I just upgraded to the lastest WordPress and also finally got around to trying the WP touch plug-in (http://www.bravenewcode.com/wptouch/).  This takes my Word Press site and formats it nicely for iPhone/iPod/Android visitors.  There is also a link for them to see the standard site if they so desire (via a Mobile Theme ON|OFF selector at the bottom of the page).

Nice and easy!

I actually heard about the MacHeist bundle from Wil Wheaton’s twitter stream.  He asked if it was worth it and got a positive response from his Mac followers and bought it.  Wondering what *it* was, I searched for it on Google and found my answer at MacHeist.  According to Wikipedia this is the third year of the “heist”  which starts out with a bundle of software at a reduced rate from individual purchases and then “unlock” more by meeting fund raising goals by the amount of money raised for charity.   The next piece of software unlocks at $400,000 and they are currently $379,128.

I’ve played around with a few of the apps and I really like PhoneView which offers a direct way to interact with files on the iPhone.  You can add folders and files or edit Notes from the Mac.  You have access to all kinds of data SMS messages, call history, etc.

World of Goo is cute, but I haven’t spent much time with it yet, I’ve been downloading and installing the apps (while it is a bundle, the apps are individually downloaded and installed)

SousChef looks pretty cute.  It has facilities for importing your recipes, making shopping lists and even using the mac with voice activation to go through each step of the recipe.

MacHeist is a great way to get some good software and donate money to charity a the same time.

FreeRice not only is a great way to practice vocabulary (especially for high school kids practicing for PSAT, SAT, CHSEP, etc.) it donates rice to the UN World Food Program.  FreeRice (www.freerice.com) also allows you to choose what you are learning while you earn rice. For example, I am practicing my Italian vocabulary at freerice.com/index.php?&s=Italian.

• To change subjects:
  • Click Change Subject
  • Select the desired subject

One student I worked with loved seeing how her studying was earning rice. I had the same feeling, as I earned 1000 grains of rice, molto bene!

If you want to search for a twitter user but don’t want to search by email address, it isn’t obvious from the twitter web site.  What you need is: http://search.twitter.com/. This allows you to search for twitter users by user names rather than email address.

Added a new page for Llinks. Not sure if I am how to get the Tech Bllog page to be what I want, more on that soon.

Overview

If you have have a legal copy of Microsoft Office 2007 you can use this  Add-In software for free to create PDFs from Microsoft Office.

PDF Add-In Installation

If you have problems with the Validation tool installation, try this alternate method (which is what I use because I don’t want to install more on my machine than necessary)

1. Click Continue
2. Instead of using the installer, scroll to the bottom and choose Try the alternate validation method
3. It will give you a code to enter and then you should be able to install the PDF Add-In

Using the PDF Add-In

1. Click the File menu (now the little Office circle in the upper left corner)
2. Point to Save As
3. The menu will expand to the right and choose PDF or XPS
4. Browse to the desired location
5. Enter a name for the file
6. Click Publish

NOTE: If the Open File after publishing checkbox is checked it will open the PDF for viewing (which I use to let me know when the process is complete

I put up a new WP theme on my bllog.  It is cute and interactive (click the espresso).

Want to share your Microsoft Outlook calendar with your friends and family? Don’t have an exchange server or access to theirs?  These simple steps allow you to set up Calendar sharing.

Prerequisites:

• A Window’s live email account
• A legal copy of Microsoft Outlook 2007

Configuration:

1. Open Microsoft Outlook
2. Click on the Calendar button
3. Right-click on Calendar under My Calendars
4. Select Share Calendar…
5. Enter the Windows live email address of the desired recipient
6. Click Send
7. (For some reason you will get an error message)
8. Click OK
9. Close the message
10. Click Yes to save the changes
11. Open the message (it will likely be in your Inbox or Drafts folder)
12. Click Send (it will work this time)
13. Your friend will then get the option to add this calendar to Microsoft Outlook for viewing (as well as a web URL for viewing via a browser)

Since I don’t have the calendar available on my iPhone, I also add the web URL as a bookmark on my iPhone for remote viewing of the calendar as well.

