Will Kelly

WWD Post: ShoveBox for the Mac and iPhone Helps Keep Your Stuff Organized

Perhaps the greatest treasure in the recent MacHeist nanoBundle (which was covered by Simon in a recent post) is ShoveBox. It’s a clippings organizer that lets you capture, view, organize and edit data that is elegant in its simplicity. This very usable application resides in the menubar, making it accessible at all times regardless of what application you are using.

via webworkerdaily.com

WWD Post: Access Office Live Workspace or SharePoint from Office 2008 Mac

Microsoft collaboration software is the typical corporate tool of choice, which, by extension, means that the Windows version of Microsoft Office was the office productivity suite of choice. However, a recent update to Microsoft Office 2008 for the Mac now enables Mac users to access both Microsoft SharePoint sites and Office Live Workspace.

via webworkerdaily.com

Recent Thoughts about Personal Information Management

One of the great things about writing for WebWorkerDaily is the exposure I get to the latest technologies and thoughts about Web 2.0, productivity, and web working. Professionally, it has helped me think deeper into some of my own personal information management issues and approaches.

Growing up with dyslexia always made personal organization a challenge for me. Also, I found out years ago that I am better organized electronically than I am in a traditional paper and filing cabinet method.

WWD Post: Yojimbo 2.0 Adds Usability Refinements

Yojimbo 2.0 from Bare Bones Software is the latest release of this popular information organizer for the Mac. It’s a tool that users can use to stow their random bits and bytes in an organized manner, making them easy to search for and retrieve.

via webworkerdaily.com

Yojimbo is where I stash some of my most important personal and professional information. The latest update adds some great refinements to the product.

Random and Recent Projects

I've been in a real tinkering mode as of late. Perhaps it's because I reread my copy of the Lifehacker book at the pool over last weekend.

Thoughts about the Recent Apple WWDC Announcements

Yesterday, I followed the Apple WWDC keynote online via Engadget, gdgt, and other online geek news outlets. While FY 2009 is probably not going to see any new hardware upgrades in my home office, I was enthused about the announcement of Snow Leopard and the next generation of the iPhone.

My Acrobat.com Wishlist: Buzzword, Create PDF and MyFiles Edition

I've been getting some use out of my Acrobat.com account as of late and regularly use Buzzword and MyFiles and had a minor let down with Acrobat.com's Create PDF features. Acrobat.com is a maturing service and I have some wishes for what I want to see in future iterations of Acrobat.com.

Yojimbo and Me

It is safe to say that personally and professionally that I am a pack rat when it comes to papers and research so I've been looking for an electronic solution for the filing and indexing of my important information. While a paperless office might not be in my future, I am looking to cut down on paper.

My Favorite Macintosh Applications for 2008

My preference is to use a Macintosh  whenever possible and I wanted to share my favorite Mac applications for 2008. These applications helped me be productive  and stay organized

Favorite New Hardware for 2008

I purchased a Fujitsu Scansnap S300M Clr 600DPI USB 10PG Adf Mobile Scanner after reading about it on LifeHacker because I recognized the ease of use would help me convert a hardcopy documents into PDFs in short order.

Road Review: MacBook Air

I took my MacBook Air along on a recent New York City trip and the machine behaved like a champ both on the Amtrak Acela and in my hotel room.

It was great that I was able to stow my MacBook Air (in its protective sleeve) in my backpack versus having to carry a separate laptop bag. I like to travel light when I am on vacation.

Why I've yet to succumb to the Apple iPhone 3g

I had multiple sightings of the iPhone 3g in the wild while I was out and about in New York City during my last visit. In fact more than once, I felt like I was in an iPhone 3g commercial. As an early adopter, I began to wonder why I have yet to surrender to the iPhone.

Gmail Error as seen through Firefox 3 on my MacBook Pro

I've come to use Gmail more and more lately especially for personal correspondence. Now that I've upgraded to Firefox 3 on my MacBook Pro, I get errors saying that people in my chat list are undefined and I see the same errors in my emails. I don't see the same thing in Safari when I got to Gmail.

See the error after the jump. I wonder if it is a native Firefox error, or an issue with one of my extensions because I don't have the same issue on my Windows XP PCs.

Thoughts about ThinkFree Premium

I've been testing out ThinkFree Premium beta during the course of researching and writing some new articles. ThinkFree has done admirable work on their newest offering. ThinkFree Write  is the online word processor which offers the features and performance on par with Microsoft Word.

The performance of ThinkFree Write has been rather impressive. While there was some operator error on my part when setting up documen synchronization, it was easily fixed.

Unfortunately, ThinkFree Write doesn't support track changes -- a must have for me especially when collaborating on documents. It's not a complete show stopper but Track Changes are an important feature to me and just not for collaboration as I depend on the feature even when I am editing my own documents. Today's track changes are yesterday's red pen.

I did experience one wierd quirk in ThinkFree Write when I uploaded my resume from Microsoft Office 2003 to the service. The bullet points in my resume  ported over as Zaph Dingbats at least on my MacBook Pro. Unacceptable.

