Firefox 2.0! XD
I just installed it a few minutes ago and browsed through the new menus and such, and I find it quite swell. Here's a quick walkthrough.
First of all, extensions and themes are now collectively called add-ons. Right off the bat, Firefox told me which add-ons have updates available for 2.0 and installed the updates. Out of the eight extensions that I had for 1.5, three were updated, two are shown to be not compatible, and the rest work fine. undoclosetab (incompatible with 2.0, of course) is now built into Firefox so I uninstalled it. I haven't used BugMeNot (incompatible with 2.0) in quite a while now so I also uninstalled it. Neither of the two themes I had were compatible so I'm using for the default theme right now. Being a somewhat skin junky, I've never used the default theme for both Mozilla and Firefox. Surprisingly, it's actually not too bad, especially when I have Windows running the classic theme and tweaked the colours to my liking.
Currently installed extensions:
Context Search 0.3
DictionarySearch 2.0
MeasureIt 0.3.6
Paste and Go (still waiting for update)
ReminderFox 0.9.9.3
text/plain 1.1.8
Some of the big things for 2.0 involve better web browsing experience. undoclosetab is built in, so is session restore. undoclosetab is self-explanatory, but I've never used session restore or the likes so it's a new thing for me. So far it's useful when I needed to install a dictionary or update something that require Firefox to restart. When it came back up, voilà, all my previously opened tabs are there and accounted for. I haven't encountered a crash yet (and I can probably count with my fingers the number of times Firefox has crashed on me in the past few years) so I can't tell how well it works, but I think I'm in good hands if it should happen. At the far right corner of the tab bar sits a little arrow, which renders a drop-down list of the tabs opened. I can see myself benefiting from this, seeing how I had over a hundred tabs opened the last time I was browsing through ff.net. XD I do find one of the new additions galling, however. The little cross on the tabs for closing. I close tabs via the context menu or Ctrl-W. Having a cross on the tab itself would mean a heightened risk of hitting it by accident. Even with the built in undoclosetab, having too many accidents can still be annoying.
As I type this, the inline spell check works wonderfully well. It underlines the questionable words with unobtrusive red dots, which is a lot easier to ignore than the ones in Word. You can easily add the words to the dictionary or select from a list of suggested spellings. When I type, I tend to just pound away on the keyboard and it's not rare for me to misspell words. The built in spell check is definitely a plus for me. Too bad it only works in Firefox and doesn't extend to Notepad... The only thing with the spell check is that I had to install the British English dictionary instead of the US one. I hate it when my "neighbour" gets corrected.
Other noticeable new features for 2.0 include Live Titles, search suggestions and a search engine manager in the search box, and improved RSS function. I'm skipping those because I don't use them. I'm sure someone else will cover them.
So what's my verdict? Well, there's still room for improvement (what software doesn't?), but it's worthy of the 2.0 label. What are you still waiting for? Rediscover the web with Firefox 2.0!
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
As I sat on my bed this morning, wrapped in my blanket in a lame attempt to fend off the cold air, I pondered on the topic of writing. A lot of my recent posts are in Chinese because it felt more natural due to the ACG-related topics. The more I write, the more familiar I become with the language and the words once again. But there're still areas where I have difficulty.
Technically speaking, my Chinese reading is much better than English, so shouldn't my Chinese writing be better as well? Not necessarily. While I do have better grammar in Chinese, I did most of my higher education in English. On one hand, I communicate with my family and friends in Chinese. On the other hand, the majority of professional knowledge come to me in English. This leads to an interesting split in my writing. For anything technical or paper style, English is my language of preference. With the long history and richness of the Chinese language, my casual posts are usually more descriptive when I write in Chinese.
There is a third area where I often have to struggle with both languages before compromising and settling with one. Fiction/Fanfiction writing. I first attempted writing my own fantasy stories back in '96. Obviously, there was no way I could have pulled something like that off with English given my level at that time. As with a lot of people, my little projects took off... and then kind of evaporated. Some due to writer's block, some because I kept changing the setting or story concept. I still have all the scripts and read them from time to time. I love reading my own writings. XD
Anyhow, a few years gone by without any organised writing on my part. Then I encountered anime and entered the realm of fanfiction. I put my imagination to work and started writing fanfiction, this time in English because that's the language of the medium that introduced me. Again I kicked off countless little projects like mad, but to this day, except the ones too outrageous or crazy for others to understand so I just keep them to myself, only a small fraction of them are posted. I've had a number of posting hiatus, but the stories continued to progress slowly in my head so I do intend to finish them all. If anything, then at least for peace of mind when I plunge in for my next original story project, which planning already started a few months ago.
