Digital Life
(1 votes, average: 4 out of 5)
Loading ...subscribe RSS: Digital Life by Chin Wong
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Cloud storage
THERE’S a lot of talk about cloud storage these days, which is just a fancy term for online storage. The idea of saving files on a remote server and accessing them from any machine with an Internet connection isn’t new. That’s been around since file hosting services from the early days of the Web. What’s new is that online storage … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Protecting online freedom
THE recent exchange of harsh words between Washington and Beijing highlights a major concern for Internet users all over the world. How this debate plays out in their own countries will determine how free individuals are to express themselves online. The latest controversy springs from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s landmark speech in support of Internet freedom as a … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Facebook: What privacy?
DO you have a Facebook account? It seems like every dog and his brother is on the world’s biggest social networking site these days. Facebook happily reports that it has more than 350 million active users. Of these, about 8.4 million are from the Philippines, which makes it the ninth biggest country in terms of Facebook users, says Nick Burcher, … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Ubuntu for Windows users
QUESTIONS that I get in the mail show that quite a number of Windows users are curious about what to expect when they make the jump to Linux. While answering one such question this week, I realized that I’ve already written quite a bit about how things are done in Linux as opposed to Windows, but that these snippets were … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Doing more with your Ubuntu PC
My webcam captures motion and takes time-stamped shots. FOR more than three years, I’ve been using Ubuntu, a popular distribution of Linux, on my home PC for work and play. As a long-time Windows user, I appreciated the freedom from crashes and system slowdowns that plagued my computing life before I made the switch. The notion that I would have … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Firing Steve Ballmer
Would you fire Steve Ballmer? » poll makerTags : ballmer IF you were a Microsoft stockholder, would you fire Steve Ballmer? Newsweek predicts you will, just as Ballmer marks his 10th anniversary as chief executive at the software giant. “Microsoft stock has dropped by nearly 50 percent on his watch, lagging not just other tech companies but even the Dow … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » A good year for desktop Linux
2010 is going to be a good year for Linux on the desktop. No, tens of millions of Windows users aren’t going to see the light and suddenly switch. Inertia and resistance to change make a massive migration highly unlikely. At the same time, Microsoft has managed to stem the erosion from its Vista-fueled disaster, first by extending the commercial … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Quick change artist
ONE of things that might disconcert Windows users after they’ve switched to Ubuntu Linux is the frequency with which the operating system is updated. There was a five-year wait between Windows XP and Windows Vista, and another two years until Windows 7 was released to fix all that was wrong with Vista. In contrast, Ubuntu, one of the most popular … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Browser of choice
A colleague recently tweeted that he was dumping Mozilla Firefox for Google Chrome. Half in jest, I said, “You’ll be back.” My prediction wasn’t based on any fierce brand loyalty. I too have gone through periods when I stopped using Firefox in favor of Opera, usually because of some annoying bug. After Google finally released a decent Linux version of … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Firefox after five years
FIVE years ago last month, Firefox rose from the ashes of Netscape’s crushing defeat at the hands of Microsoft in the first browser wars. In that first encounter, Microsoft used its monopoly in operating systems to clobber Netscape by bundling its own browser, Internet Explorer, with every copy of Windows. This strategy made IE the default browser for most Windows … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Verzio Skii: A dual-SIM phone with a lot of extras
NOBODY I’ve shown the Verzio Skii to can believe that this slim, dual-SIM touch-screen phone costs less than P5,000. Visually, everything about the Skii from Verzio of Singapore—black piano finish, the brush metal back cover, chrome trim and one-centimeter profile—speaks of an expensive phone. That Verzio has managed to pack so many features into an attractive candy-bar phone that sells … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » No luster in Chrome OS
SOMETIMES, less isn’t more – it’s just less. This was certainly the way I felt when I fired up an early open source demo of Google’s Chrome operating system that became available for download last week. To get Google Chrome OS running, I followed a step-by-step guide on GeekLad (http://bit.ly/chrome_appliance) and installed it in a virtual machine on a desktop … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Tweaking Ubuntu
Karmic Koala with widgets and the Cairo dock (GLX-Dock). ONE of the cool things about using Linux is the degree to which you can customize your system. If you want to make it look and act like a Mac, you can. Want the Windows 7 or Vista glassy look? No problem. You can do that too. For a week now, … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Good Karma
The Ubuntu Software Center replaces Add/Remove Programs in Karmic Koala. LAUNCHED seven days after Windows 7, Ubuntu 9.10 is an excellent alternative to Microsoft’s new and more expensive operating system. Also known as Karmic Koala, this upgrade to the popular Linux distribution has everything you’d expect from a modern operating system – and more. Like Windows 7, Karmic Koala is … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Windows on a netbook
ONE of the selling points of Windows 7 is its ability to run on less powerful netbooks. I put this feature to the test over the weekend by installing Microsoft’s latest operating system on an HP 2133 Mini-Note PC. The choice of this particular model was deliberate. HP’s first offering in the netbook market, the 2133 Mini-Note was widely regarded … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Political Twitter
WHEN Barack Obama used Twitter as a potent campaign tool last year, Filipino politicians took notice. Now, with national elections just a few months away, a number of them, too, have their own accounts with the popular micro-blogging service. “What’s a 52 yr old guy to do the night before his wedding?” posts Senator Mar Roxas, one of the first … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » The long and short of it
ON the Internet, longer isn’t always better. When it comes to addresses, a shorter URL is much easier to remember, to jot down and to pass on to friends. In contrast, a long address is more prone to being mistyped or, on some online forums, unceremoniously cut. And, as anyone who works in a newspaper or magazine knows, a kilometer-long … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Blues for IBM
ONE of the biggest back-from-the-brink stories of the 1990s was IBM. After suffering a staggering $8.10 billion loss in 1992, the lumbering giant turned its declining fortunes around by transforming itself from a hardware company to a dominant provider of software and services. Now, it appears the company has become too dominant, and is under scrutiny by antitrust authorities in … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » I don’t hate Microsoft
A DISGRUNTLED reader, Paul, recently accused me of being a Microsoft hater or “just a Linux fanboy.” I am neither, but let’s listen to Paul first. “Mr. Chin, you’re always bashing Microsoft, especially Windows,” he writes. “You are such a Microsoft hater or just a Linux fanboy. Every time I read your blog and the entry is about Microsoft, you … [Link]
Digital Life by Chin Wong » Snow Leopard: Less is more
HANDS down, Snow Leopard – also known as Mac OS X 10.6— is the easiest operating system upgrade you can make today. Over the weekend, I upgraded my Intel-based Macbook from Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5) and was pleasantly surprised to find that the entire process took only an hour and seven minutes. Nothing I have experienced on Windows or … [Link]
