AppleWorks for the Apple II, when supplemented with the TimeOut tools from Beagle Bros, was one of the best suites of Office software I have ever used. The simple but powerful macro programming capabilities of Beagle's Timeout Ultramacros in particular was way ahead of its time, and to this day I don't know that I've ever used a similar automation tool that was so easy to use while still being capable of controlling everything about the software.
The only thing Apple II AppleWorks didn't handle that forced me to switch to a PC based office product in the early 90's was footnoting. I had to repaginate by hand too often to fit them in and that killed my productivity when doing heavily reference-laden work in college.
Ack, bad typo, twice no less. That's 1981 for the 3.5" floppy, started showing up in designs people remember in the 1984 Macintosh. URL: http://www.macgeek.org/museum/sony400kdrive/
The guy running this site is going to hate me for doing this, but: you can see frequency response graphs of the various iPod EQ settings at:
http://www.modeemi.fi/~vesas/iPod_Audio.pdf
iPod settings like "Bass Booster" increase the level at 20Hz by up to 6dB relative to the midrange. In practice, with even remotely accurate headphones this amount of EQ makes for incredibly overblown bass. I question whether anyone who finds this insufficient is qualified to make an audio quality judgement about anything.
I personally find the "Electronic" setting on the iPod to be the only useful one that boosts the low bass a bit without totally destroying the music you're listening to. It's about a +/-1.5dB countouring emphasising low frequencies while cutting back around 300Hz and 7KHz where a lot of headphones (and MP3 files!) are a bit rough anyway.
I'm also using the Verizon 5220 and am pretty happy with it. In areas where the EVDO is strong (I've used it in Baltimore and NYC), I regularly get 300Kbps, and the reliability of the connection is average as such things go. Well worth the $80 a month to me because it serves both as a backup line to my cable modem at home should that go down and as a full solution when I'm on the road. It's also great fun to have something like this that works fairly well even when barreling down the highway; I recently submitted some work I had to get finished by the end of day from I95 at 65MPH while on a trip north.
I used to connect over Sprint's PCS Vision network using the #777 hack through a Treo 300 with unlimited Vision use for $10/month. Speeds there were on the high end of ISDN when it was working well, but it rarely worked well. Lag in particular was extremely bad even with the average bandwidth once things go rolling was decent. It's been suggested to me that newer Treo models like the 600 are being more aggresively restricted by Sprint in regards to how you can get a cheap data connection out of them. My understanding is that they are better able to monitor high data use on the newer phones and force people over to a higher priced data plan if they find you're abusing the service. They certainly never noticed whatever I did on the Treo 300.
Good advice overall, but your comments on which state to incorporate in are off. Delaware also charges a franchise tax, albeit not as large as the one in Texas. The most business friendly and economical state to incorporate in right now is Nevada, particularly in regards to corporate taxes, although there are some substantial credibility and auditing issues with that state you should consider.
Let me get this straight: the Rio Karma, a device whose warranty is a mere 90 days long, requires regular whacks in order to work? Wow, now that's a great combination--the quality is so bad the manufacturer won't even guarantee it will work six months from now, and you have to smack it around to make it even last that long.
The iPod is expensive and it is missing some features, but at least there's a reasonable confidence that a buyer will get at least a years worth of use out of it. The Rio may do gapless playback when it's new, but it seems owners can expect an extended and very quiet gap in its playback not too long after purchase.
In the same fashion that a word processor that can't read and write Word files is destined to be at best a niche product, a personal finance tool that doesn't address online banking has no hope of competing against Quicken or Microsoft Money. While QIF support is helpful, and can be made to work if your bank spits their records out in a consistant format (a big if I've had little luck with personally), the Open Financial Exchange spec supported by the recent Windows banking programs is vastly more useful for real-world bank account syncronization. Once you've seen how easy that makes keeping track of your account in a program like Quicken, it's impossible to imagine going back to using any other approach.
