Technology

Snow Leopard cometh

/ hsoi

Mac OS X 10.6 “Snow Leopard” is due tomorrow, August 28, 2009.

Macworld has a series of articles discussing the new OS version.

As a Mac software developer I have to keep up with such things. Frankly, the Snow Leopard update isn’t all that sexy for end users. You’ll see there’s no massive nor major feature list upgrade, which is a change. Every upgrade of Mac OS X so far has been a big step forward, so this is the first small step. Frankly what that points to is a maturing of the OS, and I think that’s welcome. We don’t have to be chasing the latest thing all the time and plunking down a lot of money to do so. Well, at least end-users don’t have to be… what Snow Leopard really brings about are a lot of under-the-hood changes that affect us developers far more.

Still, I have people asking me if they should upgrade. That’s up to you. Some people like to have the latest stuff, so if you like being on the cutting edge, then by all means be there at midnight when it goes on sale. One big feature for end-users is built-in support for Microsoft Exchange. If you have to work in an Exchange-based environment, you may find this quite welcome.

I must admit that I’m still a bit of a hold-out from converting fully to Apple’s own software. I still use Microsoft Entourage for my email because frankly it’s been the best Mac email client for a number of years. I have moved my calendaring to iCal (tho ToDo’s remain in Entourage because iCal’s doesn’t cut it), and with the purchase of the iPhone I have to use the Mac’s Address Book a lot more (thankfully Entourage can sync between its address book and Address Book.app). But with the massive amount of email, folder organization, rules, automation, and other such things it’s just tough for me to make the transition… probably take me a day or two just to try to get it all set up, and when I’ve attempted it in the past I discover Mail.app just isn’t quite there. But now with the Exchange support built-in, there may be more feature parity and it may work out. So I’ll probably reevaluate it at some point. The reality is, you do get further on the Mac working with Apple’s technologies because things like Address Book, iCal, Mail, etc. are all well-integrated into the system. They mesh with your iPhone better. Plus since developers can have access to such things (e.g. the Address Book API’s) the greater user experience can be enhanced if you’re taking advantage of what Apple provides. While some people don’t like this “monopoly-style” approach to things, it’s actually what makes the Mac such a great end-to-end experience. Instead of lots of disparate parts that don’t really hook together well causing the end-user a lot of frustration in accomplishing simple tasks, you’ve got parts that integrate well together from the hardware level through the OS lower layers to the higher layers to the end applications, and with everything hooking together, things can “just work.” User experience is so important and that’s what really differentiates Mac from other platforms.

So we’ll see. For me the key is being able to get my work done in a day with minimal-to-no hassle. So far so good, so it’s tough to want to change unless I can see improvement in that area.

But being a developer, I have been using Snow Leopard for a while and find that it’s just another upgrade. Being a “minor” upgrade for users, the impacts to me as a developer mean that I’ll still be supporting Mac OS X 10.4 “Tiger” for some time. Believe it or not, users are still using Tiger a fair amount. I can’t say why, but one possible reason is Tiger is the last version of the OS to include “Classic” support. If people are still relying upon Mac software from years gone by that was never rebuilt to be Mac OS X native, they would want to stick with Tiger. Trouble is, it’s going to be harder and harder to maintain that. Snow Leopard itself is Intel-only: PowerPC-based Macs are officially heading off into the sunset. Still, there’s not a whole lot at least in the work I do that would force one of my products to be Snow Leopard-only, and while I’m certainly working on a few Leopard-only things, so long as Tiger users exist and continue to buy software while holding out on that 4+ year old OS well… we’ll keep supporting Tiger users. Of course one potentially limiting factor will be Apple’s developer tools. Snow Leopard’s version of Xcode 3.2 does not install things for targeting 10.4… you have to do a custom install to get them (seems to be SDK 10.4 and gcc 4.0.x); so the writing is on the wall even from Apple: move forward.

