Comments on: The Joy of Travel in the Digital Age http://www.mcelhearn.com/2005/01/14/the-joy-of-travel-in-the-digital-age/ Writings about more than just Macs, by Kirk McElhearn Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:06:22 +0100 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: webweave http://www.mcelhearn.com/2005/01/14/the-joy-of-travel-in-the-digital-age/#comment-191 webweave Thu, 20 Jan 2005 18:45:21 +0000 http://www.mcelhearn.com/wordpress/?p=98#comment-191 In the summer of 2003 I was flying from Manchester, NH to NYC where I learned to pack my dress shoes and wear something loose and confortable as I was left standing on a cold tile floor when the Xray machine had jammed with my hard shoes inside. The belt still moving as all the objects piled up inside causing a washing machine spin cycle sound. Luckly I was holding my TiBook as they instructed me to remove it from the case before the jam happened. The problem here was I had it powered down and the inspector wanted to see it running, well as you know a starting powerbook does not look anything like a starting PC. The grey on grey Apple logo start screen did not satisify him and the log in screen did not satisfy him. I had to log in and show him a desktop to show him it was working? My solution now is to sleep it if possible and install a screen grab of an XP desktop as my start up image. It's what they want to see and if it saves me time why the hell not. In the summer of 2003 I was flying from Manchester, NH to NYC where I learned to pack my dress shoes and wear something loose and confortable as I was left standing on a cold tile floor when the Xray machine had jammed with my hard shoes inside. The belt still moving as all the objects piled up inside causing a washing machine spin cycle sound.

Luckly I was holding my TiBook as they instructed me to remove it from the case before the jam happened. The problem here was I had it powered down and the inspector wanted to see it running, well as you know a starting powerbook does not look anything like a starting PC. The grey on grey Apple logo start screen did not satisify him and the log in screen did not satisfy him. I had to log in and show him a desktop to show him it was working?

My solution now is to sleep it if possible and install a screen grab of an XP desktop as my start up image. It’s what they want to see and if it saves me time why the hell not.

]]> By: griffman http://www.mcelhearn.com/2005/01/14/the-joy-of-travel-in-the-digital-age/#comment-57 griffman Thu, 20 Jan 2005 17:01:45 +0000 http://www.mcelhearn.com/wordpress/?p=98#comment-57 The following was sent to me by a user on macosxhints as a tip for that site; it really belongs here, as it's a comment on my travel packing story, so here it is. Everything between the divider lines are his (her?) comments, not mine... <br><br><hr> I thought I would share my secret for losing some bag weight. If you are bringing a powerbook you can charge many of your other toys via USB. I have a USB charger cable for my cell and a charger/sync cable for my Palm, eliminating 2 power bricks and voltage/plug incompatibilities during foreign travel. Throw in a short firewire cable for your iPod and/or your iSight and you're pretty much covered. <br><br> If you bring your Airport Express along, you can also use the AE's USB port as a charger - which has the added benefit of not flinging your peripherals to the floor when you forget they're attached to your powerbook and you suddenly lift it off your lap or pick it up to move it. (Happens to me a lot with the rear facing ports on the TiBook) <br><br> The detachable plug part of the AE/powerbook charger will also plug into my Digital Rebel's charger, resulting in one less cable to carry. If you're traveling with a powerbook, lose the camera cable and use a PC adapter to download your photos. <br><br> As far as the extra batteries go, I have yet to burn through the battery for my digital elph or digital rebel in less than a day, and I always recharge at night if I'm in a heavy usage situation. <br><hr><br> I'll have to look for some USB power chargers for my devices; I'm not sure they exist, but it sounds like it's worth the the search time! <br><br> -rob. The following was sent to me by a user on macosxhints as a tip for that site;
it really belongs here, as it’s a comment on my travel packing story, so here it
is. Everything between the divider lines are his (her?) comments, not mine…

I thought I would share my secret for losing some bag weight. If you are
bringing a powerbook you can charge many of your other toys via USB. I have
a USB charger cable for my cell and a charger/sync cable for my Palm,
eliminating 2 power bricks and voltage/plug incompatibilities during foreign
travel. Throw in a short firewire cable for your iPod and/or your iSight and
you’re pretty much covered.

If you bring your Airport Express along, you can also use the AE’s USB port as
a charger – which has the added benefit of not flinging your peripherals to
the floor when you forget they’re attached to your powerbook and you
suddenly lift it off your lap or pick it up to move it. (Happens to me a lot with
the rear facing ports on the TiBook)

The detachable plug part of the AE/powerbook charger will also plug into my
Digital Rebel’s charger, resulting in one less cable to carry. If you’re traveling
with a powerbook, lose the camera cable and use a PC adapter to download
your photos.

As far as the extra batteries go, I have yet to burn through the battery for my
digital elph or digital rebel in less than a day, and I always recharge at night if
I’m in a heavy usage situation.

I’ll have to look for some USB power chargers for my devices; I’m not sure
they exist, but it sounds like it’s worth the the search time!

