Category: Technology

MobileOSX

Early in February my wife and I picked up shiny new iPod Touches. It was our V-Day/Tax Return/Finally-got-rid-of-that-old-futon-on-craigslist-for-200-bucks gift to each other. Now let me start off by letting you know that I love the device. It’s a fun toy and a decent (basic) PDA. That said however I have one huge UI question for the folks in Cupertino.

Why don’t all apps rotate to landscape mode?

You make this gorgeous widescreen device, in a world where the widescreen format is becoming the defacto standard. I can rotate my music, and Ohhhh and Ahhh over how slick coverflow is. But I can’t for my videos? Ok, so thumbnails of videos aren’t nearly as cool as cover art. I get it. But what about my Photos.

HA! You say. You can rotate photos and flick between them, zooming in with careless ease. Ok. Pick a landscape photo. Tap once to bring up the controls. Tell me, which orientation are those controls in? Why can’t I turn the damn thing sideways flick through a few pics and then go back to selected another Event/Folder without having to flip back to portrait mode?

Or better yet, there’s this great mobile email client on my iPod. Pretty spiffy yes? But I can’t turn the damn thing sideways to take advantage of the larger keypad layout. WTF. I understand each app has a separate purpose but that doesn’t give the developers carte blanch with regards to usability and UI design. Some apps have an alphabetical listing you can jump to by scrolling down the right side of the screen. Other apps do not. Tapping the top of a page in MobileSafari takes you to the top of the page, not so much in Notes & Mail.

Ok, I know now I sound like a total party pooper. You’re never going to look at your iPhone/Touch the same again, right? Right?

The most frustrating thing is I believe Apple will improve the UI over the course of the platforms life, which is great, but you know I’ll be paying for that new interface; not loading a new update via iTunes for free. 🙂

*And for Mac users has been for a few years now. I believe the last Mac sold with a 4:3 ratio monitor was either the iBook or eMac.

Leopard

I’ll be upgrading to Leopard today. Why am I mentioning this? Cause out of the 300+ ‘new features’ the biggest one I’m looking for is TinyMCE support in Safari 3. Right now when I’m writting a post in Safari 2.0 I don’t get all the cool editing features. All I get is this:

safari2.png

In fact, most posts are written while using Firefox. Shhh! Don’t tell anyone. I’m always defending Safari and if they find out I use Firefox I’ll have my membership revoked!

Xbox 360 Diagnostic Error Code

I found this in the comments on Cabel’s blog. He’s on his 5th Xbox 360.

By the way, it’s not a single “Red Ring of Death” error. The three red LEDs signify many different possible failures (hardware, firmware, and software). If you hold down the binding button on the console and press the eject button four times, you can read out a more specific (undocumented) diagnostic error code.

Never would have known that if I didn’t have the intertubes.

When I was 15

When I was fifteen my biggest concern was passing Drivers Ed. William Kamkwamba’s biggest concern was trying to figure out how to build a windmill out of spare parts. It’s purpose? To power a couple light bulbs and a radio.

I think it goes without saying that William’s life is a lot more complicated than anyone I know.

Operating Systems as Presidents

  • BeOS was JFK. – They both got gunned down before we could possibly see any downsides to them.
  • MS-DOS 1.0 was Herbert Hoover, aloof to the problems of the common man but friend of the engineer in all of us. Also discovered Transformers.
  • Mac OS 7-8-9, all Franklin Roosevelt, very competent, lead us through difficult times, but left a legacy of programs which have become quite a mixed bag.
  • Windows 3.1, Dwight Eisenhower, amiable enough, competent, but leaving historians (and many contemporaries) very wanting.
  • Windows 95 thru ME, Lyndon Johnson, one of the boys, very able at getting things done, but in the end a disaster, rightfully ceding his throne.
  • Windows NT, Richard Nixon, the archetypal back-room politician, ruthless, and ultimately brought down by little faults, but many believe he was a great president and did much to modernize the Republican Party.
  • Windows XP, Ronald Reagan, everybody who hates him never met him, he could charm anyone, the Great Communicator. Bought Iranian weapons for contras with drug money.
  • Mac OS X, Bill Clinton, cheerful and smart, if not the most productive. Known for his speeches.
  • Vista, George W. Bush, elected because of his name, even though the prior iteration wasn’t especially respected or well-liked. Introduced instability and performance issues, all in the name of “security”. Many of the corporate interests who promoted him early on are having second thoughts.

Taken from this discussion on Slashdot. Credit to cmowire and iluvcapra.