Digital Meanderings
Meanderings of a coder

As a business traveler I spent a lot of time on airplanes. Last year alone I took over 100 different flights. All the time I was sitting in the plane, I was curious about the goings on in the cockpit. I would imagine flying the plane myself, breaking free from gravity and rising above the clouds.

Last Saturday I took the first step to becoming a pilot - I took what is called a Discovery Flight at the Ascent Pilot Training Center in Sioux Falls, SD. It was an awe inspiring experience.

Meeting the Instructor
My flight was scheduled for 1:30pm and I arrived a little early. In fact I arrived earlier than the instructor. A few minutes later my instructor, Jeff, arrived. He explained to me the basics of how everything works, gave me a headset and we walked out to the tarmac.

On the Tarmac
If you’ve ever taken a commercial flight you’ve probably seen the maintenance people, or the pilot, walking around the plane. He’s looking for any visual indication of problems with the plane - dents, hanging pieces, holes, etc. They also check the fuel to ensure that there is no water in it. The same is true with pilots of smaller aircraft.

After Jeff and I neared the plane, a Cessna C-172 S, we did a walk-around. He was looking for any visual damage, checking to make sure all of the flaps, etc moved properly and he also checked the fuel.

Then we climbed into the cockpit and he showed me the controls - the autopilot, the Garmin G1000 cockpit system. The airplane even had an XM radio!

Next he showed me how to operate the foot pedals and then we taxied down the tarmac towards the runway. After we got on the runway he let me control the plane for a little while. It was a very weird experience considering driving the plane on the ground is all done with your feet. Unfortunately I did pretty bad at driving the plane.

A few minutes later Jeff took control of the plane, called into the radio tower and then taxied down the runway. A few minutes after that we were airborne.

Airborne
After we were safely a few hundred feet in the air, I was allowed to take controls and take the plane to 1400ft. Then we started flying around and I was shown the autopilot.

The autopilot is exactly like you think it is, set your heading, set your altitude and hit go. The autopilot then fly’s the plane for you. Jeff then told me to change the heading West, South, East and then had me take control again and fly North.

As I was turning I asked how hard the plane could be turned. Jeff grabbed the control and turned the plane almost on its side then he said “This is about how far.” At least I think that’s what he said, I was to busy grabbing my spleen off the floor.

Floating in Mid-Air
After a few more minutes of getting used to the controls, we turned to head back to the airport. As we were flying he mentioned that he didn’t want to scare me too much on my first flight. It turns out I was being baited, and, of course, I took the bait. “No, please do,” I responded to his comment. To which he pulled back the yolk and we started a steep climb. He was going to stall the plane. As he was explaining this to me, the plane stalled, the nose fell and I became weightless. I wish I could say that I relaxed enough that I could thoroughly enjoy the experience of complete weightlessness but I wasn’t. In fact, I believe my exact words were “Waaoooooohhhhhhh Shhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!” To which Jeff laughed maniacally. (He didn’t really laugh maniacally, it just makes the story sound better.)

Back to base
After descending to a safe altitude, we circled Sioux Falls and then came in for a landing.

Landing in a small aircraft is very different than landing in a larger jet. Besides the size, normally you’re sitting on the sides of the plane so you don’t see the ground coming. In the cockpit you can see the ground coming, you can see how uneven the plane is coming in.

Redux
My first flight was an amazing experience that I will never forget. I recommend that you check it out if you have a chance. It is definitely worth the money! Spend the time, search for flight schools in your area.

Although I don’t have many regulars readers, I’d like to change that. I’ll never be a Leo Laporte, John C. Dvorak, Amber MacArthur or any other of the other web populars. But I would like to write things that interest people, that cause them to think.

In its short history my blog has been a plethora of things. Serious articles, tales from my life, links from Digg, paid stories, etc. This has contributed to its post count but it has also increased its noise. I still want to share the things that I find on the internet but don’t care enough to write about. And I will continue to share them on Geekkink.com my Tumblog.

My current blog, zechariahs.org, will contain the interesting things that I find, read about, or hear and that I care to write more about. If I wish to just link to things, or share a pretty picture, that kind of stuff can now be found on my tumblog, Geekkink.com.

I hope this change makes my blog more interesting and a more substantive source of information.

As many readers of this blog realize, I’ve been searching for financial programs that run on Mac OS. Unfortunately all of the software that I’ve tested thus far has sucked something fierce. Enter Billings 2 written by Marketcircle.

Billings 2 is a program that manages time tracking and invoicing.

