Whoa man. Having a kid really does wacky things to your schedule and what not.
Little dude is crashed out (after updating his blog). It really wears him out. Kate is doing Yoga downstairs. Apparently Netflix streaming has lots of videos for the fitness minded (a category I haven’t looked much into). The one she was watching was narrated by Tobias Funke (or someone close enough to be the same). I had to leave the room when he started talking about Cat like agility.
Having a few minutes finds me tweaking my resume for a sweet job I heard about. Still holding out for a good hand model gig. Beautiful fingers crossed.
Been playing around with the Goulette. My New Old G5 Tower I was (more or less) given by my Uncle Russ. Goulette is hard at work re-muxing videos and serving as a centralized backup for a variety of other nodes on the network we call our house.
Oh hey. If you don’t have this, and you should, go ahead buy it now. Danger Doom does some amazing things. If I was a lady living in NJ or something, I would get this so I can listen to it while I ride the train into The City. Trust me.
I am an adult. Doubt that? Check out my file folder on Warranty, Appliance and witness the many fine and convenient home appliances we have. A recent swap out of out W/D completed a total swap out of every device that was in before we got here. Sweet. I spent more money on this stuff than I did traveling Central America for 5 months. Nice.
This is part of a new (and most likely short lived) series where I talk applications I use on regular basis that allow me to the amazing and unstoppable things I do.
Let’s talk about Dropbox, a service that allows synchronization of files between different machines and devices (along with a cloud service). A free service for upto 2GB and very affordable rates of $9.99 month and $19.99 for 50 and 100 GB accounts. Dropbox will synch a folder on your computer (Mac, PC, iPhone, iPad) to their cloud service. It does this automatically in the background. Sounds simple right, but synch is a headache that has stumped a lot of developers in the past. Dropbox pulls it off smoother and more consistently then any other platform I have used.
Here is how it looks, you save your IMPORTANT SPREADSHEET on your desktop, and head off to work. Crap! You realize you need to make a change post haste. Easy. You can jump on to dropbox.com, sign in download, change, and upload to the service.
Wait, it get’s better. If you are running their light weight software on each machine the folder is automatically updated at each location. Say Wha!?! So you can make a change and your files are updated back at home.
It is also retains revisions. So, you save your IMPORTANT SPREADSHEET only to realize you changed something you shouldn’t. Dropbox retains a copy of older versions of their files on their online service (login, download). Neat. Note: Revisions are only kept on their servers. It would get pretty clunky presenting you with various drafts of the same file on your machines.
It uses a SSL for uploading and some nice encryption on your files (meaning your files are pretty dang secure).
Dropbox plays very well with photos, it will automatically put together photo galleries. It let’s you share you these galleries along with other files, playing as the world’s easiest hosting service ever.
I would suggest this to any kind of user. I use it to move mediar, to create backups of files automatically, to access my files on any machine, and to share large files easily.
Download today to start using the very generous 2GB free monthly service.
And now, a very lengthy dump of the features that Dropbox offers from their site.
Dropbox Features
File Sync
Dropbox allows you to sync your files online and across your computers automatically.
2GB of online storage for free, with up to 100GB available to paying customers.
Sync files of any size or type.
Sync Windows, Mac and Linux computers.
Automatically syncs when new files or changes are detected.
Work on files in your Dropbox even if you’re offline. Your changes sync once your computer has an Internet connection again.
Dropbox transfers will correctly resume where they left off if the connection drops.
Efficient sync – only the pieces of a file that changed (not the whole file) are synced. This saves you time.
Doesn’t hog your Internet connection. You can manually set bandwidth limits.
File Sharing
Sharing files is simple and can be done with only a few clicks.
Shared folders allow several people to collaborate on a set of files.
You can see other people’s changes instantly.
A “Public” folder that lets you link directly to files in your Dropbox.
Control who is able to access shared folders (including ability to kick people out and remove the shared files from their computers).
Automatically create shareable online photo galleries from folders of photos in your Dropbox.
Online Backup
Dropbox backs up your files online without you having to think about it.
Automatic backup of your files.
Undelete files and folders.
Restore previous versions of your files.
30 days of undo history, with unlimited undo available as a paid option.
Web Access
A copy of your files are stored on Dropbox’s secure servers. This lets you access them from any computer or mobile device.
Manipulate files as you would on your desktop – add, edit, delete, rename etc.
Search your entire Dropbox for files.
A “Recent Events” feed that shows you a summary of activity in your Dropbox.
Create shared folders and invite people to them.
Recover previous versions of any file or undelete deleted files.
View photo galleries created automatically from photos in your Dropbox.
Security & Privacy
Dropbox takes the security and privacy of your files very seriously.
Shared folders are viewable only by people you invite.
All transmission of file data and metadata occurs over an encrypted channel (SSL).
All files stored on Dropbox servers are encrypted (AES-256) and are inaccessible without your account password.
Dropbox website and client software have been hardened against attacks from hackers.
Dropbox employees are not able to view any user’s files.
Online access to your files requires your username and password.
Public files are only viewable by people who have a link to the file(s). Public folders are not browsable or searchable.
One of my favorite books of last year was Neil Stephensen’sThe Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer. Long story short, the story hinges on this nearly magically computerized nano-whazzit book thing. The book dynamically changes as the protagonist grows older, tailoring its message to help her develop into a fine leader of mice…or something. Look, I can’t do it justice…just read it.
I read that book first on my Kindle, then finished it on my iPhone after the Kindle died an unfortunate death. At the time, I felt that I was a little nearer to that world of an actual smart book.
Looking at this recent video from Penguin books, it looks like the iPad will take us a bit further down the road.
Additional videos get a little more high-level, talking about how best to deliver content rich books. Use the ePub format that iBooks and most of the book world (excluding Amazon) uses or create “Apps”. ePub can support linking to external sources, pictures, and some other simple features, but lacks the ability to bring this really slick stuff to devices. Enter Applications-as-books. Up shoot, you can make it much smarter, more dynamic, and richer. Downside, this is a bit more complicated then converting a text file to be read by a machine. Also, they would need to go through the Apple App Store, which is pretty incredible but can chafe some developers.
Who knows where this will go. I don’t. But I think it will be pretty cool.
Why don’t restaurants that insist on having flash sites have atleast a link to an html only version. Or at least list their hours on their google listing.
80% of the time I am looking for a site I am on my phone. The other 20% I get angry at their non-indexed flash pages.
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