Cool – from June 26 to October 22, Microsoft is running an upgrade special to Windows 7. There doesn’t seem to be a special for upgrading to Ultimate.
I really wish that Microsoft would adopt the Apple upgrade for Mac OS X Snow Leopard. Mac OS X Leopard owners can upgrade for $29. Despite that, I’m going to do the W7 Professional Upgrade…
Looking to find a visual way to traverse the JQuery documentation? Visit http://visualjquery.com/ for you visual thinkers…
Smashing Magazine has a top 10 for design patterns that should be normal practice for commerce sites. These include Lazy Registration, Progressive Disclosure, Forgiving Format and more. If you’re a UI designer and don’t know what these are, take a look at the article.
In a practical sense, these types of patterns allow visitors to your site to complete their shopping tasks and move on to purchasing – the key to success for visitors to painlessly make purchases increasing your number of successful purchases.
http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/06/23/10-ui-design-patterns-you-should-be-paying-attention-to/
I’ve been running Ubuntu 9.04 on an IBM ThinkCentre M51 I picked up from MicroCenter for $150 for a little over 2 weeks now.
Almost flawless… I have a Belkin wireless card installed in the box, which as the Atheros chipset, which results in a lost wirelss connection after a few hours of use.
Ubuntu 9.04 identified the card, lauched a restricted driver dialogue. After downloading and activating the MadWiFi driver, everything’s running smoothly. It’s been over a week now and the system hasn’t lost its WiFi connection.
So, my attempt to get the E360 on Linux, while successful, was an exercise that didn’t result in much. Suse wouldn’t install, Ubuntu wouldn’t boot and gOS wouldn’t boot either (maybe because it’s a Ubuntu derivative?).
I installed Puppy Linux and everything worked. The system just didn’t have enough horsepower to allow Pandora, so that pretty much killed that project.
Attempted installing Ubuntu 8.10 and Redhat on an old Fujitsu E360 with no luck.
I’m going to try Suse 11.1, OpenGeu and gos 3.1 next. I just want to run it to stream Pandora in the baby’s room, and occasionally look stuff up. I’m essentially trying to build a machine that will be used to run “cloud” applications with no intent of actually storing anything on it.
I found that I’ve been able to do pretty much everything with Ubuntu with no withdrawals from either Mac or PC applications. I really think that cloud based applications will spell doom to the concept of the operating system in the coming years, particularly as people lean to adapt to web-based services that provide functionality that no longer requires a core operating system.
I finally got Ubuntu 8.10 running properly on my HP G60. My previous attempt was successful if it weren’t for the fact that Ubuntu didn’t like the nVidia graphics chipset. The system basicall ran un-accelerated, meaning it was a dog when it came to GUI updates.
After Googling for a fix, I found someon’s blog that had the simplest solution to this.
Open a terminal window and execute the following, then restart:
sudo apt-get install linux-headers-2.6.27-7-generic
sudo apt-get install nvidia-glx-177
Once restarted, enable the NVidia driver (177)… and all will be happy in Ubuntu land.
Let me know if this helps!
I just read an article Robert Scoble wrote on Fast Company on Microsoft’s announcement on their entry into the retail arena ala the Apple Store. I think his article is spot on with regards to what they should do to be successful.
My thoughts are that Microsoft should focus on selling an experience that’s unique to what Microsoft is capable of providing through their products, their technologies and through their partners. It’s a customer’s experience and a positive association of that experience that differentiates one retailer from another. For example, to the pragmatist, Levi’s and Diesel both sell clothes. However, the premium someone may have for Diesel is made through an emotional connection customers have to the brand because of design and an identification of the lifestyle Diesel represents — this is only strengthened through their advertising and in-store experience. That’s not to say that Levi’s is a bad brand or has bad products, the expectations with regard to the Levi’s brand is simply different.
Also, Microsoft shouldn’t look at this retail venture as a means to sell products… it’s an opportunity to sell an experience that will positively impact their brand! If Apple is the Gap of computers, Microsoft has the ability to transform themselves to American Eagle Outfitters, Diesel, Prada… of technology… or they have the option of becoming the clothing section of your local Walmart.
As Apple mentioned when they decided to pull out of MacWorld, their retail locations are important for educating and exposing customers to solutions and technologies on a a local and accessible level. More importantly, Apple’s retail locations don’t pressure people to buy either, they educate customers to making decisions that are right for themselves. People don’t like to be pressured into a sale, they like to be led down a memorable, positive experience that helps them make the right decision.
Like the Apple Store, let customers play with touch screen PCs, mini’s, and Zunes and iPods, but more importantly, let customers play with Microsoft innovations — set-up a large projection wall allowing customers to play with Photosynth, install a couple of SURFACE lounges, etc… answer their questions, abstract concepts of technology are stickier if they’re tangible… help drive desire of the products, particularly in a commoditized market like Microsoft’s.
Another area that I think that leads to an improved experience is don’t pack the store with crap to complete with the likes of Best Buy or Fry’s. Fill it with best-in-class products, particularly products that have a positive perception by customers – it will help streamline the shopping experience and improve perceptions of whatever the Microsoft retail brand may become. Have educated purchasers who understand both what the market desires, but also the importance of quality brands in the marketplace. Don’t sell cheap crap because it’s cheap – sell stuff whose brands denote quality and can help bolster Microsoft’s own brand in retail.
Despite what people might say about having your bike serviced at a major sports shop, I was pleasantly surprised how well my bike performed during the last training ride. The guy at Sports Chalet at Eastridge in San Jose did an excellent job!
Prior to getting it tuned up, thinks were clanking all over the place. Actually, things were clanking like crazy during the last 15-miles of ALC7. Kinda sucked, but nothing was going to stop me from making it to the end, not even a lot of grinding and clanking. Needless to say, it sucked when the last stretch of the ride was uphill into the Veterans Center in Los Angeles. The bike made it 530-miles without a problem and without a tech looking at it. Not bad for a $550 bike.
Anyways, I’m riding again this year during ALC8… same bike… but this time, I’ll be sure to make sure I get the thing regularly looked at.
Unfortunately, I’m missing 2 rides… I’m going to make it up in the next week or so. Maybe a trip down to Gilroy or Fremont.
I was forced to remove the IE8 beta from my notebook because of some rendering funkiness in Windows Live Mail. I was trying to add photos but the photos weren’t rendering. I tried everything I could think of. In the end, by removing the IE8 beta, everything went back to normal.
Me thinks Microsoft needs to do a bit more integration testing… yeah, I know, it’s a beta, but if they want people to start using it, it needs to work with their apps first (let alone a handful of popular sites).
