Apple iPad – The Future Looks Brighter Than the Present

I’ve been keeping close tabs on the reviews and reports coming out on the Apple iPad.  In my previous post, “Why the Apple iPad is a Major Let-Down” I write about all of the reasons I was let down by the feature set on this first generation product.  Since then, I’ve come to realize, this product isn’t for me.  When Apple designed it, techno guys like me were not the ones they had in mind.  It’s a little upsetting when your favorite company comes out with the next big thing and it’s not meant for you.  As it turns out the iPad device was meant for consuming content and media, not creating it.

My biggest complaint about the iPad as it was introduced is a lack of input methods.   In it’s current form, you’re limited to the on-screen keyboard or an external keyboard.  That’s not very useful for people who will hold the device in one hand while inputing with the other.  Apple knows that in order for them to advance the iPad as a platform, they’ll have to be flexible.  In true Apple style, they’re not going to show all their cards.  Why would they?  In it’s current form, the iPad appeals to millions of consumers.  Get the product out the door, let those consumers buy apps, then continue to fine tune the product to appeal to even more consumers.  They’re building a platform after all, and there’s no reason they need to be everything to everyone from day 1.

I feel that adding a stylus as an input device would add dimension to the iPad.  It would accommodate those users who are holding the device in one hand and operating it with the other.  As it turns out, Apple may be way ahead of me on this one.  There are signs that point to Apple adding handwriting recognition to future iPad products.

1. Ryan Block reports on Engadget that Apple posted a job listing back in 2008 for a “Handwriting Recognition Engineer” to help advance that technology.   That same job listing gets very specific in saying “The recognition technology you create may extend beyond Mac OS X to other applications and the iPhone.”
2. Apple Computer filed a patent (US 7,564,995 B1) for “METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR ACQUIRING AND ORGANIZING INK INFORMATION IN PEN-AWARE COMPUTER SYSTEMS” in July 2009.  That date is in-line with when Apple would have been in the midst of development of the iPad.
3. Engadget reports that iPhone jailbreak developer Ryan Petrich found prototype support for a “handwriting keyboard” in the APIs of the iPad.  One could surmise the handwriting recognition is already in the works deep within the bowels of 1 Infinite Loop.

If you recall, the original iPhone was quite a mystery.  Even after it’s launch, no one knew that inside was a 3-D chip, capable of some serious gaming.  Why didn’t Apple tell everyone at that first keynote?  Why wasn’t it on the list of tech specs?  It’s because Apple employs arguably the best marketing strategists in the world.  These guys know how to get you there and keep you coming back.

While I’m still convinced that the iPad is just a really nice e-book reader right now, more attractive is it’s future.  I’m not attracted to what it is, but rather what it will become.

Why the Apple iPad is a Major Let-Down

The Apple iPad had a mountain of hype to live up to. Most people knew that it would be nearly impossible for any device to live up to the hype, but if any company could do it, Apple Computer could. People were talking about iPad months, if not years ago.

I just watched the introduction of the Apple iPad and I’ve decided that it does not live up to the hype, nor does it live up to my expectations for an Apple product. Before you decide to flame me for Apple blasphemy, please allow me to explain myself. I am a huge Apple fan. I’m typing this on my MacBook Pro. Someone just sent me a text message on my iPhone 3GS, which replaced my iPhone 3G, which replaced my iPhone which I waited in line on June 29th, 2007 to purchase. I’m a techno geek, I love Apple, and I’ll have my picture taken at 1 Infinite Loop some day, just to say I was there.

That’s been said, so let’s move on. My initial perspective of the iPad is that it’s an iPhone with a large screen. But it’s not even an iPhone. It can’t do all the things an iPhone can do. It can’t place calls, it can’t send text messages, it can’t record video, it can’t take pictures. I’m trying to get my head around who would purchase an iPad. I believe that any consumer who wants to purchase an e-book reader would purchase an iPad. As an e-book reader, it seems ok, but not great. Allow me to review each feature individually.

iPod – Feature Rating: OK – As an iPod the iPad is useless. Unless you like to listen to Metallica while reading Dan Brown’s Lost Symbol, I don’t see much use as an iPod. However, for those of you who think it’ll make a fine iPod, perhaps Belkin will come out with an armband for it so you can wear it like a backpack while you jog at the gym.