This is where the dilemma comes in. I do better description and action scenes in Chinese, but I have not the ability to make the story flow in Chinese. I have more experience with composing stories in English, but I suck at description and action. Worse yet, I've been watching anime in Japanese for a few years now, and Japanese often pops in my head when the characters talk in my head. This annoys me greatly as I have yet to find satisfying translation for some Japanese words and phrases. Sometimes it's easier to translate it into English, but since Chinese and Japanese have closer linguistics, Chinese is usually the desirable language in most cases.
I have a habit of doing the setting and, at the same time, having the characters go ahead and play out the story in my head. This is usually a bad thing for me. If I get too caught up in all the details for the setting, the story gets stuck and isn't able to progress further. If the story moves too smoothly in my head, I have to make up some background info at the spur of the moment and by the time I'm able to actually write the story down when the settings are finished, I forget half of the middle part already and only remember the opening and the ending. The latter is what happened to Heir of Light and Slayers SEED, which explains why it takes me so long to get the chapters out, 'cause I've forgotten what's played out.
For now, I've decided to do the project, codenamed Agion, in English. It's not hard to imagine the three-way tackle match though: settings in English, characters sometimes talk in Japanese, and action scenes blur by in Chinese. I can't wait to get started on the actual thing! XD
Technically speaking, my Chinese reading is much better than English, so shouldn't my Chinese writing be better as well? Not necessarily. While I do have better grammar in Chinese, I did most of my higher education in English. On one hand, I communicate with my family and friends in Chinese. On the other hand, the majority of professional knowledge come to me in English. This leads to an interesting split in my writing. For anything technical or paper style, English is my language of preference. With the long history and richness of the Chinese language, my casual posts are usually more descriptive when I write in Chinese.
There is a third area where I often have to struggle with both languages before compromising and settling with one. Fiction/Fanfiction writing. I first attempted writing my own fantasy stories back in '96. Obviously, there was no way I could have pulled something like that off with English given my level at that time. As with a lot of people, my little projects took off... and then kind of evaporated. Some due to writer's block, some because I kept changing the setting or story concept. I still have all the scripts and read them from time to time. I love reading my own writings. XD
Anyhow, a few years gone by without any organised writing on my part. Then I encountered anime and entered the realm of fanfiction. I put my imagination to work and started writing fanfiction, this time in English because that's the language of the medium that introduced me. Again I kicked off countless little projects like mad, but to this day, except the ones too outrageous or crazy for others to understand so I just keep them to myself, only a small fraction of them are posted. I've had a number of posting hiatus, but the stories continued to progress slowly in my head so I do intend to finish them all. If anything, then at least for peace of mind when I plunge in for my next original story project, which planning already started a few months ago.
This is where the dilemma comes in. I do better description and action scenes in Chinese, but I have not the ability to make the story flow in Chinese. I have more experience with composing stories in English, but I suck at description and action. Worse yet, I've been watching anime in Japanese for a few years now, and Japanese often pops in my head when the characters talk in my head. This annoys me greatly as I have yet to find satisfying translation for some Japanese words and phrases. Sometimes it's easier to translate it into English, but since Chinese and Japanese have closer linguistics, Chinese is usually the desirable language in most cases.
I have a habit of doing the setting and, at the same time, having the characters go ahead and play out the story in my head. This is usually a bad thing for me. If I get too caught up in all the details for the setting, the story gets stuck and isn't able to progress further. If the story moves too smoothly in my head, I have to make up some background info at the spur of the moment and by the time I'm able to actually write the story down when the settings are finished, I forget half of the middle part already and only remember the opening and the ending. The latter is what happened to Heir of Light and Slayers SEED, which explains why it takes me so long to get the chapters out, 'cause I've forgotten what's played out.
For now, I've decided to do the project, codenamed Agion, in English. It's not hard to imagine the three-way tackle match though: settings in English, characters sometimes talk in Japanese, and action scenes blur by in Chinese. I can't wait to get started on the actual thing! XD
Sunday, October 08, 2006
也不知道到底在忙些什麼, 可是最近一個月就是沒有寫東西的動力跟時間。所以, 讓我們來回顧一下還存活於記憶中的九月大事吧(對, 又是總集篇, 而且這次大概還漏了不少...)
