Mindjet (MindManager): operational problems -> maybe improving

[see update for how this turned out, below]

I wonder if this company outsourced all of its sales operations. I'm used to incompetent support, but it's rare to get incompetent sales!

Mindjet sells MindManager, an expensive "mind mapping" product that, alas, is a bit of a standard where I work. It has the unique advantage of very attractive and corporate-compatible graphics and it's reliable, so it's worth my employer's money.

Except, they won't take it! Here's the sequence:

1. July 3rd: Try to place order by web site. Web site is crashing, probably due to a problem with a partial update to their pricing.
2. Phone in to see what happened to my order. They quote me a price that's increased by 50%, turns out the price on the website was a "special" (though it's not labeled that way). I send them a pre-crash screenshot and they promise to call back once the advertised price is updated.
3. They don't call back.
4. About a week later I call again. The person can't locate my order. I suspect person #1 simply tossed it in the garbage rather than try to figure out their internal problems. Rep #2 promises to email and call back. Neither happens.
5. July 13th: Now onto 11 days, I call again. Get voice mail, they are on pacific time for their sales.

It's not my money, so I'll probably enter another order on the web site for whatever price they want and if I get two copies I'll deal with it then.

I won't, however, buy the copy I was planning to get for my personal use...

Update 7/24/07: I received a phone call from a MindJet sales executive and they've posted in comments that they're working on their operational problems. I wonder if the pricing problem I ran into is due to an odd $70 or so "support package" -- perhaps their sales organization was over-incented to up-sell that package and "forgot" that it's optional. In any case they are working on the problem, so I hope things will improve. I've edited the above to reflect my current thoughts.

Not incidentally, I now have more experience with the update and it's a very nice improvement on the prior version -- but they still share the same file format. The OS X version, which I've yet to purchase, lacks some of the Pro features but has some special OS X features -- like AppleScript support. In other words, it's a genuine OS X application, not a partial port. They've implemented bi-drectional synchronization between the XP version and Outlook, though they need to do something about the default display of task attributes.

Coding Horror builds a pc

Build a PC, CH style. Once upon a time people sold books on how to do this. Now there are blog posts that do a better job.

Changing times.

I'll probably never build another PC, but the example and parts list are good references in case I change my mind.

PS. CH has about 3,000 bloglines subscriptions. Wow, to think I knew him when he was starting out... (This blog has 2 subscriptions, and at least one of those is mine.)

Update 7/11: Part II. I liked the comment about drivers that come with the mb - toss 'em.

Update 7/24/07: CH has a cumulative summary and a set of suggested configurations.

Don't use Safari 3 with Blogger

Apple - Safari 3.02 Public Beta scatters div tags everywhere if you use it with Blogger. Messes up editing and formatting. Don't use it yet!

Blogger: what the %$! happened to the title field?

This is truly bizarre, but I've validated it on Safari and Camino on OS X, and I think, on Firefox XP. I have more than one blogspot account, and it's the same on all of them. It occurs at home and at work.

I can't click into the "Title" field in either the BlogThis! post submission widget or in the blogger editing environment. The cursor won't move into the field. I have to tab into the field, then use the arrow keys to move a cursor around.

This has been going on for a week for me. I figured it was so outrageous Google would fix it by now, but now I wonder if it's simply the universe conspiring against me.

I think I need to stop reading books about probability wave collapse; the world is just getting too peculiar.

Update: Ok, it's a bug. Phew. Why the $#!$#$ doesn't Google/blogger announce this in their !#!$%$! status page?!

Update: It's not just the title field. A lot of the controls on the BlotThis! widget no longer respond to mouse clicks. Grrrrrrrrrr.

BTW, you can vent your spleen here ...

Nisus Pro has been released

Nisus Writer Pro is a $45 upgrade for Express users. Express is my favorite wordprocessor. I'll be looking at an upgrade for me, not sure if I'll do the family pack though -- I'm the one who likes the advanced stuff.

More after I try it for a while. Good news!

Google Reader vs. Bloglines: the winner is ...

Bloglines. Much to my surprise since, I'd assumed Reader was much better than Google Reader. Recently though I've been using Reader for a research project. Somethings work well, but it's suprisingly buggy for a product that Google's been pushing for months. (It's still a "Lab" rather than beta project.)

Tags, for example, weren't working on posts today, and they don't seem to work at all for feeds. You can share individual articles if you like, but you can't share your entire subscription collection the way(s) you an with Bloglines.

