- T420s
- XP VM
- T61
- Server
- XP VM
- Windows 8 VM
- T43
- X40
- X100e
- XP VM
- Byhalia
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Patch Tuesday
PCs I applied Microsoft patches to on 04/10/12:
Lumia 900 Data Bug
I started to write a blog post today accusing Nokia of falsely reporting a problem with data on their Lumia 900 in order to offer a $100 rebate effectively making the phone free. That isn't true and I'm glad I didn't post it. If you know me, I'm not opposed to free. It just worries me to think that Microsoft/Nokia would have to make a well respected piece of hardware free in order to push the operating system.
I had the original blog post almost written. The premise was that I couldn't find any user reports of the data bug before the rebate was announced.
Finally I stumbled across the problem reports in a Windows Phone specific forum.
In retrospect I think that the problem with me not finding anything with Google was that there were not enough of the Lumia 900s sold to create enough Google "juice" to get the articles on the problem high in the search results.
On the same topic, ZDNet reported that Windows Phone's market share is dropping an average of 1% per month. In that Windows Phone is at less than 4% that doesn't look good. For the time being Windows Phone is still leading Symbian.
This doesn't look good for Windows Phone. I hope Microsoft and Nokia get their act together as we need an alternative to iOS and Android.
Update: Now you can make $80 by buying a Lumia 900 at Target.
I had the original blog post almost written. The premise was that I couldn't find any user reports of the data bug before the rebate was announced.
Finally I stumbled across the problem reports in a Windows Phone specific forum.
In retrospect I think that the problem with me not finding anything with Google was that there were not enough of the Lumia 900s sold to create enough Google "juice" to get the articles on the problem high in the search results.
On the same topic, ZDNet reported that Windows Phone's market share is dropping an average of 1% per month. In that Windows Phone is at less than 4% that doesn't look good. For the time being Windows Phone is still leading Symbian.
This doesn't look good for Windows Phone. I hope Microsoft and Nokia get their act together as we need an alternative to iOS and Android.
Update: Now you can make $80 by buying a Lumia 900 at Target.
Sunday, April 08, 2012
When Clouds Go Bump
There certainly has been a lot of discussion at the CIO level about Cloud Computing. A recent CIO I spoke with was looking at the cloud to help him address his challenges in staffing and running his data center. He and I had deep discussions about his in house alternatives to the cloud. Interestingly while we were having these discussions one of the biggest clouds went bump.
On February 29, 2012 Microsoft's Azure product had a global service failure. Microsoft's Azure Service Dashboard was overwhelmed and pretty much unavailable for hours on end. When it was accessible here is one of the updates approximately 8 hours into the outage:
What I want to highlight is that cloud providers are not immune from service failures. They are likely capable of providing more redundant and resilient services than many organizations can provide.
My question is as a CIO are you comfortable with this level of opacity to service failures? Are you willing to answer your users and executives with one-way information flow from a (sometimes available) web page? Would a 10 day service credit make your CEO happy?
On February 29, 2012 Microsoft's Azure product had a global service failure. Microsoft's Azure Service Dashboard was overwhelmed and pretty much unavailable for hours on end. When it was accessible here is one of the updates approximately 8 hours into the outage:
The restoration steps to mitigate the issue are still underway. This incident impacts Access Control 2.0, Marketplace, Service Bus and the Access Control & Caching Portal in the same regions where Windows Azure Compute is impacted. As a result affected customers may experience a loss of application functionality. Further updates will be published to keep you apprised of the situation. We apologize for any inconvenience this causes our customers.This is not a Microsoft bashing. In April, 2011 Amazon also suffered a broad failure.
What I want to highlight is that cloud providers are not immune from service failures. They are likely capable of providing more redundant and resilient services than many organizations can provide.
My question is as a CIO are you comfortable with this level of opacity to service failures? Are you willing to answer your users and executives with one-way information flow from a (sometimes available) web page? Would a 10 day service credit make your CEO happy?
Monday, April 02, 2012
Chrome Setup
After my previous post on Firefox's EOL, I thought I'd document my Chrome setup.
Extensions:
I use the Greyscale theme.
Have fun!
Updated 02/24/13
Extensions:
- Adblock Plus for Google Chrome™ (Beta) - General - uncheck "Show icon in address bar", Filter lists - select EasyList, uncheck "Allow some non-intrusive advertising"
- AddThis - Share & Bookmark (new) - Hide button
- Chrome Toolbox (by Google) - Hide button, uncheck "show image floating toolbar", uncheck "show video floating toolbar"
- Drag and Go - uncheck "support 6 most frequently used mouse gestures"
- New Tabs At End
- Click the settings icon (3 bars) on the browser toolbar.
- Select Settings.
- In the "On Startup" section, check "Continue where I left off."
- In the “Search” section, use the “Enable Instant for faster searching and browsing” checkbox to enable or disable the Instant feature.
- Click on "Show advanced settings..."
- Check "Send a ‘Do Not Track’"
- Uncheck "Enable Autofill."
- Uncheck "Offer to save passwords."
- Check "Ask where to save each file before downloading."
I use the Greyscale theme.
Have fun!
Updated 02/24/13
Monday, March 26, 2012
R.I.P. Firefox
After my recent posts on Dancing Pigs and Almost Chrome I've pretty much switched completely to Chrome. Today was the final nail in the coffin. Mozilla announced the End of Life for Firefox v3.
As far as I've seen nothing has been resolved with the tab width issue. Chrome still has the Gmail formatting issue but I've mitigated it somewhat by turning off the Default Text Styling Lab. The resulting e-mails are not as pretty but they've all had consistent formatting.
Firefox 10, 11, 12, or whatever it is today still suffers with the extensions version problem. The Internet Storm Center has a good diary on this issue.
Time to move on.
As far as I've seen nothing has been resolved with the tab width issue. Chrome still has the Gmail formatting issue but I've mitigated it somewhat by turning off the Default Text Styling Lab. The resulting e-mails are not as pretty but they've all had consistent formatting.
Firefox 10, 11, 12, or whatever it is today still suffers with the extensions version problem. The Internet Storm Center has a good diary on this issue.
Time to move on.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
WISPr Connect
Late last month I traveled to Boston and stayed at a Hilton owned property. Hilton has sold their hotel Internet business (including Wi-Fi) to AT&T Wi-Fi (formerly Wayport). When AT&T acquired Wayport they allowed their Wi-Fi enabled smartphones to automatically connect to the "attwifi" hotspots transparently using a technique known as WISPr.
So when I arrived at the Hilton property with my AT&T Captivate it tried to WISPr connect to the "attwifi" access point. It established an 802.11 connection but then I got an icon in the notification bar that said "AT&T Wi-Fi Hotspot / Wi-Fi Hotspot Access Failed." When I clicked on the notification I got a screen that said "Unable to confirm eligibility, please call Customer Care at 800-331-5000." Yeah, like they could help. I was able to connect to the "attwifi" network using my AT&T DSL credentials.
I was stuck in the hotel with nothing else to do so I called AT&T Mobility Customer Care. Needless to say I got nowhere. They said I need to talk to AT&T Wi-Fi but (according to AT&T Mobility) Wi-Fi isn't open at night. (This is not true by the way.) So I got up the next morning and called AT&T Wi-Fi. Let's just say that the representatives at AT&T Wi-FI are a whole another class of representatives than AT&T Mobility. But you guessed it, they wanted to send me back to AT&T Mobility. After getting dropped back in voice menu hell a couple of times, I asked AT&T Wi-Fi to conference us with AT&T Mobility. AT&T Mobility dropped off the call without telling us.
In summary, I got nowhere. When I got home I began to research this on the Internet. I found a couple of issues worth passing on. First a couple of the truly paranoid are experiencing the same problem and have postulated that this is a scheme by AT&T to discourage users who still have the unlimited data plan (I do) into migrating onto the tiered data plans.
Probably more based in reality were several discussions surrounding the issue with AT&T silently connecting their smartphones to their insecure hotspots. The issue is that GSM 3G traffic is lightly encrypted but the 802.11 traffic to the insecure "attwifi" access point won't be encrypted at all. This is especially an issue if you're using POP e-mail that doesn't uss SSL/TLS. A word to the wise should be sufficient.
Lastly was an issue that I plan to exploit! Given that AT&T smartphones use this transparent connection to "attwifi" hotspots, there is a risk of a rogue "attwifi" hotspot hijacking your Wi-Fi session. This probably isn't too much of a risk in Memphis but could be in more dense metropolitan locations or airports.
The way I plan to exploit this is to create a guest SSID on my dd-wrt router named "attwifi." Then all my AT&T smartphone friends and family will automatically connect to my guest SSID without having to explain to them how to connect. Sure I run the risk of somebody driving by and connecting but if they really are driving by they probably won't have time to connect.
I did get a survey from AT&T Wi-Fi asking about how the call went. I responded that they were helpful but my problem didn't get resolved. Incredibly I got a personal e-mail from a manager at AT&T Wi-Fi asking how he could help. This evolved into where I got the direct number to an AT&T Wi-Fi support specialist that actually knows something. He checked back with me every couple of days and let me know what he was doing. He was able to look at the AT&T Wi-Fi logs and discovered that my phone has never connected to the AT&T Wi-Fi network using the WISPr technique. He could see the logins that I had performed using my DSL credentials. What a breath of fresh air to be able to speak with someone who could actually look at the logs.
But what this said is that the AT&T Mobility WISPr process was not being successful. The AT&T Wi-Fi representative actually had a contact at AT&T Mobility who had similar access to their logs. The AT&T Mobility representative didn't see that my phone was ever going through the WISPr process. The two of them continued to work on it and the AT&T Wi-Fi promised to get back to me by the end of the week.
I had noticed in the Captivate's Wireless Settings that the "Network Notification" was unchecked. This is part of my new phone setup that I had done after the factory reset and Gingerbread upgrade. Just for grins I checked this and headed to my nearest AT&T Mobility store where there was an AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot. It worked!
Not to look a gift horse in the mouth but why? Had AT&T Mobility changed something or did the "Network Notification" setting make the difference?
So back to an AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot with "Network Notification" turned off. It worked. Hmmm. I turned "Network Notification" back on. It worked. I left it off and went to another AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot that I hadn't visited before. It worked. Whatever, I'll take it.
On Friday the AT&T Wi-Fi representative called me back. I like those guys. He discussed potential problems with "forgetting" the "attwifi" SSID and problems that might cause with WISPr. I had probably done that in trying to get connected. I told him what I had done with "Network Notification" and the success I had. He said that his contact at AT&T Mobility hadn't changed anything.
Given what I know, it seems that enabling "Network Notification" and letting the phone discover and connect to "attwifi" enabled the WISPr authentication. The WISPr connect continued to work even after I disabled "Network Notification." That fixed it or AT&T Mobility did something and didn't tell anyone. Nah. They wouldn't do that would they?
