Transit to Chrome

Discovered this morning that Google’s blogger no longer supports Microsoft Internet Explorer 7—an unpleasant surprise. I installed the newer Version 9 with some trepidation. Having done so on Brigitte’s machine some months ago, I knew that it would slow things down. The process these days, in MS land, seems to be to pile new code on top of old to counter new security threats—rather than the much more costly process of redoing things from the bottom up—which has always been our policy at Editorial Code and Data, Inc. Sure enough. Having done it once before, the transit was just a shade faster—but the results mind-numbingly slower.

A good while back I gave Google’s own Chrome browser a try. It worked well a while back, but that was an early trial version. I went back to Microsoft. Today, in frustration, I fetched Chrome for a second time. I had it up and working in a matter literally of minutes. True, it took another half an hour before I’d replicated the Favorites pull-down menu, which in Chrome-land is called a Bookmark (but turns out to be a bookmark folder—and you can line these up in multiples, if you wish). In the MS-world it’s part of a Menu. Chrome also had a facility to import my favorites from Microsoft, so the process was simple enough. And the overall results were stunning. Chrome works faster than my old Version 7. Promptly went upstairs and replaced Brigitte’s version with Chrome too. Well, actually, “replaced” is the wrong word. Her and my MS v. 9 are also still available. But when one of them makes you wonder if something is wrong, while the other fades into the background because it works so well, guess which one we shall make our default browser?

None of this changes anything you might see here, but my experience might mean something to others who daily struggle to put stuff up on the web.

Geologic Ages: Some Footnotes

The oldest blogger on the web, more or less, except perhaps for Jerry Pournelle, is Brandon Watson on Siris—and here’s a post from Brandon to prove it. In that most informative note Brandon makes use of geologic ages to communicate just exactly how old a blogger he really is—but being a great teacher, he is actually pulling a fast one. Most of us have no idea that we are denizens of the Holocene, the most recent segment of the Quaternary—or, like me, knew once but had forgotten long ago. Brandon secretly hopes that we shall “look it up.” But the effort may be too great for some. Therefore, to help those struggling with Brandon’s post (Cenozoic? Mesozoic?) I present three graphics from ever-helpful Wikipedia here:

The first presents all geologic time. The second shows the last block of the first expanded to show more detail. The third shows the last block of the second, ditto. You will find Brandon in the second graphic, on the right, right on that line that separates the Cretaceuous from the Paleogene. Jerry Pournelle? He is left of the Cretaceous.

Blogging is a great educator if you have a guide like Brandon and able assistants like yours truly—albeit in actual physical age, I am an Upper Tarantian to Brandon’s Holocene.