When you talk about scripting and/or programming, the average person looks at you with the “deer in the headlights” look. Unless you are a programmer yourself, there is something about this topic that makes most computer users cringe and recoil in horror.
These are people who are very happy to use their Mac or Windows PC as-is to get things done. Even though I’m not a programmer myself, I’ve had enough experience to realize that there are MANY tasks that people do that can be either enhanced, done quicker or done more efficiently through the use of automated scripts.
About a year ago, I posted about an Apple repair where it was not covered by Applecare. We had a relatively new Intel iMac begin to malfunction severely outside of the one year warranty. It was a helpless feeling to know that fixing it would require spending some money and time at an Apple store to remedy the situation.
Well, it was a gamble and in that case it didn’t work out. Recently, I had the opposite experience. My own personal iMac at home began to malfunction in a similar fashion. It was fine one day, and unusable the next. The hard drive decided it was retiring from active service.
The first thing I did – after taking a deep breath – was to check if my iMac was covered by Applecare. I couldn’t remember for sure. I had to scramble to find my paperwork (computer stuff is filed together at home). What a pleasant surprise it was to discover that not only did I get Applecare with the iMac, but I was still covered for it!
When I saw the news item the other day, I was blown away. Is it really 20 years since Adobe Photoshop was introduced to the universe? Unbelievable…
In the computing industry, there are a handful of applications that have had major impacts on the world and how people get their creative work done. Photoshop is one of those programs. The impact it has had is immeasurable and it has forever changed the way we look at images in print and on screen. It has gotten so big that “photoshop” has become a verb, for manipulating images. What is amazing to me is that this ONE, almost magical program has created an industry all its own and many careers and businesses have been built up around it. I include myself in that statement as I have found Photoshop to be an indispensable tool.
Yesterday, I had an interesting experience with an Apple Airport based wireless network. There’s a pre-existing network based on an Airport Extreme base station as well as an Airport Express, functioning as an extension to widen the reach of the network. This particular network was one I had set up a few years ago and it has been functioning just fine for the longest time. It’s had Macs connected via standard wired ethernet as well as using the wireless access.
But yesterday, a Dell laptop came to town. The goal was to get it online using the wireless, password protected, airport network. Sure, it could connect using an empty ethernet port on the network switch, but that’s the easy way out. With all this hi-tech wireless stuff, it should be able to login to the wireless network, right? All I needed was the password key for the network and then, voila! Well, that’s pretty straightforward, except for one problem.
Today, Intrigue is giving a big business presentation. We have a meeting with a potential client that we would really like to work with on an ongoing basis. Actually, we’ve already done a few small projects for this client before, but we’re interested in diversifying and increasing the work we do for them.
The basic premise of the presentation is to show the client what we at Intrigue do, and more importantly, CAN DO. Sometimes, even when a person knows you, it can be very beneficial to prepare a small presentation to package your services and talents. Our client allowed us the opportunity to come in and “show our stuff”. It was a very welcome moment as it would be wonderful to be working with this account on a regular basis.
However, the problem was that we had less than a week to prepare the presentation and a budget of ZERO. Well, ok then! We’re a creative group – this should be straightforward. All we needed was a plan. So the idea was to create a slideshow with some of our best work.
Well, the odds said the risk was low. Very low. Not quite zero, but certainly close to it. We had the AppleCare signup in our hands with days to go in the original iMac Warranty. And we chose to gamble and not sign up.
And we lost!
The Intel iMacs have gotten excellent reviews overall. People love using them and they have been overly reliable. Sure, the occasional problem has been reported, but usually those are exceptions and not the rule. We bought three in late 2007. During the first year of heavy use, we had no unusual problems. Typical maintenance issues – all fixable.
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