SIP,construction,Energy Efficiency

Some pictures of the job site… In NorCal.

Nothing about Tech Comm today, I’m just having a great time putting up the SIP panel construction. Saves about 60% on energy, and is part of the Vets2Vines project.

Measure once… Wait, measure twice, cut once…

Before the pour…

They just trucked it in, we offloaded it in three hours.

They look like oreos on the side. OSB on both sides, EPS foam in the middle. For those construction or energy geeks out there, R40 is a good thing, and this is true R40, less breaks in between meaning you don’t lose insulation in the framing.

Job site chaos… We are about to start erecting the panels today, and should save a month or so in framing and other chaos.

More later as we finish. I guess you’d say we’re doing our part, social responsibility and all that.

Vista,microsoft vista,adobe,adobe cs2,software,forced upgrade,microsoft office,office 2007

I just realized that, although I purchased a laptop in December 2006 with a free Vista upgrade, I’ve yet to complete it because it was not compatible with the Adobe software I owned from 2006.

After all, my free Vista upgrade held/holds a strong chance of endangering the CS2-era software that I own, and it would cost me about $2k to upgrade all of my Adobe programs simply to perform with Vista.

Why not upgrade to Vista and see what happens?

When the upgrade comes, I’ll have to not only slick the laptop and do a raw install, requiring hours of downloading updates, formatting, and rearranging the seventeen other programs I use, but I’ll have to also fret about the potential for the worst-case scenario of an out of town program crash which might require a reload from CD. OF course I don’t intend to tote those around with me everywhere, they’re like gold.

Although Adobe stated that they would probably work in compatibility mode, because I use some of these (Captivate 2, RoboHelp X5, Contribute, CS2, DreamWeaver for my industry (Technical Communication) I didn’t adopt Office 2007 on all of my systems and also Vista on my laptop because my stuff might break down at the worst possible time.

I was also on the wire for a little bird or three to tell me that they (Adobe staffers) weren’t upgrading their own systems because of the same issue.

Why not access your industry roots?

I’m trying to approach this problem from the average user’s perspective about how they might deal with it. I can just as well get one of my contacts to get me on the inside, but it seems a bit more honorable to try and work through the dilemma as anyone else would.

Best Vista Upgrade Practices for Adobe Software?

Ideas about best upgrade practices for last year’s Adobe products if I don’t want to actually spend the additional $2k? Contact me at ideas (at) 3nw (dot) com or post them in the comments.

I feel somewhat less in control and a bit cheated. Other software vendors have compatibility built in, for the most part. They’ll release a patch or… is the trend nowadays to strongarm the customers into paying for the upgrade? Even if it’s between release cycles?

Forced upgrades. Nice tactic. Wins friends and influences people.

I feel that I might have easily figured out how Adobe had a record quarter in software sales…

I feel more loyal already.