Plan B Isn't Good Enough

I subscribe to the Windows Secrets newsletter. Recently they had an article on TrueCrypt. I'm not ready to take a position on that fiasco but Susan Bradley had a quote that got me thinking.

The TrueCrypt saga highlights the importance of having a Plan B for all our important computing services.

This reminded me of a discussion at FedEx when we were moving our data center. As I was discussing this with our Vice President he asked about our "Plan B." I told him I had plans all the way down to "Plan Z."

An example was that when we backed up the systems for the move, we made 2 sets of backups. Then when we transported them across town we used 2 completely different routes.

At FedEx we learned to have primary, secondary, and tertiary plans. When loading an airplane 1) run weights and balances, 2) put ballast in the front of the plane, and 3) tie the nose wheel to the ground. And always have a backup plane, e.g. "Plan Z."

Recently a CIO of a local transportation company asked me:

...we have full replication between the two data centers at the disk array level, should we still be making tape backups for off-site storage?

What do you think my answer to him was?

We learned the answer at FedEx: primary, secondary, tertiary.

And remember my backup solutions?

Belt, suspenders, and raincoat.

Plan B isn't good enough.

Battery Usage

I've admitted my OCD tendencies before. Here I go again.

I've been tracking the Android battery usage of my Skyrocket and Moto X. Every evening after 10:00 I navigate to Settings / Battery and screenshot the overall usage and the highest element.

Now that I've got some time under my belt with the Moto X I had the feeling that its battery usage was much better than the Skyrocket. Since the time off battery will vary from day to day I calculated the % of battery usage per hour.

Just as background, the Skyrocket was running Ice Cream Sandwich and the Moto X was running KitKat. I upgraded from 4.4.2 to 4.4.3 in the middle of this period but I can't tell that it made any difference.

While the chart was interesting...

While the Moto X was clearly better than the Skyrocket it was all over the place.

I think the best way to look at it is a simple average.

The Skyrocket was 4.12 % per hour and the Moto X was 3.04 % per hour.

Boundaries, Boundaries, Boundaries

You know the old saying in real estate, the most 3 important things in real estate are Location, Location, Location. Similarly in IT systems the 3 most important things are Boundaries, Boundaries, Boundaries.

Every boundary is an opportunity and not a good kind of opportunity.

This was brought home to me in Brian Krebs' recent post on Complexity as the Enemy of Security. Brian was discussing security and how complexity contributed to security exposures.

This maxim is true in many areas of IT. Recently I was discussing with a VP of a transportation firm on how to horizontally expand application servers for an existing application. He wanted to put an additional box in front of the application servers. I discouraged that because it added an additional boundary to the system. My suggestion was to do "outside in" routing at the remote clients and not introduce that additional boundary.

I used this methodology at a large forest products corporation to consolidate database and application server instances into a large server. While the instances still had their separate identities they were all contained in a single physical box. It made a tremendous improvement in availability.

I explored this phenomenon with the CFO relating how the old mainframe systems were easier to support because they used point-to-point circuits instead of TCP/IP networks. She hadn't considered this. It is incumbent on IT professionals to make sure that executives understand the downside of complexity.

At an international package delivery company we used this methodology to maintain extraordinary high availability. The mathematics of availability show that compounding 99% availability loses 1% for each additional boundary.

And boundaries aren't just physical. This maxim can be applied to changes in status of a system. Every time a system changes status there is an opportunity for it to fail. Simply put, if you don't reboot a server you won't suffer a restart problem.

While a single monolithic system won't meet today's demands, every boundary should be closely examined to determine if it can be eliminated.

Internet Bandwidth

Ok, so I'm OCD. But still some of the details I keep up with are interesting (to me at least).

I've been tracking my Internet bandwidth since mid-2011.

The stacked bars are Comcast cable bandwidth. The yellow line is AT&T wireless bandwidth (scale is on right axis). The units are KB so 100,000 represents 100GB. The blue is the difference in what Comcast reports versus what my router reports.

I switched from AT&T DSL to Comcast in July 2013.

I started using CrashPlan for backups in January 2014.

I pretty much don't stream video other than an occasional YouTube. No Netflix or Hulu.

I attribute the change in May 2014 to uploading and downloading home videos. That's probably worth a post in itself. Stay tuned.

The jump in wireless bandwidth in March and April is tethering while I was traveling.

Conclusions?

1. As expected my bandwidth usage (and yours) continues to climb at over 40% per year.
2. Comcast does a pretty good job of measuring it.
3. I can already see Comcast's bandwidth cap of 300GB looming in my future.
4. I love my AT&T MobilShare Value 10GB plan with tethering.

