Monday, November 12, 2007

Stop Press: I am now just plain ECSTATIC!


Signal! You don't even need to Jailbreak your iPT/iPhone!

Thanks to AlloySoft

As seen in my prior Blog I wanted an iTunes Remote: Signal! is it!!!

Apart from the fact that it cannot control the AirTunes selection, it is perfect

U just gotta try it!!!

I am now partially delighted with my iPod Touch!!!

No thanks to Apple!? Which saddens me....
(The way I could become fully delighted is for Apple to uncripple the iPod Touch and reveal the rumoured BlueTooth functionality in it, and have it work with my Apple iTunes on my Main Mac, it could be A REALLY COOL REMOTE CONTROL OVER ALL MY Music, and have it work with AirTunes)

Thanks are due to the writers of Jailbreak and AppTapp, and the now infamous Safari Tiff Exploit. Although I am experiencing slow downs since I hacked the iPod Touch. (More on that as I discover the cause)

Owners of an iPT still at version 1.1.1 will be able to uncripple their new toy using the following link from their website explained here:

There are some great apps out there waiting to be installed by AppTapp....

Monday, November 05, 2007

Is Apple losing it's way?


A sad state of affairs, Apple losing its way!

The key differentiator that Apple was founded upon was; designing for the User, rather than for Profit. This notion was the prime reason for the development of hordes of loyal Apple Users. They are always willing to upgrade, invest, or spend more money on Apple products rather than other similar, cheaper, but designed for profit Technology. The resulting product were invariably what the consumer wanted, thus the premium paid was acceptable.

Let me tell you a story.

One day one of those fiercely loyal Apple consumers (FLAC) went to buy an iPod Touch, the new form of the iPod. He was in Indianapolis so that the dollar exchange rate benefit was too difficult to resist, he only purchased the 8Gb version as he really wanted the 160Gb Hard Disk enhanced version of the iPod Touch, sadly not yet a product. He had lugged his trusty old iBook across the Atlantic as it had his music and photos on it. He couldn't wait to synch . He first called at the home of one of his surrogate daughters, as sadly her mum had suffered through the initial stages of piratisation, by a presumably short sighted foot surgeon. He proudly dropped off a copy of the Sunday Times, actually on a Sunday!, and some nice Chocs to help take her mind off the impending wooden leg, and hopefully didn't infect the household with the deadly virus he was infected with. Anyway back to the less important topic of how Apple is losing its way!

He got back to the hotel room, and expectantly plugged the iPod Touch into his Apple iBook. The result was a VERY unApple message, apparently a 0xE8000025 error had occurred, he winced and waited for the BSOD, just to add the final touch of irony. Happily, Apple have not yet got totally lost! Anyway the iPod Touch could NOT synch with the iBook. Doh! One deflated FLAC!

Sadly, the fLAC unpacked his HP Windows Laptop and fired up iTunes on it and tried to Synch, it was a long shot, he thought, but NO the Apple iPod Touch synched just fine with a Windows machine!!! However there was no music on his work laptop, and no photos to speak of. The initial joy of the synch was thus very tainted.

Then he started to play with his new toy and slowly discovered just how crippled it was. He was sure that he had read that it was based on the Mac OSX Operating System and was capable of the same things that the iPhone could do, less of course, Phoning and Taking Photos He would clearly have purchased the iPhone in preference, but those mean AT&T folks had forced Apple to cripple that device, and tie it to a Heavy Contract. (Clearly Apple wouldn't have come up with that idea..... right!!???)

First he searched in the box for pouch to protect his new toy, instead he found a polishing cloth, damn he thought "I'll soon lose that, especially as it is black!". He then searched in vain for the email application, or the weather app or the... heck quite a few of the apps he had been expecting were not present. The first inkling of an unusual Apple initial experience, when was the last time he had purchased a new Apple product and not been DELIGHTED!?. But at least the Contacts and Calendar Apps were present. The Contacts user interface was a typical Apple interface, designed for users, but the Calendar interface???...., he knew he had read that he could add calendar events but nothing he did would add one. So he resorted to Google, but WHAT!!! ...according to Steve the feature has been disabled due to a software bug. Then a little later he found that the software bug was to do with the Edit feature being "accidentally?" set to FALSE in a key line of code in the operating system. He thought, "Those pesky testers... bet Steve was livid!"

ITunes on the iPod Touch still doesn't want him to connect directly via the built in wireless, weird comments about going to the iTunes website but when he did, no clue as to what he should do to enable the iPod Touch. Hmm more and more like Microsoft every day....

A little more perusing and he found a site that could resolve the problem, literally 2 clicks later having entered the correct URL into the Safari Browser on the iPod Touch and he was happily adding Calendar events.. Admittedly the TIFF exploit crashed the Safari Browser in the process and rebooted the iPod Touch, but that was all to be expected... (See Next Blog)

So have Apple lost their way...???

There is a choice here: They haven't lost their way and they always did intend to launch the full suite of applications, but these bugs are actually real, just like the TIFF Security Vulnerability, just harder to find... and in an effort to protect their trusty iPod Touch customers from the nasty bugs that the iPhone customers will be experiencing they just had to delete all the dangerous though valuable applications.

...OR...

AT&T and Microsofts money grabbing practises have rubbed off on Apple and they are now thinking "Damn the FLAC's we want to screw them for all the profit we can!"

Well all I can say Steve is Watch Out!, for racing up behind you is:
1) an as yet unfunded start-up
2) Google
3) Nintendo...
who will build a Linux based hand held device that will have the following features
High Def Touch Screen to die for
WiFi
Blue Tooth , I'll come back to this!!!
MP3 Player
Gaming Capability
Surround Sound
Cool Browser
Camera
eMail App
The obvious Instant Messaging App
Capability of Running Multiple Open Source Apps
Oh and did I mention Blue Tooth, as this enables VOIP in the device!

(Hey folks at Nintendo are you listening this could be yours, that way I wouldn't need to be carrying around my DS, and my iPod Touch ! Imagine taking over from Apple as clearly they have given up delighting their Customers, come to think of it I was delighted with my new Wii and my DS...... AND THE DS DOES ALREADY HAVE WIFI.!!!!... hey you have already started I GET IT.... WAIT A MINUTE YOUR STOCK PRICE IS ALREADY SHOWING THE POWER OF DOING THAT)

And as of today I am no longer as fiercely loyal as I once was!!!!

I am feeling more like a Partially Loyal Apple Dupe. A PLAD?!

DOH! I gave away "his" identity!

Yes loyal reader it was me!!

The last six Tech Toys I have purchased recently were

Mac Mini- Delighted
DS - Delighted
iBook - OK (Was as expected but I did NOT get a free Leopard upgrade in the box as it was so close to the Leopard Launch date) SO really that was a "Just OK"
Wii - Delighted
Leopard - Underwhelmed
iPod Touch - Deflated, with a tinge of delight thanks to my JailBreak friends
(See next Blog)

WELL STEVE ITS DOWN TO YOU NOW!
Do you want Nintendo to take your delight the user slot?
Or is the impending Google announcement the true death knell?

Hmmm.... A Google-Nintendo Dream team, now that would be pretty neat!

So Steve:
Please get Apple back to what you did best; delighting your Customers!