My Picks for the 2022 Oscars

Here are my picks for the 2022 Oscar winners:

Picture - The Power of the Dog

Actor - Will Smith

Actress - Jessica Chastain

Director - Jane Champion

Supporting Actor - Troy Kotsur

Supporting Actress - Ariana DeBose

International- Drive My Car

Adapted screenplay - The Power of the Dog

Original screenplay - Licorice Pizza 

Costume - Cruella

Makeup and Hairstyling - Cruella

Editing - Dune

Production Design - Dune

Animated - Encanto

Sound - Dune

Visual Effects - Dune

Cinematography - The Tragedy of Macbeth

Score - Dune

Song - Down to Joy

Documentary feature - Flee

Note: My personal favorite picture of the year was "CODA"

Introducing Microsoft Lists

As a long time SharePoint guy, I've used lists for all kinds of things. They are a great way of tracking information and a nice complement to documents.

Now Microsoft has "prompted" lists to a full-blown application. This is still rolling out, so I haven't had much hands-on with them yet.

Links to get you started:

Announcing Microsoft Lists

A first look (video)

Microsoft Lists "Look Book"

The Intrazone Podcast - A Home for all your lists

Microsoft Lists Resource Center

More to come....

My Picks for the 2020 Oscar Winners

Updated with winners in bold:

Picture - 1917

Lead Actor - Joaquin Phoenix

Lead Actress - Renee Zellweger

Supporting Actor - Brad Pitt / Joe Pesci

Supporting Actress - Laura Dern

Director - Bong Joon Ho / Sam Mendes

Costume Design - Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Animated Feature - Toy Story 4

Cinematography - 1917

Editing - Parasite
Visual Effects - Star Wars Episode 9

Score - Joker

Song -  (I’m Gonna) Love Me Again

Adapted Screenplay - Greta Gerwig

Original Screenplay - Bong Joon Ho / Quentin Tarantino
Foreign (international) film - Parasite

Original list:

Picture - 1917

Close 2nd = Joker or Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Lead Actor - Joaquin Phoenix

Lead Actress - Renee Zellweger

Supporting Actor - Brad Pitt / Joe Pesci

Supporting Actress - Laura Dern

Director - Bong Joon Ho / Sam Mendes

Costume Design - Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Animated Feature - Toy Story 4

Cinematography - 1917

Editing - Parasite
Visual Effects - Star Wars Episode 9

Score - Joker

Song -  (I’m Gonna) Love Me Again

Adapted Screenplay - Greta Gerwig

Original Screenplay - Bong Joon Ho / Quentin Tarantino
Foreign film - Parasite

SharePoint Conference 2019 #SPC19 - Top Picks

Hello SharePoint Fans -

I didn't attend the SharePoint Conference in May 2019 in Vegas, but I did want to share my top picks from the conference and other recent announcements:

NOTE: I left off the SharePoint on-premise, developer stuff and Yammer announcements because they don't apply to my organization.

• Microsoft 365 learning pathways - A customizable online training portal for employees


• SharePoint home sites, a new landing site for your company’s intelligent intranet. I like the fact that your new home site will become the new "Home" button on the SharePoint app.


• The existing connector in Microsoft Flow to SharePoint will be getting "new actions to check-in/check-out documents, get version information, grant access, and create folders."


• IT Pros will FINALLY be able to change the URL of a site collection without the need to build a new site and migrate the content!


• OneDrive:
• Updates coming to the sync client will only send the changed parts of all file types instead of just Office files.
• Full-fidelity shared libraries in the OneDrive browser experience is definitely something my users will love.
• Request files allows you to request files from others


• Additional announcements  for Microsoft Search. I've already been using it with Bing and now with the addition of the Search bar in the Office applications, it really is becoming a search-is-everywhere world (I also like the addition of the search bar in SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business).


• AutoDesk DWG file previews! and other integrations! - Enough said


• Share a PowerPoint with a link that goes directly to a specific slide - nice!


• Files restore for SharePoint/Teams - Allows you to restore an entire SharePoint Document Library to a point in time in the last 30 days. This will help recover from mass deletions, corruptions or malware infections.


• There's a slew of performance enhancements too. My favorites include the Fluid Framework and quick document open.

