Archive for September, 2007

This is pretty old:

This is too new:

(Thanks Nathan)

I’m getting a surprising amount of spam comments on this blog. Last month it was tipperary-ford-auctions.murcielago-springs.cn/chevy-engine-vomit.htm, now it’s plain old “buy v1agra”. WordPress happily blocks all of it all by itself, but I have this paranoid distrust for automated systems with zero human interaction, so I get 173 emails a week from my blog about comments held for moderation.

CAPTCHA is a good solution for this sort of thing; the onus is on the user, not the server, to prove they’re legitimate.

Therefore, I’ve added reCAPTCHA my blog. Apparently it’ll keep my comment spam down *and* help computers read old books. I haven’t played with it much, so if it annoys anyone in the slightest, email me and I’ll try to find a better one.

My C600’s trackpoint mouse has a tendency to cause the mouse cursor to drift annoyingly at random. I’ll bump it and the cursor will be stuck in the bottom left corner for 5 minutes, or I’ll hit G, H or B on the keyboard and it’ll freak out and run away, it has happened completely at random. I think it’s a common problem; mine does it, and so did one that came into work the other week.

The obvious fix is to turn the trackpoint off (who the hell uses them anyway?). To do that, you need the proper touchpad drivers – get them from Dell here (Dell’s generic driver download page is here, if you have a different model).

Thing is, the driver application only runs per-user once you’ve logged in. The trackpoint can still play havoc at the login screen, especially if you use the Welcome screen. To fix that, just set SynTPLpr.exe to run as a scheduled task on system startup:

Just remember to untick all the stupid defaults so it runs even if you’re on batteries (and thus probably particularly reliant on the touchpad):

I have no idea what logical steps led to this:

Proprietary driver software still sucks:

Irony:

Sorry, no hilarious essay here. Mondays bite.

Someday i’ll regret having no respect for my money in my 20s.

I’ll enjoy it while it lasts, though.

Read the rest of this entry »

Do you hate school/uni/work?

Read this and this.