What your fingers say about you

Strange as it might seem, the shorter a man's index finger is compared to his ring finger, the more inclined he is to be physically aggressive. Psychologist Dr. Peter Hurd at the University of Alberta measured the fingers of 300 students and asked them to answer a questionnaire on aggression. He found that finger lengths did correlate to physically aggressive behaviour. Scientists believe that the more testosterone -- which is secretd naturally by the mother -- a male foetus is exposed to in the womb, the shorter his index finger will be. The same is not true for female foetuses.

"You wouldn't want to screen people for certain jobs based on finger lengths," says Dr. Hurd, "but we are learning that a large part of our personality is determined while we're in the womb.

Learn more about the effects of the length of your fingers on your personality here. » Continue reading

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Printing 3D

I just dropped my mobile phone and the outer casing has broken. What do I do?

Probably go to the suppliers and check if they can encase my phone in a new body - not a cheap or easy task. The new casing costs almost a fourth of the price of the phone.

Exact replacement

Your spectacle frame has cracked. It is difficult to find the exact replacement, which will take the place of the same costly and well-worn pair of glasses. You are forced to compromise and order the nearest fit. Theses are the scenarios of yesterday and today. Now take a peak at tommorow -- not sometime in the distant future, but later this year:

You 'capture' the shape of an object - like a mobile phone case or a spectacle frame -- using special softare; then you turn on your 3-D printer, which looks exactly like your normal laser printer, only slightly larger.

You ensure that its 'printing' medium -- not ink in a cartridge but one filled with finely powdered plastic -- is adequate; you press 'print' on your PC -- and a new phone case or whatever, is created slowly, layer by layer, in front of your eyes. It dries in seconds and is ready to use -- may be after some sand papering to smooth the edges.

Congratulations, you have entered the era of three-dimensional (3D) printing.

Desktop Factory, a spin-off from the US based IdeaLab, promises that by end 2007, it will offer a consumer model of its 3D printer for under $5,000. IdeaLab's technology makes use of a halogen lamp to heat powdered plastic that adheres to a roller and a focused laser beam to fuse it, to form a one dimensional image of the object required.

Thus far the process is very similar to the way an image is fused in a laser printer. The 'image' is rolled on to a plate and prints as a layer, much as it would on paper in a normal printer.

Now is where 2D becomes 3D. The process is repeated again and again, depositing more layers, stacking one on top of another, in the 3rd dimension, to form the solid object. Heat is applied again to fuse all the layers into a single object.

Remember how one made paper mash items in school, by pasting layers of soaked and gummed paper on a mould to create bowls and vases? » Continue reading

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Darren answers my questions on blogging and podcasting

When I woke up this morning to a pleasant weather, little did I know about the surprise lined up for me today.

As I signed in to my email inbox, I received this comment from Shypy, a new reader who informed me that my blog was featured on ProBlogger. Without any further delay, I hit ProBlogger and saw that Darren had answered some questions which I had posted on ProBlogger in response to his invitation for reader questions in February.

You might ask why is it so important for my questions to be answered on ProBlogger. The answer is ProBlogger is an A-list blog and, in order to improve one's blog or website ranking on Google and other search engines, it is necessary to get it linked from other A-list (top ranking) blogs and websites. Not only that! The visitors or readers of that site or blog are also directed towards your blog or website. Read my earlier post on How to grab the attention of A-list bloggers for some creative ideas.

Darren has not only answered my questions but he has linked to my blog, sending over lots of precious readers from his blog and also helping me improve my blog ranking. Thanks Darren! I just love you for that.

Sometimes your hard work doesn't really pay off immediately, but it surely does at some point of time in the future, as you can see it has been over 3 months since I posted those questions on ProBlogger. The comment has really paid off in terms of more visitors and readers directed towards HashOut from ProBlogger and hopefully improving my blog ranking in the long run.

So go ahead on a commenting spree. Find opportunities to comment. Comment when you feel that you can add some value to the conversation and you're sure to hit the Jack Pot. » Continue reading

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Genius G-Shot D5123 5.0 megapixel CMOS digital camera

Genius' G-Shot D5123 is a new feature rich 5 megapixel four-in-one CMOS digital camera. Its slide cover and light body make it extremely portable. The G-Shot D5123, four-in-one includes functionalities like digital camera, digital video camera, web camera and storage drive. Although the camera comes with a 32MB memory card, it can be upgraded upto a 1 GB SD memory card.


G-Shot D5123 enables high quality images up to 12 megapixel by interpolation to be taken sharply in large size pictures of 12-inch x 18-inch. The built-in microphone provides voice for video in 640x480 (VGA) and 320x240 (QVGA). A 2.0-inch color TFT LCD screen make it easy to frame th subject when capturing images and also displays the image comfortably in playback mode. The 4x digital zoom can help focus on far subjects easily.

Choosing slideshow function in playback mode, one can share photos with family and friends immediately like a digital photo frame DPOF (Digital Print Order Format) function. One can specify the image and the number of prints while chiecking the image n the display screen. With 1GB external memory card one can store over 50,000 images.

It's priced at INR 6,900 (USD 172 approx.) » Continue reading

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The write way

It's got an expressive titanium nib. A pocket clip that unfolds as a pen stand. Two striking colors - yellow and black. Oh, and you can write with it too! Emotica, a range of exclusive pens launched by Omas of Italy, is all about making a statement with your signature.

Here is what Emotica stands for:
E  - emotion
MO - movement
TI - titanium and
CA - a caoutchouc/rubber effect

The Emotica Collection is available for:
Converter/cartridge Fountain Pen - $395.00
Rollerball Pen - $325.00
Ballpoint Pen - $295.00
Mechanical Pencil - $295.00 » Continue reading

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Nurse your drink

Taipei seems to have a penchant for bizarre restaurants. The latest is D.S. Music Restaurant, a hospital-themed joint. Its bar lets patrons order 'medicine' and 'drip' it into their glasses from a transparent, suspended vat. Each 'bed' seats 10 and orders are taken by 'nurses' in starched white uniforms. The 130-seat restaurant has crutches hung from the walls and a wheelchair parked in the lobby. And the 'emergency room' sign leads to the loo! » Continue reading

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Useless Caps @ eMail

Lots of people still ask, "Does your e-mail ID use capitals or lower case?" But that question is a technical no-brainer, because it simply doesn't matter whether you use capitals or lower case -- meaning small letters -- in an email address. The email will be delivered anyway: you may type the address with all capitals, all lower case, or randomly combine both.

Yet there's one place where capitals can secure your emails: in your password. Having a password like "ScoRPioN" or "sCorpiON" instead of a plain "scorpion" makes it tougher to hack.

You might also be surprised to note that having an email address like "John.Smith@gmail.com" on Gmail is equivalent to "JohnSmith@gmail.com" or for that matter even any other combination like "J.ohnSmith@gmail.com" or "J.o.hnSmith@gmail.com" or "Jo.hnSmith@gmail.com".

That is, Gmail does not consider "." as part of the email address and removes all "." from the email address before delivering messages to the particular inbox. If you have dots in your gmail address or even if you don't have a dot, just try sending yourself and email by placing a dot somewhere or switching the position of the dot in your email address, before the @ symbol but ofcourse and look you've got a mail!.

It also means that if someone already has an email address say "a.bc@gmail.com" then all other combinations of the same letters in the same order with different numbers and positions of dots will be unavailable for signup. For example "abc@gmail.com" or "a.b.c@gmail.com" or "ab.c@gmail.com" will be unavailable for signup in the case of the above email address. » Continue reading

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