Technology
iPhone, a week without my computer.
July/14/2007 09:36 PM
You've seen the Helio commercials "Don't call it a
phone." Helio would have you believe their devices
aren't phones but much more.
On the other hand you have the iPhone. A device that markets itself as a phone and has the word "phone" in it's name but in reality is very much a handheld Mac.
My MacBook's hard drive died (7/3/2007) two days after getting my iPhone. Fortunately, I had synced my calendars, contacts, bookmarks, some pictures, music and movies to my iPhone. Because of the timing with the holiday and weekend, I went a full week without my computer waiting for a new hard drive from Apple. Some people would have panicked, but I saw it as an opportunity to put the iPhone through it's paces. So that's what I did.
Can you live for a week without your computer and only an iPhone? Yes. But, expect some catching up when you get your computer back up and running. For instance, invoicing, something you can't do with your iPhone. As a tech support person I took my wife's computer with me (just in case) on two different jobs and only needed it once and was done within one minute.
Activation:
I got my iPhone 2 days after they were released and I did have activation problems. After 3 or 4 phone calls and 9 hours my iPhone was working as expected. I recently activated a client's iPhone in 4 minutes with no problems. It looks to me as though AT&T has worked through the problems they were having.
Safari:
You've heard Steve Jobs say that the iPhone isn't the watered down web but a full web browser. I can confirm that it's certainly not the watered down web, but it's not the complete web either. Flash playback is missing. That's probably the biggest omission that most people will notice when surfing. It's possible that Flash playback just wasn't ready by the release date of the iPhone and will be added later. Downloading audio and video files directly into the iPod or available memory is something I'm looking forward to in a possible future update.
Hardware:
iPhone 1.0 hardware seems very impressive. It's like Apple built the best piece of hardware they could, knowing they would be building on it through software updates for some time. Software can greatly improve the device; anything missing will be added later. Problems with be corrected through updates. The iPhone that was released on July 29th won't be the same iPhone we're using 6 months or a year from now. After a few updates it will receive fixes and new features. I love devices that can be updated with new features. I wrote an article about gaming consoles and how they change through software updates. A year and a half after I bought my Xbox 360 they added H.264 and MPEG-4 video playback which allows me to stream videos from my Mac to my Xbox 360. That's awesome.
It's nice to no longer have a need to carry multiple devices around. Before I had my phone, iPod and computer. Now in many cases I can get away with just having my iPhone. And the camera is nice to have since I never had a camera with me before.
Applications:
The built-in applications are the only ones you're going to be able to use for a while. Apple will add more later and may even let 3rd parties in the future. There are those web based apps you may have heard about but if you're in Airplane mode (no internet connection) you won't be able to use them. This doesn't bother me because I know Apple wants the iPhone to be as stable as possible.
Syncing:
Using iTunes to get all your data makes perfect sense. I haven't had any problems. It's very easy to add what you want.
Keyboard:
I love it. I don't even realize how often it corrects my typing. Only one application allows for horizontal use; expect an update to add horizontal keyboard use to other apps. I took all of the notes for this article on my iPhone while I was without my computer.
Apple, please include the same spell correcting the iPhone has into Leopard. I like the corrected spelling hovering below the word I'm typing and the space bar activation. This is brilliant. It will help me on my desktop and laptop Macs as well.
Wireless Networks:
Unlike a lot of the tech articles you may have read online where the reviewer blasts the EDGE network for being slow, Edge network is acceptable when Wi-Fi is not available. Especially to those of us users who went from the cheapest mobile phone with no data plan at all directly to the iPhone.
Wi-Fi works great. It's always going to be faster than EDGE, so use Wi-Fi when it's available.
Address Book:
It's easy to find what you need, but it can be slow if you have 600 addresses in your Address Book like I do. A little work needs to be done for some quick searching, but it's the first time I've ever had my entire Address Book with me.
Calendars:
Calendars do not sync without a computer. So even if you have a dotmac account the iPhone won't update your calendar through the internet like your Mac does. This is probably to keep feature parity with Windows users. While I appreciate having YouTube on my iPhone I've used the calendar far more.
Calendar combines all checked calendars into one. I've confirmed that it actually stores them separately. Maybe a future update will allow viewing calendars separately on the iPhone.
Camera:
Camera works well. You need to hold it steady and the subject must be well lit. Video recording - I believe the hardware can support it so it's just a matter of a software update.
Email:
It works the same as your computer's email. I have no complaints. It's easy to use and works well. No more traveling from one job to another wondering what email I might have missed while my MacBook was in it's case without an internet connection.
