TiddlyWiki and SlickRun

These are two utility programs that I have come to love in the short time I have been using them.   I have been using them since about the 8th of January.

TiddlyWiki - it is a wiki personal notebook.  I use it for keeping a daily journal of my notes and research and collection of links etc.  If you have a specific topic you want to collect notes about, just copy a blank Tiddly file and rename, double-click and begin adding content.   It is not designed to be multi-user.  It would be simple enough to publish the HTML to a webserver, but really it is supposed to run on your local hard drive.  I recommend using a different browser other than IE to edit it, because IE has all the warnings that pop up.  Personally I create a short cut to Google Chrome to open the specified Tiddlywiki file.

SlickRun - Switch little resident program that creates a little window that by default displays the date/time, but allows you to type in commands.  Each command is like a typical windows short cut link.  So you can set up a command (Called a Magic Word) in there to launch Microsoft Word.  You may decide you want your command(magicword) to be 'msword' or just 'w' or anything.  Then it will launch Word for you when you type the command.  Getting creative, you can set up a magic word called 'ts' (for timesheet) that will launch Microsoft Excel and open your XLS based timesheet.  Having it hover above all programs and being just a keystroke away is what makes it so Slick.  It is much faster to jump to it and quickly type 'exp' to launch explorer or type 'wiki' to launch Google Chrome with your TiddlyWiki file than to find the shortcut on your desktop and click on it etc.  it has some other fun features too, but I have not used them much.    

Check these two cool utilities out...I think you might like them :)

Sketching

What a cool tool. The Google Sketchup is amazing. So easy to use and yet very powerful 3d editor with a ton of free models available for making your drawing look great.

http://sketchup.google.com

I threw the below together in about 20 minutes of playing.  Pretty fun.

Amazing Pictures

WOW!!!
Visit http://1x.com/

Awesome examples of some great photography, like this one: http://1x.com/photos/landscape/21577/

CD and DVD Burning

ImgBurn (http://www.imgburn.com) is a lightweight CD / DVD / HD DVD / Blu-ray burning application that everyone should have in their toolkit!

It has several 'Modes', each one for performing a different task:

• Read - Read a disc to an image file
• Build - Create an image file from files on your computer or network - or you can write the files directly to a disc
• Write - Write an image file to a disc
• Verify - Check a disc is 100% readable. Optionally, you can also have ImgBurn compare it against a given image file to ensure the actual data is correct
• Discovery - Put your drive / media to the test! 

Great little free tool!

Sweet little Excel Macro

I love Microsoft Excel macro's that make your life easier.  I was working on the collection of some data into a typical matrix grid, trying to compare items.  Formatting away getting layouts right and then it dawned on me, that I was going to have to put this grid online...ugh...I have seen the resulting HTML from an Excel save as...yuck.  So a quick search online revealed this little jewel of a macro.

http://www.meadinkent.co.uk/xladvhtml.htm  This macro was originally written by Chris Mead (www.meadinkent.co.uk)

It works clean and simply.  And produces a simple web page with the majority of formatting from Excel in tact.  Here is what it looked like in XLS

And here is what the output looked like in IE

Not to bad! And the HTML was clean and easy to edit for integration or use. The macro may require a bit of VB editing to make it work :) Have fun and enjoy.

AMPs

What is the AMP solution? It is a collection of some of the most commonly used open source applications - Apache, MySQL, and PHP. There are a ton of resources from which to learn more about AMP, but here is a good article from the 2001 era on the Linux AMP or LAMP as it is known.  http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2001/01/25/lamp.html 

I like this line best: 

"Of course, there are plenty of excellent open source variants for any of the pieces of LAMP. Let the L stand for Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, and Darwin/Mac OS X, all of which are open source operating systems and all but the latter have open source GUI layers. Let the M stand for MySQL and PostGreSQL. Let the P stand for PHP, Perl, Python, and Ruby."

So what?  

