Posts Tagged With: microsoft
· February 17, 2008 at 5:57 pm · Software Help
Ok, maybe I am a little behind the times - or am very careful before I give Microsoft the fair shake. Whatever my reason was, I never tried Windows Live Writer till the other day. I figured it would be like every other blog updater I’ve seen out there. It would do everything but (insert feature here). Well, I am happy to say that Windows Live Writer does it all - and does it well.
I am damned impressed with the entire product. I hate to sound like an anti-Microsoft goon, but it is a little hard to believe they developed such a nice product. (Just in case any of the Microsoft guys are reading, really don’t mean that as a back handed compliment) It worked with WordPress right off the bat too with no problems at all.
Inserting pictures into posts is as easy as dragging the image from the desktop of folder into the main editing window of Live Writer. It gets automatically uploaded, just as any other image would to my hosting account. The in-dept draft feature is nice too. I can save as a draft here on my machine, or on the server.
The only downside I have found (and this might be more my fault than Microsoft’s) is the Web Layout preview doesn’t work that well with all of the various places I write. Other than that though I would highly encourage any and all to go check it out if you haven’t. Windows Live Writer is definitely worth your time for sure and won’t cost you any money.
· January 25, 2008 at 6:32 am · Software Help
I ran into a problem yesterday, because I got a .docx file e-mailed to me and I could not open it. Why? Well from what I could tell this seems to be one of Microsoft’s wacky file formats that you can only open using their products. Since I use OpenOffice.org as my word processor, spreadsheet, and more of choice I needed to find a quick fix.
That is when I stumbled upon this neat tool provided by Microsoft. Get read for this name… the Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats.
(Try to say that ten times fast!)
I downloaded and installed it, now I can right-click the oddball files, pick “Open With…” and choose this new download. When you do it pops up with a box asking you what you would like to convert it to. With my .docx file I just turned it into a regular .doc file and I was done.
· December 4, 2007 at 6:30 am · Hot Web Topics, Personal
When I last left you - I gave you a few of the things I could think of when it comes to naming the things that Windows Vista - Microsoft’s latest OS. Today I’m ready to bring you back up again with a few positives, and all around good details about the Vista experience.
The start menu is kinda like shoving everything in a junk drawer and leaving the most important stuff on top. I don’t say that as a bad thing, personally I like my junk drawers. I’ve used search on Vista in the past week more than I probably ever used it in Windows XP ever.
The Favorite Links in the folder view is probably my next favorite feature. I like keeping more than a few folders handy at all times and this does beat the left side menus that the previous version of the OS had.
While we are in my profile folder, the saved searches is nice too. As I said before, this is the first OS I’ve actually bothered to use search with all that much and I like it. Read the rest of this entry »
· December 3, 2007 at 6:52 am · Personal, Software Help
I think the world has seen enough over the top Vista bashing. I did want to share some of my bad experiences for others though. I have to say I am amazed by reading the press that I didn’t have more problems than I did. If you believe what a number of reviewers and tech minds would have to believe you would think that Vista was about as useful to you as a newspaper is to a homeless man in the rain.
User Account Control in Vista is annoying, but not driving me crazy yet.
The only device I had trouble with getting to work with Vista was my old Logitech keyboard. Other than that though, all my other gadgets seem to have worked the first time around.
Had to finally upgrade my old version of NoteTab Pro to the newest version (actually ended up buying NoteTab Std cause it got the job done for me. Read the rest of this entry »
· February 21, 2007 at 11:08 am · Personal
I never really stopped to think about it till now, but it is true. Windows XP is not my real operating system on my computer - Firefox is! Over the past few years it seems like more and more of my Windows programs are getting replaced by Online alternatives.
Another five or ten years down the road, it will not matter if you are running Windows, Apple or a flavor of Linux. With the way everything is moving to the Web - all you will need is a good browser to access it all from. Need a few examples?
How Can I Check My E-mail Online?
Personally I use Yahoo! Mail to do this, but there are a number of other choices out there. If I wasn’t using Yahoo! Mail - I would probably be using Gmail. Maybe if Google rolls out a premium service - I might switch. Now Webmail is great because it allows you to keep track of, respond to and check your E-mail no matter what computer you are using. As long as you have a browser and a Internet connection - you should be OK.
How Can I Write Documents or Edit Text Online?
Google Docs and Spreadsheets comes into play here. It is a very nice and basic backbone of an office suit. Sure you might not get all the bells and whistles just yet, but who needs ‘em? Since Firefox 2 came out I have been using the spell checker like nobody’s business as well. No need for a text editor to make sure I spelled things correctly before I post. Running my Web sites with WordPress, I can also save drafts of articles that I am not yet ready to make public yet too.
Need a Calendar to Keep Up With Dates?
There are a slew of Online calenders to help you keep up with important dates and schedules. I was trying to decide myself a few weeks back about which one to use, but I finally decided to go with Google’s calendar application.
How Can I Read my RSS Feeds Online?
Oh man, when it comes to ways to read your RSS feeds Online there is no end. There are countless start pages that can do this for you and dedicated RSS feed reader services like Bloglines and Rojo. I have tried just about all of them - and found myself most happy with the Google Reader. There is just so much that you can do with it to make it your own.
What About All My Other Tasks?
Now that I have all of the basic tasks that one might need to do on a day to day basis, I’ll talk about some of the other applications that you can move Online to use.
Need Online Instant Messaging? Try Meebo!
Need Saved Links and Bookmarks? Try Del.icio.us!
Need Remote PC Access? Try Log Me In!
Need Something to Watch? Try YouTube!
Have any other suggestions for Online application replacement? Leave a comment and let me know!
· February 8, 2007 at 8:59 am · Hot Web Topics
I have made up my mind that I am going to wait a while before I even think of touching or upgrading to Vista on any machine. Let everybody get their updates out. Let everybody beat on it for a while. Eventually I will be forced to move over though on at least one machine.
Now what I am really waiting on pins and needles for right now is for us to get out of this “Vista is wonderful and great and pretty and will change your life” phase and get into the Vista sucks phase.
Back when Windows XP first came out, it didn’t take too long for people to go from saying:
“The interface is a welcome change from the colorless existence we once had…”
to
“The interface looks like a children’s toy. Where is the mature look and design I want?”
This time around though (or maybe I am not paying as much attention) it seems like the “this sucks” phase is taking a little longer to roll out into the mainstream conversation.