Frankly, that makes sense for Apple. You see, at the heart of it all Apple is a hardware company. To make things like Mac OS X, iWork, and other bits of software, that’s really only done to make the hardware functional and useful. Macs, iPods, iPhones — it’s all hardware. The family iMac is a PowerPC G5-based iMac. It’s long in the tooth, no doubt. I’ve been wanting to replace it with a new Intel-based iMac for some time, but I have a rule with hardware purchases. You see, everyone always wants the best and wants to minimize obsolescence. There will always be something bigger, better, faster, cheaper somewhere on down the line, so there’s really nothing you can do about it. So you use what you’ve got as long as you can, push it until you truly cannot wait any more… not just desire wait, but some larger need. Then buy the best you can afford. So now that PowerPC is officially dead to Apple, eventually the family iMac just won’t be able to cut it any more. It should last a bit longer, but push is coming to shove and a new purchase is in the wings. Works well for Apple’s bottom-line, doesn’t it? 🙂

I am not tech support

/ hsoi / 6 Comments

… but everyone thinks I am.

Just because in my professional life I’m a computer programmer, that doesn’t mean I know everything about computers. Heck, I’m a Mac guy and haven’t really touched a Windows box in ages. I know Vista sucks, but that’s about it. 😉  And yet, all my Windows-using family and friends call me for help with Windows, always starting out with “I know you’re a Mac guy but I was hoping you’d know…”

But yet, because “I do stuff with computers” I have various people always calling me and asking for help. I don’t have any idea, but this flowchart summed up my strategy perfectly:

Flowchart courtesy of xkcd.

First week iPhone impressions

/ hsoi

I just returned from a business trip to Chicago. I must admit that this trip was the event that pushed me over the edge to finally buy an iPhone. A combination of needing a dedicated mobile phone for staying in touch with Wife, for work folk to get/stay in contact, and all of the data support. In fact, I knew I wanted the iPhone more for data functionality than phone. I was correct in that area.

I love wireless computing. I love the 802.11 network in my house and how I can sit on the couch or out on the back patio and ‘pute. The one bummer has been that while technically it is wireless I am still ultimately tethered to a general location by the range of the wireless base station. I can’t do things on the road. Having the iPhone and Internet access via AT&T’s 3G network puts the world at my fingertips almost anywhere I am. There is great power and convenience in that. For example, I started writing this post while riding on the hotel shuttle bus to O’Hare airport. Or how after typing that I had to save a draft and then I continued writing the post from inside the O’Hare terminal while I wait for my plane to board. And now, I am back home and finishing the blog post on my MacBook Pro.

I find one huge advantage is being able to keep up. I can check and send email, read my RSS feeds, or just browse the web for news and information. Certainly being able to blog from “anywhere” is useful as well towards ensuring at least one blog post every day. Being able to keep up with communications and not having to “return to the desktop” to catch up and be in touch is a huge boon. Normally after a trip like this, due to the forced offline time of travel, I’d come back Monday morning to a huge slew of email and things to have to slog through and catch up on. No longer. I can just chug right along and not miss a beat.

One problem however is “ostrich syndrome”; that’s where you are so heads down focused on the device that you become oblivious to the world around you. Some people take it a step further, walking around while they do this. It comes with the territory to some extent, but I have to train myself against it. I don’t want to be oblivious to my surroundings. This is something that has to be worked on, to find a balance between being focused on your work but also focused on your surroundings.

Another problem is battery life. It’s amazing how quickly it goes down. There are things you can do to help reduce power consumption, so I’ve done what I can there. Apple posts some useful tips.

I have gotten used to typing. I don’t think I’ll be as good a typist as I can at a real keyboard. There’s no tactile feedback from the keystrokes, it’s using your thumbs and not all 10 of your fingers, but I was impressed how well I could get around. While I may not want to compose essays on the iPhone, certainly I don’t have much problem dealing with emails or even writing a short blog posting. 🙂

But again, the biggest thing I like is being able to have access anywhere. I can just pull out the phone, fire up Safari, and look something up. Or pull out Maps and figure out where to go, from where I presently am. There’s an amazing amount of power and convenience to this, and I’m fortunate to have it.

