June 2013

Revert.

Somebody switched his iPhone 5 back to iOS 6. While I’m probably not allowed to say much of this because of developer agreements, I will tell you that when iOS 7 is released this autumn it is going to be awesome and people will love it. It will definitely breathe new life into your iDevice.

That being said, as expected, beta 1 is not ready for primetime yet. It’s the start of something great, but I can’t use it on my main iPhone right now. It’s too unstable for my needs. All of that is OK and expected. What I kind of didn’t expect was not being able to restore my iCloud backup to iOS 6. So I just finished reverting my phone back to the latest “real” version of iOS and then manually setting it up to my liking. I had to download all of my apps one by one again.

My phone is flying in regards to speed. I’m a very happy camper.

12 June 2013 by J.P. Geek Macboy 0

Freedom.

I have been striving to include a photo or graphic of some sort with every blog entry lately, in case you haven’t noticed. I often come up with the title of my blog entry before I actually write it, and since I typed the word “Freedom”, I had to figure out what I wanted to include as a photo to represent this blog entry.

When I looked up from my seat in the Jeep, I saw that there was a United States Flag blowing beautifully in the wind right in front of me. So today, we enjoy a photo of the U.S. flag.

I have been thinking about freedom more than usual lately. It’s a word that gets bandied about in the media, during debates, in every day conversation; it’s the descriptor of what makes the United States “great”. We have the most freedom of anyone that calls themselves a citizen on the planet, so the story goes, and we take this freedom very seriously. Thousands upon thousands died as sought our freedom and millions have died defending our freedom. Millions of citizens of the United States have enjoyed the freedoms that we probably take for granted within our borders.

Why is it that more and more Americans don’t mind giving away some of that freedom lately?

By now you have probably heard the name Edward Snowden. He is the “whistleblower” that revealed details of the NSA’s monitoring of ALL phone call metadata in the United States. While the NSA isn’t listening to the content of your phone call, they do have a record of the fact that you called the pizza joint down the street and ordered your usual pepperoni, anchovy and pineapple pizza. And by the way, ew, what a weird combination of toppings!

The NSA is doing this in the name of counterterrorism efforts. They are looking for patterns in communication efforts so they can see who is connected to whom and where they are making that connection. This helps the NSA identify “trends”.

Many Americans scream, “I don’t really care that they’re doing this, because after all, I’m not doing anything wrong so I don’t have anything to worry about.” As I mentioned last week, that’s great until you inadvertently butt dial Iran and you find yourself with a drone up your ass because you’ve been deemed a threat.

The thing is, I don’t think the government should give two hoots about what I’m doing within the privacy of my own life unless they have a reason to believe that I’m doing something wrong. I’m sorry but as an American, I’m innocent until proven guilty, I am not automatically “under suspicion because I use the telephone or the internet.” I am not willing to give up my freedom just because there’s a chance that someone thinks that someone else somewhere that might be remotely connected to me (we go to the same car wash, for example) and therefore they feel that I should have my personal activities monitored. Too many brave men and women have fought to the death to protect the freedom that I enjoy and because of that, I’m not that willing to give it up. I find Edward Snowden to be a brave man who is fighting for our freedom just like the millions of soldiers have done so over the past 220+ years. I commend him for what he did, and though I do believe that the NSA should be able to conduct their intelligence gathering in secret ways in order to protect the freedom that we enjoy, I do not believe that we should be so eager to give up our freedom so that the government can broadly generalize, sweep and mine data.

There has to be a better way to gather intelligence. It is expensive, it is intrusive and it is unscrupulous to gather and store ALL the metadata of every single phone call made in the U.S. And until the NSA can do better at this by respecting that which was given to them by their Creator, they need to stop.

Freedom. It’s meant to be shared, not given away.

iReaction.

OK, let me start this post with two important notes, actually three important notes:

1. This is another Macboy related post.
2. I really am a developer so everything I obtain is via legitimate means.
3. I’m scared to death of Apple so I won’t post screen shots or go into specific details of what I’m experiencing whilst beta testing.

As I mentioned in my post yesterday, Apple previewed their newest versions of iOS (for the iDevices), called iOS 7, and OS X (for the Macs). The newest version of OS X breaks the tradition of being named after big cats and is called OS X Mavericks.

I’m not a huge fan of the name but it works for me. I still think “Sea Lion” would have been kind of fun.

