Ted Tschopp's Blog

Moving to the Mac

So, it's been over a month now that I have had my new MacBookPro. I have spent the last month or so getting everything up and running. I have had to purchase a couple products. But right now it seems that everything is where I need it to be.

Office
I had to purchase Microsoft Office. This is the first time I have ever had to purchase Office. I have a MSDN license, so on Windows, I always used that copy of the application. Office on the Mac is rather nice, and feels like a Microsoft product. Word and Powerpoint have crashed on me several times, and that made me feel like I was back on my PC. At first I hoped to be able to use iWork from Apple, but there really are features in Office that I need. I also had couldn't purchase the Home version of office, as I wanted to use Automator actions. I'm a bit upset that there are so many different versions of office for the Mac. It seems that Microsoft likes to diversify their product line to the point of loosing focus.

Blogging
I have had to do all my blogging in ecto. The application is a good replacement for the blogging tools I have on the PC, but it still isn't as good as Microsoft's blogging tool. On the bright side, the application is still being developed and the short coming of the application can be fixed. I have owned it now for about a month and there have been several updates in that month.

RSS/NewsReader
I have been using NetNewsWire as my RSS reader. I like the application, but I miss several of the features that I loved in FeedDemon. On FeedDemon I use to set up the folder view to display all folders that had unread items in them. The view would be set up to display only unread items, and I would scan feed by feed using the control-d to mark the displayed page as read and move to the next unread section. If I came across anything that looked interesting I would flag it and put it in a bucket to turn into another RSS feed, that I run through Feedburner and import into my personalized home page, and onto my Blog. I can't seem to reproduce this workflow exactly, but I'm getting there.

Graphics
I need to get my license of Creative Suite 3 Professional transfered off my PC and onto this Mac. I have not yet done this.

Development Tools
Well, I purchased this computer to do iPhone development. I will have to say that the customer service I have gotten from Apple vs. the customer experience I got from Microsoft is like day vs. night. I was personally contacted by someone at Apple and they wanted to help me with the process of getting my keys. I had already gotten most of this done, but the personal phone call from someone who sounded like he was calling me from the Bay Area was nice.

As for web development tools, I have tried Coda and BBedit. I have yet to land on a product that I like. I want something that integrates with Subversion or CVS.

Other Cool Tools
iCalendar + SpanningSync +iPhone + iTunes = EPIC WIN! I finally have everything all synced up. On the PC this was almost impossible. I tried to get Vista's calendar, and Outlook, and some syncing tools and iTunes all to work together. It was frustrating. It was doable outside of firewalls and proxy servers, but once you get behind a proxy server the whole workflow fell apart. This one workflow alone was worth the price of admission. I'm also looking forward to getting OmniFocus and Remember the Milk setup.

BootCamp
I installed BootCamp to do Vista. I have yet to use Vista, but I can see that I I will after I get the wireless card I have up and running under Vista (btw, getting it up and running on OSX was as simple as downloading the driver and following the instructions on installing it. It just worked.) I will probably use Vista for gaming only. Sadly I'm now thinking that all Vista is good for is games. It's my new toy operating system.

Overall Impressions
The next computer my Mom and Dad get will be an iMac. I'm also going to make my sister get one as well. I'm tired of doing tech support on PC's. I spent several weeks getting rid of viruses on their machines over the last year. Also it seems that everything Just Works on the Mac. I guess you can say that I drank the Kool Aid and It's GREAT!