iBook – Feature Rating: Sub-par – I don’t know about you, but I don’t read many novels.  For those that do, I suppose that they’ll love this e-book reader. However  I read technical books.  I read books on computer programming, interface design and highly technical topics.  Sometimes, I underline sentences with a red pen.  I also use a highlighter from time to time.  If there’s a really important topic, I’ll stick a post-it note on that page, and allow it to stick out of the top of the book.  Sometimes I’ll write my own comments in the margins.  I’ll draw an arrow from my comment to a particular paragraph.  The iBook app doesn’t allow you to do any of these things, so for me, I’ll stick with my old paperbacks.

iPhoto – Feature Rating: Cool – You can connect a digital camera and download photos directly into your iPad.  That’s pretty cool.  I’m not sure how this is better than doing the same with my MacBook, but it’s nice that Apple added this feature.

iWork – Feature Rating: Useless – Nobody in their right mind would attempt to prepare a real report in iWork on the iPad.  I attempted this in vain on my Newton 2000 about 15 years ago.  It doesn’t matter how much time Apple’s UI guys put into this one, it’s not going to fly.  When I write an article in Pages, I often switch to Numbers to look at some facts.  Then I switch to Safari to do some research.  Sometimes I put my Pages document side by side with the other data I’m reading.  The iPad does not allow this to happen.  Just the fact that they introduced a Keyboard as the first Apple branded accessory suggests that the device by itself is incapable of performing well as an Office application device.  Essentially, through the use of an external Keyboard and Dock, they’ve turned it into a subpar MacBook that requires you to constantly touch the screen.  So it begs the question, why not just use iWork on a MacBook?

Safari – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Mail – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Video – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

YouTube – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

iTunes – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

App Store – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Maps – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Notes – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Calendar – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

Contacts – Feature rating: Expected – Same as iPhone, but bigger screen.

All of the features that I’ve labeled “Expected” above are just that.  I expected that if Apple launched a tablet, they’d base it on iPhone OS and include many of the same Apps.  What I really wanted from Apple is the unexpected.  I wanted to walk away wondering how I lived so long without one, much like I feel about my iPhone.  Below I’ve made a list of what I wanted the iPad to be.

My list of unexpected things would add WOW!!! to the Apple iPad:

Notebook – Here’s what I’d like to do with an iPad.  I’d like to take my 5-subject notebook that sitting on my desk and throw it in the trashcan.  I want to launch an App called “Notebook”, slide a stylus out of the back of the iPad, and start scribbling notes on a lined notebook page.  While I’m writing, Apple’s InkWell is recognizing my handwriting as text and indexing that text without me even knowing it.  Then I want to draw a diagram in the corner of said page.  Next, I want to open Safari, load some web page my client has been telling me about, and copy and paste a thumbnail of it into my Notebook App.  Then, I want to take a photo of Client X’s office using iPad’s camera and keep that on the Notebook page.  Later, when I open spotlight and enter “Client X”, it finds all the pages in my notebook where I mentioned Client X.  Then I can browse my notes, in my handwriting, with my diagrams and such. This would be the ultimate Notebook, eliminate the need for paper, and in and of itself would make the iPad worth the price.

iBook – Allow me to write on the pages of the e-book.  Use InkWell to recognize the text so later I can search my notes. (see Notebook above)  That way, I could tag the pages with my own notes, and find content more easily later.  Think of how this would help college students who use an iPad instead of carrying around 15 textbooks.  Think of how this would help the techno weenies like me who read books on PHP and the Visual Display of Quantitative Information.

External Bookmarks – Think of how cool it would be to reference a page within a book much like you do a URL on the Internet.  If I send you to the url http://www.apple.com/ipad/gallery/, I know exactly what you’ll see when you click on it.  It’d be great if I could do the same with books.  Then I can email a colleague a link to a page within a book, so long as he owns that book.

Camera – Not totally necessary, but why not? For a large company like Apple, how much could it add to the cost?

12-13″ Screen – An 8.5 x 11 sheet of notebook paper is 14″ diagonal.  That size page gives you ample room to read, write and more.  Apple’s iPad is large enough to house such a screen, but it has an 1.5″ wide border around the screen.  Why is that border there? Seems kind of 1983 for Apple.  That big, black border might be ok for Asus or Dell, but this is Apple.  Why not fill the full face of the iPad with the Screen?  Bigger = Higher Res = Better.  Plus, it would give you more screen real estate for the “Notebook” App mentioned above.

