Windows 8 is definitely made for tablets or touchscreen computers.  Everything is still accessible by mouse, of course, but just the new layout of the “Apps” and the new Start Menu just screams touchscreen.  Personally, I think Windows 8 would be better for the home user who uses their PC as a media server for their home or maybe just a regular “standard” user who will not be using their PC for advanced functions.  As a web developer and computer programmer, I really don’t have a need for glitzy and glammy menus and screens.  If I installed and ran on Windows 8, I would probably end up “stripping” it down so it looks and acts like Windows 7.  When Windows 8 gets released, unless I get a really good deal on it, I will stay with Windows 7.  It doesn’t have any over the top glitz and glam and it is rock solid for what I use it for.

If you are anything like most computer owners these days, instead of turning your computer off when you are done using it, you more than likely leave the computer running, turn off the monitor and walk away from it.  Put your computer’s processor to good use when you are not using it and download Boinc.  Boinc is the software that you download and install to your computer that allows it to send and receive work-units from different projects that you choose to have your computer(s) to work on.  These projects, most by universities or affiliated with universities, can range from helping to find a cure for Malaria to helping measure the Milky Way galaxy.  Once you choose the project(s) you want your computer to “crunch” for, you can join a team who is dedicated to the same cause(s).  If your team has its own website, you can more than likely chat with other team members and develop new friendships.  If you are like me and have multiple computers, each with multiple processing cores, your project scores add up pretty quickly.  You can then not only watch yourself move up the project and world leader-boards, but your team as well.

If you have anymore questions about Boinc and distributed computing, check out Boinc’s website or comment here and I will try to answer it.

I love using Firefox and will continue to do so.  I just wish that in upcoming versions, the developers can come up with great algorithms to combat Firefox’s usage of system resources…

* Try it out for yourself, download Firefox here

In order to further my education and tools that I can offer to employers, I am taking on the task learning BI.  What is BI you ask? BI stands for Business Intelligence. It is the process of taking many different types of information from a client and cleaning and organizing the data so it is usable.  From there, different tools can be built that can help the end-user better understand the information that they are looking at.  By using such tools as SQL Server Reporting Services and other such reporting tools, it is easier for the end user to look at, organize and better understand exactly what they are looking at.

This week saw the beginning and conclusion of my online class on SSAS or SQL Server Analysis Services.  I always knew SQL was a powerful tool, but now I can really appreciate what it has to offer.  Learning this week about data warehousing, setting up and deploying a cube and then using tools to show the results of the cube to end users, shows me exactly how powerful and data rich SQL can be. In a world where we are taught from a young age that data is two dimensional (rows and columns), the process of cubing shows you that data can be and is multidimensional.  Cubes have members and hierarchies.  The term hierarchies implies that there are more dimensions that can be drilled down to from the parent hierarchy.  So, if you thought you knew everything about data and you’ve never heard of cubing or SSAS, think again.

Get cubing my friends!

Here is a video on the subject:

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

Please go to: http://americancensorship.org/ to learn more.

Breaking news at 10…

Erik, Dave and Ken are on a golf course. Hide your children! Lock yourselves up tightly in your storm shelters! If you don’t seek cover immediately, you may get impaled by incoming golf balls!

Here’s the evidence that yes we do, indeed golf. If that is what you would like to call it….

If you look closely you can see the ball flying by the golf cart, though a tad fuzzy, captured by Dave's Nikon L1.

I take a hack at it...The next sound you'll hear is the sickening "ploop" of dimpled ball meeting pond.

A postmortem finds that no animals were harmed in the shooting of this farce, although the trees are crying for mercy...

The result: a fun day all around.  It was probably one of the last nice, warm days we will have in a long time.

This adventure brought to you by Wilson Hauser Torisky and Associates LLC.

Peace!

There are some alternatives to having this happen, but the question is whether it would be any safer?  One major alternative, I feel is to have every car come standard with a voice to text feature.  This would be a system where you can speak to your car the words you want in the text message and it would send it when you are done.  Your car could read any text messages that come in to you.  This stops the need to look away from the road.  I believe some cars that have the Microsoft Sync technology in them can do this already. Just it needs to come standard in every car.

Do you this is a good idea? Would you use it?  Would you be willing to pay a little extra in order to have it included in the car?  Let us know your thoughts.

Why you ask?  Because I can.  I would have great network transfer speed between devices and also to the Internet with Time Warner broadband.  It would cool to know that each room has at least one connection, if not more.  I could host LAN parties and have enough network resources to do it. Possibilities are almost endless, only as far as my pocketbook will take me.

The only drawback to this plan is cost.  Besides the fact I do not have a house and would need to buy one, there is also the cost of buying all of the networking equipment needed including all of the Ethernet cabling I would have to buy and then install, either having myself install everything or pay extra to have someone do it for me.  Either way, it is going to get expensive.

If you had the money and the resources to do this, would you? What are the benefits of doing this?