NetNewsWire and NewsGator – part deux

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

I like NetNewsWire. I never used their NewsGator service because I had no need. I get my iPhone, I want an RSS reader there, I see NNW exists for it, and using NewsGator I can sync up and go and keep everything merrily in sync between my MacBook Pro and NNW and my iPhone and NNW. But then, NewsGator opts to change how things are done.

Originally I wasn’t happy about this, but now, I don’t know. Now that NNW exclusively performs its syncing and updating via the NewsGator service, I notice that I’m often lagging behind in feed updates or not getting updates entirely. This is not a step in the right direction. Who knows. Maybe the Google Reader mechanisms will work better here. I don’t know, never used it.

But honestly, all of this is feeling like a big step back in functionality. If NewsGator/NNW is honestly going to make things better, then fine go forward with the changes. But so far, my confidence is shaken and I am thinking about finding another RSS reader. 😦

NetNewsWire and NewsGator’s questionable changes

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

Long ago I adopted NetNewsWire as my RSS reader. Suffice it to say while on the go I want to keep up with my news and blog reading, so I was happy to see that NNW existed for the iPhone. Furthermore, just sign up for a NewsGator account and now everything stays in sync. I can read on my iPhone or my MacBook Pro and when I switch to the other, everything’s up to date and chugs along merrily. This I’m happy about.

However, I read in the latest TidBITS about NewsGator’s changes. Suffice it to say, I’m not happy about this. I can understand the reasons for some of their changes and have no problem with that. However, it seems there’s a big loss in functionality and that the whole transition is not being handled very well. That services will end in about 3 weeks and they still don’t have the software nailed down, pay strategies nailed down, or really anything nailed down… that’s not good. They need to have their act together and a solid plan in place, THEN they can go about transitioning people to the new scheme. I’ve been in the software business for many years, and I know if things look this bad publicly, they’re even worse internally. They risk a massive fuck-up if they don’t pause, regroup, and rethink this.

My opinion is they should back off for now. Put off the end-of-life for a few more months, get their act together, figure out their strategy, get all of their software updated, get things ready to go including fielding some feedback from users and taking the time to improve or fix things prior to the big shift. Make this as smooth as possible for users. Keep users happy, that will lead to good things. Piss your users off, you’re just screwing yourself both short and long term.

If they don’t pause and regroup, they risk backlash and losing far more revenue than they hope to gain by this move.

Yes, I’d be willing to pay for the software if it means no-ads and the price is reasonable. But if they opt to botch this up and even the full paid versions are going to lack features we presently have (e.g. clippings), well… I suspect I may be looking for a new RSS reader and service soon.

More iPhone tales

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

Today we had to travel across town to visit the kids’ dentist. Oldest is going to be getting braces, and this was the consultation… for my cash-ectomy. 😉 It’s going to hurt me more than it’s going to hurt him, but thankfully his braces will be “routine” and not any major ordeal. The big hope is improvements in well… attitude and long-term outlooks on the part of Oldest. As you can guess, he’s not thrilled about getting braces, but it’s one of those teenager rites-of-passage so here we are. How long? Dentist said 18-24 months, but ultimately it depends how his body responds to the treatment. Wife did braces a couple years ago and she was over the top with her oral hygiene during the process. As a result, she was able to get hers off a lot sooner because her mouth was in fantastic shape. Oldest has observed this and at least mentally has acknowledged that the ordeal will end sooner if he takes good care of things. Of course, that will still require over a year of dedicated every day work on his part. So, we’ll see what it leads to for him in terms of longer-term goal accomplishment and such. That is, Dad looks at this not just as a way to improve Oldest’s smile, but also a lot of other things for him too. 🙂

But that’s not what this is about. This is about my new iPhone!

