Your access to this website and/or its content is subject to certain terms and conditions. If you do not wish to agree with the terms and conditions, then you should leave this website immediately.
| Home | Privacy | Legal | Contact | Store | Humour |
Your access to this website and/or its content is subject to certain terms and conditions. If you do not wish to agree with the terms and conditions, then you should leave this website immediately.
| Home | Privacy | Legal | Contact | Store | Humour |
Mark Russinovich's BgInfo is a Microsoft utility that can be set up to display computer configuration details, such as hardware information, on the Windows desktop background (wallpaper). In this page, I am offering you some unofficial add-ons that make BgInfo more useful - particularly in offices where employees are asked to provide their system configuration details to system administrators.
The Last Emperor was a movie by Italian director Bernado Bertolucci. This costume drama was based on the life and times of the last Chinese emperor Pu Yi. The movie won 9 Oscar awards of 9 nominations. The movie's background score mesmerizing. However, its audio or video discs are no longer in production. I got a used copy of the OST from the U.S. In this page, I have provided a sample.
If you are looking for a fine rendering of some Purandaradasa kritis, then Dr. M. Balamuralikrishna and Kalavathy Avadhooth should definitely be on your list.
I have seen that a good firewall and a realtime anti-virus program can safeguard a Windows PC more than anything. I have also seen that the Windows Firewall and other commercially available firewalls do well when it comes to protecting the PC. They usually have preconfigured settings allowing Internet access for popular applications. This is their weakness. When a malware attacks these applications, they also gain Internet access.
The manufacturers cannot be strict with permissions because many Windows applications, including built-in ones, are written so poorly that they will crash Windows if the firewall denies an Internet connection. As a result, few firewalls are designed to give complete control to the user in configuring allow, deny, and ask rules for applications requiring Internet access.
R-Firewall is one program that does provide full control. I recommend all Windows XP users try it.
Some years ago, I had a blog called Moral Volcano. No, I was not one of those fools who maintained an online diary. Moral Volcano was a bunch of articles on current affairs - stuff that become stale over time. (I reserved this site at www.vsubhash.com, called at that time as Virtual V. Subhash, for things that had a longer shelf life.)
The Moral Volcano blog was not very popular. However, it attracted a lot of attention in high places, much to my amusement. But, what made it worthwhile was the insight I got by studying visitor behaviour from the visitor logs. It was educational and it was fun.
I picked some odd candidates from the visitor (referrer) logs and published under posts titled Strange Search Requests. In this piece, I have picked some of the strangest of the strange search requests. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I did picking them.
WARNING: Some of the searches are pörn-related. If you are a squemish type, avoid reading any further.
Most Internet users are not tech savvy. Google designed Chrome keeping this in mind. The installer and the browser application was meant to be fool proof. However, this greatly annoy you if you are a sophisticated user.
I don't use Chrome as my default browser. (I use Opera instead. For a webmaster, Opera is indispensable. All other browsers are too slow.) I use Chrome occassionally when I need to check out Webkit's non-standardised CSS extensions.
Even then, Chrome's excessive spyware-like behaviour and made-for-dummies attitude got on my nerves. So, I decided take my whip and remove the hide off Chrome's back. Now, Chrome behaves like it should. It does what I tell it to do, not the other way around. Well, almost…
Many product and service companies spend a fortune on e-mail newsletters. But, most e-mail newsletters are never read. Some subscribers unsubscribe almost immediately after receiving their first e-mail. Some others would not even try the unsubscribe link. They will simply mark the e-mail as "junk."
What prompts this lost love? Usually, people blame quality of content. Usability is given scant attention. In this article, I will focus solely on e-mail usability.
Online tool for typing in both English and Tamizh.
கணிப்பொறியில் தமிழ் வரிகளை எளிதாக அடிக்க இந்த கருவியை நீங்கள் பயன்படுத்தலாம். அடித்த வரிகளை அப்படியே ஒரு ஈ-தகவலாகவும் அனுப்பலாம்.
The West consumes a lot of oil. In the wide world, this consumption produces a lot air pollution and cancer. At the refinery, it also leaves behind a lot of petrochemicals. Oil companies have found a way to get rid of this - by producing plastics, detergents, and fertilizers as petroleum by-products. Plastics and detergents move fast but not fertilizers. Though not all crops need fertilizers, there are a few that cannot grow without fertilizers. A good example is corn - low in nutrition but requires huge amounts of fertilizers to grow. The demand for corn was low, that is, until fast food came along. Even that did not lift all the fertilizers. (Oil consumption was also increasing.) Then, came the obesity epidemic that (some people think) was triggerred by foods made from GMO (genetically modified organisms). Yummy!
