BitTorrent Sites Compared

Can't decide which BitTorrent Sites to use? Here's something that you can use to help you. This website looks at 10 BT sites and compares them in terms of various criteria, including number of torrents indexed and site feature.

Virtual Cassette Generator

The cassette is already a dead, if not almost dead, format. In fact, I've bought quite a number of cassettes as a teenager, and I can't play them now. So unless those tapes were reissued on a disc or as a digital music file, those music are really lost to me. As a tribute to the cassette, here's a website that you can use to generate your own cassette, complete with the labels and band name.

Lego Macintosh

Here's another LEGO creation. This time, it's a Mac made out of about 500 blocks. It is a fully functional Mac web server. Nice.

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Transform WinXP to look like Vista

Can't wait to have Vista? The Vista Transformation Pack is here to help you. Now at version 5.5, this pack and make your existing XP system look like Microsoft's upcoming system.
Link

Images from Singapore Biennale '06

Recently, I went to take a look at the exhibits on display as part of the Singapore Biennale. Some of the art works were awe-inspiring, while others were rather "blah". Anyway, I've only seen those at the National Museum and at some of the religious places. Those from the latter category were rahter disappointing. I've included picts that I've taken so far. Hope that the other works at places like City Hall and Tanglin Camp are more interesting. Click on the pictures above for the full photos.

The Great Flickr Tools Collection

Flickr is fun. That's why I signed up for a Pro Flickr account. Anyway, here's a list of great Flickr tools. Plenty of useful, fun, and interesting tools for use with Flickr.
Link

IKEA toilet graffiti

IKEA toilet graffiti
Originally uploaded by Gremlink.

Somebody certainly loves IKEA, even in the loo. Here's a wall drawing that I found in one of the toilet cubes.

Timbuk2 ipod case

Timbuk2 ipod case
Originally uploaded by Gremlink.

OK, this is another item that I got for my birthday. It's a Timbuk2 iPod case that I can attach to the strap of my Timbuk2 bags. Pretty useful. I use t mostly for my Treo rather than an iPod, mostly.

iTunes Gift card

iTunes Gift card
Originally uploaded by Gremlink.

I finally got myself an iTunes account. With the help of an iTunes Music Card courtesy of my colleagues who bought it for my birthday. With it, I can finally download those free weekly music track. I'm not too keen on buying DRMed music though. But hey, now that the iPod supports gaming, I've bought an iPod game (called Vortex) with it.

Pile of rodents

Pile of rodents
Originally uploaded by Gremlink.

A lot of soft toy rats found in IKEA. No, it's not really cuddly, seriously.

Upload to Flickr with Java-based juploadr

Looking for an easy way to upload pictures to Flickr? Here's a Java app that you can try. Since it's Java, it's cross-platform and you can use it on Mac and Windows-based machines. It's also open-source, so it's free.
Link

Sizeasy: A size comparison website

When shopping online, it can be difficult to get a good feel of the size of items when all you have are the dimensions. In comes Sizeasy, which is a site where you can input the dimensions, and it'll let you compare that size with items like playing cards and even a wine bottle. At least now you'll be able to get a better sense of that item you're buying. Pretty neat.

The Best-ever Freeware Utilities List

Free, free, free. You just don't have to spend loads on software if you know where to look. Here's another list of freeware and puts the best freeware in categories. Great resource if you're looking for some freeware to beef up your PC.

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15 ways to get more out of Pandora

Pandora is a great way to discover new music. That's why Lifehacker has come up with 15 ways for you to get more out of using Pandora. Some of the tips include ways to tweak Pandora and also to make use of Pandora's RSS feature. Neato.

Paris in pictures

Paris is a beautiful city. It's a place that I'll certainly go again if I have the opportunity. Here're some snapshots of the city:The Sacre Coeur church found on a hilltop in the Montmarte area.Antique furniture found in the St Ouen market.Assumption Day in Paris. That was the day that we intended to go shopping, but found out that it was actually a public holiday. A change of plans brought us to the Cite area and we saw a procession celebrating Assumption Day, which Catholics celebrate to commemorate the the day that Mary was received into Heaven.The procession ended in Notre Dame. It was certainly interesting to witness a mass happening in Notre Dame with all the ceremony and majestic organ music.The Saint Germaine church.A visit to Paris is not complete with a visit to the Lourve. Here, we saw the Mona Lisa (had to squeeze with the crowd to get a good look at this painting) and the Venus de Milo statue.

