Weblog Jun 2005

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Fighting the software pirates        

If you're writing shrinkwrap closed-source software nowadays, you need to spend a little time thinking about software piracy. This is a large subject, with lots of angles to consider. You need to think about your target audience, how fast you want your software to spread (piracy can actually help with this), what licensing terms you want to have, how strictly you want to enforce your licensing terms, and so on. Read more

21-Jun-2005 23:55

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Micro-ISV tools        

I've been playing around with the idea of becoming a micro-isv, and have burned through about 30 potential product ideas to see where this might lead. I've settled on 2 ideas, and am now busy doing some market research and product design. As part of this whole process, I thought it would be interesting to list the hardware and software that I'm putting together in an attempt to make my fantasy a reality. Read more

19-Jun-2005 23:20

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Proper auto-save for Word        

On my wife's main work machine, I set Windows Update to download any patches automatically and install them without any prompting from the user - basically, fire-and-forget mode. The problem is that she's working on her MBA dissertation, and a couple of days ago she worked from 10 am to bed-time without saving her work. Her Windows Update kicked-in at 3 am the next morning, downloaded and installed the latest critical patches ... and then re-booted the machine. Read more

19-Jun-2005 19:20