The Omni Group

Thanks for all your ideas on the App Which Has Not Yet Been Named. My personal favorites, in no particular order:

â?¢ OmniNCF (â??non-cat findingâ?? app), suggested by WrongSizeGlass, who went on to include the following:

â?¨Someone: â??Hey, have you heard about Omniâ??s new application that canâ??t find cats?â??â?¨Someone Else: â??Phft. Microsoftâ??s had one for years.â??

â?¢ OmniCheesecake, because as Seth pointed out, what's, like, better than cheesecake?

â?¢ Finally, Vicki's idea: OmniBaffle. That way OmniGraffle could have a friend with whom to commiserate. (“Dude, everyone calls me OmniGiraffe.” “I know, man…I know.”)

We haven't decided on a name yet â?? code or otherwise â?? but now we have a veritable plethora of concepts, both serious and, uh, otherwise (Butterstick??). Stay tuned, I hope to have a useful update on this project's progress in a few weeks.

:::

My 11-month old son has a book called Big Noisy Trucks and Diggers Demolition, which is a licensed product of, no kidding, Caterpillar Inc. (I suppose the gender-stereotypical equivalent marketed for little girls might be Fluffy Pink Ponies and Their Sparkly Anorexic Math-Hating Princess Friends.) The book details the thrilling adventures of demolition excavators and track loaders and so on, which I can tell you from first-hand experience is even more brain-numbing to read aloud than Sock Monkey Goes To Hollywood.

Anyway, while I don't guess that his Big Noisy Trucks book will prepare him for a future career in demolitions any more than his other books will help him become a Sock Monkey or a Very Hungry Caterpillar, I got to wondering about when it is that people start developing interests that stick with them throughout their lives.

Now for me, careerwise I was drawn to the fabulous art of Corporate Hyperbole at a young age because my aunt ran her own ad agency. Advertising/marketing seemed like such a glamorous, exciting world, especially after I learned that Campbell's Soup Company had very nearly accepted the joke soup name idea “Goodness Gracious, Great Balls of Meat!”. As for hobbies, I discovered BBSes when I was 12 or so on our crusty, ancient DOS machine, and finally stepped up to a PowerMac in…maybe 1997? Which I used mainly for playing Lode Runner and surfing, oh the shame, AOL.

And lo, the results of a non-techie's interest in computers and the secret desire to someday include the words “Great Balls of Meat” in a company-sponsored marketing vehicle: this very blog. (I'm totally playing the theme from Chariots of Fire right now, by the way. Duh dum duh duh DUH duhh….)

Ahem. Moving on. To my POINT, which is…what about you? When did you start becoming interested in software, in Macs? Was it when you were a kid, or older, or? Tell us your story in the comments section!

A while ago I returned from a family vacation to discover that our cat had gone missing. While the cat is at least 87% evil and often spends her time stealth-barfing into my shoes, I was concerned. After a worrying amount of time had elapsed and walking around shouting her name into various bushes had produced no results (well, other than being forever known as the Crazy Neighborhood Cat Lady), I turned to the one piece of software I knew could help.

That's right: OmniGraffle.

Exactly one day later, our cat made a dramatic reappearance – slightly haggard but no worse for wear.

COINCIDENCE?

I think not.

OmniGraffle: it has the page layout functions to find your lost cat. I'm in marketing, so what I say must be true!

(Note: your lost cat results may vary. Offer void where prohibited, taxed or restricted. Current version of OmniGraffle recommended for all cat-location activities.)

:::

Okay, now for some blog content you might actually care about: an update on the Omni “GTD app” progress.

Well, I don't have much news yet. Sorry, that's kind of a sucky update, but it's the truth. We have lots of feedback from everyone and a plan of sorts (including a UI mockup that is actually very exciting), it's now a matter of finding engineering resources and re-prioritizing other projects.

We're still really interested in doing this, and we are going to keep you posted on what we're doing. Hopefully when the engineers are back from WWDC we'll be able to start making some real progress.

Finally, it's been suggested that using the term “GTD” when referring to this project is maybe not such a hot idea, so we need a good code name. Want to give us one? Best suggestion wins a software license of your choice. Extra points given for sophomoric humor, pop culture references, or anything that makes us email your idea around internally with the subject line “OMG OUR USERS ARE CRAZY”. The comments sections awaits!

