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Thoughts and things I care to shareNew Site Layout!
Ok, its late – 2:30am Saturday morning. But I’ve done it! RickMahn.com has a new layout. I’ve leveraged a 3-column theme here on the blog, and have gotten to use several new features that I had been planning on for some time. And it only took 4 hours to do!
The nice part about this layout is that the main body of every post has much more room for text and pictures. It also has a bit cleaner CSS structure for text, bullets and the like. Another neat feature was the support for sidebar widgets in WordPress – it made it much, much easier to set up all the specialized items that I had on the original configuration.
Well, off to get some rest – I’ve got a lot of work to do tomorrow. Hopefully, we’ll get a chance to go to the Power Sports show in downtown Minneapolis – one can hope anyway.
More blogging
Well I’ve upgraded hosting on my Snowmoblog site. I’m going to work on keeping some new content going there over the winter.
I’m a snowmobile nut, so I guess it was a matter of time to start a snowmobile blog, actually I started it last spring! The reality of it all is that there is always a lack of news and such over the summer, so the site sat unattended for a few summer months.
Now that cooler weather is invading the northland (I’m in Minnesota), its time to dust off Snowmoblog and get things in gear. That started Friday with an upgrade to full hosting instead of “freebie” status, and getting the RSS feeds working right away.
Keep tuned in if you’re a snowmobiler – I’m going to focus on having fun, the glossy mags can keep up on the racing stuff and “rode reports” as it were. Snowmoblog will be updated with real-world experiences – frozen lakes, getting lost in the woods, favorite watering holes – you know how it is!
links for 2006-11-10
- Hubdog has had a Pocket PC client out for some time, but the new Smartphone client brings the same RSS capabilities to a new class of devices.
- I read about this a few weeks ago and thought it was an interesting concept. eWeek’s David Morgenstern has a pretty good article on the topic.
- The next version of Microsoft’s Exchange Server is due to be released to manufacturing in December 2006. The new version includes enhancements in mobile messaging and security.
- Small updates to the GMail user interface.
links for 2006-11-09
- Its soup! Vista ships.
- Mike Calligaro of the WIndows Mobile Team Blog, explains why ActiveSync-over-WiFi was removed from ActiveSync v4.
- MIcrosoft’s new “Windows Sysinternals TechCenter” has released Process Monitor. A replacement for two of the original Sysinternals freeware utilities by Mark Russinovich. eWeek covers the new utility and some of its potential uses.
- Microsoft is releasing many new development tools to support Windows Vista and Office 2007. Main focus is on ASP.NET, AJAX, .NET Framework 3, and SQL. These are the building blocks that tomorrow’s technology will be built with in the enterprise – not ne
- Om questions Microsoft’s choice to “pay up” to the music mafia.
- Darren Rowse at ProBlogger examines BlogBurst’s new payment policy.
- Article looking at how to find the “A-List” bloggers, and reviews the top blog search engines on the ‘net right now.
- Robert Young explores the possiblities of Google’s advertising strategy and describes the concept of an all-encompasing ad campaign management “OS”. Very interesting.
- Easton Elliot’s Fortune 500 Blog Project is an interesting take on a group-blogging effort.
GigaOM » Microsoft, Zune & The Music Mafia
Om Malik has a great piece today over on GigaOM. He points out that Microsoft has fallen to the Mafia tactics of the music industry and will pay $1 for every Zune device to Universal Music Group (UMG). At one point, he wonders if this would have happened at Microsoft’s height of dominance.
In this battle of the monopolists, Microsoft blinked and decided to pay up. (Would this have happened a few years ago, when Microsoft ruled the technology planet?) Remember how Jobs stood up to these music industry bullies. Today they are asking $1 a device; what is to stop them from asking for say $10 or $20 per device down the road. This shakedown should result in a serious investigation into the music industry cartel.
The music industry has really lost its marbles, they do believe that their customers are crooks, they do believe that they are being cheated by “fair use”, they do believe that they should get a payment every time one of their songs is heard by anyone anywhere from any media source.
The sad fact is that these once-powerful media companies are crying like children who dropped their candy, and it is obscuring their ability to logically think and plan out a relevant business model in the “new media” world.
links for 2006-11-08
- Read/Write Web recaps a number of startups featured at the “Web 2.0 Summit Launchpad”.
- This will be interesting, UIQ has been the Symbian OS varient that has powered Sony Ericsson phones for the last few years instead of rival Nokia’s S60. UIQ has had several advanced features from its inception, and has one of the best GUIs in the smart p
- Ina Fried has a great writeup of some of the goings on during the Windows Vista final release cycle. Its an interesting read that gives you an inside look at what the Vista development team goes through to get the code out the door.
- Mathew Ingram asks some direct questions about why Intel is getting into the social software reselling business. Is it just to be associated with “Web 2.0”?
links for 2006-11-08
- Mathew Ingram gives some commentary on the recent update to Virtual Earth – or Windows Live Search, whatever they are calling it now.
- Read/Write Web recaps a number of startups featured at the “Web 2.0 Summit Launchpad”.
Microsoft Office 2007 – Gold
Today Microsoft Office 2007 went “Gold” and was released to manufacturing. Availability will be on schedule for business and consumer users.
I’ve been using Office 2007 B2TR through September & October with good result. While the overall layout of the Office suite has changed dramatically for the better from Office 2003, its the ease of use that really starts to stand out.
The product is simply much better for creating visually rich documents than any other office product. You cannot screw it up, its that simple. There are pre-configured fades, gradients, lines, shapes, borders, etc… that you can simply click on and have it apply to your selection.
Now, I’ve gotten really good at subtle color use in Office 2003, but it’s stunning what you can do in 2007 – there are actual color pallets that have been professionally matched, so you simply choose the one you like and select a color blend from it.
I’ve said recently that I am moving away from client-side applications, and I’m planning on sticking to that. But if there is one application that is capable of so many things – it’s Microsoft Office. And it is one of very few applications that would make me rethink my approach.
Via: Microsoft – 2007 Microsoft Office System Is Golden
Technorati tags: Microsoft Office 2007OneNote Mobile 2007: Quick Start guide
I can’t wait for OneNote 2007 – and the OneNote Mobile 2007 client that will come with the product. All during the beta of Office 2007, I’ve been using the mobile client with great success.
Its progressed from a rough form early on to a very usable tool as Kevin Tofel over at jkOnTheRun mentions. He also has a link to a Quick Start Guide for OneNote Mobile.
Check it out.
Via: jkOnTheRun – Microsoft’s OneNote Mobile 2007 Quick Start guide
Microsoft & Novell – A Linux Partnership
So, I’m betting many, many people are flipin’ out tonight with the recent news of the Novell & Microsoft Linux partnership. Though I may be surprised by the timing, I’m not surprised at the news.
Microsoft has been heading this way for some time, and the only thing I didn’t see was Novell as a partner. Though I guess it makes sense in a way, as they have historically targeted the same markets, and have the same customers in many cases.
The interesting thing is that Microsoft is accepting Linux in their plans. Of particular interest is the OpenOffice and eDirectory compatibility. It’ll probably be Novell moving closer to Microsoft than the other way around, but having Microsoft involved in the process will improve the end results.
Via: BetaNews – Novell, Microsoft Ink Linux Partnership
I hope the leadership of the Republican Party will take his word seriously. Because this is exactly right.
This is very simple: only Americans citizens should be allowed to vote in American elections.
The SAVE America Act is common sense, and we need to pass it now!
I don’t recall you complaining when gas was $5.00 under Biden.
Hypocrisy much?
Please RT!
This Middle Ages bullshit is a cancer on the planet👇👇🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