An Apple a day

OK I admit it. I'm an Apple fan.

Not a "fanboi" in the sense that I don't believe in any tech other than that coming out of 1 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, but over the last 5-6 years I've slowly moved to an entirely Apple setup.

As the photo shows, I now have the complete set. An iPhone 5s, an iPad Mini, a 13" Macbook Pro, and the latest addition, a 21" iMac desktop.

I don't hate Windows as an operating system - I use it every day in work, and there's at least 3 Windows boxes/laptops loitering around the house. My Apple kit though offers everything I need, in every form factor I need (for the moment). And I'm very happy with it. It works, it synchronises together seamleslsy, and combined that many of my "go to" applications are now cloud based (Dropbox, Evernote, Skype, Twitter, Facebook, Gmail etc) it means I always have access to what I need.

I've been fortunate enough that circumstances have allowed me to migrate to Apple devices on a "want" basis - I want it, I don't "need" it. And I'm grateful for that.

The latest piece of kit is that gorgeous 21" iMac. It's the "base" model - but that still comes in at a hefty price. In part you're paying for the Apple brand, but you do get what you pay for. All my Apple devices are stunningly designed, they work pretty flawlessly, and they last a long time.  My Macbook Pro is over 4 years old now, and but for a swap out of the original hard drive for a bigger SSD a couple of months ago, and a RAM boost a couple of years ago, works as well now as it did when I first got it. And it still looks as good as new. The iMac though is the pick of the bunch. It wouldn't look out of place anywhere. It's amazingly thin considering that monitor house all the gubbins. There's only 1 lead - the power lead. It's a work of art. the mouse and keyboard are wireless - the keyboard itself is stunningly engineered - how can you say that about something as mundane as a keyboard?

It's kit that wants to be used. And it's a pleasure to use it.

Four of the best

I've posted something similar to this before, but it was a while ago, and may be useful to rehash for those of you who are newer to smartphones, or have not come across these before (unlikely.

In no particular order - well that's not strictly true - I'm going by the order they appear on my phone.....

Evernote

 Evernote is the ideal app for storing your snippets of stuff. It's cross platform, so there are variants for Windows, Mac, iOS, Android etc and it has an online app too - by default you sync your stuff to the cloud, but if you run it off several devices it's available everywhere. You can store notes, audio, photos, files etc etc. Basic comes free - if you have lots you start to pay, but it's worth it. There are also browser plug ins so you can snip info straight from web pages - or even whole web pages if you want. If you store loads of "stuff", it's a no brainer.

Dropbox

One of the earliest modern "cloud" repositories and arguably still one of the best. Download the app (again it's cross platform), and anything you save in your dropbox folder gets synced to the cloud - where you can also access it online. It's got versioning, sharing and loads more. Again, there's a rather stingy 2GB limit on the free version, but you can pay for more space. Again, where-ever you are whatever device you're using, you can access your Dropbox stuff.

WeekCal

I use the calendar on my iPhone a lot. The bog standard Apple calendar however is fairly sparse in functionality. I've long used WeekCal in it's place. It's brilliant. Loads of options, loads of views, great support. It syncs to the inbuilt calendar so if like me you use your iPhone hooked via iCloud to a Macbook (or Mac desktop) everything is there, all the time. A highly polished calendar app and highly recommended.

1Password

There are a myriad of password managers out there. You really need one. No you really do. Really. If you're using the same password, or simple passwords for multiple sites, frankly you're an idiot (sorry, but it's true). You're just asking to get hacked, and probably, sooner or later you will be.

1Password allows you to create and manage complicated paswords that look like "gGt6%_43@£449+qEsW3" (and no, that's not one of mine). But the beauty of it is, you don't need to know this, and you certainly don't need to remember it. 1Password does the creation, storing and retrieval from a browser plug in. All you need to do is have one (1) secure master password. Password does the rest. There are as I said, lots of these password managers/vaults out there. 1Password is pricy. But in my view it's the best. Also cross platform, so I have it on my PC, my Macbook and my iPhone and it all stays nicely in sync without me worrying about it. 

Apple goodness....Lion, iOS5 and iCloud

For users of Apple products (and that's me with an iPhone 4 and a Macbook Pro), the keynote delivered by Steve Jobs and his crew at this week's WWDC has shown us some wondrous goodies that we can expect over the next few months.

