Doing It Old School Style
Lifehacker wrote a post yesterday on “The Top Ten PDF Tricks” that made me think of how often I try to use the latest Web 2.0 technology of the moment instead of using Old School technology. With the Web moving at light speed, PDF’s are way Old School but are a great example of a product that has carved out a niche for itself because it simply gets the job done.
Recently, I was collaborating with a User Interface Designer and thought it would be great if we collaborated via a Wiki . I quickly dove into researching Wiki’s that we could use and how they could empower us to best work together. I soon realized that setting up and managing a Wiki for a short-term document collaboration between two people was more effort to manage than simply using a Word document with document tracking turned on. I also learned that the person I was working with had never used a Wiki and there would be a learning curve for them to come up to speed. Consultants and learning curves are not a good combination 
The next time you are thinking of going New School, start with these simple questions:
- What are you trying to accomplish?
- Is there software that you or your organization is currently using that can accomplish your task/project quicker and/or easier?
- What is the level of effort to learn the tool vs. payback for your effort?
- Know your audience - Will they be open to using/interacting with this tool?
What do you do when you find yourself in similar situations?
Tip: If you are looking for free software to print your documents to PDF on you computer - check out PDF995. I have been using it for about a year and have been very pleased with it.
