Rubenerd

This originally appeared on the Annexe, back when I recorded daily puzzles.

I've been doing so much work in DOSBox for other people and myself over the last few weeks again I thought I'd do some more posts about it. I know you're all intensely fascinated by my DOS nostalgia! Unfortunately I've finally come across an application that DOSBox doesn't tango with: XTreeGold.

We used to use the XTreeGold file manager in tandem with Brown Bag Software's PowerMenu before we got Windows 3.0 then 3.1 on our home computer in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Alas when I tried using it in DOSBox it returned a blank directory pane and only pointers to files without any reported sizes.

I'm assuming it's because the DOSBox "filesystem" is merely just a mount of a directory on the host and XTG uses some low level system calls that aren't implemented. IBM's PC DOS Shell works just fine.

While I enjoy using Midnight Commander which is a clone of Norton Commander from DOS days, I still think XTreeGold is the best file manager ever made. It separated files and directories into different panes similar to Windows 3.x, and instead of arbitrarily selecting files it let you "tag" files in any number of random directories and perform actions on them. Even as of 2009 no GUI based file manager [that I'm aware of] lets you do this besides clumsily selecting individual files in single open directories.

If I didn't have so many assignments and so much work, I'd see if I could recreate it in ncurses for a fun project. Then I could use it with long file names and on my Mac and FreeBSD machines! Perhaps one day :)

This originally appeared on the Annexe, back when I recorded daily puzzles.

Here's another Rubenerd Fun Fact for all you rabid Official Rubenerd Fun Fact fans. I know you're out there, I can hear you furrowing your brows and sighing.

Going through my backups I found a higher resolution version of my crappy, non existent book cover and I put it on a fun fact post.

Thank you.

Remember almost one month ago to this day I registered for a Woolworths Everyday Rewards loyalty card? My primary reason was so I could present the card when I shop at my local Woolies here in Mawson Lakes so the check out folks wouldn't ever ask me if I had one ever again, and to that end its been a huge success!

Turns out I should have been more cautious after all, this morning I got my first spam message from them, and unfortunately even after reading the whooping 23 lines of fine print at the bottom of the message I see no way to unsubscribe. I suspect the only way would be to cancel my account.

I guess it's just transferring the irritation from people asking me for that card over to the realm of electronic junk mail. I'll admit it's an improvement, but not exactly what I was looking for.

This weekend I was helping a guy in Singapore who needed to use some an ancient version of Quicken for Windows and Lotus Agenda on his shiny new Mac. I instinctively reached for VMware Fusion to create a virtual machine, but it dawned on me there might be an easier way. A few hours later I had him using his software with only a tiny amount of overhead thanks to DOSBox!

If you haven't read my raving about DOSBox by now, its a beautiful little cross-platform application that emulates a 486 class DOS computer complete with a fully usable command line, sound, input devices and graphics. Unlike other VM software you don't need to install a guest OS, and instead of using disk images you merely mount a directory from your existing hard drive. Too easy.

Because it emulates DOS its capable of running most DOS software, including graphical environments such as Gem and early versions of Windows! In this case all I had to do was copy the setup files for Windows 3.11 into a directory on my hard drive, mount the directory in DOSBox and install it. From there I had a fully working Windows 3.11 install which I was able to install and run his old software in, and more importantly export his old data from.

I think it's funny that what started as a hobby to recreate our old home computer from the early 1990s here has ended up getting me work on a few dozen occasions! Ruben Schade: Retro Software Consultant. I like the sound of that ^_^.

This originally appeared on the Annexe, back when I recorded daily puzzles.

Links shared from del.icio.us today:

MCE OptiBay Hard Drive for MacBook/MacBook Pro 15-inch: MCE Technologies Online Store

"The MCE OptiBay Hard Drive for MacBook Pro 15-inch replaces your internal SuperDrive or Combo drive with a high performance hard drive"

(categories: harddrive macbookpro shopping hardware)

VMware Communities: How do I create a DOS 6.22 virtual machine?

"Create your diskette images using the built-in dd command from the Terminal."

(categories: vmware software emulation virtualisation dos msdos howto)

Oracle Database Online Documentation 11g Release 1 (11.1)

(categories: oracle 11g software programming reference sql documentation databases)

Curses Programming with Python — Python v2.6.3 documentation

"This document describes how to write text-mode programs with Python 2.x, using the curses extension module to control the display."`

(categories: curses ncurses programming python)

beads560.jpg (JPEG Image, 560×619 pixels)

(categories: ferritebeads electronics hardware photos)

Ferrite Bead/ Wire Guard >> Ferrite Bead/RFS Wire Guard

"This device clamps over the headset wire above the plug that is inserted into the phone. It incorporates a ferrous composition based material which interacts directly with the high frequency energy and suppresses it"

(categories: ferritebeads electronics hardware shopping)

I briefly had a talk with a few epicly awesome people yesterday from interstate about the idea of online personae, and how it seems to be the norm for many people to have their real selves and an internet pseudonym that "never shall meet".

I personally never saw the attraction of having multiple online identities because by having all my material in one place with my name people can see all that I'm interested in, plus I don't have to remember which voice to use depending on what site I'm on and what account I'm logged into. I'm far too absent minded to pull that off.

I've heard the argument that people want to maintain a "professional" and "personal" online presence, but too often when I see this their professional sites are dry, dull and boring, while their personal sites are really interesting — even if they end up taking about the same thing. For me, I like people to see that I have a life outside studies and work, and conversely that I have interests in topics such as FreeBSD that I'm not studying at university at all!

I'm also a dreadful hypocrite, I maintain this site here at Rubenerd.com even though I've registered RubenSchade.com, RubenSchade.net and RubenSchade.org just in case I ever want to separate them. Oh yeah, and the name is shorter and catchier and all that.

Perhaps when I'm older and have a full time job outside studying I'll want to keep my stuff separate, or perhaps I'll even be required to. The way it stands now though, I'm perfectly happy with people knowing.

<img src="//rubenerd.com/files/uploads/graphic.java.javascript.png" alt="Java != JavaScript" style="height:122px; width:500px; display:inline; border:0em; padding:0em; background:transparent;"

Don't remember where or when I found this, but I've had it for ages and a series of phone calls and email support queries over the weekend have prompted me to put it here. Probably won't make any difference.