My main need was to be able to access all my files from all the computers, no matter what the OS was.

For a long time I have been a user of a service where you can store your data on the internet just through using a regular file management application like the Explorer or Finder. I work on the files locally, and changes gets synchronized to the internet in the background.

I never have to worry about backup again.
I have access to all my files – everywhere.

And it only costs me 10 dollars (65 kroner) a month for 60 GB or 5 dollars for 30 GB.

For a long time I have been using Dropbox, which has a free version with 2 Gb of storage. It’s a genious service which makes file backup and synchronization as easy as it gets.

There are a myriad of services out there that provide backup at a very cheap amount, but I needed synchronization of files between computers.  So when I had to start paying for it, I started researching who could give me most value for my buck.

I landed on SugarSync which is a little bit cheaper (or give 10GB more storage space) and have more functionality than Dropbox:

• The coolest feature being music streaming, though I doubt I will be using it much.
• Photo gallery
• Easy to share files/folders with friends
• Easy to make files/folders public (give everybody access)
• Easily store mobile pictures to Sugarsync

If you would like to try it out, use my referrer link (which gives both of us extra 250 MB): Sugarsync. Unfortunately they have made it a bit cumbersome to become a free user (you have to enter credit card details just to become a user).  Moreover, I was unable to validate my account and it took two days before support fixed my problem.

The easiest start is Dropbox.

I read a good review of SugarSync vs Dropbox at another blog. Many comments that the upload of files from sugarsync is slow, and I can vouch for that. It’s a good idea to set off time and a computer to upload files first time around.

I have been wanting a notebook for a long time. A small computer I can just put in my bag and have with me everywhere I go. I have for a long time been reading every rumor that has been available on the iPad, so when it was launched I swallowed everything I could find about it, and then I started comparing it to what I want in a notebook. The iPad fell short quickly because of two main reasons:

• HDMI, there isn’t a way to connect it to a TV using HDMI. When looking at the iPad specs it also haven’t a good enough resolution to support it. I want a a computer that I can easily connect to a tv and watch films with as little hassle as possible. Plug-and-play, baby!
• Portable keyboard. The iPad supports a pluggable FULL-SIZE keyboard. But, I don’t want a full size keyboard. I want something small and easy – a small, portable, foldable Bluetooth keyboard like the Stowaway iGo keyboard.  Unfortunately, that doesn’t exist yet – as in there is no drivers on iphone (iPad just seems to be a large version of iPhone without telephone capabilities) that recognizes it.  I have seen one video where it works with a jailbreaked iphone on an apple bluetooth keyboard, but that keyboard isn’t very foldable – and still full-sized.

My conclusion is therefore that I will not purchase an iPad any time soon. I will instead go for a notebook sometime before I go on vacation. But  what notebook to buy?

Yesterday I purchased an iPhone and spent hours playing around, downloading apps and playing around.

Today, I fell in love!

When walking to the train station it was incredibly cold, and when the train didn’t arrive I started wondering where the hell it was! I was freezing my butt off. So I took up my iphone, found the train app that told me my train was delayed by 6 minutes and was at Nordstrand. Then I found out that it was -21 degrees outside, no wonder I was freezing.

2 minutes later it was announced over the speakers that the train was delayed – but that’s just plain old news for me

Open the pdf in Preview.
Open the sidebar: Preview Menu –> View –> Sidebar
Choose Thumbnail view: Preview Sidebar –> On the bottom left there is an icon, click and choose Thumbnails. Ensure that you have one of the pages selected/marked.
Select all the pages: Preview Menu –> Edit –> Select All
Choose the Select Tool: Preview Menu –> Tools –> Select Tool

Now you can mark the area of the page that you want to keep. Since you previously selected all the pages, the changes will occur on all the pages.

To remove the unmarked area: Preview Menu –> Tools –> Crop.

Now you can save the document.

This worked as a charm for me and the pdf’s ended up looking good in my iliad, though the font size is still a bit small (but still readable) in most cases.

NB. The encrypted file must have printing permissions.

1. Open the file with Preview
One can verify that it is encrypted by going to Tools -> Inspector -> Encryption Inspector (the lock icon)
2. Go to File -> Print -> PDF -> Save as PDF. And voila, an unencrypted version of the file is saved.