As an OS X and iOS developer, I utilized my vast developer powers and installed the beta versions of each of these new offerings on my test devices. These are my gut reactions after just over 12 hours of experience with the new platforms.

Surprisingly, my old MacBook Pro from 2008 runs OS X Mavericks in its current incarnation just fine and it seems a little snappier than OS X Mountain Lion. There are some subtle changes in the interface that I certainly appreciate and it feels quite comfortable to me. One of the things that I really like is the deeper integration with iOS; it’s kind of cool being able to find a place in Maps on my Mac and send the information to my iPhone automagically. I know, I know, others have been able to do this for a while but the bright spot of doing it on OS X is that I don’t have to see an advertisement whilst doing it. OS X Mavericks is a comfortable evolution that I am thoroughly enjoying.

iOS 7 is more than an evolution, it’s an abrupt change.

Keeping in mind that I am running beta 1 of iOS 7, there are some things that I am finding a little confounding.

First of all, I don’t understand this obsession with Helvetica Neue as the default font. Anyone and everyone is looking to make their logo and other typography as svelte as possible with Helvetica Neue.

I believe that if you’re going to say something, say it boldly and Helvetica Neue is anything but bold. In fact, it can be a little rough on the eyes. But it’s EVERYWHERE in iOS 7 and I guess there’s not a dang thing I can do about it.

There has been a lot of chatter about the new icons in iOS 7 and I have to admit that I agree that they feel like they’re missing some of the polish that I have grown to love about Apple. I don’t know that “cartoonish” is a word that I would use; they just feel amateurish to me, almost as if they were an afterthought. There’s a certain lack of class. Maybe these are just placeholders until the real things come out because of course, this could all change at a moment’s notice and it probably will.

That all being said, I like the way that iOS 7 works. I had to make some changes to muscle memory when it came to handling email (I apparently used to swipe the wrong way?) but otherwise in that respect iOS 7 feels more familiar to me than I thought it would. The change isn’t as jarring as say, moving to an Android device. I really like the animations and the slight 3D effects. Of course, this is style over substance but I think it does contribute to the spit and polish that Apple is known for.

There is a feature missing in iOS 7 that I hope will return in later releases and that’s the “Tap to Tweet” and “Tap to Post” buttons in the notification center. I LOVED being able to be witty in 140 characters or less by just typing my hilarity in a pull down box and then going on with life. That functionality is missing right now and it’s kind of a bummer to have to open up my Twitter client (I use Tweetbot) to be witty. Half the time the moment has passed.

The Sybil sides of me have been hot and cold about iOS 7 over the last 12 hours, but the sensible side of me has been determined to just calm down and make a fair assessment of the new experience.

I’m looking forward to seeing how iOS 7 and OS X Mavericks progress.

11 June 2013 by J.P. Geek 5

Macboy.

So the keynote speech from Apple’s WWDC is less than an hour away. As a geek, and more importantly, as a nearly rabid Apple fanboy (I admit it!), I’m not only excited but I am über excited to see what Apple will be talking about during this keynote speech. Expected topics include announcements of a new version of iOS for the iPhone/iPad/iPod (iOS 7) which reportedly will have a new, “flatter” look to it and a new version of OS X. OS X has traditionally been named after “big cats”, but banners seen at the Moscone Center in San Francisco show a big ocean wave, so my guess is “Sea Lion”, but we’ll see.

The “DC” in WWDC stands for “Developer’s Conference”, so this is traditionally where Apple shares what’s coming up for their various computing platforms. While updates to Apple hardware aren’t out of the question, there probably won’t be some six-inch iPhone 6 coming out, but on the safe side, Earl and I have held off on adding a new iPad to the MacInHouse before hearing what is announced today.

I can’t wait to see what Apple announces today.

Speaking of iPads, I have been giving some serious consideration to making my iPad my main computing device. My MacBook Pro is from 2008 and the iMac is from 2009 (the work MacBook Pro from 2010 doesn’t count) and lately I have been finding that much of what I want to do can be accomplished on my iPad, especially when teamed up with my keyboard from The Brydge. Earl has expressed an interest in getting a full-sized iPad for work purposes, so there has been talk about shuffling some iDevices in the family around so that I can get an iPad with more storage. Only time will tell.

