#35: Cory

This is all I have to say today:

Maria Corazon "Cory" Cojuangco Aquino (January 25, 1933 – August 1, 2009)

#34: You''re addicted to facebook if...

You are addicted to facebook if:

5. You begin a conversation with "Eric Bringas is..."

4. You call in sick, can't barely get out of bed but will take time to update your status to let everyone know you're sick.

3. You keep saying "Like this" (with a thumbs up) during meetings when you agree to something.

2. Your friends are the first to knows what's on your mind before your mom.

1. You suddenly want to change career and become a farmer.

are you addicted to facebook? tell me why?

#33: Recovering your data from a windows crash

Yesterday, I blogged about how to recover your windows login password.

Now, what if you have a failed windows installation. Meaning your computer won't start up properly. You get confronted with the dreaded BSD (Blue Screen of Death) or windows won't just load. Chances are, your ultimate solution is to reformat your hard drive and reinstall windows.

But wait, what about your files? your photo and video collections from your fabulous vacations. If you have been backing up your data, you're in luck. But what if you don't?

Enter Knoppix or systemrescuecd. These nifty tools are both linux based systems designed to boot from your CD and be able to access any hard drive in your system. Make sure you have a usb flashdrive handy to transfer data from your hard drive. I've used these system countless times and it never fail.

Bottom line though, I suggest you always have a backup of your data. USB flash drives or external hard drives is so cheap nowadays. It won't hurt to have one handy just in case.

Never mind the software, then can be re-installed, but your data can never be recreated.

#32: Oh no I'm locked out!

So you suddenly have an amnesia and you forgot your windows login password. Or you had a fight with your girlfriend/boyfriend and she/he changed your password and run off to the Cayman Island with a hotty or a hunk. You tried every password you can remember but still can't get in. You're locked out. What now? Reformat your computer? what about your files? your music? your photos? your porn? (oops!)

Well, relax, take a deep breath and forget about her/him. Go find a new lover, take a photo with him or her smooching and send a quick MMS to your ex (assuming he/she has not changed her/his identity yet) with a caption "take that!". Ok seriously, download this neat program called Ophcrack. Make sure to grab the LiveCD version. Burn the program into a CD, reboot your computer on the CD and wait for the magic to happen. The program will search and show you every password on every user in your computer.

Once you recover the password, make sure to change it immediately. Remember the rule, make your password easy to remember but not too easy to be cracked. The best password is to include numbers, special characters and capital letters.

Now you learned your lesson, next time if you don't plan marrying your partner, do yourself a favor, your computer is yours alone. Tell them to get their own. After all you need your own privacy, right?

#31: Gonna take a lotta love

This all time classic song "Lotta Love" was originally sang by Neil Young and became more popular when Nicolette Larson did a cover. I just can't stop watching and listening...

"It's gonna take a lotta love, To change the way things are. It's gonna take a lotta love, Or we won't get too far"



can't view the video? Click here for the original post.

#30: Remote Computer support the easy way

One thing I need when supporting users with their computer problems is to be able to see what's in their computer screen.

Having supported users all my computer life, it's a nightmare when talking to a user on the phone. Users can't seem to explain what's wrong (the reason why their calling). Just a simple question like "what's on your screen?", "what where you doing when this happened?", or "Do you have network connection?" sometimes won't even help.

But this was before I used remote access software. Using these software enable you to take control of a user's computer as if you are sitting in front of their computer. Of course this only work if the computer with the issue has still network connection.

I use two remote access software. One is RealVNC and another is a service called logmein. I used them differently.

I use RealVNC when I'm located within our internal network and use logmein when am out of the network (e.g. the internet). Although RealVNC can be configured to be able to connect from the internet to your network, logmein is much simpler to use.

I also use remote access in my desktop computer at the office to have access to my files anywhere I go or check the security camera monitoring our data center. What a convenience!