All I Want To Do

All I want to do is to be able to use Google Contacts groups in the Gmail app on my wife's iPhone. That seems so straightforward. But you gotta remember that Steve Jobs was involved.

I searched and researched. What I came up with was a couple of apps from Playa Apps - Contacts Sync for Google Gmail with Auto Sync and A2Z Contacts. They both have really good ratings and reviews and only cost 99¢ each.

I'm using the Google Gmail app on my iPad and have the contacts syncing with CardDAV. It all works perfectly. No thanks to Google for killing the Exchange ActiveSync interface. It wasn't obvious what I had to do to that configuration to coexist with Contacts Sync so I wrote an e-mail to Playa App's support.

Being anxious I just popped for the 99¢ and installed the app. It prompted me to read the user guide inside the app which explained to turn off CardDAV. That worked fine and the contacts synced perfectly

Then I tried to send an e-mail to one of those groups using the Gmail iOS app and couldn't find how to do that. I then came across "A2Z Contacts - Contact Manager." Again it wasn't obvious if it would let me send e-mail to groups using the Gmail iOS app or did it have its own mail interface?

99¢ later I had the installed A2Z Contacts and the user guide inside the app explained it allows you to send group emails from it's own interface and it also allows you to create "email lists" to send group emails directly from the Mail app or the Gmail app.

So off I went to exercise it.

Oh, well.

First, on the iTunes page for "Contacts Sync for Google Gmail with Auto Sync" it says "SYNCS AUTOMATICALLY!"

Nope. Not so much.

When you try to set it to sync automatically you get this:

Maybe I should have known this but the iTunes section on In-App purchases wasn't clear.

The user guide cautions to ensure that there aren't duplicate contacts in Google Contacts so I checked that.

But "Contacts Sync" thinks differently.

And the referenced log didn't help me resolve this.

But I proceeded and tried to use A2Z to create an "e-mail list" the process worked fine. Until I got this screen:

"Periodically update your e-mail lists in A2Z Contacts so that they match the latest data in your groups."

I'm trying to do this so my wife can send e-mails to a group that she maintains in web Gmail. There are just too many manual steps in this process.

I don't fault the developer of these apps at all. He has been prompt and helpful in his responses. I realize the limitations that Apple puts on developers.

The only alternative I see is for me to manually create the same type of "e-mail list" on the web Gmail and let her use it from her iPhone Gmail app.

Simdevil

In my Moto X post, I mentioned that I had gotten a MediaDevil Simdevil 3-in-1 SIM card adapter kit.

I wasn't quite sure how it would work but I tried it the other day to put my nano-SIM in my Skyrocket after I flashed it with KitKat.

It worked perfectly. The Simdevil has a very thin film on the non-contact side of the nano-SIM.

The nano-SIM is a press fit in the Simdevil. I actually put the Simdevil and the nano-SIM on my granite kitchen counter and pressed them together.

MediaDevil is a British company and they included a couple of sticks of Maoam in the package. Nice!

KitKat for Everyone

After I got the Moto X, I got brave about flashing the Skyrocket. As usual I went looking to CyanogenMod.

With my new bravado, I looked at the unofficial CyanogenMod Android 4.4 (CM 11). The TeamChopsticks group hasn't released an Alpha since December 2013 but they keep building nightlies so I went with the latest nightly (cm-11-20140514-NIGHTLY-skyrocket.zip). Why not?

The release notes are here. As is typical Step 1 is an understatement.

1. YOU MUST USE THIS RECOVERY OR YOU WILL SOFT BRICK: Install CWM >6.0.3.7for Skyrocket

Look carefully at that referenced file (recovery-skyrocket-6037.zip). ".zip" is the crucial part.

The reason is that the standard recovery won't let you flash a new recovery so you have to use ODIN. There's the catch. ODIN won't flash .zip files.

Here we go again. It would really be nice if Step 1 discussed the intricacies of that.

A little Google searching and I turned up this that describes how to install CWM (ClockWorkMod Recovery) on the Skyrocket. That works like a charm and it takes longer to read it twice as it demands than it does to perform the flashing of the recovery.

But there's a catch. The recoveries referenced in that post aren't the ones that are referenced in the Release Notes.

I wasn't the only one lost in the wilderness. I found this post that asked the question and got a good answer.

You can only flash the zip in a custom recovery. If you don't have a custom recovery you need to install it with Odin. You'll need a .tar.md5 recovery file to flash in Odin.

