Graham Chastney

I’ve been trying out a new tool recently – the Windows Vista Snipping Tool.For most of what I do it’s a direct replacement for Jing. Jing does a whole load more than the Snipping Tool – it’s just that I don’t use those other features very often.

Having said that, there are a few difference between them even for a basic user like me:

• The Snipping Tools starts a lot faster than Jing on my device.
• Jing provides more sophisticated annotation capabilities – these include text and arrows, whereas the snipping tool is just highlighting and freehand drawing. I don’t often annotate.
• Jing provides a mechanism for capturing menu’s – something I’ve been unable to find in the Snipping Tool. Something i often want to do.
• Jing runs all of the time – but you have to start the Snipping Tool each time you want to use it. This is both a positive and a negative thing. i don’t do that many captures so don;t really want something running all of the time.
• They are both free – if you have Windows Vista.

An introductory video from Microsoft:

Windows Vista Demo: Snipping Tool

I am struggling with a system today that is going slow. It’s nothing unusual this particular system is always slow, or at least I perceive it to be slow. In other words, it works slower that I would like it to – but worse than that, it works slower than my attention can sustain.

I’m now multi-tasking – I’m writing this in the seconds in-between this particular system responding. I’ve lost attention on my primary task, which is to interact with the slow system and I’ve moved onto a secondary task; writing this blog.

Everyone should know that multi-tasking is not the most efficient way of doing anything, but I’ve fallen into the trap and my attention has now completely gone. It happens like this:

• Interact with system – click.
• Wait a few seconds.
• Interact with system again – click.
• Wait a few seconds – get bored, check Twitter.
• System is now waiting for me to finish on Twitter.
• Interact with system again – click.
• Wait for no seconds – already expect a delay, check FeedDemon for updates, see an interesting one, read it.
• System is now waiting for me to finish on FeedDemon.
• I notice system has come back – take a few seconds to remember what the next step was.
• Interact with system again – click.
• Wait for no seconds again, start to write post, also try to keep an eye on the system coming back but I’m not very good at it. Now only writing blog post because I can do that without any waits or interruptions. Not doing blog writing particularly well either.
• Look back at the system after several minutes, notice that it has come back. It’s probably been waiting for minutes but my attention is completely gone.
• Realise that I’m not doing what I should be doing so agree with myself that I am going to go and finish the primary thing that I should be doing. Struggle to focus on it because my mind has got into a groove on the blog post.
• Give up and go back to the post. Think that if I get it finished I will be able to refocus on the job at hand.

This type of attention conflict is completely destructive to my productivity. I don’t get any of the tasks done and feel guilty for loosing focus on the things I should be doing. In many ways it would be better that the system was unavailable than running slow. I’d rather focus on one thing and be completing that than trying to do multiple things poorly but it’s just not engaging enough to keep my attention.

Working, as I do, in IT service design and management most customers primarily contract in terms of availability. The system must be available all of the time. If the impact of performance can be even more damaging than lack of availability – perhaps we are measuring the wrong thing?

Perhaps I just have a very short attention?

Anyone feel a little crazy today – I must admit I am.

I’m sure that most of us can think of someone who this video really applies to. Make the most of them they are real treasures.

Yes, I know, no posting for weeks and then three in a day. Perhaps my muse has come back.

I have become increasingly conscious of a nervous twitch.

Whenever a see an address line in a browser I always start www. – why do I do that? It’s completely unnecessary these days.

If a site doesn’t correctly resolve and requires the www. then they are probably idiots and I shouldn’t be going to their site in the first place.

I wonder how many more of these useless inefficient habits that I have.

I wonder how many menus I navigate through when the answer is directly in-front of me.

And while I’m at it, can someone please tell me what has happened to my fingers recently that is stopping me hitting – ‘ . I can’;t type n’t anymore, it’s always n;t which is driving me just a little nuts.

How frustrating?

I’m currently stuck in a kind of ironic loop – which is frustrating.

I subscribe to a technorati feed for links to my blog, it’s a really good way of finding out that people have linked to me.

A little while back Sam wrote a post call “How Frustrating?” I can’t link to it, because it’s not there anymore. On a daily basis my technorati feed us updated with this particular post:

So every day I get reminded of a post titled “How Frustrating?” that I can’t even look at because it’s not there – how frustrating.