#29: Owey: What's in the name

Today, My niece Rowsel just passed the Nursing Licensure Exam in the Philippines. Rowsel is the eldest daughter of my brother Dr. Joselito Bringas and Rowena Babida.

I have good memories of my niece. After all I drove her mom to the hospital when she was about to give birth to her. I saw her the day she was born, I had my turn baby sitting her when she was a baby and I saw her took care of my kids when we moved to Bangued during her high school days.

My nieces name is kinda unique. I have not met any one by that name so far. For the benefit of those who doesn't know. Her first name Rowsel was coined after her parents names Row(ena) and (Jo)Sel(ito). Her second name Arsenne was taken from my dad's name Arsenio.

But I never call her Rowsel as most of the immediately family. She's better known to us as Owey. But does anybody ever know how she got the name Owey? Well When Owey was a baby, she would go back and forth from our family house to her mom's house as both households would play tag of war for a chance to have her sleep over. Soon we would say "Uwi dito Uwi doon" (Go home here, Go home there). Thus the name Owey. If my memory serves me right it was my brother Francis who named her such (I stand corrected it's actually my sister Nanette).

Anyway, I have no doubts that Owey will soon follow her father's footstep. As far as I know she started her career in medicine way back in high school when she would run errand to buy prescribed medicine for her dad's patients.

Congratulations Owey! I hope I can join you when your dad will close the whole Santa Rosa for your well deserved party!!!

#28: Tour de France

With the NBA off season still in full swing and football season still a month away, I've been following the Tour de France instead. It's a little bit more exciting this year because of the return of 7 time champion Lance Armstrong after a 3 year absence.

I love to watch Tour de France. for one thing, the coverage is so extensive that you feel like you're actually touring Europe for free.

To appreciate the sports, you have to have a little bit of understanding how the race works. For instance, majority of the time during a stage, you need to be in a group of riders (peloton) to save your energy (Much like walking. You won't feel tired if your walking with someone). Then of course the most exciting part when several riders sprint to the finish line.

With just two stages left, Armstrong is in 3rd place, more than 5 minutes behind the yellow jersey being held by Alberto Contador. In cycling this is a huge lead. Plus the fact that Contador is 11 years younger than Armstrong.

The race will end on Sunday at the famous Champs Elysees in Paris and I of course would be watching every bit of the action.

#27: 5 stupid things I should have not said

Did you ever wish you can take back what you said because you realized it was stupid? Well everyone in one way or another had experience such a boo boo. Here's the top 5 stupid things I said to girls (for real).

5. "What's that on your face, that red thingy? Might want to check the mirror" (not realizing it was a blush on, she spent 10 minutes in the restroom trying to retouch her makeup)

4. My co-worker said, "You know my birthday is on monday". I replied, "Already? Didn't you just had your 30th birthday last month?" (she's actually just 22 years old, I mistakenly mixed her up with another much older co-worker)

3. "I see your drinking non-fat milk, is it because you think your fat?"

2. Trying to make a conversation with a hot lady working in a coffee shop. "Maybe we can grab a coffee sometime?" duh she works at a coffee shop

And the number one stupid thing I said,"Hey you think you can brew some coffee and see if you're a wife material?"

Crap!, I just increased my chance of being single forever.

#26: Photography

I don't know much about photography but when Nadire showed me these photographs she took, I was amazed. Judge for yourself. This photos was taken using a canon powershot sd750 digital camera. (can't see photos? view it here)

#25: No Mas!

I've been going to the gym regularly for the past 4 months.

Tonight is one of those nights that the gym was packed. The usual gym rats were around, flexing their muscles, pumping irons and doing resistance trainings. The cardio machines where churning like windmills. The yoga room is worse, bodies are all over the place doing stretches and working their abs.

As I get ready to hit the free weights (today am working on my arms), I glanced around desperately looking for my work-out buddy. He promised to be here tonight.

See, it's no fun working out alone. I tend to get lazy and cannot get the results I wanted. I waited for few more minutes as I put on my headphones (I was listening to Springsteen). I waited some more until I finally gave up.