Nothing is ever simple. So I used ODIN to flash twrp_2.7.0.0_skyrocket_vincom.tar.md5. I used TWRP to take a nandroid backup of the Skyrocket's 4.1.2 and copied it to my laptop via USB. That was the longest step in the whole process, about 20 minutes. While connected I copied the recovery-skyrocket-6037.zip, the CM 11 ROM and the gapps package to the root of my internal SD card.

Then I used TWRP to flash recovery-skyrocket-6037.zip.

I already had the required radio so I restarted in CWM recovery did the wipe as instructed. Then I just flashed the the ROM and gapps in sequence and rebooted.

BINGO! KitKat. My boot only took a few seconds.

While this isn't hard, there has to be a more direct way to get there.

Anyway, now I'm off!

Since I use Google Backup and Restore, all my apps started downloading and installing. I sat back and watched them for an hour or so and began playing with it.

I have to say that it is awesome.

So now, Google Now Launcher, Google Camera, ...

Now all my Android devices are KitKat.

But what do I do with the Moto X?

Moto X

My Skyrocket is getting long in the tooth. And slow. I think that the slowness is due to the lack of TRIM. And we know what the cure for that is don't we? Android 4.3. But wait, AT&T hasn't pushed 4.3 to the Skyrocket and never will. I can't complain. AT&T has upgraded the Skyrocket twice since I've had it.

So I turned to my favorite ROM, CyanogenMod. Hmmm, they haven't released Android 4.4 (KitKat) for the Skyrocket. There is a stable version of Android 4.3 (Jelly Bean) for the Skyrocket but it hasn't been updated since December 2013. I don't want to go to an old Android.

Sounds like a good enough reason to purchase a new phone!

You'll remember that I'm sensitive to size. That's why I chose the Skyrocket (Galaxy S2) over the Galaxy S3. So I went looking for a Galaxy S4 Mini. AT&T hasn't offered that yet so I was going to have to get it unlocked. That's already a generation back compared to the S5 and Samsung hasn't pushed KitKat to it. That didn't sound like a good place to land so I kept looking.

What I found was that newer phones than my Skyrocket have actually gotten smaller while increasing the screen size due to the smaller bezels. I could have my cake and eat it too!

I ended up with the Google Moto X.

Motorola was having a May Day sale for $325 for the unlocked GSM model with 32GB so I went for it. It's marginally smaller than the Skyrocket with higher resolution.

Do you think I have enough frequencies?

I used Moto Maker to build my own Moto X. I chose "Woven Black" (looks like carbon fiber) for the back, a black front, "Metallic Silver" for an accent color, and a personalized signature.

I found a carbon fiber wallpaper to match the back.

An amazingly quick trip to the local AT&T store got me a free nano-SIM with no activation charge and I was up and going.

