TabletPC pen enables Gmail.

I have finally started using my new Tablet PC, and I am happy!!

I have used Gmail for my personal, non work stuff, for Years I but have always hated its interface: too much mouse clicking.

With the pen, fiddly I can use it.

Ironic that I just installed the Thunderbird Imap interface to G mail.

Heck, the TabletPC may help me write more on this blog. If only I could carry this Tablet every where - but since I also have a work laptop, that's a bit too much. OQO?

Google Personal Accounting

I used to be an assiduous user of Quicken for my personal accounts. I found that I could easily enter my receipts on my pen computer (originally a Compaq Concerto, later a Toshiba Tablet), and on myKyocera SmartPhone.

But then a series of unfortunate events caused me to fall off the diligent accounting wagon:



a) my employer, stopped allowing us to use our personal computers at work - so I could not do my accounts, e.g., at lunch. (Well, actually, I could, but who wants to carry two laptops/tablets around).



b) my Kyocera SmartPhone\ did not die, but it refused to work at my desk at work in Oregon. Only AT&T/Cingular phones work most places at my work campus. So I switched phone companies and, in the US, this meant that I switched phones. My wife and I still miss our Kyocera.



We have not found another software package that allows receipts to be entered on our phones. Actually, even if we had, we have not found a phone that we like using as a smartphone- mainly because we have not found another stylus based phone, and we hate teensy weensy keyboards.



c) the last straw was when my desktop died a few years ago. It had not be been backed up for quite a while. Although I talked about disk recovery, I basically just gave up on accounting.







Now I want to get back on the wagon. So this morning before work I googled far accounting software. Quicken of course - in both Quicken Online, and offline versions, the latter with a web entry option.

Now, I want to be able to enter accounts offline, when not connected to the net. E.g.. in an airplane. But I also want to be able to enter from other then my main PC, e.g. from my phone the way I used to. And I also want both any wife and I to be able to use it. fleck, I want us both to be able to USE it-not just enter transactions, but browse accounts, etc.

So, Quicken Online works, except for the offline requirement; whereas Quicken Web Entry works, but doesn't give 2 users full access.

While searching, I byes wading: does Google have an online accounts program? I came across the following conversation:



http://www.readwriteweb.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/1880

I guess I am already an example: I am actively sanely for a web, plus offline, accounting system. And already use Google. I an wrestling with the security implication of online proud finance information - but heck, my bank and retirement and everyone else is all online. What would feet another do except provide one stop shopping for fraudsters?

Google has never done a good job at solving the "offline problem" - aka the "airplane problem". But apart from that, they rock.

I wonder which will care first: offline Google docs + spreadsheets 2 Calendar, on Google personal accounting?

eBeam

Yet another vain attempt to use Dave Sager's eBeam device to record my whiteboard scribblings.

By now, this device is so old that it would probably be best to buy a new one. Yet I cannot get buying a newone approved, because nobody ever really used the old one. Sager got it working, but its usage peetered out. I have never been able to get it working at all on my laptops.

It's a pity. I would love to have a way of recording what is written on a physical whiteboard. At the moment, it looks like a photograph is the best way... although I would love to record the time series.

Campaign Finance Reform - Not Limit - Matching Funds for "Equal Time"

Topher:

As I listened to yet another of the perpetual discussions about Campaign Finance Reform - what is it, Oregon Measure 47? - I came up with the following idea. It's new to me.

Instead of trying to limit campaign contributions, which has all sorts of free speech implications, how about encouraging them?

But, tax them in the following way:

If somebody contributes N dollars to a political purpose, require that a matching amount f*N dollars be placed in a fund for "equal time".

The "equal time" funds would be distributed as follows: everyone - any citizen, any voter, whatever - gets an equal share of the "equal time" fund. He or she can assign his or her share of the funds to whatever cause or organization he or she wishes.

E.g.

* some might assign all of their funds to their party, Democratic or Republican or ...

* some might assign their funds to their church

* I would probably assign my share to a "Contrarian" organization, dedicated to debunking the top 10 mistruths publicized by the original donation. E.g. I would fund counter attacks against the Small Boat Veterans for Truth in the Kerry campaign, but equally fund counter attacks against Democrat mistruths.

Bottom Line: the "equal time" funds would be distributed democratically. Each person would control his share of the money.

The ratio f might be set equal to 1; it might even be larger than one. Without loss of generality, let us talk as if f=1.

In such a situation, half of the money in politics would be distributed as it is now, according to the incliniations of the wealthy; but half would be distributed on a per capita basis. A plutocrat seeking to advance his cause would have to balance his expenditure against the consideration that he is also financing his opponents.

The downside, of course, is that the "equal time" funds are distributed proportionately. But it's like Churchill said: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others."

One might even be able to have a graduated scale for the "equal time" funds: the poor might not have to match such funding, but the rich might. If you are a progressive, though, beware of what you ask for: the Republican party has many more small contributirs than does the Democratic party, which is funded mainly by a small number of wealthy individuals (and then unions).

I think this scheme might be able to meet US Supreme Court standards: it is not restricting free speech. It is just taxing it; and taxing it in a way that is eminently neutral. All speech gets taxed; and the taxes on free speech encourage still more free speech. By the way, that is not "free as in beer" free speech, eh?

Lest it become too dificult to tell what is a political contribution ad what is not, how about making this just be a tax on ALL advertizing, commercial, politucal, or otherwise?

