Tag: iphone

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Your iPhone is tracking you!

Oh yeah, time to freak out, because your iPhone is tracking you! Well, it’s tracking itself, or cell towers, or wifi access points, or… something of interest, but sadly, it’s not doing a great job at it.

For some people, this is “Big Brother” type of scare… and for others (fans of geo-tracking) it’s not quite good enough.

I grabbed iPhone Tracker, and dug through some of my files, and took a look at the SQLite database, and was fascinated by the data (I tend to get fascinated by data) but I didn’t feel like alerting the media about it…

Will Clarke has a nice blog post about this as well. It’s worth a read.

Here’s some data that was marked 2010-12-29. I’m not sure what that date refers to, but this seems to show my trip taken on 2011-01-01. I find it interesting to see this data. Back in mid-2010 I wrote some code to make an archive of my Foursquare data, with the thought I would map it all out at some point. Sadly, I’ve collected a lot of data, but haven’t done anything useful with it yet. Maybe it would make more sense for me to just get my geo-data directly from my iPhone. I mean, I don’t even have to check in and it knows (roughly) where I’ve been!

This seems to do a poor job of showing where I was. I mean, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t in all of these location. Maybe it was just my phone connecting to towers in all of these locations…

A nice table view of some of the geo-data the iPhone records. Now to figure out how to use it for something good. Or bad. Or somewhere in-between.

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iPod Review – Five Years Later

iPod

I got an iPod for Christmas in 2005. I’m going to review it now. Wait, 2005… Is that a typo!? No…

I’m still using the first iPod I ever got. My wife gave me the 5th generation 30GB iPod with video. And yes, I did review this iPod back in 2007. So what? I’m reviewing it again.

I love this iPod. I have not felt the urge to upgrade or replace it. It works as well as it did 5 years ago when I got it. The interface is simple and easy to use. It does one thing, and it does it well.

I use this iPod almost every day. At least, every day I drive. I’d guess that 98% of its usage is in my car as an audio player connected to my car stereo. I have no desire to get an iPod touch, as I actually think the interface would be much more difficult to use while driving. In my previous review I did mention something about this:

The iPod interface also requires you to look, or at least be able to feel around and guess where to push. Other players (with actual buttons) allow you to memorize where the buttons are and what they do. I could operate my Rio while driving and never take my eyes off the road. This seems to be a big concern with the iPhone as well, it will require visual attention to be able to use it.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been using the old iPod interface for so long, but I feel much more at ease using it to navigate for music playing than I do for my iPhone. It’s all spin and click, no typing or swiping.

I still on occasion have an issue with the iPod not turning off, but it happens seldom enough that it’s not really a bother. Battery life also seems a bit shorter than it used to be, but hey, it is 5 years old and has been used a lot. The battery does hold a charge, so that’s good. The only really bothersome thing is that at some point it got confused and started showing the wrong artwork for some of the files on it. So I’ll be listening to Sleep and it shows album cover art for Cat Power. I’ve gotten used to it. A restore might fix that, but I’ve never had the energy to do one.

I don’t need apps, or wifi, or a camera, or anything except a music player, so as long as it holds out, I’ll keep using the 5th generation 30GB iPod for my automotive audio needs.

(And yes, I do realize that by posting the sentence above, it will somehow cease to function within a matter of weeks. I’ll let you know when that happens.)

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The Obsession with Easy

Cat

Being involved with technology may have tainted my opinions for the past 30+ years, but it seems like now more than ever, there’s this push to make thing easier to use… maybe it’s always been this way, but the last few years (perhaps fueled by the iPhone/iPod) it’s been all about making things easier, and I find it slightly annoying.

Matt recently talked about ease of installation explaining that there may be (gasp!) 4 steps involved in installing an application. How does anyone even succeed at such a Herculean task? 4 steps! It’s a wonder we all don’t just stick our heads in the oven and turn on the gas. (There’s probably too many steps involved.)

For people that just want to “use” software, I suppose they do want it easier, I mean, who wants to spend the time to learn something when there’s cat pictures to look at.

My point is, while it’s good to simplify things, and make things easier, you may still need to do some work… and that’s OK. In fact, it’s a good thing, and should be encouraged. I wonder if brain surgeons bitch about “how hard” brain surgery is, and wish that it were easier, and someone would come up with a better way to do it that just required pushing one button or performing less than 5 steps.

