Top Posts
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Why Nobody Can Copy Apple
Horace Dediu has written another brilliant piece titled...
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The Job Decision Matrix
A Job Decision Matrix will help identify what is actual...
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Path To Green
A Path To Green (PTG) is a clear, crisp, and complete s...
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You are Thinking of Your Career Trajectory Wrong
Most people think about their career trajectory as bein...
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The 5Ps: Achieving Focus in Any Endeavor
Always have a plan. Always. A great, simple, framework...
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STOP 0xC2 aka BAD_POOL_CALLER Blue Screen and bad memory
My computer bluescreened with a STOP 0xC2, BAD_POOL_CAL...
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Merit Badges – A Mental Model for Success
The concept of a Merit Badge comes from the Boy Scouts...
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Have Backbone, Disagree and Commit
Have Backbone, Disagree and Commit Leaders are obligate...
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Tenets
Tenets are a few carefully articulated guiding principl...
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Work Backwards From The Customer
At the 1996 Microsoft Professional Developer Conference...
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Customer, Business, Technology, Organization (CBTO)
CBTO = Customer + Business + Technology + Organization
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Retail Pricing, Markup, and Margins
Tom’s Hardware is generally really solid. But they shou...
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One-Way and Two-Way Doors
Effective decision-making starts with understanding; in...
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Paying Developers is A Bad Idea
The companies that make the most profit are those who b...
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Be a Great Reader
When an organization has a culture where the written wo...
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Category Archives: Smart Home
Stop Digital Amnesia SWAG
Stop Digital Amnesia SWAG Originally uploaded by ckindel. Have you checked out www.stopdigitalamnesia.com yet? I know in my first post I had a typo in the URL (thanks Mark for fixing it remotely for me!).My marketing team (and the vendors who helped them) have a great sense of humor. The Dr. is very well cast, the text is hilarious, and I personally think the whole thing gets the customer promises we are making with Windows …Continue reading
HP MediaSmart pic
DSCN0235 Originally uploaded by ckindel. Here’s a pic I took this morning in the Microsoft booth at CES of the Windows Home Server powered HP MediaSmart device.I put my latte next to it so you might be able to appreciate the diminutive size of the device…it’s much smaller than it looks in most pictures. Roughly 9″ tall. DSCN0241 Originally uploaded by ckindel. The second pic is of the demo station for Windows Home Server. The picture …Continue reading
Amazing Response
My inbox is overflowing with messages from people congratualating my team, asking questionsm, and pointng me at all the great press we’ve been getting. I awoke this morning over a hundred emails directly to me and my RSS reader overflowing with feeds. I’ll be collecting the most common questions I get and will try to address them here. In the meantime here’s some links to articles and blog posts I’ve collected so far. Engadget news.com news.com …Continue reading
Windows Home Server
Windows Home Server prototype Originally uploaded by ckindel. I am writing this from the Windows Home Server blogger’s lounge in the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas. Bill Gates just finished up his CES 2007 keynote where the product I have been slaving over for the last 3 years was finally formally announced to the world!I can’t even begin to describe how excited I am that the word is finally out. Microsoft is not known for …Continue reading
Devs on my team must know INTERCAL
Jim Lyon co-authored the INTERCAL programming language. He’s a dev on my team. We decided that all devs must know this language in order to write code on my project. You should learn it too.
Stop Digital Amnesia?
Noticed a banner ad on cnet.com that clicked through to this site www.stopdigitalamnesia.com (Stop Digital Amnesia). Hmmm… Yet another Microsoft viral-teaser site. Something big will be announced on 1/7 at CES… Reminds me of Furry Goat’s post about 2 years ago that I commented on.
Furrygoat discovers the RAID rebuild
Poor Steve (Mr. Furrygoat). Like many geeks out there he bought a RAID5 system thinking it was a silver bullet providing massive reliable storage for all his precious data (precious to him, due to the time it took to back up all his DVDs, not necessarily because the content iteself is precious). A drive failed in the array. The rebuild took over a day for only 300GB of stuff; that’s in addition to the time …Continue reading
MCE Controller v1.1 Released – and now open source
I built MCE Controller as something that would be useful for my own home. I had minor aspirations of making it do more than it does, but the reality is that I don’t really have the time nor the inclination (it works beautifully for me as is). Until today I have resisted making it open source for the simple reason that I didn’t really understand what it would take to put the source out there …Continue reading
Do you have a NAS at home?
