Quicken

Tomorrow I get the anxiously awaited copy of Quicken Premier 2010 I ordered from Costco.  The automatic downloading of transaction data will be great, plus the aggregating of data across different investment accounts to analyze is a huge bonus.  Up until now I have been manually entering everything into the Morningstar Portfolio tracker.  It is great, but very tedious.  The only concern with Quicken is that some financial providers (USAA for example) state they offer 90 days of transaction data for download - whereas I have the past 5 years keyed into Morningstar already.  Oh well, if it works as well as I hope - I can start over.

The "Now what?" moment

I, being a tech nerd, have to try all the latest and greatest things.  In this vein, I have to try all the alternative operating systems because, well, there might be something better out there, and I need to try it.  Usually this takes the form of installing the latest linux variant distro, solaris, or "brand x" OS onto a spare computer, exploring all of the default applications, user interface, system settings and then I stare at the desktop and think "Now what?".  Shortly after, the computer is reloaded with another operating system and the vicious cycle takes another turn.

I have reached that point with this blog.  It is set up.  I have aggregated feeds for Amanda and I onto danzimmermann.com.  I have put up a few posts that I am sure no one but my wife reads.
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"Now what?"

Maybe I will review tech nerd stuff and/or single malt scotch.  Maybe I will babble about the latest test install I have done.

Currently my test machine is running Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 with a virtual Windows Server 2008 R2 machine running Exchange 2010.  Pretty darn sweet.  Can't wait to get this set up for work.

By the way:
-Windows isn't evil, it's dominant because it is good.  
-I could see myself switching to a Mac and really liking it if I ever have a reason to. 
-If you are looking at a Linux distro to try, check out LinuxMint.  It rules.
-Windows 7 rules even more.

-Costco may rule the most.

Yahoo Pipes, I did not mean what I said

You actually work quite well, and I intend to keep using you on my index page for the domain danzimmermann.com. The fact that I have found no other product that offers the same functionality as you and have given up searching... is merely coincidental.  Long live Yahoo! Pipes (please?).

That sucking sound you hear is Yahoo Pipes

So apparently Yahoo Pipes sucks.  It is really a very neat product and is very powerful, but reliability is apparently its Achilles heel.  I used it to set up the feed aggregator on the main page of danzimmermann.com and while I was learning about it I find that people have concerns of it's speed, downtime, and if it will just fade into nothingness.  This from the company that ditched its search engine to license Bing.  Confidence instilling, let me tell you.  So I am looking for a possible solution to aggregate two atom feeds, and if possible, tack on the author name as I have done on Pipes.  I had to manually run the pipe today to update the site, so that just won't do.

Hello World

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