Less than 45 minutes until the big keynote! I’ll probably blog more about it later today. Who am I kidding, of course I will! In the meantime, I’ll make popcorn to snack on for the big event, which will be on in the corner as I work on my work stuff from my home office.

10 June 2013 by J.P. Geek Macboy 2

Watch You Dance.

This song has been going through my head today for some reason so I thought it’d be fun this dance track. The theme of the video fits with the vibe of the U.S. these days.

Here’s “Baby Love” by Regina from 1986. It’s co-written by Stephen Bray and Regina, who was producing hits for Madonna around the same time, with the intention of Madonna recording it. When Madonna passed, Regina decided to record it for herself.

7 June 2013 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 0

Calm.

So yesterday I went on my rant about the government monitoring phone call metadata on Verizon’s network. As the day progressed, it was revealed that the government is doing much more than that through a program they called PRISM.

My tin foil hat is squarely in place now.

That being said, I’m not going to harp on that right now. I’m very calm today. I’m enjoying my Friday and I’m going to pretend that all is right with the world.

I’m taking some precautionary steps to make things just a little more difficult for the NSA.

1. I have moved whatever email I had left on Gmail to my own domain on a little server that is powered by a windmill.
2. I have switched back to Mozilla Firefox as my primary browser.
3. I removed Google+ from my phone simply because it was eating up way too much battery life.

In addition, I am currently in the process of drafting a letter to my government officials expressing my displeasure with the latest turn of events in this whole PRISM thing.

And I’m doing it quite calmly.

7 June 2013 by J.P. Geek 4

Rant.

So I went on a little bit of a Twitter rant this morning, specifically about news that Verizon is turning all “metadata” associated with *all* phones calls passing through their network over to the NSA. I will say right here and now that Verizon is doing this under court order and I have no doubt in my mind that the other telecoms in the United States are doing the same thing, but the article was specifically about Verizon. Broadly speaking, this activity falls under the Patriot Act and is taking place so that we have a safer place to live.

Right.

I’m sorry, but I don’t feel safe knowing that the government is amassing all of this data from innocent citizens. My rant went a little bit like this:

You get my drift.

I know that my thinking puts me over in that fringe area at times and that my ranting probably gets me labeled a lunatic now and then (put ’em together and whatya got? Lunatic Fringe! woo!), but if there is one thing that I firmly believe it is in privacy and the natural free will of people. I’ll admit that I have control issues but in no way, shape or form, does it seem OK to me for the government to be keeping track of every single phone call made by every single citizen of the United States for a indeterminate amount of time. There are too many insane people with questionable motives in governmental agencies that could tap that database for reasons other than the original intention and furthermore, when these kinds of behaviors occur without question or challenge, they become the norm, and quite frankly, this is a solid step in the direction of an Orwellian 1984.

I’m not a fan of this. At all.

The U.S. Government screws up all the time. We all know that. Back in 1990 the DMV repeatedly sent me a bill for some service charge that they felt they had failed to collect when I moved my car to its new residence. I ignored the bill repeatedly and they sent me warnings about losing my license, my virginity and the inability to digest corn.

The bill was for $0.00.

That’s right: ZERO.

To shut them up, I made a check out to the DMV for ZERO.

I never heard from them again.

Now, let’s see you have your iPhone or Android phone jammed into your back pocket. And you’ve butt dialed someone. Repeatedly. We’ve all been there, screaming into a phone saying “you’re calling me by mistake!” But your ass is feeling feisty and has inadvertently made some random international call and you’ve butt dialed some guy in Iran. Repeatedly.

24 hours later you have a drone hovering over your backyard and you’re toast.

Now, I know that sounds wicked far-fetched, but papers get mixed up, signals get crossed and some do-gooder (god I sound like my grandfather) in Washington decides that you’re a threat to National Security and you are no longer allowed to fly, see the Liberty Bell or digest corn.

You laugh, but with the idiocy in the bureaucracy, it could certainly happen.

As I type this, I’m wondering if I should be concerned about sharing my feelings on line, because it seems that the house is being buzzed by a Lockheed C-5 Galaxy.

You think I’m joking.

6 June 2013 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 6

Logistics.

Before I dive into this blog entry, I must confess that it is not populated with all of the photos I had originally planned on including with this narrative. Just as I was taking photos, a very large woman with a very large baby carriage parallel parked in front of the beverage station that I am about to talk about and I didn’t have room to wedge my iPhone 5 in for a proper photo. Please bear with me.

