This is a great specialty to look for in your podiatrist.
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Words to live by
I love this quote from an interview with Richard Pryor on NPR’s Fresh Aire. Mr. Pryor was talking about dealing with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), he said that his disease was a blessing and joked about it in his routines. In the interview he said:
Life to me was like… not supposed to make sense, ’cause, hey, it’s I don’t care how you slice it, you ain’t getting out alive, so enjoy as much as you can.
Richard Pryor died this month at the age of 65, his wife said he was joking right up until the and and died with a smile on his face.
Once again I’m humbled by the strength of others. A tip of the hat to you Mr. Pryor, I’m sure you watching us and still laughing.
Ellie has written a great post on the Windows Live Mail team blog about the yeoman’s work that has gone into the product to support older browsers. Ellie worked with a team in China to develop a version we internally referred to as the “down-level” version of Kahuna (she basically worked U.S. hours in the office, then went home and worked some China hours on top of that… boy does she deserve a few week’s rest!). The goal of this basic implementation is to support older and non-standard browsers for accessing Windows Live Mail accounts. The “up-level” features of Windows Live Mail such as drag and drop, spell check as you type and shift/control click require an advanced browser which supports the core technologies needed for Atlas (JavaScript, DHTML, and XMLHTTP). This is great news… after all, what good is having roaming web-mail if you can’t get to it from everywhere?
You may be wondering, what is “up-level” for the Windows Live Mail beta? For now “up-level” means IE 6 and 7.
I am now sitting here picturing the sparkle that has just come to the eye of all the Microsoft haters and conspiracy aficionados reading this. I’m picturing them clapping gleefully as they hop from foot to foot, pointing accusingly: “I knew it! You’re just trying to force us to use IE! This is just another glaring example of Microsoft forcing its software down our throats! You’re all evil footservants of the great lord of darkness, Bill Gates! [exceedingly long string of expletives removed for the sake of brevity, let’s just say that Lenny Bruce would have blushed]”
Yes, Sherlock, you caught us… red handed. That’s right Kojak, you nabbed us focusing our early development efforts on a single browser to speed initial development. Congratulations Barney Fife, you found us cutting a corner to get our latest product into the hands of customers as early as possible so our beta testers could help us mold the future of the application. We’re guilty of that age old sin of limiting the number of variables when approaching a difficult problem. You may now read us our rights.
Yes, Windows Live Mail beta has all the fancy features only available for IE 6 and 7, for now. Read what you like into that. 😉
Oh, by the way… if you are using IE 6 on the beta and want to see what the other version looks like, check out Ellie’s space… she has the method for changing the URL so you’ll get the basic UI in IE 6 or 7.
Mike, I don’t want to hear that it’s impossible to clap and point at the same time. It’s called imagery, look into it you hack. :-p
The latest update to Windows Live Mail beta was released to the world today. There are lots of great improvements including performance, in-line spell checking and the introduction of the “down-level” experience (the non-AJAX version for older browsers). The best place for a quick summary is Steve’s post and the best place for lots of details is Imran’s post to the mailcall blog (be sure to also check out the video on spell checking).
I’m hoping we’ll also hear from Ellie soon too… she led the effort to develop the downlevel client. Working with a development team in China (both from here in Mountain View, California and by flying out to Shanghai) as well as developers here Ellie got the first downlevel version ready to ship. As with the first Kahuna betas, this isn’t complete yet… but it will evolve as well.
Some spell check video trivia for you:
- a href=”http://spaces.msn.com/members/skafka/”>Steve was the camera man
- The little flash you see at the end is a glimpse of baby clothes… Imran’s going to have twins!
When I made the choice between smugmug and Phanfare one thing I found I missed was the ability to filter my pictures by year taken. To my delight, smugmug added this feature shortly after I joined. The feature is currently hidden and considered beta, but it works quite well – the only bug I’ve found is it got confused about a picture I stamped as being taken in 1959 (seems they weren’t expecting dates that old… shocker).
If you want a nifty timeline on your smugmug page, here’s how to do it:
- Go to http://yoursmugmugname.smugmug.com/?showGoodies=1 (be sure to adjust the URL for your member name)
This will take you to your homepage with the phototimeline module visible - Click the “show” link
- Very important: click the “date taken” link
If you don’t do this all your pictures in the timeline will be shown by date uploaded (which won’t be very interesting unless you’ve been a smugmug member for multiple years)
That’s it, now you have a nifty timeline on your homepage.
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Oh dear… they’re back.
Trina posted the first installment of these two Chinese students lip synching “I want it that way” about a month ago… and Paula and I almost wet ourselves.
Well, if you were waiting for more, wait no longer… they’re back with their interpretation of “As long as you love me”.
Yeah… the guy is still playing doom in the background, oblivious.
And yeah, the first one is still better.
I get this question a lot: “how do I get on the beta?” I get it almost as much as “could you please send me an invite?”
Well, we’ve taken the human element out getting on the beta (and that’s good news for you). Now, instead of prostrating yourself on every Windows Live Mail blog you can find, you can simply go to http://ideas.live.com. On Windows Live Ideas you’ll find out how to get on the waiting list of the Windows Live Mail beta as well as several other cool betas we have in the works.
Do your children like to wait in line and get hassled by disgruntled minimum-wage government employees? The perfect toy has arrived just in time for this holiday season: the Playmobile security check-in play set.
This toy comes with an x-ray machine, metal detector, scanning wand, guards, a passenger and, of course, two guns. Rookie traveler with Texas-sized belt-buckle, pocket knife, cell phone, nail clippers and briefcase (with laptop and boarding pass still inside) sold separately.
I don’t think I can understate how cool this feature is: spell check as you type.
Ever since I first saw this feature in Word I’ve been wanting it in every application I have (including DasBlog, you listening Omar? :)). Well, now we finally have it in Windows Live Mail beta. The way it works is pretty slick too, the client-side code on the browser actually starts handing words and groups of words up to the server to be checked for errors. When errors are detected the misspellings are indicated on the client with familiar red squiggly lines.
The best way to get a feeling for this is to see it in action. Since we haven’t released the feature yet you can’t, unfortunately, try it out… but you can have Imran give you a demo. Check out the Video that Imran, Vikram, Brian and Zeek made, it gives a great run down of the design, development and testing of the feature.
For those of you on the beta and wondering when you’ll see this… I’m predicting you’ll see it before the year is up (but I don’t make any guarantees ;)).
The oft-romanticized Christmas truce of 1914 has lost its final witness. Alfred Anderson was thought to be the last living veteran of the famed yule truce when German and British soldiers sang carols, exchanged gifts and, according to some reports, played a game of soccer.
Alfred Anderson was 109 years old.
British and German soldiers fraternize – Christmas 1914
I had no idea who this man was before today, but his association with the legendary truce makes me a bit sad at his passing.
From BBC News:
Prince Charles has paid tribute to Scotland’s oldest man and the country’s longest serving veteran of World War I, who has died at the age of 109.
Alfred Anderson, who served with the 5th Battalion the Black Watch, died in a nursing home in Angus.
For those of you wanting to read a little more of the history of Christmas truces here is an very complete examination with excellent source documentation. It is an excellent article, if slightly less romantic than the stories which come out at Christmas time.