I'm no techie, so I'm not going into any massive detail here, but essentially there are three strands to what's coming.

1. Lion - the new incarnation of Mac OSX - the core Mac operating system. Already a super slick user interface, Lion brings a whole host of UI enhancements, better and clevere multi-touch gestures, improved apps and a whole lot more. And all for $29.99 (though here in the UK that'll probably translate to a more expensive £29.99. And that's for a 5 license OS - yes, you can install it legally on 5 Macs!
2. iOS5 - the latest operating system version for iOS devices - the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Again a whole ream of developments and enhancements - too many to go into here, but some notable ones include improved notifications, better handling of previously purchased apps, improved mail app, and great use of the lock screen. It's coming in the Autumn.
   
3. iCloud. The new way to sync your data across all Apple devices. At the moment I use MobileMe (and pay for the privilege). That's now effectively dead in the water. When iCloud arrives it basically means if you change data on one device (my iPhone for example), that data is automatically updated on my Macbook Pro. In the words of Steve Jobs...."It just works" No set up, no fiddling, it just works. And.....it's FREE! Awesome.

If you want more detail about all this lovely Apple goodness, then trot across to any of the tech blogs/sites which are awash with the detail of these three core elements. Me, I just can't wait to get hold of them.

Keeping it all together

Regular readers will know that I've got a pretty eclectic approach to computing. I have no real affinity for any one OS, and have desktop devices running Windows 7, a Macbook Pro on Mac OSX and a netbook running Ubuntu netbook edition. Chuck in my ever to hand iPhone, and the challenge for me is keeping everything together and in sync.

In all honesty, it's made a bit simpler in that the Ubuntu netbook rarely sees the light of day. It's an old Asus Eee with virtually no memory or storage, and I put Ubuntu netbook on it more as an experiment than anything else (it works fine though).

What is happening therefore, is a slow and gradual transition to cloud computing. Applications I tend to prefer are cross platform, and with an ability to sync seamlessly with whichever device I'm using . I'm not a complicated, or power user, which makes life simpler still, and what follows is a brief description of my key picks.


Dropbox
If you work in different locations on different computers and haven't used or come across Dropbox yet, you're missing out. You install the Dropbox client on all the devices you use and it creates a Dropbox folder - so it's installed on all my PC's, laptop, netbook and I have the iPhone app. Whenever you are connected to the Internet, whatever you have saved to this folder is synced to Dropbox. Then, whenever you connect using one of your other devices, all the changes are automatically synced back to that device. Simple. Add in versioning, so you know which is the latest version, and the fact that it's free for up to 2GB storage, and you not only have a way of keeping everything in sync across multiple computers, but some free online storage too.

If you are going to check it out - drop me a line first. I can refer you, and that helps me boost my storage space!
Highly recommended.


Evernote
One of the things that many people require from their computing devices is a good way of collating all those snippet of information, notes, screenshots etc. There are literally hundreds of thousands of solutions out there, but one of the best is Evernote.
Evernote, like Dropbox is cross platform, and you can sync to all your platforms. Like Dropbox it's also accessible online, and like Dropbox free at the basic level.It also has browser extensions so you can clip all, or bits of web pages directly to your Evernote account.
You can record text notes, voice notes, photo notes, documents - pretty much anything. It's fully searchable, you can have multiple "notebooks" within your account, and use tags on notes. A Premium version (which I use) brings added benefits, but for most people, the free version is just fine. If you need to store "stuff", then this is the way to do it.
Brilliant!


Email/Contacts/Calendar
Gmail is my preferred email route, because everything is available on any Internet connected device. It's got a a lot of functionality too - more than most people realise, you've just got to dig a bit to find some of the optionsd and settings.


My calendar and contacts are all handled by Apple's "MobileMe" service. You have to pay for it, but it keeps my calendar and contacts beautifully in sync on my Macbook and iPhone (I tend not to do anything that needs calendar and contact access on the PC, although I could always access Mobile Me through the browser if I wanted to.

I've tried a few times to manage contacts via Google Contacts, but I find there's always some corruption/duplication though the sync process back to the iPhone/Macbook. I know some manage this perfectly fine, but I've never managed to do so to my satisfaction.

