Derek Hatchard blogs on

I can work in a lot of different environments.  I generally find it quite easy to tune out voices.  I can listen to music, work in front of the TV, work with the radio on, work in a cafe, etc.
Yet it is absolutely impossible for me to focus when my kids are nearby.  The sounds […]

The refund cheque for my Dell XPS M1530 arrived yesterday.  Yes, that’s right, I returned the Dell.  The deciding factor was that the chassis seemed to have warped.  It would wobble on a flat surface.  I tried multiple surfaces and tested a few other laptops to make sure.  The front left corner wobbled as I […]

Attention Canadian entrepreneurs:  Rick Segal (JLA Ventures) is holding a set of VC roundtables across Canada (Halifax, Moncton, St. John’s, Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto, Victoria, Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Guelph).  There is a limit of 25 seats at each session.  You must register at the Eventbrite sign up link below:
http://www.eventbrite.com/org/53497882?s=896278
I’m going to be on the west […]

Over at InternetDictator.com I am having a little April Fools’ Day contest:
http://www.internetdictator.com/index.php/prize-for-best-april-fools-day-prank/
The best report gets a prize.  The size of the prize will be based on how many people actually participate so spread the word!

After a couple months of procrastinating, I finally took some time this month to pick a new Wordpress theme.  As predicted, I found an existing theme and modified it slightly.  Enjoy!
I have also officially switched from derekhat.com to derekh.com as the primary domain for this blog.

I just did a clean install of my new XPS M1530 laptop.  Here is my current list of must-have software that I install on Day One.  Have other suggestions?  Leave a comment.

Windows Vista Business
Drivers (of course) - it would be nice if Dell provided a simple "install all" option on the driver disc
Mozilla Firefox (my […]

My 13" MacBook has been on the fritz lately and the warranty is almost up so I ordered a new laptop in preparation for sending the MacBook in for service.  From what I’ve heard, service from Apple can be like a black hole and I need my laptop for work.  Unfortunately my 3.5 year old […]

Xobni - it’s inbox backwards.  It’s some kind of email management add-on for Outlook.  It seems to have some compelling features like showing a profile of your email interactions with people and automatically extracting phone numbers from emails.
I was a loyal Lookout user for searching in Outlook 2003.  Outlook 2007 has better search so I […]

Yesterday I launched Internet Dictator, a for-fun site that tells you what to do and then you come back to tell your stories about your "compliance" with the Dictator’s decree.

The Dictator makes decrees on Mondays and Thursdays around 10am Eastern / 7am Pacific (+/- a couple hours).
Hope you enjoy!  Please come join up and […]

http://www.u23dmovie.com/
Worth going to. Just saw it at IMAX in Halifax. Intense.