Ramblings of a Luddite Geek

The following links are listed in Data Visualization for Dummies : https://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/ http://visual.ly/ http://chartporn...

I've written about how to force Excel to use absolute paths in its links by specifying the Hyperlink Base   That works in PowerPoint, to...

I've been using and recommending AVG AntiVirus Free for over a decade.  Whenever a new computer's trial version of Symantec AntiViru...

On Wednesday I was unable to download my personal email on my work computer.  Since downloading personal email at work is something I probab...

Today's Soup to Nutz comic strip by Rick Stromoski is definitely blog worthy... http://www.gocomics.com/soup-to-nutz/2017/01/14 If yo...

Did Hilary Clinton's discomfort with technology cause her to lose the election? After reading the FBI summaries of the Clinton email d...

I have an issue with traffic lights. When I'm stuck right behind an inattentive driver at a red light, I get annoyed when the driver d...

For this election cycle, ScienceDebate has included the Green and Libertarian party candidates in its list of 20 questions regarding the mo...

I've stopped installing Microsoft Office onto my home computers. Instead, I installed OpenOffice on my latest two computers. It does ...

FireFox is my favorite browser.  It beats Chrome in terms of usability.  But I'm curious to see if I could live with Chrome for a while....

Recently I had to set up fresh installations of Windows 7 on two computers.  Here are some tips to make that process go a bit smoother... ...

Several weeks ago I took the plunge and bought myself a cell phone.  This leaves my brother as possibly the only person in the USA who doesn...

A coworker had just bought a refurbished computer with Windows 7 OS and was dutifully applying updates.  He noticed a new icon in the taskba...

As of Wednesday Microsoft started giving away Windows 10.  What would you be giving away if you upgrade?  Privacy?  Security?  Performance? ...

Here's the scenario....  Your Android device presents you with a choice of apps to complete an action with.  You're supposed to sele...

Yesterday, my laptop wouldn't charge when I plugged it in.  The battery had drained overnight, so the laptop was unusable.  I quickly fi...

I'm still using Excel 2003 at work.  It does all we need it to do. And at home, Open Office's Calc is so compatible that I can for...

Today I found myself wanting to reverse the order of sheet tabs in an Excel file.  The VBA code snippet below does just that. Sub Workshe...

Fluorescent lights produce a lot of light for little power.  My kitchen lights, which use two T9 bulbs, are rated at 32 W , 2400 lm and 22 ...

About six years ago, I mused about what to do with an old computer , a 500MHz Pentium III.  My idea was to reformat the hard drive (20GB) an...