Understanding the accumulation of data
Among the many exciting features of Apple’s version-4 iPhone OS is the long-awaited ability to sync to multiple Exchange ActiveSync servers. The new software, now dubbed iOS 4, can synchronize mail, contacts, and calendars between many different services that use Microsoft’s Exchange ActiveSync protocol, including Microsoft Exchange 2003, 2007, and 2010 and Google’s Gmail service.
Here’s a quick tip, but a timely one now that the iPhone supports multiple Exchange ActiveSync servers: Although Google supports the Exchange ActiveSync protocol to synchronize mail, contacts, and calendars between Gmail and mobile devices, it is not active by default for custom Google Apps domains. It’s pretty easy to enable it, though.
A quick how-to today: Apple released Safari 5 this week and one of the major new features is support for Firefox-style extensions. A few interesting ones have appeared (Instapaper!) but I couldn’t figure out how to add them at first. It turns out the extension support is hidden in a “Develop” menu!
VMworld is an awesome event, and one of the few technical conferences that is still growing even as the old standbys falter. But it’s also expensive – a pass costs almost US $2,000, and airfare isn’t cheap these days, either. I was so pleased to see Jason Boche offering a VMworld 2010 pass as a contest prize that we at Gestalt IT decided to pitch in, too. We’ll pay for airfare for the winner, as well as providing them a platform to share what he learns at the event.
Nobody doubts that Steve Jobs will announce a fourth-generation iPhone at WWDC 2010 tomorrow, but the delivery date remains unclear. It must be soon, though, because AT&T is pulling major shenanigans with their customer contracts! They recently changed the early-termination clause and replaced unlimited data with less-expensive tiered options. And now AT&T is aggressively accelerating upgrade eligibility!
Rebates sell cars and electronics, so why not web search? That must have been Microsoft’s thought process when they implemented Live Search Cashback back in 2008. Under the program, Microsoft paid rebates to shoppers who purchased goods after using their shopping and price comparison search engine. Essentially, Microsoft was trying to buy their way into the hearts of web users. But Bing Cashback will end on July 30, 2010. Will web surfers still consider Bing?
The end of unlimited data is nigh! As I discussed in yesterday’s post, AT&T’s announcement of limited data packages at lower prices has everyone up in arms. But the switch to a-la carte data is a positive move for everyone involved, including AT&T, the customer, and the US wireless phone industry as a whole.
The headlines are all over the blogs: AT&T announced today that they are doing away with “unlimited” data plans and replacing them with limited packages at lower prices. I’m not going to repeat the news – Boy Genius Report has the best overview I’ve seen. Instead, I’m going to explain why I think this is a positive move for everyone involved, including AT&T, the customer, and the US wireless phone industry as a whole. This first post talks about the buffet mentality that got us here.
One of my favorite iPad and iPhone apps is Instapaper. Like the iPad itself, Instapaper seems almost foolishly simple and derivative until you experience it. Then it becomes something else entirely: A product so useful you may ask yourself “how did I ever get along without this?”
This week, two blog readers let me know what Google Chrome was warning them of malware on my blog. I dived in and discovered that, indeed, a nasty, obfuscated JavaScript attack had made its way into my site. Although I was disappointed by the lack of clarity about how to fix it, I believe I was able to remove it last night.
Although Clear clearly wants buyers to sign up for monthly service, they also have “secret” on-demand 2-hour, daily, and weekly plans. Here’s how to get online cheap!
HP stumbled mightily in 2011, and it had nothing to do with product or people. Even sales remained strong, though the PC business is changing. HP’s mighty stumble was a crisis of confidence due to a chain of shenanigans at the very top. This culminated with the short reign of Léo Apotheker, leaving HP to reassure the market of its strategy.
For a massive IT company, Dell sure doesn’t get the kind of respect given their competitors. Time and again, I’ll hear the sneers about Dell being little more than a “box shifter” who doesn’t “get” real enterprise IT needs. After a series of acquisitions in storage and networking, Dell is trying to stake a claim as a serious competitor to HP, IBM, Oracle, and the like. But why should anyone take Dell seriously, especially in enterprise storage?
Any time OS X corrects your spelling or (more likely) inserts appropriate accent marks, Dictate loses its mind and can no longer correctly enter some random letter. There are two ways to fix this problem (apart from just restarting Dictate all the time).
Moving cold virtual machine images from system to system, or even across great distances, is one of the main selling points of server virtualization. But it becomes much more difficult to manage movement of virtual machines that are still running, especially outside cluster or across WAN links. When talking about virtual machine mobility, it is important to consider what is being moved, the state it is in, and where it is going.
The difference between American and European mobile phone providers are vast, and the modern traveler is likely to run afoul if they are unprepared, running up a surprisingly large bill! Here’s a rundown of my standard techniques to prepare my American mobile phone for travel abroad.
The CompactFlash Association announced a new media card format last month, and now Sony and Nikon have introduced the first media and digital cameras, respectively. But what exactly is an XQD memory card? Read on for the details.
What elements remain unresolved to make FCoE truly world-class? What should the vendors be prioritizing?
Although they are ridiculously inefficient, incandescent lightbulbs seem to have a huge number of fans. Despite the romance of the glowing filament, many governments are moving to ban the use of incandescent light bulbs in many applications. Here in the United States, the federal government intends to encourage the use of more efficient light bulbs but there is no outright ban.