九月最大的事莫過於 9/7 拔智齒。那種可怕的經驗, 我絕對不想再經歷一次。果然大學的時候就應該去拔掉, 別讓它們根深蒂固這麼多年, 變得更難拔。不過老實說, 我對那時候在看的牙醫的技術不是很信任, 所以還是現在拔比較好一點吧? 總而言之, 真的只有一個字可以形容那個過程: 痛! 我的牙齒本來就很硬, 據說這種比較難拔, 但是最重要的是, 麻醉對我不是很有用。沒打夠? 拔之前就打了十幾針(四顆牙), 中途又打了五針左右, 結果還是痛到眼淚都流出來了。我都不記得最後一次因為痛而流淚是什麼時候的事了, 真是一世英名全毀啊。
痛歸痛, 畢竟也不到兩個小時。更麻煩的恢復期還在後面吶。拔完牙第二天, 母親大人就跟朋友到美國去了, 然後我那天小發燒。拔過智齒的人應該都知道, 之後最少兩個禮拜沒辦法正常進食。話說拔完後三天, 教會的小家要辦火鍋。連嘴巴都不能張很大的我要怎麼吃呢? 當然是不能吃。結果大家很快樂地選購食材及大快朵頤, 然後我很可憐地在旁邊慢慢地細吞著蛋糕吐司。最哀怨的是, 大家的食量都不大, 結果剩了一大堆一大堆打包回家! 我也想吃啊~~~ 哼, 即使是已經什麼都可以吃了的現在(不過因為種種因素, 右邊還是不怎麼能咬硬的東西; 從小就一直都是用左邊在吃比較多), 回想起那段只能每天吃麵類, 不能吃肉跟很多種青菜的日子, 還是令人唏噓不已。
順道一提, 在我拔牙的那個週末, 店裡的顧問之一也因踢足球弄傷腳踝, 結果 MIA 了三個禮拜, 一直到這禮拜才回來。所以我拔完快一個禮拜的時候, 就被拖回店裡上班跟代班。還好那時候已經過了最忙的 BTS, 不用跟太多客人講話。
在拔智齒的恢復期中, 把絢爛舞踏祭 ザ・マーズ・デイブレイク看完了。位於火星地面下的海盜尋寶的故事, 実に面白い! 各個城市船、不同海盜們及軍隊的做法、機械及人物的設定、火星跟地球的關係, 這一切的設定也都非常有趣。當然, 関智一和桑島法子的主角配對也是一個 plus, Vess 的主題曲「深海の空」亦是我很喜歡的一首。夜明號上的人們, 各個都有自己的目標及夢想。正因為他們是海盜, 所以他們可以任性地追求自己的夢。只要行得正坐得穩(まあ, 雖然職業是海盜, 其實他們算羅賓漢一類的義賊吧), 比起被一大堆規矩和面子束縛的軍隊, 他們追夢的日子豈不愜意得多? 最後神之石回歸火星的海, 一點一滴地將生命力灌注進去, 也將對未來的盼望帶進人們的心中, 很棒的結局呢。
除了絢爛舞踏祭, 另外一部在看的是機動武闘伝Ｇガンダム, 還剩一片(四話)就看完了。雖然是 1994 年的作品, 又是 AU, 但是很不錯吶。爆笑有時、熱血有時、感動亦有時。島本和彥加関智一, 果真除了熱血還是熱血啊! 唯一美中不足的是, 因為是北美版的 DVD, 字幕都是英文, 所以東方不敗流派跟 Sai Saishi 的招數都變成魄力不足的 romanji, 害我還得去找對應漢字(這種時候, 日文的 Wikipedia 就很有用)。Ｇガンダム果然跟一般鋼彈, 甚至是 AU 作品, 完全不同類型, 不過不是很歡樂嗎? 熱血啊, 沸騰吧! 為了地上的愛和正義!
咦, 為了地上的愛和正義而戰是女神的聖鬥士的工作吧? 沒錯, 所以我第一眼看到冥王神話的時候很興奮... 然後又失望了。還好冥王神話有兩篇, 至少有一篇是可以看的。「什麼跟什麼啊?」是我弟聽我說後的第一個反應。也就是說, 車田正美老師的 The Next Dimension 畫爛了, 手代木史織的 The Lost Canvas 可以當少女漫畫版的聖鬥士看。不曉得冥王神話的走向會怎麼樣, 不要連故事也寫爛了。只要故事好, 絕大部份的畫風我都可以接受。拜託了, 兩位老師!