So when I arrived at the Hilton property with my AT&T Captivate it tried to WISPr connect to the "attwifi" access point. It established an 802.11 connection but then I got an icon in the notification bar that said "AT&T Wi-Fi Hotspot / Wi-Fi Hotspot Access Failed." When I clicked on the notification I got a screen that said "Unable to confirm eligibility, please call Customer Care at 800-331-5000." Yeah, like they could help. I was able to connect to the "attwifi" network using my AT&T DSL credentials.
I was stuck in the hotel with nothing else to do so I called AT&T Mobility Customer Care. Needless to say I got nowhere. They said I need to talk to AT&T Wi-Fi but (according to AT&T Mobility) Wi-Fi isn't open at night. (This is not true by the way.) So I got up the next morning and called AT&T Wi-Fi. Let's just say that the representatives at AT&T Wi-FI are a whole another class of representatives than AT&T Mobility. But you guessed it, they wanted to send me back to AT&T Mobility. After getting dropped back in voice menu hell a couple of times, I asked AT&T Wi-Fi to conference us with AT&T Mobility. AT&T Mobility dropped off the call without telling us.
In summary, I got nowhere. When I got home I began to research this on the Internet. I found a couple of issues worth passing on. First a couple of the truly paranoid are experiencing the same problem and have postulated that this is a scheme by AT&T to discourage users who still have the unlimited data plan (I do) into migrating onto the tiered data plans.
Probably more based in reality were several discussions surrounding the issue with AT&T silently connecting their smartphones to their insecure hotspots. The issue is that GSM 3G traffic is lightly encrypted but the 802.11 traffic to the insecure "attwifi" access point won't be encrypted at all. This is especially an issue if you're using POP e-mail that doesn't uss SSL/TLS. A word to the wise should be sufficient.
Lastly was an issue that I plan to exploit! Given that AT&T smartphones use this transparent connection to "attwifi" hotspots, there is a risk of a rogue "attwifi" hotspot hijacking your Wi-Fi session. This probably isn't too much of a risk in Memphis but could be in more dense metropolitan locations or airports.
The way I plan to exploit this is to create a guest SSID on my dd-wrt router named "attwifi." Then all my AT&T smartphone friends and family will automatically connect to my guest SSID without having to explain to them how to connect. Sure I run the risk of somebody driving by and connecting but if they really are driving by they probably won't have time to connect.
I did get a survey from AT&T Wi-Fi asking about how the call went. I responded that they were helpful but my problem didn't get resolved. Incredibly I got a personal e-mail from a manager at AT&T Wi-Fi asking how he could help. This evolved into where I got the direct number to an AT&T Wi-Fi support specialist that actually knows something. He checked back with me every couple of days and let me know what he was doing. He was able to look at the AT&T Wi-Fi logs and discovered that my phone has never connected to the AT&T Wi-Fi network using the WISPr technique. He could see the logins that I had performed using my DSL credentials. What a breath of fresh air to be able to speak with someone who could actually look at the logs.
But what this said is that the AT&T Mobility WISPr process was not being successful. The AT&T Wi-Fi representative actually had a contact at AT&T Mobility who had similar access to their logs. The AT&T Mobility representative didn't see that my phone was ever going through the WISPr process. The two of them continued to work on it and the AT&T Wi-Fi promised to get back to me by the end of the week.
I had noticed in the Captivate's Wireless Settings that the "Network Notification" was unchecked. This is part of my new phone setup that I had done after the factory reset and Gingerbread upgrade. Just for grins I checked this and headed to my nearest AT&T Mobility store where there was an AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot. It worked!
Not to look a gift horse in the mouth but why? Had AT&T Mobility changed something or did the "Network Notification" setting make the difference?
So back to an AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot with "Network Notification" turned off. It worked. Hmmm. I turned "Network Notification" back on. It worked. I left it off and went to another AT&T Wi-Fi hotspot that I hadn't visited before. It worked. Whatever, I'll take it.
On Friday the AT&T Wi-Fi representative called me back. I like those guys. He discussed potential problems with "forgetting" the "attwifi" SSID and problems that might cause with WISPr. I had probably done that in trying to get connected. I told him what I had done with "Network Notification" and the success I had. He said that his contact at AT&T Mobility hadn't changed anything.
Given what I know, it seems that enabling "Network Notification" and letting the phone discover and connect to "attwifi" enabled the WISPr authentication. The WISPr connect continued to work even after I disabled "Network Notification." That fixed it or AT&T Mobility did something and didn't tell anyone. Nah. They wouldn't do that would they?
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Picasaweb Free Photo Hosting
When Google introduced Google+ they said it offered free photo storage. How they implemented this was to integrate Picasaweb into Google+ and not count photos up to 2048 x 2048 pixels and videos up to 15 minutes. I realize that this isn't sufficient size to use this for backup but Picasaweb has a nice presentation for sharing photos.
So I set out to figure out how to upload and resize to the target size automatically. Previously the Picasaweb web upload offered to resize automatically but that capability is now gone. Odd but oh, well. But I figured out that the Google+ photo upload process does resize automatically. But (isn't there always a "but?") Google+ wants to share the photos automatically and doesn't give you good tools to manage the sharing.
So here's my trick. You need a Google+ profile to make this work.
Login to your Google account. This is probably your Gmail account. Go to your Google+ "Photos" page (https://plus.google.com/photos). You may have to join Google+ the first time.
Click on "Upload new photos."
Drag photos or select them from your computer.
Here's how they'll look uploading. Click "Create album" when they're done.
I don't tag people in my Picasaweb albums so I "Cancel" here.
Now here's the fun part. This prompt about sharing is about sharing using Google+. Click on "Cancel" here. You'll get to specify sharing in more detail in a little bit.
Now browse to "https://picasaweb.google.com/home." Your new album should near the first of the list.
Select it and you'll get the Picasaweb sharing options at the right. Click on the "Only you (edit)" way up near the top right.
Whew! That's what you want. Down at the bottom is a drop down for "Visibility." That gives you more choices that just Google+. Notice just below this drop down is a check box to show or hide the geolocation data.
Make your choices and click on "Save changes" and you're done. If you've chosen the "Visibility" of "Limited, anyone with the link" the link is about halfway down the page on the right when you click on "Link to this album."
The link will look like "https://picasaweb.google.com/[your Google+ profile]/[album name]?authuser=0&authkey=[authkey]&feat=directlink." I know the following is confusing but when you share this, add "&noredirect=1" at the end. Google moves in mysterious ways. What this does is force the presentation to be in the Picasaweb format rather than the Google+ format. It'll work fine if you don't so don't sweat it.
These photos are resized to 2048 x 2048 or less and don't add to your Picasaweb quota of 1 GB. Unless your originals are smaller than this you shouldn't depend on this process for backup, just for free sharing.
So I set out to figure out how to upload and resize to the target size automatically. Previously the Picasaweb web upload offered to resize automatically but that capability is now gone. Odd but oh, well. But I figured out that the Google+ photo upload process does resize automatically. But (isn't there always a "but?") Google+ wants to share the photos automatically and doesn't give you good tools to manage the sharing.
So here's my trick. You need a Google+ profile to make this work.
Login to your Google account. This is probably your Gmail account. Go to your Google+ "Photos" page (https://plus.google.com/photos). You may have to join Google+ the first time.
Click on "Upload new photos."
Drag photos or select them from your computer.
Here's how they'll look uploading. Click "Create album" when they're done.
I don't tag people in my Picasaweb albums so I "Cancel" here.
Now here's the fun part. This prompt about sharing is about sharing using Google+. Click on "Cancel" here. You'll get to specify sharing in more detail in a little bit.
Now browse to "https://picasaweb.google.com/home." Your new album should near the first of the list.
Select it and you'll get the Picasaweb sharing options at the right. Click on the "Only you (edit)" way up near the top right.
Whew! That's what you want. Down at the bottom is a drop down for "Visibility." That gives you more choices that just Google+. Notice just below this drop down is a check box to show or hide the geolocation data.
Make your choices and click on "Save changes" and you're done. If you've chosen the "Visibility" of "Limited, anyone with the link" the link is about halfway down the page on the right when you click on "Link to this album."
The link will look like "https://picasaweb.google.com/[your Google+ profile]/[album name]?authuser=0&authkey=[authkey]&feat=directlink." I know the following is confusing but when you share this, add "&noredirect=1" at the end. Google moves in mysterious ways. What this does is force the presentation to be in the Picasaweb format rather than the Google+ format. It'll work fine if you don't so don't sweat it.
These photos are resized to 2048 x 2048 or less and don't add to your Picasaweb quota of 1 GB. Unless your originals are smaller than this you shouldn't depend on this process for backup, just for free sharing.
Saturday, March 10, 2012
Windows 8 Consumer Preview
Everybody has heard about the Windows 8 Consumer Preview. Like millions of others I downloaded it. I installed it in a VirtualBox virtual machine.
UPDATE: I had done this install on VirtualBox v4.1.8. Recently I upgraded to v4.1.10 and the associated Guest Additions. The Guest Additions killed Windows 8. The problem is described here. I didn't try the recommended solution. I was able to get the Windows 8 recovery dialog up after I reset the virtual machine and restored to a good recovery point.
I've played with it for a week or so and wanted to write this post with a ton of screenshots. But my use of VirtualBox is aggravating this. I run the virtual machine on my "Big Honker." Then I mostly access it via VRDP from my T420s. This really complicates the subtleties of interaction with the target system.
The upside is that Windows 8 has a clever new shortcut. Pressing the Windows key and the PrtSc key at the same time takes a screen shot and puts it in your Pictures library. Clever. The default viewer for the resulting .png file is the Metro Photo app. Interesting.
By the way, the Metro apps in the Preview are just demonstration applications. They all work but aren't full function. Not a problem.
As I was writing this I made some progress in taking screenshots so here's the boot splash screen.
Hint: That's a "beta" fish.
This is the pre-lock screen.
There are no instructions on this screen but if you click and drag toward the top...
(Please ignore the timestamps.)
You get the login screen.
The Metro interface is beautiful and provides an interesting connection back to the traditional (dare I call it "legacy") Desktop. But the transition is "jarring." It would be less so if I could figure out how to use a common background but the Metro will only let you chose from a few colors.
The Windows key toggles you between the Desktop and the Metro interface.
Hovering in the top left corner shows you a thumbnail of the previous app(lication). Carefully sliding your mouse down the left border expands this into a mini Task Manager with thumbnails of other running apps. At the bottom is a thumbnail of the Start screen. Windows + Tab also brings this up.
Ctrl + Tab lets you toggle through running apps as you'd expect.