"The middle-class Indian is travelling to the upper reaches of good life and he is feared today by all in the business of standing with folded palms and salaried smiles. He screams at the hotel staff to secretly ensure good service. He mistakes the waiter for his domestic help back home. He tries to eat everything in the breakfast buffet because it is obviously profitable that way. His wife is in the pool in a saree, mixing water sports with modesty. And his we-two-ours-two kids are all over the place." - From The Economic Times
Did you know that Swiss chocolate is made from cows, whose dung is exported to India? Did you that all the tonnes of steel from the World Trade Center was sent a scrap dealer in India? Do you know that Pepsi sent their cans to India for dumping?
The U.S. government's concern for "freedom of religion" is disingenuous at best. Inside America, the U.S. government systematically discourages Christian faith or acts in ways that are detrimental to it. Geniune and even harmless expressions of Christmas faith are suppressed. For example, Americans are expected to say "holiday season" instead of "Christmas season." It is not "Merry Christmas" but "Happy Holidays." In popular media and entertainment, Christian faith is systematically ridiculed and disrepected. Given this state in the U.S, then why does their government encourage Christian faith in other countries?
Generate an HTML signature on your own and use it in Outlook Express. Echelon Saltâ„¢ optional.
"Thanks to Echelon Salt, at least someone in the government reads our reports now." - Michael Hayden (Director, CIA) in Central Intelligence Agency Magazine.
India is a land of great diversity. Kerala is about as different from Tamil Nadu as France is from Britain. Yet, we move on, in part thanks to the English language. Over several decades, the language has acquired a unique flavour of its own in the country. People like to call it "Indian English"; sometimes proudly and sometimes derisively. Indian English is of course not truly a different language. And, surely there is absolutely no need create a separate standard for it. Yet, one often finds that an Oxford or Webster's dictionary is inadequate or incorrect when dealing with certain words or phrases that have changed on the Indian soil. This Dictionary of Indian English (DIE) hopes to provide a ready reference for such words and phrases. However, this dictionary does not contain English words that have Indian origins but are now part of standard English.
Subhash VCDPlayer is a free media player with special support for VCD playback, image capture, and transcription.
Here is a survival guide for people living outside the United States.
In February 2004, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) caused worldwide amusement when they published details of their Iraqi Rewards Program on their website www.cia.gov. Through this program, the top spying outfit of the U.S. government attempted to solicit intelligence information from the public about "recently-made" Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD).
The CIA waited for the fuss to die and took down the English version of the page. However, I had a copy of the web page saved in an e-mail. So, I promptly published the copy as an archive of the CIA web page on Moral Volcano.
Learn to load Linux from the Windows boot menu. Also, get familiar with terms such as partitions, boot loader, and MBR.
When you move from Windows to Linux, there will be some transition issues. This article is a compendium of issues that came up when I began using Ubuntu 8.10 a.k.a Intrepid Ibex and later went on to Ubuntu 9.04 a.k.a. Jaunty Jackalope, and how I went on to solve those issues.
I was asked to write an essay on this topic as part of a written test in a job interview in 2005. This article is what I wrote. If you are curious, rest assured that I did not get the job. A few days later, I called them and asked for my answer sheet. They obliged and gave me a photocopy.
Like George Orwell, Ram Swarup was one of those rare intellectuals who were really opposed to communism - not simply for the sake of opposing it. Communism helped and helps in enslaving whole countries. In communist countries, people go into slavery openly. In non-communist countries, the threat of communism is used to surreptitiosly enslave the people. To protect themselves from this enemy, people are asked to trust an opaque state and provide massive amounts of tax money to an elite who will then arm the country against this supposed danger. It is this elite that has bankrolled communism, caused numerous wars (warm and cold), and destroyed so many lives. Where communism cannot be sustained, it is being replaced by another bogeyman - The Islamic Terrorist. Islamic terrorism is sponsored and controlled from places like London and New York, not from the caves of Afghanistan. Like most communists, Islamic terrorists have no idea who really owns them.