Well if you are thinking of buying web based software for a small to mid-sized company spend a little bit of time researching the current offerings on the AMP stack and other Open Source platforms.  As an example I have been singularly impressed with the initial research on Alfresco. I can't wait to try out the integration with MS-Office, the collaboration options and workflow options.  Although technically not an AMP project (it is Java/mySQL), it still represents the open source movement well.    Read more here: http://www.alfresco.com/products/dm/

 

The Utility Master List

If you have never seen Scott Hanselman's 2007 Ultimate Developer and Power Users Tool List for Windows, you must go visit.  Many of what I listed yesterday are on there and much much more!

http://www.hanselman.com/blog/content/radiostories/2003/09/09/scottHanselmansUltimateDeveloperAndPowerUsersToolsList.html

I am trying out SlickRun and UltraMon from his list now.  Both seem great!  

More Utilities

I had to set up a new machine and as I started digging around I found a wealth of super tools that are mostly free and make experience on the PC and Web so much better. 

Here goes my list:

DropBox - http://www.getdropbox.com The first 2 GB are free.  Then it is $99 for 50GB per year.  With DropBox you're paying for 3 features. One is an offsite storage space for your files. Two is a syncing application to synchronize your files on multiple computers, and three, is a system to keep track of incremental changes which at first won't mean much if you aren't doing project related work. 

IDrive - http://www.idrive.com Similar to DropBox.  I am still comparing these.  Both are great products.  IDrive is cheaper... $4.95 a month for $150 GB.  No costs for the versioned files.

PicasaWeb - http://picasaweb.google.com Awesome picture program for the PC and free picture online hosting for sharing with friends, families and blogs.

AxCrypt - http://www.axantum.com  AxCrypt Great features like automatic re-encryption after modification, simple double-click to edit any file you encrypt. Love the integration with Explorer etc. Best of all it is GNU General Public License free software.  If you like it, consider their Xecrets free service as well.

CutePDF - http://www.cutepdf.com Create professional quality PDF files from almost any printable document.  FREE for personal, commercial, gov or edu use! It works great!

7-Zip - http://www.7-zip.org Free, open source Windows utility for manipulating archives. The program supports 7z, ZIP, CAB, RAR, ARJ, LZH, CHM, GZIP, BZIP2, Z, TAR, CPIO, ISO, MSI, WIM, NSIS, RPM and DEB formats.  This is a great utility.

ZoomIt - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897434.aspx This is a must have screen zoom tool.  Designed for presentations and it works AWESOME!  

WinSnap - http://www.ntwind.com/software/winsnap.html WinSnap is a small enhancement utility for taking and editing screenshots.  WinSnap Portable is a special version of WinSnap designed to run from removable media like a USB flash drive.

Although everything above this is Windows oriented, I must give a big pointer to some really great software that runs on the Apache/MySQL/PHP stack.  Although these are not really personal use utility apps, some small to medium size business users will love this stuff!

XAMPP - http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html New to AMP...just go get this.  It is slick and it installs super friendly and just works.  XAMPP is an easy to install Apache distribution containing MySQL, PHP and Perl. Many people know from their own experience that it's not easy to install an Apache web server and it gets harder if you want to add MySQL, PHP and Perl.  Just get this :)

Trellis Desk - http://www.accord5.com/trellis A free help desk application with intuitive UI and user friendly system. PHP and MySQL.  

PureEdit - http://www.pureedit.com Simple easy to use Content Management System.

TiddlyWiki - http://www.tiddlywiki.com A little background to go with this one...I went to SD West 2005 and bumped into personal use of wiki's for the first time.  I used FlexWiki at the time.  It worked so great for keeping track of personal notes, the syntax was quick and easy to take bulleted notes during a session.  So as I set up the new computer, I realized that I missed having that around.  My search this time around came upon TiddlyWiki, a single file HTML wiki.  It is self described as "a reusable non-linear personal web notebook".   It just flat out works and works well.  I like it.  Try it out for a notebook.  If you are graphically inclined then probably Microsoft OneNote is more up your alley.  

Well that is all for this time

PDF Utility

Ever need to turn a document into a PDF file? Don't have the money or desire to install the full version of Adobe Acrobat?

