yesterday microsoft made onenote available for the iphone – it uses skydrive to sync the notebooks across multiple devices.  i’ve been using a windows phone for the past two months and it’s great to be able to access notes from my phone, the web...

early this morning i received the following email: although it appears on the left to be a communication from the “windows live team”, check out the actual email address on the right: windowsliveteam.support394@hotmail.com – doesn’t look too official...

on saturday i will be presenting at the toastmasters leadership institute in normal, il on the toastmasters vp of membership role. i'm serving the dekalb area toastmasters as the vp of education this year (i was the president last year) and as i prepared...

this afternoon i came across an oldie but goodie – a dell floppy drive from a dell inspiron 8600 i owned in 2003.  to my surprise it has an usb port, so i was able to attach it to a windows 7 64 bit computer (the good news – windows 7 64 bit supports...

i can’t believe we’re only a month away from the students involved with technology conference!  i attended last year with my son sam.  sam will be presenting again this year – on office 2010, 2011 and the office web applications. http://www...

this month we've crossed the 400 member threshold on the chicago windows user group site on groups.live.com. next thursday we're meeting at the microsoft store in oak brook, il. if you haven't been to a meeting, feel free to join a group of passionate...

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i’m getting around to a lot of housekeeping tasks in this final week of 2010 – one of which is giving back.  there are a number of organizations i support including our church , the maccfund , the cowalunga bike tour, the american brain tumor association...

no list of applications would be complete without microsoft office.  i have always used this on windows and had a chance to check out office 2004, 2008 and 2011 on the mac.  the latest versions of office (2010 for the pc and windows phone, 2011...

games on the xbox have always been “apps” that i use, but this christmas kinect games like joyride, dance central and even the included kinect adventures have provided hours of entertainment for family and friends.  the controller free play was really...

i guess there was room for it after all – microsoft paint has always been an application i come back to for one reason of another.  on touch screen/tablet computers, it allows you to write your name as well as draw pictures.  it’s always allowed...

thinking back to applications i’ve used for a long time, snagit comes to mind.  screen shots for a techie are very important and snagit was my first.  since snagit there have been virtualization programs that even let me capture screen shots...

if i think back to some of the first apps i’ve used in windows (besides paint which should appear on this list somewhere), winzip has to be among them.  in early versions of windows, this wasn’t even an option.  in later versions, winzip still...

first it was myspace, but then as soon as facebook allowed microsoft employees to create profiles, i jumped ship.  facebook quickly became the main personal/social connection for me (surpassing email in most cases).  now twitter along with facebook...

my wife finally broke down and asked for a kindle. it was a friend - not me that finally convinced her to take the plunge and she loves it! i had taken the plunge a while ago with the kindle app and i think this emphasizes one point on this list - an...

in the first month of this blog (back in april 2008) i blogged about ice cube.  it’s now two and a half years later and i’m blogging about diddy.  he’s #9 on klout’s twitter influence list (the top 20 is interesting – included below) and microsoft...

this one made the list because of it’s use of geolocation and humorous application – itoiletfinder is a free app for windows phone 7.  you pick a location and rate “the facilities” found there.  is this the next foursquare?  time will tell...

i caught the bug a little late (stood in line at midnight for the guitar hero 3 for xbox release) but was waiting for wireless guitars since it’s one of the main reasons i love xbox 360.  when rockband released it was another pre order for me and...

no list of the most important applications of the year would be complete without this – the netflix silverlight player (for computers).  i can access netflix on my windows phone 7, windows devices, macbook as well as the xbox in the family room. ...

last january i picked up a fitbit from the 1st microsoft store in scottsdale, arizona and any list of apps wouldn't be complete without mentioning this (and it's hardware + device software + web application) since it's something i've used pretty regularly...

amazon’s mp3 store has a nifty little application that reminds me of when i first started downloading music.  they are also offering 25 free christmas songs ( http://amzn.to/guPRiO ) which is an added bonus. pc version of the application – either...

my daughter used to make up songs all the time (she still sings a lot but now it’s usually something she’s heard before) and that’s when i first discovered songsmith from microsoft research .  this is a program that can create a musical soundtrack...

i use a lot of different computers (desktops, laptops, tablets, touchscreens, netbooks, etc.) and access to data is always the most important thing (it doesn’t matter if i have the program – most of the time i need access to my data in that program),...

i’ve been using an eye-fi sd card in a digital camera for over a year now (so why is this on a list of the 25 apps for christmas?) – i actually switched to a newer digital camera and still love the fact that the pictures wirelessly transmit to the eye...

remember real player ?  winamp ?  codec’s like xvid and divx ?  there are addins like adobe flash and quicktime to work with certain video formats on webpages.  occasionally i’ve had to go find a video codec or install one of these...