright to dark more manageable.


Part of the reason I went with the dark look was also because I've started using Google Desktop search and its gadgets, and its default layout is a really sexy shiny, satiny translucent black. I'd tried to use the skins found online for Google Desktop Search, but it wouldn't work, so I went with the black theme, not risking having opposite schemes cancelling each others' coolness out.

Tomorrow's entry will be about the aforementioned selling my not just web-based soul to google.

My Partner and I

Before moving along, I wanted to create a more distinct profile of both myself and my computer, so as to better inform you reader about where I'm coming from, what types of enhancements I'll probably be looking at more than others, and how far I can go.

My PC configuration (in a nutshell):

• AMD Athlon 64 3000+ 2.0ghz (single core, circa 2004)
• Some compatible motherboard I can't be bothered to remember right now.
• 2 gb of DDR SDRAM
• ATI All-in-Wonder Radeon 9600 128mb RAM, AGP 8x (circa 2004 as well)
• ATI Rage 128 32mb RAM (to power 3rd display)
• SoundBlaster Live! Value sound card (circa... 2001??)
• LiteOn DVD+-RW 8x burner (won't eject sans paperclip, otherwise works perfect)
• Generic 5.1 speaker system (that isn't running true 5.1, re: sound card)
• primary display 24in widescreen LCD from Acer, 1920x1200
• secondary display 17in LCD from NEC, 1280x1024
• tertiary display, 15in Wacom Cintiq LCD drawing tablet(bought used for 700 bucks cash!), aka the gift that keeps on giving.
• Labtec wireless keyboard and mouse.

As you can see, this is a very middle of the road hardware configuration (with the exception of the 3 displays, one of which is a high-end though aging LCD drawing tablet). The last time I invested in earnest on my PC was before college in 2002, when I built my very first rig. Since then I've just swapped aging components out with newer (but not bleeding edge) ones, and it's managed to chug along nicely.

I've contemplated other major upgrades recently, but since doing so would require replacing everything but the hard drives, monitors, sound and optical drive, I'm going to table that for at least a while longer. I'm more seriously considering getting an iMac for video editing and productivity as well as a dedicated next-gen console for gaming. I've been on a PC for so long that it's bittersweet if/when I leave it. I know I certainly wouldn't have as much fun customizing such a setup as I do now, but perhaps I'm getting too old anyway (maybe I should just start learning to fix up my car).

Anyway, back to it. The following are the more important current software running on my machine. Some of these are very recent additions and I hope to go back in the future to recount how I came upon using them.

• Windows XP Service Pack 2 (really awaiting SP3)
• Firefox 2.x (come on 3.0 and no memory leaks!) and Thunderbird with Lightning
• Winamp 5.3
• OpenOffice 2.2
• Most Adobe Products (AfterEffects, Premiere, Photoshop)
• Flash 8
• Miranda IM for instant messaging
• uTorrent
• Autohotkey (my savior!)

As for myself, I am 24 minus 4 weeks, living in Los Angeles as a freelance animator/motion/graphics designer. I used to be a hardcore gamer when I was younger, and most recently purchased Valve's Orange Box (and will continue to be a Valve fanboy for the foreseeable future). In fact, I bought my ATI radeon in order to play Half Life 2, and it came with a coupon for a free version of said game. Nowadays I prefer to play older games that I know will run rock solid on my computer (Warcraft 3?), but I must ackowledge that most of my computer knowledge I learned along the way has been related to gaming, until just now, when apparently I'm just tweaking my computer for its own sake.

Given how my PC's certainly no spring chicken (and probably hasn't been for a good while), doing these tweaks probably add a bit more life to the machine (I don't have a name for it, as dear as it is to me, unfortunately, and it's probably inappropriate to name it during its middle age).

Anyway, now you know where I'm coming from, so we can move forward together.

Welcome to Greasy PC - Sliding Through the Future

I have to admit, this blog came to me three months late. Some extra free time in October of 2007 as well as newfound inspiration from blogs like LifeHacker (to which I've since come to pledge undying allegiance), brought me to start, plainly, improving all aspects of my life simply but purposefully.

At the time, this was all-inclusive, involving a daily routine of exercises, increased nutrition awareness, tidyness, and most of all, optimizing my computer and computer-related activities. I'd justified the final bit by claiming that putting so much work into organizing my PC would pay off in my work (as an animator/designer) by taking as much of the minutiae of extra clicks, long startups, etc. out of the equation as possible, giving me, if not more time to work on my various projects, at least more sanity and levity with which to tackle them with more enthusiasm. I did, after all, have a mean streak of getting distracted easily from work by anything that wasn't. At any given moment, that would be the internet, video games, TV, or even cleaning my room. You know what I mean.

In retrospect it turned out my passion for streamlining my computing experience was just yet another form of distraction, one that's probably become further fueled by all of the extra time I might've gained like those snakes eating their tails.

That being said, I've come so far from just three months ago to now, as far as what I can now accomplish with my computer, that I find myself compelled to make some sort of public record of it. This blog will stand as both a thank you to all of the blogs from which I got the ideas of what to do with my computer at all, as well as paying it forward (blech) for the people who might be curious about seeing how far they can take their computer pratically as well.

I'll do my best to start back from October to the present as fast as possible, and then keep a current record of any other enhancements and tweaks I've implemented. Different from other blogs that feature such tweaks, I hope to be able to come back weeks afterward to talk about whether I've decided to keep said feature, whether I've found something new, or it turned out I didn't have a real need for it after all.

Please stick around!

Arvin

p.s. - I was able to stick to the exercise and nutrition routine for over two months straight. Basically up until I went back to my hometown for winter break. I'm still trying to decide what of that routine to reinstate in the new year.