Philip Richardson

I often get asked about Mobility Solutions for CRM 3.0. The good people over at Sonoma Partners recently conducted an online event showcasing two of the leading solutions: CWR and TenDigits for Windows Mobile and Blackberry respectively. More information is available here on the Sonoma site.

While chatting to Rory in the hallway of building 20 before filming our Channel 9 video he mentioned he was leaving. I made a very poor impassioned plea for him to stay – but it’s hard to do when don’t know someone all that well. It is a shame he couldn’t find a niche within Microsoft. Sometime the lure of the creative urge and one’s hometown is too much to resist. He did mention he was a big fan of Stumptown in Portland and specifically purchased a condo to be close to it: so he isn’t without taste (albeit he said this while using the Starbucks iBrew. If the Daleks had a special ‘Coffee Dalek‘ it would be the iBrew).

I’ve read Rory’s blog for years. I’ve followed the ups and downs of his life. When he came to Microsoft I was excited for him and Microsoft. When he came to Redmond I hoped he would be the ‘technical’ Scoble (sorry – I never liked Scoble – but that is another story).

Good luck Rory. I’ll look for your book on Amazon.

My fellow ‘people who live in America’. TV just got a little better. Tuesday sees the addition of The Tudors (on basic cable thanks to our Canadian friends) and Cavemen. I love the Geico Cavemen. Can’t say what it is exactly which endures them to me. Perhaps it’s the anti-establishment tone or their nonchalant way of ordering duck with mango salsa.

Unfortunately it won’t be until 2008 for the return of Battlestar Galactica. A show equally enjoyed by wife and I (no mean feat when it comes to Sci-Fi).

Last night I dropped into Tullys on the way home and ordered a double shot of espresso (or a doppio as they quaintly call it – I felt like screaming at the teenage countergirl: "if you are going to pretend to be Italian at least make your coffee like one). Their grinding machine automatically ground the coffee beans, their tamping machine tamped the coffee, their barista (I use the term loosely), took the portafilter from the grinder/tamper over to the brewing device and hit a button. The machine then poured for a present period of time – oblivious to the colour of the actual coffee. This was my ‘control’ espresso. Needless to say: it tasted like burning liquid dogshit. What makes me mad about this: it’s the same price as a proper coffee shop. This isn’t a $5 vs $500 bottle of wine. Unbelievable. Disclaimer: I do own SBUX (sometimes it doesn’t hurt to profit from the poor choices of others).

Then today I went to Vivace. My intention was to decide the Ritual vs Vivace question. Which, for a straight shot, is better. I think Vivace’s blend has a more complex flavour. If I was to drink it every day (which only proximity prevents me) Vivace’s dolce roast is a clear winner. However Ritual’s sweet to the last drop’s roast was amazing. It’s the kind of shot I’d like my child to try before any other coffee: to teach them that coffee doesn’t have to bitter. However I think that Vivace’s subtle complexity is more attractive than Ritual’s overt sexy sweetness.

Verdict: Vivace by a nose.

BTW: This is my first post with Windows Live Writer. I don’t mind it. I tried the earlier betas and they were ‘of similar quality to Tully’s doppio espresso’.

If you see this post it means that BlogEngine.NET is running and the hard part of creating your own blog is done. There is only one thing you need to do from this point on to take full advantage of the blog and that is to set up the first author profile.

Setup

Find and open the users.xml file which is located in the App_Data folder. Edit the default user and provide your own name as the username and a password of your choice. Save the users.xml file with the new username and password and you are now able to log in and start writing posts.

Write permissions

To be able to log in to the blog and writing posts, you need to enable write permissions on the App_Data folder. If you’re blog is hosted at a hosting provider, you can either log into your account’s admin page or call the support. You need write permissions on the App_Data folder because all posts and comments are saved as XML files and placed in the App_Data folder.

On the web

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Good luck and happy writing.

The BlogEngine.NET team