Flat3D

Head in the clouds…

So I have received confirmation from OMF that I will be heading out in November (assuming there are no problems between now and then!).  It’s pretty much certain really!

In preemptive preparation I have been doing a bit of organising etc.  Today I got Office 2007 (Can’t find the discs for the student edition of 2003 I bought, so I’m taking the excuse!).  I got the “home and student” edition simply because it is ridiculously cheaper than the other versions, and was glad to find it has powerpoint (the home version didn’t have power point when my brother got it, or when my dad got it…hmmm) but also found it didn’t include outlook.  Now this is no big loss.  I had used Outlook for my calendar with it syncing to my phone and, recently, my iPod Touch but thought it would be a simple matter of telling things to sync to Windows Calendar or something.  No such luck!  For all their ease of use and anti-Microsoft following, Apple have decided that the iPod and iPhone can only sync with Outlook (2003 SP1 and above).  So I started to dig!

While digging I realised that I should get all my contacts together and store them safely (having experienced the misery and difficulty that missionaries experience when their harddisk or similar crashes and contacts are lost or even just temporarily unavailable for a week or two).  I reckoned that a cloud solution may be what I’m looking for.  I already use GMail and Google Reader, and am quite fond of the intrusive, privacy neglecting, big G so seeing as they already know everything about my email and browsing habits, I may as well give them my contacts (most are already in GMail) and calendar too!

While scouring the net for potential, I happened upon this nifty site which can be used to set up an in-the-cloud Exchange service that is able to provide Exchange style access to (among others) Google’s online services, designed specifically to give people mobile access to these services through Windows mobile and Apple handheld devices.  It’s in beta at the moment and can allow pushing of calendar and contacts, with plans to introduce email making use of GMail’s IMAP service.  Once set up I can access my google calendar and contacts direct from my iPhone syncing via Wifi and no need for Outlook or other expensive stuff!

Following that success I decided to look into laptop access.  So that I can still get at my calendar on my PC, make appointments, get contact info etc when I’m not in range of a usable hotspot.  So I tried a few things, mostly unsuccessful, until coming around to something I should have thought of at the start.  Mozilla Thunderbird.  Well truthfully I downloaded Mozilla Sunbird and set it up for my google calendar (with the relevant addons) then downloaded Thunderbird to do contacts (and IMAP gmail… maybe…) and realised I should just use the Lightning extension with Thunderbird.  So I did that.  And it works!

So now my calendar and complete contacts have joined my email in the Cloud!  But I still have a synchronising copy of each on my laptop!  Marvellous…

Tags: calendar, cloud, contacts, email, gmail, iPhone, ipod touch, japan, nuevasync, office 2007, OMF, outlook, push

And all I got was this crummy iPod Touch…

When my brother, dad and I used to go on weekend trips with the caravan we had a tape of Bob Newhart that we would listen to over and over again.  One of the stories he did was about a guy called Chuck who had retired after giving the best years of his life to his company and they presented him with a wristwatch, not best pleased in his lubricated speech to the party shouted “and all I got was this crummy watch!”

Yesterday (Friday) I finished my time at GCD,  I originally was going to go on til the end of September, but with my dissertation and other things to be done before the OMF deadline of 25th September it became clear that I needed more September to get things done and so, reluctantly, I handed in end of August notice.  My reluctance wasn’t because I want to make more money, or because I like getting up at 7 so I can make it for 8:30 (ish!)…  I genuinely enjoyed working with the guys at GCD.  I’m only 26 so I haven’t had too many jobs, but I haven’t experienced a workin environment or job like it; the work itself was interesting, fun, often challenging and only sometimes annoying, the lunchtime Halo matches and great attitude of all the guys (and later girls too) at GCD made for fantastic team dynamics and working relationships and of course the leadership team of the two Andrews made my two years (just under, but I’m rounding) without question the best job I have had so far!
Now every job has its down sides, but to be honest I’m struggling to think of them, even the annoying bits lead to great office banter and fun times.

So now I am full time dissertation for two weeks with smatterings of OMF thrown in.  I have to complete my introduction (the last bit believe it or not), then collate my references, proof read and redraft however many times, get it printed and bound and handed in before 1pm on the 15th September!

So what’s that title about an iPod Touch?  Well yesterday, as it was my last day, we all went out for lunch at Gowdy’s (local regular of GCD celebratory lunchtimes), then after a great lunch (as always – only downside was a sleepy afternoon!) Andrew G pulled out a box and a card, so I thought, “Great! sweets!” or something along those lines, but when I had fought through the sellotape I opened the box to find an iPod Touch 32GB box!  Of course I thought it was a joke, I mean an iPod Touch?!  But no, on opening the (smaller) box I found not only a sleek, shiny piece of 1 Infinite Loop’s finest hardware, but it had been engraved:

To John
All the best
from everyone at
xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx*

So now I have an iPod Touch and it is very nice, I’ve used iTunes a bit before for the store, but it is nice to now have everything in one place, at least for a while, and I am looking forward to a host of funky apps!  There were a few initial hiccups (mostly file formats, I had an MTP Creative Zen then a Sony Walkman, so I had windows media and atrac files all over the place) but the only crappy bit are the earphones!  Now this is my first foray into Apple technology (at least first piece I have owned) and no question it is a very shiny gadget…  I hope I don’t get sucked in to Jobs’ pie-chartless, spreadsheetless world of photobooks and floppy hair! ;-)

Thanks GCD, for the experience and fun of the past two years and for the ideal geek toy as a parting gift!

*the xs represent the GCD local network’s external IP…  Funny if you’re a geek like me!

Tags: apple, dissertation, GCD, GCD Technology, ipod, ipod touch, leaving, Work