< a href="http://consumerist.com/2010/07/security-patching-for-xp-service-pack-2-ends-today.html">“Security Patching for XP Service Pack 2 Ends Today”.

It costs money to have teams of people, like fire fighters, employed for the “in case of emergency” situations. Yes, while they aren’t responding to the latest hacker attacks, they can be doing productive things with their product line, but consider Microsoft has two other fully functional PC operating systems they have to support as well: Vista and Windows 7.

Short translation: If your computer(s) is (are) running Windows XP, and you haven’t updated beyond Service Pack 2, then you are potentially at risk if the hackers figure out a new way to end around the security features of XP/SP2.

The good news? Make sure you’ve installed Service Pack 3. Microsoft will still have resources that keep that “vintage” of XP updated and patched for security holes.

In the long run, it’s notice to consider drafting your plan to upgrade your operating system software, and possibly your systems. I have been using Windows 7 on various machines for about a year now, the first installation on a very old computer, and I did it just to see if it worked…it did. Not that some of the others I’ve upgraded haven’t had a few issues with finding drivers, but it’s time. Besides, it runs fast like XP, yet is pretty like Vista!

If you need help laying out a plan and a budget for your business, contact me!

Table of contents for How to VBlog

1. vBlogging: Basics – What kind of webcam should I use?

Not sure about which webcam to get to video blog/chat with? In the video, I share a little bit of advice on how to pick one, depending on your needs!

Related articles by Zemanta

• School’s Laptop Spying Focus Of Senate Hearing (huffingtonpost.com)

As technology allows components to get smaller, and more powerful, the “geeks” among us come up with ways to apply them to practical problems. In this case, it’s a project called “SixthSense.”

I have dabbled in voice recognition as far back as the Apple II+ days (that’s a long time ago. I didn’t even ask about the cost of the software, I just played with it at Apple World in Boston for as long as I could, in my first encounter. Now, voice systems at the other end of our phones “know’ our voices without us “training” them.

Move to the world of “gestures.” Even before the iPhone using mulittouch technology (reads two points and reacts based on relative movement between them), Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) had a set of gestures for things like add and delete characters and spaces, as you “typed” with your stylus.

Add to this the next small mix of current technology: Face tracking on your webcams. As you move, the digital controls have determined where your face is and automatically keep it centered with in it’s limits of digital or physical movement. That’s on your desk today. More sophisticated systems are being used for security purposes, too.

Now we do have the iPhone and may copycats, like the HTC Touch phone. Microsoft and other companies have demonstrated multi-touch of many more points and Apple has recently patented a multi-user/multi-touch system, that just knows the different sets of fingers and palms touching the display. Look for this type of technology to show up on your favorite high end restaurant’s table soon, with a direct interface to the kitchen and bar staff.

Now, I’ll get back to SixthSense, which requires a small projector and a camera, and a place to project on.  Basically, the projector becomes your display, and the camera sees what your hands are doing between you and the projected image.  Now the software takes over to allow the interpretation, in context, of the hand movements to provide a “Minority Report” like virtual reality display operated just by the motions of your hands in mid air.  Just think, that movie came out in 2002, and here we are, coming close to this being a common method of interacting with a digitally enhanced world.  Does life imitate art or does art imitate life?

This project is designed to be part of a wearable computing system.  Other projects, such as the Microsoft Natal, are for use with a fixed system, in front of your installed display (TV/computer monitor).

This really isn’t far off, and while the videos show the interaction is a little bit jerky, and the componets, as small as they are, are still somewhat unwieldy, this is what “engineering models” look like, and then some other engineers get to work doing things like integrating projectors and cameras and mirrors into a designer set of glasses frames, so it’s actually useful and comfortable.

“Early adopters” will be the people who take a Dremel Tool to that fancy biking helmet, and won’t mind the wires running down the back of thier shirt’s to connet to the battery and computer package.  Trust me, you’ll be repulsed and attracted, simultaneously, to this person and want to know how you can do it too, but you’ll only buy in if they can guarantee you that there is no residual “helmet hair” when you remove your “device.” This prototype was put together for $350 in parts. Amazing!

Interested in the bigger story?  Watch this video of the man who conceived and made this work:  Pranav MistryTED.

