Tag Archives: Tools

GoogleDocs curiosity – how to insert image stored in GoogleDocs?

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Found an interesting functional omission just now.

I’m trying to insert a JPEG into a Google Document, but the image is stored in with my Google docs rather than being online, on my machine, or on something like Picassa. So I click on the insert button, but have no way of using a stored image from this list. Google’s Insert Image help document is none too useful on the subject, nor did my quick search bring up anything productive.

The only way I can think to do it is…

  1. Open a new documents tab
  2. Find and download the JPEG in from GoogleDocs to somewhere on my machine
  3. Insert the image, using the “Upload” option.
  4. Grunt at such a faff while I’m trying to create a document with several images.

Short of using a “real” application, anyone know of a better way of doing this on GoogleDocs, or whether one is coming?

Forget new equipment: buy a good brush!

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Everyone posting online gets so worked up over cartridges, decks, belts, cables, even styli… and yet so many of us (myself included) seem to overlook the basics – keeping our precious black discs clean.

I thought I had it licked… a gentle wash in warm water with a little dishwashing detergent, followed by a wipe over with a soft, lint-free cloth.  This worked very well in the short term, but on the second or third playing I found some discs were starting to pick up dust again.  So I looked around my local music stores for a record cleaning brush, and nobody seems to sell them any more, even if they do sell everything else a vinyl junkie might need!

So I did some online research and found a RODEC cleaning brush from West End DJ, for the princely sum of £10. Not a bad buy, and it’s remarkably effective.  I have no idea what some of these discs have been through, but the amount of fine white or grey dust that this thing lifts out of even clean-looking LP’s is quite astonishing.

Otherwise it’s hard to review a brush really, but the convenience of having a brush in its own stand that prevents further dust pickup is nice to have.  A model that uses carbon fibres might well be better, but what I have is good enough and the sonic results of playing cleaner discs are clear enough for me!