Dumb Blobs

Email — you may be addicted to it, you may hate it, abuse it, love it, or eschew it. Whatever your relationship, troubled or otherwise, email is and continues to be one of the world’s few, new, great things. When it comes to “killer-apps,” it is the undefeated heavy-weight champion of the world. Email is [...]

The Message in the Cryptex

Different venues, different audiences, but the same query: Six times in as many months, I stood in front of a group asking (perhaps demanding) that I answer the same question. Audiences can be scary — and the question pointed to the heart of the matter.
In each case, I had been invited —and cheerfully agreed — [...]

Get Thee Behind Me, Disco Duck!

I hate splash pages. I hate being held hostage. The topic came up recently on the “Information Systems Forum” listserv. It’s a listserv of diverse participants, gracefully managed by the indefatigable Deborah Elizabeth Finn.
The question was: “Are splash pages effective.” I thought about it for a few days and I posted a response. Michael Gilbert [...]

Trilateral Symmetry

I’ve been using a dual-monitor setup since before before. In fact, I can’t remember (and can’t imagine) not having two monitors in front of me. My office setup is currently two 20-inch 16:9 LCD flat panels. It’s amazing what you can artfully stuff on that sort of screen-space. I’m here to say that it ain’t [...]

Skype Me, Dr. Memory!

A few days ago, a reader of this humble blog asked if I knew a way to embed “Skype Presence” in a SharePoint Web Part.
I didn’t. But, I was intrigued. (That’s a bad sign… as it usually means I’m going to stay up until the wee hours.)
It turns out to be pretty easy-breezy, with a [...]

Son of Fronkensteen

The retail release of Windows Home Server (WHS) hit the web- shops in early October. My copy arrived as fast as a flying monkey. The retail price was, as promised, less than $200 ($179 from NewEgg to be exact — a sweet deal considering what you’re getting).
It’s an “OEM” version, by the way; there’s no [...]

My Secret Summer Romance

Her name was Jane. We met, quite unexpectedly, at Zaventem Airport in Brussels. At the Avis counter. It was such a random thing, but when I saw her I knew — no hesitation — whatever the cost, I just knew. Some things are just meant to be. With Jane, it was meant to be. Jane. I [...]

Wham, Bam! DAM

For all you folks that have been ever so gently bugging me about sharing my damn DAM system… Between minor brain freezes and other lovely things like work and spending two weeks tasting wine in Burgundy, Beaujolais, Cote du Rhone, and Provence; well, time just slipped away. I apologize. [and.. Yes, I have stories to [...]

Sow’s Ears and Turing Tests

At the risk of being Pollyannaish, I find it pleasing when “good” things are born from “bad.” One of these “good” things caught my eye recently. It something called reCAPTCHA. Not only is it neat, it also turns a sad state of affairs on its head. It helps create a public good, a silk purse [...]

Fun with MOSS – Data Views and Custom Filters

In previous versions of SharePoint, I was often frustrated with how difficult it was to do things I thought should be simple. It was probably my ignorance, or it could have been SharePoint’s obscurity and overall lack of good documentation, but it seemed a herculean task to simply filter information by a dynamic variable like [...]