Cuil The New Seardh Engine

Former Google engineers are releasing their new search engine called Cuil. They claim it scans four times as many web pages, actually drills into the data on the pages themselves and displays the search results in a more organized and visually pleasing manner. Finally, Cuil, won't retain users search information which should make privacy advocates very happy.

The article was written By MICHAEL LIEDTKE AP Business Writer

Final Gadget Is Done

OK, so I made it (literally).

My final Google gadget is above. I linked in data from a database in MySQL and a photo of me at my first power lifting competition (I took second overall).

Have a good laugh.

Air Force Is Going Web 2.0

Leave it to the Air Force to move towards Web 2.0 concepts and employment. The Army's senior leadership is following suit but we are not there yet. In fact, I am trying to set up something along these lines in my organization within the logistics functional area.

The issue I am having is what this article describes; its a generation gap. The younger crowd (20's to 30's) are good with all this IT stuff, its the senior DoD employees and military folk that are resistant to change.

Is It Golfing or Cheating

Taylor Made Rossa Monza Spider

I don't golf but this "fail-proof" putter seems to take the challenge (or at least a lot of it) out of the game. Its like playing a video game with the "invincible cheat" code enabled. Why pay the fee if you aren't going to really play the game?

Thoughts from the golfer out there?

A Major Internet Change: Hundreds of New Domains On the way

"Internet Org Paves Way for Hundreds of New Domains", by ANICK JESDANUN, AP Internet Writer, posted on Yahoo News 26 June 2008.

In the first major change in 25 years, the Internet's oversight body, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, approved hundreds of new domains to be added to the Internet along side ".com." The affect won't take place until next year as they work out the bugs but we'll likely start seeing things like ".bank",".city-name" and maybe even a ".doughnut" (my idea not in the article). Check out the article.

My thoughts.

I can see where this is a good idea, especially for businesses (Oh yeah - you have to something like $100,000 to get one) that can afford it. I just wonder if this is going to overtax my search engine?

Retiring the Old Lady

The article, entitled, "Ma Deuce' Days May be Numbered" by Norman Polmar, posted on Defense News 20 June 2008 brought a single tear rolling down my check.

Looks like the military may be retiring the M2 .50 machine gun after nearly a century of service. I liked the weapon and always found it reliable.

As a cadet in the 1980's, being 6ft tall and 200lbs, I "volunteered" to carry this around for a few months during various dismounted training exercises. Not exactly sure how much it weighed but it couldn't ave weighed more than 5tons! At least that's what it felt like after a short 12 mile march. But BOY, could your rip something apart when your fired this weapon!

Ah.......Good Times My Friends.......Good Times.

If, your interested in a little history, read the article.

Training for Bloggers

Training Helps bloggers Hone Professionalism: By CARYN ROUSSEAU, Associated Press Writer, posted on Yahoo News, 13 June 2008.

I thought this was appropriate given Summer's recent experience.

Basically the article brings up the point that the popularity of some Blogs are making people (read lawyers) consider them professioanl journals and thus requiring them to abide by legal standards. Blogger could be held accountable for slander or laible based on what they put on their blogs.

So beware what you write. of course, if your Google Analytics are like mine, you have nonthing to worry about. No one is interested in what you have to say.

Blogging Moves to Your iPhone

Six Apart Introduces BlogIt for iPhone.

Six Apart, a company that specializes in social media, has come up with an idea to let people their Blogs using their iPhones. Not only blogs, but their twitters, prownces, facebook and other social media. You can reach the app by pointing your iPhone’s browser to http://blogit.typepad.com/.

So for those of us in class that love Blogging, we never have to part with Blog space. I for one am thrilled (not).

Let me know what yout think. would you use this? Take my new poll.

Zac Browser

My wife found this story in Yahoo news (see link below).

I think this is a wonderful and loving story. Please, read on.

Its a story about a grandfather, John LeSieur, and his grandson, Zac, who has Autism.

PC browsers offer a lot of options and choices, which are not good for children with autism. The options overwhelm the kids and they become so frustrated that they cannot use the Internet. Mr. LeSieur looked for web-browser tools tat catered to Children with Autism but found none.

So he built one himself.

The Zac Browser simplifies the web for kids with autism. It screens out most of the web's content and limits the choices they need to make, thus allowing them to use and explore the Internet.

The site is easy to use, beautiful and specifically focused at children and their imterests. They can chose from some basic options, "Games", "TV", and "Reading" being the main ones.; although my personal favorite is the "Aquarium." I strongly recommend you go to the link below and try it out, especially if you have children.

The link to the entire article is at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/business_of_life.

The link to download and explore Zac's Browser is at: http://www.zacbrowser.com/

Krav Maga Part 2

Well

The good news is I Passed!

The bad news is I pushed myself so hard, I went into severe dehydration, heat stroke and smashed the back of my head into a wall and got a really good concussion. The entire technical term is Rhabdomolysis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhabdomyolysis).