To dismiss a Metro app, click near the top and drag to the bottom reminiscent of webOS! While this doesn't actually close the Metro app, Alt + F4 still works.
Windows + C brings up a "charms" overlay that has "Search," "Share," "Start," "Devices," and "Settings." The "Settings" here are pretty limited.
Obviously there's lots more to Windows 8. Go play with it yourself and discover some.
I also found another post that covers many of the points that I wanted to make and they have screenshots.
Update: In TWiT's Windows Weekly 252, Paul Thurott made a couple of interesting statements:
The very notion of a productivity application is counter to Metro.
You can bitch and moan all you want ... but I've got bad news for you. It's not changing. (about the schizophrenic personality of Windows 8)
UPDATE: I had done this install on VirtualBox v4.1.8. Recently I upgraded to v4.1.10 and the associated Guest Additions. The Guest Additions killed Windows 8. The problem is described here. I didn't try the recommended solution. I was able to get the Windows 8 recovery dialog up after I reset the virtual machine and restored to a good recovery point.
I've played with it for a week or so and wanted to write this post with a ton of screenshots. But my use of VirtualBox is aggravating this. I run the virtual machine on my "Big Honker." Then I mostly access it via VRDP from my T420s. This really complicates the subtleties of interaction with the target system.
The upside is that Windows 8 has a clever new shortcut. Pressing the Windows key and the PrtSc key at the same time takes a screen shot and puts it in your Pictures library. Clever. The default viewer for the resulting .png file is the Metro Photo app. Interesting.
By the way, the Metro apps in the Preview are just demonstration applications. They all work but aren't full function. Not a problem.
As I was writing this I made some progress in taking screenshots so here's the boot splash screen.
Hint: That's a "beta" fish.
This is the pre-lock screen.
There are no instructions on this screen but if you click and drag toward the top...
(Please ignore the timestamps.)
You get the login screen.
The Metro interface is beautiful and provides an interesting connection back to the traditional (dare I call it "legacy") Desktop. But the transition is "jarring." It would be less so if I could figure out how to use a common background but the Metro will only let you chose from a few colors.
The Windows key toggles you between the Desktop and the Metro interface.
Hovering in the top left corner shows you a thumbnail of the previous app(lication). Carefully sliding your mouse down the left border expands this into a mini Task Manager with thumbnails of other running apps. At the bottom is a thumbnail of the Start screen. Windows + Tab also brings this up.
Ctrl + Tab lets you toggle through running apps as you'd expect.
To dismiss a Metro app, click near the top and drag to the bottom reminiscent of webOS! While this doesn't actually close the Metro app, Alt + F4 still works.
Windows + C brings up a "charms" overlay that has "Search," "Share," "Start," "Devices," and "Settings." The "Settings" here are pretty limited.
Obviously there's lots more to Windows 8. Go play with it yourself and discover some.
I also found another post that covers many of the points that I wanted to make and they have screenshots.
Update: In TWiT's Windows Weekly 252, Paul Thurott made a couple of interesting statements:
The very notion of a productivity application is counter to Metro.
You can bitch and moan all you want ... but I've got bad news for you. It's not changing. (about the schizophrenic personality of Windows 8)
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Resources Used by Free Anti-Virus
I've been a long time subscriber of Fred Langa's Windows Secrets newsletter. Recently I highlighted his article on Crapware. I also just described my experiences with Microsoft Security Essentials v4.
In an article in the current edition of the Windows Secrets newsletter, Fred applied the process he used in the Crapware analysis to the resources required of the various free anti-virus solutions. Fred comprehensively analyzed 6 free anti-virus tools for their impact on startup time, shutdown time, RAM footprint, and disk space.
There was no runaway leader. Microsoft Security Essentials didn't win nor lose any of the measures but was always respectable. Clamwin had more wins than anyone else.
I'm not sure there's enough difference among the leaders to make anyone switch from one to the other. To me the most interesting part was Fred's process using Oracle's VirtualBox.
In an article in the current edition of the Windows Secrets newsletter, Fred applied the process he used in the Crapware analysis to the resources required of the various free anti-virus solutions. Fred comprehensively analyzed 6 free anti-virus tools for their impact on startup time, shutdown time, RAM footprint, and disk space.
There was no runaway leader. Microsoft Security Essentials didn't win nor lose any of the measures but was always respectable. Clamwin had more wins than anyone else.
I'm not sure there's enough difference among the leaders to make anyone switch from one to the other. To me the most interesting part was Fred's process using Oracle's VirtualBox.
Friday, February 03, 2012
Dropbox Beta
I never closed the circle with my previous discussion of Microsoft's Live Mesh. As Microsoft continued their migration of FolderSync to Sync to Live Mesh to Live Sync I gave up and moved to Dropbox. At the same time I was moving from BlackBerrys to Android. Dropbox is deeply integrated into Android and related apps.
With my Android I was always interested in passively uploading my photos to Dropbox. There have been several apps that have taken various approaches to this, e.g. DropSync and Syncly. None of them were seamless and DropSync cost $6.
This week Dropbox has opened the Beta testing program for their "experimental" version. You can get the PC version here and the Android versionhere. UPDATE: Android version 2.0.9.2 is here.
Both platforms support automatic upload of photos and videos. I installed the Android version on my Captivate.
Here is the Settings screen where you enable "Camera Upload."
When you select "Camera Upload" here is the detail setting screen.
You can set Dropbox to only upload via Wi-Fi and whether to upload existing photos or videos.
Here is the "Upload" screen with uploads in progress.
RIP DropSync.
PS. A serendipitous benefit is that when you use this "experimental" version to automatically upload photos or videos on any platform, for every 500MB that you upload, Dropbox adds 500MB to your Dropbox quota permanently. Kinda like getting your cake and eating it too.
With my Android I was always interested in passively uploading my photos to Dropbox. There have been several apps that have taken various approaches to this, e.g. DropSync and Syncly. None of them were seamless and DropSync cost $6.
This week Dropbox has opened the Beta testing program for their "experimental" version. You can get the PC version here and the Android version
Both platforms support automatic upload of photos and videos. I installed the Android version on my Captivate.
Here is the Settings screen where you enable "Camera Upload."
When you select "Camera Upload" here is the detail setting screen.
You can set Dropbox to only upload via Wi-Fi and whether to upload existing photos or videos.
Here is the "Upload" screen with uploads in progress.
RIP DropSync.
PS. A serendipitous benefit is that when you use this "experimental" version to automatically upload photos or videos on any platform, for every 500MB that you upload, Dropbox adds 500MB to your Dropbox quota permanently. Kinda like getting your cake and eating it too.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Gingerbread Battery Life
All Android phones get complaints about battery life. You'll remember that I even returned my first Captivate due to battery life. After a little over a year I was about to buy a new battery for the Captivate. Then I dropped it. That story is here and ends with installing Gingerbread. Part of the screen repair process was a factory reset so Gingerbread started with a clean slate.
However I've been amazed with the battery life post the repair and upgrade. I didn't return the battery to the Samsung service center so I know they didn't slip me a new battery.
Admittedly I've been pretty light usage since the upgrade but still. Here's a series of screen shots taken each night when I plug it in for the night.
The lowest reading during those seven days was 67% remaining.
I personally don't think that Gingerbread is responsible for the majority of the improvement. I think that the factory reset and the resulting clean-up had the biggest impact.
However I've been amazed with the battery life post the repair and upgrade. I didn't return the battery to the Samsung service center so I know they didn't slip me a new battery.
Admittedly I've been pretty light usage since the upgrade but still. Here's a series of screen shots taken each night when I plug it in for the night.
The lowest reading during those seven days was 67% remaining.
I personally don't think that Gingerbread is responsible for the majority of the improvement. I think that the factory reset and the resulting clean-up had the biggest impact.
Friday, January 20, 2012
Third Gingerbread
First I installed CyanogenMod's Gingerbread on my Nook Color. Then I installed CyanogenMod's Gingerbread on my HP TouchPad. AT&T had promised last July that they were going to update the Captivate with Gingerbread. They released the update in a very low profile announcement last week.
The timing for me was perfect. I had dropped my Captivate and shattered the Gorilla Glass. I returned it to Samsung for replacement. When I got it back they had done a factory reset (which I expected) so it was an opportune time to upgrade. Samsung has published a straightforward set of instructions. Like the upgrade to FroYo the upgrade requires connecting the phone to a PC using Kies. While the FroYo upgrade took about an hour, the Gingerbread upgrade took 25 minutes which included the automatic upgrade of Kies.
Here's the result.
The AT&T Gingerbread's Notification panel is visually crisper than CyanogenMod's but still lacks the swipe to dismiss of CM7.
The Captivate seems quicker but that may be because of the factory reset rather than Gingerbread although some of the Nook Color's performance improvement was attributed to Gingerbread. My early take on battery usage is that it is better but I also wonder if this is as much due to the factory reset as Gingerbread. We'll see. Here's what the battery looked like after about half a day.
The GPS on this Captivate had always worked well but now seems to be even better. It gets a lock in just a few seconds every time. I ran AngryGPS (more in a second) and the first fix (inside the house) took 50 seconds. Subsequent fixes took around 15 seconds. This screen capture is from a "hot" start session of AngryGPS.
Ok, AngryGPS. To get the above embedded app running go to the Dialer and enter *#*#3214789650#*#*.
I had an odd problem with Screen Capture Shortcut. When I searched the market for it it said that it wasn't compatible with the Captivate. Then it flashed for a second showing the "Install" button. I quickly tapped it and it installed!
The other oddity (and a nice one) is that I get a Force Close from the AT&T Tethering Manager. The upside of this is that this is the service that blocks Android's built-in mobile AP capabilities. Without the Tethering Manager this works fine! I'm not going to look too hard for a fix.
The timing for me was perfect. I had dropped my Captivate and shattered the Gorilla Glass. I returned it to Samsung for replacement. When I got it back they had done a factory reset (which I expected) so it was an opportune time to upgrade. Samsung has published a straightforward set of instructions. Like the upgrade to FroYo the upgrade requires connecting the phone to a PC using Kies. While the FroYo upgrade took about an hour, the Gingerbread upgrade took 25 minutes which included the automatic upgrade of Kies.
Here's the result.
The AT&T Gingerbread's Notification panel is visually crisper than CyanogenMod's but still lacks the swipe to dismiss of CM7.
The Captivate seems quicker but that may be because of the factory reset rather than Gingerbread although some of the Nook Color's performance improvement was attributed to Gingerbread. My early take on battery usage is that it is better but I also wonder if this is as much due to the factory reset as Gingerbread. We'll see. Here's what the battery looked like after about half a day.
The GPS on this Captivate had always worked well but now seems to be even better. It gets a lock in just a few seconds every time. I ran AngryGPS (more in a second) and the first fix (inside the house) took 50 seconds. Subsequent fixes took around 15 seconds. This screen capture is from a "hot" start session of AngryGPS.
