The Apple watch – decades in the making

In 1983, Apple had a watch.  It took 21 years to perfect & announce it.

In 1983, Apple had a watch. It took 21 years to perfect & announce it.

Today Apple finally introduced its wrist watch — a design marvel.  But it has taken decades to get here.  This photo is the watch that the company was designing in 1983 — 21 years ago!

Thanks to “Keep it simple: the early design years of Apple” by Hartmut Esslinger.  That’s where this photo came from.

I’ll be reviewing the Apple Watch and the other cool newcomer to the market, new Moto 360 Watch (which beat the Apple Watch to announcement by less than a week) very soon.  So watch these pages for details.

 

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QuickBooks 2014 plays together well; offers enhancements

QuickBooks 2014 - choose your platform to help reduce the chore of doing your books

QuickBooks 2014 – choose your platform to help reduce the chore of doing your books

I have had the opportunity to take an extended look at 3 different versions of QuickBooks 2014 — the desktop versions for Mac & Windows, and the Online version.  Intuit is pushing the Online version with the goal of moving many users to that platform, but they haven’t forgotten the desktop users, and have been enhancing both platforms.

For a fuller view of QuickBooks direction, including details from my interview with Intuit’s VP & General Manager, read my article in TEQ.  In this post, I’m sharing some of the enhanced features over previous versions and info about how the platforms differ.

Usability

You might expect the Mac version to be lightyears ahead of the PC version because of Apple’s usability reputation — but the reverse is true with QuickBooks.  Across the board, I have found the PC platform to be easier to use and more functional than the Mac platform.

The most noticeable usability advantage of QuickBooks 2014 for the PC is the way it handles dates, filling them in more intuitively and not erring when you aren’t specific enough.  On the PC version, it automatically assumes I mean this year when I don’t insert the year in a date field; in the Mac version, whenever I forget to include the year, it makes me go back to enter the date again.  Strange that it doesn’t do that since the PC version has been autocompleting the date for years.

The way QuickBooks handles application windows is also easier on the windows platform, There you call up the QuickBooks application as the software that has your attention, and you can easily switch between the Customer Center and Vendor Center and other areas of the application.  In the Mac version, the parts of QuickBooks that are active can hide on your desktop taking some digging to find them — especially when you have a lot of windows open — in QuickBooks and other applications.

The one place in which I thought the Mac version wins for usability is the back up — which by default happens every time you close QuickBooks.  Not so on the PC version (although as I discuss momentarily), Intuit did improve the backup on PC in one important way.

The Online version feels, as you would expect, like an online application.  So if you like web-based applications better than desktop applications, you’ll be happy with it — especially if you like close integration with other outside vendor services. (see below).

Better than ever

As a long time QuickBooks user, I’m very happy with the enhancements that have happened in the past few releases, including QuickBooks 2014.  They make life easier — and more closely satisfy Intuit’s goal of making keeping the books less of a chore.

As mentioned above, the PC platform’s backup has a major enhancement — it now reopens your desktop windows after the backup as they were before you did the back up.  In older versions, it would close all your windows; and you would have to open them individually yourself to get your old working space back.  Much appreciated.

The other enhancement that makes life much easier is the ability to copy old forms when you’re ready to use them again.  For instance, you can find an old invoice to a client; then tell QuickBooks to make a copy that you can use as a basis for a brand new invoice.  This was a feature that was noticeably missing in older versions.

Online & Cloud

Although Intuit has offered an online version of QuickBooks for several years, they are ramping up their focus on it, making it easier to integrate with outside services and financial institutions, and integrating reports with many of those outside services.

You can go back and forth between Mac, PC and Online — but you need to do a transfer each time you do.  So you don’t want to rely on moving back and forth often — it could take a few minutes or more.  But from my tests, you should be able to be confident that your data will transfer well.  Don’t forget, though, that the feature sets and data are not the same in the three editions; so if you transfer from PC to Mac, you may lose data that is supported on the PC platform but not the Mac platform.  The Online Edition has a nice wizard to coach you through the steps of importing from Mac or PC.

All-in-all, if you are using an edition of QuickBooks that is a few years old, it’s worth checking out QuickBooks 2014 — especially if one of the items I mention above is important to you.  Just make sure you keep a backup of your old data, because once you go forward, you won’t be able to go back — even though they give you a trial period before you have to pay.

More about Intuit’s strategic direction with QuickBooks in the October 2014 issue of TEQ.

 

 

 

 

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Joining the indispensable: Evernote

With incomparable text recognition to help you extend your brain's memory, Evernote becomes a go-to app

With incomparable text recognition to help you extend your brain’s memory, Evernote becomes a go-to app

Getting onto my list of indispensable means getting over a very high bar.  There are only a handful of applications that meet the standard — and those have to meet a specific criteria: “Is it more difficult to get through a day without it than with it?”

It took a while to make the list, but Evernote recently achieved that status.  I now load the app on every phone; it’s on my PC and Mac; and it’s a go-to application when I want to have something handy at any time.

At its core, Evernote is a note-taking application on the cloud.  You type your notes into Evernote and it saves it for use later — giving you the ability to easily find the correct note with a few keystrokes.  Its strength and competitive advantage come from a few things it does better than alternatives:

  • It allows you to import scanned images, such as handwritten notes; then it automatically uses character recognition to index your notes for future use.
  • Its character recognition is beyond compare.  It really does recognize most of your words, whether typed or hand written — and it gets it mostly right.
  • You can even use your cell phone camera to capture images or external notes — and if it sees text, it will use its character recognition on those too.
  • It lets you grab items from the web in a few clicks; and it filters the information on the page so your saved Evernote is uncluttered and easy to read — without losing key images, headings & sections
  • It syncs in the cloud, so you have your same notes available on all your devices

So, after experimenting for more than a year, I now rely on it every day.  Even got my wife to load it on her phone so we can share important notes and lists.