	Samsung Galaxy S II Skyrocket	Motorola Moto X
DESIGN
Device type	Smart phone	Smart phone
OS	Android (4.1.2, 2.3.6, 2.3.5) TouchWiz UI	Android (4.4.2, 4.4, 4.3, 4.2.2)
Dimensions	5.15 x 2.75 x 0.37 inches (131 x 70 x 9 mm)	5.09 x 2.57 x 0.41 inches (129.3 x 65.3 x 10.4 mm)
Weight	4.66 oz (132 g)	4.59 oz (130 g)
DISPLAY
Physical size	4.5 inches	4.7 inches
Resolution	480 x 800 pixels	720 x 1280 pixels
Pixel density	207 ppi	316 ppi
Technology	Super AMOLED Plus	AMOLED
Colors	16 777 216	16 777 216
Touchscreen	Multi-touch	Multi-touch
Features	Light sensor, Proximity sensor, Scratch-resistant glass	Light sensor, Proximity sensor, Scratch-resistant glass
CAMERA
Camera	8 megapixels	10 megapixels
Flash	LED	LED
Aperture size	F2.6	F2.4
Focal length (35mm equivalent)		30 mm
Camera sensor size	1/3.2"	1/2.6"
Features	Autofocus, Smile detection, Geo tagging, Panorama	Autofocus, Touch to focus, Digital zoom, Geo tagging, High Dynamic Range mode (HDR), Panorama
Camcorder	1920x1080 (1080p HD) (30 fps), 1280x720 (720p HD)	1920x1080 (1080p HD) (60 fps)
Features	Video light, Video calling
Front-facing camera	2 megapixels	2 megapixels
HARDWARE
System chip		Motorola X8 (Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro MSM8960)
Processor	Dual core, 1500 MHz	Dual core, 1700 MHz, Krait
Graphics processor	Yes	Adreno 320
System memory	1024 MB RAM	2048 MB RAM
Built-in storage	16 GB	32 GB
Maximum User Storage		28 GB
Storage expansion	microSD, microSDHC up to 32 GB
BATTERY
Talk time	7.00 hours	12.00 hours
Stand-by time	10.4 days (250 hours)	10.0 days (240 hours)
Capacity	1850 mAh	2200 mAh
Not user replaceable		Yes
MULTIMEDIA
Music player
Filter by	Album, Artist, Playlists	Album, Artist, Playlists
Features	Album art cover, Background playback	Album art cover, Background playback
Speakers		Earpiece, Loudspeaker
YouTube player	Yes	Yes
INTERNET BROWSING
Built-in online services support	Facebook, Picasa/Google+, Twitter	YouTube (upload), Picasa/Google+
TECHNOLOGY
GSM	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz
UMTS	850, 1900 MHz	850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz
FDD LTE	700 (band 17), 1700/2100 (band 4) MHz	700 (band 13), 850 (band 5), 1700/2100 (band 4), 1900 (band 2) MHz
Data	LTE, HSDPA+ (4G) 21.1 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE	LTE, HSDPA+ (4G) 42.2 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE, GPRS
nano-SIM		Yes
Positioning	A-GPS	GPS, A-GPS, S-GPS, Glonass
Navigation	Yes	Turn-by-turn navigation
CONNECTIVITY
Bluetooth	3.0	4.0 LE, EDR
Wi-Fi	802.11 a, b, g, n	802.11 a, b, g, n, n 5GHz, ac
Mobile hotspot	Yes	Yes
USB	USB 2.0	USB 2.0
Connector	microUSB	microUSB
Features	Mass storage device, USB charging	Mass storage device, USB charging
HDMI	via microUSB
Other	NFC, DLNA, Computer sync, OTA sync, SyncML	NFC, Tethering, Computer sync, OTA sync
OTHER FEATURES
Notifications	Haptic feedback, Music ringtones (MP3), Polyphonic ringtones, Vibration, Flight mode, Silent mode, Speakerphone	Haptic feedback, Music ringtones (MP3), Polyphonic ringtones, Vibration, Flight mode, Silent mode, Speakerphone
Sensors	Accelerometer, Gyroscope, Compass	Accelerometer, Compass
Hearing aid compatibility	M3	M3, T3
Other	Voice dialing, Voice commands, Voice recording	Voice dialing, Voice commands, Voice recording
AVAILABILITY
Officially announced	31 Oct 2011	01 Aug 2013

Source: phoneArena.com

According to Steve Jobs that would be a "retina" display.

The Moto X is smaller than the Skyrocket in every dimension other than thickness (0.04 inches). And it's lighter.

I got the Seidio Spring-Clip Holster (HLMTXPAS). I used to buy cheap holsters but then one broke and cost me a new screen on the Captivate.

And just in case I wanted to play with a different phone using that nano-SIM I got a MediaDevil Simdevil 3-in-1 SIM card adapter kit.

Now I'll go flash my Skyrocket anyway.

21st Century Video - Part 2

I recently retired my SageTV box and moved to the 21st Century with my video recording. However there are still a lot of steps required so I kept looking for a modern replacement to the SageTV. (If you don't remember what happened to SageTV read this.)

Over the holidays I came across a Foxconn nettop box and a SiliconDust HDHomeRun Prime. That looked like the parts I needed to start with.

Since the Foxconn system was barebones I put 4GB of RAM and a 500GB HD in it and installed Windows 7 Professional expecting to run Windows Media Center (WMC).

I started with the HDHomeRun Prime setup. It references WMC so I just played along for now.

I may still get to WMC but it is so much bigger than I need and I keep bumping into problems (mostly of my own doing).

WMC is a tremendously rich solution but I just want to record TV video just like I did with the SageTV. WMC is expecting to be a complete media center and therefore is picky about its video capabilities. Even with the latest drivers for the Intel video in the Foxconn system it wouldn't pass WMC's tests. I found that I wasn't the only one with this problem and there's even a registry hack that overrides WMC's check. That got me to the next step but WMC still complained that there was a "serious problem." I expect that that is because I'm using a VGA monitor not an HDCP compliant HDMI monitor.

As I don't really want to watch video on this system I moved on.

I found NextPVR and that seemed to be a good fit. There is a good article on Lifehacker and a follow-up blog here. After you download and install NextPVR be sure to load the patches before you start NextPVR even for the first time. Otherwise you'll have to go into Windows TaskManager and kill off the NRecord process to get the patched DLLs to copy.