So there you have it. Core functions of email, contacts, calendar, notes and document sync/storage handled through some first class online/cross platform applications, that are free.

It's a no brainer.

1,000 posts

Blimey - realised tonight that I've posted over 1,000 times on this blog. Mostly mundane rantings of a deluded Cardiff City fan or inconsequential ramblings about shiny gadgets granted, but who'd have thought?

When I started this blog way back when, I posted a few times and virtually forgot about it. I've had another "break" along the way.

I'm not sure too many people apart from my mate Mike "Stabber" Baker (don't ask) read this drivel, but who cares?

Ubuntu Linux

I'm feeling pretty chuffed with myself.

I've got an old Asus Eee 701 netbook, which has been gathering dust for a while. Originally it had Xandros Linux as an operating system (OS), which was OK, but not great. I eventually took the plunge and after much tweaking managed to install a very cut down version of Windows XP on it. That gave me the comfortable Windows interface, but to be honest it wasn't much fun on a 7" screen. Additionally the arrival of a 13" Macbook Pro consigned the Eee to the furthest corners of the study.

Recently, I got it out and was fiddling around, and decided to have a crack at installing Ubuntu's netbook Linux edition on it. Ubuntu is now one of, if not the Linux distro of choice for many, and has come a long way from the old command line only interfaces of Linux variations of yore.

So armed with a USB flash disk to download the distribution and act as the install disk, I duly cracked on. In the end, it was pretty painless - I consider myself an experienced rather than advanced user, and I can follow instructions, and it was straightforward. The Ubuntu interface was a revelation after my previous (albeit limited) experience of Linux. It's far more "Windows" like, and the Ubuntu software centre in particular does away with all that synaptic and repository stuff for installing software. which had previously put me right off. It's there hidden away if you want it, as is the terminal console - but I don't particularly.

It hooked up to my network like a dream, and I installed OpenOffice with no hassles - all this on a netbook with only a 4GB SSD mind you.

So, I've got a working Ubuntu netbook. Next up, though I wanted to connect my printer. This works over a wireless network, and the Ubuntu software centre didn't find the relevant printer drivers (it's a multi-function Canon MP560. So I downloaded the drivers after a quick google. I hadn't a clue what I was supposed to do, so double clicked a bunch of files, seemed to extract from the archive, tried to open/run some files that looked like executables and got a few errors. Another google suggested I had to edit an install executable. So I found a text editor, edited the offending line as instructed, and via a quick trip to the terminal window (really, this is gobbledy gook to me too) and a comand line instruction - bingo! Installed. Not only working, but I can print and scan - first time. Brilliant (considering I'm flying by the seat of my pants).

I've also just installed the brilliant Dropbox that allows you to store files "in the cloud" and then sync them and make them available to any device you install Dropbox on.

That just about does it for the moment. I've now got everything I need. A small, robust device, running a tidy OS that's Internet connected, I can print from and has all my key documents available to me via Dropbox.

If you're a real tech-head, this probably doesn't sound like very much of an achievement. Believe me, installing ANY OS is often fraught, one you are unfamiliar with is often treacherous. To get everything up and working, almost first time is an achievement, especially when you have to go digging in executables and editing files.

So all in all I'm very pleased with myself. I can now truly say that I am diversity personified when it comes to computing. I've got a Windows 7 desktop PC, a Macbook Pro laptop running Snow Leopard, an Ubuntu Linux driven netbook and an iPhone running iOS4.2. A tool (and OS) for every occasion!

Neat

Adobe: What a load of old cobblers

I've just had an inordinately bad experience, and I'm trying to hold my temper, but it's hard.

I've been an Adobe Photoshop Elements (v2) user for years. That version has always just about done for me and I've avoided upgrading, but tonight decided the time had come to take the plunge to the latest version (v9), and so I navigated to the Adobe online store.

Yes I know I could have gone to Amazon, or somewhere else but the price difference wasn't that great and I get it right from the horses mouth so to speak.

No I must digress briefly here, and say that I've ranted about Adobe before - that was about the price differential between what US customers pay and European and specifically UK customers pay. Adobe put this down to the shifting exchange rate. I say "cobblers" (or words to that effect). Not a valid argument for online software purchase. It's entirely Adobe taking UK purchasers to the cleaners. Enough said.

