Outlook Current View display bug: finally found a workaround

Maybe this will help someone, it's an exotic Outlook 2003 bug.

I make heavy use of Outlook's 'Views' to change how data is presented to me and I create my own custom views. This is particularly important for tasks. A couple of months ago Outlook stopped showing me the list of views -- I could only see a single view choice in the Advanced Toolbar Current View drop down list, or in the 'View:Arrange by:Current view" menu drop down. It always showed the current view. To change views I had to bring up the View edit menu and apply from there.

I thought this bug was related to our ancient corporate exchange server, but an upgrade to the latest version didn't fix it. It only happened with the Tasks stored on the exchange server, not archived tasks stored in my PST files.

The fix was, of course, to delete every custom view I ever created and reset every Outlook view to its defaults. Now the drop down works again. It's not that hard for me to recreate was was lost, so this is a big improvement.

gCal, iCal, iPod, Palm phone: Geek joy

It seems there are a few ways to have the OS X iCal app subscribe to items entered on Google calendar: HOWTO: Subscribe to a Google Calendar using iCal - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW).

The items on iCal sync to the iPod via iTunes, and to our Samsung Palm phones using MissingSync (and thus to my wife's future Treo p700). Assuming we do data entry via gCal (google calendar -- since email carries much calendar info, users of gmail get rapid data entry to gCal) to our family calendar, this has some interesting options.

It appears one can do private sharing of a calendar:

What's a "Private Address"?

A "Private Address" lets you easily view a read-only version of your calendar from other applications. Using this address, you can access your calendar from various applications, such as a feed reader (like Google Reader) or a product that supports the iCal format (like iCal for Mac).

To obtain your calendar's private address, just click on the "XML" or "ICAL" icon. A pop-up window with your calendar's private URL will appear.

Additionally, you can export your calendar information by clicking on the "ICAL" button and clicking on the displayed URL.

Note: The private address was designed for your use only, so be sure not to share this address with others. If you want to let others view your calendar, you can share your calendar's public address (or "Calendar Address") with them. If you accidentally share your calendar's private address, click on the "Reset Private URLs" link to regenerate your calendar's private addres

My geek radar is tingling. Look at how Google is managing creating merged views of calendars, the notification functions including notify to cell phone, the variety of subscription options, the search and private integration .... This could be the best webapp thingie since ... Gmail. It almost makes me forgive Google for their Blogger atrocity.

If Palm had half a brain they'd jump on this like berserkers, but of course that company zombied a long time ago. This must be painful for Apple to watch, they almost had it with .Mac (dotMac) but they lost focus and got greedy.

Macintouch reports: slide and tape digitization

These MacInTouchreports are always excellent. Great community:

We have a great report today about Digitizing Slides collected as part of a family project and another report with lots of advice about Digitizing VHS Tapes and converting them to DVD.

I scanned the slide digitizing report. Walmart was cheapest for digitizing slides and one guy found the most efficient approach was to photograph the slide projection (I'd never have thought of that one). This is a market problem that will eventually have a better solution. I'm amazed we still don't have bulk solutions for print imaging -- a much easier problem. Maybe later this year or next year ...

Ars Technica reviews: iPod speaker systems

High-end iPod speaker systems

The Apple iPod Hi-Fi did surprisingly well. If compactness is important I'd say it's the winner, but the Klipsch outpointed it. Nice review. I'm tempted ...

GMail's been eating comment notifications!

Gordon's Notes: Missed comments: Gmail eating them!

Very annoying. Sorry!

I hate Palm. Outlook too. Oh yeah, also Microsoft.

Another fight lost in the HotSync wars.

Today Outlook/Palm/Exchange/BeyondContacts (OPEB) duplicated all of my tasks. I'm so used to cleaning up this nonsense I have special Outlook views defined to help the cleanup.

Why did it do this? Beats me. Every so often OPEB decides to punish me.

I hate sync. I hate Palm. I hate Outlook. Exchange too for that matter. Oh, yeah, Microsoft too.

Sync is hard enough when a single vendor has complete control of both transaction partners. When sync crosses vendors (bilateral messaging, reconciling disparate data models, lack of well managed identifiers), and when sync is three-way (PDA to Outlook to Exchange) it's like juggling antimatter. Every so often, it explodes.

BTW, most healthcare environments do the equivalent of "sync" across vendor systems every day. It's ugly there too.

PS. When I first tried to post this I got a "blogger has gone splat" message (ok, they said "down for planned maintenance -- at 6pm CT). I hate Blogger too. Also Google.

iBook: enhanced batteries - TruePower

Macintouch had this one:

TruePower Apple PowerBook & iBook Batteries

FastMac introduced a new line of TruePower high capacity batteries for the PowerBook G4 (Titanium and Aluminum), iBook (all models), and PowerBook G3 (Wallstreet, Lombard and Pismo). The TruePower batteries claim capacity up to 56% more than the Apple originals (depending on model) and include safety features to protect against overcharge, short circuit, and power surges, along with a one year warranty. Introductory prices range from $99.95 for most models to $119.95 for the PowerBook G4 Aluminum 17" and PowerBook G3 (2000) Pismo models.