Free Republic

With the dashing success of "Worst Album Art Ever," I'm proud to present: The Best of Teh Internets: A FR Photo Album... Feel free to share strange, or funny pictures (including, but not limited to anything found on FR, ZOT! graphics, o rly/ya rly, Photoshopped images, bad album covers, etc.)

Ford Motor is set to announce a partnership with Microsoft to provide greater wireless connectivity to its lineup of vehicles, according to a published report. The Wall Street Journal reported the wireless offering will be called Sync and will allow for hands-free cell phone communication and other wireless information transfers inside the car, including the ability to receive email and download music. The automakers have been trying to attract buyers with greater entertainment and wireless communication options, including ports for MP3 music players in traditional car stereo systems, DVD video players for backseat passengers and satellite radio offerings.

lol spare the nasty comments about both products, please. I would like an EASY way to back up both products (one step backup if at all possible)...preferably freeware. Right now, for OE, I am using Outlook Express Backup Wizard. Is there a better product? I don't have anything for Outlook itself. I see that Outlook has a native file export feature, but it looks like I have to back up one folder at a time (?) Why did they design such a troublesome method? Thanks.

When handwritten essays were introduced on the SAT exams for the class of 2006, just 15 percent of the almost 1.5 million students wrote their answers in cursive. The rest? They printed. Block letters.

Advice needed from the Brain Trust: I'm hoping some computer geeks better than I can find an answer to this Excel problem. Basically, I've used Excel to calculate grades before, and that's fine. I usually have 3 exams and I drop the lowest score. Again, that's easy. However, this marking period, I have been informed that I should give a cumulative grade for the first and second marking periods. (It is math, after all, which builds upon itself.) Now, to be fair to the students, I would like to drop their lowest two tests out of the six, not just...

Airport Arrest Turns Up Nuclear Info Nov 16 9:36 AM US/Eastern A man was arrested at Detroit Metropolitan Airport after officials say they found him carrying more than $78,000 in cash and a laptop computer containing information about nuclear materials and cyanide. Sisayehiticha Dinssa, an unemployed U.S. citizen, was arrested Tuesday after a dog caught the scent of narcotics on cash he was carrying, according to an affidavit filed in court. When agents asked him if he had any cash to declare, he said he had $18,000, authorities said. But when agents checked his luggage, they found an additional $59,000....

Hi there: When I am on the road, I often "borrow" wireless connection on unsecured networks. I am not doing anything malicious but is there a danger of the host network compromising my computer, such as accessing my files or capturing passwords when I enter them in on the browser.Thanks for any info you can offer.

Stanford researchers' new etching method shows promise for bulk manufacturing of nanotube-electronics. Semiconducting carbon nanotubes could be the centerpiece of low-power, ultra-fast electronics of the future. The challenge is getting them to work with today's manufacturing processes. Now researchers at Stanford University have made an important advance toward large-scale nanotube electronics. They have created functional transistors using an etching process that can be integrated with the methods used to carve out silicon-based computer chips. A major roadblock to making carbon-nanotube transistors has been the difficulty of separating semiconducting tubes from a typical batch of nanotubes, in which about a third...

Space shuttle Discovery was moved to the launch pad Thursday to await a launch that could be as early as Dec. 6 — an effort to avoid potential New Year's Eve computer glitches. The worry is that shuttle computers aren't designed to make the change from the 365th day of the old year to the first day of the new year while in flight. NASA has never had a shuttle in space Dec. 31 or Jan. 1. "We've just never had the computers up and going when we've transitioned from one year to another," said Discovery astronaut Joan Higginbotham. "We're...

Time for a new Free Republic folding@home thread. Our Free Republic team of 396 members comprised primarily of Free Republic members in good standing have banded together to donate their excess CPU cycles to a worthy cause. Via distributed computing, millions of computers around the world contribute directly to scientific research, in the quest for a greater understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer's, Cancer, and Mad Cow (BSE). Currently, the team is in 62th place (with 1,030 active CPUs - 79,000 completed Work Units and 14.71 million points). This is an entirely voluntary program, and if you want to learn...

You guys are usually right, so here's a question:

Oct. 27, 2006 — A 24-year-old computer security student working on his doctorate at Indiana University Bloomington has created a Web site that allows anyone with an Internet connection and a printer to create and print fake boarding passes for Northwest Airlines flights. The passes look virtually identical to the ones printed from the airline's site, and are intended to get you past security — but not onto an airplane. By entering your name and plugging in information about the flight — flight number, gate, seat number, departing city, destination, departure, and arrival times and class — the site generates...

I've broken the screen on my PC laptop, and since the cost to repair/replace could be at least half the cost of a new laptop, I'm thinking of replacing it. I've never used a mac, and I don't need the stress of learning a new system at the moment lots going on right now. We do photo editing, and bookkeeping for our business on this laptop. I also need advice on how to transfer the data and all my photo files -- at least a couple of thousand images. Used Alohabob once, and I do want to move everything, so...

Microsoft on Wednesday launched the first major update to Internet Explorer in five years, and posted the new browser for Windows XP to a download site. IE 7, which has was announced in February 2005 by chairman Bill Gates, has been touted by the company as a significant update in the areas of security and usability. The interface has been streamlined and tabs have been added to compete with rivals such as Mozilla's Firefox and Opera's flagship browser. On the security front, IE 7 adds anti-phishing defenses as well as additional features to control ActiveX controls, which historically have been...

Hey there fellow FREEPers.... I am creating a banner for the HUB radio show web site..... if anyone has flash or animation abilities, I sure could use your help.... Thanks ec

The United States could be rife with Internet addicts as clinically ill as alcoholics, an unprecedented study released suggested. Researchers at Stanford University School of Medicine in Silicon Valley said their telephone survey indicated more than one of every eight US residents showed at least one sign of "problematic Internet use." The findings backed those of previous, less rigorous studies, according to Stanford. Most disturbing was the discovery that some people hid their Internet surfing, or went online to cure foul moods in ways that mirrored alcoholics using booze, according to the study's lead author, Elias Aboujaoude. "In a sense,...

O ye great and knowledgeable FReeper Technogods.... We're looking to considerably expand our home network and I've been toying with the idea of a "thin client" setup, not only for the sake of expense but also for ease of upkeep and administrative supervision. I've spent many hours in the last several weeks reading about how to build a server for small business/educational settings, and I'm starting to get information overload. One article will seem terrifically informative -- but written 5 years ago. Another will have some great cutting edge ideas, but little of the "how to" specifics I need. My...

I think my understanding is correct, but want to make sure. Suppose I have a wireless network. All of the computers but one are capable of supporting WPA. That one computer supports only WEP, either due to the operating system or the card it has. Am I correct that - If I want this one computer to be on the wireless network the way it is, EVERYONE ELSE also has to be WEP? - Conversely, if this computer remains the way it is, but I really DO want everyone to to WPA, then this one computer either has to upgrade,...

Problem uploading to tinypic.com: I get this message: Warning: mysql_connect(): Client does not support authentication protocol requested by server; consider upgrading MySQL client in /apache/htdocs/Objects.php on line 546 cannot myConnect to database

"You will NEVER buy a Dell again." So pronounced my boss. We bought a new server and a new desktop for the boss. I talked him into buying Dell because that is the only brand our university MSS department supports. That is because our techs can open a Dell case without voiding the warranty. Not true of many other brands. The boss's new desktop was a disaster. Despite the new dual-core pentium IV it was slower than a 4 year-old Compaq. It turns out that Dell uses reconditioned parts in their new machines and the reconditioned hard drive was defective....