I started with two 20 pound dumbbells (but quickly switch to 30 pounds when a girl pass by and counting loud..30, 31, 32). As I was finishing my 4th set, a familiar (well maybe not, I can't remember his name) face suddenly came from nowhere. He was smiling, I smiled back and shook his hand.

He started by saying "Como esta senor!". oh! now I remember him, he's my former student's husband (but I still can't remember his name). Ok, now am in trouble, not only I forgot his name, I only know few spanish words.

But what the heck, let me try. I asked him "Donde esta Nina?" (yes I remember his wife's name). He answered back "Nina no esta aqui, Nina en la casa". Well that's simple, I actually understand what he said. I said "ohhhh!". Then I went blank. I can't find any spanish words.

So I decide to speak in english and do some gestures hoping he's going to understand what I'm saying. I asked him what he's working on. He gestured to his arm. Well I said I'm doing that too. So I said "Vamos amigo, let's work on those arms".

For the next 30 minutes, we went around w0rking on different machines. Every now and then I would count uno, dos tres... and he would do the same. "dies reps, cinco sets" I would tell him. He would nod and smile. At some point he would point to his arm and grimace...I would say "No...uno mas, one more"

We probably went through 5 different machines until he start shaking his head "No Mas, No Mas", Hey I heard that before. It was Roberto Duran saying No Mas No Mas (no more, no more) as he surrendered to Sugar Ray Leonard.

Well ok. I said it was bueno (good). I said, I need to run for 10 minutos (as a point to the treadmill). "ah ok, me no mas", he said. I shook his hand and as a parting words, I said "esta manana?". He said ok.

As he hurried out of the gym, I said to myself, so much for spanish class in college. I may be seeing him again tomorrow. Now if I can only remember his name...

#24: Hello am a Linux

Ever watch the "Hello am a PC and a Mac" commercial? You think it's funny? Watch these videos



Here's another one


and another one


can't view from facebook? click here to see the original post

#23: Short Summer

It's getting hotter each day. Summer in San Diego is in full force as the mercury keeps rising. But it's a short one at least for my kids.

Summer vacation has been shortened from 10 weeks last year to just 6 weeks this year. Frankly it's better for me and for the kids.

See, my kids tend to get bored if idle for a long time. After the first few weeks of vacation, they turned grumpy, restless and absolute irritant at times. They start to whine often and turn the house into a mess. Words like "I'm bored", "Nothing to do". "Well why don't you clean your room", I said. "But that's not fun!!", is always the reply.

This year, the whining and the yawning is conspicuously absent in their vocabulary. Due to the short summer, they have not reach their boiling points yet. And they never will as they are going back in just a couple of days.

Josh will be a senior, Deirdre a Junior and Nadire is starting in middle school. they've been busy attending school orientation and finishing up summer works.

But of course to me back to school means breaking my piggy bank...

#22: Orange Belt

It was a big day for Deirdre and Nadire. Today, they completed their testing to move from white belt to orange belt in taekwondo.

My daughters started their taekwondo class 6 weeks ago. They practice 3 times a week under the eagle eye of Master Kwon, a Korean grandmaster and his assistant Mr. Dan Resurrection, a Filipino fourth degree blackbelter (see photo below).

So far their are enjoying every bit of it. I can see in their eyes the motivation to reach the goal of being a blackbelter. That's 2-3 years of hard work. Quite a tall order, but as sit in the sideline each time (Master Kwon has been urging me to join them- so far i resisted), I know that they will go all the way.

The class is not cheap, but I see this opportunity as a great investment for their future. Aside from being able to defend themselves in times of trouble, it will certainly improve their confidence and discipline to face the world on their own.

To my daughters Saranghabnida (I Love you). And to Master Kwon and Dan, go'mahp'sum'nida (thank you).

