I’ve been in the same office for 15 years. For giggles I decided to move to another office recently. It is a little bigger and has a better view. Also, it is good to shake things up once in awhile. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize until after I got all my furniture moved that there is no ethernet into my new digs and as far as the network is concerned, I fell out the window.
So my PC box sits in my computer stand with its two monitors silent while I attempt to get someone to wire it up. Mainly out of necessity but also out of Mac geekiness, I decided to see if I could exist on a windows network with nothing but my MacBook Pro. Turns out I can.
We use a specific program that is a relational database for lawyers called TimeMatters. It is PC only and although the program can be frustrating, one thing it does very well is keep all of your data on the server. So I booted up parallels and had an extended call with a very smart PC friend of mine and in about an hour we had my Mac securely on the network with TimeMatters installed on my laptop and working flawlessly in Parallels. For the last few days I’ve been doing most word processing in Pages and jumping over to Parallels for the database management stuff. I’m very pleased at this newfound ability and amazed why I didn’t take steps to make this happen earlier.
I’ve frequently used Parallels for another legal PC only program, CaseMap, but interacting with the office database on my Mac seems to step it up a notch. It makes me feel a little bit of a rebel. The lone wolf.
Okay, maybe I’m laying it on a bit thick, but I’ve had very few problems. Once Parallels sent one of my cores spinning up for no apparent reason. I logged out of windows and rebooted the virtual machine and everything sorted itself out. Other than that, no complaints. And the fact that my cable installer seems to be busy doesn’t really bother me so much either.
Hey david,
yeah, another one went to conquer the windows world, go on! I was quite lucky being allowed to use my macbook here at work and I can say myself that I manage quite well, despite of the fact that all other machines on our network are either windows or linux machines.
And believe me, this is how everything starts. Soon you have some colleque, customer or friend looking over your shoulder while you work and just plainly astonish them (especially when utilizing some things like quicksilver, textmate, … ) and then they’ll be switching as well.
As for parallels, i’m quite happy with it, especially as it allows me to have some linux installed on there and as I’m working in the embedded branch it’s quite handy being able to pull of the few servers and applications that can’t be used on the mac directly (as some binary-only target system flashing utilties) or I do not want to clutter up my machine (as custom build dhcp servers) …
And if something goes wrong, you just reset to the last snapshot and grin wildly as everything is working as expected again.
I wish you good luck in conquering your windows-centric environment.
Hey david,
yeah, another one went to conquer the windows world, go on! I was quite lucky being allowed to use my macbook here at work and I can say myself that I manage quite well, despite of the fact that all other machines on our network are either windows or linux machines.
And believe me, this is how everything starts. Soon you have some colleque, customer or friend looking over your shoulder while you work and just plainly astonish them (especially when utilizing some things like quicksilver, textmate, … ) and then they’ll be switching as well.
As for parallels, i’m quite happy with it, especially as it allows me to have some linux installed on there and as I’m working in the embedded branch it’s quite handy being able to pull of the few servers and applications that can’t be used on the mac directly (as some binary-only target system flashing utilties) or I do not want to clutter up my machine (as custom build dhcp servers) …
And if something goes wrong, you just reset to the last snapshot and grin wildly as everything is working as expected again.
I wish you good luck in conquering your windows-centric environment.
Hey david,
yeah, another one went to conquer the windows world, go on! I was quite lucky being allowed to use my macbook here at work and I can say myself that I manage quite well, despite of the fact that all other machines on our network are either windows or linux machines.
And believe me, this is how everything starts. Soon you have some colleque, customer or friend looking over your shoulder while you work and just plainly astonish them (especially when utilizing some things like quicksilver, textmate, … ) and then they’ll be switching as well.
As for parallels, i’m quite happy with it, especially as it allows me to have some linux installed on there and as I’m working in the embedded branch it’s quite handy being able to pull of the few servers and applications that can’t be used on the mac directly (as some binary-only target system flashing utilties) or I do not want to clutter up my machine (as custom build dhcp servers) …
And if something goes wrong, you just reset to the last snapshot and grin wildly as everything is working as expected again.
I wish you good luck in conquering your windows-centric environment.
Hey david,
yeah, another one went to conquer the windows world, go on! I was quite lucky being allowed to use my macbook here at work and I can say myself that I manage quite well, despite of the fact that all other machines on our network are either windows or linux machines.
And believe me, this is how everything starts. Soon you have some colleque, customer or friend looking over your shoulder while you work and just plainly astonish them (especially when utilizing some things like quicksilver, textmate, … ) and then they’ll be switching as well.
As for parallels, i’m quite happy with it, especially as it allows me to have some linux installed on there and as I’m working in the embedded branch it’s quite handy being able to pull of the few servers and applications that can’t be used on the mac directly (as some binary-only target system flashing utilties) or I do not want to clutter up my machine (as custom build dhcp servers) …
And if something goes wrong, you just reset to the last snapshot and grin wildly as everything is working as expected again.
I wish you good luck in conquering your windows-centric environment.
Hey david,
yeah, another one went to conquer the windows world, go on! I was quite lucky being allowed to use my macbook here at work and I can say myself that I manage quite well, despite of the fact that all other machines on our network are either windows or linux machines.
And believe me, this is how everything starts. Soon you have some colleque, customer or friend looking over your shoulder while you work and just plainly astonish them (especially when utilizing some things like quicksilver, textmate, … ) and then they’ll be switching as well.
As for parallels, i’m quite happy with it, especially as it allows me to have some linux installed on there and as I’m working in the embedded branch it’s quite handy being able to pull of the few servers and applications that can’t be used on the mac directly (as some binary-only target system flashing utilties) or I do not want to clutter up my machine (as custom build dhcp servers) …
And if something goes wrong, you just reset to the last snapshot and grin wildly as everything is working as expected again.
I wish you good luck in conquering your windows-centric environment.
I really want to switch to a Mac, but I have been using TimeMatters since version 1.97 and just cannot give it up. So, I was very excited to read this article.
Are you able to pull data from TM into Mac programs? Or, if you want to create a document in TM (where EVERY document in my office originates), do you have to use a Windows word processor?
I really want to switch to a Mac, but I have been using TimeMatters since version 1.97 and just cannot give it up. So, I was very excited to read this article.
Are you able to pull data from TM into Mac programs? Or, if you want to create a document in TM (where EVERY document in my office originates), do you have to use a Windows word processor?
I really want to switch to a Mac, but I have been using TimeMatters since version 1.97 and just cannot give it up. So, I was very excited to read this article.
Are you able to pull data from TM into Mac programs? Or, if you want to create a document in TM (where EVERY document in my office originates), do you have to use a Windows word processor?
I really want to switch to a Mac, but I have been using TimeMatters since version 1.97 and just cannot give it up. So, I was very excited to read this article.
Are you able to pull data from TM into Mac programs? Or, if you want to create a document in TM (where EVERY document in my office originates), do you have to use a Windows word processor?
I really want to switch to a Mac, but I have been using TimeMatters since version 1.97 and just cannot give it up. So, I was very excited to read this article.
Are you able to pull data from TM into Mac programs? Or, if you want to create a document in TM (where EVERY document in my office originates), do you have to use a Windows word processor?