Technology Bytes

Whether in the form of People, Camps, Casts, or Cast-ready devices, pods have entered out geek vernacular in a big way over the last two years. If you’re all about all things pod, you might want to consider heading out Peter’s way to attend Podcamp San Antonio on May 19th. This free event is an unconference where everyone is the speaker as well as the audience. Podcasters will get together with bloggers, vloggers, and new media folk who are all interested in getting their message out. Hit podcampsanantonio.com to register as either a presenter or registrant. And if you’re without a place to stay in San Antopnio, hit up Peter soon, as his San Antonio house is sure to fill up fast.

This weekend is also the last weekend of iFest. If the weather holds, the Houston International Festival might be the one day you go out into the big blue room. Taking place both Saturday and Sunday in downtown Houston, this year’s celebration centers around China. No word as of yet as to whether or not the WiFi routers serving the area will be filtering content. For more info you can hit www.ifest.org.

This next one is a little bit in the future, but I think that it warrants a mention. Our own Dwight Silverman will be speaking at next Month’s Houston Area Apple Users Group about his own experience making the move from his windows centric worldview to the adult onset apple syndrome that he is now fully in the throes of. That takes place at the Rice University Media Center on Saturday, May 19th. I’ll have more information for you as the date approaches, but if you absolutely can’t wait, you can hit www.haaug.org.

And getting back to this weekend, if you’d rather spend your Saturday indoors with a group of linux geeks, you’re in luck. The Houston Linux Users Group will be meeting this Saturday from two to four in the afternoon at the HAL-PC Headquarters. Hit www.hlug.org for details and directions.

And to end on a slightly odd note, a new game for the Nintendo’s DS is coming out called Doki Doki Majo Saiban. From the kotaku.com site:

“Plot elements for SNK’s witch-toucher Doki Doki Majo Saiban have surfaced over at Famitsu. The game stars naughty Akuji Nishimura, who is commanded by an Angel Lulu to search for [witches] lurking in his junior high school. When the search is narrowed down, the suspected junior high school witch is examined with the touch pen.

How do you know if the little girl is a witch? Usually, there’s a “witch’s crest” hidden somewhere on her body which can appear in “Witch Check Mode.” The goal: Make her heart beat quickly. Players use the stylus to touch the girl, whose expression will change depending on how her heart beats. The background with change as well. However! Rush things, and the girl does not respond. Players must take it slow with the touching — these witches are flowers, or something.”

Odd fare for Nintendo, but not really that odd for Japan in general. Whether your weirded out by this or think that it’s kinda cool, one thing is certain. A new gaming genre has been born: “touch-a-girl-to-see-if-she’s-a-witch”. Game on.

That’s it for your touch and tell presentation and that’s that for BarretTime.

My latest Tech Buzz post is up at Houstonist! Check it out, there are blurbs covering Jay’s HelpLine column, Dwight’s TechBlog, local meetings and classes as well as other tech related Houston stories!

The KPFT website is not showing any audio archives after Monday. Until the April 18th show is up on their server, we can’t set up the podcast.

I will update as there is news.

For a number of years now, the likes of Google, Slashdot and ThinkGeek have fed users new products and rolled out ground-breaking services, all of which are announced on day one of the second quarter. If you weren’t out surfing the sites Sunday, you might have missed some of them. Never fear, as I have taken it upon myself to compile a short list of some of my favorite products and services for Q2 2007.

For the coders out there, a rapid development framework for Python which uses commonly known design patterns like ActiveRecord, Association Data Mapping, Front Controller and MVC was released Sunday. Check out the PythonOnPlanes 1.3.07 release notes for more information.

I’m bad about leaving the loft without my phone. I generally won’t realize I have forgotten it until I am about to leave my parking garage, which means a trek back through the underground garage, up the elevator, down the hallway, into the loft, and back again. I’m also bad about going to the dentist as often as I should. AT&T/BellSouth/Cingular could change all of this, though, with a new technology that would allow dentists to implant a cellphone device into a user’s molars. Howstuffworks has a good description of the technology, stating that, “once implanted in a person’s molar, the transducer caused the tooth to vibrate in response to radio signals. The physical structure of the jaw carried the tooth’s vibrations to the inner ear, where the user, and no one else, could perceive them as sound.” Hopefully they’ll have this rolled out in time for my next cleaning…

Google is at it again, this time with the launch of Google TiSP, a free in-home wireless broadband service that delivers online connectivity via users’ plumbing systems. This project is years ahead of the City’s recently announced proposal with Earthlink. It will be interesting to see if the aptly nicknamed “Dark porcelain” project will stay afloat amid Google’s other projects and purchases.

While not necessarily a product or service, this next piece of news still merits a mention. We’ve already heard that actress Gillian Anderson has announced that she will not be returning in the long-awaited sequel to Chris Carter’s The X-Files: Fight the Future. In her stead, actress Julianne Moore will be portraying Special Agent Dana Scully.

And speaking of fighting the future, you can’t escape the fact that this friday is the first friday of the month, meaning that this month’s Good Geek Gathering is taking place this Good Friday at Tropioca in Midtown Houston, located at 2808 Milam near Drew. Tropioca serves up Bubble Tea, fish pizza and meatless smoothies. A few wall outlets are available, as is free WiFi, so bring your laptop if you’re so inclined.

And so you won’t come to the Geek Gathering too weighed down with old computer gear, be sure to drop it off the day before at the Siera Club’s Computer Recycling Event at the Central Presbyterian Church, located at 3788 Richmond at Timmons. They ask that you show up with your old gear between six thirty and seven thirty this Thursday. Dropped off computers will be used in training programs, and will be dismantled by the trainees. Some parts are salvaged for re-use and other parts are sorted by type for recycling. Of course if you’re going to drop off an entire PC, you may want to ensure that you wipe all the data from the drive if you believe that the drive could be reused, or just hit the thing with a hammer once or twice if you know that it is beyond salvage.

And just a heads up for next Thursday. Yuri’s Night, the World Space Party, is coming up. Scheduled for Thursday, April 13th, Yuri’s Night has been described as the St. Patricks Day or Cinco de Mayo for Space. It is one day when all the world can come together and celebrate the power and beauty of space and what it means for each of us. You can hit www.yurisnight.org for more info or just wait for next week’s BarretTime.

That’s that for your Second Quarter Update and that’s it for BarretTime.

Microsoft has issued an alert warning of a potential security threat to the Windows operating system.

Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-017

Who Should Read this Document: Customers who use Microsoft Windows
Impact of Vulnerability: Remote Code Execution
Maximum Severity Rating: Critical
Recommendation: Customers should apply the update immediately

Apparently there are an increasing number of criminal groups targeting the vulnerabilities that this patch fixes and they are using it to silently install software when users visit a malicious Web site or open a certain types of e-mail.

It is strongly recommended that you apply the security patch immediately.

You can do this via the links listed at the security site linked above or by running Windows Update or by visiting windowsupdate.microsoft.com.