Now I've made a few big online software purchases recently - MS Office for Mac, MS Office for Windows to name two, and several others to boot. In ALL cases, I've paid, downloaded installed, registered and just got on with it. How about with Adobe? Oh no........

First up, I paid. Fine - they took my cash sweet as a nut.

Click on the download link and get a cryptic message saying if I'm downloading with IE then blah, blah, blah, but if I'm using another browser I have to download something else first. I was in FireFox, and I didn't want to download something else first to enable me to make the download I wanted, so I switched to IE (yuk) and downloaded the 1.75 GB file to my desktop.

When it was downloaded I tried to launch it. Oops. Mistake. It's some odd compressed file that nothing on my Windows PC could read, so I then had to download some more software to extract the files (stuffit expander - or a choice of another couple of programs) to extract all the files, which I did and it duly did.

So, left with two folders. A Readme and an Program folder. Read the Readme ((briefly) as you do, nothing untoward in there, opened the program folder, double clicked the "setup.exe"..........and got an error message saying "Please install/uninstall the product setup.exe to the root folder". Click OK and the installer exits. D'oh!

A quick Google didn't find anything obvious so went to Adobe site and clicked Live Chat.

Within seconds, had Umer on the desktop offering to help. I explained the problem. The rest as they say is history. The full transcript of our chat is below.

Thank you for choosing Adobe. A representative will be with you shortly. Your estimated wait time is 0 minute(s) and 30 second(s) or longer as there are 1 customer(s) in line ahead of you.

You are now chatting with Umer.

Umer: Hello! Welcome to Adobe Customer Service.

Simon: Hi

Umer: Hi Simon

Umer: I am glad to help you.

Umer: As I understand, you are unable to install the software, correct?

Simon: That's right

Umer: Thank you.

Umer: Let me check the order number AD000726232UK

Umer: I see that you have placed the order on Dec. 05, 2010

Umer: Please be informed that it normally takes 24 to 48 hours to complete the order.

Simon: Why 24 hours? Yes - I have downloaded a 1.75GB file to my desktop. Expanded it into two folders - a read me and a APSE 9 with a setup file (amongst others). Launch the setup file and get the error message

Umer: You will be able to download and install the software 48 hours after placing the order.

Simon: I already have downloaded the software

Umer: I see that the the order is processed completely.

Umer: Please try to install the software after 48 hours.

Simon: Why can't I install it now? What's going to change in 24 hours?

Umer: The product will be ready to install in 48 hours.

Simon: I don't understand why, when I have a 1.75GB file sitting on my desktop I can't install it for 48 hours! That's ludicrous.

Umer: Simon, I see that this is a technical issue and I may not be of great help to you.

Simon: If I go to a store and buy the software on a CD/DVD would I have to wait 48 hours before I installed it? I think not.

Umer: I request you to call our Technical Support team on phone if you are unable to install the software after 48 hours of placing the order.

Simon: This is ridiculous. I'd like a refund please

Umer: Sure. We can help with this.

Umer: May I please have the product serial number?

Simon: Yes it's 1057-1717-6531-9470-5398-9279

Umer: Thank you.

Umer: In order to process your return, you must agree to delete the existing software from your computer and destroy any existing copies. You may not sell, transfer, give away, donate or otherwise distribute your existing Adobe product to anyone else. Do you agree?

Simon: Yes I do

Umer: Thank you.

Umer: You will receive the refund in 7 to 10 business days by the method of payment.

Simon: Thank you

Umer: You are welcome.

Simon: I'd be grateful if you could provide some feedback to your manager.

Umer: Sure.

Simon: I have bought online and downloaded several commercial software suites recently, and in all cases with this exception, the process has been flawless. Buy, download and install and I'm up and running straight away.

Umer: Let me help you with a link with more information on this.

Simon: The process for downloading this software (and I assume all other Adobe software) is convoluted, unclear and the idea of having to wait 48 hours after downloading before I can use it is completely ridiculous. Adobe have just lost a customer, and I will be looking elsewhere for my photo editing software.

Umer: Thank you for waiting. One moment please.

Simon: I appreciate your help in processing the return, but I'm unhappy with the process and feel aggrieved that it had to come to that.

Umer: Please click here

Umer: Is there anything else I can help you with?

