"I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious. " - Albert Einstein

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Outlook 2010

New Version Scheduled for Release June 2010

A new version of Microsoft Outlook is scheduled to be released on June 15, 2010 While this may or may not be of interest to you as a user, if you are one to send out email newsletters as part of your business, it's arrival is certainly anticipated. There's been a lot of speculation as to whether this edition of Microsoft's email client will change the way we design for email. Did Microsoft take the concerns of the web community and the fixoutlook.org movement to heart and make any of the suggested improvements. What's in store for us with this new release? Is it better or worse?

Well, there is some good news and some bad news. The good news is that nothing has really changed. The bad news is that nothing has really changed. Just like its predecessor, this release of Outlook will be using Word to render HTML emails. According to Microsoft, who said they are listening to the web / internet community, it was just too late in the development cycle to make any real significant changes to the product. Perhaps next time. Dev Balasubramanian, from the Outlook team, has been quoted as saying:

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Saturday, March 20, 2010

Date Picker

A Javascript Calendar and Date Picker Solution

Have you ever needed to create a form that allowed the user to select a date from either a series of combo boxes for month, day and year, or by using a calendar date picker. User a date picker is relatively easy, and I've chosen to use the Date-Picker Widget V5 available from the frequency decoder website. The problem comes with wanting the combo box for the days of the month to accurately represent the selected month, whether the user selects the month using the combo box or the date picker. Also, the days of the month need to be correct for the month of February if it is a leap year or not. The script below will accomplish both using three combo boxes for the day, month and year coupled with the Date-Picker Widget V5.

Check out the DEMO here.

The trick is to get the combo boxes working in sync with the calendar date-picker. Here's how...

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Sunday, March 14, 2010

Hippopost

Send Your FREE Printed Postcard Today

Now for something completely new and different. Hippopost™ is an exciting new web-2-mail marketing platform that transforms consumer correspondence into social marketing opportunities. Automatically create and send FREE personalized printed postcards using your own photos. There are three ways to send your postcards:

HippoMobile: use your mobile smartphone
HippoSocial: using your Facebook account
HippoOnline: using the online interface

HippoPost takes care of all the printing and mailing.

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Saturday, March 6, 2010

Hiring A Home Inspector

Should You Trust Your Real-Estate Recommended Home Inspector

Are you buying a new home? If you are like most people, this is probably the largest investment you will ever make. Most likely, one of the purchase conditions will be that you have a home inspection performed, usually within a few days, and are satisfied with the results. An analysis of the property, conducted by a specially trained and completely objective home inspector, will often identify non-functioning systems, damaged building components, safety issues and poor-quality installations. But how do you go about finding a good, objective home inspector?

Finding A Good Home Inspector
Most people don’t have the foggiest idea about where to start looking and simply ask their real estate agent to recommend someone. Though this is certainly easiest method, it may not provide the best inspector for you. Many home buyers look in the phone book for an inspector. Or do a search on the Internet. Or ask their friends and family for the name of an inspector they have used in the past. Which approach is best?

Chances are you will not get to meet the person you hire before he or she shows up to the inspection. Before this, your first contact will be on the phone. Here is your chance to ask questions and see if he or she is a good fit for you. For most people, the first questions usually centers around price. How much do you charge for a home inspection? Let me say, if you want a thorough inspection done on the property expect to pay at least $250.00, and maybe up to $600.00 or more, depending on where you live. If you pay anything less than this, plan to be disappointed. You probably didn’t buy the least expensive house available, so why would you consider the cheapest inspection?

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Thursday, March 4, 2010

SpringPad

How do you capture all the stuff that you want to remember?

Just found this great new site. It's called SpringPad. In short, Springpad is a free personal organizer to save and use just about anything — recipes, products, restaurants, ideas, notes, articles, and more.

Some of the things you might want to use SpringPad for:

Organization
Put your to-do lists in springpad and get rid of paper notes. Keep notes on anything. Set alarms to text or email reminders to you.

Food
Collect recipes from any website. Create meal plans with a full list of ingredients. Make lists of restaurants you love or want to try.

Home
Keep track of weekly chores and events. Track receipts and budgets, home remodeling projects, and your pet's medical history.

Travel
Put your packing lists, hotel/rental car confirmation numbers, and Google Maps in one place. Keep track of places you want to visit.

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Tuesday, March 2, 2010

AddThis

Your content. Everywhere.

AddThis is a free way to boost traffic back to your site by making it easier for visitors to share your content. I haven't added this to my website yet, but plan to do so shortly.

Help your users share your content everywhere. Generate traffic back to your site and increase your site's search engine ranking. It only takes seconds to get AddThis, and it's free! Here are just a few great AddThis features:

• Smartest sharing tool
• Largest collection of services
• Supports over 50 languages
• Faster performance
• Highly customizable
• Powerful analytics
• Private and secure
• Share Flash widgets

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