Neddy's Palaver

This is my very first panorama photograph ever! I was not sure which size focal length to use, as my images were recorded as 5mm focal length. 5mm was not one of the choices for the Canon software, so I used the shortest available - 24mm. Then I went to Picnik and made a poster from it.

My neighbor Jeff was my inspiration. He posted one of his creations of the Lincoln Memorial at Facebook. Of course, Jeff is a professional photographer for the AP, so it was quite a photo. I hope this photograph will be inspiration for my Red Hats ladies, as I shot it from the very same hotel that they are planning on staying in next Spring when we all descend with our Red Hats on Salt Lake City to do some genealogy. :)

The image, Salt Lake City Skyline Poster, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

I have been searching everywhere how to “un-hide” Facebook friends, once you have hidden them. It is ever so easy to hide comments from your friends, as the icon pops up every time your mouse scans over the right hand corner of any of their comments. But then when you begin to miss your friends’ erudite and entertaining comments, how do you get them to appear again on your homepage? I started searching for “How to Un-hide Friends” at Facebook - no help. Most advice from Internet search engines postings claim one must use Firefox browser to be able to “un-hide” friends. Don’t you get weary of every problem on the Internet being caused by not using Firefox? Well, I don’t have Firefox. When things don’t work in Internet Explorer, I use Chrome or Safari. So there!

Fortunately, I found a posting that described how to un-hide your Facebook friends, and it works, even in Internet Explorer. So there! But then you wonder, why does Facebook make hiding friends so easy, but un-hiding them (undoing the hiding process) such a great secret? Seems it is just another of those “Great Mysteries of Facebook.”

How to Un-hide the Friends You Have Hidden at Facebook

• On your home page in Facebook, highlight the filter in the left-hand panel that says “News Feed.”

• Scroll to the bottom of the “News Feed” and click the link that says “Edit Options.”

• In the box that appears, click the “Add to News Feed” link for everyone you want to un-hide, then click “Close.”

VOILA! Thanks to “Tech for Luddites” for the help.

“The Twitter Book” tells you everything you need to know about Twittering and sending Tweets. Tweet Away!
The Twitter Book

OVER 10,000 Apple Apps and Counting!
Did you know, that in the first 142 days since Apple first started accepting new iPhone/iPod Touch Apps, there have been over 10,000 Apps added to the iTunes App Store?

My grandson told me that he has downloaded five pages of Apps onto his new iPod Touch. My Touch holds twice as much as his and I have only five Apps in toto: Facebook, Crazy Candle (came in handy for a candle-less birthday), Stanza (love it for reading ebooks), Twitterific and DataCase. Actually I have only four, as DataCase, the most expensive of all of them, didn’t work, so I deleted it.

So, thanks to Grandson’s enthusiasm, I went to the Apple Apps Store and downloaded many of the recommended ones at this link: “Top 15 iPhone Apps of 2008,” except for the games, plus a few others I found. Games bore me. I only downloaded the “FREE” Apps, as I know from experience that the Apps that charge oftentimes do not work, and there is little if any chance of getting a refund. Then I went to bed and before falling off to sleep I tried figuring out what I had done. Imagine this - I now have 160,000 recipes on my iPod, the complete works of Shakespeare plus some that scholars are not sure he wrote, Pandora radio, Urbanspoons restaurants, and two more lights, in case I need to see where I’m going at night. Now I need to find time to sync these to my new iPhone.

I am here to report that the favorite of all that I downloaded has got to be Pandora. It works perfectly. I now have my own custom made radio on this little device. It is like the old “Bluegrass Country” at WAMU has come back to life. WAMU kicked “Bluegrass Country” over to HD radio and the Internet, so they could have more “BORING, BORING” talk on WAMU. I’ve not listened to them since. Who needs them anyway? I’ve got an iPod Touch with all my favorite music on it. But I do miss Ray Davis.

The Shakespeare App is incredible, except it is not easy to read. I am used to reading books on my iPod Touch with STANZA, and I feel certain that I can download Shakespeare’s plays from STANZA for reading. But this Shakespeare App is nice for impressing my friends with my “new found” erudition. See, I carry ALL of the Bard’s works in my purse. If there are any quotations that they cannot remember, I can find them all right here on my iPod.