九月最大的事莫過於 9/7 拔智齒。那種可怕的經驗, 我絕對不想再經歷一次。果然大學的時候就應該去拔掉, 別讓它們根深蒂固這麼多年, 變得更難拔。不過老實說, 我對那時候在看的牙醫的技術不是很信任, 所以還是現在拔比較好一點吧? 總而言之, 真的只有一個字可以形容那個過程: 痛! 我的牙齒本來就很硬, 據說這種比較難拔, 但是最重要的是, 麻醉對我不是很有用。沒打夠? 拔之前就打了十幾針(四顆牙), 中途又打了五針左右, 結果還是痛到眼淚都流出來了。我都不記得最後一次因為痛而流淚是什麼時候的事了, 真是一世英名全毀啊。
痛歸痛, 畢竟也不到兩個小時。更麻煩的恢復期還在後面吶。拔完牙第二天, 母親大人就跟朋友到美國去了, 然後我那天小發燒。拔過智齒的人應該都知道, 之後最少兩個禮拜沒辦法正常進食。話說拔完後三天, 教會的小家要辦火鍋。連嘴巴都不能張很大的我要怎麼吃呢? 當然是不能吃。結果大家很快樂地選購食材及大快朵頤, 然後我很可憐地在旁邊慢慢地細吞著蛋糕吐司。最哀怨的是, 大家的食量都不大, 結果剩了一大堆一大堆打包回家! 我也想吃啊~~~ 哼, 即使是已經什麼都可以吃了的現在(不過因為種種因素, 右邊還是不怎麼能咬硬的東西; 從小就一直都是用左邊在吃比較多), 回想起那段只能每天吃麵類, 不能吃肉跟很多種青菜的日子, 還是令人唏噓不已。
順道一提, 在我拔牙的那個週末, 店裡的顧問之一也因踢足球弄傷腳踝, 結果 MIA 了三個禮拜, 一直到這禮拜才回來。所以我拔完快一個禮拜的時候, 就被拖回店裡上班跟代班。還好那時候已經過了最忙的 BTS, 不用跟太多客人講話。
在拔智齒的恢復期中, 把絢爛舞踏祭 ザ・マーズ・デイブレイク看完了。位於火星地面下的海盜尋寶的故事, 実に面白い! 各個城市船、不同海盜們及軍隊的做法、機械及人物的設定、火星跟地球的關係, 這一切的設定也都非常有趣。當然, 関智一和桑島法子的主角配對也是一個 plus, Vess 的主題曲「深海の空」亦是我很喜歡的一首。夜明號上的人們, 各個都有自己的目標及夢想。正因為他們是海盜, 所以他們可以任性地追求自己的夢。只要行得正坐得穩(まあ, 雖然職業是海盜, 其實他們算羅賓漢一類的義賊吧), 比起被一大堆規矩和面子束縛的軍隊, 他們追夢的日子豈不愜意得多? 最後神之石回歸火星的海, 一點一滴地將生命力灌注進去, 也將對未來的盼望帶進人們的心中, 很棒的結局呢。
除了絢爛舞踏祭, 另外一部在看的是機動武闘伝Ｇガンダム, 還剩一片(四話)就看完了。雖然是 1994 年的作品, 又是 AU, 但是很不錯吶。爆笑有時、熱血有時、感動亦有時。島本和彥加関智一, 果真除了熱血還是熱血啊! 唯一美中不足的是, 因為是北美版的 DVD, 字幕都是英文, 所以東方不敗流派跟 Sai Saishi 的招數都變成魄力不足的 romanji, 害我還得去找對應漢字(這種時候, 日文的 Wikipedia 就很有用)。Ｇガンダム果然跟一般鋼彈, 甚至是 AU 作品, 完全不同類型, 不過不是很歡樂嗎? 熱血啊, 沸騰吧! 為了地上的愛和正義!
咦, 為了地上的愛和正義而戰是女神的聖鬥士的工作吧? 沒錯, 所以我第一眼看到冥王神話的時候很興奮... 然後又失望了。還好冥王神話有兩篇, 至少有一篇是可以看的。「什麼跟什麼啊?」是我弟聽我說後的第一個反應。也就是說, 車田正美老師的 The Next Dimension 畫爛了, 手代木史織的 The Lost Canvas 可以當少女漫畫版的聖鬥士看。不曉得冥王神話的走向會怎麼樣, 不要連故事也寫爛了。只要故事好, 絕大部份的畫風我都可以接受。拜託了, 兩位老師!
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