Ilium Software Blog

Behind the Scenes at Ilium Software

The Danger of Cleaning House

by Marc

PANICI had to share something that came up in a support call yesterday. It’s either really horrible or incredibly funny depending on your point of view.

We received a panicked call from someone trying desperately to access an eWallet file that they didn’t know the password for. This isn’t all that unusual. We all know that it’s easy to forget the “really good” password you came up with (one of the things that makes eWallet so handy!) The problem of course is that eWallet, being a secure information manager, really IS secure. If you forget your password there is NO backdoor, NO way to reset the password, and NO reasonable way to hack the wallet*.

In this case though, the problem was that Company A bought out Company B and laid off all the IT staff from Company B. Unfortunately for “A”, the IT staff at “B” stored all the vital IT info in eWallet and no one bothered to ask them for the password when they laid everybody off.

Needless to say, panic ensued. As a person who knows how bad it would be if we lost access to all our passwords, I can feel their pain…but on the other hand, as a guy who has seen his friends dumped out on the street during a merger, I can’t help but snicker.

* There are numerous articles about hacking 256-bit encryption. Estimates to do so typically involve a few hundred thousand computers linked together and working continuously for tens of thousands of years. Yeah…pick a good password and you’re all set.

Making the Switch…

by Lee

Every day people contact us to change their software from one device type to another, Palm to Pocket PC, Pocket PC to Smartphone, Smartphone to Palm, etc.  I’m curious to know what drives this switch.  What single thing, or combination of things, makes people drop a perfectly usable, high-dollar device and buy a different one?

I started out PDA-dom with a Palm Kyocera 6035, but when I spent more time banging it on the desk in frustration than actually using it, I started looking at other devices.   I looked very hard at the Pocket PC phones, but the ones with the functionality I wanted were outside my price range (I will only pay so much for something I can lose or trash so easily!).  The interface for the Windows-Powered Smartphones gives me hives, so they weren’t even in the running, and that brought me right back to Palm.  Surprisingly, to me at least, the Treo suits my needs pretty well.

So what makes people switch to a completely different operating system?  Is it the promise of “better, cooler, faster”?     Is it “I hate this device, so that one has to be better”?   How much of your device choice is based on actual functionality of the device (“gotta have a phone and a thumb keyboard”), and how much is purely personal preference (“the Pocket PC is so easy to use, but the Palm is so alien!”)?

eWallet 5.0 Beta About to Commence!

by Marc

ewi2a.jpgThat’s right! We’re about to start a full beta on eWallet 5.0. We’re very excited about the new features and look forward to getting reaction from our customers! One truth of software development is that sometimes things look amazing from our perspective, but once it hits the masses we discover that the “great idea” is far less impressive from a user point of view. Hence the need for a good beta run!

The beta group will include a very select bunch of people but we do have open slots so if you’re interested drop a line to beta@iliumsoft.com . Not only do we need our usual group of Palm, Pocket PC, and Windows Mobile Smartphone folks, but we’re also looking for people who don’t use a PDA at all anymore.

Arrrr! Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day!

by Marc

captainmarctassin.JPG Ahoy there! Unless ye’ve been stranded on a desert island, ye know that today is Talk Like a Pirate Day . The crew here at Ilium Software want to wish all of ye good sailing. And to celebrate, we’ve created this special InScribe 2007 keyboard layout just for pirates! (Ye can spy InScribe 2007 here if ye haven’t already!)

Also, be sure to check out the booty offered by our mates over at Astraware. They’ve got some special offers on Pirate Software ye might like! May the wind be at yer back and yer powder stay dry.

InScribe is Now Available!

by Marc

InScribe IconIt’s done! InScribe 2007 is finished and it’s now available for download. And the best part (besides being a really great piece of software) is that it’s FREE! That’s right. Call us crazy but we’ve decided to offer InScribe 2007 for free. Just pop over to our website and you can download it from there!

I also want to take a second to thank everyone who helped to make this possible including everyone here at Ilium Software (it’s always a group effort at Ilium Software!), our fantastic beta team, JkOnTheRun, and of course Lora, Ken, and Elliot over at Microsoft. It was a lot of work and at times a bit of a whirlwind but we’re really proud of the result.

So what are you waiting for? Go grab a copy!

Getting Picked Up in L.A.

by Ellen

Not, as you might think, that some guy in the street tried to strike up a conversation, but that Randy Eisenmen, Handango’s CEO, for some reason decided to lift me up about 2 feet when he gave me the Handango Champion Award we won for eWallet. To say I was shocked doesn’t even begin to cover it – no one has tried that in many years. Apparently I looked so freaked out that he had to send someone over to ask if I was OK (I was fine. I was worried about him – I was having visions of him falling over, and seeing headlines like “Ilium Software Exec Kills Handango CEO”. I’m short, but I’m really not all that small). Anyway, it was lots of fun. Someone asked Randy why he’d picked me up (everyone else just got hugs or handshakes) and he was blaming Ken Landau from LandWare, who won the award before ours (congratulations, Ken), but I’m pretty sure that was just an excuse. If companies get their personalities from their CEOs, I can certainly see why Handango is so high-energy.

Of course I was delighted that eWallet was again recognized by the judges as one of the top mobile apps (and by the user community as being worth the nomination). And of course I was overjoyed that InScribe (which we’ll be releasing this month) was picked by the judges of the UMPC contest as one of the 3 best programs submitted for the UMPC. Both Marc and I are really excited by the UMPCs, and very happy that InScribe was recognized. And now that we’ve won another UMPC (courtesy of Microsoft, thank you to them), I might actually get a chance to use it.

The whole Summit was lots of fun – thanks, everyone at Handango. I got to meet some very interesting people, catch up with some old friends, and even listen to a few presentations. As well as eat and drink too much. Everything made it back, including the new hardware, all the swag (what was that thing from Verizon?) and of course the Champion Award, which is now in its place of honor on our awards bookcase. It’s a good thing my suitcase expands, but not so good that I do.

Once again, many thanks to Handango, the sponsors and the judges.

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