Touch Screen:
Finger wiping becomes a requirement. I will wipe the tip of my index finger on my sleeve or pants before using my iPhone. This removes that tiny bit of finger oil that would have otherwise ended up on my iPhone screen. So I don't have to clean my screen as often. The screen itself is brilliant, even if I had to clean the screen 10 times a day, I would still prefer it. I currently only clean the screen twice a day. Use the cloth that came with the iPhone or a microfiber cloth and your breath to get the best clean without any potential for scratching.
Calculator:
Just that and nothing more.
SMS:
Never used it. With email I have no need for it.
Phone:
It works well, and the headphones add to it's clarity. I have no complaints about the phone. It's very cool to be listening to music or a podcast and have them pause and fade to the background while you answer the call, then un-pause and fade back in when the call is over.
Time Shift:
From useless time to productive or entertaining time.There's nothing like being stuck at Sam's Club and grabbing a soda, sitting down in the food court, surfing the web and answering emails, while they rotate your tires. Now the most boring places (doctors offices, tire store and any place that you're required to wait) can be like your office by simply getting out your iPhone and doing some work or having some fun.
There are things on the iPhone that I didn't address, simply because they are there, they work well and as expected.
Since this is the first iPod with a speaker I was able to sit on my deck with my wife and enjoy the cool breeze while playing a little 80's music that we could both hear.
Final Thoughts: I believe the iPhone is a Trojan Horse for Apple. It puts a Mac in the hands of people who simply thought they were buying a cool phone. Should you get an iPhone? I certainly recommend it. If you're in need of both a new iPod and mobile phone it becomes more reasonable. For me it was a must, I was at the point of needing something that would allow me to take notes and create calendar events while talking on the phone. The iPhone has literally made me a better tech support person. Now I just need to get my wife one.
On the other hand you have the iPhone. A device that markets itself as a phone and has the word "phone" in it's name but in reality is very much a handheld Mac.
My MacBook's hard drive died (7/3/2007) two days after getting my iPhone. Fortunately, I had synced my calendars, contacts, bookmarks, some pictures, music and movies to my iPhone. Because of the timing with the holiday and weekend, I went a full week without my computer waiting for a new hard drive from Apple. Some people would have panicked, but I saw it as an opportunity to put the iPhone through it's paces. So that's what I did.
Can you live for a week without your computer and only an iPhone? Yes. But, expect some catching up when you get your computer back up and running. For instance, invoicing, something you can't do with your iPhone. As a tech support person I took my wife's computer with me (just in case) on two different jobs and only needed it once and was done within one minute.
Activation:
I got my iPhone 2 days after they were released and I did have activation problems. After 3 or 4 phone calls and 9 hours my iPhone was working as expected. I recently activated a client's iPhone in 4 minutes with no problems. It looks to me as though AT&T has worked through the problems they were having.
Safari:
You've heard Steve Jobs say that the iPhone isn't the watered down web but a full web browser. I can confirm that it's certainly not the watered down web, but it's not the complete web either. Flash playback is missing. That's probably the biggest omission that most people will notice when surfing. It's possible that Flash playback just wasn't ready by the release date of the iPhone and will be added later. Downloading audio and video files directly into the iPod or available memory is something I'm looking forward to in a possible future update.
Hardware:
iPhone 1.0 hardware seems very impressive. It's like Apple built the best piece of hardware they could, knowing they would be building on it through software updates for some time. Software can greatly improve the device; anything missing will be added later. Problems with be corrected through updates. The iPhone that was released on July 29th won't be the same iPhone we're using 6 months or a year from now. After a few updates it will receive fixes and new features. I love devices that can be updated with new features. I wrote an article about gaming consoles and how they change through software updates. A year and a half after I bought my Xbox 360 they added H.264 and MPEG-4 video playback which allows me to stream videos from my Mac to my Xbox 360. That's awesome.
It's nice to no longer have a need to carry multiple devices around. Before I had my phone, iPod and computer. Now in many cases I can get away with just having my iPhone. And the camera is nice to have since I never had a camera with me before.
Applications:
The built-in applications are the only ones you're going to be able to use for a while. Apple will add more later and may even let 3rd parties in the future. There are those web based apps you may have heard about but if you're in Airplane mode (no internet connection) you won't be able to use them. This doesn't bother me because I know Apple wants the iPhone to be as stable as possible.
Syncing:
Using iTunes to get all your data makes perfect sense. I haven't had any problems. It's very easy to add what you want.
Keyboard:
I love it. I don't even realize how often it corrects my typing. Only one application allows for horizontal use; expect an update to add horizontal keyboard use to other apps. I took all of the notes for this article on my iPhone while I was without my computer.
