Tuesday, September 20, 2005

Fire & motion or Innovation?

Microsoft Showcases New User Interface for Office 12:

"While the Office applications have increased tremendously in power and added functionality in response to customer needs, the core UI has remained substantially unchanged for nearly 20 years. The command bar in Microsoft Office Word 2003, for example, looks much the same as the command bar in Word 2.0 did in 1998. In fact, the new UI is the biggest, most visible change to the way the core Office applications work since the introduction of the toolbar in 1997."

Joel on Software - Fire And Motion

Yet another way of making software that works just the same as the latest version appear old and crusty.
Yet another batch of controls to buy/develop to catch up with the latest look and feel.

Why not spend some time developing a version of;
1) Word that does not randomly muck up the margin / bullet / auto number / font settings
2) Access that does not bloat or crash but does work with a scroll mouse and conforms to basic Windows GUI rules
3) Excel that... well I must admit this application seems to work as it should - make it faster
4) Powerpoint that will restrict words on a page to 20 and slides in a presentation to 5 to stop DBP ;)
5) Publisher/Visio combination
6) Infopath... solution looking for a problem.

Monday, September 19, 2005

Shiver me timbers

International Talk Like A Pirate Day: "You are The Cap'n!



Some men are born great, some achieve greatness and some slit the throats of any man that stands between them and the mantle of power. You never met a man you couldn't eviscerate. Not that mindless violence is the only avenue open to you - but why take an avenue when you have complete freeway access? You are the definitive Man of Action. You are James Bond in a blousy shirt and drawstring-fly pants. Your swash was buckled long ago and you have never been so sure of anything in your life as in your ability to bend everyone to your will. You will call anyone out and cut off their head if they show any sign of taking you on or backing down. You cannot be saddled with tedious underlings, but if one of your lieutenants shows an overly developed sense of ambition he may find more suitable accommodations in Davy Jones' locker. That is, of course, IF you notice him. You tend to be self absorbed - a weakness that may keep you from seeing enemies where they are and imagining them where they are not.




What's Yer Inner Pirate?
brought to you by The Official Talk Like A Pirate Web Site. Arrrrr!"

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Perfect use for a Trojan

Computerworld - New Trojan swaps porn for Koran:
"A new Trojan horse program circulating around the internet this week appears to be on a moral mission to stamp out adult websites, according to security research firm Sophos.

Instead of snooping for sensitive financial information or secretly taking control of an infected computer, the Trojan, called Yusufali-A, monitors web surfing habits. When it spots an objectionable term such as 'sex' or 'exhibition,' in the browser's title bar, it hides the website and instead pops up a message taken from the Koran, said Gregg Mastoras, a senior security analyst with Sophos."

NEEDED - someone to do this in NZ

www.sudden.co.nz:
"You can now send a mate a beer by SMS. Well, if your friend works in the City, in London. Oh hold on........I do. Hmm, interesting.

Buy a mate a beer

Monday, September 05, 2005

Top 10 Blog

Thank you the 18 individuals who voted for this blog
I made it to position 9 of 43

I would like to thank the academy...

TechEd 2005: Presentation Downloads

Microsoft New Zealand: TechEd 2005: Presentation Downloads

Does anyone want my opinion of the sessions I attended?
add a comment.