Looking at your development roadmap, I see you've got support for OFX and online banking described as something to look into "as the user interface gets slicker". I sincerly hope that's not the case--there really is very little reason to care what the interface to your program looks like if it doesn't perform the fundamentals. Is there anything keeping at least OFX transaction download from happening Real Soon Now? I do believe that's the only thing keeping a whole lot of people from dumping their current financial package for GnuCash.
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> The Apple ][ version was elite.
AppleWorks for the Apple II, when supplemented with the TimeOut tools from Beagle Bros, was one of the best suites of Office software I have ever used. The simple but powerful macro programming capabilities of Beagle's Timeout Ultramacros in particular was way ahead of its time, and to this day I don't know that I've ever used a similar automation tool that was so easy to use while still being capable of controlling everything about the software.
The only thing Apple II AppleWorks didn't handle that forced me to switch to a PC based office product in the early 90's was footnoting. I had to repaginate by hand too often to fit them in and that killed my productivity when doing heavily reference-laden work in college.
Ack, bad typo, twice no less. That's 1981 for the 3.5" floppy, started showing up in designs people remember in the 1984 Macintosh. URL: http://www.macgeek.org/museum/sony400kdrive/
Walkman, 1979
CD Player (with Philips), 1982
3.5" floppy drive, 1989
Since '89, no, nothing new that's worth a damn. But lots in the 30 years after Trinitron.
The guy running this site is going to hate me for doing this, but: you can see frequency response graphs of the various iPod EQ settings at:
http://www.modeemi.fi/~vesas/iPod_Audio.pdf
iPod settings like "Bass Booster" increase the level at 20Hz by up to 6dB relative to the midrange. In practice, with even remotely accurate headphones this amount of EQ makes for incredibly overblown bass. I question whether anyone who finds this insufficient is qualified to make an audio quality judgement about anything.
I personally find the "Electronic" setting on the iPod to be the only useful one that boosts the low bass a bit without totally destroying the music you're listening to. It's about a +/-1.5dB countouring emphasising low frequencies while cutting back around 300Hz and 7KHz where a lot of headphones (and MP3 files!) are a bit rough anyway.
I'm also using the Verizon 5220 and am pretty happy with it. In areas where the EVDO is strong (I've used it in Baltimore and NYC), I regularly get 300Kbps, and the reliability of the connection is average as such things go. Well worth the $80 a month to me because it serves both as a backup line to my cable modem at home should that go down and as a full solution when I'm on the road. It's also great fun to have something like this that works fairly well even when barreling down the highway; I recently submitted some work I had to get finished by the end of day from I95 at 65MPH while on a trip north.
I used to connect over Sprint's PCS Vision network using the #777 hack through a Treo 300 with unlimited Vision use for $10/month. Speeds there were on the high end of ISDN when it was working well, but it rarely worked well. Lag in particular was extremely bad even with the average bandwidth once things go rolling was decent. It's been suggested to me that newer Treo models like the 600 are being more aggresively restricted by Sprint in regards to how you can get a cheap data connection out of them. My understanding is that they are better able to monitor high data use on the newer phones and force people over to a higher priced data plan if they find you're abusing the service. They certainly never noticed whatever I did on the Treo 300.
Good advice overall, but your comments on which state to incorporate in are off. Delaware also charges a franchise tax, albeit not as large as the one in Texas. The most business friendly and economical state to incorporate in right now is Nevada, particularly in regards to corporate taxes, although there are some substantial credibility and auditing issues with that state you should consider.
Good starter references on Delaware vs. Nevada:
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As soon as I take two CDs along with me the media can cost more than the player: Durabrand CD Boombox $19.97
The iPod is expensive and it is missing some features, but at least there's a reasonable confidence that a buyer will get at least a years worth of use out of it. The Rio may do gapless playback when it's new, but it seems owners can expect an extended and very quiet gap in its playback not too long after purchase.
Looking at your development roadmap, I see you've got support for OFX and online banking described as something to look into "as the user interface gets slicker". I sincerly hope that's not the case--there really is very little reason to care what the interface to your program looks like if it doesn't perform the fundamentals. Is there anything keeping at least OFX transaction download from happening Real Soon Now? I do believe that's the only thing keeping a whole lot of people from dumping their current financial package for GnuCash.