Thinking About Buying a Lexmark x4530?

OK… go ahead, just don’t expect the wireless scanning to work.  Well, maybe it will work for you, but it is really (REALLY) flaky for me.

So let me drop some stats… I am running a Phenom 9850 2.5Ghz quad core with 4GB RAM and due to other drivers (Don’t know if Lexmark plays on 64 bit or not), I am running XP Pro (32-bit).

The Lexmark x4530 has been a pretty good unit, it prints and scans well, the software is pretty easy to use (the configuration/drivers are clunky because they bolted stuff together from previous models to make it work).  Where it starts to flake out is…well, the one feature that compelled me to buy it: Wireless.

The unit will print wireless.  That for me has been quite reliable.  But I do a fair amount of scanning for my meager DeviantArt page, and this thing is like pulling teeth. 

To get it to scan wirelessly the first time took about 30 minutes with a chat-based Lexmark technician, who had to remote into my machine and reinstall drivers.  After that it worked that one day.

A couple days later I went to scan and it was broken.  But I found if I went and changed the name of my computer via the “Lexmark Solution Center” (Advanced icon, networking button, then click the link “Change your PC name”), then I could get it to scan.  It always throws an error saying the new name I selected is in use – it is stepping on itself somehow…but it works so I do it anyway.

Of course this generated a laundry list of computer names…”Stix”, “Stix2″, “PajamaParty”, “PorkJoy”, “GrapeMadness” all of which were broken except for the current one I had created.

But then the day came when this trick stopped working.  It was back to tech support, and it took 90 minutes this time… and I was able to scan for? You guessed it, THAT DAY.

Here I am creating “PorkJoy2″ and my printer scanned but I know this is the hell I will endure, unless I either buy a USB hub, or they fix their software.

So, if you don’t need wireless , then don’t buy this printer.  If you DO need wireless scanning, then don’t buy this printer, IMHO.  However, if you just need wireless printing it might be a good fit -and Lexmark inkjet printers/ink to date are still my favorite over comparable Canon, HP and Epson (although it has been a while since I bought an Epson, the Stylus I had pissed me off way too much to rush into trying them again).

Hope this prooves useful! Happy printing and scanning….

There’s No Place Like the Office

They like me. They really really like me.

Web, DTP, Graphics and Layout

The Dilemma
Gah, I own CS2 but lost the key and for months now Adobe has been dancing around getting me my key.  Same with Studio 8 (now that Adobe owns that too).

So, I started looking for website and graphics tools that were modestly priced, and found some pretty cool stuff… maybe you know about it, maybe not.

Caveats
The web-products below generate their own CSS and inline styles (but they do support naming, just usually in DIV tags)… not the best for integration with a bigger site or .NET custom stuff, but I am going to try and figure that out too, because these products make graphics and web layout about as painless as I have seen in years

Meet the Xara Line ($50-100)
Page Layout, “WYSIWYG on crack” editing (text repel / graphic and text layout is super easy), but this is not the best for painting :

cheapest: http://www.xara.com/us/products/webdesigner/
more phun: http://www.xara.com/us/products/xtreme/

Meet MediaChance ($50):
RealDraw puts some interesting twists on blending vector illustration (drawing) and raster graphics (painting) - pretty cool, and potentially non-destructive (look at NPR styles, lighting studio and liquid vectors just to name a couple kewl psychotic tricks):

Real-Draw: http://www.mediachance.com/realdraw/index.html
Other Stuff: http://www.mediachance.com/

Enjoy! I know I am Maybe I will have a website up soon using these.

“Losing His Edge”

Oh fiddlee-poo. I have seen some stupid headlines in my time (noooo, really?), but there is this recent proliferation of “Obama is losing his edge” headlines. Bu-duh! Listen here, I didn’t vote for the guy, but he won. He is the President of the United States of America. And in so far as I can find the good in that, and support his endeavors, I am going to do it.  So, using the power of my blog, which reaches between two and four Americans every day (staggering, isn’t it?) let’s get a few things STRAIGHT, shall we?

First, no one person is going to fix this.  I’ve already had that rant when I was trying to decide which of the two competing suckers to stick with the task of helming  the Titanic after it hit the iceberg.  The only way for our government to get fixed is for people to participate in it.  And I am still guilty of sitting on the sidelines, so until we are all actually PRACTICING government, we cannot expect it to fix itself. Period. That goes for everyone in the entire country.