The basis of time tracking is the “Time Slip.” A Time Slip can be thought of a piece of paper that identifies what you’re working on and how long it takes. (I think a lot of contractors can relate to this time tracking philosophy.) Time Slips are then bundled together into Invoices.

The application also tracks taxes, estimates, and retainers.

The application data seems to be stored in SQL Lite. This makes reporting easier.

This leads me to my favorite part of the application - the reporting engine. It is the most powerful reporting engine feature that I’ve come across. If you are familiar with Oracle Reports, or any other reporting engine then you can pretty much jump right into creating your own Invoices. For an in-depth look at the reporting engine and how to create custom invoices, check out the Report Engine Concepts document.

Overall, I definitely think that any consultant looking to change applications, or looking to make the switch to Mac should take a look at this application.

Billings 2 is provided by Marketcircle and costs $59.

If you’re not familiar with the movie “Hackers” I suggest you do a little research before reading the article. May I even suggest buying the movie Hackers?

Anyway, this post is about Razor and Blade the “elite” hackers that Kate and Dade visit when they need help dealing with the feds. They are self-proclaimed media icons and run a pirate television show named “Hack the Planet.”

I understand that podcasting isn’t illegal so they do not share that in common but they do share more important commonalities. Both of them are below the radar of mainstream media and Both of them have huge followings.

And just like Razor and Blade when their broadcast was received all around the world, podcasting is breaking through. With the sale of one-hundred million iPods podcasts are more popular than ever. In the fray are not only iPods but many other multi-media devices such computers, PDAs, and other “MP3″ players. All of these add up to an ever growing market for podcasting.

Thanks Razor and Blade for being the fathers of podcasting! Sorry Adam, I know you’re the true father of podcasting but I think they beat you buy a few years …

In light of the recent Massacre at Virginia Tech many universities are responding with their condolences and with assurances as to the security of their campus. My college, Bloomsburg University, is no exception.

The President of the University, Jessica S. Kozloff, wrote her own letter. In this letter she expresses her condolences to those at Virginia Tech. She also goes on to answer seven questions that have been brought to her attention. Her answer to the second question worries me.

2. Do we have Instant Messaging (IM) or text messaging or a central public address system?
Our communications system is described above. We do not have instant text messaging capability at this time. This technology is very new to most university campuses, but it is certainly something that we will look at very seriously. The campus is too large for a central public address system.

Instant Messaging is a new technology? How many years must a technology be around before it considered new?

A brief Google search returns a plethora of information about IM and its history. Specifically, Wikipedia provides an excellent history.
According to that article instant messaging has been around since the 1970’s and, in its current incarnation, since 1997. So at the bare minimum IM has been around for ten years. How is it new?

I understand this is only one administrator, and this is only one example of a lack of technological understanding. But is this a sign of a bigger problem? A sign of a general lack of understanding when it comes to technology? If it is, it would be very worrisome. Although technology is not a silver bullet, it most certainly helps, especially in situations where time may be short.

In the end, I believe that we to ensure that people in power know and understand the technology that is available. They also need to be informed of its strengths and its weaknesses.

Edit 2007-04-18 - Turns out another school has the same problem understanding technology. This time it involves caller ID, a bomb threat and a case of mistaken identity.

As an avid Billy Joel fan, I love the song “We Didn’t Start the Fire.” As a psycho, I know all the words and the historical significance of each lyric. Since insomnia has set in this evening I was tempted to create my own post linking to the historical references made in the song. But, as is almost always the case, the interweb has beat me to it! So instead of writing it myself, I will link to the Wikipedia article - We Didn’t Start the Fire.

Edit: Since I know most people are as lazy as I am, I’d like to mention a link I found at the bottom of the Wikipedia entry. A flash version of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” that shows the historical references.

Well it seems that spring has finally arrived here in South Dakota and that means spring cleaning. Since I don’t own a home nor do I rent a garage, spring cleaning has always taken on a digital flavor for me. Here are some of the things I do.

Bookmarks
If you’re like me, you tend to bookmark a lot. Especially those websites that you don’t have time to read immediately but would like to check out later. After a year of saving those websites and all the other sites that I found interesting, informative, funny or just bookmarkable I have collected tons of bookmarks. My solution? Transfer my bookmarks to del.icio.us.

del.icio.us has been around a while but here are some tips to make your life easier:

• Download the new del.icio.us extension for Firefox. This extension syncs your bookmarks with the ones stored on del.icio.us.
• Clean-up your tags. It’s very easy to add multiple, similar tags. This can be very confusing when you’re searching for something. So take some time now and consolidate your tags.
• Get rid of unused bookmarks. In this age of virtually unlimited storage it’s very easy to keep addind and adding. Unfortunately this leads to a ton of extraneous bookmarks and it adds time when you’re searching. Take some time now get rid of these unused bookmarks.