There is a great FREE solution out there that downloads easily, installs, and just flat out works. It is CutePDF - http://www.cutepdf.com 
You can create professional quality PDF files from almost any printable document. FREE for personal, commercial, gov or edu use! It works great!

Need more than the free version offers? Consider their professional version (visit their website for the details).

Happy New Year

Wow...2009. What will this year bring?
Personally...Last year was a roller coaster for me. Had a really good first half of the year, but then in July-August, my company (DynCorp International) went into turmoil mode, with a new CEO, change in management etc. On September 10, 2008 DynCorp did a RIF and laid me and a bunch of other people off! So the last quarter of the year was great too...just Unique!
I had been at DI almost 6 years and so being back on the job market was fun and exciting. I have not yet landed anywhere full time yet, but have had a blast working on numerous part time stuff including helping out on some marketing, proposal development, software development, general consulting and advice for firms in the small business, Natural Gas and Oil, RFID, and government technical services companies.
I am excited about the new year and look forward to what God has in store for me.
Information Technology...This coming year looks exciting. Some of the items that catch my eye are:
1. Cloud Computing - Still early and only those early risk takers will jump on this year, but it appears to hold great promise.
2. Business Continuity - The risks of disasters and turmoil are as great as ever, if not greater. Companies need to make sure their DR plans are current.
3. Agility or Agile - In business, agility means the capability of rapidly and cost efficiently adapting to changes. This term, primarily originating in the software development arena, has met the mainstream now and is overheard in conference across the industry. "How can we be more agile?"
4. Cost Reduction - This is not a 'fun' or 'exciting' topic, but a hard work one. How do companies stand out or differentiate themselves in these times? A great book that I read on this in the Innovators Dilemma which discusses how disruptive technology results in either success or failure for companies. I see innovative approaches to cost reduction as being one of the key disruptive technologies of 2009 and 2010 as we emerge from this depression/recession.

On a final note...Becky made me laugh the other day with this humor...she asked: 

"Whats the difference between a recession and a depression?" 

The answer: 
     A recession is when your neighbor loses his job.
     A depression is when you lose your job.

Have a great New Year!

Overseas

Well I got very busy and went to the Dubai airshow. Was unable to take my Nikon. Ended up taking our little pocket Fuji. Will post some of those soon. I can't wait to see how the D300 comes out. Been reading a lot of reviews on that camera. I am hoping to get a macro lens or maybe another prime lens like a 35mm or 50mm.
For a macro I am looking at the AF-S VR Micro-NIKKOR 105mm f/2.8G IF-ED.

I SO forgot

Yep. That is right. I so forgot to check what ISO I was shooting and ended up not being happy with the result of my sunrise pictures. Not only that but I had left the camera on Large Basic JPG setting which meant that in addition to the noise there is a little pixelation in the gradients. I did get some that I am pretty pleased with. Here is one of them:


This one on the other hand has a lot of noise, even though I was happy with the composition.


There is a lot to keep track of. I was so worried about framing and getting the picture that I so forgot to check all the settings :) Next time!

Photography 101

Tonight I was reading on Ken Rockwell's site and ran across this:
"...photography is much easier for a layman to use and create what looks like a technically passable, sharp and well-exposed image. As most beginners discover instantly, simply having the best tools and technically sharp images doesn't get the glorious, passion-inspiring results they intended. "
and then later on another page Ken adds:
"....Your camera has NOTHING to do with making great photos. You have to master technique of course, but that's just a burden to get out of the way to free yourself to tackle the really hard part. The hard part is saying something with your images.
Photography is art. It's abstract. Therefore it's difficult for many people to grasp. It's easy and lazy to think a camera makes the photos. It's easy to blame bad photos on a camera. When you get better you'll realize you would have been better off to pay more attention to your images and less to your camera."

These two statements summarize what I think I was feeling in my post last night. Dog-gone it...photography is harder than it looks :)

Pictures

I went out trying to get some good pictures. Here's two that I thought turned out pretty ok.

