May 2013
1 post
April 2013
1 post
4 tags
March 2013
5 posts
5 tags
Side Effect Of Closing Reader: Mistrust →
Trust is difficult to develop and easy to lose. Even Google, which has a pretty loyal following is losing users trust by shutting down services. What is interesting to me about this reddit is not about another note taking service, but people’s response both sparky and sincere.
Knowing that few people bother to comment online and reddit is a somewhat specialized place, I have to wonder...
3 tags
Google Stops Enforcing Blocked Sites In Search...
Is Google trying to self destruct or have they gotten so big they think they can’t fail? Over the last few years the company has shut down service after service which individually may have impacted a small percentage of their users, but perhaps collectively impacted more. I don’t know. What I do know is that the more things they shutdown that differentiates them from the others, the less likely I...
4 tags
Vaule is a two way street
For every service that I use which Google shuts down is one more reason why I have less and less reason to use Google for anything. While I know that Google gets value from me (individually and as part of an aggregate) using their service from data collection, ad serving, and so on, I too get value from using Google services and most importantly, from Google’s ecosystem.
Take that...
6 tags
EA's Real Racing 3: Free And Worth Every Penny
I had already written about Android racing games and I was looking forward to Real Racing 3. I finally raced my way through Real Racing 2 and I had a blast doing it. I still play the game when I have time to kill and I enjoy the impressive graphics, the smooth game play, and the challenge. When Real Racing 3 came out,I picked it up. In this round, the game is free and EA is relying on...
February 2013
4 posts
When boss asks for a volunteer to deploy on the...
devopsreactions:
Submitted by Barbarius
3 tags
Social Media Stickiness Survey Results
Here are the results from the social media survey I fielded on social media stickiness. The idea of stickiness is interesting to me and in this survey, I assumed (and asked mostly about) the effect of following others affect stickiness. The assumption being that stickiness is due to those you follow, not those who follow you. There’s an obvious Twitter bias in my questions too.
Not...
5 tags
Half-baked Thoughts On Authentication
TL:DR Replacing passwords with tokens for consumer Internet services is doomed to fail. We need a federated authentication system that works for end-users, authorities, and relying parties.
While there has been an ever more vocal call to do away with passwords for authentication, there has been little talking about what to replace them with. Passwords are here to stay. Get over it. They are easy...
5 tags
RasberryPI, USB Power, and the Cable Conundrum
I picked up a Raspberry PI the other week and couldn’t wait to get to work on it. I grabbed a Fedora 18 Remix, transferred the image to an SD card, pluged it into my HDTV and was off to the races. I did notice, however, that when I plugged in my RaspberryPI, the NIC wouldn’t light up. Since I was planning on using this as a utility server (DNS, DHCP, OpenVPN, whatever), it needed to...
January 2013
7 posts
5 tags
7 tags
How to get root on a locked Asus Transformer Prime...
Like most of you, I too lost root on my Asus Transformer Prime when I updated to Jelly Bean. I just didn’t get around to doing anything about recovering it until now. I tried installing TWRP and it failed. I had sent in my TF201 for repair and I think they locked the bootloader because I know I had unlocked it. That tells me either there is an error in the TWRP installer OR the bootloader...
5 tags
2 tags
How to Live with Introverts →
America's Real Criminal Element: Lead →
New research finds Pb is the hidden villain behind violent crime, lower IQs, and even the ADHD epidemic. And fixing the problem is a lot cheaper than doing nothing.
4 tags
Android Fragmentation is a Pernicious Myth
One of the oldest and most common myths that chaps my ass is that Android is fragmented. The first instance I found was in 2007, there may be earlier instances. It’s not fragmented and saying so doesn’t make it so. Android, like all software, has a version problem which is exacerbated by handset makers’ and carriers reluctance to update the OS, but that’s isn’t...