Ok, AngryGPS. To get the above embedded app running go to the Dialer and enter *#*#3214789650#*#*.
I had an odd problem with Screen Capture Shortcut. When I searched the market for it it said that it wasn't compatible with the Captivate. Then it flashed for a second showing the "Install" button. I quickly tapped it and it installed!
The other oddity (and a nice one) is that I get a Force Close from the AT&T Tethering Manager. The upside of this is that this is the service that blocks Android's built-in mobile AP capabilities. Without the Tethering Manager this works fine! I'm not going to look too hard for a fix.
Friday, January 13, 2012
ThinkPad T420s
Anybody who's been following me here knows I have a bias toward ThinkPads. I had been using an off-lease T43 for a while but it started off (for me) with a pinky display and wouldn't run Windows 7 Aero.
Over the Black Friday weekend I lurked at the Lenovo Outlet site. They had some incredible deals but they came and went pretty quick. One of the deals that caught my eye was a T420s. I grabbed it and put it in my shopping cart but thought better and removed it. It immediately disappeared! That told me that it was a good deal. I hung around there a while longer pressing F5 every few seconds and it came back! This time I didn't hesitate. I bought it and then started trying to figure out what I'd bought.
What it was was a 3.7 lb. (the "s" in T420s stands for "slim") Intel Core i5-2540M (2.6GHz) with Windows 7 Pro. It came with 4GB RAM (which I'll upgrade to 8GB) and a 128GB SSD. It has a 14" screen (1600 x 900) and a 720p web cam. It's got a DVD burner and Bluetooth in addition to the expected Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11n wireless.
Being a "T" series it was mostly clean of crapware so my first inclination was to just go with the Lenovo image.
But after a couple of days I began to notice that I was using 80% of real memory and had almost 120 processes running. That compares to the X100e that uses less than 50% of 2GB and has less than 50 processes running. I'm not sure that's apples to apples but it certainly is an indicator.
Recently I did a clean install of Windows 7 Pro using Lenovo's instructions. I tried to do this using the UEFI feature as described here but it doesn't look like that worked.
Regardless the T420s is a lot cleaner now. It's under 80 processes and less than 50% memory utilized.
Over the Black Friday weekend I lurked at the Lenovo Outlet site. They had some incredible deals but they came and went pretty quick. One of the deals that caught my eye was a T420s. I grabbed it and put it in my shopping cart but thought better and removed it. It immediately disappeared! That told me that it was a good deal. I hung around there a while longer pressing F5 every few seconds and it came back! This time I didn't hesitate. I bought it and then started trying to figure out what I'd bought.
What it was was a 3.7 lb. (the "s" in T420s stands for "slim") Intel Core i5-2540M (2.6GHz) with Windows 7 Pro. It came with 4GB RAM (which I'll upgrade to 8GB) and a 128GB SSD. It has a 14" screen (1600 x 900) and a 720p web cam. It's got a DVD burner and Bluetooth in addition to the expected Gigabit Ethernet and 802.11n wireless.
Being a "T" series it was mostly clean of crapware so my first inclination was to just go with the Lenovo image.
But after a couple of days I began to notice that I was using 80% of real memory and had almost 120 processes running. That compares to the X100e that uses less than 50% of 2GB and has less than 50 processes running. I'm not sure that's apples to apples but it certainly is an indicator.
Recently I did a clean install of Windows 7 Pro using Lenovo's instructions. I tried to do this using the UEFI feature as described here but it doesn't look like that worked.
Regardless the T420s is a lot cleaner now. It's under 80 processes and less than 50% memory utilized.
Saturday, January 07, 2012
Those Are Standard Aren't They
One of my co-workers came into the office after the holidays with a shiny new Samsung Galaxy S II. As we sat around the table after our meeting I noticed that he had the phone USB connected to his laptop. His previous phone (HTC G1) always needed charging so I asked him if he was charging the new one out of habit. He said no that he was trying to connect the phone to the laptop but couldn't find a driver.
My experience with every smart phone except iPhones is that you didn't need a driver to connect the phone to a PC as a USB drive. He wanted me to show him how I connected so he brought me his USB cable and phone. When I plugged it all in I got a complaint from Windows that it was an "Unrecognized device." Hmmm.
Then I plugged my Captivate in with his cable. Same thing. That invoked the "Those are standard aren't they?"
Well they should be but they aren't.
I recently encountered a similar problem when the OEM charging cable for my Captivate got stepped on. I ordered the first $.99 micro-USB cable I could find. It fit fine into the tight connector on my Captivate and the battery icon changed to charging. But the next morning the battery was only at 70%.
Here's what the charging screen looks like connected to the generic cable.
Notice that it says "Charging(USB)." That's why it was taking so long to charge.
Back to Google and I found a Samsung OEM charging cable on eBay. It came quickly and fixed the problem.
Here's what it looks like connected with the Samsung cable.
Notice that it says "Charging(AC)."
Yeah, USB cables should be standard but obviously they aren't.
My experience with every smart phone except iPhones is that you didn't need a driver to connect the phone to a PC as a USB drive. He wanted me to show him how I connected so he brought me his USB cable and phone. When I plugged it all in I got a complaint from Windows that it was an "Unrecognized device." Hmmm.
Then I plugged my Captivate in with his cable. Same thing. That invoked the "Those are standard aren't they?"
Well they should be but they aren't.
I recently encountered a similar problem when the OEM charging cable for my Captivate got stepped on. I ordered the first $.99 micro-USB cable I could find. It fit fine into the tight connector on my Captivate and the battery icon changed to charging. But the next morning the battery was only at 70%.
Here's what the charging screen looks like connected to the generic cable.
Notice that it says "Charging(USB)." That's why it was taking so long to charge.
Back to Google and I found a Samsung OEM charging cable on eBay. It came quickly and fixed the problem.
Here's what it looks like connected with the Samsung cable.
Notice that it says "Charging(AC)."
Yeah, USB cables should be standard but obviously they aren't.
Wednesday, January 04, 2012
Get Real AT&T
I've been with AT&T since Suncom was bought by Cingular was bought by BellSouth was bought by AT&T. I've been fortunate enough to live and travel in areas where their coverage has been good. I even had a good experience with my recent international travel.
Recently I have been hankering to be able to get on the Internet with tablets while in the car. There seem to be two alternatives. I could enable the hot spot capability on my Captivate or buy a MiFi device.
So today I stopped by the local AT&T (corporate) store and told the representative that I was interested in adding a tethering plan to my Captivate. He tried to sell me DSL! I got him back on track. I have a $25/month unlimited data plan and $5/month 200 text message plan for a total of $30/month. Obviously I want to protect the unlimited plan and the 200 text messages are fine as I mostly use Google Voice for texting.
He said that I'd have to go to a $45/month data plan with 4GB and a $20/month unlimited text message plan for a total of $65/month, an increase of $35/month and losing unlimited data.
I asked him about a MiFi-type device. He said AT&T has a Sierra Wireless AirCard 754S for $69.99 that requires a $50/month 5GB data plan.
For comparison I looked at C Spire. They have a Novatel MiFi 2200 free with a $19.99/month data plan with 1GB, $29.99/month with 2GB. I realize that the AT&T device is LTE and the C Spire device is EV-DO Rev. A and that the AT&T is plan is 5GB and the C Spire plan is 1GB but still...
Get real AT&T!
Recently I have been hankering to be able to get on the Internet with tablets while in the car. There seem to be two alternatives. I could enable the hot spot capability on my Captivate or buy a MiFi device.
So today I stopped by the local AT&T (corporate) store and told the representative that I was interested in adding a tethering plan to my Captivate. He tried to sell me DSL! I got him back on track. I have a $25/month unlimited data plan and $5/month 200 text message plan for a total of $30/month. Obviously I want to protect the unlimited plan and the 200 text messages are fine as I mostly use Google Voice for texting.
He said that I'd have to go to a $45/month data plan with 4GB and a $20/month unlimited text message plan for a total of $65/month, an increase of $35/month and losing unlimited data.
I asked him about a MiFi-type device. He said AT&T has a Sierra Wireless AirCard 754S for $69.99 that requires a $50/month 5GB data plan.
For comparison I looked at C Spire. They have a Novatel MiFi 2200 free with a $19.99/month data plan with 1GB, $29.99/month with 2GB. I realize that the AT&T device is LTE and the C Spire device is EV-DO Rev. A and that the AT&T is plan is 5GB and the C Spire plan is 1GB but still...
Get real AT&T!
Monday, January 02, 2012
Microsoft Security Essentials v4
I've been an early adopter of Microsoft Security Essentials. Back in November 2011 I signed up for the beta of Security Essentials v4.
Microsoft's "What's New" for v4 includes:
When Microsoft sent me the invitation to download I downloaded and installed it on my "BenInTheDen" laptop. This is my workhorse PC and it is exposed to lots more sites and programs than all my other PCs put together. After installation I let it update the signatures and then requested it run a full scan.
It found and removed 2 instances of malware that had not been found by the current Security Essentials. That's the last bullet above.
I'm now running it everywhere. You can download the beta version at Softpedia. I suggest you do that right away.
Microsoft's "What's New" for v4 includes:
- Enhanced protection through automatic malware remediation: The Beta program will clean highly impacting malware infections automatically, with no required user interaction.
- Enhanced performance: The Beta includes many performance improvements to make sure your PC performance isn’t compromised.
- Simplified UI – Simplified UI makes Microsoft Security Essentials Beta easier to use.
- New and improved protection engine: The updated engine offers enhanced detection with cleanup capabilities and better performance.
When Microsoft sent me the invitation to download I downloaded and installed it on my "BenInTheDen" laptop. This is my workhorse PC and it is exposed to lots more sites and programs than all my other PCs put together. After installation I let it update the signatures and then requested it run a full scan.
It found and removed 2 instances of malware that had not been found by the current Security Essentials. That's the last bullet above.
I'm now running it everywhere. You can download the beta version at Softpedia. I suggest you do that right away.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
International Celluar Plans
Recently my wife and I traveled to Italy for 10 days. In preparation I did a lot of research on international cellular plans and costs. I am an AT&T customer and to put this at a point in time, most of my research took place in September 2011.
Plan A was to acquire a local SIM card in Italy and use that for wireless voice and data. I didn't really foresee a lot of voice requirements but data is always nice for e-mail and, while on foot in a foreign city, GPS/mapping data.
While this is mechanically simple (just pop in a SIM from an in-country provider) it turned out to be harder than that. First all the in-country provider web sites are in the local language, in this case Italian. Google's translation capability left a lot to be desired in the subtleties of cellular terms and conditions.
