Crashed Pips - Computers, politics, emetic trash

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

WWDC ‘08 Stevenote Post Mortem

Filed under: Apple, Macintosh — Tags: , , , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 18:40

If you’ll recall, a couple of days ago, I wrote about what I expected would appear at WWDC ‘08. As it transpires, it was a rather surprising event.

  • The iPhone: This made up the bulk of the Stevenote, where Steve Jobs was also (unusually) assisted by Scott Forstall and Phil Schiller. The 2.0 firmware is almost complete and will appear next month - I was surprised it wasn’t complete by now, but I suppose they’re just being careful with a few final sweeps for bugs. The actual revised iPhone wasn’t surprising from a hardware perspective: 3G, lower price, GPS, similar case design… but I was surprised that the case is now almost all plastic instead of all aluminium. The new feature list is somewhat disappointing, although thanks to the iPhone’s nature it shouldn’t be too long to see a change to this. O2 are also going to offer it on a pay-as-you-go tariff, for an unconfirmed price. However, I can’t take much credit for this. The 3G iPhone was the worst-kept secret in history.
  • Mysteriously, the rumoured new MacBooks didn’t appear. This was surprising, although the amount of iPhone stuff they got through probably restricted what else they could get in the keynote.
  • Mac OS X 10.6 was announced - it’s called Snow Leopard, and not Cougar as I expected. I was right in that it’ll concentrate on polish and performance; however, it’s hard to see Apple resisting the temptation to shoehorn a few new features in, including a few aesthetic changes. However, it was only mentioned briefly in the keynote.
  • The Mac Mini and Blu-Ray SuperDrives were not mentioned, which is also quite surprising, particularly for the former. Said machine hasn’t been revised for around a year now, indicating a revamp of the line may be imminent. I suspect both the Mini and new MacBooks (if any) will appear at a similar event to the event the revised iMac appeared last year, so at this rate we could be looking at August.
  • MobileMe (a new synchronisation service which also features .Mac’s old functionalities) wasn’t much of a surprise: it would have been insane for Apple to build in the push PIM, synchronisation, remote kill, etc if it could only be used by enterprises with Microsoft Exchange. I also like the idea of being able to sync my Eee, my iMac, and my phone’s address book, although whether or not it likes Linux is another matter. I suspect it will.

Overall, the Stevenote was something of a disappointment. It was interesting to see what they had to show us, but it concentrated heavily on the iPhone. This is very surprising.



Saturday, June 7, 2008

iPredict for WWDC…

Filed under: Apple, Communications, Macintosh, iPredictions — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 12:13

The infamous iHype has been steadily growing in anticipation of Steve Jobs’s keynote on Monday at WWDC.

The Macworld offices are, evidently, very busy, with new rumours coming in left, right and centre. And this is not to mention the Apple rumour sites, whose editors must, judging by the number of rumours we’re seeing, be on forty caffiene tablets an hour.

Rumors include a tablet Mac, larger iPhones with 3G and GPS, 14-inch MacBooks with aluminium casing, and all manner of other goodies.

I have slightly different predictions:

  • It is almost certain we will see a 3G iPhone, although I suspect the case design will remain largely unchanged. We’ll see, at most, an all aluminium and glass design - I severely doubt the authenticity of the iPhone with white plastic casing. We’ll see voice dialing, a revised home button which glows different colours when SMSes, MMSes, etc are received, 802.11n, and the actual launch of the 2.0 firmware and the App Store. O2 will also offer the iPhone on a pay-as-you-go plan in the UK, charging 11p a minute for each call and SMS, and offering free Internet access (3G, GPRS, EDGE and Wi-Fi with The Cloud).
  • I suspect we may see new MacBooks and MacBook Pros next week. Both devices will be made completely out of aluminium, and the MacBook Pro will take on a more ‘brushed metal’ appearance, similar to the iMac. The MacBook will have a black surround around the screen, also similar to the iMac.
  • The first features of Mac OS X 10.6 will be revealed. It’ll be called Cougar, and will focus heavily on polish and reliability. One of the most immediately obvious features is Fairy Dust, a new set of graphical transitions that occur when a window is minimised, an icon is undocked, etc. This will mean that the Genie effect is revised, and now causes the window to ’sink’ as well as warp into the Dock, and that when the Trash is emptied, the Trashcan will glow and the items inside will appear to explode. Cougar will also include a new Terminal, which allows users to switch, using a menu, between the Bourne shell, the Korn shell, bash, dash, csh, tcsh, and a new, Apple designed shell called crash (Completely Redesigned Apple SHell). It’ll also have native support for ZFS and ext2/3/4. The new graphical enhancements will give Cougar the slogan ‘everything that happens is a blockbuster’, and therefore the new intro movie will reflect that fact, flying around a maze of historic Macintosh models while Ed Welch’s theme tune to Blockbusters plays in the background - additionally, the new intro movie will reveal that OS X has finally been translated into Welsh.
  • ‘One More Thing’ will be a new revision of the Mac Mini. It will include an all aluminium design, and will also have FireWire 800 on board, 802.11n, a SuperDrive, keyboard and mouse as standard, and a $200 discount off a 20″ Cinema Display.
  • There will be one more iddy-biddy thing: there’ll be Blu-Ray SuperDrives for Macs, which can be ordered separately and installed by hand, or added as a build configuration option for an extra $300-ish.
Even if I am entirely wrong, it’ll be very interesting to see what is revealed on Monday. Now I just need to work out what time the keynote starts, and what time it’ll be in London when that happens.



