Tag: Technology

iPhone gets an upgrade

Today Apple did something it rarely does: announce a major upgrade to a product before it is even released. In this press release, Apple stated that the iPhone will have better battery life and a more durable screen than was previously specified.

As I noted in a previous blog post, the iPhone’s battery life has been criticized since it was announced during Steve Jobs’ MacWorld keynote address in January. Saturday Night Live joked that battery life expectancy was only 20 minutes (although the original specifications stated the iPhone’s battery would last about 5 hours). Apple is now saying that when the iPhone is released to the public next Friday, June 29, it “will deliver significantly longer battery life,” with “up to 8 hours of talk time, 6 hours of internet use, 7 hours of video playback or 24 hours of audio playback.”

Perhaps an even more significant upgrade is the switch from a plastic touch screen to one made of “optical-quality glass.” Supposedly this will make the iPhone more resistant to scratches, a problem that I have seen with many of the iPods I have owned over the years.

What Apple did not state in the press release is whether these changes will make the iPod any heavier. The switch to glass from plastic could potentially add a bit of heft, but the iPhone’s specification page still lists the weight as 4.8 ounces (135 grams), as originally announced. One would think that the move to glass would at least add a gram or two, but apparently Apple has found a way to keep the iPhone’s weight constant. Amazing, if true.

What is also amazing is the ability of Apple to announce these changes less than two weeks before the product ships. Surely there must be some units already in the manufacturing pipeline. I have to wonder whether any of the iPhones that have already been created, such as the ones on display at MacWorld and those that have been given to elite technology reviewers (like the Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg) will be retrofitted with glass screens. Perhaps the few iPhones that have plastic screens will become collector’s items…if they don’t get too many scratches on them.

ScribeFire Blog Editor

I’ve been exploring different Blog Editors lately, trying to find the best combination of features, speed and flexibility.  I have been using MacJournal, which has some nice features, including a very cool full screen mode.  Unfortunately, I have found that there are some issues with formatting and aligning images that required manual adjustment in the WordPress web interface.  Most of these issues are probably related to the new version of WordPress, but nevertheless they have prompted me to look for alternatives.

I have tried Qumana in the past, and decided to try the latest version.  It seemed promising at first, and the Q-Ads monetizing feature was intriguing.  But like previous versions, I found Qumana to be far from perfect, at least on the Mac platform.  Perhaps I didn’t give it a long enough test drive, but I soon found myself frustrated with entries not refreshing and  quirks with embedded images.  Ecto has a lot of features, but isn’t free.  At $17.95, it’s quite reasonably priced, but I’m not convinced it offers much more than what is available in freeware applications.  WBloggar is free, but is only available on Windows, and hasn’t been updated for quite awhile. 

Then I discovered ScribeFire, a Firefox add-on that used to be called Performancing for Firefox.  So far I like it a lot.  What is great about ScribeFire is the ability to blog with an editor while in the browser.  You can split the browser window in half, blog in one half while surfing in the other. ScribeFire has built-in support for Technorati tags and del.icio.us bookmarks, the ability to save drafts and notes, and three different editing views (WYSIWYG, code and preview).  I’m currently testing it out, but so far it seems to provide a very useful environment for blogging. One disadvantage is that it only works in Firefox, and I’ve been mainly using the new version of Safari lately.  I’d love to see a ScribeFire plug-in for Safari (or something like it).

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A visit to Newlin Grist Mill

This morning my wife, sister-in-law and I paid a visit to the Newlin Grist Mill, a restoration of a water-powered mill that was originally established in 1704. I didn’t know quite what to expect at first, as I’m not a huge history buff, and hardly a “mill enthusiast.” But it turned out to be a very interesting and enjoyable visit.

We began at the visitor’s center, a small building that houses a few exhibits, a small video theater, and a gift shop. After looking at some of the exhibits, we watched a brief video about the mill, with a somewhat corny but cute story about a young boy who found himself “transported back in time” by a visit to the mill. We were then asked if we would like to take the guided tour ($5 a person). My sister-in-law offered to pay, so we took her up on the offer, and spent the next hour or so listening to an informative tour guide describe in detail the intricacies of water power, wooden gears and spinning grind stones. The most impressive part of the tour was when the tour guide turned the water on, and we were able to watch the huge water wheel being set in motion. It was loud and impressive, and we got to see the mill mechanism “in action,” not once, but twice, from two different rooms of the mill.

After the tour of the mill, we looked at some of the other buildings on the property, including the neighboring miller’s house, which housed quite a few antiques. We also enjoyed just walking the grounds. The mill is surrounded by a beautiful park, featuring a trout pond, picnic tables, an idyllic creek and numerous walking trails. It was a beautiful morning for a walk, and taking lots of pictures, of course.

The Newlin Grist Mill is located in Concord Township in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, just off of Route 1 and Cheyney Road. Both my wife and I have passed by the Mill many times while driving down Route 1, but neither of us had stopped to visit. We’re glad we did…the Newlin Grist Mill is well worth turning off of busy Route 1 to step back to a simpler, slower time.

I’ve posted more pictures from our visit to this Picasa Web Album.

YouTube dumps FLV

A report at iLounge reveals that YouTube is planning to switch video formats in order to integrate more seamlessly with Apple TV. YouTube has been using the Flash Video format (FLV), which some believe sacrifices streaming efficiency for security. Starting later this month, YouTube will encoding videos in the H.264 format, which is an advanced, highly stream-efficient format based on the MP4 standard.

One consequence of this switch may be changes to the way people download YouTube videos. Currently, in order to download videos from YouTube (rather than just linking to them) one needs to either manually find the FLV file in their browser’s cache, or use one of many software or web-based utilities to do the trick. One site I’ve used in the past is KissYouTube, but there are many sites out there that provide similar services. Given the AppleTV-YouTube announcement of a few days ago, I suspect that in the future, YouTube video grabbing will be easier on the Mac than on Windows or Linux.

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Getting chummy with Chumby

Chumby is the name of a small device that displays “web widgets.” It connects wirelessly to the internet to display a rotation of user-selected content. It’s still in the testing stages, but supposedly will be on sale this summer, and will cost less than $200. But you can create your own “Virtual Chumby” now by establishing an account on www.chumby.com

Here’s the Virtual Chumby I created just a few minutes ago…

There may be some aspects of Chumby that could be useful in my sabbatical project (to create a prototype “textbook in an iPod”). The touchscreen interface and Flash playback is promising, although at the moment it doesn’t appear able to support streaming video.

BuzzDash: Make your own web poll

I recently discovered BuzzDash, a “Web 2.0” web application for creating web polls. Below is an example of a simple poll I created about my recent RECAP session on podcasting lectures. Go ahead and “vote” by clicking on one of the choices, and watch the results update instantly.

Note that you may need to set your browser to accept cookies in order to vote. If you register for an account on BuzzDash, you may add comments to your response. Plus you would then be able to create your own instant polls. These tiny “BuzzBites” are housed on the BuzzDash server, and you can link to them from your web site or blog, e-mail them to friends, or house them as publicly-available polls at BuzzDash.