Chaos

Address Books; How Many do You have?

jeemster — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 19:42:43 GMT

Well,it happened again.
Wife said get mt "THE" address list so I can send Christmas cards.
I mumbled something and walked away.

So, off I went to the office to get "THE" address list.
I use the following address books regularly.
Palm - I use an add on called Agendus but it uses the Palm Address Book.
Thunderbird - Email
LDAP      - I have an LDAP server that I run my email server and other stuff from.
Quicken   - To Keep those bills and taxes paid
Delorme   - GIS mapping software so I put in someone's name and it draws a map.
Dymo Label Printer - They have their own software to print Labels.
Legacy Deluxe - Genology Program

Now in 2006, you would think it should be easy to use one address book for everything, but it well just doesn't happen.

I have yet to find anything that will keep them in Sync, reliably.

Heck, I have yet been able to find a way to export and import them.

A whole new world or Opportunities

jeemster — Mon, 10 Jul 2006 11:06:00 GMT

If you have not read "The World is FLat" go read it now.

Then listen to "Software Strategies for Flat World"
IBM has 39,000 employees in Bangalore up from 18,000 employees in 2005.

Ray Lane: "Over the years, the profit pool for the software industry has declined, leaving three dominant players to reap roughly 80 percent of the profits, Lane noted. Microsoft, with roughly 50 percent, has the largest share, he said.

Consumer Electronics

jeemster — Wed, 04 Jan 2006 14:12:00 GMT

USA Today has an article on the Consumer Electronics Show which starts this week. You should read the highlights of the Article and how Google and Yahoo are entering the market.

But, to me, the interesting part of the piece is;

“Stunning, but complicated “

I recently bought a Microsoft Media Center PC and have found that the issue is the Consumer electronics that have problems with the new world.

I do have one of those discrete component systems, a separate receiver/amplifier, 400 disk DVD player, DirectTV receiver, HD DirectTV Receiver, two VCRs, 200 disc CD Player, etc.

The issue is the VCRs only have composite audio and video outputs, I want to use the DVI interface on the HD DirectTV receiver to get the best picture and the component video on the DVD player to get the best picture and of course optical audio on everything I can.

Now the PC has only a one composite video input and only one component video input and then I have paid extra for a second tuner so I have two coax inputs. So there is no way to connect all my video and audio to the computer directly.

So then I thought I would connect all the video and audio to my Receiver, a high-end ES Series Sony, a few years old, has no DVI video, no Component Video and will not even up-convert composite Video to S-Video. So I went looking for a receiver that would.

Well I found a couple that might do the job, but they all start around $1,900.00.

Why can the Consumer electronics gear just use FireWire to connect to each other and then to the computer. Firewire can handle the bandwidth for both the video and audio. Would this just make too much sense?

Seems like the consumer electronics folks are much more interested in protecting copy rights and their historic connections than providing a solution for their customers.

What is with the Consumer Electronic (CE) Devices?

jeemster — Thu, 17 Nov 2005 14:09:00 GMT

Why with todays technology are the Consumer Electronic companies still doing the same thing they were in the 1960's?

I have a Rather large collection of CE devices and the boss is making comments like:

Too many wires.
Too many remotes.
Too complex.

Some of the issues and devices we have:

Television - Sony TV (KE-42TS2) 42” Plasma
VCR - Sony VCR (SLV-N51)
DVD - Sony DVD (DVP-CX985) 400 DVD/CD Juke Box
Stereo Receiver - Sony AV Receiver (STR-DA30ES)
Satellite - Sony Satellite (SAT-HD300) DirecTV
CD Player - Sony CD Jukebox (CDP-CX153)

Some of the issues:

Just controlling these items takes 6 remotes or One Harmony Remote (Thank Goodness for Harmony)
Now I really like the Idea of Sony 400 DVD/CD juke box. But, the interface to put in the DVD info sucks. They have a feature to read the DVDs but it fails to read most of the DVDs. There is no method to search for all movies by Actor or Producer or any of the things I can do with Real Media for MP3’s.
Then of course there are the many different video connections. The VCR only has composite video. The DVD, to get the best picture uses component video, the satellite dish, for the best picture we use DVI.
The Sony AV Receiver, a few years old, will not Up or Down convert any of the video signals and has no DVI so switching them via the Sony AV Receiver is worthless. I see where the new Sony high end ($2,000+) will perform up-converting to from composite to S-Video or componenet video but not to DVI. It also has two DVI in-outs and one DVI outputs.
The Sony TV, has all of the input connections (and its own tuner) but now I want to add a MCE with DVI and there is only one DVI connection.

