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Payer la tps et tvq sur du «stock volé»

Si je suis un voleur, et que je vais faire un dépanneur et que je vous revend les cigarettes, je serais bien mal pris de vous charger les taxes.

Cependant, pour le gouvernement, il est courant de recharger les taxes tps/tvq sur le stock volé.  
En plus de faire de l'argent en revendant le matériel saisi par la police et non réclamé, ils ajoutent la tps et la tvq sur ces ventes!!!

Automatic update for Microsoft Security Essentials and Windows Defender

Hello Friends of Microsoft.

I use these 2 products to protects my computer, they are free and does a good job I think.

These products are Microsoft Security Essentials, and Windows Defender.  (Now the same product, Security Essentials for windows 7, and Defender for windows 8+)
I hope they will stop all these bad software before they do some damage.
But, I don’t understand why the definition updates for these 2 products are part of the «windows update» process.
Like every other antivirus software, like AVG or Avast, they must update without warn me, automatically, and check every hour for new updates if available (or at least once a day), and update without warning me.
I want these 2 products to be always updated, but I do not want them to be part of other windows updates that I want to manually install when I want.
Thank you Microsoft to correct this in a future release of these products.

Comparaison de RDS vs CTV sur Twitter pour les olympiques

Depuis le début des olympiques, pour être au courant de tout ce que font les canadiens le plus vite possible, et pour me faire dire quand il est temps d'aller voir 1 compétition en direct, je me suis inscrit aux fils Twitter de @rdsolympiques et @ctvolympics.

Les 2 compagnies utilisent le même outil web, qui a semble-t-il été développé par MIcrosoft, et vendu à plusieurs réseaux.  NBColympics utilisent le même outil.  Donc, l'équipe informatique possède les mêmes moyens pour mettre en ligne des blogs, rss, vidéo, tout le kit.
Comparons maintenant ce qu'ils font avec leur outil.
Depuis 1 heure, voici ce que @ctvolympics ont "tweeté".
  1. Ladies Super Combined right now on CTV and online! http://ow.ly/18KaC
  2. Difficult day leaves Canada without a medal: It was a day that had everything cross-country skiing can offer – fer… http://bit.ly/aNwYSr
  3. I've seen a few requests for this. The Michael J. Fox 'It's Our Game' Hockey promo piece. Here you go. http://ow.ly/18Jkh
Voici ce que @rdsolympiques ont "tweeté" dans la même période
  1. Attention si vous mordez votre médaille!: Un champion de luge allemand s'est cassé une dent en mordant, pour une p… http://bit.ly/cjxdvG
C'est tout!
Les 2 nous donnent un fait divers sympatique.  
CTV en plus nous donne une information LIVE qui permet de nous dire ce qui se passe actuellement, ce à quoi Twitter devrait servir.  En plus, avec un lien vers leur fil video qui permet de l'écouter en direct.
Aussi, une analyse de la journée d'hier.
RDS? vous êtes où ?  Je suit les 2 depuis quelques jours et je n'a JAMAIS eu une information pertinente du fil de @rdsolympiques qui me disait de me rendre vite soit sur leur site web video ou sur ma tv voir une finale d'Un canadien que je pourrais avoir intérêt à suivre en direct.  Ils sont dans le champ.  Je me demande s'ils savent s'ils ont une zone vidéo sur leur site ou si c'est généré automatiquement!
Message pour RDS: Twitter, c'est fait pour diffuser des informations en temps réel, pas juste un lien vers un blog d'hier.  Dire ce qui se passe ACTUELLEMENT.

Problems with Internet Explorer 8 in Windows 7

Problems:
– Tools > Internet Options is disabled (even when running as administrator)
– On startup, yellow message bar appears saying Protected Mode is turned off even though it is on
– Back button doesn't always work

Solution:
1. Control Panel > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off
2. Uncheck Internet Explorer 8, click OK
3. Reboot
4. Control Panel > Programs and Features > Turn Windows features on or off
5. Check Internet Explorer 8, click OK
6. Reboot

Internet Explorer will be reset and start again as when initially installed (Favorites and history are still available).

From plastic to divx

This is it.  On christmas, if I am a good kid, I'll get a PS3.  The reason I choosed the PS3 is because it seems to be one of the best media player in the industry, for the digital files and for the blu-ray player.  I am not sure if I will even play games on it!  

