Everyday Nerd

OK folks… I’ve harped on this before, and I’ll probably harp on it again, but here’s the deal:  Your hard drive in your computer WILL fail one day, and when it does, you can kiss all  those precious pictures of your family goodbye.  I’ve mentioned a couple of ways to backup your stuff, but today I want to share a great way to backup your pictures (usually the largest amount of data (short of music) that people wish to backup).

Google.  Picasa.  Picasa Web Albums.  Yup, I’ve mentioned these before too…   Well, combine all three of those, throw in a FREE Eye-Fi card, and you are not only backing up your pictures, you won’t even have to plug in your camera to transfer the pictures to your computer!

Google has been offering more disk space for Picasa Web Albums for a while now, but if it wasn’t a great deal already, they are now throwing in a free 4GB Eye-Fi card when you order 200GB or more space.  This is starting at $50 / year for the 200GB, but if you don’t use that much, after the first year, you can downgrade to what you actually need. 

Backing up your pictures from Picasa to Picasa Web Albums is as easy as clicking the “Sync to Web” button in each folder.

Next, select the size – I recommend the original size, and set your visibility (security) as you choose.  Press Sync, and your photo’s are being backed up to Picasa Web Albums!

You can also select to automatically upload anything that you import: 

More about the Eye-Fi card:

To sum it up, this is a FANTASTIC deal.  The Eye-Fi card runs about $80 – ish.  If anything, this is a great deal to get the card at a discount, plus if you’re not already taking measures to backup your data, you should be.  I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it till the day I die…

ALL HARD DRIVES FAIL…

[ Eye-Fi ]

[ Google Picasa Web Albums Eye-Fi Promo ]

DNS is the phonebook of the internet.  Without it, everyone would be typing in numbers to access websites.  DNS does a lookup from a name to an IP address – like http://18.62.1.6/ is the same as http://eecs.mit.edu/ – which is easier to remember?  Thank you DNS!

Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) offers you use of their DNS servers, but is often not the best DNS servers available – both in speed, reliability and security.  I’ve told you in the past about OpenDNS, and while Google DNS service does not come with the content filtering that OpenDNS has, it is extremely fast, secure, and very reliable – MUCH more than your ISP’s (especially if you have Charter Communications).

Google’s DNS servers IP address are:

• 8.8.8.8
• 8.8.4.4

For instructions how to configure your computer to use Google’s DNS servers, visit Google’s Help website:  http://code.google.com/speed/public-dns/docs/using.html.  They provide excellent instructions for Windows, Mac, Linux, and even your router and mobile device.

To sum up, I like the idea of Google having public DNS servers.  Providing you are not using the content filtering aspect of OpenDNS, or not using OpenDNS at all, Google’s DNS is a no-brainer.  Start using it today, and you will probably see a difference in your browsing speed!

Syncing my iPhone with work (Microsoft Exchange) is great, but I still wanted a to view personal calendar from Google Calendar to be synced to my iPhone too.  And yes, I know you can use ActiveSync to sync Calendar on the iphone.  This can be done by adding the CalDev calendar sync!

First, click the settings button on the home screen, select Mail, Contacts, Calendars:

Select Add Account, then Other,

Now select Add CalDev Account:

Enter the following information:

• Server:  www.google.com
• User Name:  Your Google account email address (can be your Google Apps email address)
• Password:  Ummm… your Google account password…
• Description:  Google Calendar (or whatever you want to put here)

Tap the Next button in the top right, and that’s it!  I did a quick test, and added an items from both Exchange and Google Calendar, and within 1-2 minutes, it was on synced to my iPhone!

I’ve been a fan of Picasa for a long time, and now I’ve an even bigger fan!  Facial tags were first introduced in Picasa Web Album, and now has gone a step further, and not only detects faces, but also will, after tagging a face, recognize a face, and auto tag it for you!  I updated last night, and was truly amazed at how accurate it was!  This is a MUST HAVE update for anyone that has digital pictures on your PC.

From the Picasa Blog, here’s a video going over the new features of Picasa 3.5:

Download Picasa 3.5 at [ picasa.google.com ]

Until now, Google Sync only worked with Calendar and Contacts, but now supports mail!  This is great news for mobile users – both Windows and iPhone!

Read more over at the official [ Google Mobile Blog ]