This post comes after a nice discussion with a friend yesterday, expecially after the sentence “you’re a strange Microsoft-addicted man“… 🙂
But why this?
I work every day from many many years with Microsoft technologies and all the Microsoft’s universe is my target of business from ever. Personally I literally love Microsoft as a company and Microsoft’s products in general. For business, there’s no better choice, with MS you’re sure to be in touch with a great company and with products that works.
My working machine (what I’m using at the office) is a portable Windows machine and here all IT things are Microsoft-related.
But what about personal life?
Technology is a big part also in my personal life, I can’t see my life at home without playing with something that is “technically cool”. But in this field, the things are a bit different. If at work I’m totally Microsoft addicted, at home actually I’m totally Apple addicted.
I’ve made this choice about 7 years ago. I’ve always used Windows at home, but one day the iPhone 3G comes out (Steve Jobs the saint!) and this was the change. The iPhone experience was so good that I decided to buy also my first Apple computer and things goes naturally…
For my personal life I want:
- Something that really works without to be a “nerd” and permits me to do my everyday tasks in the better way!
- Something that is cool
- Something that gives me pleasure to see and touch
- Something durable
- Something that can be carried with me everywhere without problems
So, what’s on my IT right now?
My smartphone is an iPhone: no better choice. I’m an iPhone addicted and I think this device is one of the best IT products everywhere. The iPhone really WORKS! In more that 7 years with the iPhone family, I’ve never had a problem. Apple devices are great, they have a very long life right now (you can install the latest software also on a device that is 5 years old) and they’re so “immediate” to use.
I have also an iPad mini that I use often when I’m out (conferences, customers) or when I’m at home in the evening (for Internet surfing, mail and other tasks). The iPad is a great companion to have and with iCloud all is in synch with my other devices.
My personal pc actually is a MacBook Air. I had a previous MacBook Air 13 (6 years old and it runs the latest Mac OS really well also now!) but now I’m using a MacBook Air 11. The Air 11 gives me all what I want now: power and portability.
I need a device that can be extremely portable when I’m out and the Air 11 is perfect on this aspect, it’s just like having an iPad on the bag but with the power of Mac OS and a desktop pc. When I’m at home, I can plug it to an external monitor and the experience is great (exactly like a desktop machine).
With the MacBook Air I can run all what I need in my personal life and I can run it immediately and with a great experience everywhere.
Microsoft plays and important role also at home… thanks to Satya Nadella, now Microsoft has its productivity apps for every devices and I can use Office and many others MS apps that I need on all my Apple’s devices.
The next steps?
I’m seriously thinking to going completely online… 🙂
Actually I’m an Office 365 user, I use OneDrive as my primary cloud storage account (but I use also GDrive and iCloud) and I can use the MS Office suite on my MacBook exactly like on my Windows pc at office (same apps and same data). Via VPN and RDP I can connect to my office servers and I can use the same programs I use at work also on mobility.
The only thing that actually I can’t do so well on my MacBook Air is programming with Visual Studio (because there’s not Visual Studio for Mac, Microsoft please think about that 😉 ). I say SO WELL because I can run Visual Studio on a virtual machine (and VM works very well on a Mac) and use it normally. But for Visual Studio, I’m thinking on a totally new experience. Why not using the cloud?
Actually I use VS Online, so my projects are safely synched with the cloud. Actually the Azure platform offers the chance to activate a virtual machine with Visual Studio ready to go in few minutes. Why not using these features?
I think that the next step will be this: stop using virtual machines on my MacBook but simply connect via RDP to an Azure Virtual machine for development when I need it. The Azure VM will be off when not used (no money charge at all). Quite easy and so powerful 🙂
The revolution begins…
Stefano Demiliani 