Archive for the ‘geekspeek’ Category
Iphone 4 camera problem (UPDATED)
***UPDATED TO INCLUDE COMPARISON IMAGES FROM 3Gs***
The following images highlight a problem with the iPhone 4 when producing photos under normal tungsten light (~3200k). the first image was shot under fluorescent light, whereas the second image was shot under standard household tungsten lights.
Images from iPhone 4:
Images from iPhone 3Gs:
Lens design is not trivial
I created this to help explain why lens design is so complex. This is a trivial illustration, but it touches on a FEW of the key principles that explain why designing lenses is really a years long process. I’d love any feedback you may have on the subject. If you know more about lens design than me (and you have a degree or achievement to back it up), then please correct me where I’m wrong. My knowledge, while more than most, is still highly limited.
Thanks!
CLICK TO VIEW LARGER:
*Bonus points to anyone who can name the camera company that misleads their customers by selling extreme fast lenses (e.g. f/1.2) which can never be tack sharp wide open at certain focus distances
What I Deduce From The Pre/Android/iPhone Rally
Lot’s of people (read: like 4) have decided to take a personal vendetta against AT&T and Apple and give up their sweet, friendly little iPhone and pick up either a Pre, a Google Android phone, or both. They tout religious fervor for abstinence from Satan’s Spawn – the App Store – driven by the need to stand up for the rights of users and developers alike. Most say they can’t stand how Apple has been heavy handed with many things (mainly the App Store/Developer relationship) and that they are going on strike. Others claim that AT&T’s incompetence is too frustrating, and they’re not going to take it anymore. A lot of them say both, and therefore have two good reasons to leave the iPhone.
So, I have been thinking in my head this whole time, didn’t these guys use cell phones before the iPhone? I mean, didn’t they try out the abysmal handsets that were crippled by the best network in the game, Verizon? Didn’t they try having conversations with T-Mobile or AT&T users where the conversation sounded more like morse code than 21st century cellular communications? And most of all, on the mobile computing front, did any of these guys actually use the Palm, arguably the best handheld computer on the market before the iPhone? Well, I’ve done all this and more, and I have to say the iPhone was a real treat when it came out.
I was extremely concerned about carrier quality when I began seriously considering the switch. Dropped phone calls was a myth as far as I was concerned, as Verizon’s network really is that good. Calls sounded as clear and as clean as calls originating from a handset. I was living in California when the iPhone came out, and still had a Verizon contract. I tried AT&T for the trial period with the then sub-standard Palm Treo 650, and was utterly dismayed at the crap quality of the phone service, not to mention the hardware differences between the same phone on Verizons network (microphone responded differently, audio levels were so low they were unusable, even on speaker, and the AT&T Treo took about 30 seconds to connect a call, vs. Verizon’s 650 that would start ringing almost the second you pushed send). Then, there was the terrible hissing sound present with ALL AT&T calls, on the 650 and the RAZR. YUK!
So the thought of switching to AT&T, even for the iPhone, was scary. What finally made me switch? Well, it was a combination of things, but the biggest was NOT the lust for the iPhone, even though that was palpable. No, instead it was the sheer hatred I had developed for Verizon. Between a move back to Utah, a first time large purchase of the Palm Treo 700p, and some really crappy experiences with the handset and carrier, I decided enough was enough.
I’d threatened to switch from Verizons asininely high priced calling network to something more affordable for months – nay – years at that point, and still had little luck getting what I felt was due from them. Complex things, like proper billing, telephone representatives who don’t lie about what were supposed to be documented promises, and most of all, a handset that actually works. The first two, I could deal with. The bill I would watch religiously. It’s not difficult when you’re paying ~$180/month (sometimes more). Some people drive a good used car for that price. The lying and seemingly cultured cheating I would counter with my all-out assault of annoying calls, hitting the 611 five or six times if needed to get the one representative who was too new, too stupid, or too kind to know that you don’t break Verizon’s policies without repercussions.
But the third point, the telephone that didn’t work, that really irked me. I had always talked Verizon into giving me the highest priced handsets for free, pointing out that this would be cheaper for them than losing me. Alas, I did spend well over the average in monthly plan fees, and always paid my bill. What was not to like. Of course, I did have to sell the idea to them every time, but each and every time, I’d get a new handset for my wife and myself, and not just the cheap ones either. These are the ones that would actually last 2 years and longer. But it was time to move up to the big time. I was sick of carrying two devices in my pocket (a palm and phone), and got the idea that a two-in-one would be the solution.