Table of contents for Win7 Wonderland

1. Walking in a Windows 7 Wonderland

Pulling together left over parts and a few Craig’s List purchases, I have a “box” now up and running on the Microsoft Windows 7 “Release Candidate 1.” I’m using the 64bit version of the operating system so I can take advantage of more memory for the computer to use while working.

System specs:
Pentium D 3.4Ghz processor, ECS PX1 Socket 775 motherboard, 4GBs of Kingston DDR2 PC6400 RAM, 2 x 74GB Western Digital “Raptor” (10K RPM) hard drives in a RAID 0 configuration, a DVDRW all in an ANTEC Sonata II Case. Video is and XFX 8800GTX with 768M or DDR3 RAM on board.

Pretty healthy box….

Note: On night 1, I had a single 1GB stick of DDR2 PC6400 RAM, with known errors, but I went ahead and used it because I was impatient.

Impressions: Loads fast, runs fast, faster than my Quad core 3.6Ghz Pentium Extreme with 4GBs of RAM and WinXP Professional, which also has a RAID 0 hard drive set up, but has an ATI 4870X2 graphics card with 2GBs of DDR5 video RAM on board.

The install went smoothly, once I got a floppy (yes, a floppy) made with the RAID drives for the motherboard. I could have used a USB drive to handle the extra requirement to load those drivers, but I went the tried and true route, since I had a USB 3.5″ floppy drive sitting nearby, and a boatload of brand new 3.5″ floppies from a friend recently moving (if you need one for a rainy day, or to show your kids how tough we had it back in the day, I’ll provide one (you come get it) for free!). If I hadn’t been putting my two drives in the system to act like one, then this wouldn’t have been an issue, so don’t sweat it if you’re building a system with a single boot drive.

There were some updates to do (and there had been almost daily), and the system alerted me and quickly had them in. I began my “routine” of installing my normal use programs so I can get a feel for the difference in performance. All routine, except one of my favorite Free! tools to keep my system safe, PCTools Firewall is oly written to support a 32 bit operating system, so I was on the hunt. A quick search got me to the Komodo free firewall and it’s working fine.

Side note: The interesting thing was I was able to get the system loaded up on the 1G of RAM and things went well,, until…I began adding more utilities, that would constantly run on top of the operating system, such as the firewall and anti-virus/anti-spyware applications. The computer would work…then freeze. I grabbed a single stick of DDR2 PC5300, which was only 512MBs and tried it. It worked OK, and I was actually surprised it ran. It was locking up when I tried to start programs, but they said the minimum as 1GB of memory for Win7…

The 4GBs got installed on Saturday afternoon and I installed a game that drives the system hard (on the ones I use now), both on the CPU and the graphics. I put the options for the display near the top of the capabilities and everything ran fine. I have a “widgets” (like the ones that came out for Vista) that shows the use of the CPU and the memory. I was’t hitting the top end of either while the game was running.

I should have some video/graphics and sound editing programs loaded later this week, so I can see how those compare to my current machines.

You can’t download copies of Win7 from Microsoft now, but you can get the key. I do have the files to make the DVD to do the install, but you’ll have to go to Microsoft and get a key of your own (they are free). You can also pre-order Windows 7 right now for an upgrade or full product (for a new system install) right now. Release date is scheduled for Oct 22nd.

I have previously placed an upgrade on a friend’s system, that had XP Home on it. The upgrade was as smooth as my new install and she’s been usiing Windows 7 for several months now…longer than I have! It’s running just fine on an eMachine with a single core 1.6Ghz processor and 2GBs of RAM.

I believe Microsoft has recovered from the issues of Vista. I hope so…

If you’re holding off on buying that new system, waiting until after 10/22, you don’t have to. You’ll get the ability to upgrade from the operating system installed when Win7 comes out.

Ok, now, take a deep breath and see what’s in the not so distant future for “interfacing” with your computer. From Microsoft, the Natal:

Update 7/15/2009: And, see some applications already in the works using this technology:

Update 7/16/2009: It’s not just planned for the XBox, either…Microsoft already is planning on a PC “takeover,” too.

Update 7/17/2009: And…after a camera/mic that figures this all out…mind control isn’t as far off as you may think. So simple a simian can do it. Think Bill Gates can?