I love it when I find a great new application that helps me. My most recent find was “youmail”- www.youmail.com. It is a voice mail application that allows you to customize your voicemail message for individuals and it can also be automated. One of the best features is that it email’s you a message that you have a new voicemail, in the email (if you choose) it will translate the message into text.

I was able to view a voice mail from a colleague while in a meeting and determine if it was important to respond.

I remember the days of having the perfect Mixed tape. You would keep it or share it with a friend. What a great time, all you needed was a boom box and you had some good tunes. In today’s age, we have mix CD’s and mp3 files. There is a great new site that is getting a lot of attention called MuxedTape (www.muxtape.com)
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/easily-share-your-mixtapes-with-muxtape/

What a great little idea.

I was asked by a client on how to tell if someone’s password was strong enough. I was not sure on the need, and at first I was looking to either build or find a webservice that would test strength. After hearing the need over the phone we were able to use some already build applications (web sites) to do what they were looking for.

http://www.microsoft.com/protect/yourself/password/checker.mspx

http://www.securitystats.com/tools/password.php

I love “Mar#h M@dness”. I would have used the words but did not want to get sued.

I’m currently just relaxing and watching basketball. My brackets are not doing well, however it is still fun to watch.

I have heard people say they love vista, I have heard others curse it and go back to XP. In one case I know of a Microsoft Developer who will not run vista. I love new technology but respect speed and performance and I do not see either of those in vista. Currently I am running vista x86 and I am enjoying it other than some compatibility issues.

Here is an interesting post regarding vista.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/microsoft-top-brass-also-had-vista-problems/2008/02/29/1204226975087.html

In this new tech age, we have lots of options Linux, BSD, MAC, and windows. So what keeps you using windows?

As of Wednesday the company I work for NuSoft Solutions (www.nusoftsolutions.com) has been acquired by RCM Technologies (www.rcmt.com) a publicly traded company.

The role I have been in as Principal consultant for our Kinetic IG initiative will still continue. Being part of the RCM family will increase our ability to scale and obtain growth.

Press Release

http://www.forbes.com/businesswire/feeds/businesswire/2008/03/19/businesswire20080319006197r1.html

So far my dell d830 running Vista 64 is doing really good. I have found that it eats the battery faster than before and that there are a few more issues with some programs.

I have found that my favorite image capture program (cropper) does not work.

the performance increase and reliability are worth it.

I finally got a new laptop from work to replace my dead D820. I now have a refurbished d830. So far I am very happy. It has the same case, look, and screen as the last one. However, this box has 64bit Vista running on it. I am excited to be using 64.

I have only noticed a few things that don’t work, but I just got it and have not had time to install all of my apps.

One of my favorite tools on the web (www.dnsstuff.com) recently made a site change. They took their free tools and lookups and moved them to a different area. They also added a subscription model and want to make some money.

I am not against the change, in fact I am excited that they could make some money off their great tools. But after a few visits to the site and having to click to find the tools, I found that I automatically went to another network site I use (www.network-tools.com) instead of dnsstuff.

It is interesting that a simple change can cause users to leave. I am sure that dnsstuff still has the same if not more users, but all of a sudden I found that the limit they put on lookups and the promotional materials they are using to get me pay $10 a month was a bit annoying. With out even thinking I went to another site that provides the same service.

It is amazing how short of an attention span internet users have (or maybe it is just me)

If you are like me and your computer died and you are now using another for every day use and don’t have your collection of images for wallpaper (I hope you are not like me) You may find this site useful

http://marcogomes.com/wallpapr

It is a very nice wallpaper search. I just selected soccer and got a great selection of Soccer images for a background.

After my not so trusty dell d20 laptop decided I needed another hard drive inside of it, I realized that I should go with solid-state hard drives. It could by my frustration with the machine I have (dell mentioned earlier) but why do hard drives have to be the main point of failure. So while a scrubber program is running on my hard drive to clean up the bad sectors and parts of the disk, I get to use my home laptop. My IBM t61 is a joy to use, but not having my main work laptop is starting to be an issue at work. I have all my stuff backed up (read earlier posts of my other 4 hard drives in this machine), but I’m not really excited about pulling and working on files from different locations if I can get a snapshot of my drive.

So to resolve the issue our IT team is cleaning up the drive with a program and Dell is sending me a new machine, they are starting to think maybe something else is wrong. Or maybe it is just me.

I have a great idea for laptop manufacturers, just make an internal slot or a memroy bay where us users can inject an SD card 4 gig or so and create a small RAID or backup utility that would work outside of an OS.

I’m not sure how I stumbled to this link, probably reading my rss feeds. But, what a simple and great idea.
SpaceStation
A product to organize your cords and also clean up your desk space for a laptop.
I have probably seen a few people do this on their own over the years but never made a product out of it. Wow, just think of the many products that have not been created yet, and the basic ideas that were used to make them.

I just ran across a post on lifehacker regarding running linux on your windows machines
Run linux on windows app

I think it is a good idea and a nice distro. I have found that I use my linux machine for years in just a terminal window. However, no matter where I go I am able (as long as I have an internet connection) to run my linux applications on my windows machine. Using X-11 forwarding you can connect to your linux machine of choice and forward the gui to your local machine. That sounds easy and it is, you just need the right tools. You need SSH (putty.exe ssh client) for windows and an X server on your windows machine. I use Xming (Xming). This allows you to run the application on your linux box, mine happens to be a laptop in my basement, and have the application appear on your local machine. There is nothing more rewarding then opening up xeyes on a windows box.

There are many reasons to do this instead of installing another app (600 megs) of one on your machine. For me it allows me to test from different locations, I may be at the office and need to view a site remotely instead of from the office to see if it is location specific or if our connection is the cause. I have also found it great for testing, pings, ssh, and application security.

Skydrive is giving you 5gigs of data. Backup, share, and push your data online.
http://skydrive.live.com/

I currently use Mozy and I-drive for backup. But skydrive allows you to share files.

Next week we will no longer be able to use a “bag phone” or at least an analog one.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/15/AR2008021500036.html

They are turning off most of the networks. I’m not sure too many people are going to notice. But some companies are very interested in this. Home security systems that were installed may run off analog, hard wired cell phones (emergency phones) may be effected.

I guess we will not know until the day and people complain.

Ah, I remember my last analog phone, it allowed for analog and digital. I can remember the sales guy saying that there are more analog towers available and that digital may not be a clear…