24 December 2007
For the last couple of weeks I’ve been comparing Parallels with VMWare Fusion on my Macbook to see which gives a better experience running Visual Studio. Fusion was winning, until Parallels released build 5582.
My comments:
- Both have similar startup/compile/shutdown performance (running 32 bit Windows XP)
- Both install and run cleanly over my Bootcamp installation
- Swapping between VMWare and Parallels requires Windows to be re-activated every time due to changes in hardware drivers
- Both handle sleep/wake in OSX nicely
- Under Parallels, Windows XP wouldn’t shut down properly, but this was fixed in build 5582
- Parallel’s ‘Coherence’ mode integrates with Leopard more cleanly than Fusion’s ‘Unity’ mode
- The defaults in Parallels are better – it maps my Mac partition as z drive by default and enables all USB devices by default
When running Windows XP on my Bootcamp partition, they are very equal. They both also provide full migration from a Windows PC and from each other. Overall, I favor Parallels – not for performance reasons, but for its cleaner integration of devices and visually within Leopard, although this could all change with one more VMWare release.
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Mac, Software | Tagged: Parallels, VMWare | 
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Posted by Andrew
15 December 2007
Creative HQ in Wellington (NZ) is launching Activate HQ, a four month programme to help entrepreneurs lay business foundations for a high growth company.
Over 14 weeks, the program covers:
- Taking your idea to the next level
- Setting goals and business values
- Market research & validation
- Building a successful team
- Cash flow forecasting
- Financial needs of high growth companies
- Strategic planning
- Protecting your IP
- Branding
- Dealing with the media
- Sales & marketing
- Shareholding and governance
- Preparing for investment
- Being a CEO
I spent 2.5 years in Creative HQ, starting a company and taking it through to merging with another company then getting investment and the support and networks that CHQ offers are invaluable.
The first full Active HQ programme is scheduled to start in early 2008 and there are a few more places available, so if you’re in this space, don’t hesitate to have a chat with Rewa on 04 381 444.
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Posted by Andrew
8 December 2007
OmniFocus is a Mac application for tracking to-do lists. Quite a basic concept that Outlook and every mobile device has been doing for years, but I’ve tried every task management system I can get my hands on, including various ABC-123 systems, and I always seem to end up with lists so large that they become useless and I return to the good-old daily list on paper.
OmniFocus is different because it follows the ‘Getting things done‘ methodology of dealing with tasks. Control-Option-Space opens the ‘new task’ window and adds a task to your task inbox.
Dealing with tasks in your inbox is easy – if you can do it today, then do it and mark it as complete. Otherwise, drag-and-drop it onto a project and/or assign a context. The context could be home/office/phonecall/lunchtime etc.
The task list can be viewed by project, group of projects, context, due date etc. Very simple, yet the three dimensions of inbox/project/context provide enough power to manage an ever-growing list of tasks and to actually get stuff done.
OmniFocus is 10/10 because its to-the-point and simple yet much more powerful than a one dimensional to-do list. Also – until Jan-8 its half price at $US 40.
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Posted by Andrew
