Where did this week go?
Baseball, softball, ER season finale (just who really was in the ambulance that blew - Pratt or Sam?), Lost, Grey's Anatomy, baseball, softball... where does the time go?
Big news is that I bought tickets for Rush for Tuesday night. I didn't know this, but they have a new live 2 CD release. Read more here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_&_Arrows_Tour
In other news, Lamb of God's drummer Chris Adler is going to be writing a monthly column for Modern Drummer. I used to subscribe to MD but it has been years since I bought an issue cover to cover - at least 15 years, closer to 20.
At work, I have been working hard. There is a lot of work to do and I am trying my best to put my head above water. One reason that makes my life difficult is the virtual machine I have been using since late March. It is not working for me. I wrote this email to my cool manager that summarizes my issues and removed references to my company:
The problem is that the Virtual Machine session of my old PC doesn't perform adequately. I discovered yet another issue today: the inability to paste formatted text when it is copied in Internet Explorer (IE) and pasted into Word.
My workflow has been to always write documentation in Dreamweaver (DW), preview the text in Internet Explorer (IE) and then paste into Word. I have used this workflow for nearly 2 years on my Windows 2000 (W2K) PC. This workflow worked without any issues when I was using a non-virtual PC. I developed this workflow because it is faster to work DW ==> IE ==> Word than it is to work Word --> DW. I experimented with both workflows while developing the most efficient way in which to write documentation.
Here's a specific example:
I write this text in my HTML file:The
Word_01 Word_02 system option is available.
I preview the page in IE. I select the above text and press Ctrl+C to copy the text.
I navigate to Word 2003 and press Ctrl+V. I get this:The Word_01 Word_02 system option is available.
In other words, my bolded text doesn't carry the formatting from the IE text.
The impact of this issue is that I then have to manually highlight text and format it as bold. There is no macro or automated way to do this. This adds time. For lengthy passages, it might make sense to copy a sentence at a time but this is not a long-term - definitely NOT permanent - solution. It is a [...] standard to bold names of menu options, system options & system values so that they stand out. Not bolding these items would make the documentation confusing to read as all the names would be title case but they wouldn't stand out. Bolding these items is a common and accepted practice among most technical writers.
I tested to see if this could be reproduced on my Vista machine. No, it cannot. I can select formatted text in IE 7, copy it to my clipboard and then paste it into Word 2007. The text will be copied as formatted text, working as I expect.
In conclusion, the inability to paste formatted text is yet another issue with using a virtual machine. This issue joins the list with 1) general slowness of the virtual machine, 2) the inability to scroll in any applications, and 3) the unstable PDF creation. I know that these issues did not exist on my non-virtual PC session. I am confident that they will not exist on my Vista PC. These issues would be resolved if [we] obtained the new versions of the software - RoboHelp, Dreamweaver, SnagIT, Adobe Acrobat - so that I can migrate from the Virtual PC to my non-virtual Vista PC.
To my manager's credit, she is working very
very hard to get this squared away so that I can move along.
And... if you got through all that, you should be rewarded so here you go. Def Leppard, Everclear, Night Ranger, Cinderella, Warrant, and 38 Special are playing at the Iowa State Fair this year:
http://www.iowastatefair.com/entertainment/mediaPlayer/grandstand.php
I just learned that
Disarray is still around and kicking. They are one of my favorite bands. I am hoping to get a review copy of their latest CD to review for DV.
We are going out of town this weekend so don't bother checking this site again until Sunday PM - and even then, it'll depend upon how tired I am. We are going to pick up our camper tomorrow night, then driving to Balltown. On Saturday, we're going to 4 PM Mass and then to the casino in Dubuque. On Sunday is a birthday party for my niece and nephew. Then we return home to North Liberty and park the camper next to the house - hopefully before the finale of Extreme Makeover and Desperate Housewives!
Take it easy or any way you can get it.