The source of Champagne

France is wine country. And of course, the sparkling wine that is known all over the world as Champagne comes from the grapes grown in this region. During my holiday, I visited two famous champagne makers, Piper Heidsieck and Moet & Chandon, both in the Champagne region.
This is the inside of the Moet & Chandon cellar. You can see all the bottles of Champagne stacked neatly on racks and waiting for the day that they will be introduced to the world as the "Drink of Kings".A visit to Moet & Chandon comes with tasting of the champagne. Delightful!In the Champagne region is also the famous catheral in Reims. This is where the French kings are crowned. The magnificant gothic-style church looks amazing and it's hard to imagine that the building was actually badly damaged during the bombings of World War II.

Home-made Paris guide book

Guide France 26,27
Originally uploaded by Jan and Roly.

I just saw this on Flickr. Someone known as "Jan and Roly" has made a guide book with maps and details of walks that he'll be embarking on. It's beautifully drawn and looks amazing. You can see the full photoset here.

Cory Doctorow on how copyright broke

There's certainly something wrong with the way copyright laws work in today's age of electronic reproduction. Sci-fi writer Cory Doctorow has written an interesting commentary titled "How Copyright Broke" examining the problems with today's copyright laws.

The idea that copyright confers the exclusive right to control copying, performance, adaptation, and general use of a creative work is a polite fiction that has been mostly harmless throughout its brief history, but which has been laid bare by the Internet, and the disjoint is showing.

Time for copywrong?

Timbuk2 Blogger bag

For my birthday, my wife bought me this wonderful Timbuk2 Blogger bag. It's a laptop bag for the blogging generation. For a long time, I've wanted a bag for my notebook but I've not found a bag that I like. So for the most part, I've used a sleeve and dump the notebook into my Crumpler.

But ever since I've found Timbuk2, I've grown to like it and would really want to get one of these hardy and versatile bag. When I saw the Blogger, I knew that I needed to give it a try. Since it's a vertical bag, I need to get used to the different orientation of the bag. Still, it's a change from most bags, which are carried horizontally.

The laptop compartment inside this bag is spacious. In fact, with my 12" Powerbook in the compartment, there's still plenty of space left. Maybe with a 15", the fitting will be better. When my company issues me with a 13" Fujitsu, I'll be able to try if the fit is better. Fitting aside, the compartment is padded and covered with corduroy material. No worries that your laptop will get any scratches. There's also a small MP3 compartment on the inside of the bag, again, it is lined with corduroy material to protect your music player.

Another good thing about this bag is the number of slots for you to place your stuff. There are slots for pen, phone, card, and even an attachment for your keys. Only thing missing is a place for a water bottle, but I suppose that can be placed in the bag itself (provided there's no spillage).

I'm looking forward to use this great looking bag. In fact, my obsession with Timbuk2 has led me to place an order for a standard medium size messenger bag from them. I'll post up pictures when I get my bag.

Check out a photoset of this bag on my Flickr account.

Plush seats

Seats in the Parliment chamber are plush and comfy.

Dials

Was at the Old Parliment house. Had a chance to sit on the seats where the MPs sat. On the armrest, you can see dials where the MPs can hear speeches in the language of their choice.

Apple Boot Camp resource

Dual booting Windows and the Mac OS... now that Apple has made that possible with Intel Macs and the software called Boot Camp, folks can now run Windows on their Mac. It's not easy, but this site called Dual Boot Guru.com is here to help you. There are plenty of useful info and tutorials, including how to slipstream Windows, for those who need help to get Windows up and running. Essential.

Grab YouTube vids for your iPod

YouTube is certainly the place if you want to view interesting videos. However, getting the videos to your iPod can be a hassle. Now there're some tools you can use to quickly grab those videos and put them on your iPod for viewing on the go. For Mac, there's PodTube and if you're in the Windows camp, try iTube. They're both freeware.

iPod losing its cool?

The iPod is losing it. According to a piece in UK's Guardian, there are signs that the popular iPod is losing its cool status and could go the way of the Sony Walkman.

Industry-watchers warn that the iPod could soon be regarded by teenage cynics as their 'parents' player' because a mass-market product rarely equates with edgy fashionability. Although it has sold nearly 60 million actual iPods and a billion downloaded songs worldwide, cracks have begun to appear in the edifice. The Zandl Group, a New York-based trends forecaster which regularly interviews a panel of 3,000 consumers aged 25-35, recently picked up its first significant criticisms. 'The iPod is far and away the most popular tech gadget with our panellists - however, for the first time we are hearing negative feedback about the iPod from some panellists,' said the organisation's spokeswoman, Carla Avruch.

