Channel 9 - Discussions by mochant

Tech Off - Cleansing my system.

mochant — Wed, 26 Jul 2006 22:22:39 GMT

Grab a copy of SpyWare Blaster. It install a regularly updated set of kill bits for both IE and Firefox and installs a list of sites to block (known adware/badware purveyors). Free from JavaCool:

http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/

They also make a cool tool called EULAlyizer which parses most EULAs and highlights passages you should probably understand before clicking "OK".

Coffeehouse - Desktop Search

mochant — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 12:10:30 GMT

Check this thread:

http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=200305

Coffeehouse - desktop search version 3

mochant — Mon, 05 Jun 2006 12:17:37 GMT

It's a known issue that hasn't been very well documented. The decision was made to use WDS 3.0 as the indexing engine for both Outlook and OneNote in teh beta 2 release and if either program is istalled, you will be prompted to update to the new WDS 3.0 beta and cannot use the instant search features until you have done so.

Unfortunately, there is no UI for this version - only the indexing agent so if you install it, your previous install is hosed and you will no longer have the ability to conduct searches from the deskbar or the WDS application window.

All that functionality is promised back in a future release. IMO, this should have been handled differently. A the every least, the consequences of installing WDS 3.0 should be stated much more explicitly to someone who has a prior version installed.

There is an option in Outlook 2007 b2 to turn off the prompts but so far you have to add a couple of Registry keys to disable the nags in OneNote.

Also, the consequences of running two indexers for people already using another desktop search tool are considerable. You will now have two aggressive background process sets grinding away with very little visibility on your system. The WDS 3.0 background processes are very persistent. Killing the main process is only a temporary fix - it regenerates itself after a short time. It's also not battery aware and can drain your laptop or Tablet PC battery by kicking in when you're untethered.

We need at least an Options UI ASAP to cotrol that at the very least.

Coffeehouse - Taming Windows & Cross referencing

mochant — Mon, 08 May 2006 11:40:11 GMT

I use OneNote's SideNote feature to keep a note-taking window pinned on top of all other windows to do this sort of thing. EverNote (which is free in its basic version also might be a good solution).

I know there are a number of free or inexpensive window utilities (like Actual Window Manager) that can do this to any window (including a notepad or Word window). You might look into one of the freeware versions of this kind of utility to see if it solves the window focus and arrangement issue.

The beauty of OneNote or EverNote is that they create a source link for many kinds of information when you drag and drop into a notebook.

Coffeehouse - GMail down?

mochant — Thu, 04 May 2006 21:33:58 GMT

Gmail is down for me too.

Windows Live and Windows Live Mail are both working fine.

Coffeehouse - Office 2007 and PDF export

mochant — Fri, 31 Mar 2006 13:02:00 GMT

PDF uses (or can use) a number of compressions schemes for different element types (color, grayscale, and monochrome bitmaps as well as text and vector elements). It can also either embed, subset, or ignore the fints used in the docment you are converting. It sounds as though the compression hasn't been optimized (did you have any graphics in your test doc?) and/or the fonts (or a subset) have been embedded in your PDF.

Coffeehouse - The Origami Project's hype is frustrating.

mochant — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 12:46:20 GMT

Sabot wrote:

The problem with the Origami project hype is that it's annoying!

What is the point of hyping a product but keeping it a mystery?

Because it generates interest.

Y'know... sometimes I feel like this company can never make everyone -even its fans - happy. For years (20+), I've heard people complain that MS doesn't how market their wares.

"Why can' they be more like Apple?" they ask.

"What's with the dinosaurs anyway? You saying I'm a dinosaur?"

For once, they get it really right and you guys are complaining about having to wait a few days to get the deets. Sheesh. Go on about your business if it's that annoying. Refuse to be distracted by the bright shiny object and develop a bit of patience.

Obsessing over it won't make it appear any faster and only sets you up for a greater fall if the product, once unveiled, fails to align perfectly with your vision.

It is going to be great though... just you wait and see.

Coffeehouse - Getting Real book from 37signals

mochant — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 12:49:10 GMT

We just bought a site license - $49 (as opposed to $19 for a single copy) gives you permission to distribute ten copies throughtout your organization. My web team and I are reading it right now and the interaction designers in our development group will be too.

It's pretty typical 37Signals stuff but very well put together - build less better, start with the UI, approach things modularly, ship frequent incremental releases, etc.

Coffeehouse - Reducing glare and reflections

mochant — Sun, 29 Jan 2006 15:26:11 GMT

Actually, screen protectors have minimal if any impact on the Tablet's active digitizer - I had one on my M200 for years with no issues. I haven't put one on my new Gateway (with one of the really shiny screens) because I haven't found a widescreen protector made for it yet.

Not sure why your Fn+Light Bulb key isn't working - you don't say which Tablet PC you're using. Works fine of my M200 and my new Gateway S7200c. At the risk of being obvious, have you checked at your OEM's site for a driver update?

Coffeehouse - C9 Female Members Opinion Wanted...

mochant — Sat, 28 Jan 2006 01:48:39 GMT

A. Definitely A. Didn't take the three seconds to decide that!

Ahh... should have RTFM - you wanted female members. Oh well. I guess I'm guilty of ballot stuffing or some other form of voting impropriety. Sorry.

Coffeehouse - Tablets & ebooks, a match made in heaven for students!

mochant — Thu, 01 Dec 2005 00:07:15 GMT

You might want to take a look at what Agilix is doing with their GoBinder application for the Tablet PC and synchronization to the Blackboard server. While it's not in wide use, it's a pretty complete solution for delivering curriculum materials and assignments electronically. The Student Tablet PC blog is also a great resource for those in academia who want to see some advanced uses for the Tablet PC in that environment.