In order to keep your bookmarks more organized in the future, be sure to organize them as you go. Review your tag list before you select one. After you read a bookmarked site for the first time, decide whether to keep it or not. If you keep it, make sure the tags you’ve selected are related to the site. If you choose to delete it, delete it now!

Files
Each year hard drives are getting larger and larger. We have online storage, network storage, CDs, DVDs and more. With all this storage space it is very easy to keep everything we download from applications to documents. Do you really need all of this stuff? Nope it is just taking up space so clean it up now!

To make spring cleaning easier for years to come, organize your files as you download or create them. I recommend downloading your files to the same directory every time, but please don’t use your desktop!

E-Mail
A lot of articles of this type explain how important it is to keep your Inbox clean. If you’re using Outlook or Thunderbird this becomes extremely important. Inbox folders grow very quickly! I recommend switching to GMail. It allows for tagging which allows you to easily organize your emails. Unfortunately Gmail’s tags lead to the same problem as we encounter with del.icio.us. So make sure you go through those tags too!

Do you have any other tips for spring cleaning for the digital age? Post a comment!

I recently made the switch from Windows to Mac OS. I’ve really been enjoying my new Mac unfortunately it seems that companies who make financial software haven’t realized that they are missing a huge market.

Before I switched I used MS Money to manage my personal finances and Quickbooks Simple Start to manage my business finances. Unfortunately both of these arenas have poor counterparts in the Mac world. Below are some quick reviews of some of the software I’ve found and evaluated.

Business Accounting

• Connected

  This is my least favorite of all. The UI is lackluster to say the least and none of the reports can be user modified.

  The UI looks like it was designed by Software Developers or by someone with no idea about UI design. The menu is filled with acronyms and instead of drop-down menus the user must click different buttons to bring up the menus they need.

  The reports included in the application are sufficient but they can not be customized. They seem to be designed for people that sell actual items, and not services. In itself this is fine, but the other programs I used allowed me to modify the reports to fit my needs and the needs of my customers.

• MYOB FirstEdge

  This has been my favorite application to play with. The UI is superb, the application is extremely easy to figure out and the reports are customizable.

  MYOB definitely spent some time designing the UI. The application is easy to navigate which makes it easy to learn even for us non-accountants.

  Although the reports are customizable the tool for modifying the reports could use some work. Resizing boxes and fields is difficult because you must click in exactly the right spot inside the “resize” icon or else you’ll move the whole box or field.

  It also seems that snap-to-grid is always on when using the arrow keys and I couldn’t find a way to disable it. Snap-to-Grid is a great feature for lining things up, but in some instances I needed greater flexibility and the mouse (the only way to move an object without Snap-to-grid) wasn’t accurate enough.

  There are two features I wish this had. One of them is the ability to group transactions with the same account number. I do consulting work and, as per the clients wishes, I charge to certain account numbers depending on the work I perform. It would be nice to see these transactions grouped together so both of us can see how much is being charged to each account number.

  The other feature is one that would allow me to track Sales Tax without charging it to the customer. The hourly rate I charge includes all taxes so I can’t charge it to the customer, but I would to print a report at tax time that shows me what I owe to each agency.

Personal Accounting

• Liquid Ledger

  Another great piece of software I just didn’t find it worth the price considering I already own Money and Parallels.

  Unfortunately the application is missing two things that are important to me - a Palm application and the ability to automatically sync with my bank account.

• iBank

  This is my favorite out of the personal finance software I tested. The UI is slick, and importing from MS Money was a breeze once I formatted the date correctly.

  Just like Liquid Ledger, it is missing a Palm application and the ability to automatically sync with my bank.

• Money Dance

  Another great personal finance application. It has a slick UI and is pretty easy to use. Unfortunately it has the same flaw as the other two - lack of Palm support and limited ability to sync with my Palm PDA.

For now it looks like I’ll be sticking with doing every financial using Windows running on Parallels. I was really hoping to switch everything to Mac OS unfortunately that seems impossible given my requirements. If anyone has a suggestion, please email me or post a comment!

Although I don’t necessarily agree that Microsoft will die, this article does make some good points as to the problems with Microsoft.

read more | digg story

Google entering the phone market? Sounds like a win to me. All of their other applications are great, I use almost all of them. If their phone works like their applications I’d definitely consider purchasing one. As long as it is Mac compatible and works on Verizon’s network,

read more | digg story