AvantGo™ turns wasted time into productive time

If you are like me you hate to waste time, but try as we might there seems to be too many occasions when we find ourselves waiting. Perhaps it is in the doctor’s office or the “Quickie Lube” joint. I sure can remember sitting for hours on gym bleachers waiting for my son’s 3 minutes of wrestling fame. One option of course is to always have reading material with you. I have an idea for those of you who use a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) or other mobile device. You can download all sorts of information in the form of electronic newspapers, magazines, short stories and other information form the Internet using a service called AvantGo™ (www.avantgo.com)

Each morning when I get to the office I connect my PDA to my office computer to update any appointments I may have made since I last “synched” the two. At that same time my computer connects with AvantGo™ and downloads sections of the New York Times, articles from Wired Magazine and selected other publications. So when I have a few minutes I can pull out my PDA and do some reading. I would not recommend reading Gone With the Wind in this 2” x 2” screen, but for short articles it is great

AvantGo™ bills itself as the world’s largest mobile internet service delivering content to some 7 million people using PDAs, wireless PDAs, and smart phones like the Blackberry™. The service does carry advertising but this allows for the basic subscription to be free. I don’t find the ads intrusive and you will find that they will be customized to relate to the content you are requesting. So if you subscribe to GolfLine, an AvantGo™ offering in cooperation with Golf Magazine, don’t be surprised if you see lots of ads for golf clubs.

Another neat feature of AvantGo™ is a MapQuest™ option. You can have your MapQuest™ results sent to your PDA so you don’t need to print them. It saves trees and time and you can just erase the information after your trip.

If you have a PDA and you are only using it for an address book and Calendar, I think you will find AvantGo™ a way to make it more useful.

AvantGo™ turns wasted time into productive time

If you are like me you hate to waste time, but try as we might there seems to be too many occasions when we find ourselves waiting. Perhaps it is in the doctor’s office or the “Quickie Lube” joint. I sure can remember sitting for hours on gym bleachers waiting for my son’s 3 minutes of wrestling fame. One option of course is to always have reading material with you. I have an idea for those of you who use a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) or other mobile device. You can download all sorts of information in the form of electronic newspapers, magazines, short stories and other information form the Internet using a service called AvantGo™ (www.avantgo.com)

Each morning when I get to the office I connect my PDA to my office computer to update any appointments I may have made since I last “synched” the two. At that same time my computer connects with AvantGo™ and downloads sections of the New York Times, articles from Wired Magazine and selected other publications. So when I have a few minutes I can pull out my PDA and do some reading. I would not recommend reading Gone With the Wind in this 2” x 2” screen, but for short articles it is great

AvantGo™ bills itself as the world’s largest mobile internet service delivering content to some 7 million people using PDAs, wireless PDAs, and smart phones like the Blackberry™. The service does carry advertising but this allows for the basic subscription to be free. I don’t find the ads intrusive and you will find that they will be customized to relate to the content you are requesting. So if you subscribe to GolfLine, an AvantGo™ offering in cooperation with Golf Magazine, don’t be surprised if you see lots of ads for golf clubs.

Another neat feature of AvantGo™ is a MapQuest™ option. You can have your MapQuest™ results sent to your PDA so you don’t need to print them. It saves trees and time and you can just erase the information after your trip.

If you have a PDA and you are only using it for an address book and Calendar, I think you will find AvantGo™ a way to make it more useful.

Watching TV without a TV v 2.2

Last week we looked at some of the videos that are available on-demand from CETconnect.org, the service of Cincinnati Public Television. This week let’s take a look as other websites that provide local video programming that you watch on your computer.

Most of the local commercial TV stations provide some video via the Internet. One of the first to get into the field was Channel 9, WCPO. (www.wcpo.com) Channel 9 offers all of their regular newscasts on line so if you missed the 11 PM news you can watch it the next morning on your computer. The videos are available for one week from the time they are first broadcast. If you grew up in Cincinnati you will enjoy watching some of the historical videos that have been placed on the site. There are some vintage “Uncle Al” shows and some newscasts from the 50s and 60s. “It’s eleven o’clock in the tri-state…”

WLWT, Channel 5 offers video on their web site. (www.channelcincinnati.com) While they do provide a brief on-line only video newscast, the offerings are a bit meager compared to other stations. They do have a display of the most popular videos making it easy to find an individual story or feature for that day.