I knew I’d use this thing more for data than phone. That I can be just about anywhere and do things I need to do is awesome. I was working on my news feeds while in the waiting room. I’m rather behind on things due to the way the weekend was, so it was great to be able to catch up and not be further behind. I use NetNewsWire for my RSS reading, and they have an iPhone app version of the same. Cool thing? If you sign up for their NewsGator service, it will keep all your subscriptions and read/unread information on their server. So I was reading things while on the road, but didn’t complete all the reading. Get home, get things synced, and I can pick up where I left off using my MacBook Pro and the desktop client. Very nice to have not only the ability to do what I want where I want, but to be able to keep various devices and mechanisms in sync. Cool!

I’m still adjusting to how the iPhone does things. I wish there was a more direct way to flip around between apps than to always have to click the Home button then re-navigate to the app. That is, some apps will launch other apps (e.g. NetNewsWire might let me view a page in Safari), then I can’t just easily switch back to NNW but I have to go back Home, refind NetNewsWire, then get into it. Granted the app doesn’t lose its state, which is nice, but it’s still one of those navigational annoyances.

One thing I really would like is a better way to access Facebook. The Facebook iPhone app is nice, but 1. doesn’t support landscape typing, 2. is really just an accessor for Facebook itself. To play games I found I have to use Safari, ensure I bypass the mobile login for Facebook, then work from there. It’s rather cumbersome, but at least I can toodle around on Facebook games if I want to while on the road. 🙂  Gotta mind the important things in life, right?

And yes… Wife has bigtime envy. I’m sure I’ll be getting her one soon. 🙂

iPhone impressions

/ hsoi / 3 Comments

So I have a new iPhone 3GS. It’s my first “mobile device” from Apple.

People find it odd that I’ve been an Apple fanboy since my first Apple //e as a child, owning many Macs over the years, and being a Mac software developer (amateur and professional) for nearly 20 years… that with all that Apple-ness in my life, I’ve never owned an iPod or an iPhone.

iPod was simple. I had no desire for music in my ears. I love music, but I also love my hearing. I’ve already done enough damage to my hearing from loud music (either the Walkman in my ears as a kid, or attending loud concerts), motorcycles, guns… all sorts of things that until I had done enough damage to my hearing I didn’t start doing things to avoid damage to my hearing. I just don’t care to do such damage any more. Furthermore, when you have earplugs in you end up tuning out the world around you. I prefer not to do that. I enjoy just listening to the world around me, most of the time. Of course, there’s things like situational awareness too. All sorts of good reasons for hearing things other than piping music into my head. Still, from time to time I thought an iPod would have been useful but never enough to justify buying one.

iPhone was also simple. At first it was cool, but not practical enough. I didn’t have much need for the mobile phone, and the original iPhone’s really lacked in features and support. But now with iPhone OS 3, and the iPhone 3GS, things are finally coming along. I actually think I want the phone more for data than telephone. I’ve had more than enough times where I’ve been somewhere and went, “Gosh, if I had an iPhone…”. One recent incident was buying my Savage 11 hunting rifle. If I could have looked up the specific model information on the Internet from right there in the store, that would have made things very simple. Instead, I had to go home, look it up, then go back. Furthermore, I’ve always felt on long trips to new places that such a device would be useful. Sure there’s the TomTom, but that’s a one-trick pony. Heck, in going to the Hunter Education course, I realized that the directions I had vs. the Google Maps vs. the street signs vs. my own knowledge of the area… everything was actually slightly off and didn’t mesh with each other. I was pretty sure I was supposed to turn at one intersection but opted to go forward a bit just to see if maybe it was ahead. After going a bit it dawned on me that I now had an iPhone. I pulled over, pulled up Maps, noted my location via GPS and realized that yes, that intersection was the correct one to turn at. Just the sort of thing as to why I was happy for an iPhone.

