journal: toy

Quick Tip: Improve Locate Me’s Accuracy

By Liam, April 13, 2008

The iPhone’s map application got a poor substitute for a GPS chip when the 1.1.3 firmware update was launched, and iPod touch owners got that same poor substitute in the January Software Upgrade, which I noted in that review places me right in America’s Heartland - I obviously live in America’s Bowels, thank you very much.

The problem is that the Locate Me feature works by detecting all WiFi hotspots (and cell towers on an iPhone) and running that against a list maintained on the servers of Skyhook Wireless. The process to build this database is essentially wardriving, and is a very time-consuming and location-limited process. Thus, if you happen to live in an area where the WiFi hotspots are all residential ones, the chances of being correctly located are slim. This issue is exacerbated for iPod touch users, who don’t have the luxury of cell towers, which have a much higher range than WiFi access points.

Someone at Skyhook evidently realized the problem. He probably asked, “Why pay for people to drive around and map hotspots when people will give us that information for free on the internet?” As a result, this page was created. You simply find…
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iPhone event roundup

By Nick, March 6, 2008

Earlier today Apple held an iPhone-oriented media event, covering topics including the iPhone in enterprise to the long-awaited SDK. Here are some of my initial thoughts on the announcements made today.

And yes, I wrote this as I followed the announcements, so they’re very, very early first impressions.

Enterprise

First of all, it seems strange to see Apple even discuss the enterprise market, considering their focus has been on the consumer for years and years. But considering almost every other smart phone out there is designed to be enterprise-friendly, it makes sense that Apple would do the same with the iPhone, especially since some corporate users are already using the iPhone.

Apple announced the addition of a good number of enterprise-friendly features for their next iPhone software, ranging from push email support and better calendar integration to better VPN support to the all-important Microsoft Exchange support. And as it turns out, Apple licensed the ActiveSync protocol for use on the iPhone. As Macworld reports, “With ActiveSync, the iPhone talks directly to Exchange. So the iPhone will get push e-mail, push calendaring, push contacts, global access lists, and remote wipe, all while talking to Exchange. And it’s built into the existing…
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Blu-ray wins, consumers lose

By UnnDunn, March 6, 2008

So now that Blu-ray Disc is poised to become the dominant next-generation movie format, it’s time to look to the future. A future that quite frankly, looks somewhat bleak for a number of reasons.

It’s been two weeks since Toshiba, creators and primary backers of the nascent next-generation movie disc format called HD DVD, ceased production and marketing of the technology, ceding defeat in a bitter format war raged between it and Blu-ray Disc, championed by a Sony-led consortium.

This move was widely expected following January’s announcement by Warner Home Video that it will be supporting Blu-ray Disc exclusively going forward. As the number one movie studio in the world, Warner Bros. commanded immense weight in deciding the outcome of this war, and once their announcement was made, it took less than two months for companies at every level of the home video distribution ecosystem to fall in line behind it, abandoning HD DVD in the process and leaving Toshiba holding the bag.

So now that Blu-ray Disc is poised to become the dominant next-generation movie format, it’s time to look to the future. A future that, quite frankly, looks somewhat bleak for a number of reasons.

In a Blu-ray dominated future, expect high prices, because everything about Blu-ray is far more expensive than its HD DVD counterparts. The players will be expensive thanks to costly laser pickups, complicated hardware and an even more…
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The iPod Touch January Software Upgrade

By Liam, January 30, 2008

At this latest Macworld Expo, iPhone firmware 1.1.3 was announced, with features such as “customizable home screen,” “Webclips,” and a new interface for Maps. It was then announced that these enhancements, along with five applications previously only on the iPhone, would be coming to the iPod Touch in $20 “January Software Upgrade.”

Fast-forwarding past all the “it’s sooooooo unfair why Apple why?” aspects of the move, we must direct our attention to the applications themselves. In addition to the applications, the new features of iPhone firmware 1.1.3 (Webclips and Icon Layout on Springboard chiefly among them) were also included in the software upgrade. For iPhone users, the following rundown/review will say only what you already know. I’m providing this information for those of us who don’t have $60 to spend on phone service each month, no matter how functional and sexy and fingerprint covered the phone happens to be.

Mail and Maps

Mail is a light and decent email client, especially for a mobile device. With support for both POP3 and IMAP, Mail has preset configurations for several popular mail services, such as Gmail and Yahoo! Mail, as well as Apple’s own .Mac mail. Mail works with any other service…
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