Rosie's Ramblings

By Sandra Rosenzweig
     
      Only Change Is Constant
      To paraphrase the late John Gregory Dunne, in the month of my marital separation, my about-to-be ex-husband moved out, I redecorated my house, moved my office into a converted dining room, and switched to a brand-new home computer on which I installed Windows Vista Ultimate (Microsoft's latest operating system) and the 2007 Microsoft Office system. Oh, and I tested a new Microsoft entertainment mouse and keyboard set, with a rather different layout of keys. According to the list of life stressors, I should already be dead.
      But death isn't all it's cracked up to be, especially since you still need to-do lists. To work efficiently on my new Sony Vaio VGN-SZ93S thin, thin laptop (available only in Japan?and now in my office in California), I carry my to-do list with me everywhere, even to bed. Not a to-do list so much as a flowchart of dependencies and sequences. So this was one of those rare times when my trusty old Dell Axim X51v PDA with Windows Mobile 5x software was the best tool for the job?it's small enough to sleep with and yet powerful enough to recalculate the chart each time I tick off a task. I wonder what those folks planning the invasion of Normandy did before PDAs.
      To transfer my data, I plugged an empty 1GB Memorex Mini TravelDrive USB2 thumb drive (also known as a flash drive) into my old computer, which immediately and automatically recognized it. Then I copied various files onto it, removed it from the old computer, and plugged it into the new one. Forget permissions and access levels?I just hit Paste, and the new computer now owned that data. However, figuring out where to put all those files took several hours of battling Vista's new interface. Where, for example, were Windows Explorer and the Documents and Settings folder? When I finally found Documents and Settings, I couldn't open the folder, which meant, I thought, that I couldn't get to my Microsoft Office Outlook personal folders and, therefore, wouldn't be able to back up the data that ran my daily life. It turns out that Vista doesn't use Documents and Settings anymore. It uses a folder named after your boot-up login name. It also turns out that Add or Remove Programs died in the conversion to Vista. Now, you go into Control Panel, then Programs and Features to do the same things.
      Connecting the Vaio and Vista to an existing network was shockingly simple. Tell the program your user ID, and that's it. No more providing answers for questions you don't understand. No more looking up passwords or configuring access. Just plug it in?that's all. And hooking up a printer, USB hub, or external hard drive, camera, scanner, speakers ... well, they just happen. And quickly, too. As for software, I have yet to find a program I use regularly that doesn't work under Vista. But if you use some older versions of legal-specific programs, I'm sure you will. Drivers for hardware, on the other hand, are hit or miss?check with the product website before you buy.
      The Vaio gives you two choices for logging on securely each morning: password or fingerprint recognition. Even with a pretty strong password generated by a dedicated password program (RoboForm), fingerprint scanning seems to me much more secure. And once you've set up and registered your fingerprint and the scanner has trained you to provide the correct movements, swiping your finger across the built-in scanner (set into the laptop's trackpad) is much easier?especially before your morning coffee?than typing in a password. Now, I also require fingerprint recognition to open any thumb drive I take away from the office. I may leave my thumb drive in some public restroom, but, without my thumb, the drive is useless to anyone else. In my opinion, using biometric identification to protect your clients' data on those easy-to-lose gadgets brings you u to code for protecting client data at every peril to yourself. (Cal. Bus. and Prof. Code § 6068.)
      So far, Vista and I barely have a nodding relationship, but soon we're going to be kissin' cousins. When that happens, I'll share. Until then, if you're taking the Vista jump, you may find these two websites helpful: The How-To Geek's Windows Vista How-Tos (www.howtogeek.com/tag/windows-vista) and Lifehacker's Vista tips, tricks, and commentary (lifehacker.com/software/vista).
     

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