Why could we not have all the devices with a fire-wire ports so we could have one wire to connect them together?

Or with the Wi-Fi capabilities today, why not have Wi-Fi embedded in them and could they all discover them selves? With a PDA with Wi-Fi we could control any of the CE devices.

Then there are the Tivos and the MCEs that portray to make it simpler, but they really make it more complicated.

Tivo has there own way of doing things and of course they could not get together with the MCE folks and come up with a seamless way to let the Tivo box work seamlessly with a MCE box, or visa versa.

Then throw in HDTV from DirecTV and then there is another mess. No Tivo and no MCE works with DirecTV because of course DirecTV has yet another way to do things.

Apparently rule number One with all these companies is “Protect Our Turf” and then rule number 367 says do what is right for the customer.

St Thomas 2005 Vacation Day Six-Friday

jeemster — Sat, 26 Mar 2005 09:40:00 GMT

Breakfast

Molly McQuires in Redhook on the “American Yaht Harbor” dock is a great breakfast place.

The Adventure

We rented a small power boat, 16 foot, if I remeber right. We wanted to see what the tour guides would’t show you. The boat guy siad go gather up some provisions like some sandwhciches and ice etc form the deli down the way and come back. We did.

Now, I do not have any real experiance driving a power boat, but I did tll the guy we used to own one. I managed to get the thing to the fuel dock with only a little trouble as we had to wait in some wind for several minutes while the other boats that were fueling left.

After fueling up we were on our way. Nautical maps are difficult to read. They certainly do not seem to scale and there were two on the boat and they showed different aspects. I think a GPS should be required for all boats. We managed to wind our way a long the north shore of St. John and found a small bay to pull in and tie up to a mooring bouy. The boat dock guy said we were not allowed to ancher in the National park. Good thing as this boat did not have an anchor.

We saw a green sea turtle 30 yards off the boat. got some pictures. We decided to snrokel in to the beach. It must of been 1/4 mile to the shore so we had a half-mile swim to take. We really did pretty good. One of the snorkle masks leaks. So we had to stop every so often to clear the mask. We were not sure where we were so when we go to the beach we asked some one and they said it was HawksNest bay. Upon arriving back to the boat, it was a long swim, we had luch on the water. Consulting the maps, we were not at all where we thought we were. We had not traveled nearly as far as we had thought.

We ventured out along the north side of St. John traveling along the line between the US VI and British VI. THe water and scenerary were the best. As we reached the east end of St. John molly commented on the open water that was ominous to the east. I told here the next shore was Africa. We went all the way around St. John and ties to a mooring bouy in a cove not so far from shore this time. We snorkeled here for another hour or so. Saw lots of fish and a smaller turtle.

Molly and I both thought this was the best day of the trip.

Dinner

I was determined to go to a place called the Frigate. But Molly said we would have to got back to the Hotel and shower if we were going there. We both had this white haze all over our hair and face. Seems the salt water that evaperated left some salt behind. Everything seemes a little crusty.

We had to wait on the boat guy to get back to the dock so we had a couple of drinks at Molly’s. We were watching the people at Molly’s put up the dinner specials and decided to eat there. So we had another drink or two.

St Thomas 2005 Vacation Day Four

jeemster — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 09:19:00 GMT

Breakfast

No Bugs

Ok, well not insects, bees or other types that seem to be pests. A lot of the restaurants are open air with no screens.

The biggest pests are the taxi drivers that all ask you if you are looking for a taxi. They are waiting outside every restaurant and shop.

Shopping

More Jewelry stores than you can count. One shop keeper said there were 118 jewelry vendors on the Island. There were five large cruise ships in port today. The shop keeper also related that this was the end of the busy season and things would slow down for a couple of months.

Lunch

We decided to seek the air conditioning. Went to the Hard Rock cafe on the waterfront. Had salads and Iced Tea. All good and suited us for the time. $33.00 with tip.

Dinner

We stopped at The Green House hoping for traffic to settle dwon a little before we went to the hotel. Had a few drinks and a shrimp cocktail.

We split a sandwich and salad for dinner at the hotel in the Cabana Bar. Good burger and the salad was great. $30.00 with tip and a couple of drinks.