There was a saga with Comcast and the CableCARD but that's nothing new. This thread on SiliconDust's forum was a huge help. Read that closely as one of the contributors notes that CableCARDs don't "scan" for channels but rather get a "map" from the provider. If you want the clear QAM channels as well you will need to scan and I did that before I inserted the CableCARD.

Comcast seems to send all the video down in MPEG2 format with AC3 audio. I used the Microsoft DTV-DVD Video Decoder and installed the LAV Filters for audio decoders.

Getting a program guide working is my next challenge.

What A Mess

Who hasn't heart about "Heartbleed?" But I like to put it in perspective.

Here's a click bait headline:

Tests confirm Heartbleed bug can expose server's private key

But go read it for yourself. The hacker was able to get the site's security certificate after "2.5 million requests" against a honeypot setup explicitly to be hacked. And keep reading. What did/could he do with that certificate? Signed an e-mail with it.

So if somebody hit your bank's site a couple of million times and got their security certificate they can't do ANYTHING with that without ANOTHER exploit that gives them a man-in-the-middle position.

Just a word to the wise: Don't do your online banking at Starbucks.

I'm not saying that "Heartbleed" isn't a real problem just keep it in perspective.

And about passwords "leaking" via "Heartbleed," any site worth it's salt (pardon the pun) is using good password management so the the passwords IN MEMORY should just be salted hashes.

Ok, sure. Go change your passwords if it makes you feel better.

And if you really want a placebo, go into your browser and enable the "Check for server certificate revocation."

Why is that a placebo? Read Steve Gibson's Certificate Revocation Pages:

1. Introduction
2. Commentary
3. Chrome's CRLSets

Clearly these are one person's opinion and a work in progress. Still, that's a real problem.

What a mess...

AutomateIT

Without airing all my dirty laundry I need to raise the level of security on my Android devices. At the same time I want to minimize the burden when I am in a "friendly" place like my home, car or office.

What I found was AutomateIT. It's free in the Play Store. There's also a Pro version. There was a good article on Lifehack that described how to use it.

AutomateIT comes with a starter set of rules. I just turned all of them off.

I created several pairs of rules. Each pair consisted of one rule that turned off the screen lock when I connected to a known network (Wi-Fi at home or office or BlueTooth in the car) and a complementary rule that turned the screen lock on when I disconnected from a known network.

Seemed easy.

Here's what my rules look like.

Editing the "When (car) is connected disable Lock Screen."

It is set to trigger when it connects to my car's BlueTooth. Then the action is to disable the screen lock.

Here's the detail.

Notice that the Action to "Enable/Disable Screen Lock" is the same and you specify whether to enable or disable with a check box. Odd but works fine.

So far, so good.

Now here's a log.

It reads bottom to top.

Let's start with the earliest full entry.

12:41:14 When (car) is connected disable Lock Screen - I started the car to drive to work.

So it unlocks the screen.

13:04:08 When (car) is disconnected enable Lock Screen - I get to work and turn off the car.

So it locks the screen.

13:04:16 When (work) is connected disable Lock Screen - I walked into the office.

So it unlocks the screen.

13:20:23 When (car) is connected disable Lock Screen - I started the car to leave work.

So it unlocks the screen. But wait. It was already unlocked.

13:20:36 When (work) is disconnected enable Lock Screen - I drove out of range of work's Wi-Fi.

So it locks the screen. But I'm in the car!

The next 2 entries are where I disabled the BlueTooth on the phone to try to get back in sync.

This really isn't a fault with AutomateIT. Perhaps AutomateIT Pro with composite triggers and composite actions can address this but it's going to get messy.

There's another situation that isn't the fault of AutomateIT. Often when AutomateIT toggles the screen lock, Android leaves the screen on. It locks it for touch but leaves the light on. To use the screen you have to tap the Power button to wake it up.

I'm undecided whether I'm going to stick with it.

DIAL

I can't believe it. I have never posted about my TiVos. It's a long story. Too long to go into here. Just suffice it to borrow a quote from The Verge:

There is nothing more instantly dangerous to the average relationship than screwing up the TV.

Amen.

Recently I was playing a YouTube video on my TV using my Chromecast. But when I clicked on the "Cast" button on the YouTube player here's what I got:

"Play on TiVo in the Den"? And it did.

Ok, what's going on here?

It turns out that the "Winter" update to my TiVo Premiere introduced DIAL (DIscovery And Launch) support. There's a little more documentation here. Pretty low key of TiVo if you ask me.