Enter the 700p. Long story short: it was great, when it was great. But soon it fell into fits of bugginess, freezing, and most regrettably, extreme lack of call quality. I would get horrible sound, bad connectivity (voice AND data) and a whole lot of lame excuses from Verizon. I had the phone replaced 3 times (learning along the way that my $350 phone was being swapped or used look-alikes with some other dude’s earwax in the cracks). Well, three strikes, and Verizon was out. They said that I would have to buy a new, different phone if I wanted to fix the issues. I said I would leave. They said go ahead. I drove to AT&T.
Now I have the iPhone on a sub-standard cellular network, and I couldn’t be happier. Ok, I could be happier. But with all this talk of how evil AT&T and Apple are acting, and how horrible the network is, I have to ask again if anyone has been awake for the last 5 years. AT&T’s customer service is all but wonderful, and the network isn’t bad either. If Verizon is 100% in quality of calls (because they are), then AT&T is about 80% on a bad day, and 85%-90% on a good day. Usually I can make calls the way I like, but I’d say I get hundreds of dropped calls a year, where on Verizon it was almost a privilege to drop a call, as it happened 3-5 times tops. Still, 100′s of dropped calls in a year when I make tens of thousands of calls, the odds ain’t bad when looked at in perspective.
Then there’s the App store that so few have been complaining about lately. Sure, it’s not perfect. But did you guys ever TRY to find software for the palm pilot, let alone the palm phones? It was hell. If you could find what you wanted, tucked away in the corners of the virtual universe, chances are you would have to do a rain dance or some other crazy ritual to get it installed and working. It was extremely hit or miss. Once again, while the App store isn’t perfect, it’s an epic breath of fresh air compared to the prior alternatives. Apple has kept tight control of their handset sphere, and that, my friends, is what makes the iPhone so incredible.
I have been asking myself recently: would I return to Verizon if they jumped on the iPhone bandwagon? Probably not. Maybe, but probably not. I hated the crap I had to deal with from a customer non-service standpoint, and that really matters to me. Feeling like I could stay or go, and they didn’t give a load which I chose bothered me to a great extent. Then there’s the price. Why would I pay more just to be kicked around by those goons. The offer would have to be pretty sweet to jump ship and return to Verizon. Now, maybe I’d consider Sprint, as they share the same network in many places, but even that’s unlikely.
So, what’s driving these folks from the iPhone and AT&T? Same thing that drove me from Verizon. Seething hatred. They’re making a statement, a vote if you will with their wallet. They’re saying enough, because they’re just mad enough. But that’s the thing: most people are NOT seething about AT&T and Apple’s decisions. And I’d argue most are aware of them. They just don’t care. I would assume many of them remember what the dark ages of cellular strangleholds were like, and are perfectly content with the solutions that Apple has come up with to cure their calling woes.
The takeaway, from my perspective, is this: You have to HATE AT&T and Apple to leave for the Palm Pre or an Android phone.
But wait – I hate AT&T. Sure, I talk nice about them in public, but taking a 20% hit in call quality IS annoying. I do hate them, but not enough to – even for a second – consider switching to T-Mobile, Verizon, or Sprint. Even IF they had the iPhone, I think it would take some very real convincing. The better network, Verizon, is run by some big anus, and the others seem to be a downgrade in network quality, which I can’t afford. So while I think it’s good that people want competition, openness, and freedom of consumer choice, I think everyone would benefit from a good dose of historical reflection.
More Expensive != More Valuable
Digital Review has an interesting in-depth comparison between the Nikon D90/D5000 and the Canon Rebel T1i 500D. Nikon offers better build quality, double the shutter life, better ergonomics, better button/menu/interface design, better image quality, better video mode, lower pixel density, better high ISO performance…not to mention the whole lineup of lenses that so many Canon V-SLR shooters are picking up so they can shoot better video on their Canons.
Short translation: the Nikon kicks the crap out of the Canon. Again.
There’s a tremendous difference between price and value. I’m not afraid to pay top dollar for what I buy, but only if by paying more I’m receiving a greater value. I’m frankly surprised so many people can willingly spend more for less, as is almost always the case with Canon cameras. I think, generally speaking, that Canon shooters don’t understand that “more megapixels” doesn’t automatically mean “more camera”, or better images for that matter.
Microsoft Buys Customers – Cowers in Fear of Apple
If you’ve seen the Laptop Hunters ads from Microsoft recently, you know that every single one of them features an Apple computer at some point during the “Hunter’s” shopping adventure. But why? Microsoft has TEN TIMES the software market share Apple has, and is the de-facto standard in personal and business computing markets. So why is Microsoft dumping incredible amounts of time, money, and emotion into this ad campaign against a flea on their back? Because they’re scared. Microsoft isn’t just scared, in fact, they’re terrified.
While on one hand you might look at Apple’s paltry 9% market share and balk at the infinitesimal nature of it, you might also contrast it with the 2.41% market share Apple held only 4 years ago. Apple is hitting the consumer/business sweet-spot hard, and Microsoft has nowhere to go but down.
