Good advice from Jonas: 2004

"Don't buy the memory at the Apple Store. It's way cheaper elsewhere and the 'Getting Started' manual explains in step-by-step detail how to put it in your Mac."

Damn but he was right. 1GB of RAM from Apple $700. 1GB from Newer: $280 with shipping.

[Thanks to Kevin for suggesting I try Newer when Small Dog Electronics, who I normally trust for my Mac needs, didn't have memory.]

This is a post from ecto 2004

I'm giving ecto a try on the assumption it's the best way to understand its capabilities.

Speaking of second chances, I've also got a post half-written about Technorati's site improvements, but they were getting hammered from all the CNN/politics.technorati.com attention so I figure I'll check back later when I have more time (and/or don't feel so much like watching movies).

One thing I can see right off the bat is that ecto will allow me to easily adjust my post dates, solving my problem with filling in my pre-October-1998 history. Go, ecto!

(And damn if I ain't impressed with the interface just in the course of writing this first post. I thought Movable Type and TypePad were good, but this is a great power user setup!)

Yes, but what does it do in general and why would I want it? 2004

I grow increasingly frustrated by having people recommend software from companies who can't seem to clearly articulate what the software or service is for and why I should download it or how I can participate. Technorati, for example, I kinda get, but only kinda and only because I already figured out trackbacks. How the hell I make easy use of it as a blog creator remains unclear as of my last visit to their site. And bear in mind that I've been doing this web content creation thing for six years and have beta tested about half the major weblogging tools. I think I'm halfway there with it, but I haven't been able to spend more than an hour trying to understand their site and get configured to participate. If I'd spent that hour and found out I understood it and knew my next steps, I wouldn't be so frustrated. As it is, I know I got started with their process for Authors but something is clearly still wrong because they think I haven't updated for 12 days. I thought they were supposed to crawl my site in addition to my being able (somehow) to ping them when I update. I'm not dumb, but I am busy enough to just say "Screw it. If the tool even survives, they'll have to learn to explain themselves better and I'll try again then."

Today's offender is Ecto. Jonas lists it among his Indispensible Mac OS X Products and describes it thusly:

how else would I be blogging this? Chris is working on Userspace again, so we might see two great XML-RPC tools out there, soon.

Did you see something go by overhead? But it's not Jonas' job to explain it to me, it's theirs, so I go to their site. And how do they answer the question "What is ecto?"

ecto is a feature-rich desktop blogging client for MacOSX and Windows, supporting a wide range of weblog systems, such as TypePad, MovableType, WordPress, Drupal, Nucleus, Blogger, and more. ecto is the successor of the wildly popular Kung-Log, which has been in use by thousands of Mac users and which earned a 4.5 mice in the MacWorld July 2003 issue. ecto earned high ratings at VersionTracker.com, and at MacUpdate.com. The Windows version is a recent product and is being developed by Alex Hung.

But those are already feature-rich blogging clients, so what does ecto do? Is it just an alternate interface? Or is "desktop" the key word? I use my desktop computer to manage my weblog in those tools without ecto. Is it that ecto doesn't require a connection to the internet for me to work on my site? Do they somehow let me work offline and then upload my changes later? If so, that'd be great - it's exactly what I need for my commute - but their description of the software doesn't make it clear, their FAQ answers questions like "I get the error message 'Encountered string encoding error' or 'failed with code '-65794' and message '\Uxxxx\Uxxxx (line x, pos x, status 3)'' when retrieving entries", and the documentation link is dead.

I suddenly feel my job as a product manager is more important than ever.

Don't Dream It, Be It 2004

I'm posting this from a Starbucks in Palo Alto from my loverly new 12" PowerBook.

oh, yes. This is going to be fun.

(Thanks to the voice of wisdom and prudence (as played by Jonas Luster), I spent about half what I expected to. Also thanks to Jonas for giving me a charged battery and his tmobile login until I can organize my own).

Site Downtime 2004

You may have noticed my site (and other TypePad sites) being a little slow lately. That problem will soon go away. Six Apart will be doing a server upgrade Saturday, May 29, 2004, from 12:00am to 2:00am Pacific time during which TypePad sites (and the management interface) will be down.

You'll just have to find something else to do for 2 hours. Suggestions:
- sleep
- dance
- cavort (nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more)
- read a book
- write on paper
- go to a midnight movie
- play a game
- watch the skies

Switching from Quicken to Budget 2004

Continuing from my earlier posts on the decline of Intuit's Mac versions of their products and on my quest for replacement software, here are some specifics on making the switch.

