| Monday
April 22, 2002
I am getting ready for a 10 day trip. During that time I will not be in
communications here at all. I will be sending my cell phone number to a
few people who also know how to deal with problems with my mail and
network, but in general I will have no email and no Internet access for
the rest of this week and just about all of next.
That means that tomorrow morning's update of this site will be the last
for a while. Apologies, but there's no help for it.
HELP:
My laptop has a copy of Outlook 2000 that has developed two, count
them, two, duplicate personal folders, each complete with Inbox, calendar,
and the rest of it. I want one of them to go away, but Outlook won't let
you delete files with that name.
I have deleted ever pst file on that machine, and it does no good. If
it creates a new file it has two personal folders in it. I am about to
completely remove Outlook from the machine and reinstall, but if one of
you knows a less drastic method please tell me. My practice is to copy
outlook.pst from this machine where I usually do all my mail and such, to
the laptop and point Outlook 2000 on the laptop at that pst file. This
worked for years until this extra personal folders thing showed up in
Outlook. I don't know where Outlook stores its structures and such. If I
could figure that out I could probably solve the problem.
Suggestions welcome.
Another thing: when I compose this page in FrontPage, there is no ugly
thick black line on the left margin of this text. The parchment left
margin fades into the page color and I like that. But: when I go on line
it looks as if I have an ugly black line on the left and I can't seem to
do anything to get rid of it. It doesn't show in Preview or composition
mode of Front Page. Does anyone KNOW what to do about this? It's not a
pressing problem.
(DONE, and THANKS)
You will note that the ugly line is gone thanks to David Schachter who
sent me mail on how to fix it. All about that when I get back. Note
the line is still there in later days. I'll fix it all next week.
I seem to have done something either very wrong or very right, because
my pro-Israeli friends are unhappy with my coverage of the Middle East
mess, and my pro-Palestine friends think I have been unfairly
pro-Israel. In both cases no one seems to think I have been
unfaithful to the truth: it's my lack of suitable feelings that seems to
be the issue.
There's no help for this, I think. The truth here is that there's not a
lot to admire on either side just now. I can and do have considerable
sympathy for the victims on both sides of this ugly ethnic war. I have
friends on both sides who have lost a very great deal. Feelings aren't
going to change realities.
The reality is that the Israelis have the power to do as they will, and
the Palestinians will suffer what they must. Suicide bombings work for a
while and can wring our concessions, but they only work up to the point of
so hardening the resolution of the Israelis that they simply give up
caring what the rest of the world thinks, and begin mass
deportations.
Building fences and walls isn't a pretty way out for either side, but
it's about the only way out.
The real question is, what is done after the walls are built? The
side that adopts rule of law and real capitalism, after the fashion of
Hong Kong, will in 2 generations rule the region. If neither side does
that, Israel with its huge head start and partial "economic
miracle" economic system, will dominate. The fat is, though, that
Palestine isn't without the resources to become another Hong Kong. The
German economic miracle began with no more: except that the Germans had
the American proconsul Lucius Clay to keep order and enforce the rule of
law. Whether Palestine can find the means to replace its kleptocratic
tyranny with something better is not likely, but it is possible. I doubt
they'll take my suggestion to hire the Brits with Gurkhas to keep order
but stranger things have happened.
Enough. I won't solve the Middle East problem. The most I can do is try
to keep my readers aware, and hope to keep the United States from being
sucked into the endless mire of trying to keep peace where there is no
peace.
I have put up a letter and
short reply on the electronic books situation. I'll try to deal with
it more thoroughly when I get home.
And Roland asks, how long before we have this here?
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/crime/story.jsp?story=287307
I have the proofs for The Prince, which is an omnibus
Falkenberg volume due from Baen Books next Fall. I will be adding a few
thousand words in connecting and revelatory scenes, so that there is a bit
more continuity to the story.
Note that the CoDominium didn't happen -- yet anyway -- so
my story, which for years might have been "possible" and therefore
was science fiction, has moved into the "alternate history"
category.
The Prince includes just about everything ever done
about Falkenberg's Legion. It ends one cycle; clearly a new one begins,
and with any luck I will write the Spartan Hegemony series in the next
couple of years, but first I have GOT to get another book out in the Janissaries
series.
Regarding my ugly black lines (see above)
You will note that the ugly line is gone thanks to David
Schachter who sent me mail on how to fix it. All about that when I get
back. Note the line is still there in later days. I'll fix it all
next week.
While I am looking for stuff, I need a replacement for
Canyon Software's Drag N' File. I used that for years, but with big drives
and W 2000 and XP it has become flakey, not seeing folders, and not doing
what I expect it to do. What I want is a good program that will copy all
files and folders from one drive to another, but do so for ALL and ONLY
the files later than the ones already there, and not stop to ask me as it
does it. Drag n' File did that extremely well for a long time but it is no
longer very realizable, or at least it has done things that undermine my
confidence in it. Suggestions appreciated. I don't mind paying. And in
fact the need is great: Drag N' File has taken to copying files I didn't
want copied, I suspect because it really doesn't understand BIG disk
drives and such like.
I really need something that will consolidate stuff from
one disk to another without copying duplicates. There have to be a lot of
such programs that work, as, alas, Canyon's Drag N' File no longer does.
Pity
I figured out what was wrong: when you select a folder in
DN'F you do not necessarily deselect the Entire Disk, so after it copies
the folders it starts copying everything. That's silly, but if you figure
out what is happening it's not too bad. On the other hand, it often won't
see the new folder it created and copied into on the distant drive. I can
use a more reliable file manager I think.
I used Canyon's Drag N' File for years, and I rather like
it, so perhaps I am being unfair. I'll have a harder look when I get back
from this trip.
And that is about it for this week and most of next. I may
have a few notes on line in the morning, but I will not be getting email
at all from tomorrow morning until the end of next week. I have got an
enormous set of page proofs for The Prince to work on, and I'll be
generating some scenes for that book, and doing family things. Back in a
week.
http://www.ttgnet.com/rbt/thisweek.html
is Bob Thompson's web site. He plays about with a lot of stuff. You might
have a look there.
And Roland suggests you look at
http://www.itweek.co.uk/News/1131114
And the department of red faces, or Read The Manual,
Stupid:
What I want is a good program that will copy all
files and folders from one drive to another, but do so for ALL and ONLY
the files later than the ones already there, and not stop to ask me as it
does it.
try:
xcopy c:\folder h:\folder\ /s /e /d /c /y
/d copies only those whose date is later than target
of course all new files are copied as well
I created an old .bat to do that
and it's FREE!!!
Best regards from Santiago, Chile
Jorge Diaz
Which I should have thought of first. Sigh.
You might be amused by
http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000012.html#000012
but I warn you it's flattering to me.
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