4.04.2008
This year's tech-challenge-so-my-brain-doesn't-rot
Every year I try to find some little tech. challenge to help keep my brain from rotting away. It has to be something that I encounter every time I sit down at the computer. Previous years have included running the computer without a mouse (a dead mouse and poverty started this entire endeavour...), creating a shorthand for tech. notes and playing around with voice recognition (I think I'll revisit that one next year) .
This year the challenge is to move to a zero-icon desktop interface on all operating systems - particularly Windows XP and Windows Vista. I've found several resources that have been very useful in accomplishing this, especially this post at Wiggins' Curse.
One neat benefit of moving to an empty desktop is that you free up your screens for applications like Yahoo's! Widgets, eperales' FlickrWall and Desktop Earth from CodeFromThe70s. For my XP notebook, which is not continuously connected to the Internet (sigh - I know - but that's just the way it is for now... ;-) I installed the XP Wallpaper Changer and several wallpaper photos from InterfaceLIFT (a really great site from an LLC with a really great name: "L-bow Grease, LLC").
This year the challenge is to move to a zero-icon desktop interface on all operating systems - particularly Windows XP and Windows Vista. I've found several resources that have been very useful in accomplishing this, especially this post at Wiggins' Curse.
One neat benefit of moving to an empty desktop is that you free up your screens for applications like Yahoo's! Widgets, eperales' FlickrWall and Desktop Earth from CodeFromThe70s. For my XP notebook, which is not continuously connected to the Internet (sigh - I know - but that's just the way it is for now... ;-) I installed the XP Wallpaper Changer and several wallpaper photos from InterfaceLIFT (a really great site from an LLC with a really great name: "L-bow Grease, LLC").
