Windows 7 -- Pleasant Surprise after Nightmare of Vista

Having used the beta edition of Windows 7 last spring, I was excited to dump Vista from my home computers. Two weeks ago, I purchased 3 upgrade licenses, together with copies of PC Mover because I wouldn't need to reinstall all my software. It was definitely a good purchase in several respects but came with a couple of glitches.

I bought the Windows 7 upgrades over the web from Office Max and PC Mover from the manufacturer's Laplink website. I downloaded the PC Mover files and when I went to Offic Max's site to track the shipment there was a note on my invoice that the offer had been discontinued and I needed to repurchase the items elsewhere. I found the same product on Amazon (as well as PC Mover for half of what I paid Laplink.) My Windows 7 files arrived two days later and I thought I'd try one computer at a time. It was the easiest and most problem free upgrade I've ever accomplished.

After my wife made me promise that this was risk free and there was no possible way anything could go wrong, she agreed to let me upgrade her Dell laptop. Everything seemed to go as before until PC Mover began reinstalling the software. It choked because the 80 gig drive wasn't big enough to store the previous Windows files in addition to the new Win 7 files. I thought, "No problem, I'll move the windows.old file on to an external hard drive and have it start over. Big mistake. I should have copied the file rather than moved it because halfway through I got an error message that some of the files couldn't retain their file names on the new drive. Not knowing what to do, I told it to cancel. I then found that several hundred files had been moved but all the directories were still intact on the old drive. I had to manually inspect each directory to make sure everything got moved. Since there were nearly a hundred directories it took a while. After that, I was able to restart the restore process and it completed without a hitch. I learned after it was complete that this model of laptop is missing drivers (the touchpad for one) and Dell doesn't recommend upgrading this model.

I am most pleased with my HP laptop's upgrade. It's a 64 bit machine and there's a touch feature for controlling the volume just above the keyboard. When I got the computer, I learned never touch that feature! Any attempt to do so caused a giant volume graphic to cover the screen while the operating system locked up. Since I got a great deal on the computer I just lived with the few times someone reached out and adjusted the volume. However, the Win7 driver for the volume control works perfectly.

A couple things have quit working that I have relied on in the past. They are:

1. Wave Pad. This is a remarkable audio editing program that has allowed me to take analogue audio files from tape, remove hiss and clicks and basically digitally remaster them. The 50 bucks I spent for this program has been well worth the investment and I'll purchase it again.

2. Paperport. I started using Paperport when it came free with my first scanner. I bought upgrades over the years, and when our office started to go paperless, I convinced my secretary that this was a great program. We got the latest (at that time) version Paperport 11 Professional and found that it was most adept at freezing whatever computer tried to use it. Since I had been storing documents on Paperport for many years, I was reluctant to give it up, but it proved to be the most irritating program I've ever used. We have upgraded to version 12 in my office and it seems to have resolved the problems we had with it. I don't know why I agreed to go with it because each iteration of this program since Paperport 7 was worse than its predecessor. It stopped working on my HP laptop with the Win7 upgrade but continues to function (marginally) on my desktop.

3. Scansoft PDF Printer. This program is the main reason I continued to use Paperport. They're both made by Nuance and this is as good as Paperport is bad. It produces PDF files that are substantially smaller than any other program. This week I took an 80 page document from a PDF file that was 35 megs and it turned it into a PDF of 530 K. Unfortunately, it doesn't work with Win 7.

4. I upgraded to this version of Windows for two primary reasons: 1) Vista was taking as much as 10 minutes to boot up, and 2) When I played with the beta version of Win 7 last spring it took less than 45 seconds to install a network printer. Installing my home printers was incredibly easy, but I haven't been able to install the scanning function of my HP Photosmart printer.

Knowing what I do now about the advantages and disadvantages of Win 7, if I had it to do over again, I would without hesitation.

Ark of the Covenant in Ethiopia

According to a news report out of Rome this past week, the ancient Ark of the Covenant has resided in Ethiopia for the last 3,000 years and has been under the care of the Orthodox Ethiopian Church for much of that time. Here's an English translation of the story:

The Orthodox Patriarch of Ethiopia confirmed that which had been anticipated for two days after a report of the [Italian] news organization Adnkronos, "I repeat the Ark of the covenant is in Ethiopia and none of us knows for how much longer. Only God knows that. I am not here to give proof that the ark is in Ethiopia but I am here to say that I have seen it."