St Thomas 2005 Vacation Day Two

jeemster — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 09:18:00 GMT

The Sunrise

Cloudy this morning. Makes me, wonder if the money we paid for the reservation for the all day trip on a boat is covered in event of rain.

No cruise ships at dock, but one is circling the bay with his lights on.

Oops. Think I felt a rain drop. Well, that was it. A drop of rain. I retreated to a place under cover, not the clouds have blown by and the sun is rising over the hill.

Breakfast

Finally, a place that can do breakfast. The ?? is a well know breakfast spot for the locals and fit our needs well. Real breakfast. Eggs, omelets, toast etc.

The Pitch

We went to a seminar to learn of this great new way to vacation. As usuaual it is a pitch on how you should buy some time share proeprty under this new method and you can vacation for life. Well, we did get a bottle of Rum and a coupon for discounts on some things we wanted to do while we were here. Probably worth the time even if it was closer to two hours than the one houre we were told.

Lunch

We did lunch at the tops of the ride. The ride was cool. Every visitor should do this. Our discount coupon it was $5.00 instead of $16.00 helped. Lunch was sandwiches and was good, but still $22.00 with tip.

Adventure

We took off to find the spot where we will depart from for our sailing adventure. On the narrow winding roads up the hill side. Amazigly country side. You pass the fancy resorts and then pass some shack that has a dirt floor with chickens and two or three broken down vehicles in the yard.

Dinner

The Tavern on the Waterfront. I think this is one of my top ten meals, anywhere. The place is upstairs and overlooks the water. $94.00 with tip.

St Thomas Vacation 2005 Arrival

jeemster — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 09:16:00 GMT

The Flight

The Flight went well. The Bose Quit Comfort II head phones are un-real. When you take them off, after having them on for a while, the noise was like being in a jet engine. Highly reccomended.

The Car

Rented a car from Thrifty, over the NET of course. It must of took us forty-five minutes to get the car. While we had no issuse with our reservation or the car, the people in front of us and several people who calle dont he phone did. One call was from some one whom had rented a car and the tire was flat. He wanted some road-side assistance. The thrifty agent siaid that they do not provide roadside assistance.

While there I asked how I would get to our hotel. The rental agent handed me a phone and I calleed the hotel. I was put on hold. Later the call dropped. The car rental agent said he knew right where the hotel was and provided a map that he kept circleing spots on the map where I was to turn and where the hotel was. The car rental agent had no nice detailed maps like I was used to from a car rental agent.

He tried to call the hotel and met with similar results. He said the service “sucks” on St. Thomas.

Interestingly, they had an award for the “Best Rental Compnay” form the New Paper.

The Hotel “Bluebeards Castle and Villas

We tried to use the car rental agents directions without much success. I called the hotel again and asked for directions. The “directions” were amazing. You go down the “main” to the police station and ya keep on going. Ya go on around the bend and ya keep on going. I am not sure if it was a result that maybe the person trying to give directions has never driven or what but the directions did not work.

After driving around on the wrong side of the road (they drive on the left here) for a while I pulled over and ask Molly to call. She of course had fun with the person. As she was talking on the phone, I noticed a distincttive stucture down the roadf on top of a hill and siad never kmind I can see the hotel.

Interesting place. Not fancy but Island Casual. Parts of the place seem very old and some seems much newer. Fraklin Rsevelt stayed here, well the sign says visited here in 1934.

There is a pool and the location is good. Fairly high on a hill with good views on all sides.

The Digs

Actually we were pretty concerned about the hotel as the places we had been driving around were, well, not what we had been accustomed to. But to our delight the palce seems fine.

Sitting higher than most of the places overlooking the “amile Harbor”

The First Meal

The hotel, as I had read was well known for thier restautants. They have two. The “Room with a View’ which is a up-scale, table cloth, low lighting type place. The “Bannan Tree” was a more causual place, or as they call it “Isalnd Casual” (No swim suits or sleveless shirts). We were promptly asked if we had a reservation and of course we did not. We wer offered on of three tables by the bar. The food was great but the service was from the bartender whom had too many things on his mind.

We did meet the owner, Elizibeth, who was taking reservations and assisting with seating near our table. She mentioned she had came here on her “first” honey moon and then returned to visit a girlfrined twenty-nine years ago and she was still here. She mentioned that her and her husband, Jerry, owned the restaurant. They used to have other restaurants, but thye were destroyed byt the “hurricane” and they decided to come here.