links for 2008-03-22

• FCC Finally Admits Its Broadband Penetration Numbers Are 'Stunningly Meaningless'
  For years, the FCC has been publishing numbers about broadband penetration in the US that were clearly bogus.
• Breaking: FCC Confirms that Big Winner in Spectrum Auction is Verizon. So Why Is Google Smiling?
  The big winner of the FCC’s $19.6 billion auction of wireless spectrum that ended yesterday is Verizon. That was pretty much everyone’s guess.
• FCC releases 700MHz auction details, Verizon, AT&T big winners
  After yesterday's wrap-up of the gargantuan Auction 73 to offload the newly-freed 700MHz spectrum, it looks like the two champions to emerge are Verizon and AT&T. Big Red has emerged with virtually all of the highly coveted C Block save for Alaska, Puerto
• OK, so Adobe ins’t making Flash for iPhone, at least not yet
  Remember yesterday we brought you news that Adobe was fast-tracking a version of Flash for the iPhone? Yah, not so much. Adobe’s CEO Narayen assumed it would be possible with the recently released iPhone SDK.
• The Conversation Has Left the Blogosphere
  We've seen a lot of new aggregation services and lifestreaming applications come into play recently, and we've questioned whether they're adding to the conversation or just adding to our information overload. (See our coverage on FriendFeed, for example).
• Google Releases Language Translation API
  As of today, the powerful Google Translate service that lets you translate between 13 different languages and 29 language pairs is now available as a handy JavaScript-based API. Given the breadth of the engine it’s built on, it already supports language
• LinkedIn Company Profiles. Gee, That Makes Sense.
  Not sure what took so long, but LinkedIn had added company profiles. Just like there are profiles for users, there are now profiles for the companies that LinkedIn users work for.
• The First Rule of Programming: It's Always Your Fault
  You know the feeling. It's happened to all of us at some point: you've pored over the code a dozen times and still can't find a problem with it. But there's some bug or error you can't seem to get rid of. There just has to be something wrong with the mach
• What’s the Persona of Your Company? Examining the LinkedIn Company Directory
  Combining both third party plus member data, LinkedIn can reveal a persona –and social capital– of our companies.
• 24% Can’t Find Google
  This week, usability guru Jakob Nielsen asks: “How difficult is it to perform a search on Google?” No, really. How hard is it? We know the search box in the upper right hand corner of your screen can get there. We know that Google.com in the address b
• OpenID and OAuth in the browser?
  When I was looking over Brad Neuberg’s Paper Airplane thought experiment I noticed the single sign on feature, where you login to the browser, and then you are done. I realized that this is what I actually want. Having one signon via OpenID is really n
• new google visualization API
  A new Google Visualization API, based on the powerful visualization techniques from GapMinder. the API is "designed to make it easier for a wide audience to make use of advanced visualization technology, & do so in a way that makes it quick and easy to in
• Trendalyzer view of the banking crisis
  The team at "And Still I Persist" has created their own version of Hans Rosling's "Trendalyzer" (see: Radar post) to visualize the current US banking crisis.
• Brian Dettmer's insanely creative Book Autopsies
• Starbucks’ Bright Idea: Launch a Social Network.
  McDonalds has better (flavored) coffee now, and that’s giving Starbucks a run for its money. The omnipresent coffee shop has even started running television commercials. A few other campaigns had hoped to get some more support from the consumers, such a

links for 2008-03-20

• iTunes Unlimited: Does Apple really want to mess with a good thing?
  Apple is in discussions with the big record labels about a possible deal that would allow iPod purchasers free access to the entire iTunes catalog the Financial Times reports. This would mark a drastic change from the 99 cent-a-song model that Apple has h
• Gartner recommends iPhone for business users, fish food for fish
  In its initial release, the iPhone was, with few exceptions, an Internet tablet with browser-based applications as its main offering, however, the release of firmware 2.0 changes that, enabling enterprises to develop local code and create applications tha
• Google about to drop the other Enterprise shoe on Microsoft?
  Several people have told me about an offline version of Gmail, coming soon. Other people say that Google, or a company working with Google, is going to come out with a new server that will let corporations replace their Exchange servers with ones made by
• Flash coming to the iPhone, if Adobe has anything to say about it
  The rumors are apparently true, after a fashion -- despite reports of Jobs' opposition to the idea, Adobe has told the Wall Street Journal that after reviewing the iPhone's SDK, their CEO says they can bring Flash to the device all by themselves.
• Using Friendfeed's Imaginary Friends as a Master Aggregator
  Using the site's Imaginary Friends feature you can turn it into a powerful, master aggregator.
• Safari 3.1 Develop Menu
  The just-released Safari 3.1 has a new "Develop" menu (check the Advanced tab in Preferences to activate it). I usually rely on Firefox's Web Developer Toolbar for testing and diagnostics -- but preferring Safari as my general browser of choice, I was hap

