Coolest Lockscreen Mod Ever
OK, I’ve been a big critic of most iPhone themes. I think they are typically pointless and almost all of them are pretty dang ugly. However I came upon a theme for the lockscreen (what pops up when you wake up your phone ready to log in) Not only is it useful (it displays the weather forecast) it is pretty amazing looking. It also supports the retinal screen of the iPhone 4.
Full info at MacThemes. The latest version is here. Be aware you’ll download a rar file you’ll need to unrar. You’ll then have a directory called Weather Elements Revisited_GPS. Follow the directions inside to modify two js (javascript) file. If you want it to automatically use the GPS to find your location and display the appropriate weather you’ll need to sign up with Instamapper and get an API key. There’s a file called README_FIRST.txt that goes through all the details. It’s not too hard.
Get Your iPhone VoiceMail
So in Cydia there is this ridiculously overpriced “forward your voicemail” application for sale. Ridiculously overpriced not just because you can never be sure if it’ll survive until the next version of iOS let alone if you’ll be without a jailbreak waiting for Cydia to update to the latest iOS update. No, ridiculous because you can get all your voicemail at any time.
Install, if you haven’t yet, Netatalk. This lets you access your iPhone as if it were a standard networked Mac. In the Finder go to:
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Windows Live Sync on Mac
So I’d heard that Windows Live Sync was out for Mac. I’d tried an early version of this and it never really worked terribly well. This is still technically a beta but I thought I’d give it an other chance. I’m glad I did. This is definitely the choice for syncing services. Further if you are backing up smaller files Microsoft gives you 2 G of free storage. That’s really nice as it more than handles most people’s various documents. Yes it’s insufficient for multimedia but most business files will more than fit in 2G.
Thus far all my files have synced flawless across networks and at a pretty high speed. I have quite a few “boilerplate” type documents that I’m forever printing out. However keeping the files that are in the office synced with the latest versions on my laptop had me pulling my hair out. No more.
Theming SBSettings
The best reason to jailbreak your iPhone is still SBSettings. Apple’s caught up on many of the other features jailbreaking used to offer. However if you want to preserve your battery life then turning on and off WiFi, Blutooth and even 3G is a must. Seriously, the amount of battery savings doing this are huge. Only use these services when you need them. The problem is that on a stock iPhone it’s such a hassle to do this that no one does. Enter SBSettings. You swipe your finger across the top of the iPhone and suddenly a set of controls to turn various things on and off pops up.
The most useful settings are Brightness for manually adjusting the screen brightness (nice in the dark) and then the Bluetooth, 3G and WiFi settings. You can via Cydia add plugins for other features. Be aware that not all work with iOS4 yet. My favorite is Veency which is allows remote access to your iPhone via the Finder and even lets you type via your keyboard. (It’s a VNC client, although you’ll need to add in the Veency service via Cydia first for it to work) SSH turns on and off SSH – although if you changed your default password there’s not a lot of reason to do that. I really like RemoveBG which basically kills all background processes. Very nice if you use Cydia’s Backgrounder to enable non-Apple styled backgrounding on some applications. (i.e. it’s as if they are fully running in the background — something I use with 1Password so I don’t have to enter my password again every time I switch between a Mail window and a secure note)
The one problem with SBSettings, if you’ve installed it, is that it is pretty ugly. Enter themes. By far the best theme is Serious SBSettings. Better yet there is an HD theme for your iPhone 4′s display. (See the graphic)
The downside is that not all the icons for custom installed SBSettings Services are available. So here’s a tutorial to fix this. First, if you are looking for graphics visit this MacThemese thread. Lots of people have provided some nice graphics for extra SBSettings switches.
On the “iTV”
So there have been a slew of rumors about the new version of the Apple TV out the past month or so. The latest is Kevin Rose’s “the iTV will change everything.” Color me a bit skeptical. The AppleTV (hereafter aTV because I don’t think there’s a chance in hell British network iTV will sell the name to Apple) is one of my favorite products that Apple just never quite finished. It’s so “almost there.”