Second AT&T could not get my Captivate unlocked (required for a non-AT&T SIM). They even referred me to Samsung who couldn't accomplish this either. You should be careful when attempting this in that there is a limit on the number of unsuccessful unlock attempts (reportedly less than 10) allowed before the phone can never be unlocked. AT&T recognized this and said they would replace the phone (with another locked) phone if they reached this point.
Anyway, we all gave up before the phone was permanently locked. At that point I escalated to a manager at AT&T and they offered a reasonable alternative. They applied a $100 credit to my account to cover the cost of AT&T international coverage while I was in Italy. That seemed more than fair and I accepted their offer.
In the meantime, a friend of mine had a Vodafone SIM and I had the unlock code so ... I put the Vodafone SIM in my Captivate and turned it on. It asked for the unlock code and I entered the code that AT&T had given me. Bingo! That worked.
But back to Plan B.
Here's what I found when I researched the international rates in Italy for AT&T.
World Traveler (Voice) $5.99/month + usage - break-even is 15 minutes (15 * $.40 - $6)
Voice $.99 vs. $1.39, Text $.50
Global Messaging $10/month - break-even is 20 texts (20 * $.50 - $10)
50 text included
International Data $24.99/month for 50MB or $49.99 for 125MB
This link will get you to all of the plans above. And this link will get you voice rates per minute by country by plan. Just in case I've include screen shots of what was there when I was looking.
Each of these features can be pro-rated for a partial month but the way that they are applied varies, e.g. Global Messaging kicks in on the first day of your billing month and International Data turns on and off day by day.
Anyway I went with these 3 features and got the 125MB International Data plan. This would have been a total of around $66 plus $.99 per minute for voice if I let them run for a full month.
How'd it turn out? I used just a few minutes of voice so I probably would have been better to go without the $5.99 uplift and have paid the extra $.40 per minute but it would have been close.
Same with texting. I'm not a big texter so I used less than the break-even 20 texts. Again, it would have been close and having a 50 text allowance made me not worry.
Both hotels we stayed in had free Wi-Fi (more in a little) so I used Wi-Fi when we were in the hotels. Since the International Data plan is pro-rated I called AT&T a couple of days after we returned to get my international data usage. The representative didn't have this readily but called back in a couple of hours with the data. With the Wi-Fi in the hotels I only used about 35MB of cellular data so I canceled the International Data plan and the charges and data allowance were pro-rated.
Overall, my AT&T charges were less than $66 even including the per minute voice charges. This $66 was against the $100 credit from AT&T so I was good.
Using AT&T's international offerings was a good deal for me (frankly even without the credit) and not having to fool with unlocking and a non-AT&T SIM.
Now, for the rest of the story.
While both hotels I stayed in had free Wi-Fi each was problematic in its own way. The first iQ Hotel Roma has wireless but you had to have an ID and password issued by the front desk. This required a login page be executed by the browser. I don't know about you but I often have trouble getting these pages up on my various Android devices. And each ID/password combination was limited to a single MAC address at a time. For example, if I was using Wi-Fi on my phone, my wife couldn't use the Nook to access her e-mail. The front desk would issue you more than one ID/password combination so it wasn't the end of the world. The Wi-Fi worked really well throughout the building including the roof garden.
The second hotel Arpaiu advertised Wi-Fi in all rooms but that wasn't so. It only worked upstairs in the common area. For a 1,000 year old building in the middle of nowhere that actually was pretty good. But it did mean that you had to get dressed and climb up 2 flights to check your e-mail.
Looking back I think that next time I'll try to get a local SIM card with a data plan. Not so much because it would be cheaper but because I could use that 3G data instead of the hotels' Wi-Fi. I'd need to enable access point mode on my phone to make that apples to apples. Figuring out how to do that over the web in a foreign language wouldn't be easy so I'd need to dedicate some time when I arrive to get all that working.
If your travel involves more than one country stick with the AT&T plans.
Note that there are a couple of things that you need to do with your phone. Turn off background data. On my Captivate I go to "Settings," "Accounts and Sync" and uncheck "Background data." This means that you'll have to initiate a refresh with each application. Next turn on data roaming. On my Captivate I go to "Settings," "Mobile Networks" and check "Data roaming." This will let you roam for data onto the foreign networks. Make these changes in this sequence on your phone when you arrive at the foreign destination. On departure do these in reverse at the foreign airport.
Send me pictures from your trip!
Plan A was to acquire a local SIM card in Italy and use that for wireless voice and data. I didn't really foresee a lot of voice requirements but data is always nice for e-mail and, while on foot in a foreign city, GPS/mapping data.
While this is mechanically simple (just pop in a SIM from an in-country provider) it turned out to be harder than that. First all the in-country provider web sites are in the local language, in this case Italian. Google's translation capability left a lot to be desired in the subtleties of cellular terms and conditions.
Second AT&T could not get my Captivate unlocked (required for a non-AT&T SIM). They even referred me to Samsung who couldn't accomplish this either. You should be careful when attempting this in that there is a limit on the number of unsuccessful unlock attempts (reportedly less than 10) allowed before the phone can never be unlocked. AT&T recognized this and said they would replace the phone (with another locked) phone if they reached this point.
Anyway, we all gave up before the phone was permanently locked. At that point I escalated to a manager at AT&T and they offered a reasonable alternative. They applied a $100 credit to my account to cover the cost of AT&T international coverage while I was in Italy. That seemed more than fair and I accepted their offer.
In the meantime, a friend of mine had a Vodafone SIM and I had the unlock code so ... I put the Vodafone SIM in my Captivate and turned it on. It asked for the unlock code and I entered the code that AT&T had given me. Bingo! That worked.
But back to Plan B.
Here's what I found when I researched the international rates in Italy for AT&T.
World Traveler (Voice) $5.99/month + usage - break-even is 15 minutes (15 * $.40 - $6)
Voice $.99 vs. $1.39, Text $.50
Global Messaging $10/month - break-even is 20 texts (20 * $.50 - $10)
50 text included
International Data $24.99/month for 50MB or $49.99 for 125MB
This link will get you to all of the plans above. And this link will get you voice rates per minute by country by plan. Just in case I've include screen shots of what was there when I was looking.
Each of these features can be pro-rated for a partial month but the way that they are applied varies, e.g. Global Messaging kicks in on the first day of your billing month and International Data turns on and off day by day.
Anyway I went with these 3 features and got the 125MB International Data plan. This would have been a total of around $66 plus $.99 per minute for voice if I let them run for a full month.
How'd it turn out? I used just a few minutes of voice so I probably would have been better to go without the $5.99 uplift and have paid the extra $.40 per minute but it would have been close.
Same with texting. I'm not a big texter so I used less than the break-even 20 texts. Again, it would have been close and having a 50 text allowance made me not worry.
Both hotels we stayed in had free Wi-Fi (more in a little) so I used Wi-Fi when we were in the hotels. Since the International Data plan is pro-rated I called AT&T a couple of days after we returned to get my international data usage. The representative didn't have this readily but called back in a couple of hours with the data. With the Wi-Fi in the hotels I only used about 35MB of cellular data so I canceled the International Data plan and the charges and data allowance were pro-rated.
Overall, my AT&T charges were less than $66 even including the per minute voice charges. This $66 was against the $100 credit from AT&T so I was good.
Using AT&T's international offerings was a good deal for me (frankly even without the credit) and not having to fool with unlocking and a non-AT&T SIM.
Now, for the rest of the story.
While both hotels I stayed in had free Wi-Fi each was problematic in its own way. The first iQ Hotel Roma has wireless but you had to have an ID and password issued by the front desk. This required a login page be executed by the browser. I don't know about you but I often have trouble getting these pages up on my various Android devices. And each ID/password combination was limited to a single MAC address at a time. For example, if I was using Wi-Fi on my phone, my wife couldn't use the Nook to access her e-mail. The front desk would issue you more than one ID/password combination so it wasn't the end of the world. The Wi-Fi worked really well throughout the building including the roof garden.
The second hotel Arpaiu advertised Wi-Fi in all rooms but that wasn't so. It only worked upstairs in the common area. For a 1,000 year old building in the middle of nowhere that actually was pretty good. But it did mean that you had to get dressed and climb up 2 flights to check your e-mail.
Looking back I think that next time I'll try to get a local SIM card with a data plan. Not so much because it would be cheaper but because I could use that 3G data instead of the hotels' Wi-Fi. I'd need to enable access point mode on my phone to make that apples to apples. Figuring out how to do that over the web in a foreign language wouldn't be easy so I'd need to dedicate some time when I arrive to get all that working.
If your travel involves more than one country stick with the AT&T plans.
Note that there are a couple of things that you need to do with your phone. Turn off background data. On my Captivate I go to "Settings," "Accounts and Sync" and uncheck "Background data." This means that you'll have to initiate a refresh with each application. Next turn on data roaming. On my Captivate I go to "Settings," "Mobile Networks" and check "Data roaming." This will let you roam for data onto the foreign networks. Make these changes in this sequence on your phone when you arrive at the foreign destination. On departure do these in reverse at the foreign airport.
Send me pictures from your trip!
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Crapware
How many times has a friend or relative asked you to look at their PC because it was running slow? When you bellied up to it you were shocked with all the crapware that had sneaked onto it.
We all have war stories about this but Fred Langa just wrote a great post on how bad it gets. You can read the post here.
While the goal of the post is to test Registry/system cleanup tools, the part I find most amazing is how much the crapware he used to test with slowed down the system.
In a nutshell he created a minimalist Windows XP image. Then he installed the software from "CNET’s list of the '20 most popular Windows downloads.'" While he links to that list, after reading his results I won't even link to that list.
The good news is that when he uninstalled those packages the system pretty well came back. Boot times were still slower but nothing like 10 minutes.
You can read the article yourself to see what he found with the Registry/system cleanup tools but I just wanted to share with you his experiences with crapware.
We all have war stories about this but Fred Langa just wrote a great post on how bad it gets. You can read the post here.
While the goal of the post is to test Registry/system cleanup tools, the part I find most amazing is how much the crapware he used to test with slowed down the system.
In a nutshell he created a minimalist Windows XP image. Then he installed the software from "CNET’s list of the '20 most popular Windows downloads.'" While he links to that list, after reading his results I won't even link to that list.
I installed all 20 apps on the test system as inexperienced Windows users might over time - layering on the software without regard to consequence and accepting all default settings, including the offers of extra toolbars, download managers, and so on.The results were incredible. The boot time went from 30 seconds to 629 seconds, over 10 minutes!
The good news is that when he uninstalled those packages the system pretty well came back. Boot times were still slower but nothing like 10 minutes.
You can read the article yourself to see what he found with the Registry/system cleanup tools but I just wanted to share with you his experiences with crapware.