Case in point: Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. Once hailed as the titan of web browsers with a >95% user base, IE today seems to be in a virtual market-share free-fall, nearing the 50% install base for all browsers worldwide. Just a few very short years ago Microsoft had a clear market advantage, while competitors had little hope of breaking in on the exclusive browser party. Yet, despite all the haughtiness of IE (maybe even because of it), other browsers such as Firefox and Safari have been able to chip away steadily at IE’s grip.
But most frightening to Microsoft must be the fact that while they’ve employed over 1,000 full-time developers at one time on IE, Mozilla employs only 175 full time employees. How did this small, lean, hodge-podge group of hackers manage to take the rug out from under Microsoft? While there are probably many factors (which I certainly won’t address here), it’s likely in part due to the fact that the Firefox developers were focused, determined, and eager to address a serious problem that was crippling the web space.
I can only see the competition having a royal fit behind closed doors in response to the current “browser war” climate. When all you have is everything, how can you survive if someone starts taking it away, little by little? In the last two years we’ve seen Microsoft pledge renewed support to web standards, CSS3/XHTML support, and even :gasp: transparent PNG’s. For those of you who don’t know how big of a deal this is, just ask your IT guy.
And don’t forget the smartphone market. I recall a couple of years back watching Steve Ballmer (chair-throwing CEO of Microsoft) scoffing violently at the idea that the iPhone posed a threat to their smartphone market dominance. His smarmy “Well, let’s wait and see, hahaha” attitude is nothing short of epic by way of fail. Not only has Microsoft lost half of their Windows Mobile presence seemingly overnight, they’ve lost nearly all of it to one, single phone: the teeny-weeny iPhone. Yes, that fledgling little phone has snuck in and stolen the proverbial wind right out of Microsoft’s smartphone sails.
And so the Déjà vu begins for Microsoft. Apple has gone from just over 2% desktop market share in ’05 to nearly 10% today. If Apple were to continue at this rate, they could theoretically own the entire OS market within the next ten years. Unlikely, but a frightening prospect for a company that has just witnessed how deafening the sound of a little trickle can become once it turns into an unstoppable landslide. Even with Microsoft’s sudden “conversion” to open web standards for their browser lineup, they’ve been able to do little to stop the inevitable slide down the slippery slope. Losing their grip on the web through IE is bad enough in a world where desktop apps are dwindling. But to lose additional OS install base to Apple, well that would be downright disastrous. Microsoft had a pretty good lock on consumer’s buying decisions because of IE. But with that strangle hold now loosened, people are beginning to peel back the scales from their eyes, and are curious to learn what else there is to see. Of course, there’s Apple. And oh, what a sight for sore eyes it is.
Then there’s the matter of money and power. Apple may be half the size of Microsoft, but as others have shown, Microsoft isn’t impenetrable. And Apple’s half-as-big size isn’t a bug that can be stepped on, it’s a smaller army with shorter swords but sharper tactics. Apple pulls in a healthy $33 Billion (that’s B) per year, and has over $15 Billion in cash on hand (probably closer to $18 bil by now). This from a company that Michael Dell (Founder of Dell Computers) stated that, if deciding what to do with Apple were up to him, he would “shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders”. Oh, and that was before Apple kicked Dell to the curb, surpassing Dells market cap in 2006. Yikes!
Also, let’s not overlook the irony of Microsoft paying their “hunters” to buy a computer with Windows on it, giving the deeper impression that the only value that comes from a PC comes by way of free, not cheap, when cheap is probably the biggest selling point of the commercial. I mean, even I would be thrilled for at least one day if someone outright bought me a Kia. Still, that wouldn’t stop the realization from hitting the very next day that I wanted to sell it.
So, back to the Laptop Hunters. For Microsoft, this isn’t a campaign to be cool. This isn’t even a campaign to sell the brand or the product. This is a campaign to survive. I’ll repeat myself, because this is really the point of it all: THIS IS A CAMPAIGN TO SURVIVE. This campaign is an attempt at a controlled blast to try to stop the Apple avalanche. Because Microsoft knows if things keep going as they have been for the last 5 years, they’re Applesauce. Maybe a more apt name for Microsoft’s Laptop Hunters campaign would be Apple Sniping. Clearly, the last thing Microsoft is hunting here is laptops.
*EDIT: As of Aug. 3rd, Apple apparently has just about $25 billion in total cash. http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=Aapl
Apple share: http://www.jeremyreimer.com/total_share.html, IE Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Explorer, Mozilla reference: http://www.spreadfirefox.com/node/238
This guy can build anything
Seems this guy could build anything he wants. Clearly, he’s a genius. I’ve poked around his website for many months now, coming back occasionally to remind myself how cool he is. Each time I visit, I’m amazed at the creativity and industry I come across on this site, from digital cameras made of flatbed scanner parts, to lego marble machines, to wood furniture, to shop tools. Wow, what an inspiration.
