Proof that Johnny can't swim:

[crustine]

haha you are welcome, but can you copy selections of your screen with a pc? I had to use the ctl apple 4 function then upload to photobucket

[myownsatellite]

Yeah, we have a print screen function. But I couldn't see the picture at all, so it wouldn't have mattered!

[AnnieDreams]

wow. It took me a long time to realize there was a person standing behind him.
I was like "what are those things?! ...oh."

[nikki4982]

^

... poor kid.

[crustine]

yeah i know about print screen function, i am talking about part of a screen, or selected section of an active screen. This picture was in a vast background of white, which although pure, would not enhance the meaning of said photograph.

[nikki4982]

That's what the image editing software with which you save the copied screen is for.

But to copy the active window, you hold down Alt+Print Screen. As far as just part of the active window/whatever, I dunno. I've never felt the need to do it. Cropping after having the whole thing's plenty easy.

[crustine]

yeah i get that. i was referring to the lack of need to do post print editing. macs really do rule this. hello I'm a mac, and I'm a PC. love the calming cranberry and pomegranate patience teas.

[nikki4982]

Anyone seen the new Microsoft "I'm a PC" commercial? It made me smile.

Not nearly as much as the crazy Bill Gates/Jerry Seinfeld ones, though. Holy crap those are hilariously random.

[Kicker774]

The Mojave commercials are a better way of getting the point across to people.

The I'm a PC commercial isn't bad, Iv'e only seen it once though.

I saw the first Gates/Seinfeld commecial. Hilariously random indeed but really not much PC content aside form the cake thing.

I read somewhere they cancelled the rest of those. $3.5 million dolalr ad campaign for nothing.

[myownsatellite]

The Mojave campaign is such crap. Put those users in a room and give them nothing but Vista for more than ten minutes and they'll want to throw the damn thing out the window. I have Vista on my new laptop and I HATE how it pops up with a dialogue box wanting my authorization every time I open an install program or even open some of my programs. YES, I clicked that and YES, I want to open/install it. And I can't for the life of me find the setting to turn it the fuck off.

[Kicker774]

Start -> Run -> MSCONFIG -> Tools

Find Disable UAC and hit launch
Close the open command window then restart Vista

[crustine]

i havent seen the gates seinfeld commercials. the mac and pc commercials are pretty funny
which one were you talking about Nikki? the genius one?

[nikki4982]

Yah man, with UAC disabled is the only way to run Vista if you're an experienced user. Though, if you can't figure out how to turn it off, perhaps you're not experienced enough to be turning it off. It's there to protect you from yourself.

Man I love Vista.

I'd forgotten about the Mojave commercial. I like that one, too. Like, a lot. It's ridiculous how many people are all "BOO VISTA" without even trying it.

i havent seen the gates seinfeld commercials. the mac and pc commercials are pretty funny
which one were you talking about Nikki? the genius one?

Nope, not talking about a Mac commercial. The one I'm talking about is a Microsoft commercial that spoofs the Mac/PC ones in the very beginning. Hang on, I'm sure I can find it on YouTube. Ahh yes, here it is:

I'm a PC

Shame they couldn't get John Hodgman to do the first bit. That would've been classic. Though I suppose Mac would fire him from their ads if he did an ad for Microsoft, too.

And, for you and anyone else who hasn't seen the Seinfeld/Gates ones (there's two, the second one's way longer and freaking hilarious):

Shoe Circus

New Family

... so those have been cancelled? WHY!? People these days have no concept of what's really funny.

[myownsatellite]

Yah man, with UAC disabled is the only way to run Vista if you're an experienced user. Though, if you can't figure out how to turn it off, perhaps you're not experienced enough to be turning it off. It's there to protect you from yourself.

Man I love Vista.

I don't know if that was said with sarcasm or not, but I think it's safe to say that since I've been using Windows and computers in general since I was a kid, I'm an experienced user and know how to protect my computer. My problem is that everything in Vista is in a different, more difficult to find place, and it's next to impossible to navigate or change my settings without getting pop-ups asking me, "Did you really want to do that?" I know how to work a computer and yes, I do want to do what I just did, and honestly, I don't need to be protected from myself. I had to do individual searches just to figure out why the heck I was getting special characters just by pressing the shift key in order to use my " character. Also, having to run a command prompt just to find the option to turn off the UAC is incredibly ridiculous. If I want to turn it off, the option should be made available through the control panel. And I searched for it. If it's there, they hid it really well.

I guess I should say that my problem is that I'm offended by a program that assumes right from the start that I'm an idiot who doesn't know what she's doing (and also by any person who assumes the same - which is what most tech people think when they look at me because I'm a girl who has questions about what she's about to buy, or needs help with something she can't figure out on her own). I wouldn't have bought the laptop if I didn't know how to use it, and I wouldn't be changing things if I didn't know what I was doing. Assuming like that puts companies in a very bad light with me, because no, I'm not an idiot and yes, I bought your product with the expectation that I would get a little bit more respect than that. I don't need my hand held while I install a program that I've installed on several other computers. Just let me install it and be done with it.

[nikki4982]

Haha, I was being sarcastic, yeah. I think the only CMer that really needs to be protected from themselves is our buddy Johnny. And I'm pretty sure he'd agree with me on that!

You don't have to do it with a command prompt, I don't believe. Though it's been probably a year since I disabled mine so I don't really remember. I know it was easy to do, though. And yeah, some things have changed, but change is good! Things always change with upgrades, it just takes a little getting used to... I'm sure you will in time.

[myownsatellite]

Change is fine. I don't have a problem with change. I upgraded to XP last year and the change didn't bother me.

Like I said, it's the assumption that I'm stupid that bothers me. I'm not stupid, and I can handle the computer without being asked if I really wanted to make such and such a change.

[nikki4982]

Gotta remember, though... a lot of people using it really are that stupid. So it's not Microsoft assuming that you're stupid, it's them assuming that the general population is.

I know if I ever upgrade my mom's computer to Vista, I'm DEFINITELY not disabling UAC.

[Kicker774]

It's a perfectly good layer of protection.
The heavy majority of the time it's unneeded but if I get pointed to a sketchy website and the UAC pops up on me I may think twice before hitting the ok button.

In XP that crap spyware could install automatically and fuck things up.

As a help desk guy stuff like that is fantastic. Saves me work, saves the end user from downtime.
For the average home user it'd be nice if they included an easier or more published option of disabling it, but you don't want to make it too easy. Maybe a nice feature in Vista Home for the average home user, but turn it off in Vista Pro.

Not to jump into nerd mode here but one thing you have to thing of when designing programs is not to assume the user will use it the correct way, but to think of all the ways a user can screw up. From there you program in all the safeguards you can, then be prepared to find the proverbial “Bigger idiot”

So blame the bigger idiots out there, not Microsoft.

[nikki4982]

They gotta idiot proof their products now that everyone and their grandmothers have computers.

Sure, things were better when it was just us geeks who had them, but we can't blame the software developers for that.

[crustine]

all I can say is I am glad I use Mac.