Apple, please include the same spell correcting the iPhone has into Leopard. I like the corrected spelling hovering below the word I'm typing and the space bar activation. This is brilliant. It will help me on my desktop and laptop Macs as well.
Wireless Networks:
Unlike a lot of the tech articles you may have read online where the reviewer blasts the EDGE network for being slow, Edge network is acceptable when Wi-Fi is not available. Especially to those of us users who went from the cheapest mobile phone with no data plan at all directly to the iPhone.
Wi-Fi works great. It's always going to be faster than EDGE, so use Wi-Fi when it's available.
Address Book:
It's easy to find what you need, but it can be slow if you have 600 addresses in your Address Book like I do. A little work needs to be done for some quick searching, but it's the first time I've ever had my entire Address Book with me.
Calendars:
Calendars do not sync without a computer. So even if you have a dotmac account the iPhone won't update your calendar through the internet like your Mac does. This is probably to keep feature parity with Windows users. While I appreciate having YouTube on my iPhone I've used the calendar far more.
Calendar combines all checked calendars into one. I've confirmed that it actually stores them separately. Maybe a future update will allow viewing calendars separately on the iPhone.
Camera:
Camera works well. You need to hold it steady and the subject must be well lit. Video recording - I believe the hardware can support it so it's just a matter of a software update.
Email:
It works the same as your computer's email. I have no complaints. It's easy to use and works well. No more traveling from one job to another wondering what email I might have missed while my MacBook was in it's case without an internet connection.
Touch Screen:
Finger wiping becomes a requirement. I will wipe the tip of my index finger on my sleeve or pants before using my iPhone. This removes that tiny bit of finger oil that would have otherwise ended up on my iPhone screen. So I don't have to clean my screen as often. The screen itself is brilliant, even if I had to clean the screen 10 times a day, I would still prefer it. I currently only clean the screen twice a day. Use the cloth that came with the iPhone or a microfiber cloth and your breath to get the best clean without any potential for scratching.
Calculator:
Just that and nothing more.
SMS:
Never used it. With email I have no need for it.
Phone:
It works well, and the headphones add to it's clarity. I have no complaints about the phone. It's very cool to be listening to music or a podcast and have them pause and fade to the background while you answer the call, then un-pause and fade back in when the call is over.
Time Shift:
From useless time to productive or entertaining time.There's nothing like being stuck at Sam's Club and grabbing a soda, sitting down in the food court, surfing the web and answering emails, while they rotate your tires. Now the most boring places (doctors offices, tire store and any place that you're required to wait) can be like your office by simply getting out your iPhone and doing some work or having some fun.
There are things on the iPhone that I didn't address, simply because they are there, they work well and as expected.
Since this is the first iPod with a speaker I was able to sit on my deck with my wife and enjoy the cool breeze while playing a little 80's music that we could both hear.
Final Thoughts: I believe the iPhone is a Trojan Horse for Apple. It puts a Mac in the hands of people who simply thought they were buying a cool phone. Should you get an iPhone? I certainly recommend it. If you're in need of both a new iPod and mobile phone it becomes more reasonable. For me it was a must, I was at the point of needing something that would allow me to take notes and create calendar events while talking on the phone. The iPhone has literally made me a better tech support person. Now I just need to get my wife one.
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The iPhone and your IT Department.
June/19/2007 07:12 PM
I just finished reading and article from The
Wallstreet Journal titled "Companies Hang Up on
Apple's iPhone".
It focuses on an IT directors point of view on the iPhone. The problem with this article is the title. Companies are not Hanging Up on Apple's iPhone, lazy IT departments are.
The article is misleading because they're not asking the people who run the companies.
When any company President says he wants an iPhone to work with the company email, the IT department will have no choice but to figure out how to make it work.
I've worked with small minded IT people like this, they think they can dictate the direction of change in the company. When in reality they don't have any power when an executive wants something.
Think about the fact that Steve Jobs (Apple), Eric Schmidt (Google) and Jerry Yang (Yahoo), the CEOs for some of the most important companies on the planet will be using their iPhones with their companies email.
It focuses on an IT directors point of view on the iPhone. The problem with this article is the title. Companies are not Hanging Up on Apple's iPhone, lazy IT departments are.
The article is misleading because they're not asking the people who run the companies.
When any company President says he wants an iPhone to work with the company email, the IT department will have no choice but to figure out how to make it work.
I've worked with small minded IT people like this, they think they can dictate the direction of change in the company. When in reality they don't have any power when an executive wants something.
