Wednesday, August 03, 2005

 

Apple, here I am!

I mentioned that I had been contemplating buying a PowerBook. Last night, I finally acted! This is my new PowerBook G4's inaugural post.

To state the obvious: I have not been posting. The lull started the day after my blogiversary, when I went to Philadelphia for the annual SHEAR meeting, which was excellent. SHEAR's reputation for collegiality precedes it, and I was not disappointed. Last week I was busy catching up after the conference. This past weekend, a wonderful visit from family was a welcome break from work. We took a trip to Harpers Ferry (yes, that Harpers Ferry) and Antietam on Monday, and yesterday was my birthday (not to mention the date of my new birth as a happy Apple customer).

So things have been busy but good. To state the ambiguous: Posts forthcoming.


Collective Improvisation:
Happy birthday and blogiversary (I'm a bit late on that last one)!

What did you think of Harper's Ferry?

I went through there once on a train (cross-country, ending in DC) and all I remember is looking around at the geography and wondering, "What was John Brown thinking?" 

Posted by eb

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/04/2005 03:24:00 AM : Permalink  

Indeed. I was also amazed when I finally saw the structure (or the restored structure) that he holed up in. (Pictures here .) I guess I had always imagined the armory building where he was cornered being larger; it turns out it's a tiny room that served as the garage for a fire engine, and ... wait for it ... it had no windows .

I've finally been reading that David Reynolds biography of Brown, but I haven't gotten to Harpers Ferry yet. I'm glad that I saw the lay of the land before I revisit the details of the attack. 

Posted by Caleb

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/04/2005 07:41:00 AM : Permalink  

Happy Birthday! Let us know how you're liking the new PowerBook. You got the 15", right? 

Posted by Scrivener

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/04/2005 04:41:00 PM : Permalink  

Caleb, Thanks for the photographs of the "fort". When I visited the area some years ago, I remember thinking that the geography was pretty awesome. Hardly a likely setting for rallying insurgent slaves -- but altogether worthy of Brown's majestic imagination. 

Posted by Ralph Luker

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/05/2005 08:52:00 AM : Permalink  

You mentioned in the earlier post that you use Citation. What are your thoughts about that program? I've tinkered with Endnote and ProCite, but ultimately didn't find them to be useful for my purposes. What I want is a robust notetaking program. My impression of Endnote and ProCite is that they are geared toward bibliography organization for the sciences. Like you, I'm a Ph.D. student in History, with a frequent need to organize notes from archives, manuscripts, and other "irregular" sources. How has Citation helped you in this work?  

Posted by Anglican

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/05/2005 11:52:00 AM : Permalink  

Happy Birthday! 

Posted by jo(e)

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/05/2005 07:01:00 PM : Permalink  

Thanks for all the well-wishing!

Yes, I went with the 15-inch! The only problem I've had is with the Airport Express base station that I bought. It was working only sporadically; the wireless network that I had created kept dropping out of my list of networks for no apparent reason, and eventually my computer wasn't even able to find the base station. But tonight I took it in and exchanged it for a new one, and so far (crossing fingers) it seems to be working. I'm very happy with everything else though. I've just been playing around with adding widgets to my Dashboard!

Anglican, I find Citation good enough for my purposes, but it doesn't exactly amaze. What I like about it is the very simple and no-clutter interface, which makes it load and run very quickly and avoid the buggy-ness that I've heard plagues Endnote. Citation is definitely still geared towards bibliographic management, much like the other programs you name. I use it mainly to keep records of published materials. It does have a feature that lets you take notes and excerpts and attach them to bibliographic records, and it has very nice sorting features. But when it comes to "irregular" sources like manuscript letters and archival materials, I haven't found it very intuitive or user-friendly. In fact, I keep most archival material, including newspaper articles that I've stripped from microfilm, in separate Microsoft Word files because I've found it's easier, and the "Find" function in Word work well enough to find what I'm looking for. Hope that helps!  

Posted by Caleb

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/06/2005 12:28:00 AM : Permalink  

Ralph, I agree, the scenery around Harpers Ferry is breathtaking. It's very close to the scenic Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park , which is well worth seeing if you're in the area during autumn. 

Posted by Caleb

Posted by Anonymous Anonymous on 8/06/2005 12:30:00 AM : Permalink  

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