Local Supervisors Told to Cut Spending, Leave Tax ... - Crozet Gazette

Crozet gazette APRIL 2009 s page 23
IT Help Desk
Information
Upgrade
by Mike Elliott
Screen Size—It Matters!
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I guess I should be classified as an
addict. “But I can quit anytime I
want,” I assure myself in a comforting
yet silent inner-voice. The good
news for me is I don’t have to quit.
In the past, I had to work hard to
get my fix if my source wasn’t readily
available, but now I can get it
anywhere, anytime. Life is good
indeed! Oh, the addiction is information
and my source over the last
year has been my BlackBerry. Don’t
be so disappointed you guessed
wrong.
It doesn’t
ountainside
matter if it’s an article
SENIOR LIVING
I’m reading and there’s a word I
don’t know, or a song I hear on the
13a
ountainside
15 15
A JABA
Assisted Living Community
WINNER OF THE 2007
GOVERNOR’S HOUSING
AWARD
13b
radio and I want to know who sings
it, or if A JABA I’m searching for ideas to
Assisted Living Community
help solve a particular problem I’m
challenged with at work. If I bump
into something that strikes me with
the curiosity stick, I’ve just got to
know more. (Many people who
share my SENIOR addiction LIVING typically love
bookstores—which is where I’m
writing 14 this—since they’re full 14 of
one source A JABA after another of good
distraction Assisted Living material.) Community I’m so easily
distracted by the desire to find out
more about whatever just caught
my attention that sometimes it’s
hard to focus on what I was doing
M
ountainside
(or was supposed to be doing). But
SENIOR LIVING
Mountainside
SENIOR LIVING
I’ve found ways to compensate that
work for me. Sometimes it’s enough
simply to make a note in a pocket
notebook that I keep handy (Yes, I
always have it. Ask my wife—I won’t
wear shirts without a pocket where I
can stick my Uni-ball Vision Elite
pen and my Mead® spiral-bound
3x5” flip-top notepad.)
For those times when I just “have
to know more” now, I simply pull
out my BlackBerry and do a Google
search and viola! Instant information!
I can just feel that rush that
fuels
ountainside
my habit! Some might call me
SENIOR LIVING
spoiled, but I know better. I’m more
like a victim of the information age,
don’t you think? Okay, maybe just
a quirky geek.
I’m guessing you’ve heard of a
BlackBerry (the mobile communications
device, not a blackberry as
in the fruit. Can’t you tell by the
A JABA
Assisted Living Community
ountainside
A JABA
Assisted Living Community
uppercase B in Berry?). If not, then
how SENIOR about LIVINGthe iPhone? How could
you not have heard of that? Well,
just about any cell phone these days
has an option to look up information
on the Internet (or at least provide
a connection from nearly anywhere
that you can use to provide
Internet access for your computer—
if you’ve signed up for the service,
Mountainside
that is).
SENIOR LIVING
A JABA
Assisted Living Community
Mountainside
SENIOR LIVING
Offering exceptional and affordable assisted living
16 16
in a quiet, convenient setting in the heart of Crozet,
near Charlottesville.
A JABA
A JABA
Assisted Living Community Assisted Living Community
www.jabacares.org 434-823-4307
The BlackBerry is a brand of cell
phone that also provides mobile
e-mail and Internet access.
BlackBerrys have been providing
mobile email since before the turn
of the century (well, actually, twoway
paging back in 1999).
Compared to the iPhone, they are
“old school” for sure. But I still love
mine, especially since it’s fully integrated
with my email and automatically
synchronizes with my work
calendar and contacts, and of course
provides full Internet access without
requiring a computer.
For me, my BlackBerry and its
1½” x 2” color screen is just big
enough to allow me to rifle through
a good entry on Wikipedia. But
after more than a handful of lookups,
my craving shifts from wanting
to know more to wishing I had a
bigger screen to read this on! Then
again, my desire for a bigger screen
even hits me when I’m working on
my laptop. So much so that when
I’m at my desk at work or in my
home office, I extend my screen by
adding an external monitor. More
on that another time.
It’s clear that I’m not alone. I
think the recent growth in the “netbook”
(or mini-laptop such as the
Asus Eee PC or the Mini Series by
HP and/or Dell) is a direct result of
people finding the small screens
of cell phones too restrictive and the
bulk of a notebook computer too
big to comfortably carry around
easily—not to mention they’re so
expensive. Thus the sub-$500
subnotebook that can run Windows
XP or Linux, and sports a very
usable screen appears to be thriving.
It fits neatly between the tiny screen
of a BlackBerry and the full laptop
computer in screen size, weight and
perhaps, unfortunately, processing
power.
My focus here though, is screen
sizes, and more importantly, screen
resolution. The latter of these two is
probably one of the least understood
and most undervalued elements in
the computer selection process for
general consumers. Because as much
as screen size matters, it’s the resolution
that tells the real tale and it’s
where most people get confused.
The thing is that screen resolution
is what determines how much
you can view on your screen at one
time. And depending on what you
do with your computer, it may be
beneficial to see additional windows
on the screen—or a larger spreadsheet
or more content when doing
page layout, for example. On the
other hand, the greater the resolution
at any given screen size, the
smaller the content will appear onscreen,
which could make it more
difficult to read if you have vision
issues. Personally, I prefer the highest
resolution I can get. Next month,
I’ll explain why and show some
examples that I hope will clear up
size vs. resolution issue.
For now that’s it. I just realized,
though, that I failed to expose anything
personal about my wife—but
I did let you know I’m a little weird
about my pen and notepad requirements
for one. If you knew I religiously
modified each one to fix the
spiral wiring so the cover flips over
just right, that’d probably be a little
more than weird, no?
Send feedback and suggestions to
mike@InformationUpgrade.com.
And thank you for reading
Information Upgrade in the Crozet
Gazette!