Monday, November 21, 2011
Powerline Ethernet Adapter
I had run a flat Cat 5e cable from the SageTV box and the router. Over the years I used that same cable for the MediaMVP and then the Tivo Premier.
When we recently redid the floors in our house I had the installer run that same flat cable under the hardwood. His work was incredible. But ...
The operation was a success but the patient died. The cable didn't work. I ran my Ethernet tester on it and it was bad. I guess it couldn't take the glue and hammering of the floor.
So I was in a mess. The Tivo simply won't work without Internet connectivity. There's no reasonable way to fish an Ethernet cable between the TV and the router. So it was off to BestBuy.
The salesperson there was pretty good on the problem. She offered the NETGEAR - Powerline Ethernet Adapter Kit and the TiVo - Wireless-N Network Adapter.
My early thinking was to go with the Tivo brand wireless adapter so I'd only have "one throat to choke." Further thinking took me back to the NETGEAR Powerline kit as I could drop a switch in the entertainment center and support multiple devices.
Turned out the NETGEAR Powerline kit was on sale for $79.99 and I came home with it.
It couldn't have been easier to install. The instructions didn't even have any words. Just pictures.
It worked immediately and has continued to since installation. I haven't tested the speed because I really don't care so long as it's faster than my DSL. I'm not moving any local data across it.
If you go read the reviews at the BestBuy site you'll see that everybody raves about the installation. A few mention the speed (rated at 85 Mbps) and every now and then somebody will say that theirs died. I've only had mine a couple of days so I can't speak to their longevity.
Pretty nice gadget.
When we recently redid the floors in our house I had the installer run that same flat cable under the hardwood. His work was incredible. But ...
The operation was a success but the patient died. The cable didn't work. I ran my Ethernet tester on it and it was bad. I guess it couldn't take the glue and hammering of the floor.
So I was in a mess. The Tivo simply won't work without Internet connectivity. There's no reasonable way to fish an Ethernet cable between the TV and the router. So it was off to BestBuy.
The salesperson there was pretty good on the problem. She offered the NETGEAR - Powerline Ethernet Adapter Kit and the TiVo - Wireless-N Network Adapter.
My early thinking was to go with the Tivo brand wireless adapter so I'd only have "one throat to choke." Further thinking took me back to the NETGEAR Powerline kit as I could drop a switch in the entertainment center and support multiple devices.
Turned out the NETGEAR Powerline kit was on sale for $79.99 and I came home with it.
It couldn't have been easier to install. The instructions didn't even have any words. Just pictures.
It worked immediately and has continued to since installation. I haven't tested the speed because I really don't care so long as it's faster than my DSL. I'm not moving any local data across it.
If you go read the reviews at the BestBuy site you'll see that everybody raves about the installation. A few mention the speed (rated at 85 Mbps) and every now and then somebody will say that theirs died. I've only had mine a couple of days so I can't speak to their longevity.
Pretty nice gadget.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
Microsoft and Android Patent Details
If you've been under a rock lately here's a link that'll show you the background to the Microsoft-Android patent battle.
One part of this that hasn't been clear is what patents are in play. Microsoft has been requiring all parties who have agreed to their licensing to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements.
Barnes and Nobles (you'll remember they're the maker of my beloved NOOK Color) has rejected Microsoft's patent claims and has published the details of what patents Microsoft is claiming that the NOOK's Android uses without licensing.
Note that I'm not endorsing the editorial position of Groklaw but rather just using their post as an anchor of the legal material from Barnes and Nobles.
For deeper background here're links to articles from Microsoft and Google's patent attorneys.
Regardless of your opinion/bias on this issue these are all interesting reading.
One part of this that hasn't been clear is what patents are in play. Microsoft has been requiring all parties who have agreed to their licensing to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements.
Barnes and Nobles (you'll remember they're the maker of my beloved NOOK Color) has rejected Microsoft's patent claims and has published the details of what patents Microsoft is claiming that the NOOK's Android uses without licensing.
Note that I'm not endorsing the editorial position of Groklaw but rather just using their post as an anchor of the legal material from Barnes and Nobles.
For deeper background here're links to articles from Microsoft and Google's patent attorneys.
Regardless of your opinion/bias on this issue these are all interesting reading.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Google Being a Pain
Ask any of my friends. I have been as staunch a user and supporter of Google products as there is. I actually bought my first Gmail account on eBay! I have moved my domain to Google Hosted Apps along with my daughter's. I'm in the process of moving my business' domain there. And what do I get in return? Ill thought out changes and slaps in the face.
Here's my list:
Several of these (Calendar event colors, and some of Reader problems) are part of the new UI redesign that has been sweeping across the Google products since the introduction of Google+ and generally I like them. I'm just hoping that the nagging problems here are fixed in a refresh but ...
Others are more troubling.
The Calendar event colors are just stupid. There's been a huge wailing from the community and practically no response from Google. A couple of the Google Help forum posts are here and here. One of those is entitled "Give us your feedback on the new Google Calendar Look!" 475 posts later they've gotten feedback.
The Gmail formatting issue is much more serious. It seems that Gmail doesn't generate rich text, i.e. html, e-mail that is compliant with Microsoft Outlook (and other clients). The result is that there is a mixture of font faces and sizes in the sent e-mail that are not visible to the sender nor easily avoided. The principal Google Help forum post is here. This is a huge issue with business users who have migrated from clients such as Outlook and now are realizing that their sent e-mails may look unprofessional. The Google employees who have participated in this thread disavow any support of the Labs features which allow e-mail formatting which really rankles most users. My own experience is that this is a problem exclusive to WebKit-based browsers but there likely are several problems here.
After Google Docs upgraded their formats they have been suggesting to "Upgrade your document to the latest version of Google documents." Recently that yellow bar at the top of the screen can't be dismissed. My thread on this is here. There's a ton of reasons that people don't/can't upgrade their documents and many are suspicious that this is foretelling a forced upgrade.
I like the Reader redesign. They took away some of the sharing capabilities and re-instituted some of them in Google+. What has affected me is that PgDn (the Page Down key) doesn't mark the last couple of items in a feed as read. Irritating and clearly something that they didn't test. Recently there's a new red dot appearing in the bottom right corner as you scroll through the feed. Apparently that is an indicator that the feed is being updated but it serves no purpose other than to distract your eye to it. They should have used one of the new pastel colors from the Calendar event palate.
I also like the Gmail redesign. I was using one of their preview templates so visually not much changed. There are lots of new features under the covers though. Similar to the Docs nagging bars, Gmail has added a black bar at the bottom saying "Get Marketplace Apps | About the new look | Send feedback." Again you can dismiss it but it comes back.
Even the Huffington Post did a story on Google's "mistakes."
This is all coming at a bad time for me as I'm trying to convince my co-workers to move our entire business' web and e-mail to Google Hosted Apps.
Here's my list:
- Google Calendar events are now pastel colored
- Gmail formatting problems
- Google Docs nagging about old version documents
- Google Reader redesign
- Gmail "Send feedback" bar
Several of these (Calendar event colors, and some of Reader problems) are part of the new UI redesign that has been sweeping across the Google products since the introduction of Google+ and generally I like them. I'm just hoping that the nagging problems here are fixed in a refresh but ...
Others are more troubling.
The Calendar event colors are just stupid. There's been a huge wailing from the community and practically no response from Google. A couple of the Google Help forum posts are here and here. One of those is entitled "Give us your feedback on the new Google Calendar Look!" 475 posts later they've gotten feedback.
The Gmail formatting issue is much more serious. It seems that Gmail doesn't generate rich text, i.e. html, e-mail that is compliant with Microsoft Outlook (and other clients). The result is that there is a mixture of font faces and sizes in the sent e-mail that are not visible to the sender nor easily avoided. The principal Google Help forum post is here. This is a huge issue with business users who have migrated from clients such as Outlook and now are realizing that their sent e-mails may look unprofessional. The Google employees who have participated in this thread disavow any support of the Labs features which allow e-mail formatting which really rankles most users. My own experience is that this is a problem exclusive to WebKit-based browsers but there likely are several problems here.
After Google Docs upgraded their formats they have been suggesting to "Upgrade your document to the latest version of Google documents." Recently that yellow bar at the top of the screen can't be dismissed. My thread on this is here. There's a ton of reasons that people don't/can't upgrade their documents and many are suspicious that this is foretelling a forced upgrade.
I like the Reader redesign. They took away some of the sharing capabilities and re-instituted some of them in Google+. What has affected me is that PgDn (the Page Down key) doesn't mark the last couple of items in a feed as read. Irritating and clearly something that they didn't test. Recently there's a new red dot appearing in the bottom right corner as you scroll through the feed. Apparently that is an indicator that the feed is being updated but it serves no purpose other than to distract your eye to it. They should have used one of the new pastel colors from the Calendar event palate.
I also like the Gmail redesign. I was using one of their preview templates so visually not much changed. There are lots of new features under the covers though. Similar to the Docs nagging bars, Gmail has added a black bar at the bottom saying "Get Marketplace Apps | About the new look | Send feedback." Again you can dismiss it but it comes back.
Even the Huffington Post did a story on Google's "mistakes."
This is all coming at a bad time for me as I'm trying to convince my co-workers to move our entire business' web and e-mail to Google Hosted Apps.
Wednesday, November 09, 2011
TouchPad Update
Recently I posted about putting Android CyanogenMod 7 (CM7) on my HP TouchPad. It's running well and I wanted to share how it's been going.
It is still rock solid. I haven't had any Sleep of Death (SOD) since right after I flashed CM7. The Wi-Fi doesn't connect as easily as it should but frankly it connects as easily as my Nook Color also running CM7. Kinda makes me wonder if it's something in CM7. Anyway, simply swiping the notification bar and toggling Wi-Fi almost always allows the TouchPad to connect.
Other people are complaining that the battery life is not good. I haven't found that to be a big problem. I tested this the other day by fully charging and letting it sit unused with the screen off for 24 hours. The battery dropped to 72%. The Wi-Fi seemed to stay connected throughout the 24 hours as I heard it dinging when I received new e-mails. That's not as good as the Nook Color but certainly very usable.
I've gotten the BlueTooth paired and connected to my ThinkPad and been able to transfer files in both directions. I've used this to send videos to the TouchPad. I use Handbrake with the same settings as I use on the Nook Color. Looks great on the video player that comes on CM7. YouTube videos play fine, even HD.
I read that the Google Docs problem was fixed in the latest version on the Android Market but I haven't tested it. What I have is working fine.
Skype will run if you install version 6 but audio drops after a minute or so.
Swype is my preferred keyboard and there's a thread talking how to decompile the Swype bits and change the code and recompile and sign the resulting .apk. Whoa! Too geeky even for me. I found that version 3 (Swype_EN_NL_WVGA_v3.26.92.35406_flat_black_v5-signed.apk) works. It isn't as wide as the display but works fine.