Bluetooth Tethering to iPhone – Wouldn’t it be great if I didn’t have to buy yet another cell phone plan?  If you’re an iPhone owner, why not allow the iPad to connect to the Internet through the iPhone’s connection?  Heck, they could encrypt the communication so that only iPad devices could do this.  Maybe they charge $4.99 a month for that feature.  But I know it’s not in the interest of cell carriers to offer money saving plans for consumers.

Wireless Sync – The iPad has an 802.11n card in it. Why can’t it connect over WiFi to your Mac desktop machine to Sync?  Aren’t USB cables a little 1999?

External Monitor Mode – This is a beautiful LED backlit screen, wouldn’t it be great if you could connect it to your Mac and use it as an extra screen while your working?  Plug the iPad into the Mini DisplayPort (<sarcasm>Thanks Apple</sarcasm>) on your Mac and you’ve got an extra 1024×768 of screen real estate to place your widgets, Twitter feed and other miscellaneous goodies.  Maybe if the iPad had the features I detailed above, you’d never want to do this, since you’d probably prefer to have it lying on your desktop, right next to you.

Conclusion – In summary, the iPad was a total letdown for me. Instead of offering a product that rocked my sock off (Like the Tenacious D song) they offer an entirely expected product that didn’t have any WOW factor at all.  It does all the things you thought it would and has a good price.  Anyone who is shopping for an e-book reader would be insane to buy anything but an iPad.  Anyone who is looking for more will be sadly disappointed.

My Love Hate Relationship with Panic Coda

My open letter to Panic Software:
I’ve been using Panic Software’s Coda for several years now. As a web development program, it’s light years ahead of anything else out there. I can vaguely remember the dark days before Coda, there was a program called.. let me see if I can remember… oh yeah, BBEdit.

BBEdit was the de-facto standard text editor for the Mac. I was using it in Mac OS 9, and I still used it in Mac OS X. Back then, you’d build a web site locally, the upload it using your FTP client. Later, Panic Software introduced Transmit, a sexy FTP client that had it all. In fact, I could double click a file on an FTP share and it would open automagically into BBEdit. Then, in BBEdit I could hit Command-S to save the file, and Transmit would re-upload it. Remarkable. It totally changed how I worked on web sites.

Fast forward to 2007. That same little company who produced Transmit, an FTP app that changed the way web developers work, introduced something all together new… Coda. Coda was everything. It could FTP, it could SFTP, it could Edit PHP, HTML, CSS, Text, it would make you a pot of coffee in the morning and the afternoon. It had built in documentation, it had autocomplete, it had built in preview for your pages, it had built in terminal for shell access. Coda was the program that made every Mac web developer wonder what they’d been doing for the past 10 years without it.

Now, fast forward to the present day. It’s almost 2010 and Coda hasn’t changed since 2007. Sure there have been bug fixes here and there, but no new features. No changes. Nothing for three years. (Yes, they did create the Plugins system. Yawn. Plugins are VERY limited as to how they can interact with the Coda core program. Very limited.)

My inspiration for this article is a css file that I just lost while editing in Coda. If you’re a regular Coda user like me (Coda is open more hours in a day than Photoshop on my system) then you’ve no doubt hit this snag at some point. You’re cruising along, working on your files, you hit “SAVE” to save a file back to the FTP, Coda seems to hang. So you wait a few minutes.. still hanging. Hmm. So you hit force quit and find that Coda is not responding… so you kill it. You relaunch it and discover that your precious CSS file is empty. That’s right… the file is still there on the FTP, but it’s empty… If you’re a web developer, and this has happened to you, you know that feeling that you get in your stomach. Like you’ve just been punched in the gut. Now this has happened only 3 times in less than 3 years of using Coda, but that’s too much.

So this brings me to my point. In three years, why has Panic not made any real changes to Coda? Is Coda 2.0 hiding in the depths of Panic? Is it going to change the world like the first version did? Is it going to fix the aforementioned problem with loosing complete files? Will it allow you to organize your web sites into folders? Willing include code collapsing? Will it tie into Apples Time Machine API so as to include an automatic versioning and save a copy every minute? Will it make coffee and donuts?

