2008 year-end link clearance - The Old New Thing - Site Home

Time for the semi-annual link clearance.

It appears that the Snipping Tool is also available for Windows XP.
How to beat the no-fly list: Change your name.
How to beat the low printer ink sensor: electrical tape.
Learn about Milliways, the unfinished sequel to the adventure game The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. It's a fascinating insight into how these sorts of games are built.
Saw a link to this program, looks useful, haven't tried it though. Mp3 Knife is a simple tool which extracts clips from mp3 files.
I don't have a Bluetooth-enabled laptop yet, but someday I may, and then I'll give the bitpim program a whirl.
One of the most awesome music videos from the 1980's gets even more awesome: Take On Me: The Literal Lyrics Version. (My favorite throwaway line: "What kind of hallway is this?") MSNBC interviews the creator.
The guys behind the Mentos and Diet Coke fountain video strike again: Having fun with Post-It notes.
An Engineer's Guide to Cats: "Like most engineers, cats are pretty much willing to eat the same thing day after day after day."
Preview PDF files directly from Outlook.
Timewasting game: Fantastic Contraption.
Timewasting game #2: Light Bot.
Not Fooling Anybody.
The curse of competence.
Dilbert invented the carbicle. Back in the early 1990's, a bunch of us invented something similar to the carbicle at the lunch table. Though our version was a lot lamer because these were the days before wireless networking, mobile phones, LCD monitors, and notebook computers you would actually be caught dead with.
SafeCatch thwarts two potential bank robberies a few months ago. (Earlier coverage.)
The travel site Yapta will alert you when frequent-flyer seats become available on flights you care about, giving you a better chance to spend those miles before they expire.
Digitally Assisted Billiards [via]. But even with this, I'd probably still lose.
Another glimpse into a mystery world: the tunnels beneath Las Vegas.
Another glimpse into a mystery world: The people who hate cilantro.
Earl Pomerantz does it again with his simple storytelling: Too Big For My Bathing Suit Part 1 and Part 2.
Exploiting Multi-Core Processors in Windows Vista, a quick overview.
In my PDC 2008 round-up, I forgot to mention Rick Hallihan's musings on crowd management, the worst-fit algorithm, and some panoramas of the Big Room. The scary thing is, those panoramas don't even cover all of the Big Room...

Finally, we have the traditional plug for my column in TechNet Magazine:

History taking up space. The original title for this article was What about Bob? Bonus trivia: The code name Utopia was actually an acronym. It stood for (I am not making this up) Unified, Task-Oriented, Personality-Infected, Active.
The dying breath of the Alpha AXP was not breathed in vain: The archivist who rolled the computer out of its dusty closet for the photo shoot quipped, "I'm considering filing a workmans comp claim now. That thing has terrible handling and zero drivability!" If you look at the picture, you can see a layer of dust. We left it there just for old time's sake. And here are some supplementary links for the article.
Windows 95 Unplugged.
Work Harder, Not Smarter.
Windows Can but Won't. Replacing a file in use is the easy part. Getting it to work is the hard part.
Keep Your Caches Close. The original title was Keep your data close and your caches closer, but that had to be trimmed for space.