The problem in this case appears to be that the opening between the trackpad and the button (see crappy cell phone picture, below) is big enough for small, foreign objects to enter.

The solution? It’s surprisingly simple. Just insert the corner of a piece of paper into that gap and slide it back and forth to dislodge whatever’s causing the problems (again, see the crappy cell phone pic, below).

That’s it. Assuming that the foreign object is “dis-lodgeable,” your problems should be solved and your trackpad button should work like new.

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And no, I’m not being paid to write this. I’m just a huge fan.

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Why would I want to do this? Mainly because I have some work-related software that is PC-only, and I don’t have a PC at home. It’s also nice for accessing the occasional website that requires Win/IE (there are still some out there). And finally, it’s great for web development, as I can now check what things look like from both the Mac and PC sides.

For those that are interested, I’ve thrown together a few notes on the installation process…

Step zero: Backup everything on your drive. I didn’t have any problems with losing data, but you never know. Especially when you’re re-partitioning the drive, as you’ll have to do pretty much right off the bat. Also make sure that your system software is updated, and that you have the newest firmware. Don’t just guess… Fire up the Software Update panel and check to be sure.

Next, download and install the Boot Camp software. When you first run it, you will be given the opportunity to burn a CD of drivers that allows XP to interface with your Mac hardware (it makes the graphics hardware play well with Windows, re-maps some keys, etc.). Next up, you’ll be asked to partition your hard drive. Fortunately, this can be done ‘on the fly,’ so there’s no need to re-format the drive before you can do this.

Partition size: I have a 100 GB hard drive in my MacBook Pro, with a little over 50 GB free space. Thus, I set up a 20 GB XP partition, leaving a bit over 30 GB free space on my main partition.

That brings us to installation. Apple says that you have to use an XP install disc that already has Service Pack 2 (SP2) on it, and they’re not kidding. I inadvertently used a base install disc without SP2 and ended up having to completely re-do the process. Yes, you can still boot into XP if you install without the Service Pack, but you won’t be able to load the Mac drivers from the disc that Boot Camp created for you. Thus, Windows is barely functional, and you can’t update to SP2 at that point.

What if you have an XP disc without SP2? Simple (sort of). Just download SP2 on a PC (hopefully you have one around) and ‘slipstream’ SP2 into the installer, then re-burn a CD. Instructions can be found here. This is a bit tedious, but pretty easy to do. The main problem is that only certain CD burning packages can successfully produce a bootable XP install disc. This is true even if they claim to make bootable discs. Use one of the software packages/versions listed in the slipstreaming instructions or it won’t work.

Since I had already gone through the installation process once with the wrong version of XP, I ended up having to re-launch Boot Camp (from the Mac side), remove the XP partition, re-create it, and then re-install XP. Time consuming, but not particularly challenging. I tried to just re-format the partition that I had, but I couldn’t make it work (the XP CD refused to boot).

Next up: disk formatting… When you start the install process, you’ll be asked to format the partition that you want to use. First off, be really careful in choosing the partition — you don’t want to overwrite you Mac partition and lose everything. The proper partition to choose should be C:, but double-check the partition size before moving forward.

Once you’re ready to format your partition, you need to decide on FAT vs. NTFS. Being PC-ignorant, I turned to Google for the answer. As it turns out, NTFS has some advantages over FAT, but you can read/write on a FAT partition from the Mac side. So as long as your XP partition is less than 32 GB (this is the limit for FAT) then you should choose FAT (this will actually end up being FAT32 since your partition will be larger than 2 GB, but you needn’t worry about that).

After the formatting is done and the XP installer has done its thing, you’ll need to re-boot (into Windows) and then run the installer on the driver disc that Boot Camp made for you.

And that’s about it… Once you’re up and running you’ll probably want to tweak little settings like screen resolution, but there’s nothing more that really has to be done.

The entire process would’ve taken me about an hour (maybe a tad more) if I hadn’t had the initial problems with my XP install disc.

In terms of performance, I’m really happy. XP screams along on my setup, and I have yet to run into any glitches.

Let me know if you have any questions and I’ll try to respond as best I can.

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(1) What’s a Blog Carnival? In short, a Blog Carnival (or Blog Festival, such as this one) is a collection of links pointing to articles on a certain topic. There are Carnivals covering just about any topic under the sun. These Carnivals are typically published on a regular basis (often weekly, although this can vary). The vast majority of Carnivals “float” in the sense that the hosting duting rotate around from one site to another, although some Carnivals. That being said, some Carnivals are hosted at the same site week after week.

The best Carnivals are more than just a link-fest; rather, the really good ones get creative. The creator comments on the articles that have been submitted. They make it funny. Or they weave the entries together into a story. Or they they really think outside the box and create something totally different.