One of the lights was really not worth the price - FREE. I am going to delete that as I cannot figure what it is suppose to do, except click off and on. I like the Flashlight, as it could come in handy at the theater or when trying to find something at the bottom of my black bag (my purse). I’ve not tried the WordPress App yet.

Most of these Apps need WiFI to work, which in the past would have been a problem for me, as the iPod Touch is not always connected. That is probably why I had not downloaded so many Apps to it. Like the Google Maps are great, but I don’t usually need them at home where I have computers and Internet. I need them when I’m away from home - like on the streets of DC where they don’t work on the iPod Touch. Now my iPod Touch stays home and I go abroad with my new iPhone, where I will always be 100% connected to the real world - the Internet.

I am celebrating by playing with my new iPhone on this exciting New Year’s Eve of 2008. I even made my own docking station tonight. See my iPhone dock above. I made it myself and was so proud until Katy Blue jumped onto my desk and knocked it over. CATS! ROTFL. ;)

I went down to the Apple Store yesterday to complain that my iPhone was not working. The Apple geeks (very sweet young women) told me that I was clicking too many things at once - causing the iPhone to freeze and crash. Oh yeah? Cliff says, “oh yeah, that’s exactly what she does all the time, with everything that doesn’t respond immediately.”

Anyway, they were so nice and helpful, and I was so relieved to be assured by a genuine Apple geek that my iPhone was not defective, that I went ahead and purchased the iPhone case she recommended. I think I like having the iPhone encased, as it is now. It’s a bit bigger, not as sleek, but it seems easier to handle and hold onto.

When she sold me the new white case she also tried convincing me to purchase the iPhone dock. I didn’t feel that I would need it. I already have three docks that I have been using for my iPod Touch - one Apple dock for my home theater, one Bose Sound Dock, and one iPod dock that came with my Cambridge Soundworks radio. She described how this iPhone dock sits next to the computer and charges and syncs the iPhone.

Well, once I came home I have been feeling the lack of not having an iPhone dock sitting next to my laptop. It is quite amazing. I have been using my computer to charge my iPod Touch without a dock for the past year, and never felt I was missing anything. Now I feel I must have a dock for my iPhone. The seed of want has been planted into my brain.

I spotted a little cardboard card box on my desk and then found an exacto knife to cut a slot for my iPhone to rest in. Now I know that I really do need that Apple iPhone dock. This makeshift contraption of recycled cardboard is not going to suffice for long, especially with marauding cats on the prowl. Next time I’m at the mall … Apple Store, here I come.

The image, My iPhone Dock, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

Although I have not yet had opportunity to view it, “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is now in the local movie theaters. I listened to the first half of the audio book for free this morning. It was written by F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1922, in response to Mark Twain’s comment about the unfairness of youth coming at the beginning of life, and old age at the end. The venue is my hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, described accurately as a “Southern” city.

The audio of the second half of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is not yet available at Librivox.org, but you may find the entire text of Fitzgerald’s work at Gutenberg.org (three fifths down the page), and probably at Stanza too if you want to download it to your iPod. See “Reading On My iPod Touch.” You can listen to the first half of the story right here, thanks to Librivox and computer technology. Give it a listen.

As to the movie - I just read a review, and apparently it has almost nothing in common with F. Scott Fitzgerald’s story, except the title and the basic premise. REVIEW.

Below is a screen-shot of part of my PortableReading library at Facebook.

I am very skeptical of most applications at Facebook. I have had some bad experiences with them. A music application I tried took over my computer and would not let me escape from its website. Just today, I tried one that a friend sent me, which resulted in a $9.95 charge on my cell phone - unbeknownst to me. So beware with most of them.

However, here is one, totally “FREE,” that I cannot say enough good things about. At Facebook the application is known as “PortableReading” however, its website calls itself “TextOnPhone,” which is somewhat confusing. “TextOnPhone” is for iPhones and iPods which I have not had much success with on my iPod Touch. For iPod reading I use Stanza, as I have already blogged.