WKRC, Channel 12 ( www.local12.com ) has several videos available coving local news stories as well as some historical materials. One of their experiments is “The Cooler” a fast paced daily quasi-news segment done in a hip format It is aimed at the young professional audience that is so elusive for local TV news programmers.

Over at Fox 19, (www.wxix.com) the station has a full complement of news stories similar to the other commercial stations. Fox 19 is also providing video content to a new online video service provided by Cincinnati Bell called Z-Street.

Z-Street is part of the phone company’s ZoomTown service ( www.zoomtown.com ) service. It is only a few months old and unlike the other sites discussed above, it solicits video from the users. Patterned on YouTube.com or Google Video, the videos are available for free viewing are quite divers. Some are entertaining, while others are just plain stupid. Essentially Z-Street is similar to YouTube ( www.YouTube.com ) with mostly local content.

Not only do the TV and Radio stations provide local video content, the Cincinnati Enquirer has equipped some of their reporters with small video cameras. The results have been interesting if a bit uneven in quality. ( www.enquirer.com )

Even the Cincinnati Opera ( www.cincinnatiopera.org ) is getting in on the act with video interviews with the featured singers of this season’s offerings.

Certainly watching TV on your computer has not yet replaced your traditional viewing. With advances in video quality and the availability of devices that will allow you to watch video from all sources (broadcast, cable, satellite and the Internet) on your regular TV set in the family room, the same blurring of the lines between broadcast and cable will happen between regular TV and the Internet TV.

Watching TV without a TV v 2.2

Last week we looked at some of the videos that are available on-demand from CETconnect.org, the service of Cincinnati Public Television. This week let’s take a look as other websites that provide local video programming that you watch on your computer.

Most of the local commercial TV stations provide some video via the Internet. One of the first to get into the field was Channel 9, WCPO. (www.wcpo.com) Channel 9 offers all of their regular newscasts on line so if you missed the 11 PM news you can watch it the next morning on your computer. The videos are available for one week from the time they are first broadcast. If you grew up in Cincinnati you will enjoy watching some of the historical videos that have been placed on the site. There are some vintage “Uncle Al” shows and some newscasts from the 50s and 60s. “It’s eleven o’clock in the tri-state…”

WLWT, Channel 5 offers video on their web site. (www.channelcincinnati.com) While they do provide a brief on-line only video newscast, the offerings are a bit meager compared to other stations. They do have a display of the most popular videos making it easy to find an individual story or feature for that day.

WKRC, Channel 12 ( www.local12.com ) has several videos available coving local news stories as well as some historical materials. One of their experiments is “The Cooler” a fast paced daily quasi-news segment done in a hip format It is aimed at the young professional audience that is so elusive for local TV news programmers.

Over at Fox 19, (www.wxix.com) the station has a full complement of news stories similar to the other commercial stations. Fox 19 is also providing video content to a new online video service provided by Cincinnati Bell called Z-Street.

Z-Street is part of the phone company’s ZoomTown service ( www.zoomtown.com ) service. It is only a few months old and unlike the other sites discussed above, it solicits video from the users. Patterned on YouTube.com or Google Video, the videos are available for free viewing are quite divers. Some are entertaining, while others are just plain stupid. Essentially Z-Street is similar to YouTube ( www.YouTube.com ) with mostly local content.

Not only do the TV and Radio stations provide local video content, the Cincinnati Enquirer has equipped some of their reporters with small video cameras. The results have been interesting if a bit uneven in quality. ( www.enquirer.com )

Even the Cincinnati Opera ( www.cincinnatiopera.org ) is getting in on the act with video interviews with the featured singers of this season’s offerings.

Certainly watching TV on your computer has not yet replaced your traditional viewing. With advances in video quality and the availability of devices that will allow you to watch video from all sources (broadcast, cable, satellite and the Internet) on your regular TV set in the family room, the same blurring of the lines between broadcast and cable will happen between regular TV and the Internet TV.

Don't Leave Home Without It!

As much of a geek as I am and given to acquiring most anything that is electronic, I was slow to adopt using a PDA or Personal Digital Assistant. A PDA is a very small special purpose computer designed to make your life more organized and efficient. Frankly I was very happy with my little paper Day Planner™ and over the years amassed quite a pile of them in the top drawer of my desk, some of them going back into the 1970s. Today, I truly can not operate without my Palm™ PDA.