There's a whole bunch of other announcements too that I haven't highlighted - I definitely encourage you to read about those as well.

FYI - Watch the keynote here - https://aka.ms/spc/summit

Microsoft Search on Bing Presentation

2/7/2019 - Microsoft Search on Bing Presentation

Given at the Chicago Office 365 Adoption User Group meeting

Links:

• Slides - https://www.slideshare.net/drxanadu/microsoft-search-on-bing

• User Group - https://www.meetup.com/Office-365-Adoption-User-Group-Chicagoland-Chapter/

• Meeting page - https://www.meetup.com/Office-365-Adoption-User-Group-Chicagoland-Chapter/events/256268181/

• YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCquooSXLpVkg9ip8zLI6I8Q

My Picks for the 2019 Oscar Winners

Updated with winners in bold:

• Picture - Roma
• Lead Actor - Christian Bale
• Lead Actress - Glenn Close
• Supporting Actor - Mahershala Ali
• Supporting Actress - Regina King
• Director - Alfonso Cuaron (Roma)
• Costume Design - The Favourite
• Animated Feature - Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse
• Cinematography - Roma
• Editing - Vice
• Score -  If Beale Street Could Talk
• Song - Shallow (A Star is Born)
• Adapted Screenplay - If Beale Street Could Talk
• Original Screenplay - The Favourite
• Production Design - The Favourite
• Visual Effects - Avengers: Infinity War

Original List (2/19/2019):

• Picture - Roma
• Lead Actor - Christian Bale
• Lead Actress - Glenn Close
• Supporting Actor - Mahershala Ali
• Supporting Actress - Regina King
• Director - Alfonso Cuaron (Roma)
• Costume Design - The Favourite
• Animated Feature - Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse
• Cinematography - Roma
• Editing - Vice
• Score -  If Beale Street Could Talk
• Song - Shallow (A Star is Born)
• Adapted Screenplay - If Beale Street Could Talk
• Original Screenplay - The Favourite
• Production Design - The Favourite
• Visual Effects - Avengers: Infinity War

Reminder:

Reminder that I'm presenting at the Chicago Office 365 Adoption User Group meeting tomorrow (2/7/2019)

https://www.meetup.com/Office-365-Adoption-User-Group-Chicagoland-Chapter/events/

One Pen at a Time

Recently I was digging around the collection of pens that we have at the house in a "bucket" on the kitchen counter trying to find something to write with. There's also pencils, scissors, tape, markers and other stuff in this bucket so "digging" is the right term.

As I was digging I was realizing that the number of pens in this bucket never goes down - it just increases over time and continues to fill the bucket. For all I know, this bucket used to be smaller and was replaced in the past with a bigger bucket. How therefore do we reduce the number of pens in the bucket?

I realized that its human nature to grab any pen, use it and put it back. We never focus on using one pen until its completely gone and then go to the next pen. Things in life are like that - Tasks, for example: How often do you find yourself mult-tasking, doing lots of different things but rarely finishing one of them completely? And of course, we keep getting more tasks added to our plate?

Tasks are like pens - we just keep getting more of them and don't seem to try to focus on one at a time until its finished.

I have pens on my desk at work so I'm trying something. I'm going to use pen, and one pen only, until it is finished before I start using another pen. Maybe that focus will help me focus more on one task at a time too.

Welcome

I'm back....Welcome to the site.

Who am I? I'm a technology professional in the Chicago area. I've worked with a lot of technologies, organizations and types of users over the years - nothing makes me happier than seeing someone's face light up when they see something cool that they can start using right away to be more productive - those are my technologies to learn and implement....

Click on the "Schedule" label on the right to see where and I when I plan on attending events - I will make every effort to keep that current.

This new blog will have all-new content and combines posts from my prior two personal blogs and professional posts from other locations.

Topics here will be mostly technology, but other stuff will pop up now and then.

For fun, there's cool links, pictures, travel, other hobbies, etc.

Thanks for visiting!

-Dave

PS: For the old blog posts that were converted over, I removed ones that had links that were either no longer relevant or just didn't. If you are trying to find an old one that isn't here, let me know.

Rock it with Pocket

I wanted to introduce you to Pocket (getpocket.com), one of my favorite productivity tools.