This means that DIAL-enabled applications can "cast" directly to the TiVo. At this time this seems to be YouTube and Netflix. Still a good start. Means I don't have to switch inputs on my TV to watch YouTube videos.

Lockscreen Shortcuts

I guess I've been asleep at the wheel. I was playing with Contacts+ and noticed that they had a widget. This led me to try to put something on my Skyrocket's lockscreen. Since the Skyrocket is still running Ice Cream Sandwich (4.1.2) I couldn't put a widget on my lockscreen but I was able to put a shortcut there.

Somehow I had missed that along the way but I apparently wasn't the only one. This thread tries to explain how to do it.

Here's what I did.

Go to "Settings" and then tap on "Lock screen."

Tap on "Lock screen options."

Make sure that the "Shortcuts" slider is "ON" and then (and here's the trick) tap on "Shortcuts."

Tap on the "+."

Now select an application to put on the lockscreen.

Ta da!

Adblock Plus

If you're not using Adblock Plus, you should be.

Here's what a Google search looks like without Adblock Plus:

And the same search with Adblock Plus:

Now that you are using Adblock Plus, go here and add "Disable Tracking" and "Disable Malware Domains" features.

I also include "EasyList" from here and "Block all Facebook annoyances" from here.

Also on the Adblock options page uncheck "Allow some non-intrusive advertising."

My Adblock options page looks like this:

Update:

Adblock Filters - 07/23/15

• Easylist https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/easylist.txt
• facebook annoyances blocker https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/fb_annoyances_full.txt
• Disable Malware https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/malwaredomains_full.txt
• EasyPrivacy https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/easyprivacy.txt
• Adblock Warning Removal List https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/antiadblockfilters.txt
• Message "seen" Remover for Facebook https://easylist-downloads.adblockplus.org/message_seen_remover_for_facebook.txt

I Sync Tasks

I'm a big user of various cloud services. As I mentioned in that post my wife and I were using a text file in Dropbox for grocery lists. That turned out to be painful as you had to tap in just the right place to put a cursor in a line so you could mark that you had gotten that item. I know it seems trivial but it was a nuisance and the WAF was low. Remember that I have my private domain hosted by Google Apps.

For my own "to do" lists, I've been using Google Tasks. There are interfaces to Tasks both from the Gmail page and the Calendar page. On Android I use Tasks. On iOS I use Go Tasks. They both work seamlessly with Google Tasks.

So I wondered if I could use Google Tasks for a grocery list. The presentaton is a natural list with a check-off box. Just what I needed.

But Google Tasks are specific to a single user. They aren't shareable. So began the quest.

First I found this blog post with a description of how to create your own Google App to share. It worked but the presentation was a unique web page and didn't seem to be readily presented on a mobile device.

Then I found I Sync Tasks. It simply just does what you want it to do.

You register with them using your Google account.

And tell them what Tasks list you want to share and with whom.

That's it. You can contribute $1 per month per user and make it sync more quickly. Seems well worth it.

Initially the sync was quick. Then after a while the frequency slowed down. I read the FAQ and it didn't specify the sync times. So I tweeted the author.

fastoy: @isynctasks I'm using isynctasks.de. What is the duration of the trial period? What is the sync frequency DURING and then AFTER the trial?
isynctasks: @fastoy 7 day trial; sync times vary, depend on multiple signals; within a minute during trial or if paid; within hours on the free plan.

Sign me up.

Gmail Shared Contacts

Continuing my quest for life in the cloud, I wanted to be able to share selected contacts with my wife. Remember that I have my private domain hosted by Google Apps.

The first solution was Apptivo but it was "bigger than a breadbox" (showing my age). I never did get it fully implemented as it was moderately complex. The upside is that it is free and you can sync contacts for 10 users with a 30 minute sync time. Here's their pricing. But it's messy. I never hooked my wife's account into it.

So I kept looking for something simpler.

I found Gmail Shared Contacts. The user side implementation is much simpler. Basically the domain administrator designates a contact group as shared and that's it. You can share 1 contact group with 25 or less contacts among unlimited users. Here's their pricing. The sync time is 1 hour. That's plenty for what I need.

The downside is that the application seems to be in transition. It has taken me over 6 weeks to finally get it working. The support is via e-mail from France but they are responsive and helpful. I'm hopeful that Gmail Shared Contacts settles down.

Both of these require the domain administrator to install a Google Marketplace App. Then you have a slight customization.