Budget is significantly harder to transition to from Quicken than to another ledger-based program like Liquid Ledger. It is a completely different mental model and it takes some getting used to. You really have to "unquicken" your mind. For that reason, I actually do not recommend migrating your existing history into it. Start with a clean slate at a logical breakpoint such as your next monthly checking account statement. Here are the steps I would recommend for a new Budget user coming from use of Quicken or a program very like it:

1. Understand that Budget does not work on a ledger model. It is all about keeping track of where you are planning to spend your money, where you really spend it and if that leaves you money left over for anything else.

2. I do not recommend the start-up wizard (as it currently exists, at least) because it doesn't support as smooth a mental transition to this new way of doing things. Instead, read the user manual. Not all of it necessarily, but just the Getting Started section and those on working with different kinds of accounts, especially the Complete Detail section of "Handling Credit Cards". I know it's frustrating not to jump right in, but, trust me; you need to shake loose some assumptions about how things work because they are very different than Quicken. It's just going to take a couple days to wrap your head around Budget and decide if it will work well for you.

3. Understand these key concepts:
Accounts - these are the closest things to the Quicken model.
Envelopes - these correspond basically to categories in Quicken.
Pay Allocations - this is where we're in brand new territory. Remember that this is a live view of your budget, so every time money comes into your bank account, you will be allocating it to envelopes from which you'll take the money as expenses arise.

4. Agree with your bank. Make sure that in Quicken you're up-to-date with reconciling with bank statements. Ideally do your Budget setup within the first week after getting your checking account statement. I did it the same day as reconciling in Quicken and it meant I didn't have to keep track of things in two places for a while.

5. Begin in Budget in the most familiar territory: create accounts. Make a new account for each of your active bank accounts and credit card accounts. I also made an account for my student loan debt (checking the "allow account to go negative" box for this kind of debt account) and my security deposit. Do one new transaction in each called "opening balance". When you have an account selected in the left column, the Available envelope in the upper right corner represents the funds which you can allocate to expenses. I only allocate to expenses from my checking account, so 90% of the time I have the Checking account selected. The Total at the top of the column of accounts tells you your net worth.

6. Next, create your envelopes. To keep the display uncluttered, I found it helpful to move some things into two new envelope groups: Once A Month and Rare. I did not create envelopes for payroll tax expenses. Perhaps I've misunderstood something, but Budget seems to deal with net, not gross pay. Since I just watch my paycheck stubs during the year and enter my totals straight into my tax forms from my W-2 at the end of the year, that's one hassle I no longer have to deal with.

7. Set up your regular pay and pay allocations to the various envelopes. This is really the "make your budget" step.

8. Now that you've got the framework for everything in place, select your checking account and drag allocations from the Available envelope to the various envelopes. This step is catching up with the fact that the balance that is in your checking would have been distributed through past allocations had you been running Budget back then.

9. Now you're ready to begin using Budget. Enter any transactions since your bank statement and you should see an up-to-the-minute view of what's happening with your money.

I expect it will take a few months of using Budget for me to settle in and perfect using it - it certainly took at least that long with Quicken! - so I may post some additional tips in the future. For now, a couple little notes:
- I made envelopes for all my regular monthly bill categories including one for my student loan. When I pay that bill, I make a transfer from that envelope to the student loan account.
- I also made an envelope for the amount I want to move into my savings account every month.
- I follow the recommendations for dealing with cash on hand in the example from the "Handling Cash" section of the help.
- Note that Budget, unlike Quicken, doesn't autosave your work. There's a handy save button in the top left corner of the display; use it frequently!

Well, that's convenient 2004

I got a nice long letter back from the folks who make Budget, another financial record-keeping program I'm considering to replace Quicken (now that Intuit has jumped the Mac shark*), and am giving it a second try. It has a very different mental model than Quicken so it's a tough transition, but I like the style of it a little better than the business ledger flavor of Liquid Ledger. If I had lots of investments and bought stocks and such, Liquid Ledger would be better for me, but I'm starting to think the friendly simplicity of Budget might do the trick.

By the way, in the course of trying this all out this evening I noticed it was about the day when my bank statement usually cuts off. I went to my bank's website to at least get the balance if possible and found I can now sign up to receive electronic instead of paper copies of my statements. Even better, the moment I signed up, there were my last 3 statements - including the one that cut off yesterday which hasn't arrived in the mail yet - ready for me to view. They're PDF files so I can easily save copies on my PC if I desire. So handy! and environmentally sound. Maybe your bank has this feature too?