Personally, I would love to see Microsoft make a bold move in this space. They'd need a better DRM solution than the one they use for Reader and ebooks though. That's so broken it's not funny.

Coffeehouse - I offer you a challenge Mister Robert Scoble!

mochant — Sun, 06 Nov 2005 14:03:09 GMT

Beer28 wrote:

Imagine no more, the future is now!

Beer:

Don't diss the Newton - it was actually quite a fine PDA for its time, especially the second and third generation models.

More to the point, Scoble (like me) appreciates and uses the mobility potential of the Tablet PC all the time. When and if Apple decides to get into the Tablet PC game, it will be interesting to see how they approach the design vector. I'm guessing it could happen after the Intel switch takes place and would love to have a dual-boot TPC with both Windows and Mac OS available.

Also interesting is that there have been a small number of bloggers who have switched from the Mac to the Tablet PC and written extensively n their experiences and reasons for making the change recently. At my company, there are a couple of us who have both a Tablet and a desktop Mac and appreciate the benefits each offers.

Coffeehouse - TabletPC Art software - which is the best

mochant — Thu, 03 Nov 2005 12:48:42 GMT

InkArt is based on ArtRage and is part of the Tablet PC Experience Pack. Aside from some UI changes and code tweaking, they're functionally identical. Alias makes a nice product but it's expensive. Paint.NET has come a long way. They're currently in late beta on a new version and it's been very stable on my M200.

I'm days away from delivery of a new Gateway S7200 widescreen myself.

Tech Off - quick proxy change

mochant — Thu, 22 Sep 2005 13:01:14 GMT

Get the Proxy button extension for Firefox and all you have to do is click a toolbar button to turn your proxy settings on or off.

http://proxybutton.mozdev.org/

Coffeehouse - Tablet PC Demo

mochant — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 18:59:00 GMT

Harlequin wrote:

NateFurtwangler wrote:
-If you have a scanner, scan your books! Its not as hard as it sounds, see my blog for details. Once it's scanned you can read/search/annotate it all on your tablet without ever having to carry books around.

An Office tool does this(OneNote/Word)?

Or a 3rd party OCR program?

Check out The Student Tablet PC blog. Tracy Hooten, one of the two students who runs the blog, recently posted a comparison on how to do this with both Acrobat and Microsoft Office Document Imaging (included with Office like a lot of cool utilities most people never seem to discover).

Coffeehouse - Time for Microsoft to sue Google again

mochant — Mon, 22 Aug 2005 20:10:22 GMT

Except it's not really a blatant copy, it integrates a lot of products and services they've already put into play, and oh.... it's shipping.... for free.

Go read Jupiter Research's Michael Gartenberg and David Card if you haven't yet figured out Google's play. It's pretty obvious, very well done, and it's working:

Don't fight Microsoft head on in either the OS or application space - co-opt them instead.

Coffeehouse - Microsoft Scalable Fabric

mochant — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 12:29:53 GMT

Larsenal wrote:

That's FF for ya. IE did the trick.

Actually FF downloaded the file just fine for me. YMMV but it might be a preference or about:config change you've made that "broke" the download.

Coffeehouse - Glamour Shots

mochant — Sun, 31 Jul 2005 12:46:31 GMT

You might also want to look at SnagIt - a really great screen capture and image editing tool from TechSmith. It has a Perspective and Shear effect to accomplish what you're after, as well as a number of other effects. It's quite powerful and very inexpensive.

Coffeehouse - Best Outlook RSS Reader ? Newsgator has problems :(

mochant — Fri, 29 Jul 2005 02:43:21 GMT

What sort of problems are you having? I currently have about 250 feeds in NewsGator with no problems.

Tech Off - Tablet PC Input Panel acting weird

mochant — Tue, 26 Jul 2005 12:13:19 GMT

I don't know if this will work but try doing the following:

Choose "Undock" from the Options menu (the purple gear on the right edge of the TIP).
Close the TIP.
Click on the Taskbar icon again to reveal the TIP.

See if that resizes it back to normal. I must admit I've never seen this before.

Coffeehouse - Hello Tablet world!

mochant — Thu, 14 Apr 2005 12:01:48 GMT

body must not be empty... [Duncanma]

Coffeehouse - Theme usage on Windows XP

mochant — Sun, 29 Aug 2004 13:50:59 GMT

Kaelan wrote:

I used to use a theme called Watercolor with a patched uxtheme.dll, but I haven't been able to get any of the uxtheme patches to work, so I'm using the Media Center Royale skin right now.

I'm using the Royale theme as well. I love it. It has the pop of the basic blue XP style with a lot more "finish".

Coffeehouse - Help Needed!

mochant — Fri, 09 Jul 2004 12:29:56 GMT

meow wrote:

I have to replace my Palm IIIc and want to know if I purchase a PDA that supports Outlook, can I download the address book, calendar, memos, and to list from the Palm operating system or will I have to enter
everything manually?

If you decide to stick with the Palm, I recommend Chapura's KeySuite. It offers the best duplication of Outlook on the Palm platform and comes with its own conduit set.

If you move to the PPC platform, the previous post has the right advice.

Coffeehouse - SP2 RC2 - fixes local fullscreen (no bars)

mochant — Wed, 16 Jun 2004 22:24:14 GMT

It is a lot snappier. Especially the TIP on a Tablet PC. For the first time, the TIP actually captures and analyzes as fast as I can write!