Tuesday, September 25

blackberry rock

I love this. I'm sitting in a bar in Hermosa Beach and posting with a blackberry. Maybe I'm a geek but the fact I can do this is cool to me. Beats having to use Outlook for email :-) And living in SoCal is cool too!

Tuesday, September 4

RANT

OMG how much do I hate Outlook. I have been a Lotus Notes and Thunderbird user for a long time now but my job requires me to use M$ Outlook. What a piece of junk! I've been sitting on the other side of the fence for so long I expected to see a completely intuitive, user friendly, business class email client but all I get is a gazillion menus and items scattered all over the place. Maybe it's just because I have been using two different clients for so long that I am missing the whole "Outlook is fabulous" mentality, but WTF? M$ bigots are always going on about usability standards and ragging on IBM/Lotus for their use of F5 to activate a security feature and F9 to refresh screens (M$ products use F5 to refresh) but Outlook has keyboard shortcuts that make *no* sense whatsoever, and contradict their holier than thou stance on standards.
Show me the M$ product that does *not* use Ctrl-F to initiate a search. Outlook! To start a search you have to use Ctrl-E, which everybody uses to Edit. And Ctrl-F? Creates a new message! Ctrl-M (most commonly used to create a new message in email clients) performs a send/receive.
And don't get me started on the freaking calendar. It's a POS. 3 or 4 clicks to get to the point where I can view other people's calendars and then the default view settings mean that you have to request that the user opens up their calendar just to see if they're busy or not!
Jeez. This thing is driving me nuts. I guess I need to stop thinking like a normal person and start drinking the Kool-Aid.
/RANT

Managed to sneak in under 6 months . ..

I hadn't realized how long it has been . . . . but have I got a lot to talk about!
Since the last post much has happened - some good, some not so good. First off, I got a job and am now working for a major software company in the IT Management space. The self employed thing was fun but the security of a regular paycheck was a very nice option and I can still do some work on the side as it doesn't really compete with what I do for my new company (more on that in a subsequent post .. .) Still riding - now training for El Tour De Tucson in November - and on a diet to get me down to a decent weight to race next year. Might even buy a track bike again.
Unfortunately a close family member has been suffering from Leukemia for some years and has recently been diagnosed with Aesophogeal (sp?) Cancer. He is to undergo surgery next week in Scotland so Helen is going back to see him after the op and I might be able to make a short trip myself (my new boss is very cool with the situation but there is some product training I need to get that happens the week after the surgery).