LepoLand - A Blog by Alan Lepofsky | Comments

Google Ad: Is Tiger Feeling Lucky Today?

Bilal Jaffery — Mon, 8 Feb 2010 11:25:35 AM -0500

lol, hilarious

Quickly change font size

German — Mon, 8 Feb 2010 08:36:58 AM -0500

Hi Alan, I write to Buenos Aires, Argentina.

I need help with Lotus Notes signature. I created my signature in a HTML document. When I insert it into Lotus Notes Preferences, I don't know why, but the size change aoutomatically from 9 to 12, It seems like the LN default size is 12, but for my work is to big and I need it in 9 size. Is there any way to set up the signature size to keep in 9?

Thanks a lot?

German

Lotus Notes 8.0.1 LiveText

lindar — Sat, 6 Feb 2010 12:44:54 AM -0500

{ Link }

live text is not explored,but it's promising

Enterprises Want Activity Streams That Include Microblogging

Alan Lepofsky — Thu, 4 Feb 2010 05:06:13 PM -0500

Hi Jon. Correct, they are just predictions. They do accurately reflect the thinking of many companies these days, but as we all know in the IT world, things can change quickly, but they can also move along at a glacial pace.

Enterprises Want Activity Streams That Include Microblogging

Jon — Thu, 4 Feb 2010 04:23:30 PM -0500

I read this report today, its pretty interesting. Doesn't mean their predictions will come true, but interesting none the less.

Now That Is How Add To Calendar Should Work!

Bryan Schmiedeler — Wed, 3 Feb 2010 04:26:59 PM -0500

Check out BusyCal. It sits on top of your Calendar Database and replaces iCal basically. I am not associated with them. I use their BusySycn to keep all my iCal calendars in sync across mobileme, the iPhone, and my Mac.

Now That Is How Add To Calendar Should Work!

Alan Lepofsky — Wed, 3 Feb 2010 03:18:34 PM -0500

"Make it so @1"

Now That Is How Add To Calendar Should Work!

Bob Balfe — Wed, 3 Feb 2010 03:16:15 PM -0500

That should be easy to do with Live Text! Sounds like a neat utility.

The most important thing I heard at Lotusphere

Alan Lepofsky — Mon, 1 Feb 2010 11:18:55 AM -0500

Tim, Steve Nikopoulos IBM Senior Software Engineer did present AD105 - Futures in IBM Lotus Domino APIs, that talked about the work they are doing, but still no C&S as far as I know.

The most important thing I heard at Lotusphere

Timothy Briley — Mon, 1 Feb 2010 11:14:14 AM -0500

"Contrast that to Lotus Notes, where after a decade of promises, there is still no C&S API."

How is this still possible? Is anyone even bothering to complain about it at "Ask the devs" at Lotusphere anymore?

The most important thing I heard at Lotusphere

Alan Lepofsky — Mon, 1 Feb 2010 11:09:25 AM -0500

Giulio, thank you for the comment. I'm not sure what IBM's cloud platform plans are. LotusLive seems to be about offering their own services, I've not heard any mention of hosting BP apps, similar to Amazon S3 or SalesForce. You are correct, this is an important area.

Thanks Ben. Again, it was great to hear, and we'll see how it pans out.

The most important thing I heard at Lotusphere

Ben Poole — Mon, 1 Feb 2010 03:00:20 AM -0500

Alan: spot on. Guilio makes a good point too. Platform PLUS API == a big win. Here's hoping :-)

Update Your Status On Multiple Social Networks Simultaneously With Wildfire

Scott Leis — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 08:58:58 PM -0500

Alan, a new version with Socialtext support was released a couple of days ago.

The most important thing I heard at Lotusphere

Giulio — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 08:22:45 PM -0500

Ha ha.. Live long and prosper..

Anway, the drum i would like to beat is a serious ramp up of PAAS providers. This is where the rubber hits the road. Some Darwinian elements are needed to help filter the best work. I see this as a whole new class of BP that IBM can tap into, and also free up the bottlenecks within IBM's bureaucracy.

You can develop any number of widgets to the world, but unless there is a good medium to get "real people" to use the gear, it will spend alot of time just doing revolutions in the yellowverse without the brutal honesty of real world use. ok.. i said it.... ill move along now...

Oh boy, I better open it!!!

UK Hot Deals — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 07:39:05 AM -0500

Great Idea, telling people to not spend money who have it will surely revive an economy badly in need of capital.Anyone who has money should spend it.

Recording a TV show should not be this hard

Alan Lepofsky — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 11:47:16 PM -0500

Please read this great report, “Reinventing the PVR” by teehan+lax: { Link }

Recording a TV show should not be this hard

Alan Lepofsky — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:12:37 AM -0500

Pete, thank you for mentioning some alternatives. I'm also interested in Bell Entertainment Services. (but BES still reminds me of Blackberry Enterprise Server!)