On balance Bloglines still has the edge, with one big caveat that some of my subscriptions seem to update erratically; quiet for a week then fifty articles all at once.

Update 7/13/07: I came across a more extensive comparison with a similar, but more detailed, conclusion. Neither will create a feed from multiple feeds, but I think Yahoo Pipes may do that. I should experiment with named Pipes...

Yet another OS X screen sharing app - this one for small displays

Telekinesis puts your Mac desktop onto your iPhone - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) is yet another OS X screen sharing application. I doubt it works with multi-user, but of course I'll try it once it's not alpha. I don't do alpha.

Ten minutes with an iPhone

Why would I bother adding to the millions of Apple - iPhone reviews based on a 10 minute trial at the Apple store?

Because I can. Also, what I have to say I've not read elsewhere. Lastly, I'll keep it very short.

1. If your computing platform is OS X you have no choice now. The iPhone is good enough that competitors will retreat to fighting from non-Apple ground. So I'll get an iPhone when my Sprint contract ends in October. No choice for us.
   
2. The aspect ratio appears to be close to that of a widescreen movie: "The iPhone hits the aspect ratio issue in two important ways: First, when held vertically, the 320×480 screen can reproduce a 4×3 television image that is as high a resolution as either the iPod or Zune’s 320×240 screen. Second, when you turn the iPhone sideways, you get a nice 3×2 aspect ratio 480×320 screen. The drawback here is that when watching content that is either 16:9 or 2.35:1, you will have to reduce the image size on the screen to fit the proper aspect ratio."
   The 1.5 ratio is a compromise between being HDTV ratio (1.8) and something that can barely fit in a man's front pocket (insert juvenile humor here) and something that can work with web pages (which assume a 1.3 ratio). It's a good choice but, not being a video person, I'd have preferred a less elongated shape. I'm not sure how pocketable the iPhone really is.
3. Speaking of pocketable, the thickness is probably ok (thicker than the idiotic RAZR of course), the width is just fine, the length might be over the limit and the weight is on the high side. We will likely have the technology to be an iPhone, be pocketable, and be semi-affordable by 2009. Not this year though.
4. I missed Flash more than I thought I would. I'm relieved to read plausible rumor sites claiming Flash is on the way.
5. The typing is not as fast or as useful for me as the combination of Graffiti One and CIC's old WordComplete, but there's not bloody stylus to lose. I'll take it. In a few minutes of use I got good results as long as I didn't look at the output but just typed as though it would all turn out ok. My hand ached a bit, but with use the intrinsic muscles will strengthen. The iPhone will produce new repetitive strain syndromes of the hand, it might not be a bad idea to start slow, work up, stretch muscles, and try alternating hands.
   
6. Performance in the Apple store was slow, I assume the WLAN was saturated.
   

Update 7/6/07: Another late review which says some new and interesting things. Incidentally, Cringely thinks Apple has a built-in capability to do a 3G update -- I doubt it.

Update 7/10/07: I've been thinking about Flash, and reading responses to its absence. I now think Apple will do their own .swf viewer, just as they did their own PDF viewer. Adobe has spent years providing how wise Apple was to have an OS X native PDF viewer; Apple is not going to rely on Adobe for anything important. Adobe lost Apple's trust a long time ago ...

Photosynth tour of the a Korean cultural landmark

We're Korean by adoption, and Photosynth is google-style cool (alas, sadly, not from Google), so I might give this virtual tour a try if I can get it to work with my older PC hardware ...

Microsoft Live Labs - Exploring Ancient Korea

One brisk Seoul winter month, over 4,000 photos were submitted by local Koreans to help construct this synth of Gyeongbok Palace, one of South Korea's finest national treasures. Originally built in 1394, it is the largest palace of the Joseon Dynasty. At its height in the mid 1800's, it covered 330 buildings and over 4 million square feet as the grand home for the royal family...

and there's a Firefox Plug-in too. (Alas, I think it requires a serious GPU, and my iBook has an Intel chip ... won't do ...)

Flash guide to the federal budget

You can navigate around the graph and then zoom in to actually read it: Death and Taxes: 2008. I couldn't get the shift/ctrl zoom to work, but the rmb brought up the Flash context menu with a zoom in and zoom out.

Pixilu: when you need to look pretty

How to Change the World: Reality Check: Pixilu and Guy 2.0

Photo retouching outsourcing. Worth a try if you want to give someone a gift photo.