I am really very organized when it comes to managing my files on the PC.  I have a standard set of folders and pretty much always know where things are.  The problem comes when I leave a company or migrate PCs and then there is the additional step of filing things on the new PC which I often don’t get around to for a while.

Today I was doing some more cleaning (got rid of those VHS and cassette tapes) and found a bunch of PC backup CDs. Now I do all my backing up on a combination of a portable 320GB drive and my UNIX account.  However, each of these CDs had some of the same items backed up.  So I needed to go through and look at each of the folders and consolidate them in to one set of data to be backed up on my passport.

It takes up less physical space than real world stuff  but can be almost as much of a pain.

I’ve dusted off my PHP/MySQL book (Web Database Applications with PHP and MySQL) and am going to start on my new application.  I have done the table planning and am ready to get started.  It will fun to be doing something more technical again.

I just upgraded and things are going well (now that I rememebered to copy my themes and plugins to the new directory.

So I wanted to give a friend a file and I wasn’t sure if it would fit I my Lexmark flash drive.  (It’s awesome, I bought it a few years ago and it is 1GB!)

Then I realized it would definitely fit on the spare 2GB SD card I have in my top desk drawer, and it will take up less room in my purse.

Then I laughed.

The app store is really cool.  Two of my favorite applications, both free

• Shazam – listens to music in a room and tells you the artist and album, worked in the Nike store and Starbucks (not so well when they were blending)
• UrbanSpoon – Random restuarant deciscion making.  Choose a city (or let the GPS find you), and then either randomly let it decide the type of food and restaurant, or lock down the type of food.  Shake and see where to eat.

For 1.1.4

Install iLiberty

1. First make sure that your timeout is set to never
2. Settings | General | Auto-Lock | never
3. Launch Cydia
4. If the launch screen tells you that you have an old version
5. Select changes
6. Select Upgrade all
7. Confirm (The first time will take about 5 full minutes)
8. Click Close window

Then all of the applications (including Snapture) should be available.

iLiberty Rules!

You know, steriods have their uses OTHER than pro-ball.  They make me very effecient at cleaning.  My place, other folks’, I should rent myself out for some extra money.  Because I have so much extra energy and it is focused (I’m doing this rather than being angry at people, I hope) I accomplish so much more.

My other secret weapon is Tivo-to-go.  I can load my shows on my laptop and then put the laptop whereever I am cleaning and it makes the time go much faster.  Some shows I want to focus on the visuals, but some of them I just need occasional visuals.

I was going to try and complete all my filing and paperwork before I left but as I look at the pile over my shoulder, it is too much.  On the other hand, I have done a TON this week and I will soon reach my goals.

• No papers that aren’t filed
• Scan and recycle what I can
• Get my craft area clean for crafting
• Decide on a few key hobbies to FINISH projects in
  • Knitting (blanket, sweater)
  • Crafts - cards, jewelry (inventory, get rid of non-working items, take some classes)
  • Italian - get back into practice
  • Cooking - one new recipe a week
  • Photography - get rid of my Film camera and get a digital SLR with macro capabilities
  • (wow, and that is the shortened list)

Off to bed, and more items to prep for my trip tomorrow.

I was going to play bocce tomorrow for some practice, but the place was all booked after 3:30pm, fooey

Some items are not automatically synched by iTunes and don’t have any backup or manual way to add them on to your iPhone.

• Notes- if you use these notes, they aren’t backed up.  Email yourself a copy before restoring.  The sucky part is that you can’t get the data back into the Notes section without re-typing.  (Apple, synch the notes, sheesh!)
• Application list – If you’ve added any applications and you like them, make a list so it is easy to get back to your known-good state
• Text Message history  - You’ll lose this
• Weather settings- you’ll lose these, too.
• Themes- there are a LOT of themes, make note of the names of your favorites so you can quickly locate them

This is a test of the tech blog