While I’d really, really like 1080p, honestly it’s not a deal breaker. For a streaming product rather than having a hard drive to cache the data it makes sense to avoid 1080p. That said I hope they have a version that can do this. However I suspect they are after the elusive $99 and $199 price points. And that’s problematic. I will say a pure streaming device might be somewhat problematic. Having that 120G cache space is tremendously helpful while on a wireless network in the house.
Complaining about Snow Leopard
The Apple Blog is complaining about Snow Leopard. I’ve noticed a few people just hate Snow Leopard. To me it’s been my absolute favorite upgrade since 10.3. And that’s saying something. They finally fixed the Finder. (Honestly, while there are new features I’d like I don’t have anything to complain about anymore) The upgrade to Automator and Services is amazingly useful in a small business. It also just feels more solid to me. Yes I had a few quirks upgrading due to 64 bit issues with Python and a few other command line tools. But given how significant the under the hood upgrades were I’m surprised how great things went.
I honestly wonder how many people having trouble with SL did a regular upgrade but had weird kernel extensions and drivers on their machines. Nearly everyone I’ve known with SL problems always ended up being due to some incompatible piece of software causing the problems. Initially, for instance, I had some huge issues with Parallels. Once I upgraded the problems disappeared. Of course I was also technical enough so as to be able to find all the drivers, kernel extensions, and so forth and remove them. (USB Overdrive was a problem for me for a while too until a new version arrived, not to mention some headaches with the Logitech drivers and Safari)
Android Malware
Posted by clark in Commentary, iPhone on 2010/07/29
As expected there’s now active Android malware. The PC/Mac comparison between the iPhone and Android is becoming apt on numerous levels. It was interesting when warnings arose over the potential that Android defenders said merely informing users over app capabilities was sufficient. Many of us recognized that, especially for the typical naive user, this just wouldn’t work.
I still think Android will dominate the marketplace although I’m curious whether the new Windows phone will make inroads or whether HP can revitalize WebOS. I think though what we’ll find is something akin to the Mac where Apple has a small relative marketshare but is more profitable and has less troubles overall. It’ll take a few more years for the marketplace to mature. My bet is that Microsoft will dominate over RIM and take their position. Microsoft’s forte has always been corporate America. Easy .Net programming along with robust Exchange integration probably will be something RIM can’t fight against if Microsoft doesn’t screw it up. But I just can’t see Microsoft dominating the phone market the way it did the PC market. Android’s too flexible and more significantly too cheap.
Apple and Jailbreaking
Posted by clark in Commentary on 2010/07/26
Contrary some I don’t think Apple has been attacking jailbreaking merely to show due diligence for some hypothetical agreement with AT&T. That said I think today’s ruling on the DMCA is an opportunity for Apple. Up to now they’ve been extremely aggressive on jailbreaking. (Although to be fair jailbreaking relies on exploits that Apple has to patch as soon as they discover them independent of the jailbreak question) I think though that there are two reasons why Android is catching up with Apple. First is AT&T and the value of the mindshare of the bay area and NYC – both places with the worst AT&T coverage. (Primarily due to the regulatory red tape of installing new towers in either city: reportedly over 3 years per tower versus a few months in most other areas) The next is the fact Android has more capabilities.
If Apple eases up on jailbreaking it can keep its simplicity and ease of use (which for the typical user is why the iPhone has better satisfaction than Android) but have the power that Android provides for techies (who chaff heavily at Apple’s limits). Make jailbreaking hard, but not too hard, and the typical user will never attempt it. Yet they’ll keep the mindshare Apple needs.
Thoughts on the iPhone 4
Posted by clark in Commentary on 2010/07/21
You may have noticed I’ve not said much about the antenna issue. That’s because it’s really hard for me to think it’s much of an issue when no one can buy an iPhone yet because of demand. Mine’s been on backorder for over a month now. Maybe once I have it I can say something.
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Apple Uses Own Location Services
Posted by clark in Commentary, iPhone on 2010/07/29
Tech Crunch is reporting that Apple dropped Google for it’s own location services with iOS4. I have tons of questions about this, although it’s not unexpected given the Google relationship. A lot of people have been speculating about this ever since they bought Poly9 and Placebase, two map companies. Edit: note this isn’t about the maps although many of us expect those to change soon.
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