I took some time tracking that dang moth around and around the flower bed. Finally was in position to capture him. I actually ended up taking it in landscape but cropped out the extra detail and turned it to a portrait.
On the second picture I layed in the grass firing away at different angles looking at the shots. After I got back this was one of my better ones.
So I spend some time and get some interesting pictures. But contrast those to this one I got when my son, Ryan, came running at me guns a-blazing!!! This was not staged and I only got off one shot. I like it the best of these three :) and in some ways it is discouraging that without perfect timing, atmosphere, etc there are only good pictures not GREAT photographs.

So I keep my camera handy and am trying to remember to take it everywhere. I did get a great sunset picture. I took about 5 shots 5-10 seconds apart, tweaking the settings. Only the first one that I rapidly shot to capture the stunning orange sky turned out...slowly beginning to understand why photographers carry around a GPS device that shows sunrise and sunset time tables for wherever they are :) There are only seconds to catch that perfect shot...and in the case of a kid...well milliseconds before they expect you to fall out of the chair 'dead' from well aimed 'finger' bullets :)

Why did I buy a new camera

I am now on my 3rd expensive digital camera.
1. My first one was a Fuji Finepix S602 Zoom. It was awesome and I would probably still be using it except I dropped it :(
2. Next I bought the Olympus E-500 with the two kit lenses. Wow! It took amazing pictures was fun and flexible. BUT my daughters took up indoor sports (volleyball) AND its flash was annoying in that it strobed when trying to auto focus in low light conditions, effectively blinding everyone. So I got rid of it and got...
3. My new Nikon D80 with the amazing 18-200mm lens and an 85mm 1.8 lens. I am still learning about this camera and what all it can do.

So why talk about this. Well I was reading tonight about "Why Your camera does not matter" (http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/notcamera.htm). He points out that the camera and even a cameraphone can get great pictures and then Ken states: "Maybe because it's entirely an artist's eye, patience and skill that makes an image and not his tools. Even Ansel said "The single most important component of a camera is the twelve inches behind it.""

So why did I buy a camera with lenses twice as expensive??? Was I an idiot I wonder? So I started going back through my photographs and felt much better about spending the extra dollars on my Nikon. I bought it to capture the memory of my kids growing up and having fun. And heck...I like taking pictures. Compare the two shots below:




Both of the above shots are without adjusting colors or anything. I just cropped and reduced them to approximately the same size. The one on the left with the action frozen and a bright look is the new D80 camera. The one on the right is my E500. Granted a lot of the diffence is in the lens. Which is another reason I chose Nikon...they have great lenses. I still have a lot of practice to go to get a good shot during the extremely fast action of volleyball in a dimly lit gym! More on that another time.

Wealth of camera information

One of my favorite sites while researching which camera to buy, became Ken Rockwell's website. It is located at http://www.kenrockwell.com/
He is heavily slanted toward the Nikon brand and makes no apologies for any of his opinions. There is a phenomanal amount if information on his site and if you are thinking about getting a Digital SLR (regardless of brand) it is well worth multiple visits.
I ended up choosing the Nikon D80. Ken has a great guide on it. http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/d80.htm
I have to admit some of his stuff was rather eye opening. His Megapixel Myth page (http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/mpmyth.htm) had me opening and comparing shots from my old Fuji S602Zoom shot at 3 MP with my new 10 MP Nikon D80. Wow. Next really big eye-opener was the $150 vs $5000 dollar cameras page at http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/150-vs-5000-dollar-camera.htm

Check it out and let me know what ya think :)

