Windows desktop apps through an iPad? You fell victim to one of the classic blunders!

Windows desktop apps through an iPad? You fell victim to one of the classic blunders!

I ran across a piece yesterday discussing one hospital’s lack of success with iPads and BYOD. My curiosity piqued, I examined the piece looking for where the project failed. Interestingly, but not surprisingly, it seemed that it fell apart not on the iPad, and not with their legacy application, but in the symphony (or more realistically the cacaphony) of the two together. I can’t be certain that the hospital’s solution is using Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) or Remote Desktop (RD,…

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The machines are coming for your job. Big deal.

The machines are coming for your job. Big deal.

This blog post is in response to the TechCrunch piece entitled Get Ready To Lose Your Job. For my entire life, my father was a physician (until he retired). He had to subscribe to medical journals and take courses to keep his skills up to snuff, but medicine, and his specialty, did not evolve to such a form that his career has been replaced. That said, his specialty (gastroenterology) now has some amazing tools at their disposal that can obviate…

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Microsoft Account – Bring Your Own Identity

Microsoft Account – Bring Your Own Identity

When you start a new job, there’s only one you. You don’t get a new identity just because you started at a new company. You have the same Social Security number, you have the same fingerprints, same birthdate, same home town. You get a collection of credentials that give you access to company resources, but you don’t really get a new “identity”. In fact, pretty much the only time you get a completely new identity is if you enter the…

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Delight the customer

Delight the customer

At an annual Microsoft company meeting early in my Microsoft career (likely around 1999), Steve Ballmer interrupted the lively flow of the event to read a few letters that had been sent to him from executives around the world. As I recall, Microsoft technology was not working perfectly for these customers, and they weren’t happy. After he read the letters, Steve broke into a speech about “delighting the customer” – a mantra he adopted for some time, and I continue to use to this…

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Task-Oriented Computing

Task-Oriented Computing

Over the past six years, as the iPhone, then iPad, and similar devices have caused a ripple within the technology sector, the industry and pundits have struggled to define what these devices are. From the beginning, they were always classified as “content consumption devices”. But this was a misnomer then, and it’s definitely wrong today. Whether we’re talking about Apple’s devices, Android phones or tablets, Blackberry’s new phones, or devices running Windows 8/RT and Windows Phone, calling them content consumption…

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Good Times… Good Times… The book.

Good Times… Good Times… The book.

In 1992, I got my first Windows PC. For more than 20 years, Microsoft has been a central force in my life, and fundamentally shaped my career. From the time I joined in 1997 until I left in 2004, Microsoft would teach me lessons, frustrate me, make me happy, make me sad – and finally embolden me to leave the nest. Though I left frustrated and bitter as Longhorn was struggling and stumbling – eventually to become the much maligned Windows Vista, I…

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Office 365 and Office 2013 – A field guide

Office 365 and Office 2013 – A field guide

One of the most common questions I get asked – by our subscribers, by press, by my friends, by my family… by lots of people, is: “What’s the difference between Office 2013 and Office 365?” This is usually followed by the person meekly (unnecessarily) stating that they feel bad because they don’t get it. Don’t. Don’t feel bad. Though Microsoft is getting better, the branding and packaging isn’t easy for people to digest (complex packaging and licensing is the cellulose…

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Email 101

Email 101

While talking with my wife the other day, I happened to mention Atos to her. If you don’t remember Atos, they’re the company that banned email at the tail end of 2011. I’m not sure how well that has gone, but I haven’t heard that they’ve reversed the decision – in fact they are still blogging about it as of last October. I thought the idea of banning email was illogical then, and I still believe it is. I was thinking…

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When I worked at Microsoft

When I worked at Microsoft

Few phrases would strike fear into the hearts of my co-workers in Austin faster than “when I worked at Microsoft”. I’ve since learned to keep my stories to myself a bit more. But recently I’ve been contemplating not what I learned at Microsoft, but instead what I’ve learned since. At Microsoft, I was a horrible writer. I’ll be honest. I hated writing specs. Considering I was a Program Manager (PM), I think that was a bad thing (in hindsight). But…

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All I want for Christmas – my Windows v.Next wishlist

All I want for Christmas – my Windows v.Next wishlist

For almost two weeks, my main computer – a ThinkPad W510 (circa 2010) has been running Windows 8. Courtesy of the Logitech Touchpad T650 I’ve mentioned here and many times on Twitter, the experience has been – to me – much smoother than when I was trying to use Windows 8 (in a VM, admittedly) with a mouse during the previews. Three things I want to say up front: I’m trying to be positive and fair, and give Windows 8 on a…

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