Tuesday, April 28, 2009

What Has Obama Done



Its been almost one hundred days since Barack Obama came into power, but what has he really done. I found this article online that summaries what the president has accomplished since he came into power.

* * *

First off the economy, when Obama put $787 billion into trying to rescue the economic system. He also put $23 billion into climate change, and he claims to be aiming for renewable energy and reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Guantanamo is set to be closed, one of the best decisions Obama has taken since he came into office according to critics. He has also banned all forms of torture and released reports which were written in the post-9/11 era of Bush.

He has determined the date to finally pull out troops from Iraq, as August 2010. He also offered Iran a new beginning in terms of its current viewpoint from Western societies and their leaders, but little has been achieved yet.

* * *

What about my opinion? What do I think Obama has done to the world?

We can look at it this way - what Obama has done outside the United States is mostly words not deeds. Although, maybe one hundred days is not enough to turn words into actions. Many critics say that what Obama thought he could achieve and what he now believes he can achieve and far apart.

* * *

What about what the world thinks on what Obama is trying to achieve?

First, a pro opinion from Grahame Smedley, France:

I think he is an honest man with his feet on the ground and an understanding of the ordinary man in the street and the poor image the USA had in world politics under the Bush administration. He needs a strong and loyal team at his side. I think he has got the majority of countries support in the world. He is a breath of fresh air and I give him 5 stars so far and wish him luck.

Then, a rather harsh con opinion from Kevin, USA:
For everyone's grandiose praise of his presidency and his talking of bipartisanship he has accomplished nothing and is actually even worse he tries to bully the opposition with a grand mandate which isn't true. He won 52% to 48% that is not a grand mandate. The country is bitterly divided and he is the main reason why. He is trying to socialize or even worse bring a form of communism to our country. He doesn't like to be labeled but that is how a lot of people see it.
And now, what do you think? What do you think Obama has really achieved since he first came into power?

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Enigma Desktop



There have been many radical changes in the way desktops are now compared to what they used to be when operating systems with graphical interfaces first came out. To name a few, there are now minimalistic desktop setups that focus on performance, and realistic desktops that make it look as if it were a real desktop.

But what about imformative desktops, desktops that have more functionality than just serving as a shortcut storage or your computers launchpad. There are many desktops that offer this but in my opinion one outstands them all, and this is the Enigma skin for the desktop enhancement application Rainmeter.

Whats so great about this desktop is that it combines functionality with elegance, where many other desktops have failed in doing so. It serves customisable widgets that you can place wherever you like on your desktop. I've customized my setup so I can see my three favourite RSS feeds, can launch a few programs, check the weather or time, check my system settings, and more.

This freedom of choice is what makes it unique. The setup of the Enigma skin isn't so simple though, even with the instructions file included, so I've written a simple step guide on how to get the desktop up and running on your computer.

First of all, download the Enigma skin here. After that, download the Rainmeter program here. Install it but make sure its not currently running. Then launch the setup file in the Enigma folder to install it. Now launch Rainmeter, and right click its icon in the taskbar, selecting Configs, Enigma, Welcome, Home.ini.

If you want things straightforward and prefer a premade setup, copy the file Preview.ini, in the Enigma subfolder, Templates. Replace C:\Program Files\Rainmeter\Rainmeter.ini with this template, making sure you overwrite it by renaming Preview.ini to Rainmeter.ini. Rainmeter must not be open when you do this.

The wallpaper I used can be found here. I just edited the top so my launcher fits in properly. And if you use this, leave a comment. Enjoy!