Simplicity/Productivity - Maybe its time to ditch Microsoft Word

If you're like me a lot of time when you are looking to just get some basic writing done you're likely finding those "great" productivity features increasingly intruding and slowing you down. While a full featured word processor is extremely useful for dressing up documents they just seem to bog you down when all you really want to do is blast out that text.

Here's my suggestion whether you're on Windows or Mac OS/X = pull out your favorite basic text editor TextEdit on the Mac or WordPad on Windows and put an alias/shortcut on your dock/launch bar. For about a week try this experiment when you're looking to craft some basic text (<3 pages = which depending on your job is likely the bulk of your writing) then use that text editor as your work space. I've found that my ability to get things done has increased significantly as it takes away the annoying features which were meant to improve your experience and justify a software vendor continuing to invest in polishing software that was largely good enough.

Give it a shot and let me know how it works out.

Look at your bookshelves => Make some cash, reduce clutter at home & maximize return from your local taxes.

While the above might sound like a lot - I can assure you that is exactly what you can accomplish if you decide to take a good long look at your bookshelf at home. If you're like me you accumulated a dearth of books all around your home that in many cases have only ever been read once. Several years ago, I decided it was time to try and consolidate my book collection and set about culling my personal library. Here is how I went about this transformation.

Step 1. Time to Purge = I started going through our books and piling all those that I hadn't looked at in the last year into one grouping. My culling was thorough and ruthless this is not a time to reflect on how it would be great to go through this book - there is likely a reason you haven't read it yet. My simple advice is put it in the "to go" pile.

Step 2. Time to Sort = Once you've accumulated a pile of books to go you're best to start by identifiying all those books that can be sold. Through my process I discovered that Amazon for the most part has the most active marketplace for reselling books on the Net which is part of the reason that their fees are so dear. My experience indicated that you're best to check out the available stock already listed on the site you can get a gauge for the prices that others are asking for similiar texts. My goal was clear to recoup some cash but primarily to be rid of books that were just taking up space - with that objective in mind I set about putting my books on Amazon as the lowest priced offering in their respective used category. The way Amazon sets up its book sales is that you're paid a flat fee for delivery of ~$7.00 so its worth checking online with your post office to get a sense of the various shipping rates around the country. If you're like me it will end up taking a while to clear the backlog of unused books but once you receive that first payment you'll find your resolve to get rid of these books moves higher.

Step 3. Dust off that library card = The biggest and best change that we made was the decision to maximize our use of our local public library. When I look at the amount that I pay in local property taxes in my city and the services available to me - I was surprised that we hadn't taken action earlier. Over the past few years, I have become a big user of the library getting books and DVDs = allowing me to explore new topics, revisit classics all the while save money and reduce clutter at home.

What are you waiting for - start shedding those excess books.

Ready for that new iPod - how to monetize that old iPod

With Apple's launch this past week of a newly revised iPod line-up in time for the holidays I thought it was worthy of pointing out a couple of tips about your existing iPod. Given that you may be looking to upgrade your iPod here are some suggestions about what to do with your old one.

• Sell it on eBay or Craigslist. I have moved an old iPod on eBay and found that competition in this case for a fairly new iPod meant that I got a great price and didn't mind forking over the auction/listing fees to eBay. I'd only recommend this move if your iPod is a more desirable model
• Apple will give you a discount. "A free iPod recycling program, conducted through Apple’s retail stores, offers environmentally friendly disposal and a 10 percent discount on the purchase of a new iPod." see here for more details http://www.apple.com/environment/recycling/
  Unfortunately, If you're not buying through an Apple store then no discount but you can still get Apple to recycle your dead device which is a plus for our environment.
  
• Donate it to a friend or family member. In certain cases if the iPod is not in primo condition to eBay and doesn't have a dead battery or component (thus not worth handing back to Apple for a discount on your new iPod) then this may be a good option to consider.
  

Personally, I'll be using Apple's retail store discount when I upgrade to a iPod Touch since one of the Nano's that I have has a near dead battery.

Any other ideas on saving on your new iPod - leave them in the comments.

Personal Finance Software for the Mac

The key hassle that hit when the Wheaten moved back to the Mac a year ago where Windows continues to hold a meaningful advantage is Personal Finance software. A keen devotee to managing his money both daily spending and investments the Wheaten is a firm believer in the power of using a PC to help track and manage his spending. The goal in shifting back to the Mac was to get away from many of the hassles involved in owning and operating a Windows based PC (e.g., viruses, firewall, klunky software that doesn't behave properly - the list goes on). In general the transition back to the Mac has been relatively painless with music, pictures, and other documents all migrating seamlessly. The one area that seamingly lags far behind the Windows world is the area of personal finance software.

Thus the Wheaten started an on-going quest for a solution to his financial software woes - for the most part Mac efficiandos have tended to really only push vendors for very basic financial management software with Quicken dominating the landscape. Unfortunately Intuit, normally a forward thinking company that has done a great job over the years in helping develop this category and create user friendly personal finance software is the dominant player in this market. While Quicken for Mac comes bundled with most new Macs the Wheaten's advice is that if you live outside the U.S. you might as well remove this app since they're no longer supporting country specific versions (at least in Canada). In addition if you're a Quicken user on the PC the disparity in features between the two versions is wide and noticeable leading you to hair pulling frustration. Thus started what should have been a simple journey the options for personal finance software on the Mac come down to the following:

MoneyDance = a multiplatform product that offers Linux, PC, and Mac versions of the software. This is the product the Wheaten ultimately migrated to and offers a fairly robust set of features covering budgeting, bill management, investments, reporting. In using MoneyDance over the past 18 months and evaluating a number of alternatives this product still manages to hit most of the Wheaten's requirements but does come up short in terms of the sophistication of the Investment management functionality (that said relative to the PC none of the Mac products really seams to have gotten investments as a category). Overall, the open source nature of MoneyDance's product means that there is a fairly lively community on Yahoo Groups! and hosted on MoneyDance's own forums for support. The product team at MoneyDance seems committed to improving the product and has significantly improved the reporting engine in the most recent release. Downloads from a large list of financial institutions are supported and for those that aren't the ability to import files in .OFX (a widely supported file format used by most financial institutions) is available.
http://www.moneydance.com

Other apps that were explored and dismissed as being caught somewhere in the middle of being basic but frustrating to use were: LiquidLedger; iBank; and Moneywell.

Cha-Ching = an interesting product that offers a basic metaphor for managing your money could be a great alternative for the novice user that is looking for basic expense tracking and budgetting. Having not spent a lot of time with the demo the Wheaten has not tested the functionality relating to the ease of downloads from your financial institution. An inexpensive product at $40 that is ideal for those looking to cleanup their desks and better manage the flow of day to day household expenses.
http://www.midnightapps.com/


Other options - at the end of the day you could leave your personal finances on a Windows based machine and manage this via use of virtualization software such as Parrallels or VMWare for the Mac. However, in the Wheaten's view this negates many of the benefits of migrating to the Mac and in his case the need really only to run one operating system on his Macbook. For now the Wheaten is sticking with MoneyDance the most advanced of the Financial Software apps for the Mac. However he remains frustrated at the fairly rudimentary
nature of the investment functions in most Mac software.

What are you using to manage your personal finances on the Mac?