December 2012
3 posts
6 tags
Week-end Project: Geek Desk
I work at home in front of a computer all day long. That makes for a lot of sitting which gets uncomfortable after a few hours. It’s not always convenient to get up and walk around. I may be on a call and I need to take notes, for example. I wanted a desk that I could work at while sitting or standing and it had to be motorized. I wasn’t going to move my laptop from one stage to...
7 tags
Solution to Google Search Not Working In Firefox →
When Firefox updated to 17.0.1 yesterday, Searching Google broke in what seemed to me in a very weird way. I could run a search using the Search bar, but I couldn’t get to page 2 or any other page. New searches would result in the site bar, search box, and a white page. Oddly, if I went into Advanced Search, everything would return to normal for a while.
I tried removing all add-ons and...
6 tags
Netflix November ISP Rankings for the USA →
This is good work by Netflix and I wish more content providers would report similar findings. Service providers are trying to squeeze customers and content providers alike and without performance reporting, customers can’t make informed decisions.
November 2012
5 posts
5 tags
It is moral to do what could be automated. →
“if you are allowed [to drive manually], it would be immoral of you to drive, because the risk of you hurting yourself or another person will be far greater than if you allowed a machine to do the work.” Ridiculous. Of course it will be moral to drive. Sheesh. People can drive safely today and if they are taught to do so in the future, they will be able to drive as safely as an...
8 tags
The Hidden Cost of Not Buying Apple
While I like my Galaxy Nexus, the battery life sucks. The battery on my OG Droid sucked too, but I bought an extended battery that left an unsightly bulge but gave me a day and a half of battery with full use. I don’t expect battery life to get better with newer phones, either. I get maybe 6 hours with light use. 2 - 2 1/2 hours if I am actually using it. Since I work at home,...
doraemina asked: Hi. I am developing an Android Storybook application. One of my app's features will be animation. I will be creating 10 books. I dont want to use layout for every scenes of each books because the app will have a large file size.... What is the most effective and efficient way to do this animation? Can I use containers for this? pls reply. Thankyou.
8 tags
What If Microsoft Copied Android's API?
While reading this really long but well thought out comment on Reddit, it occurred to me that Microsoft will struggle to attract developers to Windows 8 RT. But wouldn’t it be funny and forward thinking of Redmond simply copied Android or iOS’s API’s so that Windows 8 could run those applications natively?
Microsoft would have instant access to 100’s of 1,000’s of...
5 tags
Asus Tech Support Saga Begins
A few months after picking up my Asus Transformer Prime, I noticed an issue where for no reason, there were touches on the display and I wasn’t actually touching it. Ghost touches, I guess. I searched the net trying to find something similar and finding nothing, I started to remove applications I had installed starting with the most recent. Eventually the Ghost Touching stopped. A few days...
3 tags
October 2012
9 posts
8 tags
EA Makes The Best Android Racing Games
Here’s my pick of the top racing games. My criteria are simple. A good game has to be visually stunning, have interesting tracks, have challenging AI, contain realistic physics and be fun. My Galaxy Nexus is a good gaming device and there are three racing games that I’ve found so far that fit the bill. My favorite is Real Racing 2 from EA.
Real Racing 2
It’s got it all. The...
6 tags
New Nexus's look good, but no SD card is a downer →
Hey, I understand that a lot of people have the unreasonable expectation of being cloud connected 24x7, but then again, they don’t travel, sit is hotel rooms with Wi-Fi that is slower than dial-up. Yah know, the rest of us outside Silicon Valley. I really like the Nexus 10 and I’d buy one but the lack of SD is a significant issue.
4 tags
cxthecloud asked: Do you use any type of cloud storage? If so, what kind, and why?
5 tags
The Google Drive Back Door That Isn't →
This news item has been floating around for a few days and it’s misleading. There is no backdoor.
For a few years now Google has been merging it’s services to provide a seamless user experience and that includes single sign-on. Sign into one service and you sign into them all. I am sure there are some services that haven’t been included yet, but they will be.
