Dec 18, 2007 | blog
Hey there, ho there – with the current mini-meme of online office app’s getting a bit more attention, I thought I’d give ’em another go. That is, I have used all the major ones in the past year and a half, but have mostly come back to Microsoft Office.
Of course, I truly need MS Office Pro – my clients need documents in Word, drawings in Visio, sheets in Excel, projects in Project, you get the point. So I can’t get rid of Office anytime soon.
However, I can move my needs to the web. This is nothing new as I’ve done this before, and will continue to look at both online & offline solutions for the tasks at hand. What’s interesting is that, most of my existing data is already online. Either in Zoho or Google Docs, I’ve already migrated my “old” data to either one of these services.
Now, some of these posts today talk about the numbers of users, and how these must be an example of the lack of interest by the user community. While it may be true in many instances, my belief is that the applications are just now becoming really comparable to desktop-based solutions. I do think that there is a big future for online app’s, and as more tools like Adobe AIR and Microsoft Silverlight are incorporated, there is very little limit to the things that can be done as a service.
The pieces are already in place, I’m switching back to online app’s instead of Office for my personal use. With the advent of things like Zoho Notebook – even my need of Microsoft OneNote can be addressed.
How about you? Do you use online app’s on a regular basis, just dabble, or avoid these like the plague?
Other people talking about online office app’s & suites today:
Nov 30, 2007 | blog
Well, after wondering for several weeks how to leverage the tagging feature of WordPress 2.3, I’ve finally started using it. It helped to learn that Microsoft’s Windows Live Writer was fully supported for tagging use in WordPress v2.3.1 release last month.
The trick for WLW, is to use the "keywords" field of the post entry properties (shown below). WordPress 2.3.1 will pick those keywords up as the tags for the post.
While this isn’t the exact integration I was thinking of, it certainly allows me to use the internal tagging features of WordPress and also let’s me set tags to Technorati (and others) as well.
So now you’ll find two kinds of tags on nearly all my posts. I’d love to know if this is worthwhile to anyone or if it’s overkill.
And speaking of tags, blogging pal Steven Hodson has a post on tags today as well – but from a different perspective. Worth a read.
Nov 14, 2007 | blog
That’s what my technical focus is for the next several months. I’ve been working on a Windows automated deployment environment for a client and will also be planning the next steps for them.
With that in mind, and the upcoming release of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 along with Windows Server 2008, managed deployment systems are crucial to their success. Since I’ve gone out on my own as a consultant, I now find the need to build a full “lab” environment at home to be able to explore the latest release of Microsoft’s deployment solutions.
The stage is being set, with Server 2008, Vista, virtualization of servers/workstations/applications, the needs of successfully deploying any and all of these software packages is becoming more important than ever. The next couple of years looks to be a lot of work for organizations as they investigate, plan, and implement the next generation (the Vista wave) of system software and platforms.
So I’ve got to do something that I’ve not done for a number of years. Build a full testing environment of my own for development, prototyping and testing ideas and solutions. Being a part of a larger organization, in previous years, has allowed me to rely on other resources. Most companies have rooms filled with equipment, just for R&D purposes. Because of this I got rid of my home server “farm” that supplied all those testing requirements, web, email, file server, management server, etc…
This time, however, my plan is to go fully virtual, of course. This requires a *lot* of RAM, HD space and use of virtual environments – including virtual networks. It’ll be fun, it’ll be a lot of work – and I think I need one more machine, but we’ll see how it goes.
At any rate, I’ll be posting a bit on deployment technologies over the next few months, but don’t worry. I’ll not be forgetting any personal branding or social media items either – I’m actually interested in leveraging both of these as I work through some of the technology.
Anyone else out there a Windows Deployment architect?
Technorati Tags: Microsoft, Microsoft Deployment, Operating Systems Deployment, Managed Deployment, Rick Mahn
Nov 8, 2007 | blog
Well, I finally got around to upgrading WordPress to version 2.3. In fact, I waited long enough for 2.3.1 to be released.
Heh, guess I just found the time to “git ‘er dun” as it were.
No other changes have been made, but I’d appreciate it if you drop a comment or an email if you run across anything that simply doesn’t work like it used to, or like it should.
Thank you!
Technorati Tags: WordPress 2.3.1, WordPress Upgrade
Nov 4, 2007 | blog
I’m sitting here tonight reading some interesting thoughts on all sorts of things. From wondering what the future direction of social networking is, to computer hardware to operating systems. The post over at TechCrunch about gOS has me thinking… are both us Windows and Mac OSX users snobbish over our OS?
They both have a long history and a great rivalry. Could both camps be missing the point? Could a $200 computer from Wal-Mart gain real ground running an unknown OS? Does it matter? It’s simply a Linux PC and is running some great open source software, leverages many great free ‘net services, and could be easy for newbie’s to get started.
Are OSX and Windows the snobby Lexus/Infinity or Land Rover/Hummer of the OS world? If so, what do we get for our premium outlay that makes them better than the open source world?
What do you think?
Technorati Tags: Operating Systems, gOS, OSX, Windows
