March 2nd, 2010 by Al

Often people ask me, “How can work more efficiently with my computer?”

It’s a great question, but one that is uniquely answered by each individual. Efficiency is geared toward the person and what works best for them and can be highly subjective. I’ll just say, there is a certain flow to your work that must be considered.  A flow that represents your “Feng Shui” and should be carried through into your technical strategy.

How do you do it?

Well, for me, I began look at all the things that I work with on a daily basis. What Computer, Devices and Applications I use and how they integrate with the mobile part of my technical world. I also look at things from an enterprise perspective, one where I quickly learned that standard equipment and standard applications maintain an ease of support and makes sound fiscal sense.

For example:

Computers/Personal Data Assistant

• My Desktop choice (a 27” iMac) was made with the over technical strategy I wanted to employ in mind. It represents the anchor for my business and as such, becomes the homeport for all my correspondence and technical data.

• My Mobile Desktop choice (a 17” MacBook Pro) was made keeping in mind that I wanted seamless integration with my iMac. When I work in the field, it becomes a mobile office, effectively allowing me to dynamically create on-the-fly work that otherwise, would have to wait until I got home.

• My PDA choice (an iPod Touch/Blackberry Pearl) integrates well with either, and serves as a quick connect without deploying the MacBook. It’s drawback – a dependency on Wi-Fi. However, more and more places are offering guess wireless, but security must be accounted for and risk mitigated. I must consider at some point-for efficiency’s sake- to consolidate my 2 PDA devices into 1 and that would be obtaining the iPhone. The iPhone would provide my operation with seamless integration aligning itself with my Desktop and Mobile Desktop computing strategy.

All 3, iMac, MacBook Pro and iPod Touch create a synergy that works well for me and is easy to support and maintain.

Applications

Applications (Apps) are programs that run on computer which allows the user to accomplish some sort of work such as Email, Word or Excel. Applications are not so subjective. Market leaders are leaders for a reason and outside of technical holy wars, the prevailing Office Suite offered by Microsoft, is the winner hands-down because they allow you to maximize productivity. My computer choices however, placed me in a quandary. While Microsoft does offer Office for Mac, it’s clear where Redmond is placing the bulk of their efforts and it’s not there. However, in the world of applications, no man is an island and there are many ways to go.

What I will present next, is my own preference. I work with both Mac and Microsoft—and there is a real need for me to transcend those worldly boundaries as an IT Consultant. Also, being a frugal business owner, nothing is wasted so I use software licenses where I can.

Being a Techie, for me it’s no problem to work in both worlds.

To do this, I use a product called, “VMware Fusion,” an application that allows me to run other operating systems as virtual PC’s. An Operating System (OS) is a set of programs that allow the user to interface with the computer’s peripherals. I’ll say this for my purposes here, I run multiple OS environments for testing and evaluating newer versions of application software, including other OS’ such as Windows Server 2003, RedHat LINUX or Windows XP.
As I mentioned, certain software are better in their Microsoft porting. A port is an application developed to run on a particular OS. For me, I run XP in a Virtual Machine (VM) which is computer representing itself in a virtual way that simulates a real physical one, for the purpose of running Microsoft Office 2007 and Intuit QuickBooks 2009. Both applications are Microsoft ports and are far better than their Mac ported counterparts. These Apps affect my productivity, so having the ability to run them in a Virtual XP machine is extremely valuable to me. VMware Fusion also has a feature called, “Unity” which allows for the virtual machine to become transparent and appear to be part of the Mac OS. Applications appear as if they were installed natively on the Mac OS which works well for me.

Let’s quickly talk about Email. I was using Entourage which is part of the Office for Mac suite. It’s alright, but doesn’t integrate all that well for me with my PDA. Blackberry’s sync doesn’t work for me that well either, so I decided to change that part of my strategy. I’m now using the standard mail application with Mac OSX Snow Leopard, and utilizing the standard applications for Address book, Calendar and iTunes. It simplifies their synchronization and saves me time. It lacks all the bells and whistles, but we’re talking efficiency here. You experience fewer headaches, and systems are easier to operate and maintain.

There are a host of applications that came with my new iMac and I am finding new nuggets of gold that would otherwise remain hidden. I encourage you to explore the hidden gold within your computer and operating System as well.

In conclusion, your efficiency is dependent on your technology decisions. Computers, PDA’s and Applications should allow you to work as effortlessly as possible. These decisions are not base solely on the “cool” factor. Think the process through and go with the vendor that supports your existing technology invests the best.

If you keep it simple, you will be more efficient with less headaches.

© Al Ardon IT Strategies Inc. 2010

March 1st, 2010 by Al

I want to share a funny story.

Ever since I returned to consulting, there have been moments when I’ve really missed my old crew. The thing I miss the most, is working with my old buddy. We knew and worked with each other for over 10 years. Working with him, there was no such thing is ego, and we truly complemented one another. Especially with programming, If something could be scripted, I knew he’d be the one who could  do it. I could complement that by offering my input. All I’d have to do is feed him and idea, and off he’d go, hammering away until done. That’s the way it is with teams, especially us UNIX admins,  we really have to have a sense of laziness, in order to function efficiently. Repetitive tasks take up way too much time if you have to manually do them. But the true value has always been working with a great team, each bringing unique perspective to the project.

Our motto was always, “We postulate to automate…“

Not all working situations are like this, and I’ve worked with some possessing such deep insecurities, you didn’t let your guard down– not even a moment. But not these guys, they were a riot.

I remember this one time, I was in Northern California attending a course on the HP XP256 Storage Array. It was a grueling 5 day boot camp. Picture information being thrown at you, it’s like drinking from the fire nozzle. You get the picture. Early this one particular morning, I awoke, and logged in to check my email–keeping in touch. The team was in the process of installing a new HP9000 server for the Data Warehouse project and the guys were in the process of coming up with a name for it. So one of the wiseguys decide to take the lead on a practical joke by emailing me the new name, “pecker.”

I thought to myself, no-way. They wouldn’t, they’re not going with that name. In my mind, I could just hear it going over the company PA speaker, “Attention, Pecker is down!” or “Pecker is coming down for maintenance!” or “Great news! Pecker is up!“

Well you get my drift. I was tired, irritable and didn’t see it coming, those guys set me up. I ranted at them, “You better come up with something else or else!

I went back to finish up, caught the plane home and Monday morning when I got to the office, there they were with SEG’s just about to bust. I tell you, I learned all about humor that day!

Yeah, I miss those days. What a team.

Have fun, live large, laugh lots…

And guys, if you’re out there reading this, I still owe ya!