Geoff's Random Thoughts

As many people know, IOS 4.2 comes to iPad in a couple of months, maybe less. The second it is released, there will be a stampede to download and install it onto people's ipads. Of course, people in the App Development program have advanced beta versions to help them test and if necessary, recode their apps so they work on day one. But Fanboi's all over the world wait with baited breath to take their iPads and upgrade them to allow multitasking and various other features. It is however at this point that the moaning will start. "App A crashes with 4.2, and I can't live without it" and this is where people fail to do proper risk analysis and treat their phones and personal devices as the computers they are. It amazes me that so many people rush so quickly to update the phones they base their lives around without the slightest thought that something might actually go wrong, or that 3rd party developers may not have had time to test their mobile apps agains...

It's easy to buy an app from the Apple App store isn't it, go into the app store, find the app you want, click on the price and enter your password. Voila. Couldn't be easier. Could it? Well, as you can probably guess, I'm going to disagree. Yes, if you know exactly the app you want, it's really easy, You follow the instructions below. What if you only know your own requirements. e.g. I want an application to read RSS feeds. Well, you can go on the best selling lists, you can search the hot apps, if you've already bought a few apps you can use the Genius feature, but these avoid the actual problem of buying apps for a platform like IOS. For many years we've used Mice and Keyboard to activate things on a screen in front of us, but IOS invites us to get literally hands on. Some of the functionality is baked into the Operating System, but some of it is based around the way that the Application has been designed. You immerse yourself into these apps and ...

Well, I've had the iPad now for over a month and I thought it was time to post my thoughts after getting used to the device. Do I use it much? My iPad goes pretty much everywhere that's sensible with me. unlike the woman I observed flipping out her iPad while she waited for Inception to start at the IMAX, I don't carry it in plain sight, I don't take it to the pub and it doesn't go absolutely everywhere, but I take it to a lot of places. My MacBook pro is almost a desktop now, with iTunes syncing, mobile me and Evernote putting most things I need on the iPad, there's little need to move the MBP most of the time. From a point where I never envisaged buying anything but a laptop, My next Mac purchase will probably now be an iMac. What's the software keyboard like? I'm not a touch typist, but I can type at a fair lick. I've hardly noticed the keyboard, it hasn't got in my way although I do find the layout a little strange sometimes with the nu...

I recently bought an iPad, which led to me downloading lots of iPad apps to find the best. The flip side of this was that due to the nature of iTunes, I ended up with those compatible for iPhone also being synced across onto my phone. This was an inconvenience, so I unticked the box on the apps tab of both my iPhone and ipad so that new apps weren't synced. Job done I thought. This week, I downloaded feedle and it didn't take long to set it up, but the following day feedler wasn't there when I went looking for it. I put it down to a glitch and re-synced it again, luckily setup was easy. It was only this morning that it twigged with me what was happening. Tweetdeck crashed on me once too often this morning, so I downloaded Twitterific which I love version 2 of on the iPhone and after confirming I liked it, I purchased the upgrade to premium which was an in app purchase. A little later, I synced with my Macbook Pro and after picking the iPad up again, I soon realize...

More and more over the last couple of years I've wondered if I'm spreading myself thin, to borrow a phrase 'Jack of all trades, master of none' i.e. I do so many things I can't devote enough time to any of them. I have friends who have one or two interests and they're pretty damn good at them, but it seems to take over their whole life and I feel that though I'd enjoy that, I'd become bored at some point with doing the same things again and again. I was thinking about my own hobbies and rather than a few, I have loads of things I try to follow and keep my hand into.Here are a few of the things I have an interest in and invest some time in every single week. Apart from Family, Friends and my job 1) Computing (Tied into my Job too) 2) Cars 3) Mobile Phones 4) Apple 5) Sport (In General) 6) Football (In General) 7) Manchester United 8) The Internet 9) Sci Fi (In General) 10) TV 11) DVDs / Cinema 12) Music 13) Photography 14) Wii (Lego S...