I hate to bitch and moan about something without offering a solution, so I have one: Panic needs to charge more for CODA. A lot more. Charge $199, or $249. It’s worth it. There’s not a web designer out there using Coda who thinks MS Office or Photoshop is worth more than Coda. Hell, I paid Adobe $499 for a crappy Photoshop CS4 update that does absolutely nothing that CS3 didn’t already do. Talk about feeling like a first class heel. I give Adobe my money almost every year for a worthless update that offers no real forward progress. So Panic, why don’t you come out with an update to Coda every so often that offers some new features? You could make some money. Think about it.

Fact of the matter is… even with all it’s problems, Coda is still the best thing out there. I’m going to go rebuild my lost CSS file now. Ugh.

Apple Cinema Display Broken or Won’t Turn On

If you’re using an Apple Cinema Display with the Mini Displayport Adapter, and it stopped working, well… I know the feeling. I just bought my display two days ago because I needed the built in camera and mic for video conferences. Plus, the LED backlit screen is pretty sexy too.

It worked great for a day, but then yesterday, when I plugged it in… nothing. The display was black. That’s a little disheartening after spending that kind of cash. Plus, getting in line for a return at the Apple Store is not on the top of my Christmas wish list. I could open my MacBook Pro and upon unplugging the Cinema Display, the screen in my MacBook Pro would come back on, but the external display just would not work. Well, it seems that the Power Management Unit in my MacBook wasn’t sending the proper signal to the display. The fix… delete a particular plist file. Yes… a plist file, the cause of so… so… many problems.

My particular setup is a late 2009 17″ MacBook Pro. I like to use it in clamshell mode (i.e. closed) with a USB keyboard attached an a Bluetooth wireless mouse.

So now that I know the fix, I’ve created a little Applet that does the fix for me. Basically all you’re doing is deleting a single plist file located at:

/Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.PowerManagement.plist

I keep the AppleScript that deletes that plist on my machine in case the problem crops up again. First, before you fix it, make sure that every time you use your MacBook Pro in clamshell mode (i.e. running an external display with the screen on your laptop shut) that you follow Apple’s specific instructions on how to get your computer to wake up in that mode properly click here. If you continue to do it wrong, your monitor will keep going wonky.

If your Apple Cinema Display won’t turn on, follow these instructions.
1. Unplug the Apple Cinema Display from your computer
2. Download my “Fix Apple Wonky Display” utility click here
3. Double click the Apple Script, when it prompts you, click “Run”
4. If it asks you for your password, punch it in
5. Once it’s done running, plug in your Apple Cinema Display again

Presto… you’re back in business. If this was helpful to you, please post a comment.

Phillies vs. Yankees (i.e. Rebel Alliance vs. Galactic Empire)

Tomorrow is the big day.   The Phillies open the World Series against Darth Vader and the Galactic Empire, uh, er, George Steinbrenner and the New York Yankees.  It’s sure to become an instant classic.  In one corner, you have the Philadelphia Phillies, with their core players that were developed within their own farm system, a wizardly general manager and a skipper who could surely tell some captivating stories around a campfire.  And in the other corner, the New York Yankees with their arrogant money-is-no-object owner, teammates who feel entitled to a WS trophy and the best bubbly and starting pitchers that a team could buy.

Let’s do a quick comparison, shall we…

J.A. Happ = Luke Skywalker (The young Jedi knight who’s learning the ways of the force)

Cliff Lee = Obi Wan Kenobi (The confident leader who’s not afraid to pitch inside or hammer the strike zone)

Shane Victorino = Han Solo (Prefers a straight fight as opposed to all this sneaking around)

Ryan Howard = Chewbacca (Howard is a self proclaimed “teddy bear”.  Let the wookie win.)

George Steinbrenner = The Emperor (Both visually and metaphorically)

Joe Girardi = Darth Vader (The Emperor’s right hand man, you make an error, you get the neck choke pinch)

Derek Jeter = Jango Fett (The one who the emperor wants all his other minions to be like)

Alex Rodriguez = Boba Fett (A close clone of Jango, I mean Jeter, but still not as good as the original)

In conclusion, if you want to route for the good guys, the Phillies are the clear choice.  If you want to sip brandy with the emperor, well then go to the dark side and get it over with.  I’ll be on my sofa with my Chase Utley jersey and a giant “Phillies #1″ foam hand routing for the Rebels.

Here’s your sign

There have been too many times when I’ve experienced a Bill Engval style “Here’s your sign” worthy experience. So I’ll share some that come to mind…

Coke Glasses from McDonalds
My wife and I were in a McDonalds. There was a sign that read “Buy one get one free Coke glasses, available in 4 colors.” We placed our order and asked for a green and a blue Coke glass. The lady asked us “Which one would you like for free?”

