IBGerm

Archive for September, 2010

Use OCR to Extract Text from Any Image

by admin on Sep.12, 2010, under Cool Stuff, Technology


Download here from cnet.-JOCR

-side note, You will need Microsoft Document Imaging installed on your system. If you have Office 2003 or higher, chances are that you have it installed. In case it is not, you can do so from within “Add and Remove Programs” and then choosing to install “Document Imaging”.

mdiinstall

Once this is installed, JOCR can be used to recognize any language that is installed within Microsoft Document Imaging.

 

JOCR

JOCR essentially allows you to take screenshots and then detect the text within the image, excellent for situations where you are copying from an image but you don’t want to type the text.

image

You can capture a region, a window or the entire desktop and then perform character recognition. Once you have captured the image just hit recognize and JOCR will attempt to give you the text from within the image.

image

image

It is pretty fast and the actual recognition time will depend upon the type of image you are trying to perform OCR on. The recognized text is placed on the clipboard and JOCR will open up a notepad file where you can paste the text and see how well JOCR fared.

Although JOCR is officially limited to reading screen grabs, however there is nothing stopping you from scanning a document, save it, open it up at 100 % and summon JOCR. It actually did a pretty good job when I opened this image and then took a screenshot of the window to read it.

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Broken Lizard Latest News

by admin on Sep.12, 2010, under Cool Stuff, Entertainment, Strange Stuff


Ok,I know this isn’t more normal blog material, like there is a normal, but… I so dig Broken Lizard, they have made some funny, strange cult movies. I ran across this “special” last night on Comedy Central and it was GOOD!!!. I am thinking of broken_lizard_logogetting the DVD when it releases. When I was looking up the release info, I cam across this. I didn’t know they did another movie after Beer Fest. The latest film, although it appears to have been released  on DVD and BLU-RAY in April of this year.  http://www.slamminmovie.com/. The synopsis….

 

“Slammin” Clean Salmon (Michael Clarke Duncan)is a former Heavyweight Champion of the World turned celebrity owner of a high end Miami seafood restaurant, The Slammin’ Salman. A terrifying bull of a man, Salmon uses fear to rule over his misfit waitstaff (Broken Lizard’s Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, Paul Sate, Erilt Stalhanske, as well as Cobie Smulders and April Bowlby) and on this particular night, he takes his bullying skills to a new level. In an effort to pay off a gambling debt to the Japanese Yakuza, Salmon sets up a contest to ‘inspire’ his waitstaff to sell more food than they ever have before: the top selling server wins $10,000 while the waiter in last place gets served with a broken rib sandwich—courtesy of the Champ himself. Spurred on by greed and panic, the staff resort to backstabbing, bribery and indecent proposals in an attempt to upsell their patrons while simultaneously sabotaging their coworkers. As the hours pass, the dining room action becomes more frenzied as the contest escalates into a brawl for first place in order to win the money.

broken-lizard

Here is the release info on the Comedy Central Live special. Yet another item I will need to add to my collection.

shinannigans

 

 

COMEDY CENTRAL HOME ENTERTAINMENT® RELEASES
"BROKEN LIZARD: STANDS UP" DVD
HITTING STORES ON TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14


Includes Over 30-Minutes Of Uncensored Material Not Aired On Television
Plus An Awesome Selection Of Bonus Content Taking Fans Behind-The-Scenes And
Reintroducing Fan-Favorite Characters


The World Premiere Of "Broken Lizard: Stands Up" Premieres On
Saturday, September 11 At Midnight ET/PT


NEW YORK, August 18, 2010 — Nothing is off limits when Broken Lizard, the guys behind "Super Troopers" and "Beerfest," Jay Chandrasekhar, Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, Paul Soter and Erik Stolhanske, unveil their uproarious night of stand-up comedy. Live from The El Rey Theatre in Los Angeles, each group member takes the stage to discuss drugs, lust and everything in between, culminating with the origin tale of how they all met. Broken Lizard delivers their unique brand of outrageously raunchy comedy in one unforgettable night of stand-up. Released via COMEDY CENTRAL Home Entertainment and Paramount Home Entertainment, "Broken Lizard: Stands Up" DVD arrives in stores nationwide on Tuesday, September 14.
"Broken Lizard: Stands Up" DVD is a single disc release containing over 30 minutes of uncensored material, not previously aired on television and including a collection of bonus features: “Backstage Pregame Long Cut and Outtakes;” “Live Super Troopers Sketch” re-introducing fan-favorite characters; "On the Road with Broken Lizard," a behind-the-scenes look at the troupe with several segments including "Shopping with Broken Lizard," "Erik’s Parrot Song" and “Who’s on First on Steroids.”