I'm listening to the soundtrack to Triplets of Belleville and toodling around with budgeting, happy as the proverbial clam. It's a bit silly, in a way, when I know full well that my friends have now finished their dinner and are out having drinks somewhere in this fair city and I could be out on the town. I am such a funny mix of extrovert and introvert. Earlier in the week I was eager to go out and chat and flirt and drink - and it's not that I wouldn't enjoy that tonight - but I'm having such a jolly time with my accountancy. Guess I'll make a cocktail and carry on!

*You are encouraged to read the interesting origin of the phrase jump the shark and, optionally, hum 'Mac the Knife' which may now be running in the back of your mind thanks to the juxtaposition of the words Mac and shark.

Disconnect 2004

Can the router and modem tell when the resident system administrator has left the building? I've spent 45 minutes trying to get my email to little avail. I was just connected long enough to get 10 or 20 messages, almost all spam, and to see there are another 200 messages waiting. Argh!

(This is posted from my phone, on which I, of course, have not yet installed an email program).

Treo 600 Tips 2004

So far I've only collected one tip for Treo 600 use. A guy on the Muni said "Get the program Snapper to handle your POP3 email."

Any other recommendations or warnings anyone would care to add?

Mobile, technically 2004

So, this post is coming to you from my new mobile phone/PDA. Based on the trend among my friends and friends of friends, I opted for a Treo 600. I must say, its pretty swell so far.

No juice. 2003

Boy oh boy do I like electricity. Being without it for 29 hours this past weekend was very irritating. When I left home this morning we still had no internet connectivity, but at least we have power & heat again.

On the bright side, my fussiness over my cooking setup worked to our benefit since the gas stove allowed us to have a hot meal. Also the gas water heater provided hot water. I should mention as well my continued and usually unstated appreciation of clean water piped into my home and sewage piped away. Our weekend was definitely and annoyingly disrupted, but it could have been worse.

Rotten Apple 2003

Apple makes really swell hardware, but sometimes their software really pisses me off. I was just removing one of the Mail accounts (in Eudora speak, a "persona") which I had used to grab mail off my server without going through Knowspam (and more about my Knowspam experiment later). I didn't read the warning message carefully enough and failed to notice that deleting the instructions for downloading from an account will also delete all the messages in your inbox which came to you through using those instructions.

There does not appear to be any way to undo this mistake.

Apple's Mail program doesn't move the mailbox it deleted into the trash; it's apparently just gone. One not too obvious warning that this doesn't work like other mail programs you may have used in the past and then "Sorry, Charlie. You lose."

Bad user experience.

(By the way, if you've sent me email since November 30th and want me to respond to it/have it to keep, please send me a new copy. Thanks.)

(p.s. Yes, I'm switching to Eudora)

This is going to be well worth the measly $20 a year 2003

Yesterday at noon I signed up for spam blocking service through Knowspam. I was prompted to do this by noticing Lance's minipost about them having now blocked over 1 million spam messages for him.

It's been 28 hours. Knowspam has already blocked almost 700 spam messages for me. I am already thinking about what I'll do with the time I won't have wasted by this garbage anymore.

(If you're curious, the only reason I saw the subject line of the spam mentioned in my last post is that I was just reviewing the held messages and fine-tuning my settings to be sure nothing I want was being blocked. I am given to understand that most Knowspam users stop doing that after 2 weeks or a month and can just trust the service to automatically handle sorting the mail into "real" and "crap").

Recommended open-source forum tools? 2003

One of my co-workers needs to set up a BBS-style forum with a web interface for communication within her group. She's looking for something Jive-like or otherwise spiffy. It should include a search feature. She'd prefer that it not use ASP pages and I don't blame her. Does anyone have any recommendations of a good Unix program for this?

Dreamweaver MX question 2003

I'm having a minor problem with Dreamweaver MX. Unfortunately, for some unknown reason, it is inserting an old break tag < br > instead of a nice clean properly-closed XHTML break tag < br />. If I create new documents, it's fine, but when editing existing ones, it won't default to XHTML (at least for that tag).

Does anyone know how to bend it to my will in this regard?

A Minor Glitch 2003

Yeah, yeah, no stylesheet. I'm beta testing the new domain mapping and I think something went wonky when I republished.

