Remote Sharing - Luckily an easy alternative exists to Netmeeting

Netmeeting - its a hate and love relationship. You love it , because it makes sharing and collaboration so easy - type in a ip address, call the computer and bingo! now you can share, control and even conference! and you hate it.. because apparently for MS this was a useful tool which user might find useful and even gain productivity - so they did what they can do best.. trash the simple and working software and create new versions, give them a new name, trash netmeeting and yes.. here we go MS way..

Since this has not been updated by MS in quitesometime, Netmeeting as of now has serious limitations - most prominent being not being able to connect to user behind routers . For the general user this would mean going into router and playing around with settings.. not a very pretty task for average Joe...

Sunday afternoon, and got a call from Home.. PC almost dead.. need to troubleshoot it. Being some thousand kms away, the only thing that came to mind was netmeeting. Folks being not too tech savvy, other options were ruled out. Somehow I never liked remote desktop and too bad I dont have XP Pro edition.

Googled for simpler alternatives and yes.. they do exist to make life easy ->

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/7-easy-screen-sharing-and-remote-access-tools-all-free/

The link above contains links to some easy to use and simple screen sharing tool. And Crossloop tops the list. Not without a reason. Its simple, no nonese approach.. and the best its free.

So herez a mini how-to on how to use this to connect to your PC remotely (assuming both are running MS OS) and get your taks done.. or maybe help someone out by troubleshooting:

Download Crossloop(Very small, approx 2.5 MB):

http://www.crossloop.com/ipage.htm?id=download

Install it and run it once installation is complete.

You can skip the registration process to create account. Simply click on Skip in the bottom right hand corner of application screen

NOTE : The software needs to be installed on both the machines .

You will see two tabs- Access Share

If you want to access someones PC:

For You:

Ask the person (remote) to send you their access code.

Click on Access Tab

Put the access code (incl space between numbers)

Click Connect

For Person on remote machine:

Click on Connect.

And yes.. you are done!!

after few moments, your status should be connected and you can see the remote desktop. You can use it to perform taks, share files etc.

Easy,simple, short.. I liked it. It saved my day and hopefully you will find it useful too...

Life and its meaning : On google

Read the discussion

http://www.atheistnetwork.com/viewtopic.php?t=24148

The topic which time and again haunts me...literally... glad to see.. lifez pointless.. just a journey.. to destination .. mayb nowhere..

:)

PS: google searched for "why we live purpose existence"

Arranged Marriages....

India is certainly more than a land of snake charmers and elephants now in the West...but yes.. definitely a land of cows.. :)

Well the latter is true mostly for people who have visited India or have some near and dear one who have been to this "mystic" and "exotic" land...

Since the majority of the people I have met are yet to "experience" India.. for them two topics seem to define India...

1 The ubiquitous techie

2. Arranged Marriages.....

And since the writer belongs to the category 1 and was in the company of other non-Indian techies at lunch, the discussion soon shifted to the arranged marriages....

Its lunch time, have skipped breakfast (the usual) ,and after half a mile walk to this restaurant, the food is on top of the mind.. for me at least... and then when the food finally arrives.. and a sense of relief is about to set in.. the question comes up... are you married?  

The thing about the question,if you are from India, is that it sets off a stream of questions towards the topic.. yes.. "Arranged Marriages" ..  ... which people like us .. hold close to the heart..

Why ..you may ask...?  Well er.. becuz we like to respect the tradition and for the faith our elders has reposed in us.. and ...........

Ah... if only they knew.. for people like us, its is perhaps the only ( and for the rest Plan B), to end their singleton status... but then that shall remain a secret....

so if you are not quick at making some random arguments.. tread carefully.. for the sole topic which might be the only hope  for millions to get a partner and most likely the only sex partner for life.. is going to be debated and queried on...at length.. and then it will be upon you... to make the sacrifice of the lunch you had been yearning for so badly... to defend the only hope for the millions.. the institution of arranged marriages.... the hope that they can still rely on the the parents to make arrangements to fulfill their needs of adulthood ... and yet be seen as gracious and responsible individual..

So as to help the you prepare in advance for such a likely and momentous event,effecting the life of millions,  the author would like to present a few FAQ's .. in the hope that this will allow you to prepare yourself to defend the cause of millions ... 

Whats the reward you may ask.. before proceeding to FAQ's.. even if the hopes of millions mean nothing to you ..and you are mean , self centred and happily married.. then...oh fellow Indians... think of the generations to come... your generation...where would they go without their parents.. how will they ever.."experience adulthood" and that too with grace and honor...if this institution is looked down upon ! 

I rest my case and for the sake of millions in world, billions to come and your "khandan" to survive...I hope you will rise to the occasion and defend the cause.

FAQ's

1. Do you believe in arranged marriages

(Note : Its not OK to give example of old generations.. we are modern, new generation.. u get the drift... )

2.  How can you "marry" someone you never met...

(Note: The author, intelligent as he is, tried a new term : arranged blind date.... use at your own risk...)

3.  Is it true that generally when a bachelor goes to  India on vacation, the purpose is to get married...?

4.  Tips on photo-reading.. aka how can you arrive at compatibility factor looking at the photographs

5.  You meet on a date(ok... arranged blind date.. in presence of parents) , get married and then go straight for honeymoon..? is this ~traditional~....

Feel free folks to add to the list and contribute to the great cause... ! may the gift of gab be with you!!

