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Firefox, Star Downloader and Zip/Exe’s no longer downloading

After briefly trying Star Downloader and later uninstalling it, I found that Firefox would not download any exe or zip files. Instead, I would be greeted with a blank tab with the exe URL in the title bar. Everything else seemed ok.

To troubleshoot the issue I did as followed
1) Disabled all my fancy extensions to get as much of a pure firefox as possible.
2) Checked the file associations for application mime types and exe/zip associations opened in the current application. To access these options go to:
Tools->Options->Downloads->View & Edit Actions…
You will see the ‘Download Actions’ dialog. Look for anything that has Star Downloader / Opera plugin and change the Action to either save or use another program to open that kind of app.

3) On restarting firefox the problem was still there. In firefox, going to About:plugins in the address bar, showed me that the star downloader dll (npstar.dll) was still in firefoxs plugins directory. Even though the zip/exe associations were now cleared from the download actions dialog, they were still getting handled by the plugin.

4) Closed Firefox. Deleted npstar.dll from E:Program FilesMozilla Firefoxplugins. Restarted firefox.

The behaviour was now restored. I reactivated my extensions and enjoyed being able to download again.

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Jude smells better than a Rose

http://jude.change-vision.com/jude-web/product/community.html

The guys at work started using a modelling tool known as Jude to help with their design of various projects and enhancements. Jude comes in a community (free) and professional version and the free version allows you to create the following UML diagrams:

  • Class (Object/Package/Robustness)
  • UseCase
  • Sequence
  • Collaboration
  • Statechart
  • Activity
  • Component
  • Deployment

It also has some Java code generation and importing although it didn’t seem to handle generics at all (claimed a syntax error) so I’m not sure about Java 5 support.

The application appears much more robust than Rational Rose ever did. I wish I knew about it for my System Design and Implementation subject this semester as one of our group members couldn’t get Rose to run on their home PC. The price of Jude community is more student friendly also ;-), as well as benefiting from the platform independence that Java provides.

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A goody in SDK clothing

http://jgoodies.com/freeware/jdiskreport/index.html

JDiskReport is a system filespace analyser, that is part of a demo of the jgoodies.com system.

For functionality and ease of use it scores highly with a strong comparison to SpaceMonger without the treemaps. I like its multiplatformness, abiltity to exclude directories (useful for symlinks) and its freeness.

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Freemind taking off (sort of)

http://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&words=freemind

Another trip on sourceforge revealed that Freemind has a couple of wiki’s that support its format along with some tools to extend its functionality.

My favourites from the above search are:

LiveMind: AJAX MindMap editor – “this is an on-line, html (AJAX) based editor & browser for FreeMind (http://freemind.sourceforge.net/) mindmaps.”

Mapp.it – “A web-spider, based on the availability of URL APIs to most web based databases, mapping web pages to two dimensional FreeMind mind-maps. “

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Topographica and the NIMH Human Brain Project

Topographica and the NIMH Human Brain Project

Something interesting on the sourceforge homepage today. I found an application known as Topographica which is used to help researchers identify the functions of the brain related to sensory and motor functions.

From the webpage:

Topographica instead focuses on the large-scale structure and function that is visible only when many thousands of such neurons are connected into topographic maps containing millions of connections.

While I touched on the ideas expressed only very briefly when I studied Computational Neuroscience, I’m sure the future of this app looks promising and is something I’ll come back to when I get more time.

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New Aussie Bands

These two bands have appeared on my radar recently.

Sleight of Hand
Karnivool

I know that these bands have both performed with Cog in the past so there is a tick of approval.

I know Sleight of Hand are from Newcastle and have a catchy tune going on. It’ll be a while before they hit Melb but still worth noting.

Karnivool, as my brother tells me, are a fusion styles, focusing on rock, more technical than tool, apparently the guitarist has one an award recognising him as best guitarist in Australia! To me I hear butterfly effect and grand silent to a higher production level. Took me a little while to get into, but once I was in the right space to enjoy it, enjoy I did.

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The Making of Net of Being

http://www.alexgrey.com/net.html

This man must be my most favourite artist ever. This page on his site shows the steps of how this monster was created. If anyone wants to buy me a signed copy of Net of Being please feel free

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I heart Alex Grey

http://asap.ap.org/stories/575717.s#

Link to article about Alex Greys work with Tool and a very brief video of Alex’s workspace, along with soundbites from Adam Jones about getting the stereoscopic images onto the record.