May 15 2009

Too Many Screens Is A Good Thing

I work on a Lenovo Ideapad laptop. It has a 15.4 inch screen. I like my Lenovo a lot. But, with all the stuff I am tracking, sometimes 15.4 inches feels a wee bit small.

Smaller still is my 10.2 inch Asus Eee Pc. Sometimes I set the little Eee up next to the Lenovo to maximize my screen real estate. Believe it or not, it really helps to not have to switch between windows or tabs and to have an extra screen open to track matters while working in other programs. Particularly if you are like me and frequent social media sites with real time updates.

Enter the Mimo 710 – a 7 inch 800 x 480 pixel screen that can rotate for either portrait or landscape mode and runs off one of my USB ports. It is a handy little box in which I can keep information that I don’t really want cluttering up my main work space. Like having your calendar or calculator at your elbow, while you work in the center of your desk. It was fairly easy to set up (particularly because my IT guy / husband helped me do it) and it works fairly flawlessly on my dual core processor.It comes with a power plug in case your computer’s USB ports don’t run enough juice.

My Wacom pen is much better at moving the mouse between screens than the laptop’s glidepoint. It is a bit cumbersome to open windows and move them between the two screens, but it can be done. I can see the appeal of their higher end model with touch screen.

It is so nice to keep Friendfeed or Sky Grid in the little window – I can see information pass out of the corner of my eye and occasionally glance over there for more. If I used something like Tweetdeck, I imagine it would be nice for that application as well.

The little guy cost $129, which chafed me a bit because you can get 19 inch monitors for about the same price. But the USB connector is a great feature and I definitely don’t have space for that big a monitor in my current spot. Speaking of which, I think it is high time to move these gadgets off the kitchen island.

Three Screens Running Web – Twitter, Pandora & Friendfeed

May 15 2009

Advocate's Studio – Live & Kicking On Your Kindle

Advocate's Studio Masthead The Advocate is very pleased to announce that you lucky Kindle owners can now get your favorite law, research, writing and technology blog on your Kindle for easy reading on the go. As of yesterday, Amazon opened up its Kindle blog catalog to publishers large and small. Follow the link to Ben Parr’s Mashable article for more information. Signing up to install the blog on their directory was simple: all it required of me was to set up an account with a tax id number and make some simple formating choices. Amazon does the rest and has told me that the Studio will be available within 42 – 78 hours for download to your Kindle.

Convenience does come with a small price tag. I am not sure what the Studio will cost to purchase from Amazon, but I figure it cannot be too much since the big name blogs will be going for between .99 cents and $1.99. Personally, my preference would be to make Advocate’s Studio on the Kindle available for my favorite number: free. Unfortunately that is up to Amazon and not me. As with iPhone apps, however, I am never bothered by a small fee for the convenience these portable tools offer and hopefully, Kindle owners won’t balk at the price either.

I also signed up my art blog, Star Toe Studio, so that both sides of my brain will be available for viewing by Kindle users far and wide.

I don’t have the URL’s at which the blogs will be made available yet, but I will update this post when they are live.

Happy reading!