January 2004 Archives

    I have been so happy with the latest device I have been able to test that I had to say something. I have no time (again) because of events in the business world (always exciting), but I thought I would post a few thoughts about the Toshiba e800 and Mark/Space's Missing Sync for Pocket PC:
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1) I still think Palms kick Pocket PC's butts, but there are two things missing from Palms that I am oh-so-sick of: missing Bluetooth SDIO support under Palm OS 5 and the missing high-resolution, large screen that the e800 offers (by the way, the e800 and e805 are the same - one comes with an additional software package that I can't remember and didn't care about in the first place).
2) Pocket PC 2003 has better handwriting recognition than the Pocket PC version found on the Toshiba e740 (another model I played with for a month last year). It still has quite a way to go, but it is definitely better.
3) Mark/Space is awesome. Really. They developed the Missing Sync for Sony Clie (another of my favorite Palm OS based PDA's - the UX/50 was my last one, but the size of the screen eventually was what blew it - plus lack of a CF slot), which was a God-send when I originally moved to the OS X platform. Now they have a fairly reliable Pocket PC-to-iCal/Address Book program (for you OS X junkies). There are some problems with the syncing, but it works well enough for me not to complain - yet.
3) The 480x600 resolution on a 4" LCD is awesome. I don't mind working with small text. (If you do, then the 480x600 resolution may be too difficult to see and/or find useful.) In fact, that is the whole point of trying to cram so much info on a small device... it's smaaaallllllll.
4) If you are going to make sense of surfing on the device, forget IE for Pocket PC. I can't stand Microsoft's browsers in the first place (it irritates me to no end that so many sites are IE specific), but the one on the Pocket PC is even worse than the one you find on every Windows desktop. Download NetFront. It is worth every penny. (If you can afford to blow $600 on a PDA, then the extra $30 shouldn't kill you.) It supports tabs and it renders pages much better than IE.
5) Also, there is a program that does wonders for getting everything out of the high resolution capabilities of the e800: RezFix 2.0 Pay for it, too. It's worth it. Period. (If you don't understand my logic, see the above comment about blowing $600 on a paper replacement.)
6) Pocket PC 2003 (as with every other Microsoft PDA OS) is bloated. It feels bloated. It runs bloated. Thank goodness it is on a 400 MHz Xscale processor. Given this, it works for what I use it for... when I don't have to reset it.
7) I don't understand why so many Pocket PC developers insist that you install their programs from a Windows machine. You - yeah, you, the one developing for the Pocket PC - will you please give me an installer that I can run from the PDA itself??? What a novel idea.
8) I don't rely on the e800 as my only electronic paper pad, so I am willing to put up with its quirks. It is really the screen that has me - you won't believe it until you see it.
hmmmm.... I can't think of anything else right now.

    I don't necessarily like linking to another page unless I have input of my own about whatever it is discussing, but I thought I would help with *BSD evangelism by pointing people to a NetBSD-on-an-iBook HOWTO written by a gentleman named Anselm R. Garbe. Link: port-macppc: Howto install NetBSD 1.6.1 stable on an iBook
(via: OSNews)
I agree with Anselm about a few quirky directory layout and naming conventions that OS X uses that makes it very BSD unlike. While I find it irritating at times, it is just as frustrating as the differences between Linux and other *nix-type OS's. I'll never forget reading Dr. Dan Bernstein's rant on his Cross-platform Compatibility page:

    I came across the quote while doing my initial research into qmail a few years ago and it has stuck with me since. While I was extremely happy when I found Apple base OS X on FreeBSD, I was disappointed to find so many differences. I understand why they are there, but from a philosophical perspective, I never would have allowed most of the differences to pollute the elegance of FreeBSD. (My opinion...) So, for those of you wishing to use one of the true BSD variants on your Apple hardware, I thought this HOWTO might be helpful.