(2) How can I participate in a Blog Carnival? Simple. Just find a suitable Carnival and submit your stuff. Perhaps the easiest way to do this is to visit the aptly named Blog Carnival, which is a repository of pretty much all Blog Carnivals, and also allows for direct submission via their website. Of course, you can also track down the Carnival homepages, figure out who the host is, and then submit directly. But a one-stop submission site is far easier. (Note that The Conservative Cat also used to host a handy submission form, but ended up taking it down due to spam-related issues.)

(3) Why would I want to participate in a Blog Carnival? This one wasn’t actually asked, but I’m going to answer it anyway. For newer sites, the biggest reason to participate is exposure. It’s frustrating to pour your heart out on the pages of you blog if nobody notices. No matter how good your stuff is, you won’t attract a readership until people know that you’re out there. One possibility is to network with other bloggers. Exchange links, leave (on topic) comments on their posts, link and use trackbacks, etc., etc.

Blog Carnivals add another dimension to this strategy. They let you reach out to the readers of other (often popular and highly trafficked) sites. They allow you to showcase your work. Another reason to participate is search engine optimization (SEO). After all, each and every Carnival that you participate in provides you with a direct link to one of your articles, usually from a topically-related site.

Of course, you don’t just have to participate… You can host. In this case, you can get a lot of exposure due to the fact that Carnivals often attract a reasonably large number of visitors. Sure, they’re there to see what others have submitted, but now they know you’re out there. And don’t be shy. Go ahead and say a few words up front about what your site is all about, how to subscribe, etc. Just to overly-pimp yourself, because the submissions are really the star of the show.

(4) How can I be a good Carnival participant? First off, only submit articles that you’re proud of and that you put some effort into. Ask yourself whether or not this is something that you really think that others might be interested in, either because the topic is so timely/interesting/whatever, or maybe because the writing is just so good.

Second, try to submit well in advance of the deadline. Having hosted Carnivals myself, I can honestly say that last minute entries are a pain in the butt. No, it’s not a problem if a few roll in under the wire, but it’s not much fun if the vast majority show up at the last minute.

Third, be sure to send a short description of what you think your post is about. This can be incredibly helpful to the host, who may be dealing with as many as 50-60 entries.

Finally, be a good citizen and link back to Carnival once it’s been published. People put a lot of time into hosting, and some Carnivals can push quite a few visitors in your direction, so why not return the favor as best as you can and write a quick post pointing to the Carnival?

(5) How can I be a good Carnival host? Step one: sign up. Most Carnivals require nothing more than prior participation in order to be considered as a host. So find the Carnival’s homepage, contact the owner, and get yourself on the list.

Second, start early. Carnivals can be a good bit of work, so piecing away at it as submissions come in can result in a substantially better product.

Third, do a good job putting the Carnival together. Here again, it’s important to be creative, or at least attentive. Comment on the posts that have been submitted. Don’t be afraid to editorialize a bit — tell people what you think, highlight the best posts, etc.

Fourth, don’t flake out. Post the Carnival when it’s supposed to go up, and by all means don’t drop the ball entirely — doing so shifts the burden of hosting to someone else (most likely the Carnival creator/maintainer), and it does so at the very last minute.

Finally, advertise it by dropping each of the contributor’s a quick note giving them the full url of the Carnival, and asking them to share it with their readers.

So there you have it… My thoughts on the ins and outs of Blog Carnivals.

For those that are interested, here are links to some of the finance-related Carnivals out there:

The Carnival of Personal Finance
The Festival of Frugality
The Carnival of Debt Reduction
The Festival of Stocks
The Carnival of Investing
The Carnival of the Capitalists
The Carnival of Business

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Clicking on a pdf link spawned the annoying dialog box that asked if/how I wanted to open it, and sites with Flash movies just displayed a blank box instead of the video. While this didn’t affect every FireFox plugin (the Performancing Firefox Plugin, for example, kept humming along). Needless to say, this was driving me nuts. I double-checked that the plugins found their way from my old computer to the new one (they did). I double-checked that they were the newest versions (they were). I deleted and re-installed them just to be sure. Still no joy.

I read far and wide about plugin conflicts, made sure Firefox wasn’t set to use QuickTime for pdfs, etc., etc., etc. Needless to say, this was all very, very frustrating. In the back of my mind I had the feeling that this had something to do with the transition to the Intel architecture. Well, as of about ten minutes ago, I solved my problems with the Schubert IT PDF Browser Plugin. The trick was that Firefox automatically launches in the native Intel environment, whereas the PDF Browser doesn’t work under those circumstances. The solution, then, was to ‘Get Info’ on Firefox and check the box forcing it to open in the Rosetta emulation environment. And just like that, it worked!

Sadly, Flash was still down for the count. However, upon further investigation I found that Adobe has released a Universal Binary of Flash Player 9. While running in Rosetta should have solved the problem, installing the Universal Binary did fix it.

So if you’re having any Firefox weirdness on an Intel-powered Mac, check for a Universal Binary version of any troublesome plugins, or try running Firefox itself in Rosetta.

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