Simon: OK. Thanks. Goodbye

Umer: Thank you for contacting Adobe. Goodbye!

Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure Umer is a nice person. But what's all this crap about having to wait 48 hours before installing software that I've just paid for and downloaded, and is sitting in a whacking great 1.75 gig file on my desktop? Excuse my French but that's just bloody ridiculous. What the hell is this, and how suddenly after 48 hours will a file decide it's OK to be installed?

I'm beginning to understand why Steve Jobs (head honcho at Apple) has a thing about Adobe.

It's worth googling Adobe and install - seems I'm not the only one.....

Any thoughts?

Apple: It just works. No it doesn't

You know, for a company that prides itself on ease of use and the "it just works" principle, Apple have sometimes got things horribly wrong.

Take calendars, and three Apple specific elements.

1. An Apple Macbook Pro
2. A pricey (by most people's views) subscription to Apple's Mobileme cloud/syncing service
3. An Apple iPhone 4

Now then, let me see - oooh, I have all of those. And what I want to do is have my calendars on the two bits of hardware to be seamless. Update one, the other one updates. And it works, mostly.

I have two calendars on my MBP that are "subscribed calendars". These are calendars that someone else has built. You download them, and then subscribe to them, usually for free (in my case, a calendar of all Cardiff City's fixtures, which saves me having to type the darn things in at the start off a season, and a UK holidays one so I don't have to add in things like "Christmas Day" or "Easter Sunday").

The beauty of a subscribed calendar is, if the data is updated - say a CCFC fixture v Middlesborough on Saturday is moved to a wet Tuesday, the calendar automatically updates with the new data - I don't have to do anything! Marvellous!

And it works except.....that the subscribed calendars don't sync. A "normal" local calendar syncs to Mobileme and to the "other" device, but the bloody subscribed ones don't.

It's such a pain in the arse. A beautiful elegant solution that's been hamstrung for Lord knows what reason.

You'd have thought Apple would have been able to make it work, but it doesn't. And that means they are driving people to alternative solutions like third party sync tools and Google. Surely that can't be good for business?

Come on Apple, make subscribed calendars work with Mobileme.

Data, data everywhere.....

So the good news is I've got my shiny new network hard drive set up and whirring quietly away. The next job is to consider how best to use the darn thing.

Here's the current situation.

I've got two desktop PC's running Windows 7, a Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard, a 7" Asus Eee running Ubuntu (to be fair hardly ever wheeled out) and an iPhone. Two iPhones if you count my son's 3G. Oh, and an iPod Touch belonging to my daughter.

I have a wireless network which includes a Canon multi-function printer not connected to anything except the power outlet (how clever is that - never ceases to maze me when it churns out paper without being connected to a PC).

There's also a 500GB external HDD attached to the main W7 PC, but available on the network to all other PC's and the MBP.

One of the problems I have is that I tended to keep the MBP/my iphone separate, so I have music on the MBP, and a bunch of music on the Windows network HDD> Same for photos. A bunch on the MBP and a (mostly duplicated) bunch on the Windows network HDD.

Oh, and this is discounting a bunch of "personal files" stored on Dropbox, but the beuaty of Dropbox is that it syncs to any computer it's installed on - in my case, both Windows boxes, the Eee, the MBP and my iPhone.

So what's my strategy going forward?

Well, I'm going to use my new wireless network HDD/NAS as the "master". My plan is to consolidate my music and photos and videos/movies onto this drive, back them up routinely to the standard external drive.

I can then free up space, especially on my MBP (not that it's tight for hard disk space, but I'm a bit paranoid when I get below half the drive full). My iTunes on whichever box I'm using will be accessing the network storage source, not individual local sources, and it will be the same for photos via Picasa.

Hopefully this will all work.

Of course, I've got to set up the back-up strategy too, but I use the highly effective and configurable Acronis True Image for this.

Fingers crossed!

Oh no....another to do app

Bugger. Barely 4 days after I've revamped and rationalised my notes/todo apps on my iPhone, I've gone back on my plans not to fiddle.

I saw a tweet from somewhere that said Appigo's ToDo app had been updated, and like a fool I went and re-downloaded it.

Last time I had this app on my device I didn't get on with it at all. It looks like it's gone through a few iterations since then, and now looks like a very grown up, capable to do app.