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Very Basic Troubleshooting Guide to Common Windows PC Problems

by admin on Sep.02, 2010, under Cool Stuff


image

Your Windows PC might be designed to make your life easier, but they often have a non-stop list of problems. Today we’ll walk through some of the more common problems and how to troubleshoot them.

This list is, of course, by no means complete, and you should always use best practices to make sure that your PC doesn’t need to be reinstalled all the time, is properly secured with anti-virus and a firewall, and is properly backed up at all times—but if you’re currently having problems, keep reading for a list of common problems and troubleshooting techniques.

PC Won’t Boot Into Windows

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems
Try Safe Mode First
When your PC just won’t boot into Windows at all, you’ll probably want to start off with Safe Mode—use the F8 key right when the system starts up to access the menu and see if Windows will boot into Safe Mode. If you’re able to get into Windows, the problem is likely something that would load only when you boot normally—graphics card drivers, junk applications, or perhaps some spyware applications.

Even Safe Mode Doesn’t Work
If you can’t even get into Safe Mode, you should use the Startup Repair tools, which can be accessed from the Advanced options in the Safe Mode menu; you can pull out your system repair disc, or your Windows installation disc and use the Repair option. If you’re having a bootloader problem that says "bootmgr is missing", you can use the command prompt from an installation CD and use the bootrec /fixboot command.
The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems

Use System Restore
System Restore in Windows XP might not have been the greatest tool, but since Windows Vista came around, it’s been an excellent choice for fixing up all sorts of problems, including issues that cause your system to not boot anymore. While testing, I once deleted a bunch of files in system32 to purposely cause a blue screen of death, and then used System Restore to get the system up and running again in minutes. If you’re unfamiliar with the process, you can follow this step-by-step guide to restoring your PC with System Restore.

Try Booting Off an Ubuntu CD
Whenever I’m having issues with a PC not booting up properly, one of the first things I do is grab an Ubuntu Live CD and try and boot from that, and see how well the system is working. If everything is working in Linux, then you know the problem is likely just your Windows installation, and not hardware related.

PC Crashing or Blue Screening
The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems

When your PC is crashing with the blue screen of death at random intervals, you should make sure that you first disable the automatic reboot after the blue screen, and then write down the error message so you can Google it later. If you’re able to get back into Windows, you can try using the previously mentioned BlueScreenView tool to give you some extra information about the error message, but your best bet is usually to do a search.

If you’re using Windows 7 or later and you’re getting a blue screen of death, chances are very high that the problem is either driver or hardware related—contrary to legend, Windows just doesn’t crash like that very much unless the problem is tied to hardware somehow.

Once you’ve identified the driver causing the problem, try and head into Safe Mode and uninstall or upgrade the driver causing the problem—sometimes the driver won’t be visible, so you’ll need to use a command-line trick to show hidden devices in Device Manager. If you’re doing a bunch of work in Safe Mode, sometimes it’s helpful to force Windows to load into Safe Mode without using the F8 key every time.

No Luck? Recover Files and Reinstall
If you simply can’t get anything else to work and you don’t have a full backup, your best bet is to pull out an Ubuntu Live CD and back up files from your PC, and then start the process of reinstalling WIndows again. If you’re using the native Windows backup tools, you can restore your system from an image backup, or use the standard backup and restore process.

PC Is Running Slowly

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems
Check Task Manager
The first thing that every geek is going to do when a computer is running slowly is open up Task Manager, or Process Explorer (if you’ve already got it installed) to see what process is taking up the most CPU or memory—that’s generally the culprit. While you’re in there, it’s a good idea to look for other resource-wasting apps that we can kill.

Uninstall Crapware
Now that we’ve killed the application that’s currently killing the CPU, it’s time to start getting rid of applications that we don’t need. You can use Revo Uninstaller and the PC Decrapifier to clean up applications without leaving extra traces.

Clean Up the PC
Cleaning up your PC is really quite easy. You can start by running Disk Cleanup, but if you really want to get the job done, grab yourself a copy of CCleaner and run through a cleaning session. While you’re at it, you can set up CCleaner to run on a schedule to keep the PC clean on a regular basis.

Scan for Viruses and Spyware
It’s a good idea to run a system scan when your PC is running slower than normal and you’ve already determined that it’s not a runaway application. We think the free Microsoft Security Essentials app is the perfect tool for the job.

Use the Reliability Monitor
This under-utilized tool is an excellent way to diagnose problems and figure out what might have caused your system problems—it will show you a full history of system crashes, application problems, and even Windows Updates, so you can track down what changed on your system right before your system started running slow. Just type in reliability into the Start Menu search box, and you’ll be able to see everything, and even drill down into specific errors to see more details.