"Some of the biggest men in the United States, in the field of commerce and manufacture, are afraid of something. They know that there is a power somewhere so organized, so subtle, so watchful, so interlocked, so complete, so pervasive, that they had better not speak above their breath when they speak in condemnation of it." - Woodrow Wilson, 28th President of the United States (1913 - 1921)…
CONTENT ADVISORY: Contains verses descriptive or advocating, suicide, incest, bestiality, sadomasochism, sexual activity in a violent context, murder, morbid violence, use of drugs or alcohol, homosexuality, voyeurism, revenge, undermining of authority figures, lawlessness, and human rights violations and atrocities.
EXPOSURE WARNING: Exposure to contents for extended periods of time or during formative years in children may cause delusions, hallucinations, decreased cognitive and objective reasoning abilities, and in extreme cases, pathological disorders, hatred, bigotry, and violence including, but not limited to fanaticism, murder, and genocide.
Here is a collection of jokes of all types and all colours (as in black humour) from all over the globe. Most of them are what I had heard or improved up on. There is wit and wisdom up here; many humorous anecdotes and quotes; and a whole of bevy of others that simply defy description.
Americans are fond of saying, “If life gives you a lemon, make lemonade.” With Bush in the White House, the United States has become the world's leading producer of lemonade.
Google has always given us consistently good results. People trust Google. There is never two arguments about it. Not the one to rest on its laurels, Google goes to great lengths to cultivate a cool hip image. Sometimes, the effort shows.
I am tired of Internet Explorer's (IE's) bad behavior. I will not have any more of its nonsense. My website will boycott IE. If your computer operating system (OS) is Windows, then please use a standards-compliant browser such as Opera, Firefox, Safari, Chrome, or K-Meleon to browse this site.
6:5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
6:6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.
6:7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.
As mentioned in my article PC Hardware Explained, anyone with a screwdriver can assemble a personal computer (PC) by hand. The components of a PC are modular in nature. They do not have to be welded or wired or tied together. When a few screws, levers, and plugs are in place, a PC is ready to go.
Moral Volcano's Universal CSS Font Stack is a basic stylesheet for Web designers to provide native font support for their web pages in almost all popular operating systems including Linux, Mac, and Windows.
Although I consider myself as a techie, I know squat when it comes to photography. I had a megapixel camera in my Motorala V3i RAZR phone, which I considered to be enough for my needs. It was only after I held in my hands actual photos from a digital camera did I realize that there was no substitute for a real camera. So, I went and bought a Sony DSC H20. I wanted to bypass compacts and go straight for a DSLR costing 30,000 rupees but my yelling half did not receive the idea calmly. So, I settled for the Sony compact digital camera costing 18,000.
Initially, I regretted this decision because I would have missed all the excitement of using a DSLR but the camera and photos it took simply blew away my blues.
The Internet is about freedom and sharing. Greedy corporates have taken the enforcement of intellectual property rights to a ridiculous extent. They pay politicians (legally and illegally) and create laws that leave the citizen little or no rights. It is easy to show them the absurdity of their audacious attempts at infringing our rights. If you are a webmaster, feel free to use these terms and conditions on your website. No attribution is necessary.
These IE extensions, created in 2004, are testimony to the fact that my objections to IE are based on sound facts. Yep, I was a fan of Internet Explorer (once). I used to hate Firefox because it was very slow while IE was pretty quick. It was only after I became a webmaster on a professional basis that I realized what a poor browser IE was. (Even before that, I had moved to Opera.)
Although I object to the use of IE, I understand that some people will be forced to use IE, say, as part of their work. These IE extensions are for those people.
This is the oldest article on this website. To find this page easily later, just type the words "pc hardware explained" in any Internet search engine.
AK-47 assault rifles are a proven success in protecting buns with guns. Arm all women with assault rifles. Let each woman kill a man a day. Soon, all men will be dead. Will women be safe then? No, they will all be raping each other next. As sanity kicks in, punishment at that time will be considered disproportionate.
When totalitarian states such as China tend to look down up on notions such as "free democracy" or "free press," there is a certain amount of pragmatism in their approach. Western countries are not really free. They have the illusion of being free. Nobody is more enslaved than those who falsely believe their free. In America in particular, truth is ignored, hidden, embellished, or whitewashed i.e. given the Hollywood treatment.
This article is for users of really old Windows operating systems such as Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows 2000 and maybe even Windows XP. This is the second-oldest article on this website and has been online since year 2000.
This web application offers free generation of privacy policy files to make your website P3P compliant.
This is useful only for website owners.
Written by V. Subhash, a certified astrologer and alumnus of People's School of Self-Criticism, Pessimism and Astrology, People's Republic of China.
