Handicapping Harness

Tech Tuesday

Internet Explorer 7 (beta 2)

Everyone knows that I'm a Firefox man (having a tabbed web browser is the only way to go), but when I saw that a new version of Internet Explorer was out (IE 7 beta 2), I decided to give it a whirl, and I have to admit, it isn't too bad. The only problem I've really had with it was installling it. I could never get the program to finish the installation process on my computer and kept getting an error message at the end of every install I would try. I went to the Microsoft site and followed the instructions to fix it, but still couldn't get it to install. Finally I Googled the problem and came across a solution that worked: install it while in safe mode! After I did that it worked like a charm. It has good safety features and the tabbed browsing is set up very nicely (in some ways better than Firefox). It did seem to load pages pretty slowly at first, but once I turned off the anti-phishing feature, things speeded up nicely. Should you install it? Well, if you use Internet Explorer as your main web browser, I would probably hold off for the final release version later this year. If you use IE as a secondary browser though, or if you just want the latest and greatest, I would go right ahead. It seems very stable and trouble free (at least for me so far). I've been running YouBet and several betting services at once and had no problems at all. If you are still afraid to give it a try, you can give a tryout to Maxthon, which is an Internet Explorer shell that offers tabs (and more). Here is a pretty good CNET review of IE 7.

Tech Tuesday

I posted The Clocker's screen shot of his monitor last week and wondered if anybody else would care to send in what their setup looks like. What I didn't think about, was that maybe you don't have a screen capture tool installed. With that in mind, here are some free programs that will get the job done: Gadwin PrintScreen (freeware version), Snippy, ScreenJot and FGWndGrab. All of these programs will do the job in fine fashion. If you want to spend a couple of bucks on a commercial program, you can't go wrong with SnagIt (30 day free trial available). I've been using it for a couple years now, and don't think I could get along without it anymore. All of these programs are simple to use. Play around with them for 2 minutes and you will have it down pat! Now go get some good screenshots and send them to us here at Handicapping Harness! :)

Tech Tuesday

Today's post is on using two monitors for Handicapping Harness. I'll leave the technical part of it to this Kim Komando article from USA Today, which explains it very nicely. For my part, I'll just say that I use two 19" flat panels and I love it for playing the races. What I do is open up Firefox tabs on my left monitor with YouBet, my betting sites (two or three depending on what tracks are running) and Handicapping Harness (of course). On my right monitor I open up Adobe Acrobat with all of my downloaded and marked up programs (anywhere from 2 to 8 programs usually) and Trackmaster F.A.S.T. Sheets (I'm a big believer in race modeling). I usually have a few other tabs open in Firefox for news and other things and also my e-mail program (Outlook) open in my right monitor also. The power of multiple monitors is amazing, and until you try it or see it, it's hard to get excited about. If dual monitors isn't for you I would suggest getting the largest flat panel that you can afford. The extra screen space and extra desk space are indispensable.

Tech Tuesday

This is just a short Tech Tuesday post as I've been too busy to write a real article for today :) Check out these semi enclosed work stations. What do you think? The perfect environment for Handicapping Harness?

Tech Tuesday

Tech Tuesday is going to be my new weekly post (I'll keep it short and to the point) on using tech (computers/Internet) in Handicapping Harness. I'll try to make it a weekly post but it will be bi-weekly at least (I say while keeping my fingers crossed). Today's post is on using Firefox to view websites that will only be render properly in Internet Explorer.

Hanicapping Harness On-line: Part 2

Handicapping Harness On-line: Part 2   

This post is not intended to be all encompassing look at Handicapping Harness On-line. What it is about is the hardware and software and websites that I use to view and handicap the races on-line. So let’s get started with Part 2! See Part 1 Here.

Hanicapping Harness On-line

Handicapping Harness On-line

This post is not intended to be all encompassing look at Handicapping Harness On-line. What it is about is the hardware and software and websites that I use to view and handicap the races on-line. So let’s get started!