Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Redesigning: Cubicles

Here's an article from FastCompany, where they asked some folks from the big design firms like Herman Miller and Steelcase to imagine cubicle design to enhance both comfort and collaboration. As much as I wish cubicles would go away, in favor of more open and flexible space, they probably won't, so this design is at least a bit of a compromise towards improving some of the limitations of the design of more traditional cubicles. I especially like the hexagon shape, and I suspect it would also increase person-per-square-foot efficiency. The automatically activating noise-cancellation speakers would be great, too!


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For a Company That Sells Productivity, A Space That Fosters It (37Signals)

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Inside 37signals' new office in Chicago.

When you're a company that focuses on productivity tools, you set a high bar for your own practices. For the last seven years,37signals, a company that produces products like the project management software Campfire and Basecamp, as well as the popular blog Signal vs. Noise, prided themselves on their flexible working habits, even though those habits were born out of necessity. (read full article here: http://www.fastcodesign.com/1662465/for-a-company-that-sells-productivity-a-space-that-fosters-it )

Plus a video:
 

http://www.fastcompany.com/1755695/creating-a-productive-office-space-with-jason-fried-of-37signals 

Jason Fried of 37Signals (http://37signals.com interestingly, they make collaborative web-based products like Basecamp and Campfire), speaking about how workspaces need to be sure to provide quiet areas to help employees concentrate, as well as providing areas to converse and socialize. I thought it was interesting that they are trying to have the area be fairly quiet, but it's 10,000 square feet! There's also an article describing the materials and design of the new space; personally, I think the felt looks great, and I bet it is fantastic at dampening sound.

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Thursday, June 9, 2011

Notes in the Cloud

Let's say that you have a Mac computer (laptop or desktop), an iPhone, an iPad, and maybe more devices. How do you keep all of your notes to yourself organized? Here are three ways to do it; they take a little set-up, but are very easy to use and keep "in sync" after.  And, with one exception, all are free! (Note that all of these methods require Internet connectivity in order to sync, but they do keep a "local" copy on each device as last synced.)

Formal Notes
Use Evernote. 

Evernote has clients for the Mac OS and Windows, as well as applications for most mobile devices (iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry, etc.). In addition, there is a full-featured browser-based client you can use without any download. Just create an account on their website, install the applications on any and all of your devices, and log in. Any note you create in one location is auto-magically synced to all the other locations. The Search feature in Evernote is augmented by a powerful character-reader, which even lets you find text within an image. This really works.

Notes can consist of text, web pages (especially easy using the Evernote Web Clipper for browsers), photos snapped with your phone's camera, PDFs, emails, audio notes, and more. Any of these note types can be created on your iPhone or your Mac. If you upgrade to the Premium account, you can upload any file type. Premium also expands your storage allocation, and allows notebook sharing, all for $45/ year. But there's still plenty you can do with the free version, so try it out!

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Evernote Article List on Mac

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Evernote Article List on iPhone

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Evernote Article List on iPad

Informal Notes
What about all those little tiny snippets of things you run across? Sticky-note type things, maybe something you got on your phone, but you'd like to see it on the big screen of your computer, or conversely, you'd like to take it with you? Temporary-type things, like an address you're about to put into your GPS, or a list of things to edit on your TiVo to-do list. Evernote can do all of these things of course, but what if you don't want to "clutter up" your Evernote notebooks?  I've tried a few integrated systems for this, as well as Evernote, but I've recently discovered this method. Note that this solution only works on Macs and iPhones/ iPads; I'm sure you can find something similar on other platforms. So if you'd like to set this up the way I do it, follow these steps:

1. Dropbox
You should be using Dropbox anyway, say, to sync your 1Password file. But here's another way to use it for little snippets of notes. Set up your Dropbox account, if you haven't already. In your Dropbox folder on your Mac, create a new folder called "Notes".

2. Notational Velocity
Download a copy of Notational Velocity (free) and follow the directions to install it (easy, the usual way). After you install it, launch it, and go to the Preferences, and select the Notes panel, then the Storage button. For Store and read notes on disk as:, select the option Plain Text Files
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Back in Finder, open two windows side by side. Navigate one window to " ~/Library/Application Support/" and find the "Notational Data" folder. In the other window, navigate to your your Dropbox folder. Drag the "Notational Data" folder into your Dropbox folder. 

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3. PlainText for iPhone & iPad
Install PlainText on your iPhone and/ or iPad through iTunes, either through your Mac or directly on your iPhone. After it's installed, launch it, and go to to the Settings menu (little gear icon), and pick Dropbox. Tap the text field to the right of 'Linked Folder' then enter the folder path "/Notational Data". Then enter your Dropbox account name and password. Repeat this for your other iPhones and iPads. :)


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Now, any note you make or change on one of your device, will automatically appear on all your devices! I find this so useful I keep my Notational Velocity (NV) notebook open all the time, set to launch at startup.

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Notational Velocity Screenshot

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PlainText Screenshot

Web Pages
Notice in the above reference to little scraps of information, I didn't mention web links. A common occurrence for me is to get a URL via email or a text message on my phone, but I'd rather read it on "the big screen" of my Mac. I use Instapaper for this, and it works great. Here's how to set this up:

1. Sign up for a free Instapaper account. Drag the "Read Later" bookmarklet to your Browser's Bookmarks Bar. 
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Whenever you see a web page that you'd like to store in Instapaper, click on the "Read Later" bookmark button in your browser and it will be saved in Instapaper:
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2. Install Instapaper for your iPhone and/ or iPad. This costs $4.99, but is a Universal app (which means it runs on, and looks good on, both the iPhone and your iPad--see below). Remember, you only need to buy one copy to use on both your iPhone and iPad (as long as both are on the same iTunes account). After you install the application on your iPhone, launch it and log into your Instapaper account. You will instantly see the web pages you have saved in Instapaper from your Mac, and they've even been optimized for your smaller screen. You can also add web pages from your iPhone and iPad by installing the iPhone Mobile Safari bookmarklet, although if you are syncing your bookmarks from Safari via iTunes, the bookmarklet should already be there. 