A bunch of us were sitting around arguing about why people are buying these inexpensive NAS (Network Attached Storage) boxes. Then we started arguing about who was buying them. I’ve poured over all the market research I can find and neither of these two questions are answered: Who is buying them (home users, tech enthusiasts, small business owners, corporate workgroup folk, etc…)? Why are they buying them (more storage, backup, sharing, …)? So I figure I’ll …Continue reading
MCE Controller 1.0.4 Released
I’ve released an update to MCE Controller that fixes a bug where it would prevent Windows logoff and shutdown. Head over to http://www.kindel.com/products/mcecontroller to download it. MCE Controller allows the Media Center application of Windows Media Center Edition (MCE) to be integrated into an advanced control system by enabling programmatic control of the user interface via a TCP/IP connection. To put it simply, MCE Controller, allows you to simulate a press of any button on …Continue reading
Steve coins a new phrase: DVR Clog
In The Furrygoat Experience: DVR Clog Steve coins a new term that I like: “DVR Clog”. I love it! DVR Clog. The state of affairs when your digital video recorder is full of shows you want to watch, but don’t have the time.
Chris Gray – Building your own home server
Chris talks about his home server on Channel9. “Let’s go to my white board…here’s a diagram of my home network…” He’s actually a pretty good artist. And I thought he was just a great developer. Chris’ office is basically across the hall from me. Let’s just say it’s rarely quiet.
Great Windows Media Center videos
Check out these great Channel9 videos on Windows XP Media Center Edition (MCE). If you’ve ever wondered what all the fuss over MCE is watch John Canning and Charlie Owen expose it all. Media Center exposed, Part I Media Center exposed, Part II There’s about an hour of video here, but if you really want to understand this amazing product it’s worthwhile to watch it all.
Blobservations: Windows Server, Home Edition
Rick Hallihan presents a really nice vision of what a Windows based home server would look like in Blobservations: Windows Server, Home Edition. At my house I use Windows Server 2003 to manage all of my client PCs. For example I can easily change all machine’s IE security settings (and prevent my kids from changing them back) centrally via Group Policy. Today there are some problems with this in the home, namely some really cool …Continue reading
Bluetooth GPS, Smartphone, Channel9, Oh My!
Channel9 has posted a wicked-cool video of Alex Kipman demoning using Visual Studio to write slick SmartPhone app that talks to both the GPS and MapPoint via a web-service. Who says Microsoft can’t innovate? What other platform provides anywhere near the richness and integration across devices?!?! I purchased my Pharos GPS reciever as part of buying Microsoft Streets & Trips 2005. I bought it at the Microsoft Company Store for a silly low price (you …Continue reading
My team
Chris Gray on my team is playing with IIS at home. He’s got a little moblog app that automatically takes pics from his PocketPC phone and uploads them. This pic was taken right before we had an executive review for our project. Charlie, Chris, Sergey, Todd, Lee…
Crazy expensive home server
Sheesh. I thought Linux devices were supposed to be cheaper… Engadget writes about the Niveus A/V Storage Server which is basically just a Linux based NAS box with 1TB of RAID 5 storage in it. I can’t even tell if it actually supports SMB or not. Sure it’s pretty and fanless but why does it cost $3K? If you think this box sounds cool to you, I suggest you instead consider what you could do …Continue reading
Killer home server deal
Slickdeals.com is showing that you can now get a DELL PowerEdge SC420 P4-2.8GHz, 80GB system for $289+tax w/free shipping. These SC series machines from DELL make great home servers. They are plenty powerful, expandable, and amazingly very quiet.
A File Server…in Your Living Room?
Via BusinessWeek a good article on home servers: That’s right, with most homes nowadays having multiple computers and lots of files to share, these new low-cost devices can do wonders Want to watch movies, control your stereo’s music, and back up your computer files from any PC in the house? A cheap server computer, a scaled-down version of the pricey machines locked away in corporate data centers, might be the best way to manage your family’s …Continue reading
New Windows PC Form Factors
It’s going to be very interesting over the next few years as OEMs begin to finally produce truly innovative new PC form factors focused on specific user scenarios. Neowin.net points out that a British OEM, Scan Computers, has launched the “Project PC”, a PC specifically targeted at project managers who make heavy use of Microsoft Project. We’ve already seen great innovation in small form factor (SFF) desktop machines such as those from Shuttle. And great …Continue reading
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