    I initially had an expletive after the title, but decided against using it. I'm trying to put forth a visage of intelligence and charisma, right? (Why do I always start my posts with some ridiculous anecdote, then?)
    To the point: Wil over at WIL WHEATON dot NET was commenting on some different RSS goodies and had some added comments about coding pop-up/blank windows into his links:

I agree with him on the reasons he gives, but the post became a catalyst for a small rant of my own:
I rather dislike target="_blank" because after much use on my own website (especially at the beginning in stevenfettig.com v. 1), I realized it was done out of ego - not out of help to the visitor (at least this is my own psychoanalysis of it). It is done because I never want people to leave my site. After having gone to too many other sites that use the same technique, I got extremely annoyed. I know how to use the back button, key commands, mouse button, etc. dammit! Plus, you are the one showing off the link - let it be. Let me go there and decide to come back through my own volition! I would much rather have people stay on my page or come back willfully than because I made them do so. Plus, I have such a disdain for pop-ups that I loath them in every shape and form. (Substitute loath with hate, abhor, can't stand, curse, deprecate, deride, despise... you get the point.) sigh You ought make the visit enjoyable. Make people want to come back because of what you offer, not because of a little technical trickery.
I feel better now. Thanks, Wil, for helping me get this off my chest.

    Quite a while back, I went on a record accusing the RIAA of using bad statistics and half-facts to back up their claims that music piracy vis a vis the old Napster and newer gnutella clients is the real reason why the music industry is failing. A German weekly news magazine, Die Zeit has come out with a short article on the same topic making some of the same points. Take a minute to read Britney für lau - unfortunately, this is for German readers only. (I wish, however, more journalism like this would make a point of citing sources for information. While the article contains good points based on what appears to be valid statistical questioning, it doesn't actually give the statistics or the facts...)
    One of the points made later in the article:

I think this is cause for some consideration, however. We have seen how the idea that advertising is going to be the savior of every free product has failed. There remains little of the free dial-up, DSL, cell phones, land-line phone calls, publishing, etc. that was once talked about. The problem with advertising is that many continue to see it as a nuisance. For example, most of my day is spent on a dial-up line in my office (because we have no other reasonable form of internet access available in our cornfield) and I am more often than not extremely annoyed by the bloated and intrusive advertisements that appear on many of the pages of online magazines and newspapers I like to read. Although I very much understand the need for such revenue to continue providing content for free, the way in which it is done plays a big role in how successful the content can be. C|Net's News.com is an example of a painfully irritating website when it comes to reading articles. The writing is often overtaken with adds that cause me to stop reading after the first paragraph - plus, when you ad the fact that load time of the page is slow because of the added bloat, I think twice before visiting news.com. Now, imagine every song you downloaded for free came with the cost of an advertisement at the beginning and end. Most people might not think much of it, but I think it takes away the quality of the product and I would much rather pay my dollar for the copy that is without the annoyance than get it for free.* Have you ever noticed that you can no longer fast-forward through the FBI and Copyright warnings at the beginning of a DVD? What a pain! What if I have already seen that DVD a few times, why do I need to constantly be reminded of this? I find it highly annoying. These are little issues that make the advertisement idea questionable. Plus, in a down market, where people are not necessarily making the same type of impulse purchases that advertising is often aimed at, what happens to all of this free stuff when the market starts to dry up?
    It is my opinion that easy to manage distribution methods (like iTunes) are the closest thing we are going to get to "free" over the long run. We need to learn to accept that paying for things is what makes the world go round. People should be compensated for their efforts. What the RIAA and music industry has been so slow to realize is that their distribution method is broken. When CD's came out, there were a number of clear advantages - portability, ease of use, and quality (both in the sound of the music and also in how much abuse a CD could take in starting, stopping, rewinding, etc.) - and the only people who seem to have recognized a few of these items are those pushing for distribution methods similar to Apple.** There need to be limits on what we can do with the music and video we purchase. To think that we are going to have data files that can be copied and moved limitlessly is highly idealistic. That would only be asking to exacerbate the legitimate problems brought on by digital reproduction. What needs to be done is work on more transparent and easy to understand methods of keeping media from being distributed at will. Again, in my experience, Apple has done a great job at doing this. They give me the sense that what I bought is actually owned by me. There are a few glitches (like my wife having purchased music on her PowerBook that I now want to have on mine, too), but I would imagine there will be refinements to what we already have. So instead of continuing to battle over whether or not media/content ought to be free or not, we should agree that the seller (i.e. the one who has come up with the idea or content) has a right to decide whether he wants to make us pay for it or not. We should also agree to find easy methods of selling and buying said media. CD's are a good structure to start with. One goes into a store (or goes to an online store), makes a choice, walks out of the store and pops the CD in the CD player. Done. If one wants to use the media elsewhere, he or she pops it out of the CD player and puts it in another. Easy as that. Even my dad can figure that out and that's the way it should be.