-rob.

]]> By: webweave http://www.mcelhearn.com/2005/01/14/the-joy-of-travel-in-the-digital-age/#comment-215 webweave Sat, 15 Jan 2005 20:09:58 +0000 http://www.mcelhearn.com/wordpress/?p=98#comment-215 Ah, yes. The question of what to bring? Kind of reminds me of traveling with the girlfriend. NOW IT'S ME. I returned on Tuesday from a 24 day trip to the UK and Ireland. Sounds nice, Christmas in the Irish country side and New Years in England perfect. Except I had to keep in touch with my clients, one is teething with a new ecomm package, one has just had a break in and all his PowerBooks were stolen and his Linux servers were left sitting in the lobby. Etc, etc, etc. You get the picture. Add to this I stretched something in my foot and by favoring it my back now hurts as well, I have to plan to not injure myself. I limit myself to two small backpacks, one as a carry on and one to check. I have traveled enough to know if you need it don't check it. What to bring? Well right off the PowerBook is out, I need my camera and accessories for sure, I always bring a flashlight for safety. My gf has an MP3 player so I burn a dozen disks for her. My clothes, extra shoes, carefully chosen winter ware and some personal stuff in my carry on to wash my face and freshen up on the plane as it is a nine hour flight, and that's all. So far so good, the gf says internet is free for an hour in the library and one pound for each addy. But what she did not know as a yahoo mail user was that "there are no useful internet tools on a stripped down windoze machines", as well as being behind some proxy, I was able to use workspot.net for a Linux desktop inside a java window inside IE. Slow but working. The hospitals were she is working/living also have net access. What I found was two WinXP embedded kiosks with only IE and behind a overly aggressive proxy, which I found more restrictive then the proxy for Saudi Arabia, a new low. I can check yahoo mail but not my own ssl cert mail where my work is or get to workspot.net There were no internet cafes that I could find in this area. Phone cards are about four to six times more expensive to call home than they are to call the UK from home. As I was waiting for the plane home I noticed an internet kiosk in the food court. The display was totally customized to hide the slimy underbelly of windoze. A Pound for fifteen minutes it said. Yahoo mail worked but I cound not connect to ssl, and on my second try to get to my ssl mail the machine locked up totally and reset itself leaving me without my mail or my Pound! The Windoze experience I am used to. Not being a windoze user I was caught unaware of how bad the rest of the world has it. Next time I will set up my own proxy and run the workspot.net software on my own server. By the way not bringing the laptop was sort of like a new freedom of never having to worry about it. If I have to give presentations I might just get that new Mac Mini. and a pda. Cheers, BB Ah, yes. The question of what to bring? Kind of reminds me of traveling with the girlfriend. NOW IT’S ME.

I returned on Tuesday from a 24 day trip to the UK and Ireland. Sounds nice, Christmas in the Irish country side and New Years in England perfect. Except I had to keep in touch with my clients, one is teething with a new ecomm package, one has just had a break in and all his PowerBooks were stolen and his Linux servers were left sitting in the lobby. Etc, etc, etc. You get the picture.

Add to this I stretched something in my foot and by favoring it my back now hurts as well, I have to plan to not injure myself. I limit myself to two small backpacks, one as a carry on and one to check. I have traveled enough to know if you need it don’t check it.

What to bring? Well right off the PowerBook is out, I need my camera and accessories for sure, I always bring a flashlight for safety. My gf has an MP3 player so I burn a dozen disks for her. My clothes, extra shoes, carefully chosen winter ware and some personal stuff in my carry on to wash my face and freshen up on the plane as it is a nine hour flight, and that’s all.

So far so good, the gf says internet is free for an hour in the library and one pound for each addy. But what she did not know as a yahoo mail user was that "there are no useful internet tools on a stripped down windoze machines", as well as being behind some proxy, I was able to use workspot.net for a Linux desktop inside a java window inside IE. Slow but working.

The hospitals were she is working/living also have net access. What I found was two WinXP embedded kiosks with only IE and behind a overly aggressive proxy, which I found more restrictive then the proxy for Saudi Arabia, a new low. I can check yahoo mail but not my own ssl cert mail where my work is or get to workspot.net

There were no internet cafes that I could find in this area. Phone cards are about four to six times more expensive to call home than they are to call the UK from home.

As I was waiting for the plane home I noticed an internet kiosk in the food court. The display was totally customized to hide the slimy underbelly of windoze. A Pound for fifteen minutes it said. Yahoo mail worked but I cound not connect to ssl, and on my second try to get to my ssl mail the machine locked up totally and reset itself leaving me without my mail or my Pound! The Windoze experience I am used to.

Not being a windoze user I was caught unaware of how bad the rest of the world has it. Next time I will set up my own proxy and run the workspot.net software on my own server. By the way not bringing the laptop was sort of like a new freedom of never having to worry about it. If I have to give presentations I might just get that new Mac Mini. and a pda.

Cheers,
BB

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