A PDA can perform several functions. This week we will discuss the basic features like the calendar and address book. Next week we will look at some neat expanded features like on line newspapers, picture albums and specialized software.

There are two main types of PDAs. The Palm™ operating software-based models and those that use scaled down Windows™ operating system. I use the Palm™ but most of the features are very similar across platforms.

My PDA is a Palm™ Tungsten Model /e and is about three years old and cost about $125.00. It is about the size of a pack of cigarettes but only about ½ the thickness. Don’t let the size fool you, it is a very powerful tool. Right now I have all my contacts in the address book. There are over 1000 different names with telephone and fax numbers, email addresses, home and business mailing addresses. Some entries even have birthdays, kid’s and spouse’s names and other personal information. Of course all is searchable with the touch of a button. All entries can be edited and updated.

The calendar can be displayed in day, week, month or even year format. After entering an appointment in the calendar you can ask the PDA to remind you with an audible alarm a few minutes or a few hours before the event. It can remind you of birthdays or other special events from data in your address book and remind you a few days in advance to send a card. For example my Palm™ reminds me of my wife’s and kid’s birthdays five days in advance.

The small video screen can display full color images and text. The size of the text can be adjusted so even my aging eyes can read it easily. The device is battery powered and is charged up each day when I “synch” it with the computer. All the information `contained in my Palm™ is also available on my desk top PC. Each morning I connect, or “synch,” my Palm™ to my PC and the two devices exchange information. So if I added an appointment into my Palm™ it now shows up on the calendar on my PC and visa versa. If there is a conflict it alerts me. If I added or modified an entry in the address book on my Palm™, say a new telephone number, that number is now also updated on my PC.

Having all of this information at my fingertips is a great time saver. Gone are the days of pencil scratched paper address books with old telephone numbers crossed out and illegible addresses and zip codes.

In the next entry I will take you on a tour of my personal model and tell what software I carry in the palm of my hand (or at perhaps in my pocket.)

Don't Leave Home Without It!

As much of a geek as I am and given to acquiring most anything that is electronic, I was slow to adopt using a PDA or Personal Digital Assistant. A PDA is a very small special purpose computer designed to make your life more organized and efficient. Frankly I was very happy with my little paper Day Planner™ and over the years amassed quite a pile of them in the top drawer of my desk, some of them going back into the 1970s. Today, I truly can not operate without my Palm™ PDA.

A PDA can perform several functions. This week we will discuss the basic features like the calendar and address book. Next week we will look at some neat expanded features like on line newspapers, picture albums and specialized software.

There are two main types of PDAs. The Palm™ operating software-based models and those that use scaled down Windows™ operating system. I use the Palm™ but most of the features are very similar across platforms.

My PDA is a Palm™ Tungsten Model /e and is about three years old and cost about $125.00. It is about the size of a pack of cigarettes but only about ½ the thickness. Don’t let the size fool you, it is a very powerful tool. Right now I have all my contacts in the address book. There are over 1000 different names with telephone and fax numbers, email addresses, home and business mailing addresses. Some entries even have birthdays, kid’s and spouse’s names and other personal information. Of course all is searchable with the touch of a button. All entries can be edited and updated.

The calendar can be displayed in day, week, month or even year format. After entering an appointment in the calendar you can ask the PDA to remind you with an audible alarm a few minutes or a few hours before the event. It can remind you of birthdays or other special events from data in your address book and remind you a few days in advance to send a card. For example my Palm™ reminds me of my wife’s and kid’s birthdays five days in advance.

The small video screen can display full color images and text. The size of the text can be adjusted so even my aging eyes can read it easily. The device is battery powered and is charged up each day when I “synch” it with the computer. All the information `contained in my Palm™ is also available on my desk top PC. Each morning I connect, or “synch,” my Palm™ to my PC and the two devices exchange information. So if I added an appointment into my Palm™ it now shows up on the calendar on my PC and visa versa. If there is a conflict it alerts me. If I added or modified an entry in the address book on my Palm™, say a new telephone number, that number is now also updated on my PC.

Having all of this information at my fingertips is a great time saver. Gone are the days of pencil scratched paper address books with old telephone numbers crossed out and illegible addresses and zip codes.

In the next entry I will take you on a tour of my personal model and tell what software I carry in the palm of my hand (or at perhaps in my pocket.)