Whoomp! Here it is:

Gantt charts, schedules, summaries, milestones, and critical paths – oh my. People, the public beta of OmniPlan has officially been released.

Enjoy. And thanks, everyone.

Project management has been called the ability to create the impossible, with the unwilling, against insurmountable odds, under budget and on time.

That's actually a pretty good description of our process for creating Brand New Secret Product.

(Well…sort of.)

Introducing OmniPlan. Our brand new project management application.

(Totally not an inkwell!)

Please stay tuned, folks! We're shooting to release a public beta of OmniPlan next Wednesday, July 26th.

• Now a Universal binary

• Based off a slightly customized version of WebKit.*

• Supports user defined style sheets

• Gets whites whiter, plumps when you cook it

* Greatly improved website compatibility, speed and stability. Many rendering and compatibility issues users have been experiencing should now be addressed.

Go forth and download, OmniWeb fans!

Hey, folks, just a brief note today to tell you we're looking for a Systems Guru.

(I just noticed that the description reads, in part, “You need to be comfortable supporting people who have differing levels of technical expertise”. Ha! I think they're talking about me.)

Tell all your geeky Guru-y pals, Omni's taking resumes.

You know, I thought we'd get maybe 20 guesses or so on what Brand New Secret Product is. Not HUNDREDS. Holy, uh, fiddlesticks.

So this is one of those occasions when us marketing weasels have to decide between silence, subterfuge, or straightforwardness. And other terms that begin with the letter “S”, like “snake oil” (as in, Our powerful, extensible solution creates a paradigm shift in infrastructure core competencies).

We're going with a large serving of straightforwardness, with a hint of silence on the side and a sprinkling of delicious, bacony subterfuge. (There's a reason we're called weasels, after all.)

Some of you guessed correctly about what Brand New Secret Product is. Some of you are clearly insane and made us laugh until we sprayed Jamba Juice out our collective nostrils. And some of you – check that, LOTS of you – guessed that we're building some kind of GTD app.

Brand New Secret Product is not a GTD app. However, we have been talking very seriously about building a GTD app, and collaborating with our friends Ethan and Merlin, and hearing so many of you tell us that you're interested in that kind of software…well, we would really, really like to come up with something. We have some awesome ideas for how it could work.

In a couple weeks we're sitting down with some folks here in Seattle and brainstorming what this GTD app might do, and how we might be able to get it out the door in a timely manner. We do have a lot on our plates these days, and we're not a big company; we just don't know yet if we have the resources. But! If you would like to send us ideas, feature requests, or just a plea for us to make it happen, please email omnitask-planning@omnigroup.com, in the next week if possible. (OmniTask is our code name. Shhhhhh.)

There: some straightforwardness.

Now for the subterfuge! Well, not exactly, but here's another annoying image of Brand New Secret Product – not blurred this time, but clipped so only a piece of it shows. Go nuts, CSI-enhancers.

And the silence: we're not going to tell you what B.N.S.P. is just yet. But very, very soon we will have more info and a public beta. I think some of you (no, we're not saying how many!) are going to be really happy.

P.S. Yes, those of you who guessed correctly will be hearing from me shortly about the private beta. Booyah!

Well! Apparently our OmniWeb 5.5 beta whooped some butt in a recent browser test.

I'd love to tell you exactly why OmniWeb was so darn fast, but uhhhh….we're not exactly sure. It might have to do with something called garbage collection, which I would explain in great detail except I have no idea what it means. Also, benchmark tests are maybe not 100% indicative of what your own personal browsing experience will be, so take it all with a large grain of salt, but…go, OmniWeb, go!

OmniWeb 5.5 is still in 'private' beta (not exactly PRIVATE when it's in a benchmark test, I guess), but we're shooting for a public beta next week.  Hang in there, OmniWeb fans!

:::

In other news, Omni has a Brand New Secret Product in the works. Before you ask, we are absolutely still working on our other apps – there are, let's see…11 engineers here who are assigned to various projects, in addition to product managers and support folk and sales and QA and of course, the espresso machine – and we still plan to provide you with updates for those (yes, like OmniWeb! And OmniGraffle! And…everything else! Except Oni; you Oni people need to CEASE and DESIST).

