Flow

Today was an interesting day. I started with a torture session at the JCC (my trainer calls the worst part “Fun with Foam” and promises it will get better some day). I had a call soon enough afterwards that I didn’t have time to drive to work, so I went home instead, took the call, and only then went to the office.

The afternoon started with another call, then my annual review (I live to fight another year!).

And then I got to have some fun. One of the projects I’m working on needs to gather some data from Lotus Notes calendars, and there was a group who had someone working on a tool to get that data. But they were having problems of various sorts, and they were stuck. Fortunately, one of my hobby projects for the last few years has taught me a lot about accessing Lotus Notes calendars from Python code, so I contacted the developer and offered to see if I had anything in my archives which might be helpful.

I didn’t – somehow, I’d not copied the relevant directory to my new Windows system (and this particular technique, using the COM bindings to Notes, only works on Windows). But I did have other Python/Notes code in hand, enough to remember how to start, and her Java code showed me what she was trying to do.

The next time I looked up, two hours had passed. And I had a working program (at least it worked in my environment!) to send her.

It’s been a while since I really dropped into flow on a technical project — it’s fun!

The final word on Macworld

Trying to do all of Macworld Expo in one day was probably a mistake — I didn’t have a chance to go back to interesting booths (especially those in the West Hall), and I was rather tired by the time I left But I had a hard enough time clearing one day from my calendar; two would have been impossible.

After a night’s sleep and sorting through my bag-o-crap, here’s what still clings to my memory.

I am still amazed at how much of the floor was devoted to iPod and iPhone accessories, as well as wraps and briefcases for MacBooks. If I’d wanted to personalize my iPhone or my MacBookPro, the options were endless. Ditto speakers, chargers, and FM transmitters for my iPod — and I probably could use them, but with so many choices, I decided to wait. Replacement headphones were also a Big Deal; I spent time at the Shure, Creative, and Etymotics booths, but wasn’t ready to replace my Frankenbuds yet (I’ll wait till they break).

If I used a desktop Mac as my primary machine, the MacBook Air would be the ideal travelling companion. It’s light, sexy, and functional — the Remote Disk is a cute workaround for the lack of an optical drive (but I wind up installing almost all my software via web downloads, anyway), and I like the multitouch gestures on the trackpad (it would be nice to get those through a software update on the MBP — I would think it could handle the zoom gesture, since it can already tell the difference between one and two fingers). But my primary machine is already a MacBook Pro, so the Air would be superfluous; the extra few pounds aren’t significant given my normal travels.

Bento looked interesting and I’ll probably install the demo when I have some time to play with it (December?). I also walked away with demo disks that I may actually try for The Personal Brain, VMWare Fusion, Nisus Writer, as well as a few that were handed to me which will be as handy as the AOL CDs that used to arrive in the mail.

Intuit was pushing Quicken and their other products. They were showing a demo of their Quicken replacement, due this year, which looks to be a Web 2.0 version of Quicken (in much the same way as Quicken became Web 1.0-like a few years ago). They promised a migration path from Quicken/PC to the new product. We’ll see, but frankly, I’d be happy finding somewhere else to go entirely, as long as I can give my tax accountant the data he needs.

There were lots of people selling storage solutions. I didn’t look at them very closely. I am, however, ashamed to admit that I couldn’t crack the code at the Western Digital booth without giving it some serious thought. Maybe I should get on the air sometime.

I spent some time at the Fujitsu booth ogling the ScanSnap S510M (as mentioned on 43 Folders a few weeks ago). I would have been happy to win one in their drawing, but I didn’t. I did take home a discount coupon, but I’m not really sure that turning paper into PDFs is really a step in the right direction for me; what I need is to make stuff Go Away Entirely.

I also looked at the various printer and camera vendors, but not seriously. I would like a color laser all-in-one to reduce the clutter at home, but the prices are still too high. Even mono laser all-in-ones are expensive and big.

I did buy the Goldtouch for Mac keyboard. I haven’t unboxed it yet, though — it’s for home, to replace the Apple Keyboard I bought for the Mini a while ago. That’ll go to the XO laptop so I can play with it more easily.

I’m glad I went to the show; I’ll probably do it again, schedule willing, next year, but my expectations will be more realistic. And I’ll wear socks with more padding. And maybe even take advantage of the onsite nap service so I can make it through the entire day.