#21: Leveraging Open Source in Health IT

I was interviewed by linux.com in August 2008 (FOSS app eases the pain for San Diego community clinic) regarding my works in leveraging Open Source Technology in Health Care particularly to non-profit community clinics.

I first presented the idea on a round table discussion with other clinics around San Diego back in 2003. The discussion was attended by CEO's, CFO's and IT Manager. Unfortunately, the feedback was all negative and somehow even elicit some faint laughter. I remember one of the attendees said to radical, too good to be true and emphatically declared "if it's free it must be worthless". I left that meeting disappointment but not discouraged.

Six years later, I succeeded in bringing a cutting-edge Health Care software that enabled our clinic to survive the rapid changes. While other clinics are now struggling and confused on what to do next, our clinic is at full speed ahead in our implementation of a low-cost sophisticated EMR (Electronic Medical Record).

Every time I look back on what had happened through the years, I'm always reminded on Mahatma Gandhi's famous quote, "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win".

#20: Chichacorn and the magic jack saved the day

Often times I suffer from brain drain. It's a situation where I just want the day to pass without doing much effort. It was like everything is blurry and in a very slow pace.

It's my first week back to the office after a brief vacation and I'm already exhausted. I was ready to call it a day until the chichacorn saved the day. I got a bunch of these delicious treats from my Brother Dennis together with some kiko (Francis Magalona) shirts. My brother sent the package through his co-worker (Sunday) who's in town. Sunday even gave me some dried mangoes and a cookies & cream flavored polboron (never thought it existed but my kids loved it).

Back home, I called my brother's magicjack to thank him but found out he's in Malaysia. I got my mom instead. I forgot she's in Manila (I talked to her just two days ago)

We talked for about an hour (who cares, it virtually free anyway) as we exchange news here and there. I finally bid adieu to my mom...as I explained my kids need to go to their Taekwando practice.

As I hang up the phone, I realized it's not a bad day after all. Now am sitting, watching TV and on my second pack of chichacorn...

#19: Barangay Ginebra

I just came back from a conference in L.A. regarding the State of California's Initiative to convert all Medical Records to Electronic format and be able to seamlessly exchange clinical data to different health care providers.

I was planning to write about what transpired during the conference but on my way back to San Diego, I was browsing inquirer.net and saw the sports headline that San Miguel Beer stayed alive as they even up the series 3-3 against Barangay Ginebra in the PBA fiesta cup finals.

Anyway, I just realized I have not been following the PBA since I moved to the U.S. 9 years ago.

Ok California Initiative can wait (after all the state is broke and politicians are still fighting in Sacramento on how to close the more that $26 Billion budget deficit ).

As I continue reading the article, it seems that Ginebra is still the most popular team today. But I cannot recognize any of the players anymore (except for Menk). Gone are the players I knew very well...The Big J, Chito and Rudy.

This brings back one memorable moment in the history of the PBA that I can never forget. It was 1991. Ginebra was battling Shell for the Open Conference Title. Shell jumped to a commanding 3-1 lead in a 7 game series. It was over (at least for the Shell fans) but Ginebra fans refused to surrender. Then it happened. Ginebra made a furious come back and tied the series and eventually completed the greatest come back in PBA history courtesy of a last second off-balance shot by Rudy Distrito. Of course it would have not happen without a great inbound pass from the Big J.

Let's relive the moment and watch one of the greatest shot ever:



if you can't see the embedded video just go directly to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bW7VV5z9m-I

#18: Do you feel lucky?

I love to watch movies. I specially love good scripts or quotes which make them more memorable.

Who can forget Michael Corleone in the Godfather movie, "I'll make him an offer he can't refuse." or Tony Montana in Scarface blasting his way with an RPG "Say hello to my little friend".

What about Forrest Gump saying "My momma always said, "Life was like a box of chocolates. You never know what you're gonna get."

Does anyone remember Phoebe Cates in the TV series Lace asking "Which one of you bitches is my mother? ".