Phoneless iPhone

The iPhone is supposed to require an AT&T contract to work. So, in theory, you can't pay $600 and just use it. Unless you cancel your AT&T service within 3 days of signing up - (alexking.org). For now the iPhone keeps working. This will be more interesting if/when Apple adds Skype/VOIP support and allows one to use it as an external drive.

Apple's contract with AT&T may require them to disable this trick, and one assumes they get money from the AT&T monthly fee too. So it wouldn't be surprising if a future update blocks it. If Apple doesn't block it, that would say something about where they want the iPhone to go. (Via Daring Fireball)

iPhone: SIM card works in cheap phone

This is a good:

Tada! The 6th Gen contract-free WiFi-enabled iPod - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

Removed activated SIM and placed into a cheap disposable AT&T cell phone. Worked fine. Was able to place calls. Good way to save your iPhone from danger on ski or bike trips.

Or to survive while you're having the iPhone battery replaced by your local back alley battery guy. A cheap backup phone makes lots of sense.

Update 7/3/07: Looking at the iPhones calling plans, and given the lack of any subsidy for the iPhone, it seems like a reasonable strategy is to:

1. Switch to AT&T and get a subsidized cheapo phone.
2. Switch to an iPhone and keep the cheapo phone for backup.

Of course one would want to confirm this with AT&T first, since you'd probably want to switch to Apple's plans.

Update 7/3/07: TidBits explains Apple's alternative to the 2nd phone, an iPhone rental program:

... Most people can't be without a phone for three working days or perhaps five or six over a long weekend. Apple has a deal for you: the Apple Service Phone, a $29 rental that lasts until a few days after your iPhone is repaired.

The rental phone has to be returned 7 days after you receive a repaired phone back by shipping service, 5 days after your phone is ready for pickup at an Apple Store, or 10 days after its sent if you fail to sent your broken iPhone in at all. There's an extra $50 charge if you return it late, and a $600 reserve placed on your credit card that's turned into a charge if you fail to return it within 10 days of the end of the loan.

The SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) that's used to identify your account uniquely can be removed from the iPhone by poking a paperclip tip into a hole at the top of the iPhone. That SIM can be swapped into the rental phone before you send back your own model for repair. If you send the SIM card in when you return a rental phone, you have to contact AT&T to get a new one.

So you drop your phone off at the Apple Store and pick up a rental until it comes back. It's a significant nuisance and cost, but such is the price of a cell phone that doesn't suck.

How to setup an iPhone with a prepaid account

Is this how to activate an iPhone if you don't intend to use it much as a phone?

iPhone: Prepay the right way - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

... Buy the iPhone. Connect it to iTunes. Sign up using 999-99-9999 as your social security number. After failing the credit check, select a GoPhone plan. After signing up for a GoPhone plan and being assigned a number and passcode, connect to the AT&T GoPhone funding page as prompted, enter your credit card or debit card information and you're good to go. DO NOT attempt to fund your iPhone over the phone with AT&T. DO NOT set up your iPhone prepaid account in advance with AT&T...

Update 7/2/07: Apparently the prepaid plan can be cheaper than the cheapest fully paid plan. Estimates are about $50/month. If Apple enables VOIP services in the iPhone the prepaid plan will be very popular.

GrandCentral - now I can start using my GC number

My concerns about GC's longevity have been assuaged: 

Official Google Blog: All aboard

We're pleased to announce that we have acquired GrandCentral Communications, a company that provides services for managing your voice communications. ..

... GrandCentral offers many features that complement the phone services you already use. If you have multiple phone numbers (e.g., home, work, cell), you get one phone number that you can set to ring all, some, or none of your phones, based on who's calling. This way, your phone number is tied to you, and not your location or job. The service also gives you one central voice mailbox. You can listen to your voicemails online or from any phone, forward them to anybody, add the caller to your address book, block a caller as spam, and a lot more. You can even listen in on voicemail messages from your phone while they are being recorded, or switch a call from your cell phone to your desk phone and back again. All in all, you'll have a lot more control over your phones...

As I'd hoped back in March, Google acquired them. So I can start putting my number on my business card, and build GC into my daily routine. There's only one catch ... Which identity do I associate this number with? Currently it's not associated with any of the identities Google has for me, but soon I'll have to choose. This will take some thought.

I'd be even happier if Google would add fax-in services to GrandCentral ...