But … “PortableReading” works wonderfully on Facebook. Join Facebook for free, and then sign on for the “FREE” application “PortableReading.” Then you will have your own personal library at your fingertips. You can choose your free books, set the type, colors, and size, so that you can read on your computer screen without scrolling by just clicking the “next” button to go to the next page. I do not know if one can use this application without an Internet connection. I have not been able to do that on my iPod Touch, which is another reason I prefer Stanza for that.

Stanza does not have a Facebook application, so if you want to conveniently read “FREE” books on your computer, PortableReading works great. Give it a try.

The image, My Facebook Library, was originally uploaded by barneykin. It is posted here from Barneykin’s account.

Visit Neddy’s Archives for more of Edna’s writings.

How To Post Music at Facebook

I have been tinkering with posting music at Facebook. The following scheme seems to work nicely for MP3 files.

To get an MP3 file of your own music you must first upload it to your own FTP space. If you do not know how to do that, you can find an MP3 file already uploaded somewhere on the Internet with its own URL. To post a song, you must have an URL of the song. Here is a legal one to use from librivox.org of the Christian hymn “Nearer My God To Thee”. (Right-click on this link and choose “Copy Shortcut” and go to your Facebook account).

The next step is to paste the song’s MP3 URL, that you got when you clicked “Copy Shortcut,” under “Share Link” and then click “preview” on the Facebook screen, or “enter” on your keyboard. Next write something in the blank box, if you want, such as “Nearer My God To Thee.” Then click “Post.” VOILA! Automatically, you should see your song posted as an actual music box, with a music note graphic and play button. COOL, eh? This is a screenshot of my Facebook page where I posted “I Heard the Bells” from Jon Sayles website of free guitar music:

Your goal then is to try and find another MP3 URL of music that you really like. Here is an entire collection of free MP3s from The Owen Family. You may find more legal Christmas MP3 files at librivox.org: http://librivox.org/christmas-carol-collection-2006/. Again, remember to right-click on the MP3 link and choose “copy shortcut.”

The easiest way I have found to post music at Facebook is to use my Twitter account and my Seeqpod account. I post the Seeqpod URL of a song to Twitter. I have Twitter set to automatically post to Facebook, so my song comes through as a link, which when clicked takes one to Seeqpod where the song plays.

You can also go to Seeqpod and get one of their links, under “embed.” These files at Seeqpod are not MP3 URLs. Here is one I already found for Yankee Doodle Dandy: http://www.seeqpod.com/search/?plid=7ba92255c5 . Copy and paste this link just as instructed above. Because it is not an MP3 URL, it will not make a music box, but be an ordinary link. You can add in the comments: “Click link for Yankee Doodle Dandy.”

Computing for Seniors
If you were lucky enough to get a computer for Christmas, yet “unlucky” enough to have the mind of a senior citizen, I have some advice to get you started. Are you puzzled about where to begin and worried about pushing a button or clicking the mouse and breaking your brand new magnificent machine? Are you wanting to take up web surfing, but unsure that you have what it takes to become a grand surfer like the younger set? Are you generally confused about everything to do with the computer world? This introductory FREE course from AARP is designed for seniors and can teach you everything you need to know. You will learn terms and techniques, and how to troubleshoot common problems.

Go to aarp.org/computers/ and look to the left hand side of the web page for the “BASIC WEB LESSONS.” Then you can begin to follow the Seven Step Web Lessons from AARP, written especially for seniors. Once you master those, you can graduate yourself to the INTERMEDIATE WEB LESSONS.

iPod Touch Web Apps

Last week Apple came out with something called WEBB APPS for their new iPod Touch. I noticed there were about five pages of WEBB APPS and I started playing with them a bit. Now I notice that there are more than 25 pages. Last night I found that Google has come aboard with some really nifty ones. My favorite is the Google Search: www.google.com/m. I started with that and it immediately opened my own personal Google calendar, my email and today I was able to read my Google docs.

This is really neato. This iPod Touch thingy is becoming a computer in the palm of my hand. However … these things only work when there is a WiFi connection. I wonder when that hurdle will be scaled?