And then of course several quotes from Harry Callahan (Clint Eeastwood)

Sudden Impact: "Go ahead make my day"

Magnum Force: " A man's got to know his limitations"

My top of the list is from Dirty Harry Movie:

"I know what you're thinking. "Did he fire six shots or only five?" Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kind of lost track myself. But being as this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you've got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk?"

here's the actual clip:



What about you, what's your favorite movie quote?

#17: It's not all about technology

I'm back to work today after a 10 day hiatus. My calendar was full. let's see, a briefing from my IT assistant, a teleconference with our software developer, an urgent report requested by the CEO. Technical issues from the Billing department, and some bits and pieces that's not so urgent.

As I entered the IT Lab, my assistant filled me in with everything that had happened (good and bad) while I was away. Most of the issues were not new since I was always in touch through email. But he gladly talk about it anyway.

As always, the first order of my business is to check my phone messages. 23 messages! whoa! I went through the messages and there are some important ones and there are some messages that sells something that I normally delete. But there was one message that actually set the tone of the day..."Hello Ms. Cole (not her real name), we just got your pap smear result please call us back at ...". I turned to my assistant and ask, "did you ever remember if I had a pap smear?". And we started laughing. "Not that there's anything wrong with it", he said.

I turned my attention to my emails. There's a couple of them I need to respond to. "Hi sorry for the delay, I was on vacation" was my standard opening statement (copy paste seems to be very convenient in this case). There's a question from a user "Why can't I go to youtube?, I just want to see the ghost of Michael Jackson".

I sent one to the billing manager asking her status of our electronic claims format which I modified recently. I promptly got a reply back. "Still waiting for feedback...and oh by the way, light bulb in my room is out, you think someone can fix it?" which i replied back, "do you know how many IT guys will it take to replace a light bulb? 3, one to check what version is the bulb, one to to find the latest version of the bulb, and one to test the new version to be compatible with the socket"

It was all downhill from there! Working in IT sometimes is not all about technology, sometimes it's the humor that goes with it!

#16: Getting into the Cloud

Doing business of all sorts these days needs to have some kind of a computer system infrastructure in place.

You need to buy hardware (e.g. computers). You need to buy business automation suites (e.g. word-processing, spreadsheet and presentation software).

You may also need to buy a specialize accounting program to manage your finances, maybe an inventory software, a CRM (Customer Relations Management) System. These applications would then requires a computer server so users can have simultaneous access to your data. Computer server can be 10 times more expensive that your normal desktop computer.

It doesn't stop there though, depending on how many users you have, you may need to buy more licenses. You would also have to have a good backup system to protect your most important asset - your data.

And lastly of course you would need internet connection for your online activities, email system and your corporate website. Oh what about maintenance costs??? constant software and hardware updates, and then of course IT support can be very expensive too.

Adding up all these technology factors, your cost will definitely go through the roof.

Today, these expensive cost can be avoided my using the cloud computing technology. The cloud is actually a metaphor of the Internet.

In a cloud computing system, applications are running on the Internet. Accessing the cloud will not require installing any software. All you need is a web browser such as firefox or internet explorer. The beauty of cloud computing is that, you can have access to your applications anywhere you are as long as there's an internet connection available.

Most of us are already using cloud computing. If you have an e-mail account with a Web-based e-mail service like Hotmail, Yahoo Mail or Gmail, then you are already using cloud computing.

Google actually offers cloud computing services (for free) on their gmail, google docs (word-processing, spreadsheet and presentation), calendaring and task management. Using these services, you can easily collaborate in the cloud by sharing these applications to other users.

Building Cloud Services is straight forward. Right now am playing around Amazon EC2 AWS (Amazon Web Services) to run different web Applications. I am quite impressed as I was able to install a complete web server running a LAMPP (Linux, apache, mysql, php, perl) stack and installed hosting control panel ispconfig and run Joomla CMS in under 10 minutes. I plan to move abrenian.com soon to AWS.

