Warren’s
baby, uklug
is on the way.  The agenda
is now finalised and will be made public next week.  If you have not
registered, take my word for it and do it now.  Spaces are running
out fast for the best free event in the UK this year.  The speaker
list is outstanding, with technical sessions, case studies, Gurupalooza
and much more….

By the way, if you are thinking of speaking
at this event.. well its too late.  All slots are gone.

Em… that ain’t me…

Bill Buchan sent me this
link yesterday.  I have not
tried it but its damn interesting.  This makes the iPhone a lot more
useful.  I had no interest in jailbreaking my phone until now….
This makes me want to do it.

Chuck Norris Widget… still makes me
giggle

• Simply put.. battery life is terrible.
   You NEED to charge this every night, or forget it.  Attribute
  it all you want to 3G, wifi and the screen.. but its still really bad.
  It reminds me of the XDA1, back in the day.  But, the XDA1 had feck
  all functionality compared to this phone.

• I have some Ipod things I bought over
  the years.. for some reason they will not work with an iPhone.. C’mon Apple
  - stop trying to screw us for every penny – considering your quarterly
  fiscal report, you are not stuck for a few quid Steve.

• GPS is great – but sat nav is what is
  needed

• The keyboard is really good on the iPod,
  but its hard to beat the tactile interface of a blackberry

• Using the iPhone as an iPod is great,
  but the tactile interface is a loss there aswell, especially if you use
  it walking/gymming… I want to be able to click to the next song without
  looking.  That would be a great third party product (headphones with
  some basic tactile buttons).  It may already be out there – I have
  not looked.

• For day to day business work, the iPhone
  is not a patch (repeat.. not a patch) on the blackberry.  If you live
  in email (many people do) and hammer out short bursts of messages all day,
  I don’t think this is the model for you.  Give it another release.

• It has crashed… quite a few times.
   Nothing serious now, and I have not had to reset like others, but
  it has frozen up.

• Some applications are just not ready
  (netnewswire on the iPhone has left a lot to be desired with me)

• I really don’t need to mention the lack
  of Lotus Notes support at this stage, do I?

  Update:  Matt White was
  good enough to tell me there is a clicker on the headphones that came with
  the iPhone – 1 click for pause, 2 for next track.  Its not bad (would
  like a bit more functionality though)

• The UI is outstanding -by far best in
  businessss

• It development of the UI is so impressive,
  that it almost seems to know what buttons you will want, and only displays
  them to you.  Outstanding

• Screen interaction and touch screen
  is by far the best I have ever used (and I have had many windows mobile
  devices over the years)

• GPS is excellent – when real SAT NAV
  software comes out for the iPhone, it will be a car "must have"

• 3G is good, as long as you have signal
  life

• The iPhone switches itself from wifi
  to 3g to gprs as it needs to – no questions asked.  It.Just.Works.

• The iPod is as good as ever
• The applications are good – no real
  killer app for me yet, but I know that some will come along

• Google maps on it is excellent
• It is a capable phone.  Now I live
  in the UK, I need a UK mobile, and this is it

• eMail rendering is outstanding
• The calendar is excellent (needs a week
  view though)

• Simply put – it is the best smartphone
  I have ever used from a consumer’s perspective

GSX
have kindly invited me to present
at their GSX Network Management Seminar in Nice on 1-3 October, 2008.  This
is being held in the Boscolo
hotel (short trip from Nice Airport)
and is shaping up to be an impressive 2-day event.  I have heard rumours
of another guest speaker… who will have some pretty good stuff to demo
by then!  Register to attend the event by clicking here.
 For those that do not know the GSX software (where have you been?)
it is a very solid impressive third party product suite with a very long
history at this stage.  GSX
monitor software is by far my
favorite of theirs.

So, considering the weather in Europe
that time of year, get yourself down to the south of France for a few days
and meet with some interesting people.

Charles
Robinson is without doubt one
of the nicest guys I had the pleasure to get to know over the past year.
 Not only that, he is extremely smart and astute.  There was
a large scale DR situation where he works recently, and Charles was good
enough to post his experiences.  I found myself nodding at almost
everything he wrote, having experienced it in some form or another over
my years in the trade.  If you work in IT, take time to read this
and this.
 It will be time well spent.  So much so, that you read this
one during work hours in front of your boss, so when he asks what you are
doing "cocking about reading blogs" so it to him aswell.  I
only hope that Charles gets to write more (without getting himself in any
bother with his employer) about his experience.

Caption competition

Originally uploaded by pmooneynet
Taken with my iPhone 2.0

Interesting stuff for SMB market.  The
install was quick and easy. I can see space for this product in the marketplace.
 Will post a review when I have played fully.