Rome, June 19, 2009 (Adnkronos) "Ethiopia is the throne of the Ark of the Covenant. [It] has been in Ethiopia for 3000 years and it is still there and by the will of God will continue to be there. It arrived in Ethiopia by way of a miracle."

The Patriarch of the Orthodox Ethiopian church, Abuna Pauolos, confirmed what had been anticipated earlier through the news agency Adkronos. At a press conference at the Aldovandi hotel in Rome, the Patriarch said, “I have seen it with feelings of humility—not pride as when one goes to church.” Also participating in the press conference was Prince Makonnen Haile Selassie, nephew of the Emperor. "This is the first time,” Patriarch Paulos continued, “that I say this in a press conference. I repeat, the Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia and none of us knows for how much longer. Only God knows."

"Everything that is found in the Ark," explained the Patriarch responding to the curiosity of the journalists, "is perfectly described in the Bible. Its state of preservation is good because it is not made from human hands but it is something that God has blessed.

“There are many documents and proofs available concerning the presence of the Ark in Ethiopia. There is no reason for someone to pretend to claim to have something that he does not have," the Patriarch affirmed. "I am not here to give proof that the Ark is in Ethiopia, but I am here to tell what I have seen, which I know, and can testify about. I have not said that the Ark will be displayed to the world. It is a mystery and object of worship."

Patriarch Pauolos also spoke of construction of a museum at Axum, a buildng where treasures built over centuries and centuries could be displayed. The museum, financed through a foundation established by the Prince, should be built within two years—where the Ark of the Covenant could also be placed.” However, for this to take place the patriarch explained, "there still needs to be a decision on a petition made to the Holy Sinod—the ruling council of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church." Patriarch Pauolos, president of the G8 for Religions—attended meetings of the council 16th through 18th of June near Rome and l’Aquila. Subsequently, the patriarch was invited by the community of Sant’Egidio to participate in a day of study on the religious history of Ethiopia and all day yesterday he met at the Vatican with Pope Benedict XVI.

“Benedict XVI and the Patriarch discussed many things, and his Holiness extended an invitation to the Patriarch to return in October” explained Prince Markonne Haile Selassie.

Althought it would be really cool if it were true, a few items of this story don't ring true to me:

1) Patriarch Pauolos claims to have seen the actual Ark; but his face hasn't melted.

2) He claims the Ark has been in Ethiopia for 3,000 years. That's 400 years longer than possible. The Ark was in the Jerusalem temple at the time of Josiah's reforms and until about 585 B.C. when the Babylonians sacked Jerusalem. 2 Maccabees claims that the prophet Jeremiah spirited the Ark out of Jerusalem at that time and hid it in a cave on Mt. Sinai. (see 2 Maccabees 2:1-8.) Some legends claim the Ark was taken to the Jewish temple at Elephantine shortly before the Babylonian assault. At any rate, 3,000 is too many years.

3) The Patriarch claims that the Ark wasn't constructed by human hands; yet God gave instructions to Moses to have it constructed by human hands.

Pull My Finger

I want to begin by apologizing to visitors who find that I've been MIA for six months. I've had a couple of adventures but not that much time to comment on them. A couple of months ago I fell on the ice which made it very hard to type for a while. Here's how I explained it to my kids:

I dropped off the van this morning to get snow tires in the midst of a big snow storm. I planned on taking the bus home, but saw it too late to get to the bus stop. Since it was only about 10 blocks, I figured I would start walking.

As I passed a grocery store, I went inside to see if they had an orange peeler. They didn't--but they had 2 liter Sprite on sale for 69 cents each. I bought four and two doughnuts and started walking again. About a hundred yards from home, my feet went out from under me and I went down. I heard a "crunch" when I landed, looked at my right hand and screamed. It was ugly. I had either broken my middle finger or dislocated it or both. I kicked my groceries off the sidewalk into the snow and took off for the nearest hospital. A kind lady stopped and gave me a ride. Unfortunately, this health care facility doesn't accept my insurance. I didn't care as long as they were willing to pull my finger back in to place.

The doctor wasn't in yet due to the snow. They couldn't give me anything for the pain because I hadn't eaten anything yet that morning (the doughnuts were lost in the snow). So, I got out my cell phone and took a picture of my hand. The doctor arrived in about 10 minutes. I held up my hand and she said, "That's a good one." She gave me two shots in my finger and sent me for x-rays. She explained that it was obviously dislocated but that it might be broken as well. If it's broken and they pull really hard on it, it can have additional distressing consequences.

