NetBloke.com - Search And Save
Publication Date: 04/04/2001
ISSN 1445-1360
Publication Date: 04/04/2001
ISSN 1445-1360
G'Day!
Who is the lucky duck then? It is me, because this time next week I will on the beautiful island of Oahu. I started my vacation from work last week. The funny thing is I have been doing quite a bit of work!
Anyway this issue of NetBloke has some great Site Recommendations related to searching and saving on the Web. You will just have to read on for more details!
I am going to attempt to get out an issue each week while I am on my holiday, but please excuse me if I don't get it out on time, or it comes a day or two early.
Anyway that is it from me for this issue. My mind is already in Hawaii!
Nathan Allan
As you may remember I published an issue not too long ago on search engines. One of the search engines I featured was Google, which just happens to be one of my favourites at the moment. Well I was at work the other day and one of the guys had a Google search built into his Internet Explorer. Well I knew I had to try that out! So I went to the Google Web site and dug up what they call the Toolbar.
It is pretty nifty. It remembers your search queries, allows you to search the Net or a specific Web site. It also lets you rank a page's popularity (this version requires you to allow Google to track your surfing habits, I opted out).
All up I thought this was a great little tool that has allowed me to be a faction of a percent more efficient with my time spent surfing the Internet.
Get the Google Toolbar from:
toolbar.google.com
This means difficult and sometimes strenuous work. For example "It sure is a hard slog piling up these bricks". Whereas this example would not be an appropriate use of the term, "Boy mate, it sure is a hard slog being personal masseur to the 2001 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition models".
I can feel a theme coming on. I figured that I would get hundreds of emails recommending Meta search engines after recommending the Google Toolbar, so I decided to jump the gun and recommend metacrawler as one of this weeks Site Recommendations.
What a Meta search engine does is allow you too search multiple search engines at the one time. The theory is that you will end up with a better quality match.
If you use the Power Search on this site you can even select the particular search engines you want to preform your search on.
www.metacrawler.com
Have you ever found that your hard drive is running out of space?
Well here is a solution for storing data. It isn't a solution for running programs from, just for storing backups and the like. Although personally I would feel more secure using a ZIP drive or I would burn a CD, for less mission critical data there is no reason you couldn't use one of these Web based solutions.
Some of the things I think it would be good to use for include hard to find exe's of shareware programs, digital photos and as another backup place to be double sure!
Two examples of 'online' hard drives are:
www.xdrive.com
www.idrive.com
Bill asked me the following:
"In your newsletter you made mention of " cool little program called World Time" that counts down dates. Where can I find it?"
Answer
I love this little freeware program! It is great when you have friends or family all over the world. I just leave it running with all the numerous clocks set to the local times of all my friends overseas. In an instant you can find out the local time of the place where the person you are talking to resides.
It also has some other great built in tools such as a Calendar, TraqDate, Stopwatch, Time Calculator and Time Manager. You can even set it to synchronise itself with military clocks for pinpoint accuracy.
So Bill you can get it from:
www.pawprint.net
Gunnar Jensen sent me this joke as he thought it was appropriate considering my upcoming wedding.
THE PERFECT HUSBAND
There are several men sitting around in the locker room of a private club after exercising. Suddenly a cell phone on one of the benches rings. One of the men picks it up, and the following conversation ensues:
"Hello?"
"Honey, it's me. Are you at the club?"
"Yes."
"Great! I am at the mall two blocks from where you are. I just saw a beautiful mink coat. It's absolutely gorgeous! Can I buy it?"
"What's the price?"
"Only $1,500.00."
"Well, OK, go ahead and get it, if you like it that much..."
"Ahhh, and I also stopped by the Mercedes dealership and saw the 2001 models. I saw one I really liked. I spoke with the salesman, and he gave me a really good price...and since we need to exchange the BMW that we bought last year..."
"What price did he quote you?"
"Only $60,000..."
"OK, but for that price I want it with all the options."
"Great! But before we hang up, something else..."
"What?"
"It might look like a lot, but I was reconciling your bank account and I stopped by the real estate agent this morning and saw the house we had looked at last year. It's on sale! Remember? The one with a pool, English Garden, acre of park area, beach front property..."
"How much are they asking?"
"Only $450,000 - a magnificent price...and I see that we have that much in the bank to cover..."
"Well, then go ahead and buy it, but just bid $420,000. OK?"
"OK, sweetie...Thanks! I'll see you later! I love you!"
"Bye...I do too..."
The man hangs up, closes the phone's flap, and raises his hand while holding the phone and asks to all those present: "Does anyone know who this phone belongs to?"