Neither Fish Nor Fowl

Recently BestBuy put the 32 GB Lenovo Miix 2 8" on sale for $199.99. I didn't need one but I couldn't resist.

I'm not just echoing what many others have said but this thing is really neither fish nor fowl. Its screen is too small to run the Windows Desktop and it doesn't have a physical keyboard available. And the Modern (Metro) interface, let's just say it makes me want for iOS.

It's not so much that the Metro interface is bad, it's just that it is different and not discernibly better than iOS or Android. The steps to close a Metro app are just bizarre. webOS had this right and iOS 7 pretty much copied that. Android isn't any better than Windows 8.1.

The Start icon appears in various places in the navigation and does different things depending on where you are.

Would you have figured out that this is the Desktop tile?

The physical Start button is capacitive so you have no sense of where it is nor does it "click" when you do touch it. There is some haptic feedback.

You can use the device without a Microsoft login but the Metro apps force you into using a Microsoft login. That means that you can't get e-mail (even Gmail) without logging into a Microsoft account first. Then that Microsoft account drags all its stuff along with it.

If your modus operandi is Microsoft that's probably good. If your modus operandi is Google or Yahoo that's at best confusing. I finally got the Mail app to read my Google e-mail using imap but it wouldn't send and didn't present any kind of error. There isn't a Google supported Gmail app and the Gmail app in the Store (Gmail Touch) wasn't intuitive to navigate, e.g. I couldn't figure out how to see my labels.

And the Live Tiles, they are pretty and "live" but some seem to change just to be changing. For example, the People tile keeps changing faces but when you tap on the tile it doesn't take you to the face that is presented. They don't represent senders of the e-mail in your inbasket. They're just random faces. Odd.

I really tried to like Windows 8.1.

You And The Horse You Rode In On

Background...

Back before Fall 2013 here's what Chrome's New Tab Page looked like:

There's a selection at the bottom center that let's you choose whether you want to see "Most visited" or "Apps." This screen capture shows the "Apps." At the bottom right are choices for "Other devices" and "Recently closed."

I was a big user of "Other devices" as I would use this to go pick up a page that I had left open on one of my other devices.

The cursor was placed in the Omnibox ready to enter a search string.

After Fall 2013 Google replaced the New Tab Page:

The top half of the screen is a Google doodle and a search field. But the cursor is still placed in the Omnibox ready to enter a search string. And the choice of "Most visited" or "Apps" is gone with only "Most visited" displayed. "Apps" is a link at the top left.

"Other devices" and "Recently closed" are in the "hamburger" menu at the top right.

Not much of this mattered to me except that the new "Other devices" list only contains 4 entries per device.

But it was possible to reinstate the previous New Tab Page by setting a flag in chrome://flags/.

So I set this and moved on.

But Google has a way of jumping up and biting you.

In v33 of Chrome the option in chrome://flags/ is gone and there is no alternative to the new New Tab Page.

That this has caused quite an uproar is an understatement.

The Google Chrome team's response has been very reminiscent of the Firefox team several years ago. Remember what has happened to Firefox's usage share since then.

Then the leader of the Google Chrome team responded.

Not a very friendly response to say the least.

Scroll up in the above thread to see how this was raised in the pre-stable releases. And Google's total non-response other than locking the threads.

In the end it looks like the function that I want ("Other devices") is still available on the History page.

I think that this is another instance of Chrome deprecating old APIs for future function or compatibility as I discussed here. A little transparency on the part of Google would have really helped.

Oh, the title of this post? Read here.

Rock, Meet Hard Place

One of my favorite Microsoft pundits Paul Thurrott had a post recently on the future of Windows. I borrowed his summary for the title of this post. Microsoft has found itself between a rock and a hard place.

Since Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows has been "good enough" for desktop users. Microsoft is going to finally kill off XP by abandoning security updates for it. Certainly they will do the same for Windows 7. That's already set for January 14, 2020. If only Microsoft had a "hook" for obsolescence like Intuit does with Quicken.

But Microsoft has a bigger plan if it succeeds. They are trying to converge the various consumer devices onto a single software platform.

Stepping back a for a moment, I see three mainstream consumer computing platforms today: Apple, Google, and Microsoft.

Apple clearly has their walled garden, i.e. iCloud, but seem to be some way away from converging Mac OS and iOS. And they are determined to be a sole source.

Google has their "Let one thousand flowers bloom" platform, i.e. Android, but this may be moving somewhat to their own walled garden. It wouldn't surprise me if the platform turned out to be Chrome rather than Android but that's another discussion.