How many times have you been looking at a web page or a social media post and said "this is really good, but I don't have time to read it all right now" - that's what Pocket is for. Pocket allows you to save links and read them later - literally putting it in a pocket. The site and app are free. I use it the most on my smart phone. Once installed, Pocket gives you access to all your existing saved sites to go back and read, but more importantly it gives you a new destination on your phone to save the site/post you are on. For example, from Google Chrome on your smart phone while looking at the site, click the "share" or "send-to" and choose Pocket. Now it's saved and you can go back later and read it. You can also create your own tags to organize the saved pockets.

Sign up for free at the site, add the plug-in to Google Chrome and most importantly, install the app on your smart phone. 

Enjoy your new-found productivity!

Getting Started with a Smart Home: Part 3 - Voice Assistant

Besides controlling the Smart Home, we wanted a voice assistant to stream music, entertain, inform, etc. Music is big in my house so that was critical. It came down to Amazon Alexa and Google Home. We went with the Alexa and are very happy with it.

We got an Echo Home which went right in the middle of the main floor of the house and is so good it hears you just about anywhere on the main floor. Setup was pretty simple and it works quite well. I love the fact that it works as a Bluetooth speaker and the sound is great.

We also got three Echo Dots - one for the basement and two for upstairs in the office and guest bedroom. I like having Alexa everywhere.

More on setting up Alexa in Part 4 ...

Part 4: Smart Plugs/Smart Bulbs

Getting Started with a Smart Home: Part 2 - Better WiFi

Almost all the Smart Home devices I looked at relied on good WiFi to connect and work well. I was already having some challenges in parts of the house that were farthest from the wireless router, so I knew I would have to start with this.

I had tried several brands of repeaters before without success. I currently have Xfinity/Comcast as my provider and I'm using their router, so I started by asking them. They have an add-on feature called 'XFi" that extends your WiFi range, but it wasn't available in my area. I asked to go on the waiting list and held off on my Smart Home work. You may have a different router or configuration - I recommend you start with some research on your own. Look for options that are popular and rated highly.

Once xFi was available, I talked to a tech from xFinity first that specialized in xFi and he convinced me it was the way to go. xFi comes in packs of three - each device is the same and couldn't be easier to set up than plug it in, fire up the app and after few taps, all is good. Now, how to determine when each one would go? The router was in the basement and coverage was good there, so that was out. The main floor was OK, but the upstairs was really where coverage was needed. I decided to put one on the main floor near the TV (which relied on WiFi for streaming) and the other two upstairs near the bedrooms, one on either side of the house. I used a free WiFi signal strength app on my phone to measure the signal as I walked around the house. I also used the SpeedTest website to test (A long-time favorite of mine).

I also walked outside around the house and measured the performance, especially on the back patio. Internet everywhere! Ready for the next step...

Part 3: Pick a Voice Assistant...

Getting Started with a Smart Home: Part 1 - Overview and Planning

In this series, I will walk you thru my experience setting up my own "Smart Home".

Overview

First of all, what is a "Smart Home"? In my opinion, it's a set of technologies that allow you to automate things around your house and allow devices to communicate with each other and just make things easier. For example, do you manually turn on your front lights each night and turn them off in the morning? You can automate that. Do you set up timers when you go on vacation so lights are turned on and off when you aren't home? You can automate that. You get the idea.

In my case, I wanted to do all those things and more. My goals were: Automate as much as I could, have peace of mind when I was on vacation, learn about the technologies and of course, show it off when people come to visit.

Planning

I did my research before I started. Lots of great resources I found out there, especially on YouTube. Here's the steps I came up with:

1. Implement better WiFi throughout the house and make it available on the front and back lawn/patio too (my existing Wifi was just, meh).
2. Pick a voice assistant that everyone in the family would use and a high number of supported Smart Home devices and apps.
3. Inventory all the types of Smart Home devices I would need: Smart bulbs and smart plugs were on that list.
4. Once a voice assistant was selected, buy the first Smart plug and try it out (pilot program, if you will). I started with the indoor ones and then worked my way outside.
5. Continue buying and configuring Smart plugs and bulbs until everything was in place.

Next: Part 2 - Better Wifi ...