Earl and I are at the local Panera for a little wind down soft drink and treat. This location was renovated a few months ago and part of the sprucing up of the place involved relocating the self-serve drink station to the rear of the restaurant.

It wasn’t the most efficient of moves.

To keep matters interesting, the drink dispensers are located to the right of the utensils and condiment station as shown above in the second photo. So, one gets an empty cup at the front register, follows handwritten signs to the back of the store, fills their drink amongst others that are trying to figure out how to fill their drink and then to get a cover for their cup of free water (or purchased pop, iced tea, etc.), they must move to the aforementioned condiment/utensils station to the left of the beverage dispensers.

However! The dispensers and the condiment/utensils station are separated by …

… a hallway! And it’s not just any hallway, but it’s a hallway to the seating that was recently added to the location AND the rest rooms. So people whipping their baby buggy around Panera can slam into the patron who is trying to move from the filling station to the covering station.

As seen in the first photo, there is plenty of room to the right of the beverage station to house the utensils, or at the very least, the covers for the beverage cups.

This is not efficient. This isn’t even smart. The hallway is often slippery due to spilled drinks. I would think that a chain as large as Panera would have already figured this scenario out to peak efficiency.

Apparently I was wrong.

5 June 2013 by J.P. Why. 1

Share It.

So this morning I got up a few moments before the alarm, took a peek at my iPhone and then hopped out of bed to get my day started. It is at this moment that I made a crucial decision that would set the tempo for the rest of my day.

I decided to smile.

Even though it was a chilly morning and I needed to head to the office soon, I pulled on my sweatpants, put on a t-shirt and what I affectionately call my “trailer trash jacket” and went for a 15 minute walk to get my blood and mind moving for the day. I may not have had time for a bike ride but I certainly had a few minutes to walk.

I continued to smile.

(Taken at 5:34 a.m., I look like I just got out of bed and I’m not ashamed of that.)

It’s amazing what you can do when you decide to smile and it’s even more amazing when you decide to share your smile with others. Admittedly, this is something that I forget at times and sometimes I scowl and that scowl becomes contagious. This is not good for the human equation. It’s the smile that we should make contagious.

The reason this has been on my mind today is because I just walked into the Dunkin’ Donuts closest to work. This is the same location that once upon a time always had my large, unsweetened iced tea with lemon poured and ready to go when I walked in the door, but times change and habits are modified accordingly. The attentive staff always had a smile on their face. They were pleasant and they seemed like they were enjoying their job.

A new shift leader has apparently joined in the past couple of months. The first time I noticed that she was added to the staff, it was because she was shrieking at a co-workers about the hot chocolate machine. People may say that I exaggerate at times, but trust me, “shrieking” is not an exaggeration when used to describe the noises she was making regarding the discontent with the hot chocolate machine. It wasn’t until a few visits later that I noticed the words “shift leader” on her badge.

This new addition to the crew is never smiling. She doesn’t look very happy. Maybe things like hot chocolate machines bother her. Perhaps her till is unbalanced. Maybe she’s unbalanced. I hope that whatever makes her choose not to smile is not something that turns out to be insurmountable, because no one should have to live a miserable life.

Her scowling has become contagious, and the rest of the formerly pleasant staff have turned very quiet and apathetic towards their duties. I have noticed this on my last couple of visits. If the store is dead silent when I walk in, it means she’s the shift leader.

So today I decided to smile at her. It was a happy, well-intended smile. I even said, “Have a good day.”

Nothing was returned aside from a blank stare. Apparently my smile was not contagious enough. Maybe I’m spooky. Perhaps she found my intentions to be creepy. Whatever the reason, she decided not to return the smile. That’s all well and good and as I said before, I hope she can find a reason to smile at least once today.

As I left Dunkin’ Donuts I made the choice to continue smiling. And for me, that in itself is a reason to smile.

5 June 2013 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 1

Let’s Dance.

Someone made a “Pride Remix” of “Dance Your Pain Away” by Agnetha Fältskog. I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again: The album “A” is outstanding.

Enjoy!

4 June 2013 by J.P. DJ 0

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June 2013

Revert.

Freedom.

iReaction.

Macboy.

Watch You Dance.

Calm.

Rant.

Logistics.

Share It.

Let’s Dance.

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