It'll be back to normal soon. For now, eat minimalism, suckers!

(On the bright side, it's pretty cool that to see the separation of content & structure from presentation. Love that XHTML!)

Publisher Survey 2003

There are 17 books in my cube at work. One of them is a present for my friend Ed and it's been sitting here for a week waiting to be mailed. Sorry, Ed. I'll make it up to you by asking a nice question you'll enjoy:

Who publishes what you use?

Of these 16 work-related books in my cube,
5 are from New Riders
3 each are from Peachpit (all Visual Quickstart guides) and O'Reilly
2 from Prentice-Hall
1 each from IDG, Artech, and McGraw-Hill

I've met the authors of 7 of them. My friends happen to do things that make my job easier.

4 of these books I have hardly used since I started here over a year ago. None of those 4 were published by New Riders, O'Reilly or Peachpit.

Happy Birthday, Cutie! 2003

We love you.

(Now here's the scary part: clever little Google's five now. Just old enough to head off to school and really get goin'...)

Freedom from debt traded for freedom from discomfort 2003

Yesterday I was credit card debt free for the first time in a long time. Go me!

Today I charged four and a half months rent to a credit card. D'oh!

But, really, it's a good thing. I bought a bed. A real bed. One of the best beds in the world, or so I fervently hope. I will soon be upgrading from a futon on the floor to a McRoskey.

I feel very good about buying from them since they are a local company who build the mattress and box springs themselves. They have a very strong reputation and it appears that I can expect this bed to last me 20 years or more. Given that I spend a third of my life in bed, the investment seems worthwhile.

My new bed will be made for me and delivered in a few weeks. I can hardly wait!

(Oh, upon re-reading this and noting all the singular pronouns, I suppose I should note that, yes, Chris will be permitted to sleep in my new bed too).

Reading on Palm PDAs 2003

I recommend this nice summation of Palm OS document readers for anyone who wants to start carrying longer documents around.

I'm going to give PalmReader a try. I'll let you know how it goes. I'm sure it will be nice to have something to read on the train besides whatever section of the newspaper was last abandoned near my seat.

***

Well, I also needed a program to convert text files to Palm documents, so I'm trying DocInOut.

Good Company Alert 2003

I highly recommend the fine folks and products of Anthro. After using one of their 24" AnthroCarts as my desk while Edmond (its owner) was hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, I gave it back to him when I moved to my lovely new home. Of course, somehow between San Francisco and the south bay where we made the handoff, the bag with all the screws for assembling it vanished.

*sigh*

So I went to their website to see about ordering a replacement assembly kit. They have live chat help, so I tried that. Betsy was very helpful indeed. To my pleasure they're sending replacement screws directly to Edmond free of charge!

Somehow I doubt that IKEA - makers of the piece of furniture which I brought back from the storage unit in the south bay and which is also missing its screws - would be so very responsive...

Intuit dropping the ball? 2002

Hi everyone, had nice holidays I hope?

Has anyone tried the latest version of Quicken for the Macintosh? Is it any better than Quicken 2002 Deluxe?

It pains me to say so, having been a loyal Intuit customer for at least 11 years and having evangelized about their products to many an individual and small business, but Quicken 2002 Deluxe is crappy software. It's buggy as batshit and very poorly adapted to OS X (e.g. minimized windows can't be retrieved by clicking the links & buttons that refer to them in Quicken, you have to go to the dock and select them. Pathetic). That last fact really gets my goat as they used to make great products for the Mac.

Any inside info out there? Have they given up on the Mac just as it's going through a resurgence? Have they lost all their talented programmers? Are the executives under some sort of illusion that people will keep buying their stuff because of its name even if it crashes all the time - and by all the time I mean total crashes about half the time upon deleting a transaction and quitting the program via the menu command results in a "The application Quicken has quit unexpectedly" error message. Sweet Jumping Jeebus, what did they do to their lovely program?!

*sigh* Anyone know a good alternative? Especially one that permits me to connect to Wells Fargo and download my transactions?

[Oh man. I just read all the reviews for Quicken 2003 for Mac and I'm even more ready to wave Quicken bye-bye. "more bugs than the 2002 version" hardly seems possible. This is sad news indeed. Intuit used to be a good company, but I don't see how I can really trust their products anymore, particularly with my money. I think it may be time to write a little software requirements document and buy my codin' sweetheart some dinners at Frjtz...]