My First Look At Zoho Business

Zoho Business is another entry into the Web Office arena that has features on par with Microsoft Office.  This Web Office Suite takes a more portal-like approach to a Web Office suite unlike ThinkFree Office Premium that behaves like a traditional desktop Office Suite.

Zoho already has a strong body of work delivering Web Office productivity applications that rival their desktop-bound competitors. I've had the opportunity to check out their Notebook application (a competitor to Microsoft Office OneNote 2007) and their hosted Wiki product. Each application had a clean user interface  that bespeaks Zoho's strong product management, engineering, and usability expertise.

Their portal like approach to their productivity suite should appeal to more Web savvy users. However, familiarity breeds contempt when it comes to Office suites amongst other things. This means an organization considering swapping out Microsoft Office for Zoho Business shouldn't forget training their users in the new Office suite and making necessary changes to formal and ad hoc business processes that rely on an Office suite.

Is Microsoft Office for the Mac going Corporate?

Microsoft boosts Office for Mac's business features (from news.com)

Microsoft's next release of Office for Mac, due in January, will include business features that PC users have taken for granted for years.

I regularly use Microsoft Office 2004 for the Mac and will be the first to say it is getting long in the tooth as Office suites go and thus was disappointed when word came out that its release had been delayed until January 2008.

Business features in the next release of Microsoft Office for the Mac are a good thing as the Macintosh gains new inroads inside corporate enterprises.

More Analysis on the Office for Mac Delay

A lot could be going on behind the scenes when it comes to the Office for the Mac 2008 delay. Apple's switch to an Intel-based architecture speaks to the Mac finally entering the mainstream of computing while the Microsoft Suite for the platform lags behind.

There is definitely a requirement for some cross-platform Microsoft Office suite nirvana to enable more seamless document exchanges between Windows and Macintosh users. I am not asking for a document format war heree but rather that Office for the Mac becomes more aligned with Microsoft Office on the Windows platform.

ZDNet's Mary J Foley blogs on the delay:

 Office for Mac 2008 delayed until next year by ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley -- The next version of Microsoft Office for Mac won't hit in the latter half of 2007, as originally expected, according to Microsoft. The new ship target for Office for Mac 2008 is January 2008. That also means the promised Open XML file-format converters for the Mac are pushed back, as well, given Microsoft's original converter timetable.

Microsoft Office on the Mac Delayed until 2008

I got my start back in the day using a Macintosh. It was the first computer I ever learned to use. When I entered the working world, I had to put my Mac skills aside until I bought an iBook. Later I upgraded to a MacBook Pro which is my primary writing machine these days.  Microsoft Office 2004 for the Mac is my primary writing tool as I often transfer documents to a Windows XP machine.

Now I read online that the next version of Office for the Mac is delayed until 2008. ZDNet's Marc Orchant wrote a great post on the delay:

Microsoft delays Office 2008 for Mac until… 2008 by ZDNet's Marc Orchant -- This is bad news for those of us who need some of the advanced functionality in Mac Office to collaborate with folks in the Windows world. Track Changes, in particular, is a compatibility issue that keep from from switching off Microsoft entirely on the Mac. It's so commonly used in the work I do that I simply can't afford to rely on another suite or set of products. I was pretty excited about the changes I've been hearing about in this next release but I guess I'll just have to continue muddling along with Office 2004 on my MacBook a while longer.

MacUpdate Promo

Once upon a time, I was a computer lab assistant in college. My boss was very Pro Macintosh. Apple went through a number of machinations and came close to near death since that time. During my career as a technical writer, I did drift away from the Macintosh.

Though, I've come back home with one of my primary writing PCs being a MacBook Pro and an iMac found its way into my home office. This means that I've been exploring Macintosh software including last year's MacHeist and this year's MacUpdate Bundle.  Marc Orchant offers up some more insight:

MacUpdate promo bundle nears finish line by ZDNet's Marc Orchant -- I'm a sucker for these bundle promotions. I admit it. Last year's MacHeist bundle got me and so did the current (and about to end) MacUpdate promotion. This one's quite a nice deal if you're looking for an ecelectic but very useful collection of Mac applications and utilities at a significant discount. The bundle includes...

Alternative Word Processors on the Macintosh

I've been running only alternative word processors on my iMac since it came online in my home office. Here are some thoughts on Microsoft Office alteratives on the Mac:0

• Nisus Writer Express: I've written first drafts of two Processor Magazine articles with Nisus Writer Express and like it a lot. Saving the files in RTF seem to ease some of the issues I encounter when transferring an article draft to a Windows PC. I've had cases where the styles go a bit wonky when I open up a document I create in Word on the Macintosh using Word 2003.
• AbiWord: While I want to like AbiWord, I found the screen rendering of the fonts on my iMac to be a deal killer for this open source word processor.
• NeoOffice:  I am still reserving judgement on NeoOffice because OpenOffice.org lost a lot of credibility with me with their PR attempts saying that the leap for the everyday user from Microsoft Office to OpenOffice is seamless and didn't require any retraining. Though I do plan to exercise NeoOffic while writing an upcoming article.