Anyway! We are getting very close to opening the kimono on Brand New Secret Product, if you'll forgive me for using a cheesy dotcom-VC-wooing term from 1999. Would you like some hints? SURE YOU WOULD.

Hint the First:

Some of you have asked for this product. Repeatedly.

Hint the Second:

Here is an annoyingly blurred image of the product's application icon:

Hint the Third:

It is NOT a replacement for Mail. Or a word processor.

(I know, I know. Pre-release hype kills kittens, etc. “Remember the Segway”, etc. I know.)

Now for the fun part: if you guess what Brand New Secret Product is, we'll get you on a private beta to start looking at it. You'll have to be sworn to secrecy – on pain of…well, maybe not death, but cake? cake or death? – but you'll be among the ELITE, the BRAVE, the, um, BUGGY BETA BRUTE SQUAD!

Or…wait, did I not make that sound attractive enough? What I meant to say is, if you guess correctly, you'll have an early, exclusive sneak peek at our biggest new product of the year. Cooooool.

HIE YE TO THE COMMENTS SECTION, make your guess, and don't forget to include your email address.

(Update: in order for me to have a snowball's chance of going through everyone's guesses, comments are now closed. Thanks for all your interest, folks!)

Hey, did you know that OmniDazzle is based on the unique capabilities provided by Apple's Core Image framework and showcases the power of the OpenGL based windowing system in Mac OS X?

(I have no idea what those words mean. I just copied an engineer's email. Ha! Am v. smart and technical-sounding now.)

The final release is up now: OmniDazzle One-Point-Ohhh Yeah. From beta to final release in 14 days – boy, I'm pretty sure this is a first for us at The Omni Group. I know every single caffeinated beverage has been plundered from the snack room and there's more than one person walking around in that I-haven't-slept-in-days fog (look, I'm not pointing fingers, but guys? The tag on your shirt goes on the inside), so believe me when I say it hasn't been easy.

If you're just joining us, welcome! Pardon the cat hair. OmniDazzle is a set of fun and useful enhancements that help you highlight certain areas of your screen, create special effects, and track the location of your mouse pointer. It is most certainly not just a cursor locator, as has been explained to me repeatedly and maybe with some spirited hand gestures.

OmniDazzle helps you incorporate graphical cues as a presentation tool, capture great screenshots, point out information on your desktop, and make your computer an object of envy by producing impressive onscreen effects.

Or, as some people here are referring to OmniDazzle, it's utilitainment.

(Can I just, uh, make it clear that your trusty Marketing Weasel is NOT one of those people? Okay then.)

We've received some positive feedback from some of you on the Focal Point plug-in, which functions by bordering the active UI element on the screen and dimming the background. As Bill mentioned here a couple posts back, it's great for staying focused on a particular task when you're working by yourself – or, if you're doing a presentation, directing attention to specific elements. People also like the Zoom plug-in, which works nicely for magnifying interesting sections of your screen (like for instance this fantastic squirrel's sweater).

You should also check out the Scribble plug-in, especially if you do slideshow presentations. Being able to draw all over your screen is handy, you can circle things and draw arrows and write notes and so on. I particularly recommend doodling a little robot on top of your Keynote slide while you're talking about something that has nothing at all to do with robots.

Seriously, it's awesome. Try it. Give your robot some fancy eyelashes and maybe a pair of roller skates if you really want to freak everyone out. Then deny, deny, deny! (“What robot? I'm not sure what you mean, Bob, and frankly I think we're getting off track here.”)

If by some bizarre chance you don't find the plug-ins themselves to be fun or useful, just looking at the app while it's active is pretty cool in my opinion. You've got the smoooooth animations, anti-aliased rendering awesomeness, and slick reflections in the plug-in previews. It's eye candy, but not the empty calorie kind, the sports–energy kind with an inexplicable protein source!

Jeez. I mean, it's utilitainment. And it's available for a very reasonable $14.95.

Please note that while we're working to resolve any remaining hardware incompatibility issues, you'll need a fairly modern video card to run OmniDazzle. Check here for more information on that.

Okay, this post has definitely exceeded the Unwritten Yet Generally Agreed-Upon Blog Word Count Limit, so…the end! Go play with OmniDazzle now! And thank you, as always, for coming by. 

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