*Yes, this may seem like an easy statement to make because I have already made it clear that I don't mind paying for music. There is a philosophical and moral value to this, however. I feel that intellectual property is like any other property (as long as we don't stretch the definition of intellectual property too far and make claims on rights to it for too long) - there is definite ownership of it and the owning party should be paid for it. By saying that something is "too expensive," you are simply saying that you a) cannot afford it at this time because there is a literal limitation on your wealth or b) are not willing to pay for it - i.e. you do not feel it worth the investment the selling party believes he is entitled to. There is no greater philosophical meaning than "too expensive" and those that try to use the phrase "too expensive" to demonize the selling party are fools. They are only muddying the waters about ownership and when stealing is indeed stealing.
**The only thing I see missing is that there is still a question as to the over-all quality of the music. With all of the technological advances in recording, you would think that music would be better and clearer sounding. I realize there is a barrier to all of this, but those who shunned Dolby 5.1, etc. were wrong in thinking that people wouldn't be interested. The fact is that an AAC or high bit-rate MP3 is still lower quality than the original CD wav file.

    One thing that often disappoints me about my SprintPCS data account on my Treo 600 is that I rarely use it. Other than occasionally checking email or sending a picture of something to my wife, that part of my phone service is practically unused. I think I have finally found a use for the data services that will actually come in handy from time to time - Pocket Tunes.
    What originally caught my attention was that the blurb on Palm Gear mentioned that the player supported streaming music from Shoutcast based servers. This was news to my ears! One of my favorite online radio stations, Digitally Imported, uses Shoutcast servers for their MP3 streams. I thought, if this device will use the network interface on the Treo to connect to one of Digitally Imported's Shoutcast servers, then I just may be able to listen to streaming music on my Treo. While I never envisioned the Treo as a portable music player (I like my iPod thank you very much), this might be a very convenient use of not only one of the Treo's side abilities, but also the capabilities of SprintPCS' Vision network in my area. At the time of finding this little gem, I happened to be waiting at an airport in Copenhagen, Denmark for our flight home, but I planned on trying to see if it would work when we were back in the States.
    Well, now that we are back in the States and I had a few free moments to install Pocket Tunes (Deluxe) on the Treo, I plugged in the 24K MP3 Trance link. It works! Not only does it work (well) with the 24k stream, but it also works (fairly well) with the 56k music stream. I imagine if I were in a moving car, the 56k stream would be harder to keep consistent, but it seems that the 24k stream would hold up well (as long as network coverage was decent).
    The only con I can think of is that Pocket Tunes does not allow you to set a media buffer size larger than whatever the default is. That would help greatly with areas where network connection faded, but where the signal would eventually return (much like when on a phone call and the signal fades in and out). Although I am generally happier with Verizon Wireless' internet/data services - something which I am planning on writing about - it appears that Sprint is more than capable of keeping up with the challenge of plugging that kind of data stream over its wireless network. I'm not sure what the equivalent size data stream a voice call is, but 24kbps is pretty good for audio, especially if I don't need anything more than the equipment I already own, service I already pay for and a relatively well priced software program ($24.95).