Midnight Whispers

I’m moving again!

Yeah, I had this domain alishabdar.com which I wanted to move to for a long long long time.

It looks more like me and since my career is changing (getting into business than doing technical) gradually, I felt like changing the whole thing. Even the contents of the posts (and the frequesncy of them!) is changing.

But I couldn’t close the site or remove the posts, not that it is full of original brilliant content but when I look at my archive starting from Feb 2006. It’s such a memory and well, I believe there are good posts too.

Anyways, just login to my new site; AliShabdar.com to get the new stuff. I hope you like it.

Ten Tactics That Could Save Your Online Reputation

1. Know your achilles heel
2. Assume everything will make it’s way to the web
3. Create a great online impression; dress to impress!
4. Choose your blog voice carefully
5. Hangout at the right social network
6. Send blogger’s love letters, not PR pitches
7. Build your Google reputation now, not later
8. Monitor your online reputation as often as your email
9. Ostriches are not great role-models
10. Three words to remember

Read the full story from Mashable.

iPhone SDK today, Tablet Mac tomorrow!

I am just watching iPhone 2.0 Keynote.

It is just awesome! Enterprise support and the most important, Exchange support is the key for iPhone to step “ON” blackberry the ugly enterprise monopole!

In the other hand, iPhone SDK which gives 100% features of native iPhone development is just a WOW. I can picture those 1000s of apps rolling out for iPhone and I have no idea what Nokia, Ericsson, or Blackberry will do for competition! Maybe they are the folks behind Apple’s ridiculous (well, for me!) idea of excluding it for the rest of the world. Otherwise you’d see it literally everywhere.

Cocoa touch over the OS 10 replaces Cocoa to provide touch input instead of mouse and keyboard.

Now I can smell that in a near future Apple will release its first Tablet Mac.

They have the latest Intel processors, thin design of Macbook Air and OS 10.5. Cocoa touch will just complete the recipe!

Just imagine a beautifully designed thin and light tablet PC that does not need a Stylus. You can just type on the screen make touch gestures and work like Microsoft was dreaming for the “Surface”.

What do you think?

RE: Windows Vista (In)Capable

 I was just reading Robin Harris’s post, Windows Vista (In)Capable. A good read with some interesting quotes from MS insiders who are caught by Vista curse too!

I commented the post (see below) thanking both Steves…

“I personally want to thank Steve Ballmer!

Yes! It’s been since Windows 3.0 that I was using Windows and struggling with it every single day!
Moving back ad forth to Linux and from Linux to Win again did not work for my everyday PC use either.

On October 2007 and after a bitter miserable 3 month with Vista Business Edition ( and just before Leopard released) I bought a Macbook Pro and “just” dumped Windows!
I still can’t believe that I could dump Windows that easy!!!
Let me make it clear that I am in managing position and do web development in my leisure as well. So I am not a “cool” music guy that just poses with his Mac. I seriously use it for 10 hours a day.

When OS Leopard released on October, and since I bought my laptop during that time, I was eligible to get Leopard for free!
I know that many vendors (Dell, Sony, …) did the same with XP to Vista upgrade BUT was it for the better or worse?

Many say (even I say to my colleagues who we bought them Vista laptops because that’s what you get here in Dubai) that OK wait for SP1, but will it solve all that misery? Even it will who is responsible for all that suffer and inefficiency? Ballmer? Hell no!

At the end I just wanted to thank Steve Jobs and all his genius - yet cool - team.”

Firefox 3 beta 3

It is ready for download that I’m doing it right now (for Mac)!

Let see how it looks like…

Vista Service Pack 1, this March

Finally we can smell SP1 approaching!

Apparently they released it for manufacturers but end-users can wait another one and half months (I hope!) to get their hands on it.

I’m afraid it would so big in size (considering the number of current bugs in Vista) that they might call it “Windows Vista - Service Pack Edition“, another addition to Vista’s crowded family!!!

I use Mac OS Leopard happily but many of my colleagues and friends use Vista (that’s the only unwelcome guest you get with your latest bleeding edge laptop!!!) in pain and grief.

Microsoft buys Yahoo, Google be ware!

Having a crush on Google, it is hard for me to even think about what might happen if Microsoft buys Yahoo!

They offered such a tempting price to Yahoo! that it is really hard to predict that what will really happen, a giant baby “Microo!” or “Yacroo!” or something like that.

“Microsoft said Friday that it is making an unsolicited offer of $31 a share, or $44.6 billion, to buy Yahoo in a move that would give the software giant more market share and become a significant threat to Google.”, ZDNet announced.

Yeah, this really could be Google’s nightmare and I really hope they have their secret weapon ready. Personally I think that Microsoft with all that power and glory did not get the whole idea of Web 2.0 and the connected world.

Hotmail is not my favorite and Live search often disappoints me (considering I search 10 to 50 times a day). Whatever they make keeps this universal rule of being Windows dependent. The connected world means being cross-platform NOT “genuinely” Windows certified!

Vista proved me that they just didn’t get it. I am so happy using Leopard. Let me clear that I don’t hate Microsoft and I respect their role in the history of mankind. I just have arguments about how ignorant they are to consumers.

Yahoo! is a legend and my first Internet experience was opening an e-mail account in Yahoo back in 1996. How excited I was!

However nobody could do what Google did and I hope they always have the main role in leading the IT world.

Apple starts preordering Mac Office 2008

good news for Office fans that Apple just started preordering Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac.

Expensive as usual but with a host of fantastic features it is a must if you are a business Mac user. I used Office 2007 on Windows and frankly it is one of the main reasons people still stick to Windows!

Currently I’m using Office 2004 for Mac. Although it is pretty old but it’s a blessing for my daily work especially Entourage that I managed to connect to our work Exchange server.

Anyways I don;t think I can get my hand on it for at least a month but it’s encouraging to know that it is FINALLY released!

Leopard Moments 3 - Dialog Boxes

As a switcher (coming from Windows to Mac) I was used to “Tab” along different dialog boxes in order to choose buttons.

In Mac I struggled (first you have to give up with old habits, then to learn new ones!) doing it somehow till I finally figured it out.

The figure pretty much shows how to do that but just to mention that you need to make sure that keyboard setting is correct and then by ^+F7 enable tab navigation. Then tabbing will navigate you through the buttons. Note that to select a bordered (selected by tab) button you need to “SPACE” it and for blue button you need to “ENTER” it.

Weired, isn’ it?! I personally didn’t get the point of going through all this hassle though!

10 Ways to Improve Your Energy

Scott Young made a list of 10 “to dos” to improve your energy level. Might seem simple but more energy means more effectiveness, performance, and even a better mood during the day.

1. Eat Smaller Meals
2. Exercise Regularly
3. Drink Plenty of Water
4. Learn New Things Every Day
5. Stimulate Your Mind With Games
6. Find a Hobby
7. Inject Your Day with Optimism
8. Align Action With Conscience
9. Set Goals
10. Find Your Purpose

Well, if you need to get into it and read the deatils check out his nice post.

He says to implement the list above you should start with picking the ones which helps you the most and are easier to do. You need to train yourself more and turn them to habits.