Wireless Friendship Beads for Kids. [Gizmodo 4/4/2005] As part of her master's thesis studying communication among teenagers, Ruth kikin-Gil designed techno-jewelry 'BuddyBeads' that can be used to show friendship and indicate mood within groups. Messages are decided by the group in advance and construct a secret private code among its members, emphasizing their social structures, behaviors and needs. As the group changes, so does the bracelet’s composition. When two girls are no longer friends, they can remove their friend’s bead from the bracelet and keep it as a memory of their friendship. When they become friends again, few weeks later, the removed beads can be added to the bracelet once again. 4/24/2005 7:34:27 PM    

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Mitch's Must Have Programs. [Lockergnome - Mitchelaneous 4/5/2005] Within the time span of one year I have installed, reinstalled, deleted, and created more than any one person should on one computer. About a week ago I figured it was time I did a little spring cleaning. I totally reformatted my machine and put Windows XP back on just like it came out of the box. So what programs to I make a note of installing first? What do I use most often and what do I find the most effective? Here's my basic list: TweakUI, FeedDemon, Firefox, SmartFTP, Trillian, OpenOffice, NoteTab Pro, Audacity, Spybot, AVG Free ... 4/24/2005 6:40:31 PM    

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Microsoft releases free new VB 2005 refactoring tool [Scobleizer 4/24/2005] Microsoft has made an agreement with Developer Express to include a fully functional version of Refactor! with VB 2005 and Visual Studio 2005. Refactor! for Visual Basic 2005 Beta 2 is a free plug-in that enables Visual Basic developers to simplify and re-structure source code, making it easier to read and less costly to maintain. Refactor! supports more than 15 individual refactoring features, including operations like Reorder Parameters, Extract Method, Encapsulate Field and Create Overload. 4/24/2005 3:10:25 PM    

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Novell Insists NetWare is "Not Dead Yet" [eWeek 4/15/2005] With Novell's focus on Linux, many—including sites that depend on NetWare—wonder if it's the end of the road for Novell's once-dominant network operating system. Novell has indeed announced that there will be no further standalone NetWare releases, but the operating system will continue to live on as an underlying platform for Novell's Open Enterprise Server. The work Novell has done to plaster over the differences between NetWare and Linux in OES should extend the life of NetWare as a platform. This is good news for NetWare shops that aren't ready to migrate off this stalwart platform. "I think I'll go for a walk..." 4/24/2005 10:58:36 AM    

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Microsoft's New Mantra - It Just Works [Fortune 4/21/2005] Windows guru Jim Allchin talks to FORTUNE about Microsoft's next version of its operating system, Longhorn, revealing some of its features for the first time. Allchin, a wiry-built 54-year-old who has been in charge of Windows for almost a decade, is admirably blunt about his own frustrations using the current operating system. “You shouldn’t have to spend a lot of time struggling with things,” Allchin said, adding that the number one design goal for Longhorn has been: “It just works.” 4/24/2005 10:41:46 AM    

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