Find out what’s really near a place/ Google Map location, sights to see, businesses and points of interest. Top tip!

Find what’s nearby with Google?

Google’s “What’s Here” feature doesn’t tell you what you think it’s going to (though TechCrunch don’t appear to have noticed!). No, it’s not a list of local points of interest, not even local businesses. Nope it tells you the address of the object in focus on your Google Map.

This Address != What’s Here

It’s just a mis-labelling. I can see it’s kinda useful.

How to really do it – what’s really here

click a marker to bring up the menu

find "search nearby" and search for "*"

places nearby are listed

• Find yourself a location via a search on Google Maps, eg Charles Street, Newport (UK)
• Click the point marker to bring up options
• Click “Search nearby” and enter “*” as your search term; i.e. do a wildcard search.
• …
• Profit! Find places near to that marker point, all listed nicely and shown on the map. Very useful.

Example map, try it!

View Larger Map

Code monkeys short method

The short-hand method is to do a search for, e.g., “* loc:Eiffel Tower” (without quotes). Have fun.

In response to “Text getting smaller from one end up” on Launchpad Answers page for Inkscape (an SVG editor).

Here’s a quick (works for any path) in Inkscape. Unfortunately the text can not later be editted as it is converted to a path in the process.

Could an Opera browser based web-server on-your-desktop (!) be the new Facebook, Dropbox, Flickr, File server and data sync all rolled into one!? .. is Opera’s little browser about to change the [internet] world?

Opera’s new paradigm, user-servers?

I read assertTrue()’s blogpost predicting (on the basis of nothing it seems) that Opera will embed a web server in the next version, Opera X (ie Opera version 10) and thought .. yeah that could be cool.

Then I read Silicon Valley Insider on why MySpace is in far worse state than News Corp realised when they bought it. And then I grasped some of the potential of the paradigm shift that Opera may be about to swing.

Social networking without the central organisation. Serving MySpace or Facebook or Orkut like content from my own computer … no need to worry about losing control of your information, inability to backup, etc.. Probably the greatest first move here will be the ability to sync your browser, there’s no additional problem about relaying information (links, history) elsewhere – another computer, as authorised, can simply connect to your port 80 (assuming it’s open) and download the information. Simples!

Dropbox might be about to get a kick in crotch! The user controlled web-server could make it as easy as drag-and-drop to share files, but without having to use additional software.

Further thoughts, problems, solutions

Wow, I wrote most of this post then walked home for 20mins and these things struck me:

• Going offline
• Opera is mainly installed in other places than on a PC
• This goes beyond the internet! (So my tweet mentioning web 4.0 wasn’t even wild enough)
• Opera is a MUA, RSS reader too.

The upshot is that if a browser is serving content then there’s going to need to be some heavy caching, possibly simple mirroring, e.g. at an Opera web address that intercepts users if the browser is off-line (ie not serving web pages/content). Opera’s install base is important here too. Opera is on a lot of phones and used by Nintendo as their installed browser on the DS. Phones are usually on 24/7 … so no problems with being offline provided you’ve got free 24/7 access to the internet. Or …

Beyond the internet – double awesome

PeerNet?

Although … a browser based server, using Opera, that is installed on devices with Wifi and Bluetooth connection doesn’t need the internet. This is not just WWW as we’re talking file sharing beyond web pages. This is not just internet as content could be accessed only over local nets (intranet) or via Bluetooth, say. “PeerNet” or “PeerWeb” seems a good description of this sort of distributed micro-server amalgamation of p2p and the web.

What do you think?

What possibilities does such a paradigm shift create?

Please add your comments. I think there is a whole lot here that we can probably not even imagine. Despite the potential security implications and some obvious roadblocks (ISPs blocking traffic) it’s got my inner-geek quite excited! Could Opera on-your-desktop (!) be the new Facebook, Dropbox, Flickr, File server and data sync all rolled into one?

Update (2009-06-13 17:38) : Or maybe not, no mention of it in other previews … perhaps Opera XI?

You’ve uploaded a video to YouTube and the aspect ratio is wrong. What do you do?

Fix aspect ratio of YouTube videos

You’re uploading or reviewing a video on YouTube and notice that the aspect ratio is wrong – the video image is squashed or their are black bars around the video. It’s really easy to fix!

Prior to upload

YouTube actually have good advice about this:
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Eurovision win for Norway in Russia

Alexander Rybak from Norway, Eurovision Winners

Eurovision presenters reveal the 2009 results

Norway’s singer and violinist Alexander Rybak the bookies favourite at 4/5 (from UK firm Ladbrooke’s) has won the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest from Moscow, Russia singing “Fairytale”.

See the winning performer singing Fairytale in the video below, along with a performance of Always by AySel & Arash (from Azerbaijan), one of the other favourite songs …
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Ever washed a spider down the sink, flushed one down the toilet .. you may have to rethink your spider killing – they’re back from the dead!

Spiders – Back from the dead

spiders reanimated

Marsh spider, Arctosa fulvolineata during an experiment. In the first image (a) the drowning begins, in (b) the spider becomes nonreactive (see the reduced air storage), in (c) the spider has entered a coma and in (d) it is recovered four hours after the end of submersion. [Images: Sonia Dourlot]

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My upgrade from Ubuntu Intrepid (actually Kubuntu) to Jaunty Jakelope, 9.04, including screenshots and solutions to errors encountered.

Upgrading from Ubuntu Intrepid (8.10) to Jaunty (9.04)

Errors and all!

One can upgrade to Jaunty Jakelope, Ubuntu 9.04 (ie the April 2009 version), from Intrepid Ibex (8.10) simply by using Alt-F2 to open a run dialog and typing:

update-manager -d

In theory.

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There will be a South Wales Linux User Group (SWLUG) “Technical Meeting” at 6pm on Sunday 26 April 2009.

Here’s a SWLUG Technical Meeting poster (pdf, svg) based on the previous “Lightning Talks” (2008) poster. Licensed CC-BY-SA.Happy to make alterations if needed for this event. I don’t particularly like the poster but I think I prefer it to the other suggestion I’ve seen.