Use the Advanced Tools in Windows 7
Windows 7 has quite a number of useful tools to troubleshoot performance problems, but they’re buried in Control Panel where you might not think to look. Just head to Performance Information and Tools –> Advanced tools and you’ll see a list of performance issues along with suggested fixes for the problems.

Trim Down Startup Apps to Speed Up Boot Times
This applies both when your PC takes forever to boot and when you’ve got a glut of applications running away in your system tray that you don’t need; it’s time to trim down your startup applications. You can use the built-in MS Config utility or any number of tweaking applications, but you might want to take a look at Soluto, which not only helps you disable startup applications, but it shows you exactly which ones are affecting your boot times the most.

Internet Is Slow or Not Loading

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems

Pull Out the Ping Command
If you’re having problems connecting to the internet, you should first make sure that you are really connected—most of the time you can pull out a command prompt (hit the Windows key, type cmd, hit Enter) and type in a ping command like ping yahoo.com to see if you’re getting any response.

Disable and Re-Enable Your Connection
If you’re not getting a response, you can try disabling and re-enabling your wireless connection, which solves more problems than it really should. If that doesn’t work, use the Windows network troubleshooter by right-clicking your wireless icon, and follow through the steps. Windows will disable and re-enable the adapter again, and wipe the DNS caches as well. If you’re still having problems, there’s a good chance your internet connection is just down.

Slow Response Times
Sometimes the problem isn’t connecting to the internet, but slow response times while you’re browsing—or maybe your browser is simply hanging. If you’re using Internet Explorer, you can reset all your settings to fix problems; if you’re using Firefox you can follow this guide to troubleshoot problems or just completely restore the default settings.

Web Site Not Loading
If the problem is a specific web site not loading, you can check downforeveryoneorjustme.com to see if you’re the only one having the issue with the web site—or you can often do a quick search on Twitter to see if other people are complaining as well.

Wireless Connection Dropping
If you’re having problems connecting to your wireless and staying connected, you probably need to tweak your connection. You can change your wireless channel to optimize your signal, but if you really want to make your connection better, try installing another wireless firmware or using an old router as a repeater to boost your signal.

Dealing With a Forgotten Password

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems
While forgetting a password might not technically be a troubleshooting problem, it’s a common problem that needs to be solved. Your best best is to try and recover your passwords using free tools to crack your existing passwords.

If you’ve got an Ubuntu Live CD laying around, you can use that to reset your password, or if you want a more streamlined Linux-based Live CD and you’re not afraid of some command-line action, you can use the System Rescue CD to reset your Windows password in no time at all.

Windows Explorer is Hanging

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems
If you’re having problems loading up Windows Explorer and browsing your file system, the problem is almost always a shell extension that shouldn’t be installed, or some shell extensions that are conflicting with each other. For example, the shell extensions for Dropbox and TortoiseSVN tend to cause problems when you put your code into your Dropbox folder, causing hanging and generally slow file browsing.

Your best bet is to grab a copy of ShellExView and start disabling third-party shell extensions, or uninstalling Windows Explorer plug-ins that you don’t actually need. You can also use this tool in combination with ShellMenuView to clean up your messy Explorer context menu.

Computer Is Overrun with Viruses or Spyware

The Basic Guide to Troubleshooting Common Windows PC Problems

PC Still Boots into Windows
Running a virus scan on your PC is never a bad idea, and when you’re dealing with an infected PC you’re definitely going to want to start the cleaning process. Your best bet is to reboot your PC into Safe Mode—and then run your antivirus utility of choice.

If you’re dealing with Spyware problems you should probably start off with SuperAntiSpyware and follow up with MalwareBytes to clean up the leftovers, since they do a better job of cleaning spyware than most of the antivirus tools out there. I’ve previously written a guide to removing a spyware infection, and we’ve also covered how to clean up after XP Antispyware.

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G.I. Joe

by jeremy on Sep.02, 2010, under Cool Stuff


mmuxa

knowing…

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Digg.com is Dead to Me!!

by jeremy on Sep.02, 2010, under Technology


Untitled 

It is official, Diig is dead to me. I was a big user / reader of digg.com for several years. They updated to v4 digg.com, and well not very smoothly. I’d think that if you were to do a massive and almost complete overhaul of your website, you might want to beta it. I know they did, but not long enough!!! From the moment they made the switch, they’ve been up and down way to much…

 

So, time to move on!!. I’m moving back to reddit.com. I’m of course not using the standard almost archaic view, but I’m skinning it. The source is from http://userstyles.org/styles/33879. I cant take credit for this, but will be more then happy to share what I’ve found! Just follow the directions on that page, install Stylish and run the script, it makes reddit.com almost like the v3 digg.com. Very Nice!!! Just be careful what feed you look at especially at work!!

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