Apple
Apple iPad
Jan 29th
When the Apple iPad was announced on Wednesday my immediate reaction was… “I want one!” Then, the more I thought about it I asked myself… “Why?”. About a year ago I was wondering why Apple didn’t release an iPod Touch that had Wi-Fi + 3G capability & now we know why they didn’t as they were developing the iPad. If something like that was out then, I wouldn’t have bought an iPhone. The iPad isn’t a breakthrough device and people are calling it the Kindle Killer. I disagree with that as the Kindle is a true eReader & will survive in the marketplace. They should have named it iPod Touch 3G XL instead & I’m perfectly happy with my iPad Nano (iPhone 3G).
Speedtest.net
Jul 8th
Speedtest.net is a broadband speed analysis tool that allows anyone to test their internet connection. I use this site all the time when it comes to measuring broadband speed & used it a few days ago for this entry. Ookla provides this service for free to anyone curious about the performance of their connection to and from hundreds of locations around the world. Buckeye Express also uses Ookla for their speed test site, http://performance.bex.net. What I didn’t realize is that they, Ookla, released a native iPhone/iPod Touch application. When you first launch the application, it will want to use your current location… just allow it. By doing so, it will find the closest test server. If you want to test a different server, you can choose which one you want within settings. You’ll be able to test Wi-Fi, 3G, & EDGE. In the results screen, it will give you the option to email that individual result. To delete results, just swipe from left to right on a specific result and you’ll get the delete button. Here are few screenshots:
AIM 3.0.1 on iPhone
Jun 23rd
AIM with push notifications on the iPhone is one of my favorite applications now. I haven’t had any problems with notifications coming through. The only annoyance I had is something I mentioned earlier within the comments on my previous entry:
I wish there was a way for AIM to know when your signed into a desktop client. Since AIM was keeping me signed in on the iPhone & when I sign on Pidgin… I would get a push notification and the message within Pidgin as well. I have to sign off manually via the iPhone.
Well, I found a little work around. When you are on your desktop client, set AIM on your iPhone as Away with a message of “On iPhone” or whatever you choose. With the iPhone set Away, this will stop the push notifications, but will still keep you signed in. When you sign off on your desktop client, people will be alerted that you are away, but will see your message about being “On iPhone”. After you are done with the desktop client, you can change your status on the iPhone back to Available. Also, if both the iPhone & the desktop client are away… the push notifications will come through.
AIM 3.0.1 iPhone Update
Jun 22nd
What’s new in this version:
- Stay logged in for up to 24 hours and receive notifications through Apple’s Push Notification Service (iPhone OS 3.0 or higher only) or via SMS when you receive new IMs.
- Support for landscape mode in buddy list and conversation views.
- Minor fixes or improved stability and performance.
TomTom for iPhone
Jun 9th
Peter-Frans Pauwels, TomTom’s co-founder and CTO, demonstrated TomTom’s navigation software in combination with a specially designed car kit on the iPhone during Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco this past Monday. It is the world’s first dedicated in-car navigation solution.
The TomTom solution combines two new TomTom products to provide users with state of the art in-car navigation on their iPhone 3G:
- The TomTom navigation application for iPhone; an Apple version of TomTom’s award-winning turn-by-turn navigation software, including IQ Routes and latest maps from Tele Atlas.
- The TomTom car kit for iPhone; a specially developed car kit for secure docking, enhanced GPS performance, clear voice instructions, hands-free calling and in-car charging.
The TomTom navigation application for iPhone will be available via the Apple iTunes App Store, following the release of Apple’s OS 3.0 operating system. Details regarding pricing and availability for both the application and the TomTom car kit for iPhone will be made available in advance of the products’ launch later this summer.