If you think you're spending a lot on your technology needs, maybe cloud computing is your solution...shoot me an email if you do.

#15: Party's over...at least for now

It was a crazy two day party. Nadire's party is over. I didn't have much sleep last night since I was trying to make sure Nadire and her guests won't be doing any crazy things. I went to bed at 4AM and I can still here them talking. I don't know how they did it but all the girls stayed up all night.

In the morning, some parents started to trickle in and picking up their kids. By noon time, a couple of them still lounging around, tired, weary and quiet (thank God!). But later in the day, those who stayed around took a short trip at the 7-11 store to grab some free slurpees. I asked why it's free? Well duh! It's July 11, it's 7/11, my sons explained.

I finally dropped off the last kid at 6pm. By then Nadire already fell a sleep and didn't wake up until 10PM. We started talking about the party and she said she enjoyed it very much. Her friends went home happy and she got some nice gifts as well.

Whew! It's finally over, I feel exhausted, and the though of going back to work on monday doesn't seem too comforting either.

The tent is still left standing in the backyard. I asked Nadire if I can take it down and she said "Maybe I can still invite some friends over again.." whoa! here we go again.

#14: Soccer dad

Today I was running around like a headless chicken. I was a soccer mom...err dad. Today is Nadire's Birthday party.

Her party started at Atlantis laser tag. A grueling 2 hour of laser gun fight with 10 rowdy twelve year old kids. It's my first time to ever play the game and I must say it kinda enjoying.

After the game, we moved the party to our house where we setup a tent at the backyard.







All of her friends are sleeping over. As I write this blog, my house is a mess, I got cellphones, shoes, socks and bags all over my room. I can still hear them giggling, laughing in the backyard. I'm not sure if they will ever sleep tonight so I guess I am in for a long haul. Tomorrow I have to cook breakfast and am wondering what to serve hungry and sleepless 12 year olds?

What a long day but one thing for sure Nadire is having a lot of fun. So am I...

#13: Consider a netbook as your next portable computer

Are you in a market for a new laptop? You may want to consider buying a netbook instead. What are the advantages of going for a netbook as opposed to a more traditional laptop?

1. Netbooks are cheap. Netbooks can have a price range of just $200-$400.

2. Netbooks are lightweight. Typically from just 2-3 pounds. Very good for road warriors

3. Netbook starts fast and runs fast. The operating system is a strip down version of either Linux or Windows XP. Forget Windows VISTA.

4. Very simple, no frills. Netbooks are designed to tightly integrate with web-applications such as email, web browsing or cloud computing.

I have an eepc as my second laptop. It's very portable and serves me well when am traveling or plan to work in a coffee shop or the library.

There are many netbook brand to choose from aside from what I just mentioned. There the HP Mini, acer one or the dell mini just to mention a few.

#12: Dancing in the dark

Bruce "The Boss" Springsteen is one of my favorite singer. I love listening to "Thunder Road" and "Born to Run" among others.

My favorite video of The Boss is "Dancing in the Dark" from his smash hit album "Born in the U.S.A.". The song's lively and make you want to dance when played.

Notice at the tail end of the video, where Bruce danced with a girl on stage. Do you recognize her? Yes it's Courtney Cox, one of the starts of friends. It was though that it was this video that started Courtney's career in showbiz.

I've been waiting to see a Bruce Springsteen concert since I came to the U.S. So far no luck. He's actually touring Europe at this moment. here goes the video...enjoy!

Dancing in The Dark

#11: After the Thrill(er) is gone

Today is all about Michael Jackson. It's information overload. Every available medium is talking about him. Every news media tried to out do each other as they talk about his rise to fame, his music and his death. I don't have to tell you what happen today as everyone probably watched the event.

But I do have to say that once in my younger years I did listen and even dance to his music, in particular to his famous Thriller album released in 1982 (If I'm not mistaken my friend Pancho has the album in vinyl - if he still have it, he might want to put it up on ebay? hehe).