But, before I receive it, I started converting all of my dvd library (specially the children's one) to digital format.  They will no longer have to manipulate them and destroy the media.
I discovered that converting a movie to divx is not as as easy as I tought.
First of all, I bought the official Divx Converter with the mpeg-2 plug-in for a little $15.  Why is it so cheap? because it DOES NOT WORK.  There is 1 film out of 10 that was fine.  All others have the voice out of sync with the video.  I read on their site that their algorighm is dropping some frame of video, that's why the video becomes out of sync with the audio.
They propose a solution, from someone who created a "batch" process to convert a dvd to divx without sync issue, but there were abount 10 steps to follow to convert them, and I do not want to lose 1 day for each movie I want to convert.
I finally found THE perfect tool.  That's a tool I was already using in the free version, DVDFAB HD Decrypter.  I used this software for a while to copy all my children's dvd to my computer. I need to copy my dvd, that I own and pay, to my computer, because I edit them to extract only the main movie configured with french audio track for my childrens.  At 4 years old, they are not able to skip the ads. go to the menu, select options, choose french, start the movie.  I create them an edited copy of the dvd with DVDShrink, then put it in the reader, and it automatically starts with the french audio track.  
But now, I will use the extended features of this software.  The option I am using is the dvd-to-mobile feature.  This product worth about $100, but to convert all my dvd to dvix, it worth it.
I did some tests with a lot of the pre-configured formats offered in it, and I finally found THE perfect conversion profile.
After selecting the dvd files (vob) as input, I use this profile: dvd to mobile – Avi – generic.divx.avi.audiocopy profile.  I only open the Edit window to choose the 2 pass (high quality) conversion, I left everything else configured by default.
What I like the most about this profile is that the bitrate is automatically configured to get 0.2 bytes per pixel.  If I have more resolution, I have more bitrate.  I do not configure a "locked" 1000 mbps profile that will be better with smaller files and not enough for bigger resolution movies.  With the locked "bytes per pixel" ratio, I always get the exact same quality for every movie.
The default configuration is locked to 0.2 bytes per pixel.  I did not found where it is configured, this is not in the XML profile file, I think that this setting is "hard coded" in the binary file, but that doesnt't matter, because this is the profile I prefer.  A 2 hours movie creates a 1.25 gigabytes file, meaning that the avi file is 4 to 6 times smaller the the original VOB files, with an excellent visual quality.
Second thing I like, is to keep the original audio track.  It does not reconvert it, it keeps the original AC3 5.1 audio track from the dvd and copy it directly into the AVI file without any conversion.  
That creates a really good quality movies that I can only test on my computer for now, on the ps3 in 3 weeks!  
Something is strange, I tried the exact same profile but in the "generic" instead of "avi" section and it did not use the 0.2 b/p ratio.  I also tried the ps3 profile, which creates a 5.1 aac audio and a H264 video, and I really did not like the result.

Attention! Le vaccin tue!

Incroyable, tout à l’heure aux nouvelles, au canal H1N1, LCN, ceux par qui est née cette panique, j’ai entendu dire que le vaccin tue (source).  Pourquoi?  Parce que quelqu’un est mort aujourd’hui et il avait reçu le vaccin il y a quelques jours.

J’y vais de statistiques simples pour expliquer en quoi cette conclusion n’a aucun sens.
Il y a 7.7 millions de québécois (source)
Il y a environ 150 québécois qui meurent par jour, peu importe la raison.  Des gens naissent et des gens meurent.  C’est la réalité. (source)
On dit qu’il y aurait environ 1.3 millions de personnes qui ont reçu le vaccin à date, donc 17% de la population. (source)
Si je ne considère pas le facteur âge, il devrait y avoir 25 personnes qui meurent chaque jour qui ont reçu le vaccin.  Va-t-on faire un bulletin spécial à LCN à chaque fois?
Donc, c’est NORMAL qu’il y ait des gens qui meurent qui ont reçu le vaccin.  Statistiquement, ça DOIT arriver.
Hey, LCN, lorsque la crise de la grippe va être passée, vous allez parler de quoi à journée longue?  Vous allez inventer une autre crise?

HP is totally not Green

Like all companies in the world since 2 years, HP pretends to be green.  They have a section on their web site to explain us why they are so green.