links for 2008-03-19

• iPhone Users Are Having More Fun
  New data from M:Metrics for the month of January confirms that folks who own an iPhone tend to do more entertaining things on their devices — such as watch video and visit social networks — than those who own smartphones.
• Apple releases Safari 3.1 for Mac and Windows
  Apple has released an updated version of the Safari web browser with a slew of performance, compatibility, and reliability tweaks. Safari 3.1 also adds support for CSS 3 web fonts, HTML 5 audio and video elements, and other web standards.
• Zeppelin moored to gigantic steamer with buzzing biplanes
  From the April, 1923 ish of Popular Science, a proposal to moor stately airships to the masts of titanic, biplane-sporting steamships on transoceanic journeys as a means of preparing for the next Great War.
• Tesla Roadster enters production at long last
  Tesla Motors claims it finally has the car under production, and is naturally taking orders for the 2009 run -- 900 cars have been reserved so far.
• large-scale color name survey
  A chart mapping about 1,300 colors and the according (English) names that people gave for them. Each name is printed in its own color and positioned on a color wheel
• Does More Than One Monitor Improve Productivity?
  People using the 24-inch screen completed the tasks 52% faster than people who used the 18-inch monitor. People who used the two 20-inch monitors were 44% faster than those with the 18-inch ones. Productivity dropped off again when people used a 26-inch
• Thwirl now lets you post to Twitter, Jaiku, and Pownce simultaneously
  Title says it all
• The Lost Hindu Temple in the Jungle Mist
  A beautiful HDR image
• The FCC's 700-MHz Auction Raises $19.6B, But Still No Winners List
  After 261 rounds of bidding, the FCC's 700-MHz auction, also known as Auction 73, came to a end Tuesday afternoon. According to FCC chairman Kevin Martin (pictured right), the agency raised a total of $19.6 billion, more money than any auction in the agen
• Arthur C. Clarke, inventor of satellite, visionary in technology, dead at 90
  Today is a very sad day in our little world. It's been reported that Arthur C. Clarke, among the most influential visionaries in technology, has died at the age of 90.
• Realtime PR
  The Sarah Lacy/Mark Zuckerber SXSW interview wasn't as bad as it was made out to be but it was pretty bad; and it was pretty bad primarily becuase Lacy forgot the number one rule of communictions -- remember the audience.
• LCMS Pulls the Plug on "Issues, Etc."
  The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod's Board of Communications suddenly pulled the plug today on Issues, Etc. Both Rev. Todd Wilkens and his producer Jeff Schwarz, were both let go without advance notice.
• A German fighter ace has just learned that one of his...
  A German fighter ace has just learned that one of his 28 wartime 'kills' was his favourite author. Messerschmidt pilot Horst Rippert, 88, said he would have held his fire if he had known the man flying the Lightning fighter was renowned French novelist An
• In the middle of this interview with rapper DMX, it...
  In the middle of this interview with rapper DMX, it becomes clear that he's never heard of Barack Obama before.
• Obama: ‘A More Perfect Union’
  Stirring speech from Barrack Obama today in Philadelphia, addressing racial issues head-on, and, more importantly, challenging the level of political discourse in our news media:

links for 2008-03-18

• Steve Jobs Was Only Half-Right: People Do Read - Even Kids - They Just Do It Online
  When Amazon introduced their e-book reader, the Kindle, Steve Jobs made a strong proclamation regarding the book industry that received a lot of attention: "It doesn't matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don't read anymore... Th
• News: California looks to tax iTunes, other downloads
  Mirroring efforts by a number of other states, including New York, legislators in California hope to apply sales taxes to iTunes and other digital downloads, according to the Orange County Register. The tax would result in the price of a 99-cent song goin
• Martian Headsets
  Mirroring efforts by a number of other states, including New York, legislators in California hope to apply sales taxes to iTunes and other digital downloads, according to the Orange County Register. The tax would result in the price of a 99-cent song goin
  (tags: standards ie8 microsoft)
• A LEGO space odyssey - Discovery
  Legos and spaceships, need I say more?
• Prism 0.9 released, runs as a Firefox Extension
  Prism 0.9 was released and it added functionality that enables it to run as a Firefox plugin so you can quickly and easily turn any site into a Prism application. They also added functionality that lets you detect embedded “bundles” (packaged Prism a
• How true…
  Product Interfaces
• Really Big Bones Up For Auction On Ebay
  Prism 0.9 was released and it added functionality that enables it to run as a Firefox plugin so you can quickly and easily turn any site into a Prism application. They also added functionality that lets you detect embedded “bundles” (packaged Prism a
• Craigslist Cleared Of Discrimination Charges In Listings
  Craigslist, the popular online classified system, has been cleared of problems stemming from discriminatory ads placed on its sites.
• iPod takes one small step for PMPs, one giant leap for consumer electronics
  iPods in outer space
• Size Does Matter — Bigger Monitors Save 2.5 Hours a Day
  According to University of Utah researchers, using a larger monitor could save you 2.5 hours per day.