Second, the problem has little to do with government.  Yeah we have all seen the videos about “the biggest game in town,” and arguably that is part of the government – but not really.  The root cause of the problem is economic terrorism.  I’ve already had THAT rant, as the economic terrorists (AKA “The best and the brightest”) haven’t even tried to change their spots – they are just switching their funding sources from consumer markets to taxpayers (and since BOTH of those are the SAME people, nothing has changed).

So there it is. This isn’t about Obama. This isn’t about McCain. This is a battle between consumers and “the best and the brightest.”  This is a battle between the American people at large, and the American elite -who seem to remain untouchable despite of their gross management of financials, their lack of ethics, and their addiction to rape.   This isn’t about State, about Religion, about Race or about anything other than Greed.

Greed. Lets call it what it is.  I was reading some comments on artwork on DeviantArt, and an artist acquaintance of mine stated how she was sick of capitalism and religion enslaving people.  I replied to her, and for the life of me I cannot find my reply on the site.  But the answer holds true here.  At the root of greed is ignorance. I am not kidding.  What is greed? www.dictionary.com defines it as “excessive or rapacious desire, esp. for wealth or possessions.” Odd that the term “rapacious” is used, because I used the word “rape” earlier before I had read this definition. 

What would motivate someone to aspire to greed? Fear. People fear what they don’t understand, they fear the unknown, they fear the future, they fear death, they have a lot of fear.  Fear drives us, even on our best days.  Fear, and how we manage it, is part of life itself – it drives religion, it drives science, it drives the arts…and yes, it drives the economy.  Fear is always there, and it NEEDS to be there.  What the “Best and the Brightest” represents are the ultimate financial warriors.  They surround themselves with “intelligence”, they exploit every possible venue and amass their wealth because, like it or not, they are scared and don’t know how to deal with it any other way.

I am not saying it is right.  I am not endorsing their choices.  But what I am putting forth is the notion that their greed is ignorant. I told my fellow DeviantArt member that the only way to fix things would be to educate both the slavers and the enslaved.  But what would we teach?  Ahhh. The light is on, and that is a topic for another blog entry.

Please comment.  There are as many perspectives as there are people, and I only lament my human incapacity to absorb them all.  But please, share!!

That’s Not Yoga I’m Smelling…

Holy chips and bean dip, captain! I have definitely stumbled across one of those accidental discoveries that should probably remain UNDISCOVERED.  But, pop culture being what it is, and media catering to the lowest denominator and people waving signs saying “God Hates You” and all that, I figure… what the heck, I will SHARE (yummay!)

Now, if you’ve read around (which I have not, I just borrow from other people’s research), you may have heard how yoga balls make for better ergonomic chairs, and they cost $30 instead of $4,999,014 (price slightly dramatified to show texture).  So, yes, I bought a yoga ball and threw my chair in the attic (it was a folding chair, just so you don’t hurt yourself visualizing my attempt to get a chair through a small hole in the ceiling).

So far, things are pretty mundane.  But about a week ago, I made 12 quarts of slow-cooked split-pea soup.  One need not use much imagination, as I think we have all experienced the joys of our fair-weathered “musical fruit”!

The true entertainment value, however, is when I combined this “music” with the yoga ball. What would normally have been a silent squeak was amplified via the ball!  Like some form of deranged mad-scientist, I bounced happily on the yoga ball while unleashing a chaotic cacophony using only the pure sounds of the booty-flute and the zen amplification provided by said yoga ball.

Needless to say, when I was done with my exhillerating Symphony of Split-Pea in B-flat (ulant), I did stop to wonder, who else might have been home?  The land lord? My roommates? Guests of my roommates? Perhaps I should be embarrassed, but I am instead liberated! Just, for your own well-being, don’t ask to borrow my yoga ball…

Nocturnal Condo

I had a weird dream (OK, that was stupidly obvious). I dreamt my oldest daughter and I had somehow procured a thing that looked like one of those old map drawer cases – the wooden ones.  And it was crossed with that “lazy susan” technology that  has become a common upgrade in corner cabinets in kitchens, so the wooden draws spun out instead of pulled out.

What do you think the cabinet was for?? It was a multi-layer terrarium for nocturnal reptiles! Yes, for some reason we decided we wanted an entire reptilian high-rise in our house. Each level of this thing held (supposedly) different types of creatures appropriate for that drawer – the drawers were stocked with crickets/bugs, dirt, and some foliage.  On top of this structure was a pond with, of course, amphibious reptiles in it.

As I opened various drawers, a diverse array of creatures would scurry/slither to the back of the drawer. I remember talking with my daughter and wondering why in the world we would acquire such a creepy thing.  I thought the pond was kind-of cool, but it had a blue and yellow snake swimming in it.  As all dreams go, I just HAD to put my hand in the water to “pet the cute, potentially poisonous snake” and what do you think happened? Yep. He bit me.