Street Signs
We were driving down the Atlantic City expressway a few weeks ago. We were on a two lane highway doing about 65mph. There was a sign that reads “3 lanes begin 1 mile ahead”. Now this might not seems like much… but why? What is the purpose of warning drivers that a third lane will appear? Were there accidents? Do some drivers see that third lane and swerve off the road in total confusion? Totally unnecessary use of steel and paint.

First Monday

It’s the first Monday of the month, and it’s 2:00pm. You may wonder, what could be so inspiring as to cause a post at his very time? Well, out my open window I can hear the whine of the warning sirens for the Limerick Nuclear Power Plant. Having lived here all my life, it’s no surprise. They test the sirens every month at this same time. But I have new neighbors who live down the street. I can’t imagine what a person thinks who just moved here and is unfamiliar with the procedure. I’ll be sure to tell them, but man, what a head job if you’ve never heard that before.

Verizon FiOS IP Addresses

Recently, I called Verizon to see if I could acquire a static IP address. Apparently it’s possible, but it would ultimately cost me an additional $100 a month. I say it would “ultimately” cost me that amount because the transaction would have been more complicated than I would have liked.

First, they’d have to switch my account from residential FiOS to business FiOS. The smallest business plan was about $60 more a month than what I’m paying now. Then, the static IP was about $10 a month. For those astute with mathematics, we’re up to $70/mo now. Lastly, because I would no longer have residential FiOS service, my FiOS TV and telephone would no longer be eligible for their bundle discount, which would increase the price of that plan by about $30 a month. Needless to say, that’s a bit too much for a static IP.

So, I called Verizon’s FiOS division tech support and I asked a simple question… what is the IP address range for FiOS in my area? She couldn’t answer… in fact, she didn’t know what I was talking about. So I told her to find someone there who could answer… She couldn’t. I was appalled. I actually said to her “There has to be someone at Verizon who knows what the IP range is.” I tell you, it was like talking to a wall.

Anyway, I’d been keeping track of my router’s IP address to try and assess what the range might be on my own. I figured I’d see the last two digits hop around and I could determine a range based on the values. So for whomever cares… that isn’t working so hot. My address started in the range 71.175.1.XXX then recently hopped over to 72.94.169.XXX. These subnets aren’t even close.

Moral of the story is… if you want a static IP… go with Comcast or a DSL provider for now. Or you’re going to coughing up the funds.

Import a MySQL database on the command line

If you’ve ever tried to use phpMyAdmin to import a large sql database, then you’ve no doubt had fun slicing the file into smaller parts, or changing apache’s request timeout, or …etc…

There’s an easier, and faster way. Just upload the sql file to your server and use mysql from the command line to import the data. It’s as simple as issuing the following command:

mysql -u USER -p DBNAME < dump.sql

Where USER is your MySQL username and DBNAME is the name of the database you’d like to import into. After hitting enter, you’ll be asked for the password. Enter it and away you go.

Mosso, So Slow

I signed up for an account on Mosso, the cloud hosting provider who was purchased by RackSpace.  I figured for $100 a month, I could have as much computing power as I require, and expandability whenever I need it.  Plus, they have automated billing tools built right in, allowing me to act as a reseller.

All this sounded too good to be true, and it was.  During the first day, I attempted to upload a few projects I was working on to my web space.  I fired up Coda, connected to my Mosso server space via FTP and started to send up files.  Low and behold, every file sent had about a 1-2 second latency before transfer.  Now, I’ve seen this before, and to solve the problem you typically set your FTP client to use Active Transfers instead of Passive.  No dice.  Same slow speed.

Now, latency of 1 second per file doesn’t sound bad, but when you consider an upload of 500 files will take a minimum of 8 minutes and 20 seconds, you realize that it’s quite a nuisance, especially as a developer, when you might decide to duplicate your entire WordPress install to try some new, crazy code.  Imagine waiting 8 minutes to download your entire WordPress site, then another to upload it to a new directory.

So I moved on.  I started messing with a web site install (WordPress, of course) and I got the same effect on the front end, a 1-2 second delay before the response was sent to the browser.  I expected so much more from a server that is supposed to represent the future of computing.  Anyway, today I cancelled my Mosso account, and I’m moving on.