I can’t wait for the next big family road trip. 🙂

So Far

So far, so good. I’ve gotten her all hooked up, updated, synced. I’ve gone through various address books and gotten things updated and in order. I can’t get my work’s POP email to work for some reason, tho SMTP is working. Probably just a configuration thing, despite it matching the config on my laptop. *shrug*  I’ll deal with it in the morning. Plus I’ve been on the App Store and have a bunch of free apps and silly things. Bought a couple little games too.

I’m getting better at typing on it. I’m sure in short order I’ll be rather fluid with it and things will flow just fine.

I admit that I think ringtones are stupid. I just want a basic “ring”. I see far too often when someone gets something they think is a cute ringtone, then their phone goes off around “other folks” and the embarrassed look the person gets on their face as everyone hears their ringtone. It’s hard to find something that’s just plain and simple and won’t sound stupid being played over and over for the world around to to hear while you fumble for your phone. 🙂

The only other bump in this? The physicalness and limits of iTunes.

I wanted to use my personal MacBook Pro as the sync point for the iPhone. Makes good sense. However, I do not have my iTunes music library on this machine; music runs out of another box. I’m trying to find out a way to deal with this… so I can have some music with me. I tried hooking up the iPhone to the other box to manually sync just music, but when I tried that I got told “we’re going to erase everything because this iTunes library isn’t the same iTunes library”. Ugh. I really don’t want to deal with this. It’s just a limitation of iTunes, in that there’s no good way to share music. It’s so one-person/one-computer oriented. I’m not sure how much of that is bug, feature, imposed by Apple, imposed by the media groups. I don’t know, but it really hampers the user experience. I’ll be Googling around to see what I can do on this.

Oh, battery life is interesting. Just having the device sleeping on my nightstand lost about 10% charge… just sitting doing nothing (if you will). That’s nuts. Don’t forget your charger.

To bring a gun thing into this, one of the first gun-related apps I downloaded was SureFire’s ShotTimer. I haven’t had a chance to use it yet, but I can’t wait to. 🙂

Transition

/ hsoi

A relative sent me a link to the Transition, a flying car.

I’m not a plane guy, but a few friends are hobbyist pilots and fly small planes. This looks pretty cool, especially the part about using unleaded fuel for both driving and flying. I’m sure my pilot friends could tell me more about the practicality of such a vehicle and put it in proper perspective, but still it’s a neat bit of technology and takes us one step closer to that Jetsons lifestyle. 🙂

My new iPhone

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

I finally get to join the ranks of the cool kids. I bought an iPhone 3 GS. Trying out the WordPress app.

More later….

Updated: oh… man I gotta get used to typing on that thing. My poor thumbs…  I’m fixing and updating this post on my laptop.

I always knew the smooth face of the phone was good in a lot of ways, especially that it allows you to do well, anything as it’s adaptable. But the total lack of tactical feel of keys beneath your fingertips doth suck.

Jamming student phones? Bad.

/ hsoi

An Iowa school system is considering jamming student phones.

The FTC did say such jamming equipment wasn’t legal, but that doesn’t matter. Student’s are disobeying the rules and using their phones, so we’re just going to jam them.

Trouble is, the jamming equipment isn’t discriminatory. So I trust that teacher and administrator phones would also be jammed. Plus, any parent or other visitor to the school, their phones would be jammed. How far would the jamming signals go? Could someone driving by the school be infringed upon?

The school system says they’ll disable the system during an emergency.

Oh yeah, I’d like to see that happen.

Quick! The school is burning down! Turn off the jamming system so people can call the fire department!

Oh noes! An active shooter situation! Turn off the jamming system! Vital seconds were already lost, lives were already lost as a result… and oh the lawsuit that will probably ensue.

Look. I understand it’s bothersome that teenagers have no self-control and keep using their phones. Welcome to teenagers, and welcome to trying to teach them greater responsibility. But such blanket measures are not going to solve the problem; in fact, they’re only going to create bigger problems.