Newspaper on the move

I had rushed to the airport to pick up Andy. There was urgency in his voice and I did not know why. He was on his way back from England after covering the Ashes. Andy works with USA Today and covers International Sport. I had carried my laptop as he had requested me to. The moment I reached the airport, Andy stormed into the car. All he told me was to drive him straight to his office. This meant a good one and half hour drive from the airport.

He picked up my laptop and plugged in his PDA and while doing this he told me his laptop had crashed. When I enquired about his stress he went on to tell me one of the world’s best cricketers living in the US died and he needed to file an Obituary for tomorrow’s edition. It was almost 3 PM and with my limited understanding I knew he had to file in his report earliest by 4.30 PM to catch the morning edition.

I knew his PDA was loaded with Apps-D and it was a mobile office by itself. It was amazing to watch how he managed to open his personal laptop files using the PDA. Already having a few websites that had information of this cricketer, he dragged all the information on to the laptop, opened his Outlook extracted some info and opened QuarkExpress which was also loaded on his PDA.

I kept driving and there was silence from his end as he was really busy trying to finish the story. I noticed he had finished editing the story in Microsoft Word and transferred all the files onto QuarkExpress. He called the Chief Editor, queried about the space allotted for the article and he got down to creating the layout which was ready in less than 20 minutes. Opening his mail again, he made a .tif file and mailed it off to his editor.

I asked him how many files he could store on his PDA. He mentioned Apps-D requires a minimum of 128 MB space inclusive of the applications. As we were driving, his editor called and told him to check his mail. He checked his mail and there was a PDF of the complete page layout. I peered into his screen and I got a sneak preview of tomorrow’s Sports Page.

I told him “so I can surprise my wife by showing her tomorrow’s newspaper layout today?” Andy frowned, saying “Hello…! You are not going to do anything like that…what makes you think the layout is stored on your system? Please understand, Apps-D does not leave any traces on the host machine, nor does it cache private information in the host's browser history.” I was kidding but I was kicked to see the next day’s newspaper being created on my laptop and of course using my favorite Apps-D.

Travelogue

I am addicted. Yes, you heard it right, I am addicted, to traveling. Istanbul, Egypt, China, India, Burma, Greece. I have seen some and I want to see more. I am a businessman and travel is a part of my job description. I need not travel to all these locations but I tweak my plans so that I can visit the places I want to. Still don’t see the problem? Well, you see, I travel with my laptop. So I need to lug that piece of technology around wherever I go. I’d sometime need to conduct meetings at a short notice. Hey, traveling with a laptop and some hitches is far better than not traveling at all. But yes, it is an inconvenience. Not the demand on my time by the business, but carrying the laptop around. Sometimes the laptop is not charged and the meetings get postponed and my schedule goes haywire. I then regret the places not seen because most often than not I don’t get an opportunity to go back and see them again. I put them on my ‘have to see’ list. The list just grows.

I have been looking for a solution to my problem and the last time I went to a business lunch, I happened to mention it to my client. He said there was a solution and was surprised that I had not looked at it yet. He mentioned about an application called I-Flapp. He said he has been using it for a long time now and it’s been extremely useful. He thought maybe I should take a look at it.
As soon as I reached home, I looked up the device and I was happily surprised that it suited my needs perfectly. Once the application is installed on the device, it literally carries my desktop everywhere. I could carry my PowerPoint, my messenger, my outlook and all my other applications in a small external USB drive, to accessed from any computer anywhere.
I can also carry my music and my games. Needless to say, I need not carry my laptop during my excursions anymore. I can probably plug it in the local internet café and access my work using just my I-Flapp device. Security is not an issue either, as there are no traces of my work left behind on any of the computers I’m working from. I can sync back changes from the work done back to my laptop (when I am back to where my laptop is). I am thrilled with the find. I can now travel without any need to be in a hotel room at a particular time to plug in my laptop and work. I just need an internet café. For that matter, any computer, anywhere will do. Well, that’s another story altogether. Till someone invents internet café’s in a pocket, I-Flapp will work nicely. I dare say I am as addicted to my I-Flapp now, as I am to traveling…ummm…well almost.

All in a day’s work

We had a call from a leading FMCG brand manager of a leading television brand for which we were invited to pitch. In situations like these, all teams across the country require to be on red alert. To get a variety of creative inputs, we give each branch a different brief.

The presentation was complete and while we boarded the agency’s private jet, I knew a big day was ahead. I was happy that we did not have to cart the laptop. We reached one of the cities and my CEO plugged in his PDA. He was working straight from it and the laptop which was given to him transformed into his laptop’s desktop. He opened his PowerPoint and made his presentation and in between I had to support filling details of the direction for creative. There were occasions when I had to open a Photoshop file. The laptop did not have the software but I opened it with ease as the complete application was stored on his PDA. I also had a copy of the presentation and with the file being close to about 100 MB, I could load it on to a USB 2.0. That was the beauty of the Apps-D.

After the meeting my CEO asked the secretary to mail him the minutes of the meeting. He logged on to his mail and I could see his mail box was being accessed through the PDA - another winner from Apps-D. He read through the document made a few changes and attached the brief which we had just discussed and mailed it. While he was opening to check the PowerPoint he opened the brief meant for another branch. I could see that he was absolutely unperturbed. I realized that Apps-D was the safest and no traces would be left behind and nothing remains in the host system and not even in the cache.

As we walked towards the aircraft, I thought to myself this exercise was to be repeated 3 times. As we fastened our seat belts, I said to him “My gut feel is we would win the million dollar Television deal.” I could see the happiness on my CEO’s face and a nod. Digging into his pocket he pulled a cigarette and lit it up. As he inhaled the smoke, he crooned to me “I think we need to get more of these i-flapp Apps-D along with PDAs for our executives across the country rather than investing on laptops.” As the cigarette burnt and the wisps of smoke trailed in the air, I thought to myself anything for convenience and for a million dollar business. It’s after all, all in a day’s work.