Addenum : 

On a bit serious note , liked this post and the discussion in the comments section....

http://roopscoop.wordpress.com/2008/09/09/on-arranged-marriages/

Addenum 2:

Another piece from the same author...with a lil bit different perspective on the subject...andyet again.. interesting read...blog and comments....

http://roopscoop.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/arranged-marriages-contd/

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PS: The author is a firm believer in the institution of arranged marriage as he sees it the only way to seek and end to his forced celibacy and Singleton status. All the contents have been written with the best of intentions and to help the cause of millions (and billions to come). 

With the advent of digicams, photography for amateurs(like me) is about click, preview and keep/delete. But at times there is need to share those high resolution pics via email. And with most of us using ADSL, which means slower upload speed as compared to download speed, sending across pics can be bit painful. Thankfully there are loads of batch resize tool available to help us cut down the size of image while maintaing most of the image quality. One of the tools which I personally use and find quite adequate is Visualizer Photo resize (http://www.freeimagebrowser.com/resize/). Just point to the folder which contains all the pics, the desired size of the new pics and yes you are done. All your photos are resized in one click . It simple. But then it means not too much of configurations…for me it works fine. And yes its FREE.

On another note, for those in India , if you ever suspected u were missing belonging from your airline baggage, this might be just what you have been thinking. Certainly for me, its just the tip of iceberg. The fact that complaints almost fall to deaf ears, probably calls for deeper investigation. Anyway herez the most recent news about the issue…. Finally at least somewhere culprit is caught…..[ http://www.khaleejtimes.com/DisplayArticleNew.asp?xfile=data/subcontinent/2007/June/subcontinent_June433.xml&section=subcontinent&col=

]

I wonder if they cant use security tapes available to investigate the claims of its customers instead of shooing them away……long live customer care.

Bad web site design, products - Bajaj Allianz, Rediff

Life makes you wiser. It has been probably in one of my wiser moments that I had been trying to get some insurance policies in India and was trying to search(aka google) for the different policies on the web. And then it struck me, how badly these customer attracting sites are designed. Either for most of these players , the website dont exist or if they exist, the way they are designed serve little purpose. For example take the website of Bajaj Allianz. It is one of the leading player in the insurance market. Take a look at its website (www.bajajallianz.com).

Being inquistive about their products, I would really want to know what they have to offer along with the price . If that interests me, well it would be really nice, if i Can get their contact info or can leave my name and number to be called up.

But then some things are different. You need to mandatory include your first name, last name, email address and mobile number before u can view any information. Even the products or their rates. Yes, they are so concerned about ur visit , that they wont let u view their products until u get them ur full details. Too bad they didnt ask for my salary, permamenet addresss and credit card info too....and yeah searching for information.....get ready for the mess ahead.....oops dont expect a site search.... people dont seem to beleive in it.

I fail to understand how can such a big company, with such good credentials in the market can afford with such a website design. Certainly a case of overzealous and overconfident designers/planners. But then this is defn not an isolated case.. but irritating enuff for a corporate website....at least for me.
As for me, I am still looking. Provided some dummy information on their website

And then there is rediff . Excellent website with loads of info and features focused on Indian community. I suspect , they copy yahoo in terms of their features and business models. But then at least on email... i would give them a big zero. Even with a "unlimited storage" account, i can hardly use it. Rather I am unable to use it. Perhaps this email service provider forgot the bulk mail option. To be true, there is a BULK mail folder, but then all the spam gets into inbox. No message into bulk mail.

Why am i writing all this.... well because i felt this is my private space and i could write about something, which I am unable to comprehend. Perhaps it makes some business sense to them. But to me, it doesnt.

And yeah.. a small disclaimer... These are not the only sites which seem bad to me, but these do trouble me. These are only my personal opinions. Your comments are welcome.

The diwali weekend. Its celebration time and holiday time. It was supposed to be same with me. But due to some personal reasons and the fact that am away from home(read no holidays) , this was a diwali I would like to forget, but perhaps would not be able to quite easily.

Once again, I marvel how close this e-revolution has brought us, at least in terms of keeping in touch(nah, I aint new to this… just keep getting fascinated). Its always nice to have frndz you can speak to.. talk nuisance without worrying too much about the impression thats going to make…..and yahoo(just my preferred example) certainly makes that task lot easier.

Thanks everyone for bearing with me.

And yeah, I spent some time googling for “boring diwali” and it did threw up some interesting , nice to read blog. Otherwise, it was just another weekend, shopping for the necessities, cleaning, and most part of the day: online, surfing and chatting.

Speaking of search, I do try some search engines from time to time and have almost always found google on top. The searches from MS simply didn’t match in terms of quality . But guess the new live.com is different. Unlike previous MSN search , which I considered to be the worst, live.com provides quite impressive search results.

It would be interesting to see the clash of titans in the search industry. For me, google is the preferred option and likely to remain so . Its just the simplicity and the comfort factor it provides with the search that awes me. Its email service though is one area where it can take some tips from Yahoo.

And yeah, every time I sit for lunch and dinner, it just reminds me that cooking is not my forte. I can cook good enough to survive, and have been doing so almost an year. But then, I feel like I have almost forgotten how good food tastes like and the different dishes you can cook. Maybe I am just lazy.

Had mentioned the performance benchmarking about my notebook and its unexpectedly low results. Have been doing a bit search on this and then using my friend’s working DELL power adapter, re-ran the tests. The results… Phew… amazing.

Apparently, the SpeedStep technology of the Intel, which varies the processing power, when running on battery (in my case the faulty adapter) , was causing the low benchmark for my notebook. The Speedstep doesn’t interfere with the processing speed when running on AC power or if it has been explicitly disabled from the BIOS.