Visually it's great without being "twee". Very "Ronseal" - does what it says on the tin. Importantly, it now has local task alerts, and I'm pretty sure since I last looked at it (though it may have had it a while if not always) better alert notification generally.

I'm very impressed and have shunted "2Do" to my rarely used apps folder as I get to grips with it. It's got a fair few settings for those who want to customise it a bit, though it's set up to work very well out of the box so to speak.

It syncs with Toodledoo if that's what you want, or it's own ToDo Online which looks visually stunning but comes at a cost.

I'll stick with the free Toddledo for the moment, although the app looks to do everything I want it to.

very impressed.

IE not a "modern" browser - it's official

I was trying to have a look at ToDo Online today but as I was at work (horrors!) I was stuck with using the horrible Internet Explorer. Personally I'm a Firefox man by choice - and I don't get choice at work.

Imagine my surprise when the page illustrated pooped up. I have to be honest, I had to stifle a loud chuckle.

Twitter and professional sport

Twitter and celebrities go hand in hand. Just about anyone who's anyone (including me - @Statto1927) has a Twitter account, tweeting their every move.

Professional sportsmen and women are no exception, and people like me are genuinely interested in hearing things direct from the horses mouth that we might otherwise not get to see or hear.

However, as with all things, there's a fine line which is crossed occasionally, sometimes with catastrophic results. Philip Hughes the Australian cricket opener was reprimanded and banned from tweeting after he announced that he was dropped from the side before it was officially announced.

I follw James Anderson (@JimmyAnderson9), Graham Swann (@Swannyg66), and Tim Bresnan (@timbresnan) amongst some others whose banter is often amusing, sometimes very close to the knuckle, and sometimes just dull.

However, today, one of England cricket's greatest celebrities Kevin Pietersen (@kevinpp24) announced via Twitter that he had been dropped from the England T20 side. Bad enough if he'd done it before any official announcement, but he also used a rather bold expletive to reinforce his unhappiness about it. He also revealed that he was moving to Surrey - perhaps less of a surprise but again prior to any announcement.

The repercussions of this are likely to be that all England cricketers will be banned from using Twitter. That's a shame, but probably predictable if people can't be more professional about how they use the service.

I wouldn't dream of putting myself in the same arean as KP an others (although I have scored a few tons in my time) and anything I tweet is personal or a personal view about things that I think are relevant, interesting or that I have a general opinion on. However, I would not for example tweet about anything specifically to do with my employment or employer (other than I might be having a bad day for example). If I did so, I'd expect to get a quick march down to the bosses office to explain my actions and unprofessional behaviour at best, and a request to pick up my P45 on my way out at worst.

In a black week for cricket with the allegations of spot betting and corrupt Pakistani cricketers, this is the last thing England cricket needed.

KP might be a brilliant cricketer (though sadly out of touch and thus the reason why he was dropped), but a little more thought about what he was doing when he tweeted that wouldn't have gone amiss. On the other hand, if he's free this weekend, mabe he could come and bolster our Tour sqaud for our annual sojourn to Torquay!

Clever GMail

How clever is GMail?

You probably know this already, but I didn't. I just went to send an email in which I had intended to add an attachment, and had said in the body of the email "...see attached". Except I hadn't attached it. I do this all the time at work and Outlook blindly sends the email and people come back and say "what attachment?"

GMail though popped up a message that basically said "Ooop! looked like you meant to attach a document but you haven't done so - do you still want to send?"

Simple, but brilliant!

I and I know GMail isn't in beta any more, but this is the image I had lying around.

Toodledo

I'm still trying to find the perfect to do app for the iPhone, over a year after moving to the platform.

Recently I've been using 2Do, and it's kind of OK, though some feel it's more form than function with it's colourful, nice to look at interface, which can at times feel a bit cluttered.

I use Appigo's Notebook app for my notes, and I find this a very decent app. It syncs to Toodledo, a cloud based to do/note application, but I've never bothered with it's to do element before now.

I've forked up the £1.79 asking price for the iPhone Toodledo app (come on, it's not even the cost of a pint of beer), and of course setting up the sync was a piece of cake.

I'll see how this goes - it's more like a traditional to do list rather than the over complicated (for me) "getting things done" model, though it does have folders, a hotlist and starred list options.