I had to learn to use a lawnmower, and a screen press, and how to drive a car, and gift wrap a box (I’m still learning that one) but the point is, you still have to learn things, and if you have to learn how to use an iPhone, or an iPad, or a computer, or any piece of technology, I think that’s fine. Things will advance, but we still have to learn. Compare programming a VCR to programming a DVR. We are making progress, but yes, you still need to learn.

By the way, do schools teach kids how to learn yet?

(See Also: The Dumbing Down)

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iPhoney

iPhoney is an iPhone simulator for web designers and developers that runs on Mac OS X. You can grab a copy of it from Marketcircle’s iPhoney page. (iPhoney is open source, and you can also find it on Sourceforge, though as of this writing the version there is not the latest.)

iPhoney does an ok-but-not-great job of replicating the iPhone Mobile Safari browsing experience. There is an option for Zoom to Fit as well as Hide/Show Location Bar, and it does let you View Source. You can also rotate it. (You can’t pinch/zoom or change the magnification beyond the Zoom to Fit capabilities.)

Here are some screen shots comparing Mobile Safari running on an actual iPhone versus running in iPhoney. (This post was used for comparison.)

Fig. 1: Mobile Safari on iPhone (vertical)

Fig. 1: Mobile Safari on iPhone (vertical)

Fig. 2: Mobile Safari on iPhone (vertical)

Fig. 2: Mobile Safari on iPhone (horizontal)

Fig. 3: iPhoney (vertical)

Fig. 3: iPhoney (vertical)

Fig. 4: iPhoney (vertical)

Fig. 4: iPhoney (horizontal)

I’ve found iPhoney useful for basic testing. It obviously does not take the place of an actual iPhone for proper testing, but if you just want a quick overview of how a page might look, it’ll work just fine. Also, since it’s open source, you can feel free to use the code as you wish, and even improve it. (Under the terms of the GPL of course.)

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Twitter Apps Reviewed

There are a lot of choices in Twitter apps for the iPhone (and now the iPad) but how do you choose which one you should use?

Obviously there is one criteria that is most important when looking at Twitter clients… Which one has the cutest icon?

Twitterrific Twitteriffic: I’m not a fan of birds, but the name “Twitter” and “tweet” and what not, it’s part of the Twitter brand, so it makes sense. This icon is probably cute if you like birds, but as I said, I don’t like birds.


Twitter Twitter for iPhone: This is the “official” Twitter client, and it’s not very cute. Another stupid bird. I’m not a fan of birds. Couldn’t they make a cute bird instead of this goofy silhouette bird?


Twittelator Twittelator: OK, this isn’t even a bird, it’s an egg! How is an egg cute? I guess if you don’t like birds (like I don’t like birds) then maybe Twittelator would be cute. Well, cuter than a bird anyway. (Though it appears to be a bird egg, so maybe it will be a bird someday.)


TwitBird TwitBird: Another bird? And this is really the most uncute bird of them all. It’s worse that the “official” Twitter for iPhone bird. Who wants to look at this bird? Not me! (The bright orange sunburst is sort of nice though…)


EchoFon EchoFon: Finally, not a bird! It appears to be a word balloon type thing. I suppose that’s better than a bird, but as far as being cute, this is not cute. Unless you somehow think word balloons are cute. Plus, it’s just one word balloon, not two, so it’s not even a proper conversation, it’s just one person shouting.


Osfoora Osfoora: Like EchoFon, Osfoora has an uncute name, and an uncute icon. Not one, but two word balloons! If one isn’t cute, how are two going to be cute? At least it looks like a conversation, which is what Twitter can and should be, unlike the one EchoFon balloon that looks like just one person talking.


HootSuite HootSuite: Finally, a cute bird! It’s an owl, and I really like owls. I like when they turn their heads around and rip apart mice. Owls are cool. HootSuite has a cool looking owl. It’s a bird, but not a stupid bird like other apps have. Owls are the best birds.


Brizzly Brizzly: OMG! From what I can tell, this is a bear wearing a bird costume! How freakin’ cute is that!? I mean, bears are way cuter than birds, but this bear has stepped it up a notch by masquerading as a bird, but he’s not really a bird. The cute-o-meter is almost up to 11 on this one!


Seesmic Seesmic: Home Run! It’s a raccoon! I mean… Come on! How cute is that little raccoon!? He’s got big eyes, and he looks a little startled like maybe you scared him, and he’s wearing a mask, because he’s a raccoon!


Wow, things got exciting at the end, eh? I mean, a bear and a raccoon battling it out for the supreme titled of Best Twitter App (based on how cute the icon is.) It’s a tough decisions… Bear or raccoon? I really don’t think you can go wrong with either one.