Google Docs is great but how do I get all of my Microsoft Office documents uploaded and available for use online?
DocSyncer, a new service that will soon be in beta, aims to answer that question by offe4ring synchronization of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents for your PC to the web where they are available to Google Docs. It sounds great but I’ll have to wait until I get a beta invite to find out for sure. My first reaction is that this will be great for anyone with lots of Office documents who is making the jump to the web. In the enterprise environment, I can see alarms going off as information security groups consider the privacy and data retention issues that a service like this could present. Either way, it looks like it will be worth checking out.
Watching the iPhone frenzy is almost like a spectator sport. I don’t have one yet and I’m not sure I’ll get 
one anytime soon, but I can certainly understand the enthusiasm of the early adopters. It reminds me of how I felt back in 1984 when my Dad surprised me with a brand new Mac.
Once of the criticisms of the iPhone that I hear often is that it’s a closed environment with no SDK. Although that’s true, it appears that the web is the platform on which iPhone applications will be built. The iPhone uses Wi-Fi and AT&T’s EDGE network to provide a seamless data connection. Despite the difference in performance between the two, it’s enough to allow web applications to keep working. Add a caching mechanism like Google Gears and things start to get interesting.
Anyway, I’ve seen several lists of web applications appear since the iPhone launch. This one from Rev2.org is the most extensive. Lifehacker also has a good list. Finally, I’m glad to see 37signals get on board with Ta-da list for the iPhone. After iPhoneDevCamp, who knows what will happen.
Mary Jo Foley is reporting that the iPhone will be compatible with Microsoft Exchange after all. If true, the biggest barrier to adoption among the Enterprise set is removed. This will be interesting to watch.
I’m not a Windows Live Messenger power user, but I do like to tweak the interface a bit to make look the way I want. The tabs on the left and the ad on the bottom of the main window have always bugged me. WLM Universal Patcher does the trick by allowing me to easily disable these annoyances. Additional options include hiding search bar, actions pane, and enabling multiple logons.
Although Windows Vista was released to manufacturing in November, the much needed deployment tools were not. Since then, things have been coming together, and and with last week’s release of the Solution Accelerator for Business Desktop Deployment 2007 (BDD 2007), the final piece is in place. Organizations now have everything they need to set about making Vista deployment plans in earnest.
I’ve been working with BDD for a while in beta and was anxious get the final release installed in my environment. After making a backup of my distributions share, I uninstalled the beta and manually deleted everything else. After a system restart, I began the process of putting it all back. From beginning to end, the process took about two hours.
The only issue that I experienced after the install was the inability to connect to my database. After entering the necessary information, I received a message stating “Unable to load SQL Server OLEDB provider resource DLL.” I never received this message running beta version of the BDD. I solved the problem by finding a copy of sqloledb.rll and copying it to C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\Ole DB\Resources\1033.
Often in the course of my work, I have the need to repartition drives on Windows XP systems. Typically this involves reducing the size of a large, single partition and creating a new, second partition in the free space. Partition Magic is my tool of choice because it allows the work to be done from within Windows and without data loss.
I was working with Vista RC1 this morning and discovered that the Disk Management features have been improved to offer this capability out of the box. Referred to as Shrink Volume, this command can be used to reduce the size of simple and spanned volumes. This morning I used it to reduce a single 80GB partition to 50GB and then created a new 30GB partition in the free space.
Here are the steps:
- Open Computer Management (Start, right-click Computer, Manage) and click continue at the UAC prompt.
- Click on Disk Management in the Storage section.
- Right-click on a partition and Shrink Volume and will appear on the context menu.
- After some checking, Windows will report the partitions current size, how much it can be “shrunk”, as well as the new size. You can go for the maximum “shrink” (default) or enter a smaller value.
- When the values are set, click the Shrink button.
- Unallocated space will appear which can be used to create a new partition.
Technorati Tags: windowsvista, vista, microsoft, beta
I’ve been trying to get Virtual Earth Mobile to work with my GPS receiver for days with no luck. Because the application uses Windows Mobile 5’s GPS Intermediate Driver, no application specific GPS configuration is offered. After a bit of searching, I found this post on the Windows Mobile Team Blog and my problem has been solved. The confusion centered around Windows Mobile 5’s reference to “Hardware” and “Program” ports. After reading the post, it’s simple: “Hardware” refers to the COM port that you would normally configure your GPS enabled application to use directly and “Program” is the COM port that you select for all or your GPS enabled applications to use (share). In the case of Virtual Earth Mobile, it finds this “Program” port automatically.
Technorati Tags: windowsmobile5, virtualearthmobile, gps, map, mobile
Anxious to see the new Mobile Device Center, I connected a Pocket PC running Windows Mobile 5 to my Beta 2 machine with Office 2007 installed. I thought a test run would be good before connecting my Smartphone. The Pocket PC was recognized and Mobile Device Center came up. Right now all you can do is browse the file system of the mobile device and sync music, pictures, and video with Windows Media Player. Calendar, contacts, mail, and tasks will be added to the mix through an update scheduled to be available through Automatic Updates by the end of June. More information can be found on the Windows Vista Team Blog.
Technorati Tags: windowsvista, vista, microsoft, beta, mobile
So I go to Technorati to track the BlogJet post via search. I open the seach in “mini” and I see an ad for RocketPost at the bottom. A quick review of the features led to an immediate download and inclusion in the evaluation. I’m using it now and really like it.
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