Yes I admit, my friends and I were among those who would try to imitate his moonwalk moves, his spins and his outfit. Our nights at the disco will not be complete without dancing to "Billy Jean". We probably got crazy with his music for a year that our group was once called "The Punky Boys".

Eventually we have outgrown Michael Jackson. Suddenly dancing is no longer cool. We have given away our wind breakers, our tight pants and even our gloves to the next generation. Together with my friends we started listen to Jackson Browne, Bruce Springsteen and other classic rock musicians up to this day.

When I heard the news about Michael Jackson's untimely death, I immediately asked myself "is it drugs?". Indications seems to point to that direction.

I asked my daughter Deirdre what she thinks of Michael Jackson's music and his death. She said, "His songs are ok but It's not good how he died". Obviously sounding disappointed.

Undoubtedly, Michael was a great artist. Whatever the reason he end up dead, we may never know unless we ourselves will be in a position where he was.

I've long put away my dancing shoes, but I still have good laughs recalling those days which I'm sure my old friends would also feel the same.

#10: A glimpse of the past

My whole family love humor. My late dad had endless jokes and often times he would talk about priests and nuns. There were times when a storm would knock off power for hours at night and we would light candles and snuggle with each other as my dad would belt off story after story until we would fall asleep.

I also remember when watching sitcoms became a happy family event. I remember, we would sit around and watch our favorite sitcom just after dinner. Although there's been a lot of instances where my dad would dooze-off in the middle of the show.

Anyway, definitely a family favorite was the local sitcom "John and Marsha". I just love Dona Delilah's sermon "Kaya ikaw John...magsumikap ka!". But for foreign shows, there where several. "Three's Company" was definitely a must. Different strokes, Doggie Hauser MD, The Cosby show and my mom's favorite "The Golden Girls".

Except for Three's Company, I never watched the finale of the rest of the shows i mentioned, until today when I caught the finale of The Golden Girls - in a nutshell, Dorothy married Blanche's uncle Lucas after Blanche set them up for a date. Dorothy and Lucas moved to Atlanta. Sophia decided to stay with Blanch and Rose in Miami.

I love watching old sitcoms because it reminds of the good times I shares with my family. I really miss those days.

#9: Try Ubuntu Linux the easy way

Linux is an OS (operating system) much like windows. Both are used to control the operations of a computer. A big difference is that Linux is free. Free means you can modify the codes to your liking.

There are hundreds of variants (more popularly called distos) of Linux you can choose from. Redhat, Debian and Ubuntu are some of the more popular distos out there. The way to choose the right one for you is to try some and with your experience you can decide which one to use.

I have been using Linux for quite a while. For server I like installing Ubuntu or CentOS. For the desktop or laptop, I like Ubuntu.

The safest way to try Linux in your existing windows-based computer is to do dual-booting. In this way, you will not mess up your windows installation while test driving Linux.

A cool program to do just that is using wubi - an Ubuntu Installer for windows, you can install and uninstall Linux much like you do when installing a windows application.

Once you completed the installation, you will notice when you restart your computer, you will now be prompted to choose which OS you want to load. To uninstall Ubuntu, just go to your add/remove program in your control panel and remove the software. That's it!

I've tried wubi on different desktops and laptops and it's quite great detecting every devices. It even detects my PCMCIA aircard for my anywhere internet connection.

note: the initial file installer is very small but when you start the installation, it has to download the complete OS which is about 650MB. So make sure you have a broadband connection to speed up the process.

#8: Serendipity on the web

Serendipity (not the movie by John Cusack) according to wikipedia is the effect by which one accidentally discovers something fortunate, especially while looking for something else entirely. Often times this happens to me a lot when I am on the web finding something.

Today, I downloaded a program called winscp, a program i normally use to access my remote linux servers. As I started installing the program, I was asked if I want to install Flock too. Flock? I have no idea what it is but it sound harmless, I thought. So sure why not.

