Automatically Show and Hide Dock Bar on MacBook Pro

By default, the dock bar always show on MacBook Pro. It consume a lot of space on screen. To make it automatically hide and show:

1. Right click the middle space between icon, go to dock preferences.

2. Check automatically hide and show the Dock

or
Click on the Apple icon on the top left screen to access Dock preferences

or really quick: Press <option><command><command>D keys at the same time to turn on/off the automatically hide and show the Dock

How to Open Two Excel Files Side by Side in Two Monitors?

The best solution is using LibreOffice. With LibreOffice Calc, you can open one Excel spreadsheet in one monitor and another speadsheet in other monitor to compare, view or edit.

Change the configuration in Excel 2007 or 2010 is another solution by check the check box 'Ignore other application that use Dynamic Data Exchange'. You may encounter with the run-time error when you attempt to close or open again.

References:

• http://www.lytebyte.com/2008/05/13/how-to-open-two-excel-files-side-by-side-in-separate-monitors
• http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/w7itproinstall/thread/6ba32569-19a0-4b45-806f-9a42258bdb5f

Troubleshoot Internet Connection

1. Make sure you can connect to your router by ping to your router IP (for example: 192.168.1.1) from command line (Windows) or terminal (Mac or Linux) or access to the router web page using the browser. If you cannot ping or see the router web page, check your network configuration on your computer.
2. Are you using the wireless? If yes, connect the CAT 5 Ethernet cable connect to your computer.
3. Is the wired connection working? If yes, your wireless has issue.
4. If the wired connection is not working, is other computer in your home, your office or your LAN can access to the Internet? If just only your computer, check your network configuration.
5. If all computers in your LAN could not access to the Internet, power down both the router and cable modem.
6. Wait for 15 seconds, and turn them on.
7. If you still not connect, check to see there is outage in your area. If not, verify your router is working.
8. To verify your router is in good condition, hook up another spare router or your computer directly to the cable modem. Note: If you hook up your computer directly to the cable modem, make sure the firewall on computer enable and all ports other than 80 are closed. Connect computer with open ports: 20, 21, 139, 3389 directly to cable modem or Internet is dangerous and not recommend. Here, I'm using my test computer running GNU Linux with all closed ports to connect directly to the router.
9. If you can connect to the Internet without router or with another router for an hour or more, your existing router is bad. It need a replacement.
10. If you cannot connect to the internet, chance is your cable modem or the link from cable modem to your internet service provider have issue, call your internet service provide technical support.

Delete Facebook Message

How many clicks to use to delete a Facebook message?
1. Click on Action
2. Click on Delete Message
3. Click on Delete All button
4. Click on Delete Conversation button

and to delete a regular email: one click. Which one is easy?

How to mount a VirtualBox shared folder in Ubuntu guest

1. Click on VirtualBox VM Devices and Shared Folders... to create a shared folder, named it SharedFolder, for example.
2. On Ubuntu guest machine, open Terminal
3. Type sudo mkdir /mount/vboxshared
4. Type sudo mount -t vboxsf SharedFolder /media/vboxshared to mount the VirtualBox shared folder as read. To make it read/write, use this command: sudo mount -t vboxsf -o uid=1000,gid=1000 SharedFolder /media/vboxshared

If the shared folder is a permanent share and auto mount, make sure your user id in group vboxsf. To add a user id to group vboxsf, using command: sudo usermod -a -G vboxsf linuxuserid

Reference:

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/VirtualBox/SharedFolders
https://forums.virtualbox.org/viewtopic.php?t=3201&amp;highlight=share+folder

Apple iPad 2 vs. Toshiba Thrive vs. Acer Iconia Tab vs. Samsung Galaxy Tab vs. Motorola Xoom

There is no question that Apple iPad 2 is a leading table. Let compare it with other 16GB Wi-Fi tablets.

Tablet	Apple iPad 2	Toshiba Thrive	Acer Iconia Tab A500	Samsung Galaxy Tab	Motorola Xoom Family Edition
Operating System (OS)	Apple iOS 4, 5	Google Android 3.1, 3.2	Google Android 3.1	Google Android 3.1	Google Android 3.1
Screen Size	9.7-inch	10.1-inch	10.1-inch	10.1-inch	10.1-inch
Screen Resolution	1024x768	1280x800	1280x800	1280x800	1280x800
Processor	1GHz dual-core Apple A5	1GHz Dual-core	1GHz Dual-core NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2	1GHz Dual-core NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2	1GHz Dual core
Memory (RAM)	512MB	1GB DDR2	1GB DDR2	1GB	1GB
Storage (ROM)	16/32/64 GB	8/16/32 GB	8/16/32 GB	16 or 32 GB	16GB
Expandable memory	None	Full-size SD Card slot. Up to 128GB SDXC	microSD, microSDHC	None	Up to 32 GB microSD card
Back Camera	1MP. Video recording, HD (720p)	5MP with auto-focus, 720p video capture	5MP with auto focus and single LED flash	3MP auto-focus camera with LED flash. HD(720p) Video recording	5MP auto-focus camera with LED flash. 720p video capture
Front Camera	0.3MP VGA	2MP	2MP	2MP	1.3MP
Microphone	Yes	Yes	Yes		Yes
HDMI	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
USB	No	Mini USB 2.0 port, Full-size USB 2.0 port	1 USB 2.0	No	Micro USB
Wi-Fi	802.11a/b/g/n	802.11b/g/n	802.11b/g/n	802.11 a/b/g/n Dual-band (2.4GHz, 5GHz)	802.11b/g/n
Battery	10 hrs	11 hrs	8 hrs	9 hrs	10 hrs
Weight	1.33 lbs	1.60 lbs	1.69 lbs	1.25 lbs	1.43 lbs
Flash support		Yes		Yes	Yes
Price	$500/$600/$700	$380/$400/$480	$350/$450/$500	$500/$600	$400

How to remove exif tag

Each time we take a picture from a digital camera or smart phone, the exif tag and other photographic meta data are include in these pictures. These meta data contain info about your camera or your phone, GPS location,... To protects your privacy or reduce the picture size before publish the pictures on the web, you should remove exif data.

On Ubuntu: Using GPS Correlate
In the terminal:
To show the exif tags: gpscorrelate -s *.jpg
To remove the exif tag: gpscorrelate -r *.jpg

On Windows: Using a free software called IrfanView