So the food was good the service not so good and the price was higher than expected at $80.00 for food and a two drinks.

The Internet

Well I tried from the room last night with no success, but here by the pool I found a open wireless connection. Ah, life is good.

St Thomas 2005 Vacation Day One

jeemster — Fri, 25 Mar 2005 09:16:00 GMT

The Sunrise

I am an early riser. So I like to see the sun rise. St Thomas, St. Thomas where we are sits in a basin surounded by hills. The Sunrize happens beyond the hill where we sit and so the sun is not visible as it rises from the horizon. Yet as always, it is a neat time of the day. You can hear roosters off in the distance as the city awakens.

No one appears to be awake in the hotel area. All is quiet except he constant fans frm the air conditioners.

A large crusie ship is dacking at the port. As I understand the crusie ships, they travel at night so when the people awaken they can be at a port.

Shopping

This is the place for shopping. When the crusies ships dock the shops fling thier doors open and the frensy begins. Jewlery sales is available everywhere. Why here?

Lots of jewlery. The variety of jewlery is amazing. any style from anywhere. The shop keepers are as varied as the jewels. A gentleman from India, been there for years. Had been married 30 years and said; “Keep the wife happy and whole familly will be happy.” A young women was from Norway. She related she just wanted a change.

Visisted a Dive shop and spoke with an great guy that told how they do thier dives in 40 ft of water and over a ship wreck.

The shops at the docks are amazing. the shops are in buildings like store-n-lockit buildings, row after row of buildings.

Breakfast

Dive shop guy reccomended a place arround the corner so we tried it. Two elderly women were working and as rental guy said, the service sucks. We were never even acknowledged we arrived. We sat patiently while they did their thing with this customer and that custumer and dissappeared int othe back and then reaapeared. Then we got a glance with a gaze of well, what do you want? We really only wanted coffee and a roll or something and the food was ok, but still expensive.

Lunch

Saw a tee shirt a guy was wearing that said; “When a person gets physically tred, one should rest. When a person gets emotionally tired, one should move one” -gladys It was an advertisement for a restaurant. So that was where we went for lunch. Good choice. The food was great. Watch out for the hot sauce, they are not kidding. The waitress was fun and much more attentive than most.

The Ocean

The “Bluebeard Resort” has a beach club down the road and a round the bend that is on the ocean. We went for a drive and stopped there for a dip in the ocean. The beech was nice, a little rocky but anytime you can get in the ocean is not bad. Sun was great.

Supper

The “Green House” We think as there is a picture of a parrot after the word “Green” is is really the Green parrot House”. We had grouper sandwiches, they were great. The cole slaw was a little spicy and not to our taste. The Margerittas were also better than most and two-for-one. We asked “jack” the waiter if he knew who had the really big sailbost that were docked on the water front. He said no, but the one was the world’s largest single mast sloop at 230 some feet and was about 50 million dollars.

Vacation 2005 - Getting Ready

jeemster — Wed, 16 Mar 2005 23:17:00 GMT

Things ya just gotta Know:

Passports for U.S. Citizens are not required for the U.S. Virgin Islands, but you must be prepared to show evidence of citizenship upon leaving (such as a birth certificate and photo ID).
The U.S. Virgin Islands are in the Atlantic standard time zone, one hour ahead of Eastern standard time (during daylight savings time only).
Virgin Islanders drive on the left side of the road.
English is the official language.
Our currency is the U.S. dollar. Traveler's checks and major credit cards are honored.
Postage in the U.S. Virgin Islands is the same as stateside. First-class mail to the U.S. automatically travels by air through the U.S. Postal Service.
You can direct-dial from the United States Virgin Islands to the U.S. mainland. The service connects callers to Europe and South America.
The electrical current is the same as in North America (standard 120 volt/60 cycle).
Tipping of 15 percent to 20 percent is customary for good service. Some hotels automatically add a service charge.
340 is the area code for all U.S. Virgin Islands phone numbers.
Casual clothes for warm weather. Our average temperature ranges between 77ºF and 83ºF.
Plenty of sunscreen. The use of sunscreen is recommended at all times, even on overcast days.
Take all the pictures you like, but please help us protect the islands' delicate ecological balance. Removing sea fans and living coral is against the law;
Collecting shells from the sea is strongly discouraged.