Mac@Work : The Ultimate Business Machine

The
Ultimate
Business Machine

Technology, business
and innovation.

And, not least, about
the Mac.

Weblog • Archive • Cutedge

by: Bernard Teo

Wed 11 Jan 2006

Macs on Intel - riding down the cost curve

Category : Commentary/costcurve.txt

"Time is the friend of a good business,
the enemy of the mediocre" - Warren Buffet

The day is finally here. We've got Macs on Intel, a move that strikes at the heart of the Wintel duopoly. The MacBook Pro has got Intel inside but not Intel prices. But the Core Duo chips are still new.

From now on, the more PCs (with Core Duo chips) that are sold, the cheaper the Mac will get. Apple rides down the same cost curve as Dell. It's like "going with the flow", the Aikido philosophy of "protecting oneself against aggressive attacks by blending and neutralizing them". Turn your opponent's strength to your own advantage.

Posted at 1:17PM UTC | permalink

Mac OS X 10.4.4

Category : Technology/10dot4dot4.txt

I've upgraded a couple of systems to 10.4.4, just released today, and tested them. They look OK - SMTP, POP, IMAP, Fetchmail, WebMon and DNS Enabler.

Posted at 8:47AM UTC | permalink

Thu 05 Jan 2006

Another year over, a new one's just begun

Category : Commentary/YearOver.txt

So this is Christmas
and what have we done?

Together with Hai Hwee, we've managed to get five pieces of software done last year - Postfix Enabler for Tiger, DNS Enabler, WebMon, MailServe and Luca Accounting.

I'm trying to create a set of tools that will allow people to run a business on top of the Mac platform - tools that will allow the business to communicate with a potential customer base (through email and a web site), build a community around the use of its products, transact business on-line and in real-time, as well as account for the money flows.

And I'm using this Mac@Work site to demonstrate what I mean.

So what I hope to do in the coming year is to deepen the value of each of the products, cover the gaps between the products (if that is something we can do), and make the pieces easy to snap together and set up quickly - always with the objective of helping people get going using the tools to serve their businesses better.

There are obvious things that can be done - if you're a user of WebMon or MailServe, you probably have a very good idea of what I should be working on to help you manage or exploit the web and mail server better.

But there are other things that can be done - e.g., Luca. I believe that the most important thing about managing one's life is to get a firm grip on where all the money has gone - whether you're an individual managing your personal finance, or a small business owner, or a large corporation.

I think we've got a very good double-entry engine built into Luca. And it's got a nice interface for traversing through all the figures, drilling down into the details and making cross-references, so that you'll get a good picture of where all the money has gone. But it needs a little more work to make it suitable as a personal finance tool for individuals, especially when it comes to data-entry.

Do we need another accounting application for the Mac when there is Quicken and MYOB? I don't know. What I know is that they're not Mac-centric and I'd rather do my own since we can do it, and having control over it, I can tie it in with all the other stuff we're doing, building tools for Mac business users. And managing the business means managing the business's finances.

There is one more thing I'd like to do. Bundle all of Hai Hwee's work interfacing with PayPal into a package people can download and set up so that they can also do business on the web the way we've done. There is quite a bit of negativity surrounding PayPal, about its susceptability to fraud and all that, and that's probably deserved. But in the realm of powerful ideas, I can put forward a case that PayPal is probably the most important test-bed we have right now for deriving A New World Currency. I think, in the scheme of things, PayPal is more important entity than eBay, its parent, and may end up being a whole lot more valuable (if eBay doesn't kill it first through mis-management).

So, I'd like to do a PayPal-based, PHP-based, eCommerce solution. But PayPal has a more interesting web-services-based solution that we haven't been able to access yet because we're outside the US. I think that would make for a neater solution and so we'll wait until there's a better time to work on that.

Posted at 1:34PM UTC | permalink

Mon 02 Jan 2006

MailServe 2.0.2

Category : Technology/MailServe202.txt

I kept getting problems with the mail queue. Then I realised that I couldn't count on the fields in the mail queue log to follow fixed widths on different machines. Sometimes the queue ID of the message takes 10 characters, sometimes 11, and so on. So I had to find another way to parse the fields into table columns. I think I've killed this problem once and for all. 2.0.2 is out.

Posted at 3:20PM UTC | permalink

The Good Books Guide

Category : Commentary/GoodBooksGuide.txt

Look, you can get all these books from our Library. It's been a lazy December but I did get a lot of reading done. The great thing about using the Library is that you can try out lots of different stuff - God knows I've got tons of great-looking but utterly useless books strewn all over the house. (Guess what a second-hand book store would pay for them now? 30 cents each, I just asked).

This is how I found "The Cloud Sketcher" by Richard Rayner. Architecture, jazz, New York in the early 1900s, Finland, and a skyscraper - the cloud sketcher. It looked interesting and I enjoyed it. Quite like Ayn Rand's Fountainhead. Only in Ayn Rand, the characters are concepts (like creativity, power, individualism, even love), not people. Here the people are a little more accessible. Imagine you're little Esko, disfigured by the fire that took your mother, uncomfortable in a suit, an outsider at a local dance, and somehow a pretty girl is making her way towards you, she's got a little mirror in her hand, which she uses to ward off the other boys like a gypsy, and she's asked you to dance, beautiful Esko. And you're smitten. Fate brings her back to your life when you're older and you know that there's such a thing as a soul mate.