iPhone 3.0 / iPhone 3GS
Jun 9th
I love, eat, & breathe technology/gadgets. It’s one of the reasons why I started this blog years ago. Sometimes, there aren’t people around to talk about new technologies or share that same passion I do. It’s possible that only a few people read this blog regularly, but this gives me an outlet to share with others. Yesterday, Apple announced a few new items, but I’m only going to talk about the iPhone 3.0 software and the iPhone 3GS. The iPhone 3.0 software will be released next Wednesday, June 17th. Free to iPhone users and $9.95 for those that have an iPod Touch. As an iPhone 3G owner, I’ve been looking forward to this release for a few reasons. The main reason is for push notifications. I’m hoping that Gmail will finally be able to use this system. I know Gmail supports push as anyone with an Android phone get’s this ability. I believe Apple & Yahoo! had an agreement as Yahoo! was and still is the only service that would allow push notifications to be enabled. The other reason was for MMS. I’m a little bitter about the MMS news though. Even though the iPhone will support MMS next Wednesday… AT&T won’t support it until late summer. I know more people are happy to finally have a solid copy & paste solution, but there weren’t too many times that while using my phone I needed to copy & paste anything. I know there are more features and I’m sure if something awes me, I’ll post it on my blog. Since I just got my iPhone 3G this past February, I’m not going to spend the $499.00 (I qualified for a small discount) to upgrade to the iPhone 3GS, releasing next Friday; June 19th. I’ll qualify for an upgrade next year around June 10th. Which I’m sure they’ll have another iPhone coming out & I’ll just upgrade then. However, I really like that the new phone has a 3 megapixel camera with an auto focus & a touch to focus feature. The new phone also supports video capturing with streamlined editing and the ability to upload videos directly to YouTube. The ability to send this video directly to YouTube is a great selling point. There have been times where Caleb, my son, was doing something hilarious… but I don’t carry a video camera with me and times like that would make the new iPhone 3GS worth the $499.00. New customers to AT&T can get the phone for either $199.00 (16GB) or $299.00 (32GB). For non-qualified customers, including existing AT&T customers who want to upgrade from another phone or replace an iPhone 3G, the price with a new two-year agreement is $599 (16GB) or $699 (32GB). People are complaining about that, but really they shouldn’t be. That’s how it is on all carriers, just not AT&T. I still think the Palm Pre will only be 2nd or 3rd best at this point.
Flight Control v1.2
Jun 3rd
Firemint just released an update, v1.2, for their iPhone application called Flight Control. It includes new aircraft, two new airfields, & a fast forward option. It’s strange that they didn’t name the airfields, but here are the two new ones & the original;
I played, what I’ll call the Island airfield, & landed 97 aircraft my first try. It’s a great update & an excellent iPhone game that I recommend to anyone owning an iPhone/iPod Touch.
Flickit for iPhone
Feb 12th
I haven’t found an efficient way of uploading pictures from my iPhone to Flickr, but that all changed today. I found an application for the iPhone mentioned over at Lifehacker & it’s called Flickit developed by Green Volcano Software. It allows you to add photos from your iPhone library or take new shots directly with the camera. It also supports batch uploads (multiple photos). With each photo, you can add Flickr metadata such as title, description, and privacy settings. You can also assign tags, create new tags, sets, & tag photos with geolocation coordinates with the built-in geotagging function. I had a question regarding geotagging, so I sent an email to Green Volcano support. I use to upload my iPhone pictures via email to Flickr which keeps the EXIF location data. I noticed when uploading a picture via Flickit already within my iPhone library, the location is always unknown. So, you really can’t use the built-in geotagging function for older pictures unless you happen to be at the location from which you took the picture. My question to them was, “Does Flickit strip the data before uploading to Flickr?” I got an answer within an hour from them:
There are two kinds of geolocation tags on Flickr:
One is the geolocation data embedded in the EXIF metadata for a photo. You can see this in the ‘More properties’ link when viewing photo details.
The other type of geotag is the Flickr ‘map’ tag. This lives outside the EXIF data, and is seen as the ‘Taken in
‘ link in the photo details. If you email a photo to Flickr using iPhone’s mail app, it preserves all the embedded EXIF data, and you can see the first type of GPS coordinates if you look at the ‘more properties’ link. If you have the special “Import EXIF location data” setting turned ON for your Flickr account, then Flickr will automatically extract first type of geotag from the EXIF metadata into the 2nd Flickr version of the geotag. Otherwise, you still need to manually create the Flickr version of the geotag.
The problem is that there is a bug in the iPhone SDK that strips *all* EXIF data from a photo. (iPhone Mail seems to not have this problem) Currently, all iPhone developers are stuck having to re-create the EXIF data. Unfortunately, none of us will be able to re-create the GPS data from the original shot, and you can see this if you try to upload using any of the other iPhone Flickr apps. Some apps re-create the basic EXIF data, but GPS will always be missing.
So, the short of it is that you need to explicitly geotag the photo using the built-in geotagging function of Flickit in order for geotagging to ’stick’. There is no way to turn the original GPS coordinates into the Flickr version of the geotag.
His answer cleared everything up & hope that the bug in the iPhone SDK gets fixed or perhaps this is intentional by Apple for whatever reason. This is an app that I would have paid for, but you can download it for free.
[SOURCE: Lifehacker, Green Volcano Software]
Chipotle (Mobile Ordering)
Jan 13th
Chipotle Mobile Ordering builds upon their already substantial online ordering system by allowing iPhone and iPod Touch owners to find locations, customize their orders, save their favorites and pay for everything while on the go. Unfortunately the app was removed from the App Store due to the software being “buggy”. Hopefully it returns soon to download. Are there any other iPhone/iPod Touch users that would download this app?
[SOURCE: Gizmodo]
AppleTV Update
Oct 3rd
For those who own an AppleTV, Apple recently released version 2.2. Here is a table showing what changes they have made. They’ve added the iTunes 8.0 features… like Genius playlist, the ability to download HD TV shows & a few other new ones.