There are other products with many similar capabilities that are very good — such as OneNote from Microsoft  But in the long run, you can’t use them all without causing long run problems.  Evernote is a great choice to be your one go-to product to extend your memory beyond its normal bounds.  And it’s inexpensive — as little as Free; more likely $5/month.

Find more of my posts and articles around the web, including in TEQ.

 

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Android phones compared

Moto G has colorful shells; some of them also protect the face of the device.

Moto G has colorful shells; some of them also protect the face of the device.

Tech devices go in phases — sometimes where there are substantial differences; sometimes where they are alike.  The recent set of Motorola Android phones on the Verizon Wireless network, while each having its own advantages depending on your needs, are really pretty similar.

If you’re trying to choose between them, here are a few things to consider:

Although they seem much the same, there are differences in recent crop of phones.

Although they seem much the same, there are differences in recent crop of phones.

The Moto G gives you HD video at 720p; while the Moto X gives you 1080p HD video.  The cameras on both front and back are higher resolution on the Moto X than on the Moto G.  So if high resolution image or video capture is a key criteria, the Moto X is a better choice.

However, the Moto G gives you burst mode, panorama photos and slow motion recording on its very nice 5MP back camera — so it’s no slouch.  If these features are important to you, then it makes more sense than the others.

The Droid Mini is particularly adept at taking pictures in the dark or when you need to snap a photo quickly.  In our tests in dark environments, the resulting photos were noticeably crisper.  Shake the phone to wake it; then tap it anywhere.  Its still camera resolution on front and back is as good as on the Moto X (10MP & 2MP).

Then there are some of the unique features —  

The Moto G has interchangeable shells (backs) and a rubberized grip.  So it won’t drop as easily and by customizing with your own color, it’s easier to find when your phone is sitting on the table besides a handful of other phones.

For the patriotic American, the Moto X is assembled in the USA (unlike most phones which are assembled in Asia).

The Droid mini has a few features that make it easier to watch videos on your TV screen that play from the phone, touch less controls, and an NFC chip (which means it can be aware of other devices near it to trade files or alert you to friends nearby).

The Droid Maxx has a water-resistant shell and a larger display than the others; and you can use voice control to command it, even when it’s asleep.

In our tests, the battery life of the Moto X was great, lasting in many cases up to 2 days; while the other phones were generally in the one-day range, and within 20% of each other for most days.

Operating Systems

The Moto G, The Moto X and the Droid Mini are all based on the same Android operating system (KitKat 4.4) and use Gorilla Glass — great for helping minimize hard to your display when you drop your phone.  The Razr Maxx uses an older operating system (Jelly bean 4.12).  The choice operating systems means a bit to functionality, and a bit more to usability.

More in my other articles and posts and at TEQ.

 

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Venture Capital and Angel Resources

Raising funds for your start up or growth stage business is hard.  Here are some resources that could make it easier.

100dollarhomeorigami

Tools to Shop Your Deal and Submit to Funders

Gust.com (formerly Angel Soft) is often used to submit your deal so funders can more easily compare your company, share it with their partners, and get feedback to determine how to best fund you.

Angel List is one of the early public investment marketplaces.  You can call it crowd funding if you want.  Great feature: Angels who see an investment that they like can invite other angels to participate in a round.

Investor Associations

Most start ups and early stage companies will want to be aware of at least these associations and the resources they bring.

National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) is a great place to find Venture Capitalists.  They hold events where you can meet and greet potential funders.  And if you’re a member of the NVCA, you can access their online directory. (For entrepreneurs, this may mean finding a friendly VC who is willing to help you access the membership.)

Angel Capital Association (ACA) is an association of Angel groups around the country.  Unlike the NVCA, the ACA has a fully accessible list of its members, so entrepreneurs can browse to find groups that match.  Most of the groups are regional.

These websites can give you great stats to use for decision making and for pitching and give you great insights into how to better deal with VCs and Angels respectively.

Industry Data Resources

Want to know what’s going down in technology investing?  CrunchBase gives you a database of Venture Capitalists & Angels, investable companies and deals that have happened.  So you can see where you can go, who might be willing to do a deal with you, and comparable deals for your planning and your pitches.

AngelSearch and VCSearch comb government records to gather investment data, industry preferences and total stock positions of America’s wealthiest individuals and VCs – giving you access by simply entering your parameters.  Alas, it’s not free; but for a few bucks, you might be able to find ways to parlay your small investment into 6 or 7 figure investments by others.

From Their Own Mouths

Some Venture Capitalists and Angels share their views and data publicly on their own blogs and via Twitter.  Here are several where I have found intriguing and helpful information.

FeldThoughts – posts from Brad Feld, VC at the Foundry Group in Boulder Colorado.  I also follow his tweets.

AVC.com – posts from Fred Wilson, VC at Union Square Ventures in New York City.

GenuineVC – posts from David Beisel, VC at NextViewVentures in Boston.  David is a native of Upper St. Clair.

Local Sources – Pittsburgh

Here’s a short list; but there are a lot more resources in Pittsburgh that can be helpful.

Apps

VC Calendar from Fundingpost – This app lists VC, Angel Investor, and Entrepreneur events from around the world.

Your Favorites

Feel free to add your favorite resources as comments — whether they are from local sources or from around the globe.

And good luck getting the investment you deserve.

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