I found out because I had these popups that came up when browsing in firefox:

It always pointed to the same ip adress 216.255.186.11. At first I thought it was something wrong with popup blocker in firefox, so I installed adblock in hopes that it help. It didn’t. That was what pointed me in the right direction.

I installed MacScan, and what do you know. It found a Trojan called DNSChanger..

I have managed to stay ahead of the game so far by being careful about what I install. Obviously, that didn’t help. So I guess… no more gay porn for me. (Hey, JUST KIDDING!)

Unfortunately, after many trials I discovered that MacScan didn’t do their job properly to remove the file. It only removed a file named plugins.settings, but there was a lot more than that happening. I started searching out more information about the problem and found a site containing analysis of what the trojan does. So, here is what one must do to remove it:

Crontab contained this line:
sudo crontab -l
* * * * * “/Library/Internet Plug-Ins/QuickTime.xpt”>/dev/null 2>&1

I removed it using this command (DELETES ALL CRONTABS FOR ROOT) : sudo crontab -r

Delete: /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/plugins.settings
Then I deleted /Library/Internet Plug-Ins/QuickTime.xpt

After this session – No more popups for me !!! *Celebration*
Previous history:

Update: DAMN! That popup is still there !!! So what in the hell is it? Firefox is in “show no popup” mode.
So I tried this solution and set privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins = 3 (instead of 2). Hopefully that helps..

Update2: Apparantly, that didn’t help as well. Now I’m really baffled. And it makes no sense, because it pops up randomly on different sites.. *thinking hard*

Update3: My last desperate act is to search through all files on my harddrive looking for the ip adress in question (though time consuming). A tip is to delete all history files (clear browser history etc) where the ip adress might appear.
sudo find . -exec grep ’216.255.186.11′ {} \; -print

I got a hit on these files:
~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/7kojvnaz.default/places.sqlite
~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/7kojvnaz.default/places.sqlite-journal
So I renamed the file too places.sqlite-journal.old.The files is used for preserving Firefox browsing history. In my case – will not be missed. That didn’t help – the popup is still there.

~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/7kojvnaz.default/sessionstore.js
Firefox session data

Frustration solved! Finally !

I have had my mac for about 10 months, but I still hadn’t figured out where to find those programming keys like curly braces, square brackets, straight vertical (pipe) and tilde to name a few on my keyboard.

The solution was easy when I found it, but it wasn’t intuitive for me. After all, it took me 10 months.

These works for norwegian keyboard layout (and probably some more):
~ = Option + ^
| = Option + 7
[ = Option + 8
] = Option + 9
{ = Option + Shift + 8
} = Option + Shift + 9
\ = Option + Shift + 7

First you need to create a new ITunes account. Find an american adress (for example an hotel or another “public” adress), and follow the instructions in this video:

Now you have access to the US store, but you still can’t buy anything. To buy something with your non-us credit card will get you nowhere. The answer is an US ITunes Gift Certificate.

I suggest checking out EBay and see who sells them there. To ensure you don’t waist your dollars, take a look at the sellers feedback.

It’s amazing that it has to be so difficult to buy music, films etc. The reason is probably because of the contract ITunes makes with the producers. The producers take is their contract with television channels in the different countries. TV channels pay a lot of money to air TV series. TV series produces viewer ratings, which again provides commercials, which leads to increased revenue for the TV channels itself.

The problem is that producers are fighting a loosing battle. People don’t want to wait for their favorite shows, so they download it illegally as torrents or any other means available.

By doing so the producers actually loose money, but not only because of piracy. The problem is that the producers needs to make things internationally available for purchase, not only for the US. If something is unavailable, then people will turn to piracy. Pirated items are cheaper, but they are also usually of low quality. If something is available (and for a reasonable price) people will purchase it.

And the producers should entice people to buy their products by making the products available, at good quality and even may be give some extra value (like extra features etc) when people buy their products. Furthermore, when people like a show they want to purchase items connected to it, because it supports something they are interested in. If I like a show, then you can be damn sure I want to purchase items connected to it. I want to see the product succeeds because it’s in my interest.

So dear producers: Put a little trust in the consumers of your products. We want you to succeed and we will give you dollars for your work if you only let us to do so. Because we do care (how is that for a slogan? Naah… googling showed it was overused by many others).

…..What is the future of the tv industry then?