While Lion and Safari 5 still do not natively support the display of favicons in the Bookmarks bar, there now is a way to display one of over 400 emoji icons in their stead.
With the release of OS X 10.7 Lion Apple inverted the direction of scrolling to match that of their iOS platform. Up become Down, Left became Right, and the setting was named “Natural Scrolling”.
The change to achieve cross-device consistency seems counter to the principle of cross-device coherency, which can be more forgiving and places a stronger emphasis on context. After all, the metaphor on iOS stems from direct-manipulation of an object, whereas the swipe direction on the laptop has its root in indirect manipulation, where one indicates the goal by the direction; the latter is still true with the scroll bar, and perhaps the scroll wheel on many Mice. This, combined with 10 years of acquired muscle memory has made the past week somewhat difficult but eventually my neurons rewired and I have finally come to terms with the brave new scrolling direction, as I chose to give the new paradigm a try.
In the end, Apple is going the route of gesture. As buttons, scroll bars, and mice fade away, gestures will need to become a predictable consistent and ultimately coherent convention.
I’ve been wanting to replace my cell phone service provider ever since I got the first generation iPhone a few years back as it has been consistently spotty and unreliable, especially in my home and commute route.
That is why I was very excited when slew of new Android devices made it to the market recently and began testing different carriers. After testing many providers I have decided to stay of AT&T for now, as they provided me with a free MicroCell to resolve my coverage issues at home. While it is true that their service is far from stellar in the SF Bay Area and they are not the cheapest provider, my personal experience with Virgin Mobile, Sprint, and T-Mobile was inferior. Looking back at my trial run I gotta say that you have to have a strong stomach and a good amount of time and money to shop around.
Virgin Mobile is one of the first prepaid carriers in the U.S. that carries Android devices. During my one week test I found coverage to be even more spotty and unreliable than with AT&T. Furthermore they experienced two lengthy data-outages (“We’re upgrading the network”), which is not something I had ever encountered with AT&T.
Cost for one person: $60 for 1,000 minutes. Cost for my family: $150 for 1,000-1,500 minutes each (two smart phones, one feature phone).
T-Mobile was the next carrier I tried because of their “4G” network (HSPA+), return policies, and phone selection. I got the brand-new LG G2X, which in my opinion is the only Android phone that can compete with the iPhone. The build of the phone is great and the dual-core processors ensure significantly smoother scrolling than customary on Android devices. Service was generally reliable and the “4G” network was speedy and widely available. Alas, my block is in a complete T-Mobile dead-zone. They do allow you to make/receive phone calls and send messages using your T-Mobile phone number. Update: Tech Support told us that they are sending a technician to the area to test coverage and that we may get a cell repeater. Update: No improvement to coverage. Went to return phone to Costco, which told me that there actually is a $35 activation fee, if you are not satisfied with the service. This was in contradiction to what they had told me earlier. I called T-Mobile and they told me that they are not charge an activation fee. Shady.
Cost for one person: $80 plus tax for unlimited everything. Cost for my family: $155 for unlimited everything (two smart phones, one feature phone).
I tested Sprint last year when the HTC Evo 4G was first released last summer. I was pleased with their SF Bay Area coverage although it was not notably better than AT&T’s. Phone calls were more reliable. However, Sprint did not offer 4G in my area (but charged for it) and the Evo was clunky and had poor battery-life. A year later there still is not 4G coverage and the Evo is still their flagship phone (although the latter is about to change).
Cost: Similar to AT&T.
I am not going to give Verizon a shot until they have more compelling LTE phones. I actually was about to drop $300 for the new iPhone, but when I asked them if they could waive the activation fee the sales rep told me that “sorry, I can’t help you with that”. I considered getting the iPhone from a reseller but since AT&T resolved my home coverage issues I’ll stick it out with them for now. I did play with the Thunderbolt 4G but it did not have impress me; it felt clunky, heavy, sluggish, had low screen resolution, and according to reviews terrible battery life even for an Android device.
Lifehacker has jolted me into starting to blog my design thoughts and ideas, as again I sat on an idea for months/years, to see it posted somewhere else later as a how-to.
So, check out lifehacker to find out how you can make a hipster iPhone stand out of pizza box support.
http://lifehacker.com/5752712/turn-a-pizza-box-support-into-a-phone-stand
While I have not followed Apple’s moves in-depth in recent months, here are my predictions for today, and the coming weeks, based on recent news reports and instinct:
Very Likely:
Likely:
Maybe:
Of course there may be a disruptive surprise in the bag, as with many Apple events. One can only guess what that would be, but it probably won’t be one of these:
Only time, and Steve, will tell.
