I visited the Apple store one weekend for other reasons, and asked them about their iMac stock, you know, since I was already there. They don’t carry the upgraded model that I wanted (no surprise) so I’d have to order it online and wait. And that’s when the fun began…

When we returned home from the Apple store that day, it’s like the Mac Pro just knew. It seemed to retaliate and refused to boot up. Nothing I tried seemed to work – just the normal startup tone and a gray screen. Eventually, after I sucked it up and ordered the iMac, I realized that it was a system drive failure.

The iMac finally arrived and I was all giddy setting up my new toy. The screen is ridiculous. I just wish it was under better circumstances – I wanted to migrate my data over to it more gracefully, and at my own leisure…

I’ve learned a number of things during the setup of my iMac. First, I already knew that my most recent data backup was not really up to date (my bad), but at least I had something. Secondly, the Library folder is hidden in OS X Lion – so it takes just a little extra effort to migrate my data over to the new machine. And third, the folder structures in Lion have changed – significantly. I can no longer do a simple folder copy from one machine to another in order to “migrate” my data. It just won’t work.

I tried the migration assistant, which worked. Kind of. Since the iMac was already setup with a user account it needed to migrate the data over to a new user account. After that, I tested copying the Mail & Calendar folders over to the original user account now that they’ve been converted to the new folder structure – but that presented with a handful of permissions issues that I need to work through. The Calendar seemed to be mostly OK after that, but Mail just wasn’t quite right and, frustrated, I left it there.

I was actually able to get the old system drive working long enough to grab my Library & a few other folders off of it – so the data backup issue is no longer an issue. Now I just need to get everything Lion-ified.

So here’s my current plan of action (because I know that everyone’s just dying to know):

1. I scavenged another drive and rebuilt the Mac Pro with 10.6 & installed all of the updates.
2. I’ve started “restoring” my Mail, Calendar, and Address Book data back to the Mac Pro in 10.6 format.
3. Once that’s confirmed OK, I need to install my older version of iPhoto, make sure the photo library is OK, then link my iTunes library to the proper location and make sure that’s OK.
4. Then, I need to install the new version of iPhoto so that it’ll update the iPhoto library database. Apparently I decided at the wrong time to upgrade iPhoto – JUST prior to the failure. It didn’t actually install due to App Store connection issues…

That will be the end of the preparation phase. After that, I can go one of two routes:

1. Upgrade the Mac Pro to Lion and migrate the data over from there.
2. Reinstall Lion on the iMac and use the Migration Assistant to hopefully grab my data and migrate it over for me from the Mac Pro.

I’m going to reinstall Lion on the iMac anyway, because at this point I’ve tinkered so much that I don’t trust it’s stability. It’s already started throwing kernel panics.

This effort better be worth it! From what I’ve seen of the iMac and Lion so far, I think I’ll ultimately be pretty happy. If I can ever finish getting it setup.

I didn’t make any changes to the forum, though I have been attempting to integrate WordPress with a new install of Vanilla. I didn’t think I had made any changes that would impact bbPress, but apparently… I did?

Check back later this weekend. Might need to continue moving forward with the Vanilla install and manual data migration.

A long while ago I learned the hard way never to create a folder titled “Forms” within a document library. SharePoint will let you “create” this folder (even though it already exists as hidden for internal purposes), but then will not let you delete it, rename it, and will exhibit other weird behavior.

This week I’ve found another interesting combination. If you create a site and set the URL to “con” the site will be useless. You can set the title to “con” – you just can’t set the URL to that value. I still haven’t figured out why – I haven’t found any mention of this anywhere online.

It’s not related to the template, site permissions, which parent site you’re creating it in, or title. There were no other sites or lists with that name or URL anywhere I’ve tested to cause a conflict. I can use other 3-letter titles, just not that specific one. I’ve tried creating a site with this URL in various locations on the portal as well as another portal entirely. Both portals are running MOSS 2007, one is using AD authentication while the other is using FBA.

On one portal I receive an error that the resource cannot be found when trying to complete the site creation, or attempting to view anything inside the site (including the site settings). When trying to open the mostly-created site in SharePoint Designer I receive an error that “the version of windows sharepoint services running on the server is more recent than the version of sharepoint designer you are using” – only on this one site. I receive just a blank page on the other portal when trying to open the site.