But this afternoon I got the absolute confirmation that they are NOT.
I had to do a simple Bios Update on my HP Pavilion a6077c computer.  I bought that machine 2 years ago, it came preinstalled with Windows Vista.  My bios was version 2.51, I wanted to upgrade to the latest, 2.53, that may help me solve a memory trouble I have with windows 7, that only allow me to use 3.25 gigabytes of my 4 GB of memory.  On their site, there is a lot of downloads available for that machine.  But all of them are mentioned to be only working on Windows Vista.  That is because the machine was sold with Vista preconfigured in it.  So I downloaded the Bios Update setup utility, for Vista 64 bits, hoping that it will work on Windows 7 64 bits.  During the setup, I got a message telling me that my Operating System is not compatible with the bios update application.  I tried to run in in Vista SP2 emulation Mode, but I got the same message.
I contacted them with their "live chat" utility on their web site.  I finally got the confirmation from technical support person that Windows 7 is not supported, so I can't update my bios.  WHAT?  A motherboard bios is not supposed to have something to do with the OS, they should provide a kind of "bootable iso image" to let me upgrade my bios even if I want to run Linux, or even Dos 6.2!  Their solution is to buy a new HP PC that is configured with Windows 7, to get the Windows 7 support.  That is SO green!  Put my desktop tower to the trash, what a great solution.
That's the third time they do this to me.
2 years ago, I got to put my HP scanjet 2200c color USB scanner to the garbage, because they decided that they will NEVER release driers for Windows Vista.  Because the scanner was released during the Windows XP era, only XP will ever be supported, nothing else.  I tried to sold it, but no one wants this scanner that PERFECTLY WORKS under windows XP, but not on vista.
Then, the same thing happened to my iPaq rx1950.  When Vista was released, they confirmed that I will never be able to sync my iPaq with Vista.  That's over, another HP hardware to the garbage.
That is the best Green strategy I have ever seen.
Hey, Hewlett Packard, if you really want to be Green, make sure that we can use your hardware for more than 2 years.  Microsoft supports all their software for 10 years, can you support your hardware for that time too?

médias sexistes

Voici un exemple de nouvelle sexiste que je ne suis plus capable de lire dans nos médias:

"Première mairesse de Longueuil" (lien suite à l'élection de Caroline St-Hilaire)
Mon problème avec la nouvelle?  En quoi le fait qu'elle soit une femme est-il un exploit?  Est-ce que la nouvelle n'aurait pas dû être "Nouvelle mairesse à Longueuil"?  En quoi le fait que ce soit une femme devrait être exceptionnel?  On est plus dans les années 80 où chaque première pour une femme devait être mentionnée tel un exploit.  J'avais eu le même commentaire lors de la couverture médiatique de la nomination de Monique Leroux à la tête de Desjardins.
Lorsque je lis une nouvelle en ce sens, j'ai toujours un doute que finalement, ce n'est pas le meilleur ou le favori qui est en place, mais que la personne gagné juste par sympathie pour une raison qui ne devrait pas être.  Est-ce que les citoyens ont voté pour elle pour lui laisser une chance parce que c'est une femme?  Je ne crois pas, et j'espère sincèrement que non.  Mais si c'était le cas?
J'entendais aussi Louise Harel à Montréal dire que les femmes sont tentées de voter pour elle parce que c'est la seule femme à se présenter.  Si c'est pas du sexisme c'est quoi?  Depuis quand les femmes doivent voter pour les femmes et les hommes pour les hommes?

Windirstat VS Spacemonger

I am an old time user of spacemonger, which is very useful to find what is getting so much space on a hard drive.

Yesterday, from the Tekzilla show, I got the suggestion to use Windirstat.  The screenshot seems to be very neat, so I tried it.  
Let me tell you something: the screenshot of windirstat is the ONLY thing that is better than spacemonger.
First, windirstat scan several directories at the same time.  That is bad and makes the procedure very slow because the hard drive head is going to one place to another to scan every folders and there is a big lack of performance here.  Spacemonger analyse it in 1 thread so the hard drive head is not moving, and the scan is a lot faster.
Second, the result displayed in the virual map is not usable in windirstat.  It represents EVERY file of your disk, it is very slow to render, and it's impossible to select a whole folder from this view, you can only click on a single file.  In SpaceMonger, it shows you a representation of the biggest files or directories from a zone, not every one big like 4 files in 1 pixel.  And you can zoom in by double-clicking to view more, and it's easy to select a containing folder, not its content, from the graphic view of spacemonger, which is impossible to do with WinDirStat.
So, forget windirstat, use spacemonger.  Their latest version 2.1 is offered at 24.95, but they also offer their old version 1.4 which is free, certainly less performant or beautiful, but works really fine, and can be used on Windows Vista and Windoed 7 even if it was created for Windows XP.