How Did Google Do?

I recently contacted Google for assistance with a problem on Google Apps. I received the following email this evening:

How did you do? Fairly well on the support, but horrible on the follow-up email!

To Be Mad or Not To Be Mad

Apple lowered the price of the 8GB iPhone to $399 today. And early adopters are mad to say the least.

As a relatively early adopter myself, I thought long and hard about it. Am I mad? Not really.

Why?

• My iPhone was worth the $599 then; it’s worth the $599 now.
• I have used my iPhone a lot over the past two months; more than I ever used my previous phone.

That being said, I think Apple made a rather large mistake by lowering the price. In addition to lowering the price of the 8GB model, Apple also discontinued the 4GB model. I feel this was a poor business decision because:

• Apple just upset many (most?) early adopters of the iPhone. And who are the majority of the early adopters? Your typical Apple supporters and “fan boys”.
• Apple just upset the 4GB iPhone owners. With the new 8GB model price, they could have spent less money and gotten more storage.

Although $200 is $200, I’m still extremely pleased with my iPhone and not really upset about the price drop.

Leopard Screenshots

New Leopard screenshots have been posted by ThinkSecret. I can’t wait until its release in October.

Redemption.. I Was Wrong!

In my earlier entry concerning my switch to Apple Mail, I stated that Apple Mail had sub-par IMAP support. When I wrote this, I was under the impression that it was not possible to have separate Sent/Drafts/Junk/Trash folders (mailboxes as Apple Mail calls them) for your different IMAP accounts.

I was wrong!

Apple Mail and the IMAP accounts simply have to be configured for it.

• Make sure all IMAP accounts are configured to store the messages on the server.
• In the correct folder tree for each IMAP account, select the folder you wish to use for Sent email and go to the Mailbox menu >> Use This Mailbox For >> Sent. Do this for Drafts, Junk, and Trash for each IMAP account.

And voilà! You now have separate special folders for each IMAP account.

Apple Mail has the ‘combined’ mailbox interface, and it does take some getting used to. But so far, I don’t have a complaint about it.

My Own Personal Browser War

My name is Tom and I have a problem.

No, this isn’t an AA meeting. My problem is deciding what browser to use on my PowerBook. My choices:

• Safari
• Firefox
• Camino
• Flock

Each have their advantages and disadvantages. Here are my opinions/observations:

• Firefox is slow compared to Safari and Camino. Additionally, it’s painfully slow compared to the Windows version of Firefox.
• Camino has the Mac feel to it but doesn’t support Firefox extensions.
• Safari has the Apple name and Mac feel to it but doesn’t support Firefox extensions naturally.
• Safari and Camino are both very fast.
• WordPress’s visual text editor (TinyMCE) doesn’t work in Safari. I use WordPress on many sites, so this is a huge loss.
• Flock is rather new on the scene and built off of the Gecko rendering engine (Firefox) but doesn’t fully support all Firefox extensions.
• Flock still seems bloated and very beta.
• Safari’s bookmarks sync with my iPhone.
• Safari has a weird cookie issue with Microsoft Outlook Web Access that’s quite annoying.

So my question to my three readers: What browser would you suggest I use?

Bluetooth Schmutooth

There’s no mistake that I’m a self-proclaimed gadgeteer. A popular trend these days are the bluetooth headsets that allow you to have a conversation on your mobile phone wirelessly. For the most part, these headsets are a great idea.

For the most part.

I am a proponent for banning mobile phone calls while driving if not using a hands-free adapter. Mobile phones are quickly becoming the number one distraction while driving, and these bluetooth headsets can help combat that.

However, if you’re shopping at Target, take the damn headset off. You look like a fool walking around with this stupid little piece of plastic hanging over your ear. No one is important enough to necessitate wearing a headset in a store – with the exception of the Secret Service naturally. If you get a call, take your lazy ass hand out of your pocket and hold your phone up to your ear.

Which leads me to my next rant..

If you’re in a store checkout line, get off the damn phone. The checkout employee is due the respect of not overhearing your unimportant conversation. The employee is there to serve you; have the decency of allowing them to do that properly. The same goes for drive-thrus, restaurants, and any other similar situation.

Whew.. I feel better now.

Onward to the Moon

After six years of protest, I have changed my Sony Vaio’s Windows XP Professional to use the Luna interface rather than the Windows 95 classic interface.

Why?

More than likely, in the next few months I will be upgrading to Vista and will want to use the Aero interface.

Again, why?!

Well, I’m a Director of IT and I’m not even running the newest Windows operating system. There’s something wrong with that picture, so as soon as I purchase an external hard drive, I’ll back up my files and music and upgrade to Vista. If something doesn’t work right, I’ll just wipe the drive and reinstall Windows XP Professional.

<sarcasm>
But everything will work since Microsoft never breaks things working in previous versions.
</sarcasm>

iPhone Wish List

Every iPhone owner has one; here’s mine.

• BCC ability. I don’t understand why this isn’t an option already. This is fairly standard on every email program I’ve ever used.
• Distribution List ability. Mail/Address Book on OS X supports distribution lists, but not the iPhone. This one baffles me as to why it was omitted.
• Mulit-client chat (YIM, AIM, Jabber). Not very important, but would be a very cool addition. If added, I just hope it’s not limited to AIM.
• Contacts having own home screen icon – Address Book. It’s an annoyance that I have to enter the Phone app to get to my contacts. Seems an Address Book option on the home screen makes too much sense.

I realize that Apple didn’t want to miss the June deadline, and I appreciate that. Hopefully these features and more will be added in the near future.