Thursday, December 6, 2007

A (Very Brief) iPhone Review From Someone Who Doesn’t Own One

Filed under: Apple, Communications — Tags: , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 07:54

Well, I got my fingers on the screen of an iPhone yesterday (albeit for less than ten minutes, at my local O2 store) and so here is a very brief review.

The Interface

The interface is simply wonderful. True, I found it fiddly to operate when it was docked and with a security tag in the top-left, but as soon as I took it out of the dock it was wonderful to use. I even managed to do it without triggering the security alarm…

I do, however, have my reservations with the keyboard. In my opinion, you should be able to use it in landscape mode for Email.

The ‘pinch’ gesture is a cinch to get to grips with. Neither does it take too long to master the art of flicking through scrollable lists, pages and artwork in Cover Flow.

The interface is atypical of mobile phone interfaces, because you actually find yourself wanting to use it. No silly submenus, or buttons that are covered in grease after a few minutes of use, just a genius user interface.

Safari

Safari is a joy to use, just like it is on a fully-featured computer. The web sites I visited, such as Google, and this very web site, rendered perfectly. This no surprise really - because Safari on the iPhone is effectively the same as Safari on Windows or the desktop version of OS X, it renders in almost exactly the same way.

Operating system

The iPhone again sets itself apart from other phones in this respect, because it runs an OS which will also run on full featured desktop PCs: the iPhone runs Mac OS X. Put simply, the iPhone is a stripped down Mac computer, with multi-touch replacing the mouse and acting as the keyboard.It runs at a very fast rate, and is most certainly incomparable to any other OS running on mobiles. In fact, while using the phone, I thought to myself, “OS X, Safari and iTunes? This is a phone!”

Apps

The apps provided are very impressive, even if the third-party SDK is not surfacing until February. I was particularly impressed to see what looked like either the Genie or the Suck effect (used on Macs as the animation where windows slide into the Dock) used to great effect on the Notes app. I’m still confused, however, as to why these don’t sync with Mac OS X Leopard’s notes. I don’t have Leopard, but several users have reported this, and it seems very odd.

Reservations

After having a little look at the iPhone, I am able to cast a conditional verdict on its problems.

  • I didn’t find the keyboard a problem at all, even though landscape use in Mail would have been nice. I did make a few mistakes, but I think the keyboard would be quite easy to train yourself to after a few days with the machine. I took far less time typing a sentence on the iPhone than I did typing the same sentence on my Motorola.
  • The camera was something of a disappointment. I was expecting something more high-res, and able to capture video as well.
  • EDGE and no 3G - no, no, no, no, no. 3G really needs to be made an option on iPhone Mk II. True, the speed of the connection using Wi-Fi was reasonable, but switching to EDGE made things excruciatingly slow.
  • Flash memory instead of a HDD is a real let-down. The fact that you can only store 8gB on your iPhone is almost an insult.
  • Priority improvement: PAY AS YOU GO. I really can’t afford to shell out £35 a month for a phone. A suitable plan would be a round £350 for the phone, 10p per minute for calls, 5p for outgoing texts, and 50p for unlimited access for 24 hours to The Cloud and EDGE.



Monday, November 12, 2007

The iPhone’s Problems

Filed under: Apple, Communications — Tags: , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 18:43

So, to much fanfare and the infamous iHype, the iPhone launched in the UK and Germany on Friday.

I can see the expression on your face - you’re waiting for me to produce an image of my shiny new phone and then talk about how magnificent it is.

Well, I haven’t got one.

Why haven’t I got one? Well, there are several things that I find about the iPhone that discourage me from buying it.

