bruceb news

Lynda.com is a learning and training site with video tutorials to teach software skills. It has courses at all levels, from novice to expert, and it covers a wide variety of programs and subjects with something for almost everyone, from photography hobbyists to business and graphics professionals.

I’m frequently asked where to find help or how to get started with a program. Lynda.com is going to be one of my answers to that question for many programs.

It’s particularly good with deep and complicated business and professional software. There are extensive libraries of videos about notoriously difficult Adobe programs, for example. […] continued

The little box in the picture to the left measures eight inches across and just over three inches tall. It’s quiet and inexpensive. In this difficult world of technology, the best I can tell you is that it might be just what you’re looking for.

The Dell Inspiron Zino HD is a compact little computer that is best used for a single purpose: to bring your photos, music, and videos to the big screen TV in your living room. There are more details about the Zino in this review.

The Zino runs Windows 7 and has sufficient processing and video power to decode most video formats. […] continued

The good news is that Microsoft has released Windows Live Essentials 2011, an updated collection of free programs that are well designed and useful additions to Vista and Windows 7.

The bad news is that you almost certainly don’t want all of them, and Microsoft has released them in a way that makes it more likely that you’ll install them all by accident, with some side effects that you won’t like.

The programs included in Windows Live Essentials 2011 have been shifting for the last couple of years – programs have been added and dropped, features have appeared and disappeared, and names have changed around endlessly. […] continued

Ze Frank has been doing interesting online experiments for almost ten years. He delivered a talk about some of his projects to a TED conference a few months ago; if you can find 20 minutes to watch it, you might come out feeling a little better about community and sharing and connections and what to think about the person staring at their cell phone as they walk down the street.

In the dark ages before YouTube became a global phenomenon – about four years ago – Ze Frank spent a year posting short videos, one per day, which were funny, smart, political, silly, emotional, and thoughtful, sometimes all at once. […] continued

Now I know the answer to a lingering question: if I embed videos into a news post and send it out to my email subscribers, the video links will just vanish. Poof! Nothing to click on.

You’ll have a better idea of what the Ze Frank post is about if you visit the news page online, where the videos should show up quite nicely. Sorry!

Previously:
Understanding Google Voice
Fully Committed to Google Voice – Part 1
Google Voice Interlude – Background About Voice And Data
Fully Committed to Google Voice – Part 2

Skype is best known for its program that runs on a computer to call other Skype users for free anywhere in the world, but Skype is able to do several other things now – things you’ll recognize from what I’ve been writing about Google Voice.

Skype is built on the same technology to carry your voice over an Internet data connection for as much of the journey as possible. A Skype call to another Skype user travels over the Internet the whole way. […] continued

Ah, Avatar. Extraordinary movie-making, one of the prettiest movies ever to hit the screen. The perfect movie for your new Blu-Ray player and HD TV – it will look splendid.

Well, that’s if it will play. And if the disc in the stores now is the one you want to buy. Because the release of Avatar on DVD and Blu-Ray has managed to combine all the worst instincts in our entertainment companies for marketing and for copy protection paranoia.

The Blu-Ray disc on the market now has the movie on it. It has no extras. It has no commentary. It has no 3D. […] continued

Long time readers know that periodically I mention J River Media Center, the program I’ve used for many years to organize my embarrassingly large music library. If you’re not familiar with the program, then please go read my write-up a few months ago, where I tried to make it clear who it might appeal to – and more importantly, who should not consider it. Anything that touches your music library, your photos and your videos should not be taken lightly!

Development has begun on J River Media Center 15, as the company continues to add features for the rapidly evolving multimedia world. […] continued

Who’s going to buy an Apple iPad?

Well, not you or me, anyway – not this version, not at $600-800.

It’s not going to revolutionize anything, it’s not going to replace netbooks, but it will find large and devoted audiences, particularly after the price drops and some features get added. It’s easy to imagine version 2 or 3 with the built-in camera that ought to have been there all along, and with the GPS receiver that is driving the most interesting uses of the iPhone. More importantly, a couple of years from now the low-end version of the iPad will be something like $199 or $299, and at that point the game changes. […] continued

What software do you use to listen to music on a computer?

Most people use iTunes. A few lonely folks have gotten the new Zune HD and use its software. Still others use Windows Media Player. All of them are just fine. They’re very attractive and they handle basic functions to help you buy and listen to music. If they make you happy, don’t change!*

Some of you are outgrowing those programs.

If you’ve accumulated a large music library, you’ve probably realized that iTunes and the others are terrible at handling collections of more than a few hundred songs. Navigation is clumsy and it’s nearly impossible to do a lot of handy operations on the files and tags. […] continued