They took x-rays and determined it wasn't broken and then started pulling on it. The nurse was pulling my finger while the doctor had hold of my arm--leaning against me for leverage. There was a loud "pop" and I said, "That's it? Is it fixed?" The doctor said, "No, that pop was my thumb, we have to do it some more."

After some more pulling, there was a much louder pop and it was back in. They wrapped two fingers together and charged me $700 and I went home. It's surprising how hard they had to pull to get it back in.

It looks like I won't be able to drive for a while since I won't have the use of my middle finger.

Turns out the Sprite cost me $175 per bottle--such a deal.

It's been interesting to see how many things are impacted by an injured finger. I can't tie my shoelaces, type "8", "i", "k", or ",". A few days after the accident, I took off the splint while watching "White Christmas" on TV with my wife. I said that even though they were gifted entertainers, it would be impossible to put together their dance number "just like that" as I held up my hand and tried to snap my fingers...

It's In The News, It Must Be True

I have recently been enjoying a website engaged in the fruitful field of analyzing bias in the media. An article from yesterday showed how good news from the Bush administration morphed in headlines from one outlet to another so that the original message was good and lost. It reminded me that I pretty much distrust everything I read and hear—noting that there’s some factual basis that caused a particular story to end up in the news, but that it probably isn’t what really happened. These are a few of the reasons why I think the news is not accurate.

Almost 30 years ago, I had spent several hours of my work day repairing control equipment in a parking garage. Unable to get an exit gate to function in the basement of the ZCMI garage, I broke the board off and told the cashier that I’d try to get back later. If people didn’t stop to pay, there wasn’t much she could do about it until I could fix the gate—but at least people could get out.

I realized that I could fix these problems more readily if I had a work bench where I could plug in the electronic modules away from traffic lanes. In the back office, I quickly assembled such a work bench that only needed to have a power supply. There was an electric panel a few feet away and I thought that I could probably insert a couple of wires somewhere and get everything to work. The only real problem was that I didn’t know anything about electricity. But, I figured, “I’ll be careful” and opened up the panel.

I got an extension cord, stripped off the insulation and hooked up two wires. The test bench had a 110 outlet on it and I figured that if I had done it correctly, the soldering iron in my tool box would probably work if I plugged it into the newly powered outlet.

I plugged it in. The lights in the room started to rapidly go dim. Scared, I quickly unplugged the iron and the lights went back up. I thought, “Was that my fault? Naaah.” I plugged it back in. Suddenly there was a loud “pop” and everything went dark. My secretary yelled, “What are you doing back there?”

“Nothing!” I yelled. I stepped out to where I could see outside. Next door was the main office for Utah Power and Light Company—five floors of offices with lots of windows—all completely dark. I ran out to the street. Semaphores in each direction for as far as you could see were all dark. So were all the buildings—except for emergency lighting in the underground ZCMI parking garage.

I dropped the soldering iron.

I wondered, “Who designed an electrical system that could be disabled by an idiot with a soldering iron?"

Over the next few minutes, we learned from radio news reports that a fire under some power lines had created a cascading effect of shutting down electrical power throughout Utah and into parts of Wyoming, Idaho and Nevada.

We spent most of the rest of the day getting people out of elevators. Power was restored by evening so that we could watch the national news on television. I heard Dan Rather report the massive power outage and note that there were no serious problems except for a few hundred vehicles that were trapped in the basement of the ZCMI parking garage—in the dark and unable to leave because the gate wouldn’t open.

The gate I had removed several hours earlier in the only garage in the city equipped with emergency lights.

Several years earlier I was in Italy where terrorists occasionally attacked innocent civilians. During a communist rally in Forlì, a bomb hidden in a garbage can exploded, killing six people. Several of my friends were living in the city and had seen the rally—a gathering of hundreds of thousands of people. They took pictures of the town square with a giant banner showing pictures of Lenin at one end and a hammer and sickle at the other end. A week later, TIME Magazine reported on the attack that they said occurred during a “Catholic Worker’s Rally.” Their picture was cropped so that the communist insignias weren’t visible.

These were instances where the truth didn’t seem interesting enough and so someone decided to revise things to make better copy.