After some few minutes, the installation was completed. I have my winscp and flock. I fired up flock and what do you know, it's an internet browser. As I play with the program a little bit, it looked like it was designed to streamline interface with popular social networking sites, video sites, photo sites and webmails.

Digging more information, flock actually was built on mozilla firefox code according to this review from cnet.

My first impression is that it's a little bit overwhelming at first because there's to many icons. it may take me sometime to get used to it. Flock maybe useful to social networking junkies who want to have a convenient screen to access all their accounts.

Try flock and who knows you might love it. Now back to my winscp, gotta start building the new abrenian.com web 2.0 beta.

#7: Filter Unwanted Internet Contents For Free

Ever wonder where your kids are surfing on the Internet? If you have a business, do you wonder if your employees are using company time to update their facebook status or searching the latest bargain on craigslist instead of working? Do you want to protect your home or office network from visiting dangerous websites?

There are ways to do it. One way is you can buy a content filtering appliance which will cost you thousands of dollars. Another is to build your own (if you are tech savvy enough) using an open source program like dansguard.

At some point I did tried using dansguards but I gave up after few weeks because it's just not working for me until I discovered OpenDNS.

OpenDNS is a free service that make the Internet safer through integrated Web content filtering, anti-phishing and DNS. There a three ways to setup openDNS. Either on your computer, through your router, or through your existing DNS Server.

Once you're up and running, you can start by choosing different pre-configured security setup that will block unwanted traffic such as porn, ad-wares, phishing websites, known rouge sites and more. You can also have the option to block specific website by just adding to your blocked list. The changes is almost instantaneous. In addition, you can turn on access log to record websites that are being visited.

I have implemented OpenDNS in our office and the effect is remarkable. Traffic went down by almost 50%. Productivity went up and calls for virus warning just went down. Although it made me unpopular to some staff who can no longer access their favorite music sites or social networking sites. I didn't mind because it's my job to keep the company's network safe and secure.

If you decide to use OpenDNS, I would love to hear how it worked for you.

#6: Two birthdays and maybe something else

Tomorrow, I will start my 10 day vacation. I'm not going anywhere though. I will be home most of the time with my kids. I do this every year not only because I need it, but more important it's the week where my kids Deirdre and Nadire will be celebrating their birthdays.

Deirdre will be turning 16. "I don't want a party, I am a party pooper ", she said. All I want is a Mac. Ouch! pretty pricey for a gift. I told her, I can't afford it at this time but am working on it (thanks a lot Steve Jobs!). She said "Fine I can wait".

Nadire is the opposite. She'll be turning 12. She loves parties. She gets invited all the time. She invites friends to the house even when there's no party. She gets bored if she doesn't go out. She had planned her birthday party 3 months in advance. In fact her birthday will last for two days. The first day, she and her friends will go laser tagging. The party will then move to our house for a back yard camping until the next day. And guess who's baby sitting these wild kids? ahem!

Two birthdays in 10 days is not that all bad. But of course I will have some time for myself as well. Get some sleep, get to the gym earlier, maybe read a book (nah!), catch a movie (definitely - last movie I watched was slumdog milllionaire) or maybe, just maybe I can finally put up a test website of a new abrenian.com (the site needs a major face lift) using elgg - a facebook/myspace/friendster-like social networking software.

Kids' birthday parties will definitely push through. The rest? I'll just play it by ear.

#5: Surf the web faster and safer with Firefox 3.5

I just upgraded my firefox browser to version 3.5, a day after it's release and already am loving it. It's definitely much snappier than the previous version. So far the new version has reach 5 million downloads in just one day.

I've been using firefox since it was first released in 2004 and I haven't stop using it ever since. It's definitely much much better than internet explorer specially when it comes to virus protection and security.

It is now a part of my routine when I setup new computers or fix old ones to install firefox. Aside from your anti-virus software, installing firefox should be a must.

If you have not heard of firefox before, it's not to late to start. Grab your copy for free at mozilla.com. The new features are pretty awesome.