The Tech Gap

Look What I Found!!

As the famous 21st century philosopher, Homer Simpson, says --- "DOH" --- why didn't I think of this? Well. I didn't. But I did find it and I'm posting it here for you in hopes that it makes your life just a tiny bit better. Did you ever inadvertently unplug your computer instead of your projector, because you couldn't tell one plug from the other in your power strip while rummaging around under the conference room table?   I sure have! I discovered this handy little solution and though I'd share it with you ... you can order them today and they'll be here in mid-April when you start your spring office-cleaning. [You DO spring cleaning at your office, don't you?]

ID Pilot Wire Identification Labels each contain a drawing of the device it powers. They’re pretty easy-to-use as they're pliable vinyl and stick directly onto the plug. Sets come in three different themes: "Office" contains 22 office computer labels & 10 office equipment labels; "Electronics" has 16 home computer labels, 16 audio/video equipment labels & 8 charger labels for wireless devices; "Household" has 8 kitchen basics labels, 8 gourmet kitchen labels, 24 household labels & 8 workshop labels. The "Office" set is wonderful, the "Electronics" set is OK, and the "Household" fairly useless as far as I'm concerned.

They stick well to uneven and irregular surfaces and their background is ultra white to enhance visibility of the images. The labels are 5/8 inch in diameter. And they're cheap at $6 a set. I found them here.

Now back to reviewing tax returns .....

gll

And the One Shall Become Two, er ....

Friend and fellow CITP Darren Root of Bloomington, Indiana asked me a few weeks ago if I knew of way to utilize a split-screen or, preferably, a dual-monitor in a Citrix environment. Although I was sure I had heard of others doing this I was stumped when Darren asked me "how". Well, like the great technologist he is (he was awarded the Indiana CPA Society Technology Person of the Year a few years back) he went out and found the solution and was kind enough to share it with me ..... so I'm sharing with you with thanks to Darren.

An Indian company, Vyooh produces software systems for managing computer systems and IT infrastructure. Their flagship product appears to be SplitView. The product enables use of dual monitors in a Citrix or Teminal Services environment ---- solving a  vexing problem for many practitioners. It also works in the inverse --- essentially making one large monitor into two, or three, or ..... you get the point. Now, before you yell "I can do that myself!" please understand that there are two separate products here. The personal and the server.

If you happen to be lucky enough to have dual monitors at home (I do) and would like to have the same functionality there as in your office, SplitView might just be the trick you were looking for. The personal version for the "one monitor, two screens" solution for only $29. The workhorse solution, however, runs at the server site and allows all users to utilize their multiple screen set-ups. That version runs $729 per server.

Thanks, Darren!

gll

They Say a Picture is Worth 1,000 Words .....

For a numbers-guys I've always been pretty visual. Early in my career (pre-personal computers) I often scratched out rudimentary charts to help clients (actually it helped ME) understand the relationships between numbers on their financial statements. Now we have dozens of applications available to chart and graph F/S data to our heart's content. I've written and spoken often regarding financial statement analysis and strongly encourage the use of products such as ProfitCents, Financial Analysis CS, BizBench, and ProSystem fx Profit Driver --- and today I'd like to tell you about a couple of other "visual tools" that I use.

DiskMapper provides a picto-gram (these are technically called "treemaps") that allows you to see a disk and the relative size of the files and folders on that disk. Since it's interactive you can quickly drill down to "see" exactly what, where, and to what extent, files are using your hard disk space. In the future Microsoft's new extensible file system may obviate DiskMapper, but for now and probably for a several years, its a valuable little utility. It's $50 here.

And ... just because I love the visual depiction of data .... a free pick for you. NEWSMAP is a mashup of Googles news search data  and a treemap. The results are customizable by area of interest (sports, entertainment, technology, world, nation, etc) and show you at a glace the up-to-the-minute news story count. It's absolutely fascinating ..... here's a link for you.

Enjoy.

gll

Tech2Go --Episode 2

Tech2Go seems to be a great success .... hundreds of you have listened in (many actually download and listen later!!) and so far the feedback has been very positive.... so we've recordeded episode 2 and it's now available. It's a fast-paced roundtable discussion that I host with guests Brent Goodfellow, Dave McClure and Randy Johnston. We tackle current technology issues impacting the tax and accounting profession. This month, we discuss useful hardware and software tools to boost productivity, Microsoft Professional Accountants Network (MPAN), Microsoft Office Accounting, and the current state of PDA Smartphones. [Running time is 1:17:44]

For full, linked  show notes please go here.

To listen just click here.

Enjoy ... and please let us know what you think. Leave us a voice mail and we'll include it in our next episode. Just call the Tech2Go comment line at 800-456-0864x 2106 

gll