William, thank you very much for the excellent advice. I like your "go to the guide, then go to the sweet spot (524 at 9pm)" idea.

And as for the tips, I hope to continue providing them for many more!

Recording a TV show should not be this hard

William Ryken — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 11:11:15 PM -0500

Well that was entertaining. I've been a Rogers customer for a long time, and I understand your pain, but I'll try to suggest some alternatives for you:

1) The "not-so-Quick Start Guide"

Totally useless, marketing fluff. Hit the GUIDE button twice to get past it. You'll see it on your screen for a brief moment, and after a while, you'll stop even thinking about it...

2) Finding a show

I find that searching by date is easier than searching through the list.

Now, I tend to record shows in the primetime slots. The most popular shows tend to be on the US broadcast channels, which on the Rogers system, are ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, and FOX. Channels 522, 532,524, and 526 respectively (for East Coast time zone). (More on that later).

The GUIDE displays five rows of information at a time.

So, one way that I setup the shows I'd like to record:

- Pull up the GUIDE (guide button twice)

- enter the number of the channel in the "sweet spot", NBC - 524

- then scroll with the left and right arrow keys to get to the start of primetime, i.e., 8pm

- you'll find the most infomation right on a single screen, for all five channels.

- if I see an episode of an interesting series, I'll scroll up or down to select the show, then hit the "record" button

- Unlike your video, I tend to select "All Episodes", then the A key, then "This Channel, Any Time".

- You won't have to worry about missing a "special length" episode this way.

- Once you accept that show, you're dropped back to the Guide, with the selected show now red.

Here's where I differ in my "search method":

- You can scroll to the right to see what comes on at 9pm, and then 10pm.

- While I've got the Guide open, at NBC, at 8pm, I can change the date using the B key

- You'll skip to the next day, but still be on NBC at 8pm

By scrolling left and right, and changing the date once I've seen what's happening that night, I find that I can quickly setup my recordings for the week pretty quickly.

If one of your shows gets bumped for a sporting event or TV special in a given week, the PVR will remember that you wanted to record it, and will add it back into the rotation when it comes up again the next week.

3) Oh, and about the time zones...

If you're picky about your TV, and I am one of them, it is to your advantage to pay a few bucks more ($5 per month, IIRC) for the timeshifting option with Rogers. The West Coast feeds of the US broadcast stations are a much better source to use for your freqently recorded episodes.

In the Great White North, our wonderful CRTC, the Canadian equivalent of the FCC, has deem that cable companies must show the Canadian station's commercials, if both a Canadian station (Global, CTV, CBC) show the same show, in the same timeslot, as a US broadcaster.

This means the even though you are tuned, for example, to channel NBC 524, to watch "Heroes"... if Global is playing it at the same time, you'll actually get the Global feed on the NBC channel. Rogers displays the same feed on both channels at the same time.

The bad part about this, is that the Canadian broadcasters are not as sensitive to the start and stop times of the shows, and you will frequently lose either the first 30 seconds, or the last 30 seconds to a minute of the show.

The Seattle-based, West Coast feeds are great. Perfect timing, exactly matching the guide for the start and stop of a show. And I personnally think they are a better quality encoding than the Canadian version. They have sharper, more consistent, high definition feeds.

And one last thing, Alan, the Rogers HD-PVR box has an eSATA port on the back. There are numerous forums that talk about plugging in an external hard drive to that eSATA port. Not all eSATA drives and enclosures are the same, so do a bit of research to get the right combination the will work with the PVR.

I added a 250GB drive to mine, and I never have any space issues. AVSForum is a great resource. Lookup the "SA 8300 HD Tips & Tricks -- SARA" thread. ( { Link } )

Once you get used to the system, it's actually not too bad.

Hope you find this helpful to, in some small way, repay you for all of the great advice and tips you've shared over the years.

Regards,

William Ryken

Recording a TV show should not be this hard

Christopher Byrne — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 03:05:12 PM -0500

Per advice of my PR contact at Rogers, I tweeted @RogersHelps ( { Link } )to take a look at your video and reach out to you...

Notes Rules! (Really ! You’ve Helped a Lot !)

Edward H. — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 01:41:22 PM -0500

The CTRL+R help solve my problem in copying and pasting part of an Excel spreadsheet into my daily e-mail. It was always putting in the left margin no matter what I did in the Page Setup and changing the margins.

But I'd like to save those settings, so when I cut and paste into a draft e-mail, I don't have to adjust the margins with the CTRL+R. (remember, the page setup and change margin just doesn't work for me. (Notes 6.5) Is there a way to save that format for a draft e-mail? I don't want to change it for the entire database. Thanks for all your wisdom & help.