Well, just hope that Apple keeps innovating. That's the only way.

Blogmusik: Listen to Music Online in a Virtual iPod

Don't have an iPod? Check out this beautiful Flash based application which allows you to search for your favorite's song and listen to the music online, just like a real iPod. You can navigate through the sound tracks in the simple, iPod (but Creative patented) navigation. The only question is when the RIAA and other copyright folks will force this off the web.

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Connecting a 40GB HDD to a Nintendo DS

Seems like all the Nintendo handheld systems are great props for hackers. The GBA had plenty of hacks, and now, there are a number of NDS hacks floating around. One of the more interesting ones is this, where NDS hacker Natrium42 succeeded in connecting a 40GB IDE hard-drive to a Nintendo DS. He shows you how to do it step by step on his blog. Only downside is that with this hack, you probably can't put your NDS in your pockets.

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Home of French royalty

Versailles is outside Paris and is the residence of the least few French kings. It's a beautiful palace with a beautiful garden. Too bad they day I was there, it rained and the wife and me were drenched trying to walk around the gardens.At one corner of the huge, huge garden is a place called the Queen's Hamlet. This was built by the last queen of France, Marie Antoninette. It's a reconstruction of a quaint French village, complete with a mill and even a farm.Well, since the real Rose of Versailles aka Marie Antoninette, is not around, at least there are a few roses around for me to capture on film.

Monuments in Paris, France

Who is the most famous female in French history? Has to be Joan of Arc. You can practically see statues of her everywhere in France, from churches, to monuments, to postcards, to mugs. The above is a picture of a statue of the gutsy girl from Orleans who fought against the English... and won.Paris is a city of monuments. There are tons and tons of monuments (I bet the amount of rocks used to build these also weigh tons) scattered everywhere in the city. This is the famous Arc de Triomphe, built by Napolean I. I've seen this Arc in pictures, but nothing prepared me when I saw it in person. I was really imposing and impressive. Since my hotel is near the Arc, seeing it on the first day when I arrived in Paris sort of reminded me that... wow, I'm indeed in Paris!The Eiffel Tower is the symbol of Paris. A tower of steel, you either love it or hate it. Well, plenty of folks certainly love it as the queue to go up the tower is looooong. Because of the queue, I gave climbing the tower a pass. Maybe next time.

GSpot for codec info

Although named after some illusive location, GSpot the software is actually a Codec Information Appliance. What it means is that it will look at your media file, and then try to tell you how your file is encoded and what codec you will need to play it. Really nifty for media files junkies.

Delete apps with KillBox

This is a handy tool if one day, you find that you can't get rid of a virus, spyware, or any other files that you just can't delete because the file is running. With KillBox, the software will attempt to kill the process before deleting the file. Of course, use it at your own risk.

Putting Dashboard widgets on the desktop

Dashboard widgets are really useful. But the idea of having to hit the F12 key everytime to use those nifty widgets can be a drag. Lifehacker has provided a tip that will let you put your widgets on your Mac desktop. It involves typing a Terminal command, then dragging it to the desktop.

Catacombs in Paris

Catacombs in Paris
Originally uploaded by Gremlink.

Paris is a romantic and beautiful city. But there is actually an underground Paris that people seldom see. It is literally an underground area called the Catacombs. In it are the bones of millions of Parisians who were buried in this city. Since the cemetaries were running out of spaces, bones were dug up and placed in the catacombs. The skulls and bones are neatly stacked and going through the catacombs is a chilling and memorable experience. Just looking at the sockets of the skulls starring back at you gives you the chills, but also gives you a sense of history.

Holiday in France: Mont St-Michel

I recently got back from a long holiday. It was a great experience visiting many places in France and England. In France, the main stop was Paris, with a few day trips out and around. Perhaps one of the most impressive place I visited was the Mont St-Michel. You can see the picture above.
From a distance, you can actually see it standing above the plains. Basically, it is a cathedral built on a piece of rock and before they built a causeway, you can only get there when the tide was low. It was also a place of pilgrimage when the monks still stayed there. Now, it is a tourist haunt, but still a beautiful, haunting, and impressive place.