For those of us who use OS X in an enterprise environment, it can be difficult to make our Exchange calendars sync with our iPhones. There is an excellent workaround, however. All of the updated versions of Office for Mac include a synchronization service that makes it easy as pie.
In Entourage, go to Entourage > Preferences > Sync Services.
There you have an option to sync your address book, calendar, or both with Apple’s built-in software. This works great for synching the iPhone.
For those of us lucky enough to own an iPhone, help is coming in the way of a delicious Apple SDK. The main fault of the iPhone has been, for quite some time, the lack of native third party applications. In the past, the only way to to run applications directly on the iPhone was to Jailbreak it, which could void your warranty. Most of us stayed away from this.
Here’s to hoping for some iPhone SDK goodness this week! Additionally, I sure hope Business Week was wrong in its prediction that the SDK could be several weeks to a month late.
Computerworld’s Scot Finnie (a recent Mac convert) writes on the danger to Microsoft presented by Apple’s current “buzz”.
Finnie seems to think the perception that Apple’s product is hot, new and superior will drive new growth. He perceives the threat to Microsoft as being not from a market share point-of-view, but rather in terms of “mind share”. He calls the Apple story one of the “Top Ten” tech stories of the year.
He’s right. He touches on something that a lot of us in the tech industry seem to miss sometimes. It isn’t always the traditional drivers in a market that push a product towards success or extinction, but rather this intangible and not yet measurable sense of buzz. When people begin making a computer the topic of conversation at sports pubs, it’s time for us to listen up. From a business point-of-view we need to find a way to measure this “buzz”. As an IT Professional, I’m listening closely to that buzz, and plan to capitalize on it and move IT forward on newer, better technologies.
Recent events have changed the field in which the iPhone is going to compete. Since it was introduced earlier this year, Microsoft introduced Windows Mobile 6. Far from innovative, WM6 is merely a .x upgrade to WM5 with a few added features (like HTML e-mail) that should have been around to begin with. TechBlog.TheVanguard.Org noticed something else, too: AT&T seems to be making its EDGE data service network faster. In some ways, EDGE data will always be inferior to 3G (HSDPA) technology at AT&T. EDGE cannot be used while in a GSM phone call. With HSDPA, users can have simultaneous data and voice calls. However, we’ve recently seen EDGE coverage not too far from our offices (we’re in a 3G area, so we have to do some traveling to see EDGE) begin to increase in speed from about 100kbps to 170kbps.
As some of you may recall, one of our biggest complaints about the iPhone was its lack of 3G. It’s clear why Apple decided to go with EDGE data, however. Windows Mobile devices that operate on AT&T’s 3G network suffer from terrible battery life. In a device with a screen as vibrant and large as the iPhone (and with as many capabilities) battery life is likely to become an issue.
We think the increased speeds (with more promised in the future) make EDGE viable for light browsing and heavy e-mail. We’re also a lot more excited about the potential for use by business people who are turned off by Windows Mobile’s battery life problems and lack of compatibility with the Mac.
NetworkWorld has an interesting article about Apple’s prospects in corporate America. Recent architecture changes, virtualization, clustering, storage networks, interoperability hooks and the price of upgrading hardware for Windows Vista all put Macs under the microscope for careful consideration as replacements to existing Windows and Linux machines.
As has been the case in the past, Apple is not defining a clear course for going after corporate business (the article points this out). Apple’s rebellious, anti-corporate attitude continues in 2007. However, innovative new technologies like Parallels, which allows users to run Microsoft Windows from within Mac OS X on a Macintosh computer are likely to make corporate moves to Mac OS X more likely.
Everytime I go to a computer store and see someone who looks like my mother in line with a copy of Microsoft Office, usually priced in the 300-400 dollar range, I get a little bit sick. The story is always the same… someone ordered a new computer, but the manufacturer or salesman didn’t bother to tell them that it included substandard or no office productivity software. When they fired it up and got their first e-mail attachment, shock ensued as they couldn’t open the .doc flyer or the .xls spreadsheet from the PTA.
What really makes me sick is that there is another way!
OpenOffice.Org is a complete office productivity suite that is multiplatform (e.g. it works on Macs and PCs), multi-lingual, and best of all - it is free! A free office productivity suite is hard to come by. In addition to this, it is open source, meaning the source code is out there for a savvy community of developers who continue to develop the software and make it better. For most home users (and a good deal of business users, really) OpenOffice is more than enough to get the job done. Not only is it compatible with Microsoft Office, but it is also compatible with other formats such as OASIS.
