Coping with death – of software
I have to admit it. I have loved and lost software to the ravages of time. The five stages of grief in the Kübler-Ross model;
- Denial
- Anger
- Bargaining
- Depression
- Acceptance
Here’s a list of software that I have loved and feel is dying along with my stage in the grieving process.
- ScreenPrint32 – [Bargaining] – Vista comes with a screen grabbing tool installed (called the Snipping Tool) and ScreenPrint32 isn’t even available for Vista. Granted, many people have rejected Vista and have reinstalled XP on their machines but I don’t plan on doing that ever. So I’ll continue using the program on the computers that i can.
- Trillian – [Acceptance] – As a self-proclaimed “early adopter” (thanks to close friends and family for the most part) i have ICQ, AIM, and other instant messaging accounts. I used to use them frequently – daily in fact – but with almost everyone carrying cell phones which are almost always on why bother with a program that has you tied to a computer and needing to be logged on? Instead of Trillian i just send a text message.
- ePrompter – [Anger] – I have hotmail, yahoo, gmail, and a few pop email addresses. It’s nice to be on top of the mail without having to go to individual sites to log in, block ads, and move on to the next account. ePrompter solved that. Every 15 minutes it would log in, check accounts and notify you of any new messages. Sadly, it tends to have frequent shutdowns of services, lately the send mail feature has been buggy and for some reason it sometimes resets all of my yahoo mail to unread every now and then. I like the small size, easy setup, and just about everything except for the dated interface and using text instead of buttons in some places. I need to find a better program to do this and i’m upset that it has stopped working as well as it used to.
- miFiles – [Denial] – Sometimes software just gets one-upped by something else. FireFTP is a FTP program (File Transfer for uploading stuff to websites). I don’t use it yet – but i can tell that i should make the switch!
- Palm OS – [Denial] – I can’t believe that I’m saying this. I’m starting to think that the Palm OS is dead. It just needs to get with the times. I want WiFi on my cell phone. I want GPS. I want a better camera. Yesterday i found out that the programs that i really love (Splash Money and Splash ID) are available for Windows Mobile and the iPhone platforms. The release of new phones that will run my favorite programs and that have the features that I’m looking for might be enough to lure me from the Palm OS. I’ve been using Palm devices since 2000 or 2001.
Kubler-Ross-McFarland: funny stuff. I’ve never heard of ePrompter!
What I use:
1. The Gimp: Sure it may be a little behind the non-free image editing tools at its level, but I primarily use it for screen shots and editing the screen shots right after I take them.
2. Pidgin: What can I say, I’m a programmer, during work hours I’m always sitting at my desk, logged into my computer.
5. When I was still using my palm, I was using a program called Strip (Secure Tool for Recalling Important Passwords) for what I think the purpose of Splash ID is. Strip has a lot of features for those of us who had to manage group accounts, etc (allowing password groups to be beamed), but at my 5 min glance it may do what you want…that is until you ditch your Palm OS device.