Thursday, January 8, 2009
Breakfast: sliced apple, water. Focus group followup. Helped student MY with a question about Sophos. Focus group pizza order followup. Discovered that the Sophos download provided by OAAIS leads to a website with an expired SSL certificate, which is a complicated, 4-click workaround in Firefox and a 1-click workaround in most other browsers. Reported the problem to OAAIS. Continued troubleshooting error "Please wait while Windows configures Adobe Acrobat 8.1.3" which no longer appears when right-clicking files on the Windows desktop or in Windows Explorer but still appears when launching any Office application such as Word, Excel, Outlook, or PowerPoint. I solved part of the problem using the solution found by searching the web on "Kostic Branislav - 12:49am Aug 15, 07 PST". Today I again tried the solution found by searching the web on "Bueford Tannon - 6:55am Mar 31, 08 PST". The Bueford Tannon solution did not work for me when I tried it in November, and it did not work for me when I tried it again today on a different computer. Purchased a printer cable at the Tech Store. Helped student CF with a listserv question. Websteering lunch with John K at NKRB. IT Services meeting. Completed installation of Shirin's printer. Prepped imagery for the BTS website. Troubleshot color printer stuck tray problem, called Sak Y for service. Reviewed new wireless instructions for Rebecca and OAAIS. Troubleshot a Belkin USB hub that was giving Chris trouble—swapped it with the identical one on my desk, no problems, gave him mine with additional suggestions on how to isolate. Home. Opened a package that Susie L had sent recently: a gift basket with gourmet coffee grounds and a medium-sized coffee cake! Delightful! Dinner at home with Patrick: hawaiian pizza. Dessert: coffee cake with hot mayan cocoa spice tea. Edited and uploaded photos to Flickr. Recently 2 different people on 2 different days told me that they were reluctant to buy a Mac because the mouse had only one button. I laughed at this because Apple's current mice—the Mighty Mouse and the Wireless Mighty Mouse—both have the 2nd button that these people wanted but you can't tell that it does just from looking at the mouse. Apple's elegant design hides the 2nd button underneath the case; it detects left-clicks and right-clicks just the same as a non-Apple 2-button mouse. Apple's current mice actually have 4 buttons—the 3rd button is under the scroller ball (press the ball down to activate it) and the 4th button is activated by squeezing the sides of the mouse. I have my button #3 set to Dashboard and button #4 is not set to anything. (I have an irrational fear that if I squeeze the mouse then something might ooze out.) To me, this situation of people reluctant to purchase Apple computers based on the lack of a 2-button mouse is an example of Apple design gone slightly awry in that marketability based on familiarity did not seem to have been accounted for in the design of the mice. I would not have expected anyone to say that the lack of a 2-button mouse was a dealbreaker, and, ultimately, it probably isn't with the 2 people I talked to, but it does create an unnecessary hurdle that the customer and Apple must clear in order to complete a sale. I still find it silly that when you buy a black-and-silver MacBook or MacBook Pro your Apple Remote and power adapter and power cord are all white. These should be either silver or black. Similarly, the Apple Keyboard should be silver and black, and the Mighty Mouse should be either silver or black. On an unrelated note, I predict that Apple will eventually release computers in colored aluminum similar to colored anodized aluminum products we began seeing in the 1990's. I predict that the first release will have a small set of colors—perhaps 5 or 6. If successful, a wider palette will follow. Kind of like how the iPod line grew to include iPods of color. Tomorrow is the last day of Macworld, and although I have a ticket to the exhibit hall I'm not going to go. There's too much to do at work, and Apple announced nothing particularly exciting to me on Tuesday.