  1. The fact that it’s locked into a pay-monthly contract: I simply can’t afford to pay O2 £35 a month for a phone. In the long run, the cost is nonsensical: for an 18-month iPhone contract on the cheapest tariff, (£35*18) + £269 for the cost of the phone = £899. And that’s only if you stop using the phone and cancel the contract after 18 months.
    In my opinion, not offering a pay-as-you-go option was foolish, both on Apple’s and the providers’ part. True, it would be more expensive, but the market would be greatly expanded (improving Apple’s and O2’s profitability from the phone) and the cost to the consumer would, in the end, be lower. It’s a win-win situation.
  2. EDGE instead of 3G: EDGE simply isn’t as fast as 3G. Others’ experience proves it, research proves it, my own experience with the two technologies proves it - leaving 3G out may turn out to be a crucial error.
  3. No video capture: I can do this on a phone I can pick up on a pay-as-you-go tariff from Tesco for a mere £70. Or £55 if I also buy a few bottles of milk, some sausage rolls and a loaf of bread. It’s rather unfortunate that this was omitted, and 3G video calling would also have been nice. The camera could be mounted above the earpiece and cover itself with some kind of door when the sensor detects a face nearby.
  4. No GPS or sat-nav: If a GPS system, and perhaps some sat-nav abilities using Google Maps and a few speech synthesis voices were thrown in, the iPhone could effectively replace your wife in the passenger seat of the car.
  5. Voice commanding: It would be nice to be able to tell it what to do. I don’t just mean a puny voice-dial system like on most phones. I mean a proper speech commands system - eg it can tell you what day and time it is, it can read out your news and email for you, you can tell it to boot up your iMac at home in time for you to use it when you arrive, you can tell it to phone your PA and tell him you’re late, and so on…

In a way, I’m mildly surprised by the iPhone. Apple is famous for refusing to compromise in its products - which it seems it’s done quite a bit of with this phone. I can only hope that the next version will improve on it.

Of course, the iPhone is still a great machine, but I do think that it leaves some things to be desired. And, of course, this review is incredibly detailed for someone who’s never even touched one.



Friday, October 19, 2007

Your Phone Is A Computer. So is your toaster, your alarm clock…

Filed under: Apple, Communications, Security — Tags: , , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 19:26

Steve Jobs has announced that the iPhone will be getting its own SDK by February. Why is it taking so long, you may ask? Well, there’s a very simple explanation for that, which I can do best by quoting from Steve’s press release.

It will take until February to release an SDK because we’re trying to do two diametrically opposed things at once—provide an advanced and open platform to developers while at the same time protect iPhone users from viruses, malware, privacy attacks, etc. This is no easy task. Some claim that viruses and malware are not a problem on mobile phones—this is simply not true. There have been serious viruses on other mobile phones already, including some that silently spread from phone to phone over the cell network. As our phones become more powerful, these malicious programs will become more dangerous. And since the iPhone is the most advanced phone ever, it will be a highly visible target.

This surprised me - I thought the fact that the iPhone is effectively a programmable computer was widely known, and that if it’s a programmable computer, it’s automatically susceptible to viruses.

Obviously, I was wrong.

These days, computers are everywhere. They’re in your toaster (for controlling how brown you want the toast), in your TV (for decoding the digital signals), in your alarm clock (to allow for complex alarm patterns), and, thanks to the wonders of RFID, in your drink can, in your clothes, in your DVD, and so on.

Now, by and large, these chips are safe (except for RFID, which I will go into at a later date) because they have no external input unless the devices are physically disassembled and then connected to an input device. And the virus can’t spread unless there’s a connection between the machines, either physical or wireless. Mains power doesn’t count.

However, a phone makes things more complicated. This is because a phone communicates with other phones (through the GSM cell network) and, in cases, to normal personal computers (when accessing WAP web sites, and when using Bluetooth).

Because these phones are programmable using the same languages as computers (Java in particular), this makes phones susceptible to viruses in Java. If a virus is written in the iPhone SDK language (which I would assume will be Carbon or Cocoa, Mac OS X’s main programming languages), then it can easily infect the phone and others around it (if it’s programmed to spread).

The only ways to stop these viruses are to close the platform entirely (using only the manufacturer’s apps) or to build safeguards into the programming language (or SDK in this case). That is what Apple are quite rightly doing.

But, in the end, the bottom line is… you can’t escape the computer.



Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Bricking unlocked iPhones: something of a moral dilemma

Filed under: Apple, The Law and Technology — Tags: , , , , , , , — Jonathan Rothwell @ 19:25

According to this Slashdot story, Apple is planning to turn iPhones that have been unlocked from AT&T Wireless into very expensive and elaborate paperweights.

Now, I personally believe this is wrong. A person has the right to use their mobile phone as a client on whichever network they would like.

However, I am finding it difficult to place the blame on anyone in particular.

On the one hand, Apple could be blamed for wanting a commission from each iPhone call, and therefore resorting to locking the iPhone into only one carrier.

Alternatively, AT&T could be blamed for the fact that they’re generally such a rubbish mobile provider, and that they also earn a huge commission off the iPhone (probably bigger than Apple’s, as you’re tied into a rolling contract, feeding AT&T with $59.99 a month).

In the end, I can’t really point the blame at anyone for this situation. However, I do have a suggestion to Apple for the next version of the iPhone.

Instead of tying iPhone users to a single provider, why not program the iPhone to charge x proportion in addition to the call price from either your credit/debit card or SIM card and credit that to Apple? That means that it could be SIM-independent, the iPhone could work with whichever carrier you want, and everyone’s happy. (Except AT&T, but they deserve it.)



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