I’ve been wanting to make some furniture from the plans he’s posted, particularly the napping bench, the couch/day bed, and heck – why not a few milk crates, kitchen chairs, or even a queen size bed. In a world where the equivalent is crappier, plastic-ier, and expensive-ier, how can you look at his stuff and not want it at least a little?
FUN!
Attach multiple photos to an email on your iPhone
This stumped me for a minute or two – I knew I had seen that it was possible to attach multiple images to an email message, but it wasn’t obvious once I had gotten the new iPhone 3.0 OS installed. Here’s a quick refresher for you if you are wondering too…
Go to a gallery on your iPhone. Click on the rectangle (with an arrow shooting out of it) in the lower left corner of the screen:
You will now be in select mode, and you can scroll throughout this entire gallery and select whichever images you would like to copy:
Now that you have some images selected, simply press the copy button at the bottom of the screen, and Voila! they’re in memory:
Go to your mail application, activate your cursor in the email body, and again press your finger down on the cursor until you see the magnifying glass. Let go, and the black copy/paste bar should appear. Press the paste button, and there you have it. You should see all of the images that you selected appear in the email.
Note that you can also choose the “share” button, instead of the copy button after you’ve selected your images from the gallery. Be aware that depending on which approach you use, final image sizes will vary (i.e. copy/pasting will allow you to send the full resolution image, while choosing the “share” option to send the image to mail will cause it to be shrunk down to a more suitable “web” size). Something to be aware of if you need one or the other.
Sent from my iPhone
Pretty
Simple but beautiful new app from Apple: Voice Memos
Sent from my iPhone
I’m tethering on my iPhone 3g
Against the loving wishes of the gestalt AT&T, there have been some enterprising young folk who have figured out how to enable tethering on the iPhone. In the U.S. Now.
Of course, realizing immediately it was foolish to not have computer tethering available just because I was using a crap mobile carrier, I decided to give this highly immoral iPhone mod a whirl. I must say, it’s surprisingly fast. Clearly reports of safari page rendering times on iPhone being bottlenecked by the phone’s processor – and not the 3g network – are spot on. In a pinch, I could use tethering and ALMOST not notice the speed. That’s saying a lot, since I consistently get ~7Mbps download speeds at home.
Please note: There is a simple way to do this, and a less simple way to do it. I’m linking to the simple way, mainly because *it’s simple*, but also because it’s how I did it, and I had no problems using this method.
DISCLAIMER: YMMV. AT&T may hunt you down and cut off your fingers or rip out your tongue. You might be charged $7,633.27 in data charges. You may void your warranty. AT&T may void your life. You might fill your void with some sweet out-of-wireless-range-tethering-goodness. In other words, PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK.
Go to this address (on your iPhone’s Mobile Safari browser):
Scroll down to the spot shown in the screenshot below, then click on “download”.
Then scroll to the bottom of the list and select “USA”:
Choose your carrier:
Click install:
You will get a warning that the certificate is unsigned; that’s ok, click “install now”:
Now go to Settings > General > Network > Tethering:
(Note that you’ll probably see a warning that says something to the tune of “contact AT&T to enable tethering on your account”. Just dismiss the warning and click on tethering again. This should show you the tethering configuration screen):
Now for the fun part: setting up your Mac/PC to connect via bluetooth. Alternatively, you can plug in your USB cable and share the connection that way. Setting up the iPhone to connect via Bluetooth on the Mac is still a bit sketchy. I had to choose “Any Device” instead of the “Mobile Phone” option when choosing a device type. It seems that this process requires a few attempts before everything connects, so let patience and persistence be your friend. 
Once you’ve got your connection set up, you should be able to turn wi-fi off (on your laptop/computer) and rock and roll with your newly tethered connection.
There are a few more steps to getting bluetooth set up, but they’re pretty intuitive, and I’m typing this on my iPhone. Let me know in the comments if you have any issues and I’ll try to follow up with any help I can offer.
Happy tethering, you rebel!
List only hidden files with “ls” command in Terminal
I was looking for a way to show only hidden files (files with names preceded by a period) when I use the ls command, and I came across the solution today. Of course, we all know how to show hidden files like this:
“ls -a” or
“ls -all”
BUT WAIT! Can’t we show ONLY hidden files? Well, my friend, if that’s what you’re looking for, then you’ve come to the right place. Let me show you how:
ls -ld .??*
Yep, it appears that it’s really that simple. Hope this helps someone else who’s needing to find two simple hidden files in a folder with over 1,900 high quality digital images of a candy factory. Or something like that.