I also installed QuickOffice and along with Swype this combination has made the TouchPad extremely usable. This week I was on the way to a meeting and received an e-mail with a .docx document relative to that meeting. I pulled up to a Starbucks, connected to their Wi-Fi (with no problem) and downloaded the document. QuickOffice opened it and rendered it properly. I proceeded on to the meeting and was able to participate in the meeting while referencing the document on the TouchPad.
You couldn't ask for much more for $99.
It is still rock solid. I haven't had any Sleep of Death (SOD) since right after I flashed CM7. The Wi-Fi doesn't connect as easily as it should but frankly it connects as easily as my Nook Color also running CM7. Kinda makes me wonder if it's something in CM7. Anyway, simply swiping the notification bar and toggling Wi-Fi almost always allows the TouchPad to connect.
Other people are complaining that the battery life is not good. I haven't found that to be a big problem. I tested this the other day by fully charging and letting it sit unused with the screen off for 24 hours. The battery dropped to 72%. The Wi-Fi seemed to stay connected throughout the 24 hours as I heard it dinging when I received new e-mails. That's not as good as the Nook Color but certainly very usable.
I've gotten the BlueTooth paired and connected to my ThinkPad and been able to transfer files in both directions. I've used this to send videos to the TouchPad. I use Handbrake with the same settings as I use on the Nook Color. Looks great on the video player that comes on CM7. YouTube videos play fine, even HD.
I read that the Google Docs problem was fixed in the latest version on the Android Market but I haven't tested it. What I have is working fine.
Skype will run if you install version 6 but audio drops after a minute or so.
Swype is my preferred keyboard and there's a thread talking how to decompile the Swype bits and change the code and recompile and sign the resulting .apk. Whoa! Too geeky even for me. I found that version 3 (Swype_EN_NL_WVGA_v3.26.92.35406_flat_black_v5-signed.apk) works. It isn't as wide as the display but works fine.
I also installed QuickOffice and along with Swype this combination has made the TouchPad extremely usable. This week I was on the way to a meeting and received an e-mail with a .docx document relative to that meeting. I pulled up to a Starbucks, connected to their Wi-Fi (with no problem) and downloaded the document. QuickOffice opened it and rendered it properly. I proceeded on to the meeting and was able to participate in the meeting while referencing the document on the TouchPad.
You couldn't ask for much more for $99.
Monday, October 24, 2011
3 Months
You'll remember that the closing line in my HP TouchPad Clearance post was "Now let's see how long it takes to get Android on it." It took 3 months.
Cyanogen has been hard at work on putting CyanogenMod 7 (Gingerbread) on the TouchPad. In mid-October they released an Alpha entitled "'lower your expectations edition." I began following the thread on the Rootzwiki forum.
This week they released Alpha 2 known as the "don't link directly to the files edition." I was ready to jump at that point.
Being that it is an Alpha, it is not as straightforward as putting CM7 on the Nook Color.
There is a youtube video that guides you but unfortunately doesn't really show everything. I found a post in their forum that had more step-by-step and used it as well.
The install came off without a hitch. The step where you run their ACMEinstaller took longer than I expected (and much longer than on the video) but just sit back and let it run.
From that point forward it's pretty much the same as the Nook Color. You need to go to Settings->CyanogenMod settings->Display->Automatic backlight and check "Enable Light Decrease". And go to Settings->ADW Launcher->Screen -> Desktop Columns. Set to 8 for more space on the Launcher screen.
There are still lots of issues outstanding but they haven't been a problem to me. People are reporting problems with Wi-Fi. The only problem I've had is connecting to a second Wi-Fi network. I had to reboot for the TouchPad to see it. In response I set Settings->Wireless & network->(menu) Advanced->Wi-Fi sleep policy to Never.
Others report Sleep of Death (SOD) where the TouchPad won't wake up from sleeping. Seems to be a lesser problem in Alpha 2 but one recommendation is to set Settings->CyanogenMod settings->Performance->CPU settings->Available governors to ondemandtcl.
The Android Market works fine. I can't get Swype to work yet and haven't played with my Bluetooth keyboard.
There's a list of apps and their status here.
The current version of Google Docs for Android is 1.0.4. It seems to presume that if the device is a tablet that the operating system must be Honeycomb. I downloaded an 1.0.20 apk from here.
Even the media that I had loaded on the TouchPad made it over to Android and play perfectly.
Here's what it looks like (remember it's a 1024x768 screen).
And just to prove it's on the TouchPad.
Cyanogen has been hard at work on putting CyanogenMod 7 (Gingerbread) on the TouchPad. In mid-October they released an Alpha entitled "'lower your expectations edition." I began following the thread on the Rootzwiki forum.
This week they released Alpha 2 known as the "don't link directly to the files edition." I was ready to jump at that point.
Being that it is an Alpha, it is not as straightforward as putting CM7 on the Nook Color.
There is a youtube video that guides you but unfortunately doesn't really show everything. I found a post in their forum that had more step-by-step and used it as well.
The install came off without a hitch. The step where you run their ACMEinstaller took longer than I expected (and much longer than on the video) but just sit back and let it run.
From that point forward it's pretty much the same as the Nook Color. You need to go to Settings->CyanogenMod settings->Display->Automatic backlight and check "Enable Light Decrease". And go to Settings->ADW Launcher->Screen -> Desktop Columns. Set to 8 for more space on the Launcher screen.
There are still lots of issues outstanding but they haven't been a problem to me. People are reporting problems with Wi-Fi. The only problem I've had is connecting to a second Wi-Fi network. I had to reboot for the TouchPad to see it. In response I set Settings->Wireless & network->(menu) Advanced->Wi-Fi sleep policy to Never.
Others report Sleep of Death (SOD) where the TouchPad won't wake up from sleeping. Seems to be a lesser problem in Alpha 2 but one recommendation is to set Settings->CyanogenMod settings->Performance->CPU settings->Available governors to ondemandtcl.
The Android Market works fine. I can't get Swype to work yet and haven't played with my Bluetooth keyboard.
There's a list of apps and their status here.
The current version of Google Docs for Android is 1.0.4. It seems to presume that if the device is a tablet that the operating system must be Honeycomb. I downloaded an 1.0.20 apk from here.
Even the media that I had loaded on the TouchPad made it over to Android and play perfectly.
Here's what it looks like (remember it's a 1024x768 screen).
And just to prove it's on the TouchPad.
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Almost Chrome
I have very simple needs (in a browser). I want my browser to:
After this week I need to add 2 more:
Here's how I got here. It starts with the topic of my previous Dancing Pigs post. Following that post I slowly started to move my browsing to Chrome.
While I like Chrome it almost made me add another requirement:
Chrome has an OmniBar. In a nutshell this means that it doesn't have a search bar like Firefox and Internet Explorer. So if you want to search you have to open a new tab and type your search in what I call the address bar. After a while the Ctrl+T to open that new tab became almost natural so I can live with the OmniBar.
Chrome began to grow on me. You see lots of discussion on how fast Chrome is. I never could really tell that Chrome rendered much faster. What I did notice that Chrome is much quicker to navigate around with. The "instant" option of loading the page while you type the URL significantly speeds up my navigation. It can be somewhat disconcerting though.
Chrome had a problem where some of the threads (Windows processes) would exhibit runaway processor usage. Sometimes you could kill off a couple of them and sometimes you had to restart Chrome.
While this was annoying it wasn't nearly as annoying as Firefox's memory leak problems. I have to restart Firefox every day or two as its memory usage will grow to more than a gigabyte. There's even an Add-On for that!
Then after a couple of weeks with Chrome I began to notice that when I sent someone an e-mail and they replied to me including my text that my text had irregular fonts. It made my e-mail look very unprofessional.
At first I just though these were situations where I had copied and pasted foreign text into an e-mail but more research proved this wrong.
I went to Google and found this in the Gmail forum. You'll see that this is a long-standing problem that has been acknowledged by Google.
The last update from Google is on 08/23/11:
Here's what the recipient saw:
Notice how the point size changed from the first paragraph to the second. This is actually one of the better e-mails. Often the font changed between paragraphs as well, e.g. from Arial to Times.
I simply couldn't tolerate that so I went back to Firefox 3.6.22. It was like putting on an old pair of jeans. Gmail formatting was instantly cured. Whew!
One of the other features of Chrome that I liked was the ability to pin tabs and reduce the space required for persistent pages, e.g. Gmail, Twitter, imo, etc.
Golly gosh Firefox 4+ has this capability! Why don't I just upgrade to Firefox 6? Was my brain absent when I leaped to that conclusion?
Guess what was the first problem I ran into? Firefox Bug 574654. In a nutshell this arbitrary developer removed the beloved about:config capability to specify the minimum and maximum tab width and then created an Add-On that performs something of the same function. Go read the reviews to see the reception. Don't miss the one that points out that this add on doesn't work with the upcoming Firefox 8.
But I'm smart enough to always have a fallback plan. Right? We'll see. I had created a Windows System Restore point before I upgraded to Firefox 6 so I simply fell back to the previous configuration. Unfortunately Firefox seems to cross the line between system and user so when I restarted Windows after the restore Firefox 3.6.22 wouldn't run. I had to undo the restore, uninstall Firefox 6 and reinstall Firefox 3.
I'm crossing my fingers that Google fixes the Gmail formatting issue with Chrome soon.
- Shield me from obnoxious ads
- Open new tabs at the right
- Close tabs when I double click them
- Let me drag links to open in a new tab
- Let me drag selected text to search
After this week I need to add 2 more:
- Render rich text e-mails faithfully in Gmail
- Reduce tab width appropriately as I open additional tabs
Here's how I got here. It starts with the topic of my previous Dancing Pigs post. Following that post I slowly started to move my browsing to Chrome.
While I like Chrome it almost made me add another requirement:
Have a search bar
Chrome has an OmniBar. In a nutshell this means that it doesn't have a search bar like Firefox and Internet Explorer. So if you want to search you have to open a new tab and type your search in what I call the address bar. After a while the Ctrl+T to open that new tab became almost natural so I can live with the OmniBar.
Chrome began to grow on me. You see lots of discussion on how fast Chrome is. I never could really tell that Chrome rendered much faster. What I did notice that Chrome is much quicker to navigate around with. The "instant" option of loading the page while you type the URL significantly speeds up my navigation. It can be somewhat disconcerting though.
Chrome had a problem where some of the threads (Windows processes) would exhibit runaway processor usage. Sometimes you could kill off a couple of them and sometimes you had to restart Chrome.
While this was annoying it wasn't nearly as annoying as Firefox's memory leak problems. I have to restart Firefox every day or two as its memory usage will grow to more than a gigabyte. There's even an Add-On for that!