I’m assuming that this is similar to the “Forms” folder issue that I’ve run into before, though I don’t have any hard evidence.

Has anyone else experienced this behavior? Have you found any other “problem” names or URLs?

Update!
Thanks to my awesome friend Jim, this does appear to be a known issue… of sorts. I’ve tested this with some of the other “reserved words” (e.g. “AUX”) and confirmed that it’s consistent. See here for more details:
http://www.windowsitpro.com/article/dns/windows-xp-and-2000-tips-tricks-update-august-26-2002.aspx

There aren’t too many. Some are just annoyances, but there are a few that would take the user experience to the next level.

1. A simple one to start: Continue to display the current time when receiving a phone call.
2. The ability to configure battery saving preferred settings (like “turn off GPS, Bluetooth, and Wifi”), then “activate” them just by tapping an app icon. Touch the same app icon to set it back.  I’m tired of having to go in several places to turn items on and off when I’m on the go.
3. Custom ring profiles similar to the Blackberry. I’d like to be able to set rules on how the phone behaves when receiving emails, texts, or calls with various criteria.

If I can have those 3 things, I would be a much happier iPhone owner.

Funny thing is, the number they called was the main number for the house – but not my number. I have my cell and only my cell, and it’s been that way for years now. So I logged into my account and looked up the company’s number and gave them a call. They have no record of anyone trying to call me recently. And why would they? They have no need to call me right now – unless they’re trying to sell me something.

So it looks like someone found my billing information and looked up the phone number for this address. Yeah, that gives me the warm-and-fuzzies. I’ll have to keep an eye on that account.

In other news, it looks like I’ll have to take these guys to small claims court if I’m ever going to see my $500 in rebates for my cell phone purchase from last year. Granted, I was in the wrong when I initially sent in my rebate paperwork – but with the best intentions. I had paid my account well in advance and sent in the paperwork early because I knew that I was going to have to move and didn’t want that interfering with my rebate. But at the time I thought that was allowed.
To make a long story short – I sent in the paperwork. Weeks and weeks later they sent me an email confirmation. When I looked it up, the status said:

Dates of submitted wireless bills do not fall within the date range specified on the rebate form.

You will receive a letter or postcard describing this problem. The letter or postcard may have instructions on how to correct this error.

I waited for a letter or postcard, but did not receive one. I wasn’t sure if I would ever get it because I had moved. So I emailed them asking what actions I need to take. They told me they couldn’t help me because I provided the wrong bill. I complained and explained the situation. They said (essentially) “oh, ok. Just follow these steps and we’ll take care of it.” I followed the instructions and gave them more than enough information. No email confirmation. I sent an email asking for a status. “Sorry. We can’t help you. You’re not allowed to resubmit your bill. Essentially you get one shot, and since you provided the wrong bill your rebate request is null and void.”

So there goes the money that was going to pay for my flight to Spain.

On top of that, I’m not happy with Best Buy – but again this is actually my fault. When I bought my TV I was supposed to get some “reward zone” gift card things for all of the points that I earned for spending so much cash. I waited and waited for them to arrive – because I had lots of things I was going to spend them on

After I moved I found the envelope with them in it. $95 worth. Woohoo! But they had expired 9 days before I found them. I called up the Reward Zone number and asked if they could reissue them. “Sorry, we can’t help you.” They apparently have a “no reissue” policy. So there goes $95.

Also – from the move – my awesome Klipsch PC speakers died. The subwoofer keeps blowing fuses immediately when powering it on. I didn’t notice until about a month after moving because it took me that long to get settled in enough and get off my lazy butt to set them up. My roommate was cool enough to call Klipsch and talk to them. They told him that I’d have to find my receipt and bring it to Best Buy and they could send it in for repair under the 1 yr warranty. Only thing is, it took me another month to find the receipt – and guess how far out of warranty it was? Just over a month. And (even though they have the EXACT make and model IN STOCK) they aren’t able to help me any further with replacing or repairing them.

Wow. Best Buy REALLY goes out of their way to help their customers, eh?

So let’s just tally this. I’m out $500 from my cell phone rebates, $95 from the Reward Zone cash, $160 for my speakers (that I have yet to replace and not sure that I will), and not to mention the $300+ that I spent to send all of Jason’s stuff out to AZ.

That’s over $1k in losses in about 2 months. Ouch.