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August 22, 2008
Getting the Most Out of Your Tools
Work At Home. While are much of our lives happen on site, contractors are the classic work-at-home breed. And, where do so many of us start? You already know: the classic 3'0" solid slab birch door bridging 2 file cabinets.
Cut the Cord. Is the slab-and-cab in your home? Do your kids scurry around your feet as you do estimates? Do you rent a shop?
When I did the slab-and-cab deal we were just eclipsing the wired world. I haven't gone desk free but what with tablet computing – www.Field2Base.com, ruggedized computing www.Dell.com www.ToughBook.com and smart phones www.Apple.com www.BlackBerry.com you might be able to. Are you totally wired..er…wireless?
Communication. I wrote the early versions of my novel www.TheCarpentersNotebook.com slab-and-cab style, hacking out the early drafts by hand. Now I can barely scribble a materials list on a 2x8—which is where the title comes from, by the way—without a Qwerty keyboard and emails da-dinging.
But construction's hardly a wired industry. While we run conduit and chases for customers' low-voltage lines (I call it InfoWire) and umpteen plugs in home offices, most of my subs and I talk.
My customers, on the other hand, are wired. We both like sending links—a Kohler tub and water closet are the hottest back and forth. www.Kohler.com is great—we both use it, almost as if we were talking. Searching makes sense and the WaterSense stuff www.WaterSense.com is forward thinking—more on that later.
What works for you?
Posted by Mark Clement at August 22, 2008 4:27 PM