Think about the fact that Steve Jobs (Apple), Eric Schmidt (Google) and Jerry Yang (Yahoo), the CEOs for some of the most important companies on the planet will be using their iPhones with their companies email.
What can you do without electricity? Nothing useful.
May/21/2007 01:24 AM
Normally when my neighborhood is without power I'll
blog about how I can blog when the power is out.
Because I keep my router and modem on battery backup. But this time I lost power and my internet connection.
So I can open my blogging app on my MacBook and type this post but it isn't going anywhere til my Internet comes back up.
Here's a list of things that you realize became more difficult without power:
Why is it when you're without power you feel the need to do something that requires it?
Because I keep my router and modem on battery backup. But this time I lost power and my internet connection.
So I can open my blogging app on my MacBook and type this post but it isn't going anywhere til my Internet comes back up.
Here's a list of things that you realize became more difficult without power:
- Opening the garage door.
- Getting ice from the ice machine.
- Getting the flashlights from your basement.
- Going to the restroom.
- Reading a book.
- Tucking your kid back into bed.
Why is it when you're without power you feel the need to do something that requires it?
I've never owned a stand alone DVD player, have you?
December/24/2006 03:19 PM
I've never owned a stand alone DVD payer, we got
one for my daughter several years ago but she was
the only one that used it.
So how did I play DVDs? Let's start with the list.
1. 1999 iMac with built in DVD player, no remote. First DVD, The Matrix.
2. 2000 PowerBook with S-video out to my TV, no remote.
2. 2001 Playstation 2 with 3rd party remote.
3. 2002-2005 Xbox with DVD remote.
4. 2006 Xbox 360 with extended remote.
So what's next? Well as long as my game systems play DVDs I won't need one.
I plan on getting a Wii which doesn't play DVDs, but that's OK since I'm not giving up my 360.
So how did I play DVDs? Let's start with the list.
1. 1999 iMac with built in DVD player, no remote. First DVD, The Matrix.
2. 2000 PowerBook with S-video out to my TV, no remote.
2. 2001 Playstation 2 with 3rd party remote.
3. 2002-2005 Xbox with DVD remote.
4. 2006 Xbox 360 with extended remote.
So what's next? Well as long as my game systems play DVDs I won't need one.
I plan on getting a Wii which doesn't play DVDs, but that's OK since I'm not giving up my 360.
Some tech doesn't die quickly enough.
October/03/2006 09:11 PM
As a tech support person I have to deal with a lot
of software and hardware. And sometimes that tech
has outlived its usefulness.
Yeah, they might still be using it. But, none of the original companies are still supporting it. I'm supporting it, but it's getting more difficult.
I'm talking about Mac OS 9. And why do I still have to mess with SCSI? It happens.
Steve Jobs said Mac OS 9 was dead in 2002, so apparantly I'm kicking a dead horse.
Don't get me started on fax machines. Really, do we still need those things? Put VCRs in that same category.
Yeah, they might still be using it. But, none of the original companies are still supporting it. I'm supporting it, but it's getting more difficult.
I'm talking about Mac OS 9. And why do I still have to mess with SCSI? It happens.
Steve Jobs said Mac OS 9 was dead in 2002, so apparantly I'm kicking a dead horse.
Don't get me started on fax machines. Really, do we still need those things? Put VCRs in that same category.
My entire neighborhood is without power.
January/12/2006 05:28 PM
New Scanner
January/19/2005 10:30 PM
I finally got myself a new scanner.
I've been scanning the world (everything), it's nice to have a scanner that can do negatives as well. The problem is that once you start scanning you can't stop because you're that much closer to having all of the memories on your computer.
And having them on your computer (for me at least) is the only way I really want to keep them. I can't wait till I can have all of my movies on my computer as well.
I've been scanning the world (everything), it's nice to have a scanner that can do negatives as well. The problem is that once you start scanning you can't stop because you're that much closer to having all of the memories on your computer.
And having them on your computer (for me at least) is the only way I really want to keep them. I can't wait till I can have all of my movies on my computer as well.
Apple's Operating System Strategy March 1997
March/01/1997 12:00 PM
This 1997 video is narrated by Jim Gable V.P.
ApplSoft Marketing. Here's a list of the topics
covered in this video, Mac OS 7.6, Mac Runtime for
Java, QuickTime VR 2.0, Rhapsody, Tempo, Allegro,
Sonata and NeXT. With a video clip of Steve Jobs at
MacWorld 97 San Francisco. This video is posted on
Google Video instead of YouTube because of their
time restriction.