Pretty much all I'm after is a basic and easy to enter in, app that tells me when a task is due to be done and can give me an alert.

I'll see how this goes for a while.

Google contacts update

I thought it was too good to be true, and so it proved. Although enabling Google Contact sync from my Macbook Pro (see post below) appeared to have synced all my contacts across to Google, when I fired up my MBP tonight, I got a message saying that Google wanted to make 40 odd amendments to the contacts in my Mac's Address book.

It wanted for example to replace a perfectly valid record such as:
Title: "Mr & Mrs" with "Mr"
First Name: "M" with "& Mrs"
and so on....

So I've turned off the syncing for the moment, until I can work out what to do for the best. All my records in the Mac Address book are accurate and up to date, and I can't risk Google's sync process buggering these up. At least of got 270 plus contact records in Google that look OK from the way they synced across originally.

You would have thought in this day and age, something as obvious as contact management would have evolved a fairly standard sync protocol. I appreciate some of the more esoteric fields found in certain address books might cause problems, but it can't be beyond the wit of man (or coders) to at least be able to come up with a standard for title/first name/ last name syncing?

Obviously it is.

Contacts in the cloud

I've used the sync to Google function in my Mac to sync my contacts to Google Contacts over the air. Everything seems to have come across although the way Google works I've ended up with a few duplicates. I'll sort those out soon.

I now have (I think), what I really wanted which is my contacts in three (or is it 4) places. They're on my Mac in the Address Book, my Phone in the Contacts app, on Mobile Me in the cloud, and now on Google in the cloud. That might sound a bit like overkill, but as someone who's got a bit of OCD about keeping things in sync, it suits me.

I'm trying hard to start using Google for a lot more. I'm migrating to it slowly as my main email address way from my long time ISP pop email, but it wasn't that effective without all my contacts available. Should be fine now.

I've migrated two of the three websites I've built and maintain (Chepstow Male Voice Choir and Dinas Powys Cricket Club) to Google Sites, and I'm in the process of switching the third (Hendre Eynon Caravan and Camping) as well.

I haven't really used Google Docs much, but as I keep all my important and most frequently accessed docs in the cloud too on Dropbox, it makes sense to start using Google Docs more as well.

And of course, Google own the Blogger platform that this blog is based on. I also use and love Picasa for photo management and organisation, and Flickr for online photo storage, and my default search engine of course is, Ask Jeeves. No it's Google. I was joking.

Add all that up, and I've almost become a Google junkie without even thinking about it.

There's no doubt that Google has matured well enough for me to stat making the move more consciously. Given that all of the above is free as well (bar the Flickr premium account), I'm amazed more people don't make the move. I've got over my concerns about cloud data storage. I haven't done anything specific to dispel those concerns, rather just accepted that provided I'm sensible, it shouldn't be any more risky than using any other storage mechanism.

Blog analytics. Thanks for your custom!

I analyse (only very occasionally) my blog visits using Google analytics. For some bizarre reason, they recently stopped working. A quick flip through the Google Analytics FAQ suggested that a newer version of the analytics code should be being used. I can't rmember being advised of this, so how I was supposed to know is beyond me.

Anyway, they give you instructions to check whether you're running the old or new code, which is basically view the page source code (!). I did so and found that in fact for some reason I was running neither! I can't remember changing or deleting the code, but a while before Christma I changed the theme template, so whether this buggered everything up I'm not sure.

So having found that out I added the new code, and in one day my stats have rocketed +1,600% I'm not quite sure how that figure's arrived at, because in real terms it looks like about 20 people have visited. I've never had that many viewers, apart from my regulars (thanks - you know who you are), but hopefully things will start to pick up.

I never set out with this blog to inform the world, but more keep it as a record of stuff that happens, and see what occurs along the way.

Keep it going, and spread the word!

Thanks for reading

Cloud computing - Google's ever increasing dominance

A lot of people who write on the sites and blogs I frequent use and swear by Googlemail, and Google in general - Google Calendar, Google Contacts , Google Apps and so forth.

It always seems such a clean and neat idea to have everything in one place under one "brand", and I frequently think I should migrate all my email and PIM type activity to the monster that is Google, but I haven't yet done so.

