XP update

When Windows is done applying security updates, I do not accept their prompt to RESTART.  I accept the CLOSE option instead. Why?

Because Process Explorer shows a great deal of MS activity and it continues for some time.  As those processes complete and terminate and all goes quiet, then I do a restart from the PE menu.

Pale Moon Browser

I have been running tests on the Pale Moon alternative Firefox build and I am very pleased.

One high point for me is that a layout error in Firefox 13 is not present (it affects my Curl kanji review applets when minimizing the browser to the size of the applet.)

Pale Moon is recovering memory after Tools | Clear Recent History which is a welcome change.

This build may be the answer for any netbook running an Atom processor with the Windows 7 starter version.

The wikipedia article on Pale Moon is here.

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IE Updates

Oddly, the Windows Update option for Microsoft XP as found in the IE8 Tools menu (Internet Explorer 8) does NOT go to an HTTPS site but instead to http://www.update.microsoft.com/microsoftupdate even though just going to https://www.update.microsoft.com/ provides the XP user of IE an HTTPS site for updates!

Why does MS even keep that HTTP target on-line?

What would such a minor update to IE8 have cost the accidental collosus?

Ruby 1.9.1 on Windows after 1.8.6

I came back to Ruby on Windows the other day after working on a linux box and did not want not be in Cygwin. So I hopped out to ruby-lang.org and pulled in the Windows 1.9.1 binaries. Then I flipped my ruby env variable to point to the new directory so that my path - which uses %ruby%\bin - would update. Then I called gem to install Treetop for PEG and ... Segmentation fault. Oh joy.

I saw that 1.8.6 has a one-click installer for Windows, so I used that, flipped the ruby var and presto all was well.

So why not with the 1.9.1 zip install? Well, ruby for windows XP is not really Ruby for windows so much as it is Ruby for Gnu on Windows. What was missing in the path were Win32 versions of linux DLL's - specifically:
gdbm.dll
libeay32.dll
pdcurses.dll
readline.dll
zlib.dll

The quickest fix was to copy them from the 1.8.6 \bin into the 1.9.1 \bin

So if you start ruby or irb or gem on Windows and hit a Segmentation fault error, this may be the only issue.

You may avoid this issue if you build ruby from source .. but the point of running Ruby on a Windows box outside of Cygwin or Msys is usually to either try something out or get something done - not to do development work. And after all, Ruby is supposed to be at least one notch above its file-based and cmd-line cousin, Gnu Smalltalk, right? Or why else is Ruby seeing so much use on the server-side? Of course if Ruby were to displace that other Smalltalk-descendant, Objective-C, on the iPhone we would be running RIGS for GnuStep anyway ...

Btw, there is Cocotron for that other pseudo-Smalltalk on Windows ...

PS
The DLL's can also be found here.