I pulled my right hand out of the water, declaring to my wife that this snake just bit my hand. I remember telling her how I really didn’t know what half these creatures were, and figured because the snake was brightly colored, there was a chance it might be poisonous.  She was not thrilled.

My hand started to tingle, and I looked down at the bite marks, which were fairly deep punctures, but not too big.  Two holes on either side of the back of my hand, just below the knuckle of my  forefinger, and two more closer to the back side of my wrist.  The ones on my knuckle were just starting to  become inflamed, and I watched the crimson blood start to well-up in the holes.  I was calm, but I was sure there was venom, and it was working its way somewhere.

My alarm went off, and I woke up . Of course I looked at my hand and there was nothing there… whew.

Economic Terrorism

Think about this.  We all know about terrorism, although there is no standard definition for it, we generally accept that an entity, representing a very small and radical set of the larger populace, employs terror as a means of achieving their goals.

 

I unwittingly realized today, as several thoughts came together within my stressed little brain, that terrorism is being practiced in our economy. In the military there is a “deck of 52″ – the most wanted terrorists.  But in our economy, I think we would be hard-pressed to limit the deck to such a small number of names. In the US, I would venture to estimate that there’s a deck of 208? 624? 8,320?  (pull a number out of…well, you can guess) They are practicing economic terrorism.

 

Yes, I would bet a dollar-two-ninety-eight that this group of financial extremists, operating under the alias of “the best and the brightest” has deployed weapons of mass economic destruction by leeching decades of profits out of every possible venue into their own pockets.

 

Now, most people would say,”But that is just greed. Not terrorism.” Oh no-no, my friends. Greed might be the idealogy behind these extremist’s actions, but it runs far deeper. For, now that they have unleashed this unholy, monetary-mutilating beast upon the people of this country — indeed this planet — they have also coerced the government into trillions of dollars worth of bail-out.  What does that mean? That their reward for screwing over the entire planet is, they get MORE MONEY!!

 

And who pays for that? As millions of people (millions, if you caught that) lose their jobs and experience the terror of “the best and the brightest,” these SAME economic terrorists are LEECHING yet more money out of the future via the people who still TRY to remain employed.

 

AND (oh yes, it does get richer, my fellow lemmings) – what DO YOU THINK happens when this planetary implosion reaches its peak? YES! Demand goes down.  When demand goes down, prices go down. AND WHOOOOOOO will have all the money to MOP UP the failing businesses, failing real estate, and FAILING GOVERNMENTS that have over-extended themselves??? “The best and brightest” will.

 

There’s no military to stop them.  There’s…nothing…to stop them. No punishments in place. No tribunals or hangings for their weapon of mass destruction or the terror they have caused.  There is nothing but a street lined with gold, and they will be repaving that in platinum – because gold is passe.

 

That’s my little theory. Some days, it is good to be wrong.

 

Cheers!

 

Package Load Failure Microsoft.VisualStudio.Xaml

BACKGROUND
Well, if you are like me, you downloaded the Express version of Visual Studio 2008 because you were too impatient to wait the 3 days for the DVD to arrive in the mail.  Then it arrived and took 10 years to install, and after firing up  Visual Studio 2008, you get a “Package Load Failure” siting Microsoft.VisualStudio.Xaml.  Afterwords, you notice there is no XAML intellisense.  After a brief bout of insanity – running around screaming, chewing on the cat’s leg, sending the children to bed at 3pm – you then calmly search the web.

FIX
I removed the express editions. No Go.

I ran the repairs suggested here. No go (and, my default key in my registry was not blank, so I was just trying it because I could).

I ran the devenv.exe /setup suggested here (found it buried in an article):
“If you are still hitting this, I just found a fix.  Using cmd, navigate to the Visual Studio 2008 (9.0) folder in the Program Files folder.  cd to Common7\IDE.  Type, “devenv.exe /setup”

You can open taskmgr to monitor the devenv process.  When it’s done, just reopen visual studio and xml should start rendering.  At least it worked for me.  Good luck.”

I deleted the toolbar temp files (and I can’t find the link – sorry) which are located in C:\Documents and Settings under your username, then look under Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0 (or something similar) and delete the .tbd files there. No go

What worked for me was to download and re-run Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1

Now it could JUST be SP1, or maybe a combination of steps – so I would recommend running the last three.  Of course if this obliterates your system, then I am not liable…all this stuff is DO AT YOUR OWN RISK!

Enjoy the XAML Goodness (or so I hope)!