I ordered a Macbook which arrived at work on Friday. I had it delivered because the last three time I've ordered things from Apple Online, the Delivery has been a Collosal Pain in the arse. I've had to schlepp across Manchester to pick things up from the depot. I'd ordered the Black Macbook with a 160GB HDD and 2GB of Memory, Plus Applecare. I currently own a Powerbook 1.25Ghz 1.25Gb Memory and a Mac Mini Core Duo 1.66Ghz The Brown box it was shipped in was TINY, I was expecting much bigger, and when I opened the shipping box and saw the actual 'display' box I was even more gobsmacked. As you'd expect from Apple, the packaging was a design in itself, someone had put time into it, it wasn't as good as the iPod Mini or Nano 1.0, or even the Mac Mini, but still well thought out. In the box was the Macbook, Install disks, the Power block, Power lead, the Apple Remote and a UK adaptor to slot straight onto the Powerblock. The first thing that struck ...

Yesterday I made a major step forward in the Airey - Wrigley Household. The Last Windows Computer (Except for my work laptop which HAS to be Windows) has been deactivated and we're an all Apple home now. I can't tell you how good this feels. The Windows Computer the Girls and Adele share has been a complete and utter PITA as it can't decide whether or not it's connected to the Wireless, and when it is connected, the signal was garbage. I put my aging Powerbook right next to the PC, full signal, no problems. With me losing my office, I've chosen to move the Mac Mini into the Living Room and set up account for everyone, and as usual, it all just works. Fantastic. :-) No more headaches for me about Computers at home.

I spent 2 hours last night pulling my Powerbook to pieces very, very carefully. I had a problem with White Spots on the screen and took it into Apple for them to fix it. I use my Powerbook all of the time and usually leave it open on my desk, or shut it down and take it with me. It was only recently that I noticed that it wouldn't go to sleep anymore. After some research (And some help from the Mac community here on LJ) I found out that it was a magnet in the Lid that activated the sleep and I reasoned that it had probably been left disconnected when they replaced the screen. After much struggling to remove the back of the screen, I found the tiniest magnet you've ever seen which wasn't powered, had a play with the position and it was about 1/4 of an inch out of position, you'd have thought that the Genii would be able to test and get it right. Put it all back together and felt very, VERY accomplished. 24 screws on the casing of a Powerbook + 3 that hold the h...

On the 5th of July I posted This regarding the experience of booking my Powerbook in for it's screen to be replaced. Since then, I'd checked the Website regularly, unfortunately the information was not helpful, just that my Powerbook was awaiting repair. A little more info on this page would have been useful, e.g. 'awaiting parts', 'On the bench', 'Final Testing' this would show progress to the customer. I was told that the repair would take between 7 - 10 days, and I put my expectation firmly at the 10 day end of the scale, with this being a Free repair, I would expect paying customers to get the better service, however Wednesday came and went. I did think about phoning the store, but knew that it would be completed as soon as possible, on top of this I've been manic at work and I've not had much time to use the Powerbook anyway. Last night I got a phone call at around 16:40 to say that the Machine was in final testing, was expected to pa...

Lets do the whole thing start to finish, I wanted to document this 1) For my own memory 2) For others who had never used the Genius Bar before. I went on the Apple.com/uk site this morning and booked a spot at the Trafford Centre Genius Bar, this was really easy, fill in a few minor details (Your name, email address and Mobile phone number) and select a slot from those available. These are in 20 Minute segments. I was aiming to leave work at 15:00, the store is about 40 minutes from work and knowing my record for leaving when I want, I booked for 16:40, this would allow me a leeway of an hour for holdups and getting caught on the way out of work. The webpage then confirmed the appointment date and time and had basic instructions. If I had any criticism of this process, it was that there was no email confirmation to both remind and reassure that the booking has been made, this would be nitpicking though. I got to the Apple Store in the Trafford centre and Looked at the kit, but t...

After recently upgrading from iPhoto 2 I've been playing with iPhoto 6 a little, and I've seen a lot of good points, but also some bad points. Now I appreciate that this is probably a far larger leap than a lot of you may have made, so some of these features may have been in iPhoto 5 Full Screen editing it's excellent, with the gallery along the top and the features at the bottom, I now find it easier to focus on the photo with the black background now Keywords I use Keywords a lot they make my life a lot easier. They are now part of the main window, I did prefer them to be on a movable 'pallet' type arrangement, I could move it around at will, I don't like it fixed on the right hand side, and I certainly don't like it sharing space with the Source window, for me they both need more space. I don't like the fact that you have to go into preferences to alter, add or delete keywords, too clunk by far, why not a button on the bottom toolbar, there...