One of the best features of Instapaper is its integration with other applications, including a variety of Twitter clients and GoodReader. Instapaper has some additional features, like a built-in dictionary and choices of fonts, and even a "Dark Mode" to make reading easier in the dark. It also features the ability to send your webpages to read on your Kindle or other e-reader.

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Instapaper Article List on Mac Screen

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Instapaper Article List on iPhone Screen

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Instapaper Article List on iPad Screen

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Text Version of Article on Mac Screen

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Article on iPhone Screen

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Article on iPad Screen

Finally, remember that the best feature of all of these note-keepers is that, although they require Internet (WiFi or 3G) access to download your notes and web pages, everything is then stored locally so even if you are off-line, you still have your notes. And, any changes and updates you make will automatically be synced next time that device can get to the Internet, so feel free to work away on whatever device you have with you!

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Sunday, April 3, 2011

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

look at all the young #Stanford fans playing basketball at Tourney Town

Stanford Band playing basketball at Tourney Town

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Pep Rally #Stanford Band best as always. (others boring) #spoiled

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably, the Tree knocked out in 2nd round. A&M didn't bring their collie mascot :(

watching Mascot Challenge. Inexplicably Tree knocked out in 2nd round, but A&M didn't bring their collie mascot

Monday, March 14, 2011

How Telecommuting Lets Workers Mobilize for Sustainability | Reuters

For U.S. businesses, making the transition to go mobile represents a triple win: It provides workplace flexibility for employees to telecommute or adapt other forms of telework, improves productivity while reducing costs, including reducing the amount of office space needed, and contributes significant environmental benefits in the form of reduced energy consumption and carbon emissions.

While I don’t think the main reason companies should implement workplace strategies and technologies is so employees can work from home (I think the main reason is to support distributed teams), some studies and surveys around telecommuting (another common name for work-from-home) have come out recently.

• in a 2008 survey of 1400 CFOs, one-third said telework arrangements are the best recruiting inducement, while half said it was the second-best (after salary)
• since transportation represents about 26% of (Green House Gas) GHG emissions worldwide, telecommuting is the biggest way to achieve significant reductions in GHG, with a relatively small investment in technology and infrastructure

We are seeing lots of surveys telling us that telecommuting is not only one of the strongest recruiting tools, it’s also one of the biggest retention incentives. These are both good news in these tought economic times for cash-strapped companies, as well as now that recruiting is becoming a little harder again.

Of course, if a company invests in technology and infrastructure to enable its employees to work well together, and to work from everywhere, then these same investments already include what most people need to telecommute.

So why not take advantage of these investments you’ve already made, and use them to offer telecommuting as both recruitment and retention incentives?

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Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Completely Redesigned Evernote for iPhone and iPod Touch « Evernote Blogcast

If you are a mobile worker, use multiple devices (including a smartphone), and are a compulsive notetaker like me, then you should be using Evernote. It automatically syncs with all of your Evernote instances (I use the Mac, iPhone, and web versions; although they have versions for most other platforms), all by itself, with no prompting from you. All of your notes are always with you!

This new iPhone version makes it much easier to add a new note, including incorporating snapshots. This makes it faster to write your notes and include pictures of the speaker and presentation. I use this feature all the time, and the new version really speeds it up for me.

It's also much faster and easier to find your existing notes using tags. This is a huge improvement over the previous version, and best of all, it's free.

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Monday, February 28, 2011

Google Docs secrets: 20 power tips | Office | Working Mac | Macworld

I use Google Docs (mostly spreadsheets) all the time to work on documents collaboratively. This top 20 power tips has some good information, but the best one is about sharing with others:
5. Share docs with non-Google Docs users

Google Docs is all about collaboration, and you can even permit people who don’t have a Google account to view and edit your documents.

To share a file, click the padlock icon alongside the document title at the top left of the window. In the dialog box that appears, select Change alongside the Private entry in the list. In the new dialog box, select either Public on the Web or Anyone with the Link. If you want viewers to be able to edit the document as well as just to see it, put a check next to Allow Anyone to Edit. Then click the Save button, and copy and paste the link into one or more e-mail messages.

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TELUS Talks Business - Flex Work Gone Wild

Research and analyst organizations around the world have given considerable focus to the topics of workforce mobility, distributed work and flexible workstyles.

 

Telus is a company playing an active role in industry research and in 2010 they sponsored a national study of the changing workforce dynamics (Harris Decima Flex Workstyles 2010.) The study was designed to look at the current state of the union in flexible work and get the pulse of employees and managers across the country on the benefits and shortcomings of flexible work options.


While I will use this one specific study to step you through the major findings, you should note that there is a substantive body of research that goes back 20 years that supports all of the general trends outlined below. So without further delay here are a few of the highlights:…

Although this series of articles is and data analysis has lots of interesting points, these two seemed the most significant to me:

• How does Flex Work stack up when employees/managers are considering a new career opportunity… Number 2 on the hit list right behind PAY…

• Almost 2/3rds of employees’ spend a significant time away from their desk but only 33% indicated that they have the tools to work effectively anywhere else…

I worked with Ian many years at Sun Microsystems, and he really is a pioneer in this field. And very good at looking at, and understanding, data and surveys.

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