Needless to say, it was an ambulance ride to the hospital (INOVA Fairfax to be exact) and a three day stay and a weeks rest.

I told myself I was going to pass this test or die, and I kept my word. In fact, I almost did both.

The doctors kept telling me they were amazed I did not die and how quickly my body recovered as one usually winds up staying in the hospital for a week. I was there a little over 48 hours before my chemical levels were back to normal and they released me.

Thoughts of the whole situation:

First, the Krav Maga instructors were great. They gave me first aid and got the medics there fast. They and the EMT ambulance folks (never got their names and barely saw they ladies faces - I know it was two women) literally saved my life.

Second - waking up in an ambulance and not knowing how you got there is not fun. To this day, I still do not remember what happened.

Third - being strapped and immobilized on a stretcher and only being able to see ceiling tiles in a hospital is scary.

Finally, I am grateful to my wife who was very supportive and helpful throughout the whole thing.

Sorry for scaring you Pam. I love you.

Google Earth’s 3D Goodness Comes to the Browser

Here is an article I got from my RSS reader, posted on TechCrunch on 28 May 2008, author Mark Hendrickson at http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/05/28/google-earths-3d-goodness-comes-to-the-browser/. The artilce reads......

"The Google Earth team announced it has ported the Google Earth desktop client’s 3D mapping technology into the browser. Website developers are now able to embed 3D maps, which can be modified using Google’s JavaScript API to add KML data, draw 3D buildings, attach callbacks, and more. The entire embed is powered by a special Google Earth Browser Plugin that end users must install. Unfortunately, it’s only available for Internet Explorer and Firefox users on Windows. Google is not offering the equivalent of a default installation of Google Earth in the browser. If you want to search the globe from square one, you still need to visit the 2D Google Maps website. Therefore, this release is mainly a developer one - not really a new product launch."

Many readers of the original posting/article have commented that this is not a major deal since Microsoft has been doing this for over a year.

Vince's Blogger reader

Just added the RSS reader to my site.

Not even sure what this thing does.....................

Get this widget!

Israel Update

Here is a panoramic picture of Jerusalem

Israel (Jerusalem)

Being in the military has its ups and downs. One of the "ups" is the opportunity to travel all over the world (of course this sometimes takes you to places no sane person would ever want to go....but that will be a series of different posts).



On this trip, I went to Israel (sorry can't say why); however, during some time off, we got to visit Jerusalem. I was really impressed with the city. The mix of religions and political ideologies makes this city a mass of confusion unlike anything I have ever witnessed in my 18+ years of military travels.


This is a picture of a wall being built to segregate Palestinians and Israelis. It reminded my of Berlin (I was stationed there in 1990). You can see a checkpoint here in the foreground and part of the wall being built. There are check posts all over the country; a necessity given the violence there.





I was particularly impressed with the Wailing Wall. All these people swaying and praying in one spot is interesting to watch.






While in Jerusalem, you can travel the the path Christ walked towards the site of his Crucifixion, called the "Via Dolorosa". It was a long walk and virtually all uphill. Note that this is a huge tourist attraction, hence the "Hard Rock" like cafe located at the four "stage" of Christs' walk (nothing is sacred anymore).





All in all Israel is a very modern and truly pretty country. I highly recommend a trip there to anyone who has not visited tat part of the world.

Shark Diving

This is my wife, Pam.

After you've been together with a person for 21 years, as anyone can tell you, its gets hard to buy them a birthday gift.

Jewelery, art or a dinner at a four star restaurant are nice but they've been done before.


So this year, I decided to get her an "experience". So I went on-line and found a good company that designs "experience holidays". If you are interested, the EXCITATIONS website is at the following link: http://www.excitations.com/



I opted to let her swim with sharks (as a former marine biologist living in Florida, she's already swam with dolphins).



So we spent a nice weekend in Philadelphia, where Pam got to swim inside a 550,000 gallon shark tank at the Camden Aquarium.

Here are a few pictures.

Krav Maga

For those of you interested, I highly recommend Krav Maga.

What is Krav Maga? Well its a self defense and individual combat system developed and used by the Israel Defense Forces. Please note that KM is NOT a martial art form but a self-defense/combat system. KM takes from many martial arts and stresses realistic combat situation during training (even your first day); albeit in a safer environment than you'll likely encounter in the streets.

I first learned about it during a business trip to Israel last year and have been studying/training now for the past six months. I am hooked!

I am currently training at a Krav Maga Center near Ft Belvoir, VA. Their website is at the following link: http://www.kravmaganova.com/index.htm. Check it out! The instructors are great as is the work out.

On 31 May, I am taking the level 2 test.

Wish me luck.

My First Blog Input

Hey,

I am blogging! First time I ever did this, HOOAH!