Blog of a Boston-based IT Consultant

I am writing an awful lot about IM clients lately. Not sure why.

Regardless, if you have a PDA or BlackBerry, you need to check out BeeJive simply because it is the most intuitive, easiest to install, best IM client I have found for handheld devices. The people there are cool, too.

Consider this a plug. I had an 8703e and now sport an 8830. I was going to get the Curve now that Verizon carries it, but I picked one up and ewwww it felt like a toy. I like my solid 8830. I was it was solid chrome and heavier, but it’s cool. As much as I will never go overseas with it, or at least have no intentions on going overseas with it, I will keep it. Sure, the Curve has a qwerty with space between the keys, but could they make those keys any smaller? My big fat thumbs can’t handle something so precise.

Anyhow, BeeJive. JiveTalk Mobile Messenger. Get it. They have it for iphones and have a Windows Mobile version getting ready for prime time.

Best,
Josh

I just blogged on how much I like Disgby and how I like it better than Trillian. That was a hard fact to swallow.

And today, someone IMs me and tells me about Trillian Astra.

Man, do things change quickly.

It looks sexy. It looks pretty cool. I don’t care about MySpace messages or emoticons, but it looks pretty slick from the screen shots and I like what I read about the functionality. I dont tend to install alphas, but I just might… this one time…

Take a peek: Trillian Astra

J

I had a hard time figuring out where to find the older versions of PGP. The older versions had a wipe free space command, command-line functionality, and all kinds of other stuff that they are charging for now. Zimmerman had PGP as an Open Source, free project. Then, some weirdness happened (I wonder) and it was sucked up by a corporation.

Anyhow, here, for your enjoyment, is the freebie PGP 6.5.8

There was some controversy as to whether or not this had a “back door” for G-MEN. I don’t believe it, but it might matter to you in principle. I only post this here because PGP is a very cool product and what Zimmerman did in regard to opening the code to the world (when the government decided that PGP was a threat) was brilliant. I dig the product. Or, I dug it. When it was free. When the philosophy was indicative of something new and well-intentioned.

Take care,

Josh

Oh yeah, thanks to everyone who wrote me and said they liked the new layout. I do too. I wish I could say I implemented it (sounds harder than ‘turned it on’) because of aesthetics. That was only part of the reason. My version of WordPress had a crazy security vulnerability that allowed some loser to insert tiny iframes into my blog (to poker sites) and I had to upgrade. It wasn’t too painful of a process, and I got a little more freedom with my design. So, thanks, and Google: you can re-index me now. Please. Like, soon. You just send me an invite to your App Engine. You know that I am a good guy with a nice, safe site. The emails below show that I was approved for the app engine while being declined for content indexing. What does this mean?

I know what it means. Evil Empire!

J

This is nothing groundbreaking, but I think that it is interesting.

I run Digsby (am a Trillian convert) and so I get to have people on my IM list from a wide number of IM services. I have AOL people, Yahoo people, a couple wacky Jabber people; I have about 60 people on my list, in total.

Almost 75 percent of these folks use GTalk.

That surpirses me, now that I am noticing it.

BTW - this site is now the latest and greatest version of Wordpress (to prevent the goofy hacker who has been pestering me from exploiting a hole in the previous version - yeah, GOOFY). Because it is the latest and greatest, please let me know if you see anything break. I know some links on my front page have broken, and I swear I will fix them soon, but so far nothing on the blog seems to have broken.

Have a good week. I don’t think I will have time to eat until Wednesday - but I should survive. Lots of stored energy expressly for that purpose.

J

I dont know how it happened, but apparently when Plaxo checked out my gmail contacts, it decided to ask virtually everyone I do not want to talk to if they would like to connect with me.

I know a little bit about computers, “web 2.0″ sites, and social networking online. I really doubt that I invited a guy that I cannot stand the sight of to be my connection on Plaxo. I know I didnt. Besides attempting to connect me to the aforementioned jerk, Plaxo apparently sent requests to recruiters, scammers, and other folks that I hope to never hear from again but happen to have exchanged emails with me since I opened my gmail account a few years ago.

Bad, bad practice. I know users = $ to these sites, but there is a user and there is a User. Big difference.

And now, with me, there is an ex-user. If you want to delete you Plaxo account, this link should remove your Plaxo account for you.

We’ll see.

Someone remind me to not try every Beta that exists?

Best,

Josh