Running The Ladder is the company blog of Bainbridge Studios, a tiny runt of a design practice based in lovely Tacoma, WA.
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Time to Get Those Last Minute MacWorld Predictions In
Friday, January 5th, 2007 | Tom Carmony
Seattle’s own Mike Davidson offers his contribution to the ever-burgeoning number of Macworld predictions, and I have to say that I’m liking his list. Of course, most of the attention in recent months, from both Apple fans and Wall Street analysts, has been on the supposedly “sure thing” Apple phone, but Mike offers a few other tantalizing suggestions, including (my personal favorite) the “iTheater”.
Check out Mike Davidson’s Pre-Macworld Rundown »
Opposite Ends of the Network Security Spectrum
Friday, January 5th, 2007 | Tom Carmony
New York Times technology writer David Pogue runs down some of the potential risks (from a privacy/security standpoint) of using public wi-fi networks. This is certainly not new to anyone well-versed in network security, but for the average user, it’s a bit of a wake-up call to just how easily (and to what extent) any of our information can be gleaned from our computers on our next visit to the corner coffee shop.
Using software easily downloaded online, Pogue and Co. were able to demonstrate the ease with which information about your wi-fi could be tracked, including:
- Copies of e-mail sent and received;
- Lists of websites visited;
- Even graphics and other files that appeared on websites you’ve visited.
One the other end of the spectrum, for those exceedingly concerned with network security, the NSA has posted a free PDF guide on beefing up your own home or office network’s security (via Treelimb).
Mapping the Trends of 2007
Tuesday, January 2nd, 2007 | Tom Carmony
Jason Kottke has an interesting link up today for a series of visual maps (based on Subway maps), done by Information Architects, that are designed to show inter-relationships between companies and technology trends in the coming year.
Ideally, the whole point of utilizing any form of visual metaphor such as a map would be to make the information easier to take in and process for the end-user. Unfortunately, these visuals seem to miss that point entirely.
Click here to view the full Information Architects post » (via Kottke)
Lessons Learned Courtesy of Mother Nature
Tuesday, December 19th, 2006 | Tom Carmony
The past five days have been rather harrowing for many of us here in the Pacific Northwest. The windstorms that swept through the region last Thursday night knocked out power to more than one million homes throughout Washington and Oregon. Aside from addressing the most basic issues such as maintaining food and shelter and avoiding the cold, Mother Nature also brought with her a test for businesses – dealing with the impact of the storm on technology, communication and more.
Here at my home office, from which the vast majority of all Bainbridge Studios work and communication emanates, the storm proved to be a particular test. Having been fortunate over the years, we’ve rarely been faced with any power outages lasting more than a couple minutes and Internet service outages have been few and far between (knock on wood).
Thankfully, we had pretty fair warning that this particular storm was coming and what could be expected as far as damage. By late Thursday afternoon, the winds and rain were significantly picking up and the lights began to flicker. Having finished up most of the day’s work, I went through a quick backup routine to get an additional set of all client/project files on a portal USB2 drive and then powered down the office server. Despite a few “blinks”, the power did in fact manage to stay on throughout most of Thursday evening, finally dropping off early Friday, around 1:15am.
Friday is what proved to be the true test of flexibility. We woke up to no power, no heat and (obviously) no Internet access. Given the seemingly slim prospects of the power being quickly restored that day, Dianne and I elected to head out of Seattle for the day, visiting with family in the burbs that were fortunate to have power.
Unfortunately, their DSL service was down.
What could have been a rather insane day of managing work, sans online access, turned out relatively painless. My Blackberry provided easy access to keep up on any/all incoming email and allowed me to inform clients of the day’s events and circumstances. That, paired with a relatively light work day (with only a couple minor deliverable deadlines to meet), made the potentially madding actually rather manageable.
I did find myself spending a good deal of Friday afternoon bouncing from cafe to cafe in search of a working WiFi connection to get a couple client email campaigns ready for delivery, but aside from that, managed to crank out a reasonably productive day in spite of the circumstances.
So what did I learn from last week’s experience? Planning is key. You never know when adverse circumstances (be it weather, accidents or any number of other factors completely out of your control) will impact your business, and it’s best to be prepared:
- Have flexible options for working from the road.
- Make sure your computer systems have working APC backup devices, to allow you to save files and properly shut down your computers in the event of a power outage (I discovered that my APCs didn’t hold up well when the power was lost).
- Have an email- and web-enabled phone or PDA that will give you access to email and necessary online services, and make sure that device works when the power or WiFi is down.
- Back up your data! Regardless of pending nature disasters, always maintain backup copies of your critical data. Ideally, that backup should be portable, so you can simply grab an external drive and take it with you.
- Finally, and probably most important of all, RELAX. No matter how frustrated and stressed you might be in that crisis moment, there are others out there dealing with a lot more. If you’ve taken the necessary steps to prepare yourself and your business for such adverse circumstances, you’ll be fine. Relax and enjoy the adventure.
Adobe Announces Release of Photoshop CS3 Beta
Thursday, December 14th, 2006 | Tom Carmony
For much of the (Mac-based) creative community, the official adoption of the new Intel-based Mac computers won’t be complete until the release of Adobe’s Creative Suite 3 as a Universal Binary sometime this coming spring. For those unfamiliar, a Universal Binary is a program format optimized to run on both older PowerPC-based Macs as well as the new Intel machines. Older (non-Universary Binary) software is capable of running on Intel Macs today, but performance in many cases (Photoshop in particular) leaves a lot to be desired.
Suffice to say, there’s a lot of excitement brewing today after Adobe announced that they’ll be releasing a beta version of Photoshop CS3 tomorrow (Friday, December 15th) for free download. The software will include a two-day preview period for non-CS2 users; those currently running CS2 and possessing a legit software license will be able to use the CS3 beta at least until the final, official release of the software in the spring.
MacWorld has a rundown on the release »