For those of you (like me) stuck in the world of Windows Vista, here are some handy shortcuts on the Microsoft page that will make your experience a lot easier.
In many ways, they do make the experience a little better than XP - just different. For instance, Ctrl-Alt-Del+K was always how I locked my XP machine when I stepped away from my desk. Now it’s Windows-L. Makes more sense, as I’m locking Windows. I also like Windows-Tab, which allows me to tab through Windows applications in Windows Flip 3-D. I prefer the Mac OS implementation of this function, but you know… the copy is never as good as the original. Oh well.
There’s quite a bit of literature on the Internet about email etiquette. Angry email users fill blogs, discussion boards and chat rooms with rants about poor email manners and general rudeness. I’ve decided to do a series of blog entries on this issue from a point-of-view that is rarely used when discussing this subject: organizational politics.
Indeed, the position you and the person receiving your email are in directly relates to the mannerisms in the email. That isn’t to say that you should be rude to anyone, but that etiquette is just different depending on who is on the other end of the tubes (that’s a political joke, for those of you who don’t get it).
Subject Lines
Remember to use a subject line every time you send an email. Though indexing features in OS X and Vista make it easier than ever to search email content, most of us are forced to prioritize emails beforehand. Not only should you provide a short, descriptive summary of the email in your subject line but you should also avoid using names. For example, you might provoke entirely too much interest for wandering eyes on the other end if your HR-related email’s subject is the name of the person about whom you are communicating. Despite warnings from IT, most managers leave their email open and computers unlocked while they get coffee, go to lunch or go to a meeting.
If you’re in the middle of an email thread and the subject changes, change the subject as well. Your email software can still track the thread, in most cases.
Read Receipts
The ability to send read receipts requests is one of the rudest, most annoying features in Microsoft Outlook. Avoid them. If you’re a manager and you can’t trust your people to read the emails you send them, find new staff. Reading email is a basic task. If your people can’t keep up with them, they’re probably in over their heads.
If you’re a manager sending these receipt requests, it’s rude and condescending. If you’re sending them to your boss, it’s in extremely bad taste. Either way, it’s a no-no. I know there are a few exceptions, especially in help-desk situations… but in general, just think about all the ill-will you stand to create in your company.
Forwards
There are really two categories of forwards: legitimate emails and non-legitimate ones. Non-legitimate emails make up about 30-50% of the forwards that arrive in my Inbox. Most of them are inappropriate and could get the sender fired from their job. It’s very rude to forward emails around. If it requests that you forward it or promises riches for you or a dying cancer child in exchange for forwarding it to others, you should probably not forward it. If you want to help kids with cancer, get out your wallet and make a big contribution to the children’s charity of your choice. Volunteer. Don’t try to take the easy way out…. mainly because the easy way doesn’t work.
The other category is legitimate emails, and this is an entirely different story. Some people think that because it is a business email, I want to be CC’ed or forwarded every message. This isn’t always true. I get less email than lots of people, and I get between 30 and 60 personal emails per day (this doesn’t include auto generated messages, notifications, etc.) A lot of folks get more than me. Think carefully before hitting that forward button. Not every email is important enough to demand your entire department’s time.
More later…
GSM World, the website of the GSM Association, publishes maps and other information for GSM customers with regards to coverage and roaming contracts. It’s a pretty cool resource if you are an international traveler but it’s also cool if you’re kind of geeky. Check it out! It may come in handy if you travel the world with your new iPhone from Cingular (AT&T).
Which reminds me…. check out this YouTube video from Stephen Colbert’s show regarding his take on the AT&T/BellSouth merger. Hilarious!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bj1Mtv9cD0I[/youtube]
With the Apple iPhone coming out this summer, many wonder why we’d need a blog post with this title. That said, there are a lot of Windows Mobile users out there who love the features of WM5 but are faithful to the Mac on the desktop. Even if you want an iPhone, you’ll have to wait until June. If you’re stuck in the Windows Mobile 5 world until then (or indefinitely, if you’re like me and need total integration with Microsoft Exchange) I have a hint or two that might help you.
The Samsung Blackjack, Palm Treo, Motorola Q, all those hideous Dell PDAs and many other devices normally require Microsoft Windows with ActiveSync installed. However, a company called Mark/Space, Inc. has a product called “The Missing Sync” which allows you to sync your Mac with your Windows Mobile device. For Microsoft Exchange users, in the Mac world, this can be a GREAT piece of software.
By the way, it is also now possible to tether your Samsung BlackJack on the Cingular network to your Mac to enjoy wireless 3G Internet, where available. The Windows world may not be friendly to Mac users, but Mac users are innovative and clever!