Scanning your way to Hi-res photos

I think we have all at one time or another scanned a picture, negative or slide to digitize a picture. Recently I had access to some old family pictures and had no scanner around to capture them, so I laid them out on the table and used my 6MP digital camera to digitize them...they turned out pretty good :).
This post though is about an aritcle I read the other night on using the flatbed scanner for macro photography! I was skeptical at first until I saw some of the images. http://www.photogalaxy.com/articles/materials/scan/2005-10-16-SCN-01-38.jpg
Basically the concept is that you place the object you want to 'take a picture' of on the bed of the scanner. If you want a black background turn off all the lights in the room and scan away and the result is a high quality picture of the object (http://www.photocritic.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/268361_11025_5ab50e5ae5_p.jpg)
I have to climb up in the attic and dust off the scanner that I thought lost it's usefullness some time back and see what images I can create with it. I will keep you posted on when and if I make that trip into the attic to retrieve one of my archived computer items. I think it is next to the AMD 586/133 desktop with16 MB of ram :)

More picture taking stuff :)

The entire photography scene is way more complicated than I ever dreamed. Learning about f-stops and aperature (same thing I found out), shutter speed, scense composition, artifacts, sensor dust, macro, micro, metering, color aberations etc etc. It has been a fun learning adventure so far and I have just scratched the surface.
Last night my favorite read was Macro photography with a pringles can! (http://www.photocritic.org/2005/macro-photography-on-a-budget/)

Every once in a while

It seems that every now and then I remember to blog...
So here goes.
I got a new Nikon D80. A really sweet camera. Picked up two lenses for it, 18-200mm VR and the 85mm 1.8. I really wanted the 1.4 85mm but it was just too much. It is really amazing how much a really good lens costs. I was looking on Ebay the other night and saw a lens from 1974 going for over $4000 bucks. The 2007 equivalent lens is $6000. They hold their value amazingly well. I have been having fun taking pictures...kinda a new hobby. I actually got up early on the weekend and went to a local park to snap pictures. Learned that I am not yet a very good photographer, but the camera took high quality pictures of whatever I pointed it at :)

San Diego - Gartner conference

San Diego, CA -- 19 Jun 2006 11 AM --
Greg and I are here in wonderful San Diego attending the Application Integration & Web Services Summit and the Enterprise Architecture Summit.
Things are going pretty good so far. We had a pretty uneventful trip, other than the fact that we missed the NBA Finals game...grrr. And then when we landed we found out the Mavs had LOST! Double grrr.
Anyway, just got out of the Keynote address. Very interesting focus on Web 2.0, Enterprise 2.0 etc with the overall look being SOA.
Just starting the session of Portals...must pay attention :)

Notes from Portals session
6 Generations of Portals
Gen 1 1998-2000 - Contnet mgmt agregation, serch, personalization
Gen 2 2000- 2002 - appications integration, mobile, wireless, mgmt tools, portlets starting to show up
Gen 3 2002-2003 - Portlet integration , process integration, advanced personalization, knowledge mgmt, web services
Gen 4 2004- 2005 - jsr168, WSRP, personal content, advanced web services, microsites, JSR168
Gen 5 2005 - 2007 - SOBA/PIP/PCA support, advanced collaboration, WSRP V2, JSR 286, orchestrations, user experience mgmt, portal as services
Gen 6 2008-2009 Portal ubiquity, user managed portal aggregation (Clent based/server based/hosted), peer portal federation

It is all about aggregation and integration
WSRP is the basics of federation
The WSRP standard defines a way in which a webpart can be delivered from a remote system (it stands for Web Services for Remote Portlets). One example of this would be a portal which supports publishing WSRP could communicate with a different portal which can subscribe to WSRP, and a portlet/webpart which was only written for the publisher could then be shown in the client.
JSR168 is a cross-vendor standard byt limited in scope. JSR286 is slowing coming
JSR will not be supported by Microsoft
WSRP maybe...WSRP 2.0 is here...
WSRP is an interoperability standard. It’s platform- and language-neutral. It’s all about requesting and transmitting chunks of HTML using SOAP.
http://blogs.msdn.com/mikefitz/

BPEL - Orchestration
Business Process Modeling
BPEL is defined using XML. Accordingly, it was designed to be generated by tools, not written directly by developers. ep

AJAX is big...also potenttial security problem etc
http://www.tiddlywiki.com

Prepare for the Web 2.0 wave which introduces new approaches to platforms and processes.