Esko grows up to be an architect and he builds his skyscraper for Katerina. Rayner's evocation of the early years of the 20th century - where cars, elevators, street lamps, electricity, ocean liners and airplanes are novelties, as well as the invention of the steel that allowed skyscrapers to be built - reminds me how much of human technological progress had been compressd within the last hundred years. And it made me pick up another book - about oil.

Oil was what made all these things possible. In many ways, world history in the last 150 years was the history of oil. Daniel Yergin's "The Prize" is how history should be written - clever, entertaining and illuminating. Exxon, BP, Shell/Royal Dutch, Rockefeller, the Shah of Persia, Iraq and Kuwait, Tony Blair and the George Bushes. You can see how the actions of today are made inevitable by decisions in the past. And just as the basis for our digital technology could be traced to the exigencies of World War 2, automobiles and mechanised transport could be traced to the necessities of World War 1. ("The British Expeditionary Force that went to France in August 1914 had just 827 motor cars and a mere 15 motorcycles. By the last months of the war, British Army vehicles included 56,000 trucks, 23,000 motorcars, and 34,000 motorcycles.") I understand things a lot better now.

Posted at 1:56PM UTC | permalink

Sun 01 Jan 2006

MailServe 2.0.1

Category : Technology/MailServe201.txt

I've updated MailServe to 2.0.1. This is from the Release Notes :

The Fetchmail launch daemon was re-spawning itself when launched on the faster machines due to some timing issues. This has been fixed in this release. (Thanks, Klaus Nielsen, for helping out and pointing the way to the solution. Really appreciate it). Also, Fetchmail could not deliver mail to machines that have been set up to receive mail for more than one domain. This has also been fixed.

It's been a busy day. By the way, Happy New Year, everyone.

Posted at 5:38PM UTC | permalink

Thu 29 Dec 2005

MailServe Released

Category : Technology/MailServe2Released.txt

I've released MailServe 2.0. It costs $19.99 but Postfix Enabler users will be able to upgrade for $9.99.

I've been feeling rather unwell since coming back from Bangkok, so it was all I could do to get the final testing done and the documentation updated. But I'm glad that's all done.

It's something about Christmas. I've been sick I think eight out of the last ten Christmases. But November, December and January are, for me, the best months for living in Singapore. I start to feel the cool breeze in November, and the light on the leaves sparkles when we're not wet with rain. I don't think anyone else that I've talked to feels quite the same way but I look forward to December. I relax, savour the days, and get knocked down by flu. Maybe that's my body's way of keeping score - making sure I'll catch up on all the rest that I need. Lazy days and December. But it doesn't last. The heat, humidity, and awful glare of the equatorial sun will all come back once Chinese New Year is over.

Posted at 4:21PM UTC | permalink

Tue 13 Dec 2005

To Bangkok, Thailand

Category : Commentary/toBangkok.txt

I'm going to join my family for three days in Bangkok. There should be a wireless Internet connection at the hotel that we're staying in. Hope I can keep in touch with those that need to reach me, then.

It was so quiet at home the last few days that I managed to finish the MailServe documentation, at last. It still needs more polish. But it'll do for now.

Posted at 1:23AM UTC | permalink

Tue 06 Dec 2005

This is us

Category : Commentary/us.txt

This is a picture of all of us here - from left, my long-time collaborator and friend Hai Hwee, my kid Brendan, and my wife, Bee Khim. We were going to sneak over to Johor, at the southern end of our neighbour Malaysia, for the day. That's always going to be fun and don't we look like it?

Next week, Brendan and Bee Khim are going to spend a week in Thailand but I'm only going to join them for the last three days, in Bangkok - in case I can't find a good Internet connection and the support for Postfix Enabler, WebMon, DNS Enabler and all, starts to languish.

So, I'm a long way from having this business run like a well-oiled machine, able to run for much of the time on its own without me. One day, I hope to get this figured out.

Actually, Cutedge was the name we used when Bee Khim, Hai Hwee, and I were writing software for insurance companies for most of the last twelve years, together with a couple of other people. We've spent the last two years "recuperating" (I've almost managed to never touch a PC or cross an IT manager's path in two years and I think it shows - I feel fresher and happier). But business seems to be re-awakening in the region. Who knows where the journey will lead? The Journey is the Reward, remember?

Posted at 4:17PM UTC | permalink

Wed 30 Nov 2005

MySQL 5.0

Category : Commentary/mysql5.txt

MySQL 5.0 is here. Stored procedures, triggers, views, etc. Support for views - that was the last thing we were waiting for to replace Oracle entirely in our applications. Oracle should be afraid - very afraid.

Posted at 2:37AM UTC | permalink

Tue 29 Nov 2005

Softpedia

Category : Commentary/softpedia.txt

Softpedia is featuring all of my products in its collection. How did we get in there? We've been awarded its "100% Clean - No Spyware, No Adware, No Viruses" badge. Don't want to look too unappreciative. Hey, thanks guys.

Posted at 2:10PM UTC | permalink

The MailServe Page

Category : Technology/MailServePage.txt

I've created a more permanent place to house the MailServe project. MailServe is the successor to Postfix Enabler. I thought it needs a name change because it's doing a lot more than just enabling Postfix.

The trial version now expires on 30th December 2005. I think this will give me enough time to add a couple more things and test it more thoroughly (as well as to bulk up its documentation).

To try out MailServe, just use your current Postfix Enabler serial number.

Posted at 1:42PM UTC | permalink