Sunday, June 22, 2014

Windows 7: Disable Homegroups From Windows Explorer

Disable Homegroups from the Windows explorer (Windows 7) works as follows:

  • Disable Homegroups
  • Open Windows explorer.
  • Right click on Libraries.
  • Select "Change HomeGroup" settings.
  • Click on "Leave the Homegroup", then confirm the selection.
  • Click on "Finish".

  • In the Windows Services, seach the "Homegroup Listener Service" and "Homegroup Provider Service".
  • Stop both services.
  • Disable both services.
A reboot of Windows might be necessary.

Saturday, June 21, 2014

XCOM: Removing the Intro Videos

To remove the annoying intro videos for XCOM: Enemy Unknown, you need to edit the configuration file "XcomEngine.ini", which is located in the directory "My Documents\My Games\XCOM - Enemy Unknown\XComGame\Config".

  1. Stop XCOM 
  2. Open the file XcomEngine.ini with any text editor,
  3. Search for the four lines starting with "StartupMovies", and remove them from the file
  4. StartupMovies=Logo_2KFiraxis
    StartupMovies=UE3TechLogo
    StartupMovies=LogoLegal_PCConsole
    StartupMovies=1280x720_Black
  5. Save the file
Any subsequent start ofXCOM should now immediately go to the start screen.

Monday, June 2, 2014

ESR To The Rescue

As it seems, yesterday's post seems to be only part of the truth .. another "great" feature was to remove the original download browser config option (and the old download browser entirely with Firefox 26 or so .. wtf .. again!

But what I learned is that something Firefox ESR, where ESR stand for Extended Service Release. Which offers security fixes etc., without this constant, nagging, freaking pushing towards upgrading and pointless, unnecessary, unwanted new "features".

So now it's downgrading to Firefox 24.5 ESR with the hope that next (more less) forced upgrade is in the future in a galaxy far, far away ...

Please Mozilla Foundation, do not force upon the users these changes to the user interface without some sort of reasonable fallback option. Even better, why do new UIs need to be mandatory. Why do it as theme/add-on/extension or whatever you wanna call it?!?! Currently all I am doing after upgrades is spending more and more time on restoring the old usability of Firefox.

Sunday, June 1, 2014

The day is not far ahead ..

The day is not far ahead .. that I am going to quit using Firefox. Again with Firefox 29 and their new and "improved" Australis user interface. I just want to use the goddamn browser, not cope and learn a new interface every 6 months. Now after updating I always have to check if there's a proper way to order title bar, menu bar, bookmark bar, the way it used it be .. this is annoying as hell.

It's like when your bringing your car to an inspection and they'll tell you, OK we can do this, but we have to switch the gas and break pedals, the rear view mirror is now on the hood, and you have to keep pressing the button for the high beam seven times to make it work. Sure it'll work, and you'll find some guys liking it that way, but you're sure as hell annoying a lot of users as well ..

There two options, either stop adjusting the user interface in such radical ways or give the users at least option to stick (easily) with other/older default configurations. Oh wait, there's a third option .. I just quit using this quicksand of a browser and switch a to viable alternative like Sea Monkey.

P.S.: My thanks goes this time to the guys who programmed the "Classic Theme Restorer".

Also see Microsoft and their Windows 8 user interface fiasco.

Friday, May 30, 2014

Music -- Ten

Ten Music Albums that stayed with me ..

  • 1974 -- Mike Oldfield -- Hergest Ridge
  • 1983 -- Yes -- 90125
  • 1983 -- The Police -- Synchronicity
  • 1984 -- Sade -- Smooth Operator
  • 1985 -- Latin Quarter -- Modern Times
  • 1987 -- Queen -- The Works
  • 1989 -- Tom Petty -- Full Moon Fever
  • 1990 -- Indigo Girls -- Nomads Indians Saints
  • 1991 -- Baby Animals -- Baby Animals
  • 1993 -- Marc Cohn -- The Rainy Season

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Best Served Cold

In the past months I have been reading or (to be more precise) listening to the First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie. For the most part I rather enjoyed the books, not so much because of the story itself, but the characters are very interesting (I wouldn't call them heroes), and the writing which is fresh and entertaining.

So I am usually skeptical about book series (I am looking at you Wheel of Time), but upon a recommendation by a friend I started listening to the sequels, starting with Best Served Cold. I am about 1/4 into the book now, and I must say it's again another good read. And I appreciate the fact, that the author didn't continue the story from the original trilogy, but started a fresh one.

The Next Great Thing?

Sunday, May 18, 2014

Winamp: Gracenote Services Terminated

Unfortunately the autodetection of (music) CDs in Winamp is no longer working, which means, that the automatic tagging is no longer .. automatic. DrO, member of the Winamp team, posted the following explanation in the Winamp forum on May 15th, 2014:

it looks like the access Winamp had to Gracenote's services has been terminated and is the reason why things have stopped working. this was going to happen anyway as a result of the sale of Winamp and SHOUTcast in January where the deal with them was not going to be renewed (and if Winamp and SHOUTcast hadn't been bought, what you're now seeing would have happened anyway), but we weren't at all sure when things were going to stop working (as all that was known is it might be sometime between the start of 2014 and early 2015). as such until a new Winamp client is released with a Musicbrainz based solution (as we're not aiming to have a new client out until the end of the year due to the mass of work required to remove / replace the AOL / Gracenote specific parts), there's not much i can really suggest at the time on what can be done as an alternative for the Gracenote powered features.