Colored Zips

I was just fumbling with my rollaboard - the sort of carryon luggage one rolls through airports, designed to fit into an airplane's overhead storage. I am now rolling one around at work, since I am carrying my bicycle gear - helmet, jacket, etc. - and I often do not have time to go to my office.

Anyway, I was fumbling with my rollaboard, looking for the pocket into which I had placed my lunch. 6 choices, different sized pockets. I ended up opening them all.

Although size and position of the zipped pocket should be a clue, how about another:

I seem to remember colors very well. If the pockets all had zips of different colors, it might make it easier to remember which pocket you had slipped something into.

Save USEnet! Start posting in XHTML with SVG.

Save USEnet! Start posting in XHTML with SVG.

Ideal Communication Tool

On 9/17/06, Dean Kent wrote:

So - let me ask you a question: Do you have an idea of what would be your
ideal tool for all your communication needs? Without sticking to what
exists today. For example, if everyone on Usenet would instantly convert to
this new tool as well as everyone else you currently communicate with, or
download information from, etc. What kind of things would such a tool need
to do in order to satisfy you (Yes, I read your post all the way through,
but it seems like much of it was based upon 'what is', rather than 'what
would be ideal'.)

Just curious... (of course, you can post the answer to comp.arch if you
wish, rather than directly to me - if you desire to answer it at all).

I may post it to my blog, but it's off-topic for comp.arch. Not sure what USEnet group it would be on-topic for.

First off, "without sticking to what exists today" is impractical. The purpose of a communication tool is communication - the best tool is useless if there is nobody to talk to. So, a first requirement is that the tool talk all of the standard protocols - email, nntp, IM, RSS, etc.

Let's start off with the text oriented tools:
I/O: email, USEnet news, blogging, IM'ing
I was about to put RSS down as input ony, but that is not true - I may have a wiki site that generates an RSS feed to others.

Output: one of my key desires is multimode multicast: you compose a block of text. Maybe with graphics - your favorite format, XML, with graphic SVG, bitmaps, etc. You want to be able to send it or post it to any subset of selected services. NOT you cut and paste it from one to another, e.g. write email and cut and paste it to post in your wiki. Instead, you write the text once, and then you can set one or all of the following:
Email: To, CC, and Bcc
USEnet newsgroups to post to
Blog sites to post to
e.g. I often want to post the same item to my inside-the-company internal blog and my external blogger blog
Wiki sites to post to
wikis are a bit odd in that they are context sensitive - typically you click on a page.
but nevertheless I find that I often need the same stuff posted in more than one wiki
Similarly, many wiki pages contain text boxes and the like, such as TWiki's comment.
All of these are really separate potential output streams
IM conversations to post to
Yes, occasionally I am in 3 or 4 IM conversations at once - not the same conversation, but several separate
- and I want to post something to more than one
FAX: send to fax
SMS: send to cell phone text

I want to be able to create a "list" which consists of any or all of the above.

Note: above I am just talking about a user interface for media. I am not designing new media. Let's do a media mode taxonomy, and see if anything is missing:
Email: transient, deferred, disconnected, point to point
Blog: transient, semi-permanent, but temporal; deferred, disconnected, broadcast, one to many
IM: immediate, point to point (with multicast); transient, temporal
Wiki: permanent, reference - not intened to be temporal


Out of all of these, I think that what is missing are tools to assist you in cretaing both the transient, temporally contextual, stuff, as well as the current latest reference stuff. E.g. I was in a meeting this AM. Rajeev wrote up minutes: I updated our POR (Plan of Record) document. It would be nice if we could get both at once.

I guess that I am really vocifereously arguing against having to do things more than once.

Also... I think that everybody, every individual, needs a personal issue tracking system. Something to keep track of the highest priority thing to do next.

Note that YOU said "communications system". I said "communications and information management system". Communication is just one form of information. Memory is another. I want my communications, both incoming and outgoing, to be prioritized in the same list as my To-do items.

Most issue tracking systems are too heavyweight. You have to create an issue report. I want to be able to just say "Action Required" in a document, e.lg. in an outgoing email, and I want an entry in the issue tracker to be automatically created. (E.g. with a pointer back to the orignal document, possibly with the surrounding paragraphs extracted to explain the issue.

Similarly "Action Required By YYYY MM DD" should automatically do the date extraction thing. As should PORs, etc.

The personal information management system should track resources. So, e.g., if you commit to 3 days of work here, and 4 there, in the next 5 days, it should warn you of an overcommit.

... But you asked about communications, not calendaring, so I will not go too far down this path in this email.

Let's return to communication. We have already talked about multimodal multicast output. Now let's talk about input:


Basically, I see all of these separate input streams - email, RSS, IM, phone, etc.

I want my filtering going on, prioritizing. E.g. any communication from my wife or boss takes priority, no matter the input channel.

I want the same reader interface to be used for all inputs. Certainly easy enough to see for textual. For recorded voice or video, similarly easy.

For live voice or video, may be harder - you snooze, you lose. Although that's actually part of what I want to avoid. Record everything - all text, all voice, all visual inputs. If you are listening in on 2 phone meetings simulaneously while listening to email, have the ability to play back the last 2 minutes when something catches your ear. Compress... it's fairly easy to compress voice into 1/3rd the elapsed time. So, do small scale time shifting and scaling - listen in a minute or so behind. With this, you may actually be able to listen to several meetings all at once, without losing anything.

Speech to text - its a help. I can manage 4 IM conversations, but only 2 phone meetings.

Enough for now. I will now cut and paste this to my blog.