In the late 1970’s a fundamentalist polygamist named John Singer decided to take his children out of school and teach them at home. At the time, Utah law didn’t allow for home schooling. Through negotiations with the court system, the State determined that he could teach his children at home provided they received periodic tests and psychological evaluations. After a while, Singer declined to allow his children to be tested but the government backed down. At the end of 1978, Singer took a “plural wife” who brought her children from her legal marriage to the Singer compound. The father of the children had legal custody and demanded that the authorities intervene and rescue his children from Singer’s control. When confronted by sheriff’s deputies, Singer pulled a pistol on them and was shot and killed. News reports consistently claimed that Singer was killed because he refused to send his children to public schools. He was killed because he had illegally confined someone else’s children and threatened to shoot the police if they challenged him. The New York Times wrote in 1988 that, “Mr. Singer, … was killed at the cabin Jan. 18, 1979, by police officers seeking to arrest him for refusing to send his children to public school.

The US Constitution guarantees the right of a free press but not necessarily a responsible or honest press. It used to mean something to me when someone cited the date and page of a newspaper article. I remember my childhood friends saying, “They couldn’t print it unless it’s true.” I wonder if they're as innocent today.

Does Anyone Care if Jong is Il or Dead?

Yesterday, a professor from a Japanese university claimed that Korean leader Kim Jong Il likely died several years ago but has been propped up (so to speak) by look alikes. Today, several news agencies claim that Jong Il probably had a stroke last month and is now incapacitated. Does it sound like the politburo in Korea has seen the movie Dave?

Mormon and Protestant Scripture - Follow up

In an earlier post, I discussed the canonization of the LDS Doctrine and Covenants in 1835. I mentioned that the comments made by those present at the August 1835 meeting where the book was approved, indicated a distinction between the Lectures on Faith and the Revelations. Those comments appear both in the LDS (and RLDS) History of the Church as well as on page 255 of the 1835 Doctrine and Covenants.

The preface to the book and the arrangement of the subject matter also demonstrates the same distinction. I photographed pages from the RLDS reprint of the 1835 edition that I include here.



Additionally, I photographed the corresponding pages from the 1846 Nauvoo edition of the Doctrine and Covenants. Unfortunately, this book is so fragile that splaying it out on my scanner would have damaged the binding. So, I propped it open on a table and took pictures with a digital camera. Consequently, the pages have a slight angle to them.





Clearly, the main reason the Lectures on Faith don't qualify as part of the canon is because Church leaders have maintained that they aren't and never have been canonized. When the Church canonized the Pearl of Great Price in 1880, George Q. Cannon made some preliminary remarks immediately after the Church had sustained John Taylor as the Church president. He said, "I hold in my hand, the Book of Doctrine and Covenants and also the book, The Pearl of Great Price, which books contain revelations of God." The Pearl of Great Price that he held included the Hymn (as a poem) "O Say What is Truth." After Cannon's remarks, Joseph F. Smith put forth the motion that the Church accept as its canon, "the revelations" included in both books held by George Q. Cannon. Consequently, the Church voted on that measure and accepted the revelations--obviously excluding the Lectures on Faith, the hymn, and apparently the article written by Oliver Cowdery on government--since they were never classified as revelations. The Articles of Faith were separately presented to the Church's vote in 1890 and again in 1907, so even though they may not be technically "revelations," they're included as part of the canon.

There is, though, still a wrinkle in this process that gives non-LDS folks heartburn. Throughout the history of the publication of our scriptures, editorial revisions have taken place. Oliver Cowdery corrected William W. Phelps' edition of the revelations, Joseph Smith made corrections to each edition of the Book of Mormon, and later Church editions have also made authorized changes.

The Book of Abraham, printed first in the 1842 newspaper Times and Seasons provided the initial text for Franklin D. Richard's missionary pamphlet titled "The Pearl of Great Price." However, when the Church obtained original manuscripts to the work, it was clear that the 1842 publication wasn't faithful to those manuscripts. Consequently, when the Church produced a new edition in 1981, it was updated to reflect the originals. The same is true for passages in the Book of Mormon. So, even though the earlier versions were canonized, the later, corrected versions are today's official canon.

That's one reason I refer to my pre-1981 Book of Mormon (triple combination) as the "Expired Version." Alma 32:30 is twice as long as in previous versions, nobler and foes were changed to robber and joy to coincide with the original manuscript. There are several other interesting revisions. They're more correct than the earlier canonized editions and clarify some puzzling passages. We subscribe to Joseph Smith's and Moroni's idea of rational scripture: If there are mistakes, they're the mistakes of men--if we notice mistakes, we fix them.

