I guess I'm bored again so I'm spending a little time to dump out what new things that I've came around and been doing research on and of course the little things that are keeping me sane.   For those who didn't know,  I've moved out of my semi-large 1 bedroom apartment in to an enormous 2 bedroom combined unit condo,  although I'm no longer on the penthouse level its still quite nice.   I gave up most of my view that I had before since I'm only on the 25th floor instead of the 33rd floor.   I have a great view of the Hancock center and the Drake hotel so that still alright.

For those interested here's the linkage for the Virtual Tour
http://tours5.vht.com/Viewer/PhotoGallery.aspx?ListingID=1176459&Style=PPI

Since moving I decided I was sick of paying for Cable TV and maybe finding one or two things on that I would like to watch,  so I've joined the ranks of the non-cable tv people.  Netflix OnDemand has basically replaced my cable tv for the better (and is a helluva lot cheaper)  Here is the list of what I've watched that I was surprisely amazed on how good they were.

Spartacus: Blood and Sand:  IMDB - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1442449/

Spartacus is a Starz original series trying to depict the most accurate version of Rome as a Gladiator / Warrior.  It's very good, comparable to 300.  If you liked 300 at all you'll love this.

Gattaca : IMDB - http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0119177/

An oldy, but definitely refreshingly good

On Hulu,  I've been watching Caprica, Kings, and House M.D.

So in the effort to get rid of our Citrix environment due to increasing complexity and prices in licensing I've been out looking for a newer and better solution.  I came upon a product called RingCube vDesk.   It basically gives you the whole VDI experience but takes it further than what Citrix XenDesktop would give you.  The biggest feature that sold me on the technology is that it supports Dynamic Roaming Profiles, so that I can provision customers running database driven applications with a single installation of the core application and use profiles to emulate the core application settings.

Video Demostration - http://www.ringcube.com/portal/content/products/vdesk/demos/vdi/vDeskOve...

Comes in at a very reasonable price, for 30 concurrent connections for right under $6,000 including knowledge transfer.  They claim the deployment takes less then an hour to do.

So if you're in the same position that I get to be in sometimes and are waiting for the slow purchase orders to happen for a M$ key here is a quick and easy way to Rearm your Windows 2008 R2 eval.

Start > Run > slmgr.vbs -rearm > restart > back in business

This will give you a 60 day extension on your eval, you are able to do this 3 times.

For the lighter side and less techy side of the Rant and Raves ... Test your IQ a little with this question and the answer to the last question

Answer for the last question:

Which number is the odd one out?

3628, 2426, 4146, 1448

4146 is the answer.

For all the numbers, the middle 2 digits add up to the last digit:
3628: 6 + 2 = 8
2426: 4 + 2 = 6
4146: 1 + 4 = 5 (not equal to 6)
1448: 4 + 4 = 8

19:7  Unscramble the following four anagrammed words and determine their commonality or relationship

ANTRUM
TRACER
RECIPE
DOMAINS

Drink of the week - Alhambra Royale
3 parts cognac
Hot Chocolate (1 Cup)
1 wide slice of orange peel
whipped cream (optional)

Fill mug nearly to the brim with hot chocolate.  Twist the orange peel over the mug and drop it in.  Warm the cognac in a ladle over hot water, ignite the cognac, pour slowly into the mug while still flaming.  Stir.  Top with a dollop of whipped cream