Quote- Steve Jobs & Exit Strategies (37signals): When I did the business plan competition, “Exit Strategy” was a required section of the plan. I didn’t really know how to answer besides, “Umm, none?”
Eek! A Male! (wsj): This is true. I’m actually self-conscious about being pinned as such, and it’s not healthy. On a side note, this is the second article from Lenore Skenazy I’m linking to from this week. I think I found a new favorite writer.
A major complaint about Windows Vista is that everytime you try to do something, Vista asks you if you want to allow it or not. Anyone who uses Vista immediately experiences this when they try to do anything. Today, we turn off that feature.
With all the news in politics happening lately, I’ve almost forgotten why I started this blog: to talk tech. It’s what I know best. Well, here you go: My thoughts on Apple’s newest iteration of the iPod Shuffle.
I’ve posted thoughts on Apple and their precious iPod before, but this is pretty baffling. This shuffle is the smallest it’s ever been at 1.8″ tall and 0.3″ in thickness. That’s smaller than a key, which is pretty cool. However, when you need a guide to controlling the thing, there is a problem. 1 click to play/pause, 2 clicks to go forward, 3 clicks to go back. Other controls to traverse through playlists. I mean it’s cool that it talks to you and all since there is no screen on the device, but there is actually nothing on the device.
Right- the controller is actually on the headphones, and that is where my main problem lies. This new shuffle is limiting you to using Apple’s proprietary headphones or paying extra to buy an adapter to use your own. You need an adapter to use different headphones for your own mp3 player.
Apple touts all of this as innovative- small because it should be small; convenient, easy-to-use controls. But nixing a back and forward button is not innovative- it’s making something overly complicated and saying it’s innovative because no one has done it. And believe me, there is a reason.
At the beginning of the year I wanted to find all-inclusive, online accounting software. That is, something that kept track of invoicing, other income, and expenses. As much as I loved Zoho Invoices, I needed expense tracking. So after doing some research, I settled on Less Accounting. Here are my thoughts.
Pros:
You can import contacts from Highrise, GMail, or Basecamp
It has expense tracking
You can upload receipts to go along with each expense
It’s relatively cheap
The dashboard is pretty nice (though total income and expenses would be nice)
The reports features are nice
Cons:
Recurring invoices do not auto send – why even have recurring invoices if I still need to go in and send it myself?
Recurring invoices weren’t working at all for 3 weeks after I first started using it
Email messages do no format- All of my emails when sending invoices have been on one line no matter how I format it
No “Mark Invoice as paid.” I actually have to go in, add a payment, reenter all the invoice information and then associate an invoice with the payment
Import Highrise contacts also wasn’t working for a while after I first started using it. I reported both this and the invoices twice
In order for my recurring expenses to have a name, they must be associated with a contact, so all my recurring invoices say “No Contact” instead of the reference name, like “Monthly Subscription to X”
I had to fix one of my recurring expenses to actually get it to show up, and my other ones still aren’t because I need to fix them, which isn’t very intuitive. If I set the 7th of each month as a recurring expense, it should show up on the 7th (or maybe even a few days before)
An “Include Paypal link,” while not detrimental, would be nice. Zoho Invoices had it and I used that quite a bit
All-in-all I’m not to impressed by Less Accounting, despite all the rage about it, and the fact that they sponsor a site called, “We All Hate Quickbooks.” The design is nice as are some of the features, but they took some liberties on user experience (or poorly designed their databases), leading to some pretty big grievances.
Did I miss something? Am I doing something wrong? Comments are open.
When she wrote, “Dear Mr. President” it pissed me off mainly because she didn’t make a single good point. Now she has a new song out called, “Sober,” where she sings, “How do I feel this good sober.” Oh Pink. You’re so deep. And no one will take your lyrics the wrong way. Good thing her target audience isn’t the 13-17 crowd.