I don't use Windows XP anymore, as I now have Ubuntu Linux. But, this article is one of my oldest articles. If you are still with XP, then this writeup may be useful for you.
There is a great deal of sympathy for the millions of Jews who died in the Holocaust during the Second World War. Taking of advantage of this, Jewish and Israeli organizations have been flogging the Holocaust theme endlessly. This is ironic because Israel has been conducting a mini Holocaust of its own in Palestine.
Israel is the only openly colonial power left in the world. Few people are aware that most Israelis are Europeans who migrated to Palestine after the Second World War. The immigrants first came as refugees. They started colonising Palestine by either squatting or by buying land with money provided by rich Jews living abroad. Later, they used war and terrorism to take over lands from Arabs and Christians. They then got the newly-formed United Nations to divide Palestine into two unequal halves with Jews taking the bigger portion.
I first read about Ambrose Bierce and his "devil's dictionary" in the Young World Saturday supplement of The Hindu. That was back when I was in school. Several years later, I came across a full-text version of the dictionary on the Internet. So, I created this free PDF version using HTMLDoc.
Access several search engines from one place. Search from Google, Yahoo, Rediff, eBay, Amazon, Lycos, Excite, Altavista, Rediff, About.com, Dictionary.com, Ask.com, DMOZ, Webopedia…
"It is to Mother Teresa of Calcutta's credit that her soup kitchens feed three times as many people in New York as they do in Calcutta."
How To Invest In Stocks is a beginner's guide to investing in Indian stock markets. I have written this book based on my own introduction to the stockmarkets. In this free PDF ebook, you will find information on actual real-world issues related to investing such as starting a demat account, placing orders, and managing a portfolio.
The book does not carry any hype about investing in the stock markets. It merely identifies sharemarkets as one of many possible investment destinations for your investment portfolio. It provides an easy introduction to company laws, primary market (IPOs), secondary markets, securities regulation, and international and Indian finance, commerce and politics. More importantly, it enables you to perform your own research for identifying trends, making forecasts, and selecting good shares to buy and sell.
Most grownups do not read any books. After they leave school or college, they just watch TV. And, there are others who read only fiction - Mills and Boon or Sidney Sheldon but nothing else. All their life, they just read fiction. When I was in school, I read fiction a lot. From Asterix to Hard Boys to James Hadley Chase to Jim Corbett. I have read them all. One day, I read Gandhi's autobiography. I was captivated by how close one could get to history by reading biographies. Soon, non-fiction became my staple. You would be amazed how much your world view changes when you read just a hundred books. I assure you knowledge grows exponentially as you read more books. On this page, I am recommending a few books for you to read.
“We want clean air, clear water, good living conditions, the best health care in the world. Yet, we aren't willing to pay for anything manufactured under those restrictions.”
The developed world has already moved to disposable multi-blade razors and shaving cream in cans. In India, we are slowly leaving behind safety razors and shaving creams. The reasons for this change can be pinned down to glamorous advertisements, ignorance and/or laziness.
Learn how to recharge Dish TV India subscription via SMS using an Oxigen PIN.
And, a really a cheap, good-looking 4-in-1 universal remote For Dish TV, Reliance Big TV, Sun Direct and Tata Sky.
| Home | Privacy | Legal | Contact | Store | Humour |
© V. Subhash, 2009. All rights reserved.
Moral Volcano is the work of a thinker, astrologer, software programmer, GNU/Linux user, web designer, technical writer, lexicographer, hacker, pioneer IE Blocker, and amateur photographer named V. Subhash (Me). I have written a fake American Policy for Dummies book. My e-book How To Invest In Stocks PDF eBook is free but not fake. So, I my PDF eBook version of Ambrose Bierce's Devil's Dictionary, which was created using the all-text original provided by the Guttenberg project and a free software HTMLDoc.
I do not have any time for social notworking sites such as Facebook. They cause a huge loss of productivity in offices where employees have access to Internet. I had a Johnny Bravo fan site but that was gone when Yahoo closed Geocities. Sites such as Facebook, Linked-In, MySpace, Orkut, and Twitter thrive only because spies and marketers feel there is a great need for easy access to demographic and personal information. "Free" pretends to be free for a reason. Otherwise, everything comes with a price tag.
Finally, this website blocks Internet Explorer - all versions, not just IE6. This is the first website on the Internet to do so. If you have a website, I welcome you to do so.
