Apple's industrial design has always impressed me. A few years ago, probably in 1997 or so, when I was fiddling around with a PPC desktop Mac, I was stunned at the way they'd designed the case so that mounting backets were balanced and would swivel;… more »

...although it's from an Australian. Ah, close enough. more »

Having used VNC extensively at work in the past, we've mostly migrated to using Microsoft's Remote Desktop where possible due to better performance and a far more reliable screen refresh. There's also the bit that all versions of Windows from 2000… more »

I'm quite a fan of the open source version control system Subversion (tastes particularly good with TortoiseSVN if you're using Windows), so it was interesting to get this passed along. It's quite a widely-dispersed network of people, many of whom have… more »

Not authoritative in the slightest, but this is what I've observed, from a huge sample size of two people and inferences from elsewhere. Footnotes be gosh darned :) Curiosity The would-be blogger is finally curious enough to wonder what blogging is… more »

Delphi (now available in free 'Turbo Delphi Explorer' editions for old-style Windows coding and new-style .NET coding) has a pretty good migration path from regular Windows to .NET. Unlike Managed C++, which is one of the very few things that can mix… more »

Oh. Wow. more »

Over the last number of years, a new stylistic movement of music has come of age. It's rock influenced, but not rock. It tends towards being instrumental, but not exclusively. It has aspects of worldbeat, but it's not part of that either. It's sometimes… more »

DC's Vertigo line is a pretty reliable source of intriguing, dark, mythology-based graphic novels. Douglas Rushkoff and Liam Sharp's Testament is no exception. The approach is intriguing. The landscape is a 'twenty minutes into the future' type take,… more »

When I lived in the UK, "Top Gear" was a very traditional motoring show. They reviewed new cars, discussed their mechanical systems, looked at motorsports, and ended up being extremely boring. Take, for example, this review of the Sierra Cosworth from… more »

Nimblebrain has at last found a new home. With quota problems and some troubles generating downloadable backups before we went on holiday, to the hacking after we came back that apparently lost all the backups, too, to a DNS problem that went… more »

For a homemade toy, this tauren shammy plushie is quite amazing. I've not been into stuffed animals for years and even I want one! more »

I don't really have much to add to this entry by "Rands" except "Yup" to all points raised. If you work with computers for a living, go read. more »

A few years ago -- 2003 to be precise -- I wrote up an article on ripping DRM'd CDs to MP3 and stuck it on my website. I updated it a bit last year and then forgot about it. Today, the feedback mechanism on the site produced this: Just wanted to say… more »

The Nimblebrain blog logs referrer details, including the search string used to get here. Usually they're pretty mundane ("nimblebrain", "ritchie blog") but sometimes they're just odd. Some examples, in no particular order or importance: alternative… more »

Leander Kahney over at Wired News has put up a great article on the development of the iPod. What stood out at me is how much of the original design was licensed or purchased from third parties. This isn't a slam on Apple; I'm always impressed when… more »

Having recently moved to the Macintosh from a long sojurn on Windows after the Amiga imploded, I've been following Mac-related weblogs. Generally I find personal computer blogs a good way of tracking down tip and tricks to make the systems more… more »

While looking at upcoming game releases on the Future Shop website, I took a look at "Alan Wake" and happened to notice the disclaimer at the bottom. It reads: *Please Note: System Requirements Not Available. Future Shop is not liable for soiled… more »

Oh, look, another version of Need For Speed. Prettier graphics for sure, but I wonder if they've made the multi-player part of it worthwhile yet. I doubt it. more »

I think it's a sign of the times that the number of books professing frustration with religion are on the rise. In Dawkin's case, the times are ripe for a book like this. As an evolutionary theory promoter, he has witnessed galling inroads of attempts… more »

This ad for the Canadian Forces has been showing up on television of late. I must say that the approach is intriguing. It's gritty, it's unglamorous, and it's tense, both in music, visuals and themes. One scene, if I don't miss my guess, even flashes… more »

I loved my Mazda. Sigh! It is the end of an era-- the Purple People Eater is finished and is just now a donation to the Kidney Foundation of Canada. more »

This decidedly untame animation pits record album covers against each other. Sounds wierd? Well, yes, but it's quite funny. Enjoy a new internet fad in the making! more »

Own up; you thought exactly the same when you read that news story too. more »

I don't really have an awful lot to add to the Washington Post commentary on extended warranties, other than highlighting the interesting sidenote that they're not always offered by the point-of-sale but by a third party. Personal experience is that if… more »

Oh boy, South Park does World of Warcraft! Everyone who plays it... will understand :) more »

The Smoking Gun, repository of bizarre documentation and mugshots, has a rather amusing concert rider from Iggy And The Stooges. I'd hate to have received it. Concert riders are notorious for having idiosyncratic, if not downright bizarre,… more »

This one completely passed me by until just now. Up in the Yukon territorial politics are incredibly fluid with sitting MPs changing party affiliations seemingly at a moment's notice. The CBC backgrounder makes for a fascinating read, particularly when… more »

I am in severe envy. Do I need a hidden room in my house? Absolutely not. Would I love one? Oh, yeah... more »

Wired Online has an excellent article on the very strange and circuitous rise and fall of the Gizmondo handheld. Fascinating reading. more »

This is just the neatest damned game I have come across in a while. Originality is not usually the strong suit of videogames, and when originality comes into play, it's often coupled with either frustrating mechanics, mere confusion or repetition.… more »

My old high school friend, Menwin, and I chatted about string theory around 1990. He'd done quite a lot of reading on it, and was powerfully intrigued. So was I, but I didn't get a lot of the promise of it. I presumed that the standard model would come… more »

October 1, 2006, there will be no more worldwide patent impediments to using the GIF format for pictures. People making their own gaudy animation software for MySpace users heave a global sigh of relief :) more »

One of the things that stands out about Steve Jobs' ability to sell his product is his ability to recover well when things screw up during a demo. The link above is to a compilation of keynote screwups where Job's ability to roll with the flow is made… more »