Category Archives: it just works

Apr 07 0 comments
it just works

Jajah ‘Direct’ – The best “calling card”

I’m convinced that in our globalized world, there remains two reasons why people don’t call their friends and relatives that have spread around the world.

One: People think international dialing is expensive.

Two: People don’t know how to dial international phone calls.

Even though most people use mobile phones almost exclusively, carriers like Rogers & AT&T still impose cruel foreign long distance rates. That and the combination of the international access code”011″ and variable phone number lengths around the world are intimidating. These factors seem to form a mental block prevent people making foreign phone calls.

Boo-huckey. Enter Jajah.

Add your contact details and a smart web-site will do it’s best to see that you enter the phone number correctly. (Handy for countries that have optional leading zeros in their area codes.)jajah-logo

Once entered, from the Jajah website or mobile web page press ‘Dial’ associated with your contact. Jajah will dial YOU at your number (be it cell phone, home phone etc.) and when you pickup your phone Jajah will dial the other number and connect the call in a split second. Your call-display and their call-display will be correct. You pay pennies a minute.

But that’s not the best trick.

For each entry in your Jajah phone book, you can get a unique local phone number (Toronto, Montreal, many cities in the US and around the world). When you call that number from your own number, it will dial the number you setup. Call display is still correct.

So, if Rogers or AT&T gives you a boat load of local minutes, but charges you highway robbery rates for long-distance. Setup your foreign contacts on Jajah, dial the local number and pay pennies a minute for a perfect call.

Apr 05 0 comments
it just works

The best airfare web-site

The Travelling Trini, cause he travels a lot, often gets asked “What’s the best web-site for the cheapest airline fares.”

I always answer: “ITA Software” (http://www.itasoftware.com)

It does two things exceptional well. One of which has nothing really to do with airlines fares.

A: If your trip requires a connection, ITA Software appears to apply some magic in finding the lowest fare. Most airline fare web-sites will retrieve a list of options from each airline in response to the question “what are your options for A to B?”. What ITA Software does is use the fare databases published by the airlines to find suitable connections that possibly cross airlines. For example the fare from every airline from Dallas to Chicago might be $450. But if Northwest has a fare sale from Dallas to Memphis and United has a fare sale from Memphis to Chicago, ITA Software will put those fares (and flight times) together and add it into your result. ITA Software also correctly deals with red-eye flights correctly and will provide a TOTAL fare. It’s the weapon the traveler needs to find all the options.

B: ITA Software, is in the business of selling their fare search engine to other companies such as: Air Canada, US Airways, Continental etc. As a result, two wonderful things happen which make ITA Software, in my opinion, the best airline fare web-site out there.

The first is that ITA Software’s ability to pair together multiple airlines is non-existant. Air Canada doesn’t sell Westjet tickets, so Air Canada’s ‘version’ of ITA Software’s fare search engine doesn’t include Westjet tickets. This is one of their best features, which is available at ITA’s own website.

The second is ITA Software’s use of basic HTML. When I mean basic, I mean it looks like the web of 1999; and that’s just what the doctor ordered. I guessing this is to any complaints from their true customers (i.e. airlines) from complaining about out-glitzing ITA. That’s fine by me!

The web site is efficient. For example the result grid has airlines, stops (non, one, two), prices, times, flight durations and more. Want to select only flights by an airline? Click on it. Want to choose one stop flights on one airline? Click on it.

As a result, it’s just a straight up web site that delivers what a web site should be. It’s extremely fast, easy to find and drill down to any information you require. It hasn’t changed in many years, and still represents my airline web-site of choice. It just works.

– The Travelling Trini

Apr 02 0 comments
it just works

“P”repaid Stamps

Are we that thick?

The postage stamp dates from 1840 and admittedly the idea of yearly postage rate increases are something a bit more recent. But why did it take nearly 150 years to give rise to the prepaid stamp for a letter?canadastamp

Even Canada Post and the USPS had prepaid envelopes for their courier services. Give them $10, and you get a prepaid envelope to stuff and pop in a mailbox any time you wish.

Maybe the post office took great glee in watching us poor suckers buy a big sheets of 1c stamps every year and then gum up our tongues attaching often more than one of them to an envelope.

I think they also took great pride in making the price of mailing an envelope the most obscure hard to find piece of information on their web-sites.

Alas, no more!  — You can buy them online in Canada or the US.

All hail the prepaid stamp.

– The Travelling Trini

Mar 23 2 comments
it just works

Introducing – It Just Works!

Stay tuned for a new feature!

IT JUST WORKS!

The best things in life are free.  The second best things in life are simple.  Simple tools, or design, that accomplish a task with no frills or extras to gum up the works.  These ideas fit nicely into our ethos in that they typically work better than over-designed, and subsequently overpriced, items. Have we really improved on the toaster by adding a ‘reheat’ feature?  You get the idea.

A good friend, and the Scot, will be posting about good design, that just works, on a regular basis so stay tuned.