Microsoft has the legacy platform, Windows, and their challenge is to transition to an ongoing platform. This is what the Metro Modern user interface (UI) is all about.

But the Modern UI is just the user interface. They key to the success of the platform is the platform. Can Microsoft converge the underpinnings of the three screens?

Obviously desktop Windows has a foothold but consumers aren't lining up for the current Windows 8 product. Windows Phone is making slow but steady inroads. Windows RT is all but dead.

The enterprise market is a completely different question. Windows Server and Linux have the server market locked. Same with desktop Windows.

The enterprise questions are "Is Microsoft going to push Modern UI so hard that enterprises rebel? Can they rebel?" There doesn't seem to be a serious alternative today.

I wonder if Chrome is the alternative. It's certainly a ways out in the future but it's cloud-based and hardware agnostic.

The real money for the IT vendors is in the backends. What will Chrome talk to? Windows Server? Linux? Unix? OpenStack?

Stay tuned for further updates...

OBiVoice

Remember in this post I said that there was another twist coming in my VoIP saga? Just after I had gotten my OBi100 up and working Obihai posted this on their blog.

Unfortunately, (after May 15, 2014) you will no longer be able to use the Google Voice communication service to make calls using the phone connected to your OBi device. Also, the ability to receive calls to your Google Voice number, directly from Google’s service, will not be possible.

Well, that burst my balloon. I decided to just ignore it for a while.

Then I found a thread on the OBiTALK forums that mentioned OBiVoice. They are part of Intelafone. Their BYOD (using OBi100) lite plan is $24.99 per year. This includes E911, free voicemail, free Caller ID, and 500 incoming/outcoming minutes/month. Their basic plan is $39.99 and has 2000 incoming/outcoming minutes/month.

I signed up for their free trial for 60 minutes over 30 days. While they are not an "approved service provider" with OBiTALK, OBiVoice has a simple copy and paste guide to setup the OBi100.

I went into the OBiTALK portal to put OBiVoice into the Service Provider 2 (SP2) slot. The instructions are here. Basically all you have to do is copy/paste the information from OBiVoice into OBiTALK.

(06:58:26) *** Ben Moore joined the chat ***
(06:58:26) Ben Moore: I'm setting up my OBi100. I'm looking at https://www.obivoice.com/byod.php. It has User Name as XXXX. Is that what I put in OBiTALK?
(06:58:29) *** Andrew joined the chat ***
(06:58:36) Andrew: Thank you for contacting Obivoice Customer Support. I am currently reviewing your question and will provide you with an answer momentarily.
(06:59:06) Andrew: Yes you can either put in the SIP credentials or use the automatic setup tool from that page.
(06:59:38) Ben Moore: The automatic setup page resets my device. I'm trying to add OBiVoice as SP2 on my OBi100.
(06:59:45) Ben Moore: Where do I get the SIP credentials to use?
(07:00:05) Andrew: On the Softphone/BYOD page of your web portal, under the Devices category.
(07:00:16) Ben Moore: Gotcha. Will do. Thanks.
(07:00:22) Andrew: Is there anything else I can help you with today?
(07:00:36) Ben Moore: Not so far. Seems easy.
(07:00:45) Andrew: Let me know if you have any trouble with it!
(07:00:46) Andrew: Thank you for contacting Obivoice Customer Support and have a wonderful rest of your day! [We appreciate your feedback. If you would like to rate this Support Chat today, please select one of the options below by clicking on the bullet point. Thank you!]
(07:00:50) Ben Moore: I found this assistance helpful.
(07:00:53) Andrew: [Thank you for your feedback. If you have any other questions please feel free to contact us back as we would be happy to assist you!]
(07:00:56) *** Andrew left the chat ***
(07:32:40) *** Ben Moore left the chat ***

Look closely at the time stamps. The representative joined the chat in THREE SECONDS. The whole transaction took 2 1/2 minutes. Customer service doesn't get much better than that.

OBiVoice has worked fine on the OBi100.

OBiTALK announced their approved service provider on 02/11/14. Their partner is Anveo. The basic offering is $39.99 per year. This includes free incoming calls, E911, free voicemail, free Caller ID, and 250 outgoing minutes/month.

I looked at my Google Voice log of minutes and I had used just under 800 incoming/outcoming minutes in the last month so I didn't think that 250 outgoing minutes would be enough.

I went with OBiVoice's basic plan. $40/year is still way less than the $50/month I was paying AT&T. I'm not porting my Google Voice number but just forwarding it to OBiVoice and spoofing the Caller ID to my Google Voice number.