I do have a Googlemail address, although my primary email address is on a long standing Pipex account (which incidentally I've been threatening to leave for years). I've slowly been advising some of my contacts of my gmail address and changing contact details on the multitude of websites I've registered with over the years, and sooner or later, my gmail address will become my primary address.

However, I'm less inclined to migrate my contacts and calendar. I used to use Outlook on my home PC (an old XP version), which was adequate rather than great. OK it was horrible.
Since buying a Macbook Pro, I signed up to Mobile Me, and now all my contacts and calendars are managed via my MBP or iPhone, syncing seamlessly via Mobile Me. OK, it's costing me, but it's a price I'm currently prepared to pay. There's the bonus of 10G of iDisk space too.

Additionally I have an irrational thought that storing my 250+ contacts on Google's servers isn't very good for data protection, but conversely seem to ignore the fact I'm happy enough having them sitting on Apple's Mobile Me servers!

My calendar and contacts needs are pretty comfortably met by the iCal and Contacts apps on the MBP (I don't use the Windows PC for this at all now), and being an iPhone user everything "just works" pretty much flawlessly, which after some of the issues I had with my Palm devices with duplicate entries, disappearing entries etc (not often, but enough to be irritating), I'm just happy to see the iPhone and MBP work like they're joined at the hip (which I suppose they are).

So, email aside, I have no real need to move Contacts/Calendars to Google currently. But the worm is slowly turning. Email is going slowly that way. One of the two websites, the cricket one I run is now hosted on Google Sites (www.dinaspowyscc.co.uk), and the other (www.chepstowmvc.co.uk) will be going that way this year, and of course this very blog is now part of the Google empire. For the moment though, Apple hold sway in calendar and contact management.

Website move complete

I've now completed the migration of my cricket club's website from my own ISP free webspace and built in Serif's WebPlus, to a Google Sites website. Everything has gone OK, and I'm quite pleased with the results.

Next step is to set up some other people in the club who can edit it, so everything's not entirely reliant on me.

You can checkout how it all looks at www.dinaspowys.co.uk

Mac update

Time for an update on my venture into the world of all things Mac.

So far, it's all going swimmingly well with a few exceptions. I'm getting used to the Macbook Pro which I find to be a very nice machine. That multi-touch trackpad is just a dream to use and I never miss a mouse

Currently my main uses are email, browsing, some (albeit limited) wordprocessing, some minor spreadsheet work, Twittering and updating my Google Sites cricket club web pages. In many ways I guess it's being used like an expensive netbook, but I'm cool with that.

Other than the trackpad, the bonuses for me are a great battery life, a superb screen and virtually no noise operation - fan is almost inaudible, keys are quiet and you almost never hear the hard disk. I still drool and dribble over the design, and luckily, being aluminium that's easy to wipe off.

The ability to connect and write as well as read my NTFS formatted external drive is a boon too - not sure where that came from, but it appears Snow Leopard may have that ability hidden away but not publicised very well. The web is full of people saying they can't without some dark magic, but I can and I'm very glad of it.

There are a couple of things I haven't yet managed to get to grips with, but I suspect that's a matter of time/use.

I need to spend some time with the iWork suite. I'm sure Pages (wordprocessor) has a lot to offer, I just wish I could get it to save to Word format by default - maybe it's possible, I just haven't found the setting yet. NeoOffice can.

I've tried editing some photos in iPhoto without too much joy. I've also download the GIMP, but that looks like it could be overkill. I've got a £50 voucher from my birthday for the Apple Store (we have one in Cardiff now), and I'm toying with getting Photoshop Elements 8 (I have v2 for Windows and like it a lot). Having said that, I'm not sure the Macbook Pro's 13" screen is designed for lengthy photo editing sessions.

One other thing , coming from a Windows background, I wish screens could open up full screen width. By default most screens open up leaving plenty of room either side of the active window. I don't know why, but that irritates me to hell - again, there might be a setting somewhere that resolves that - either that or I have to learn to live with it.

Having the MBP has also seen me make more of a concerted effort to utilise the "cloud". As I've previously noted, I've started to make far more use of the exceptional Dropbox online storage solution, whilst MobileMe keeps my contacts and calendars and email all nicely synced.

With one of the two websites I manage in the process of being migrated to Google's Sites and the other one heading that way, I'm doing more and more stuff in, and via the "cloud" - and it feels good.