Then after a couple of weeks with Chrome I began to notice that when I sent someone an e-mail and they replied to me including my text that my text had irregular fonts. It made my e-mail look very unprofessional.
At first I just though these were situations where I had copied and pasted foreign text into an e-mail but more research proved this wrong.
I went to Google and found this in the Gmail forum. You'll see that this is a long-standing problem that has been acknowledged by Google.
The last update from Google is on 08/23/11:
Just wanted to let you know that we're investigating cases of incorrect formatting when labs are disabled. I don't have an update on a solution right now, but I'll check in next week to let you know if I have any news.To demonstrate the problem here is a screen capture of what my original e-mail looked like to me:
Here's what the recipient saw:
Notice how the point size changed from the first paragraph to the second. This is actually one of the better e-mails. Often the font changed between paragraphs as well, e.g. from Arial to Times.
I simply couldn't tolerate that so I went back to Firefox 3.6.22. It was like putting on an old pair of jeans. Gmail formatting was instantly cured. Whew!
One of the other features of Chrome that I liked was the ability to pin tabs and reduce the space required for persistent pages, e.g. Gmail, Twitter, imo, etc.
Golly gosh Firefox 4+ has this capability! Why don't I just upgrade to Firefox 6? Was my brain absent when I leaped to that conclusion?
Guess what was the first problem I ran into? Firefox Bug 574654. In a nutshell this arbitrary developer removed the beloved about:config capability to specify the minimum and maximum tab width and then created an Add-On that performs something of the same function. Go read the reviews to see the reception. Don't miss the one that points out that this add on doesn't work with the upcoming Firefox 8.
But I'm smart enough to always have a fallback plan. Right? We'll see. I had created a Windows System Restore point before I upgraded to Firefox 6 so I simply fell back to the previous configuration. Unfortunately Firefox seems to cross the line between system and user so when I restarted Windows after the restore Firefox 3.6.22 wouldn't run. I had to undo the restore, uninstall Firefox 6 and reinstall Firefox 3.
I'm crossing my fingers that Google fixes the Gmail formatting issue with Chrome soon.
Thursday, September 08, 2011
Geotagging II
I rambled at length in previous posts about my interest in geotagging. In my recent comparison of cameras I even talked about geotagging. In the GPS section of that post I linked to a Picasaweb album that had GPS data from the Lumix.
Yesterday I put the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS7 to the test. The results weren't pretty.
We went to the Memphis Zoo and I wanted to use this trip to compare my previous geotagging process with the built-in capabilities of the Lumix.
I enabled GPSLogger on my wife's BlackBerry Curve and set it to log every 30 seconds.
As soon as I arrived I turned on the Lumix and enabled GPS. That was the first mistake.
The Lumix took more than 5 minutes to obtain a GPS location fix. Consequently my first pictures didn't have GPS location in their EXIF data. Then the Lumix began obtaining GPS locations every 5 minutes.
When we returned home I used GeoSetter to compare the GPS locations.
Here's the result.
The top set of markers is from the Lumix and the bottom is from GPSLogger.
The first thing to notice is the absence of markers in the Lumix set near the bottom center. This is the entrance to the Zoo and the Lumix hadn't obtained a fix yet. To be fair I have to acknowledge that I started GPSLogger before I left home. The next thing is to notice that the Lumix seems to have fewer markers than the BlackBerry. This is because the Lumix tends to cluster photographs as it only renews its location every 5 minutes. Another thing is the Lumix has one photograph tagged as being in the middle of a small pond. Let's just say that I didn't get wet so this indicates a lack of accuracy on the part of the Lumix's GPS.
The other issue I observed is impact on battery life on each device. With the GPSLogger frequency set to 30 seconds it had no noticeable impact on the BlackBerry Curve's battery. I didn't fully charge the Lumix's battery before I left as it indicated a full battery although it had been used several times on that charge. During the day the Lumix's battery indicator dropped to 2 of 3 and then 1 of 3. When I returned home to offload the photos it began flashing red. I could do a more comprehensive test of the impact of the GPS on the Lumix's battery life but given the ineffectiveness of the Lumix's GPS who cares?
Perhaps I have the bar set unrealistically high. If your interest in geotagging is to tag your photos with which part of a town you are in then the Lumix does fine but carry an extra battery. And if you're lost the Lumix will even show you where you are every 5 minutes. When it obtains a GPS fix it I have it set to show the town and landmark. It kept displaying "Memphis Zoo."
On the other hand GPSLogger and a BlackBerry is a first class method to geotag your photos.
Oh and if you have an Android phone? Don't even bother.
Yesterday I put the Panasonic Lumix DMC-ZS7 to the test. The results weren't pretty.
We went to the Memphis Zoo and I wanted to use this trip to compare my previous geotagging process with the built-in capabilities of the Lumix.
I enabled GPSLogger on my wife's BlackBerry Curve and set it to log every 30 seconds.
As soon as I arrived I turned on the Lumix and enabled GPS. That was the first mistake.
The Lumix took more than 5 minutes to obtain a GPS location fix. Consequently my first pictures didn't have GPS location in their EXIF data. Then the Lumix began obtaining GPS locations every 5 minutes.
When we returned home I used GeoSetter to compare the GPS locations.
Here's the result.
The top set of markers is from the Lumix and the bottom is from GPSLogger.
The first thing to notice is the absence of markers in the Lumix set near the bottom center. This is the entrance to the Zoo and the Lumix hadn't obtained a fix yet. To be fair I have to acknowledge that I started GPSLogger before I left home. The next thing is to notice that the Lumix seems to have fewer markers than the BlackBerry. This is because the Lumix tends to cluster photographs as it only renews its location every 5 minutes. Another thing is the Lumix has one photograph tagged as being in the middle of a small pond. Let's just say that I didn't get wet so this indicates a lack of accuracy on the part of the Lumix's GPS.
The other issue I observed is impact on battery life on each device. With the GPSLogger frequency set to 30 seconds it had no noticeable impact on the BlackBerry Curve's battery. I didn't fully charge the Lumix's battery before I left as it indicated a full battery although it had been used several times on that charge. During the day the Lumix's battery indicator dropped to 2 of 3 and then 1 of 3. When I returned home to offload the photos it began flashing red. I could do a more comprehensive test of the impact of the GPS on the Lumix's battery life but given the ineffectiveness of the Lumix's GPS who cares?
Perhaps I have the bar set unrealistically high. If your interest in geotagging is to tag your photos with which part of a town you are in then the Lumix does fine but carry an extra battery. And if you're lost the Lumix will even show you where you are every 5 minutes. When it obtains a GPS fix it I have it set to show the town and landmark. It kept displaying "Memphis Zoo."
On the other hand GPSLogger and a BlackBerry is a first class method to geotag your photos.
Oh and if you have an Android phone? Don't even bother.
Friday, September 02, 2011
Tablet Keyboard
My Nook COLOR with Gingerbread is still pretty much the perfect tablet for me. I even shoehorned the Swype Beta on it.
But even with Swype sizable text input is painful. Even e-mail gets tedious.
So I went looking for a physical keyboard that matches the portability of a tablet. I found the Scosche freeKey Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard at Meritline for $29.99 and free shipping (sorry the coupon code has expired).
Here's what it looks like.
It paired easily with my Nook. Android does a good job of translating the keyboard actions into touchscreen equivalents. The up, down, right, and left arrows move the focus around on the screen and Enter is the same as tapping.
It came with a retractable mini-USB cable to charge it. I wish it used micro-USB like the Nook and TouchPad but I've got tons of micro-USB devices still.
But even with Swype sizable text input is painful. Even e-mail gets tedious.
So I went looking for a physical keyboard that matches the portability of a tablet. I found the Scosche freeKey Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard at Meritline for $29.99 and free shipping (sorry the coupon code has expired).
Here's what it looks like.
It paired easily with my Nook. Android does a good job of translating the keyboard actions into touchscreen equivalents. The up, down, right, and left arrows move the focus around on the screen and Enter is the same as tapping.
It came with a retractable mini-USB cable to charge it. I wish it used micro-USB like the Nook and TouchPad but I've got tons of micro-USB devices still.
Friday, August 26, 2011
HP TouchPad Clearance
On Thursday August 18, 2011 HP announced that it would "discontinue operations for webOS devices, specifically the TouchPad and webOS phones." That began a run on the now discontinued HP TouchPad tablets. The TouchPad has a 9.7 inch screen with 1024 x 768 resolution. It has a 1.2 Ghz dual core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor with 1 GB of memory and 16 or 32 GB of storage. It began shipping in July 2011.
I saw the sale on slickdeals.com on Saturday and went to the BestBuy in Southaven. The representative in the tablet department said that they had some but had been told to take them off the shelves. I went home and placed an order on bestbuy.com for in-store pickup at Southaven, MS. That store showed "in stock."
I hadn't gotten a "Ready for Pick-up" e-mail by the time I left to go to the store Sunday morning. When I got there 10 minutes before opening there were 4 people in line. By the time it opened there were 25 people in line.
There was a person just inside the door telling everyone that they were out of stock on TouchPads. I proceeded to the Customer Service desk and presented my paperwork. As I waited a manager was nearby. She was saying that that store only had 8 TouchPads before this clearance started. She said that they had 2 "OMS" (online) orders (one was mine) from last night that they had put back and that was all that was left.
Mine was there and I had no trouble checking out. They didn't automatically price match but the Operations Supervisor called the 800 # and waited 20 minutes.
There seemed to be some consternation about whether they were really supposed to deliver to the online customers so I politely picked up my TouchPad and receipt and excused myself!
I went back to the store early in the week and they gave me the price match of $321.00.
Now let's see how long it takes to get Android on it.
I saw the sale on slickdeals.com on Saturday and went to the BestBuy in Southaven. The representative in the tablet department said that they had some but had been told to take them off the shelves. I went home and placed an order on bestbuy.com for in-store pickup at Southaven, MS. That store showed "in stock."
I hadn't gotten a "Ready for Pick-up" e-mail by the time I left to go to the store Sunday morning. When I got there 10 minutes before opening there were 4 people in line. By the time it opened there were 25 people in line.
There was a person just inside the door telling everyone that they were out of stock on TouchPads. I proceeded to the Customer Service desk and presented my paperwork. As I waited a manager was nearby. She was saying that that store only had 8 TouchPads before this clearance started. She said that they had 2 "OMS" (online) orders (one was mine) from last night that they had put back and that was all that was left.
Mine was there and I had no trouble checking out. They didn't automatically price match but the Operations Supervisor called the 800 # and waited 20 minutes.
There seemed to be some consternation about whether they were really supposed to deliver to the online customers so I politely picked up my TouchPad and receipt and excused myself!
I went back to the store early in the week and they gave me the price match of $321.00.
Now let's see how long it takes to get Android on it.
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