Why Fundamentalists Don't Get It

For the past couple of months, I’ve been corresponding with a young man named Steve—raised in the FLDS Church. It’s reminiscent of a similar exchange I had about 20 years ago with representatives of the AUB Church—a break off group from the FLDS. Both correspondences began as I attempted to respond to attacks against the LDS Church. Steve wrote on an internet forum that Spencer W. Kimball was a false prophet because he warned the Church against the so called Adam God theory. Similarly, the AUB had purchased a full page advertisement in the Salt Lake Tribune complaining that the LDS Church had forsaken its fundamental principles.

As both exchanges proceeded, I quoted scripture and statements of Church leaders that they claimed to revere and they responded mostly with folklore and third hand recollections that often made no sense at all. But there was an even more puzzling facet of our communication. It seemed as though they were incapable of comprehending elementary concepts of doctrine—no matter how carefully I explained them. If there was any possibility at all of misunderstanding what I wrote, they misunderstood. A significant portion of what I wrote to them had to be clarified, explained, re-explained and qualified so much that it seemed we were speaking different languages.

I remember thinking again and again, “How is it that this guy can’t understand what I write?” And now, more than 20 years later, I find precisely the same mental paradigm—one that embraces shoddy or pretended sources, and instinctively and repeatedly misunderstands basic elements of communication. (A fellow named John Lester left comments here this week that follow this same vein.) It was so frustrating because it was clear that I wasn’t dealing with someone who was mentally handicapped—but he was so obtuse when it came to evaluating simple statements of doctrine that I wondered if he really had both oars in the water.

I eventually concluded that my correspondent from the 1980’s fit Paul’s description of the “natural man” who was incapable of receiving the things of the Spirit of God. “…the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” This reminded me of what I wrote to an LDS woman who complained that the Church baptizes converts before they have a complete grasp of Church doctrine. I wrote back:

“There is a very good reason to be baptized as early as possible. When Joseph and Oliver were baptized, Joseph wrote that upon coming out the water he immediately understood the scriptures in a manner that previously was impossible. True doctrine comes more readily to people who have the gift of the Holy Ghost than otherwise.

“A couple of weeks ago, we were teaching the gospel to a young woman who had been raised in a fundamentalist, polygamist family. She has thousands of questions. Her brother, who was baptized about 3 months ago, told her that there was no way all of her questions could be answered until she was baptized. He said he had tried it, and after worrying over many questions, he got one answer that he knew came from God: that Gordon B. Hinckley is a living prophet. At that point he decided to be baptized and since that time, it is as though he was given prescription glasses when before he couldn’t see anything clearly.

“If the gospel were merely a scientific endeavor, people would be well advised to wait until they became experts before joining, but the gospel cannot be understood by the natural man, it must be discerned spiritually and that’s why we have to be baptized and confirmed while yet doctrinal babies.

I Went to Zion and Kolob

I like to believe that I'm always open to learn something new. This week I learned that I'm too old to hike the Subway in Zion National Park.

The Subway is a slot canyon hike located in the Kolob Terrace portion of the park. It covers nearly 15 miles where you start in a bleak desert, descend into a deep canyon, swim for your life, rappel down sheer cliffs, wade in shallow water past dinosaur tracks and then hike almost straight up out of the canyon back into the bleak desert.

At the end of the hike, it was 107 degrees and I remembered that when I did this in 1992 I said to myself, "I'm never doing this again." Unfortunately, I forgot to tell my wife about that and she arranged for a reprise this past week. It was beautiful, glorious, and too much for my old bones.

Although the hike takes a serious physical toll, the part that makes me not want to return is that I just don't like the terror of standing at the top of a rock cliff with slippery, sandy shoes-- thinking that one wrong move will end my life as I know it. And, after hiking for about 4 hours, you realize that you can't turn around and go back. Once you unhook the rope, you're committed to continue on--the only way out is straight ahead.

Here's a photo of the last of our group descending into the actual Subway. When I say "our group" I really mean "my wife" casually putting on the harness to descend with a laugh. When I came down five minutes earlier, I wasn't casual or laughing. I wasn't sobbing either, but almost.

This is one of those trips where the fright soon fades from memory--unless you do it again.