So yes, if you use...
3 tags
99 Life Hacks to make your life easier!
shialabeowulf:
5 tags
Cleaning Up Behind Cloud Storage
I was cleaning up a computer today and removing some applications that use Internet services for data storage and replications and discovered that while the applications were removed, the data was left behind. This was true for Dropbox, SugarSync, and Evernote. I haven’t tried other cloud storage offerings.
I am not sure if applications should or should not automatically delete the local...
September 2012
1 post
4 tags
Learning To Write Android Apps
The process is pretty straight forward. Here’s the short version. Learn Java. Get familiar with the Android API. Walk through the tutorials. Learn to use search to answer questions on how to do something. Get an account on Stack Overflow and participate (ask and answer questions). Think up an app you want/need and get coding. The longer answer Whether or not you already know a programming...
August 2012
3 posts
6 tags
Mounting Android .img files on Windows
Opening or mounting Android image files under Windows is not straightforward. However, based on this post on XDA, it is rather simple. This is based on Googles Factory Android Images. This process may not work with other images.
Here is what we are going to do. Get the stock image. Extract the .img file. Convert the .img file to Ext4. Open the converted file under Windows.
You will need:
7-Zip...
5 tags
6 tags
Google Off-Line Maps Are Useless; You Still Need A...
TL:DR With Google Maps off-line maps, you can only see where you are. That’s it. Nothing else.
When Google announced off-line maps at GoogleIO, the Android world went ga-ga over the fact that they could now use Google Maps when they don’t have a data connection. What no one reported and what was painfully obvious by what Google didn’t show is that the off-line maps is useless...
July 2012
2 posts
4 tags
2 tags
Running Inspiration
While I have been successful running so far—my running intervals are getting longer, my walking intervals shorter, and I am recovering faster—which is my main source of motivation, others sources include people around me. We all run at our own pace and keep going.
The wife and I walk our dogs almost everyday on a trail near our house. Rain, snow, sun, sub-zero temps, we’re out...
June 2012
2 posts
5 tags
Why Would I Want a Q or Any Single Service Media...
Google announced their Q media device. It lets you stream video and music from Google’s content systems or your Android devices. It looks cool and has some nice features.Here’s the dealkiller. It only plays Google’s content.
Worse, the social sharing features are neat, but my friends and family who are almost all iPhone users can’t use them. Totally limited by the walled...
4 tags
Amazon Sucks at Search
They really do. They suck so bad at search, that I often don’t buy things because I can’t find them. What is really surprising is how bad Amazon sucks at searching video.
Look for new releases and.what you get are videos that have been newly added to Amazon’s catalog including 60 year old films. It’s a joke. But wait, it gets worse.
We wanted to see the movie “Man...
May 2012
1 post
4 tags
I am a runner
I have finally convinced myself—changed my self-perception—that I am runner. When ever I made a big life change, it occurred with a perception shift. I am convinced a big change won’t happen without a corresponding perception shift.
I remember when I quit smoking. It was midnight, I had one cigarette left and when I finished it, I said to myself “I am non-smoker” and...
April 2012
5 posts
5 tags
VM Snapshots and Dropbox
I asked myself What would happen if I
take a snapshot of a VM that is running Dropbox,
I then modify a file synchronized withing Drop Box, and then
restore the snapshot (reverting changes)?
Would Dropbox retain my newly modified file or replicate my old file?
My thought was that it would replicate my old file over my newly modified file, but at least in initial testing, I was wrong....
3 tags
"Tell someone you love them today, because life is... →
Courtesy Richard P. Goldberg @GoldbergLawDC
4 tags
4 tags
FRAND IP use in standards →
5 tags
March 2012
4 posts
1 tag
NYT: A Catholic Classmate Rethinks His Religion →
Column on humanity, beliefs, *isms, and a journey from blind faith to thoughtfullness.
