Lately, the Technology Explained articles have talked about the Internet and communications in general. This article will add to that series by explaining a very important piece of equipment – the router. In order for a computer to connect to more than one other computer, you need a router or a hub. Two very different [...]

Have you ever done a speed test on your Internet connection? A lot of people have, and they see Internet speed numbers like 500 kbps or 2 Mbps or sometimes even higher numbers. Then they turn around try to watch a streaming video on YouTube and the video stutters or stops for seconds at a [...]

How many garage sales have you had, or been to, that have had items for sale that were recalled by the manufacturer? You don’t know do you? I know I don’t. Did you know that in the United States of America, you could be fined up to $15 million for selling recalled items? According to [...]

Does anyone remember a commercial that said, “The future is now”? Seems like an odd thing to say, especially if you have any grasp of physics. Yet, the statement is not entirely without merit. As far as technology goes, the future is, indeed, now. What is being created and tested in research and development labs [...]

As a self-confessed tin-hatter and someone who has worked with asset management and inventory controls, I’ve got a lot of interest in RFID technology. Why the tin-hatter bit? I’ll get to that in a few paragraphs. First off, you need to know what RFID is an initialization of – Radio Frequency Identification Tag. The initialization [...]

The leaves are starting to change where I am, and the nights grow longer and colder across the plains. The deer are retreating deeper into the woods with furtive glances across the now harvested fields that they recently dined on. The joy of returning to school and seeing friends has quickly sublimated to the normal [...]

Learning is a pursuit which can only be positive for us. Even if we learn something that we don’t think we need to know, it may serve you in an unexpected way at some point in your life. Not all of us can stay in school forever though, so I present to you some of [...]

If you’ve ever wondered, “What are computer chips made out of?” – That’s a tougher question than one might think. A computer chip is any small electronic device that contains an integrated circuit (IC). What that means is if you look at an ordinary electronic circuit, like the copper lines on the green boards in [...]

To some degree, we’re all familiar with cookies as they relate to websites. Most of you are aware that they are out there and serve some purpose. Some of you know that websites use them to store information locally on your computer. There are also those cookies that track information about you and your web [...]

As each day goes by, you probably hear more and more about impending flu doom, the Mayan calendar, climate change, more terrorist actions and conflict. I know I do.  Really, these things and events like them have hounded humanity as long as we’ve existed.  Whether you believe that they will come to pass or not, [...]

There is no other quote that one could use to lead into a story like this except, “It’s like deja vu, all over again.” Thank you, Yogi Berra. Really, what do you do with the number one social networking site after you’ve added so much crap, like Facebook Apps, Facebook Ads, more quizzes than you [...]

Somebody at Microsoft is doing things right in my humble opinion. What they’ve done with Small Basic is reintroduce hand-coding software, but with just a little less help than drag-and-drop or WYSIWYG interface. Let’s take a look at at it shall we? Take a look at the interface. Doesn’t look like much more than a [...]

Must be something going on in my mind about my dad. My last article was inspired by his tattoo. This one is about left-handers, which my dad was. I remember him telling me stories of how when he was a kid, they tried to force him to do everything right-handed. Apparently there was a time [...]

I love tattoos. I know, everybody loves tattoos since Miami Ink and Inked and the biker culture was reignited by guys like Orange County Choppers. (Fun Fact – I did an image of the Lincoln bike for their site years ago.) But I’ve loved tattoos a lot longer. See, my dad was an Army man [...]

So you say you can’t get on the open seas of the Internet at school/work/home? You’re concerned about men in black suits watching what you see? What you need, then, is a proxy server. You connect directly to the proxy server and it connects you to the rest of the Internet, using its IP address. [...]