How to Save $500 on a Pimped-Out 13″ MacBook Pro
Disclaimer: I’m in no way affiliated with OWC or Deal RAM. My recommendations merely express my opinion as a consumer and is based on my limited anecdotal experiences.
If you recently bought a base MacBook or are in the process of purchasing one but are sticker-shocked by the price Apple’s RAM and Hard Disk options fret not. Upgrading your MacBook is easy, quick, affordable, and if you purchase OWC’s hard drive upgrade kit even leaves you with an extra 160GB USB 2.0 hard drive.
Apple’s base MacBook Pro 13″ costs $1,200 and has a meager 2GB RAM and 160GB HD. If you’re like me and have a lot of videos/songs or want to run Windows in Boot Camp or VMware then this setup is not quite sufficient.Apple allows you to custom-build the MacBook Pro with formidable 8GB RAM and decent 500GB hard drive. But it will set you back $2,100.
Wait, almost double the price than the base model? Yup! So, if you’re fearless and eager to save 5 Benjamins from falling into Steve’s clutches then you should consider doing the upgrade yourself leaving you with a much more comfortable sticker price of $1,700.
There are a lot of third-party options out there, but I chose OWC as my one-stop shop for getting the RAM and Hard Drive because in my experience they’ve proven to be very fast, reliable, provide great instructional materials and their hard drive upgrade tool-kit greatly simplifies cloning your existing data to your new hard drive. However, If you’re really pressed for cash you can shop around for even cheaper deals.
Instructions on how to clone your existing Mac and/or Bootcamp partition:
Instructions on how to replace your hard drive and/or RAM:
I hope that you’ll find these instructions helpful and will put the money you save to good use.
Source: Engadget.
Update June 26, 2010: I’ve visited the Apple Store this weekend to check-out the new iPhone. It’s quite beautiful but also uncomfortable to hold. I tried 3 random iPhone 4s in the store and all had the Antenna issue.
I’m not sure I will be getting a new iPhone after all given the many issues that have surfaced in the past couple days:
Apple’s response to the Antenna issue reeks of ignorance and arrogance. If brand relationships are a dialog then I certainly don’t want to keep talking to a jerk. Here is Apple’s current answer to the officially acknowledged antenna problems:
Gripping any mobile phone will result in some attenuation of its antenna performance, with certain places being worse than others depending on the placement of the antennas. This is a fact of life for every wireless phone. If you ever experience this on your iPhone 4, avoid gripping it in the lower left corner in a way that covers both sides of the black strip in the metal band, or simply use one of many available cases.
And Steve Job’s response:
It’s not a big issue.
Really? If I cannot hold the phone, can you at least make it levitate, instead of forcing me to hold it in an unnatural way or by making me buy one of your rubber bandaids? It’s no a big issue? I’d call it the design & engineering mistake of the decade.
My Other Reactions to the new iPhone 4:
I’ve been somewhat left cold by the news surrounding the upcoming upcoming Nintendo 3DS and its purported support for 3D displays and gaming.
However, after Apple announced its slick “Facetime” video chat software and seeing the latest rumors about the 3DS to feature a 3D capable camera in the front I am beginning to wonder if Nintendo isn’t going to leap-frog the competition once more by upgrading its video chat capability that was introduced with the DSi to support 3D video chat. While, like Facetime this feature would only work for a small niche of users initially, Nintendo could provide 2D backwards compatibility with the 18+ million DSi users world wide, giving it an instant edge.
What do you think? Will the new Nintendo DS 3D support 3D video-chat and would you be interested?
The devil lies in the details. In a sign that reaffirms the coming end of physical delivery systems (including the phyrric winner of the HDVD vs. Blue-Ray battle) Netflix has promoted it’s “Watch Instantly” tab to the first spot in it’s main navigation.
In the fifth class we turned in our first written assignment, the RDR1. Then read and discussed two sample interview transcripts, focusing on what good and bad interview practices could be drawn from either. Before the break the different groups critiqued each other’s questions. Although no one from my team was present I did receive their inputs and believe that we have a good set of questions to take into the field.
To put the Peshkin readings into practice we listened to a short essay about subjectivity (or reflexivity) by Rene and then were tasked to think about our own subjectivity and it’s positive or negative impact on our research. Lastly, we were given a broad overview of the Qualitative Research Process, since we would only be able to practice a small subset of it in this class.
