Sunday update November 19th 2017

Rainy day here in Brisbane today. Perfect weather for lounging around. Bit of a quiet week on the tech front this week.

New Firefox released

The team over at Mozilla have released their latest version of Firefox. Long story short is that the underlying engine that Firefox runs on has been completely overhauled, and now runs very fast. Details of the new browser can be found over at Mashable. Might be worth a look, especially for laptop users, as Chrome can be a bit of a battery hog at the best of times. I’ll be giving it a go over the new few weeks and reporting back.

Tesla announces a truck and a new roadster.

Tesla has shown off their latest inventions, a new All electric truck, and a new roadster sports car. The roadster is typical Tesla awesomeness (eg, stupid fast off the line) but also features the best range of a Tesla so far.
The really interesting device is the truck. Trucks sell for a very different set of reasons to a car. Running costs, reliability and safety are much bigger concerns for your average truck buyer. This thing needs to be able to hit the road, and make it’s owner more money than the model its replacing. It’s that simple. There was little talk of the upfront cost (although, again, transport companies usually care about the cost per month than the upfront cost), but there was a mention that recharging the truck would be fairly fast. This isn’t going to be a viable option if the truck needs to be off the road for 6 hours charging every day.
A swap-able battery might have been a good choice here.

Phone as a computer

This is a bit of old news, but Samsung has annouced they plan to be able to run full linux desktops on their latest Galaxy phones shortly. You’ll need their special dock, which lets you connect a monitor, keyboard and mouse to the phone, and already lets you use a desktop like version of Android.
Many phones have tried to tackle this premise, and none have really had any success. Personally I’d love to see they day where my desk at home or a work is just a dock with some screens that I can pop my phone into, and everything of mine is there ready to go. Phones today certainly have the processing power to do the job.

Owning your own data

For anyone not in IT in general, that statement flies directly in the face of everything we’ve been taught. If you don’t have antivirus software, we’re told, your pc will cripple and die in a matter of minutes.

Viruses/Malware/Spyware etc

I almost consider all the above titles the same thing. Software that tries to get into your pc and do something you don’t want. There are hundreds of ways this can happen, from being bundled up with software you are trying to legitimately get, to having advertisements on websites trick your pc into running something.
The key here is something needs to know about these things and stop them.

The best defence is a good defence.

If you have Windows 7 or newer, you already have built in antivirus software that auto updates, and it’s free.
Some reports seems to indicate that the latest version of this is very responsive to threats discovered:
So why use the free antivirus from Microsoft, surely the paid ones are better?
Very nerdy articles here that explain why this isn’t always the case, but in short, because of the way antivirus software tangles itself into your machine, it can actually introduce more bugs and exploits than it stops.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/01/antivirus-is-bad/
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/07/what-amateurs-can-learn-from-security-pros-about-staying-safe-online/

What you should really be worried about

Here’s what you should focus on to keep your pc safe when you’re online:

• Keep your pc’s software up to date. Set Windows and Mac OS to auto update themselves, and if they tell you they need a restart to update, so it as soon as practicable. This applies to your phone as well (it’s just a computer now)
• Use Chrome or Firefox as your browser on your PC at home (they’re both free and auto update themselves in the background to keep out vulnerabilities)
• Don’t use the same password for everything. Most online issues are caused by using the same password for your email/iTunes as you used for some shady website that asked you to sign up. If you want to check, goto https://haveibeenpwned.com/ (it’s run by a Gold Coast security expert Troy Hunt, who is very well regarded) and you can check if your email address and/or password has been leaked by something/someone. https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords will also tell you if your password has shown up somewhere else. If it has, change it.
• Use a password manager program (I recommend lastpass https://lastpass.com or 1password https://1password.com ) to store your passwords. It will also randomly generate good passwords for you to use. It has iPhone apps, as well as plugging into your browser to fill in passwords for you.

I’ll cover off on the password thing in a later article in more detail.
Safe browsing everyone!

Sunday update November 12th 2017

Welcome to another Sunday everyone. Hope you’ve had/are having a great weekend.

Dual Screen phones!

Now, while I use an iPhone primarily, this is cool:

I’m super happy that phone makers have started to play with wildly different tech. Reminds me of back in the day Nokia nGages, Motorola swivel phones and the like. While they might not have been everyone’s cup of tea, someone needs to have a crack at these different designed to get us to move forward.

Intel might have a go at 3D graphics cards

While Intel has been making 3D video chips for a while (sort of,) they’re not what you would call high performers. If you want a decent 3D graphics card, you’re buying an nVidia or AMD card.
However Intel have announced that they’ve hired Raja Koduri to work on new graphics tech for them. Raja is the current head of the Radeon graphics section of AMD, and has previously worked at Apple as well (he helped build the retina displays on the MacBook line.)

iPhone X the most breakable phone

There’s been reports out there that the iPhone is the most breakable phone, due to someone doing a “drop test.”
Please don’t buy into that hype. There is no way a lab test is going to test for the exact scenario of you dropping your phone. Almost every smartphone out there today is just a huge sheet of glass with some circuitry attached to it. If you drop it without a case on it, and it lands in just the right way to crack the screen, it’s going to break. If you’re worried about it breaking, put a case on it. It’s that simple.
I’ve seen phones fall less than 10 cm and crack, and I’ve seen phones fall from metres up and survive. There’s just no way of telling.
Having said all that, the new iPhones do have glass backs, so it’s another sheet of glass to shatter of course. Apple chose to move to a glass back to allow for wireless charging (it won’t go through aluminium backs like the iphone 7 and 6 before it), but it would have worked just as well with plastic. And that wouldn’t have broken so easily.

Thanks everyone, and have a great day.

Don’t install antivirus software (because you’ve already got it!)

For anyone not in IT in general, that statement flies directly in the face of everything we’ve been taught. If you don’t have antivirus software, we’re told, your pc will cripple and die in a matter of minutes.

Viruses/Malware/Spyware etc

I almost consider all the above titles the same thing. Software that tries to get into your pc and do something you don’t want. There are hundreds of ways this can happen, from being bundled up with software you are trying to legitimately get, to having advertisements on websites trick your pc into running something.
The key here is something needs to know about these things and stop them.

The best defence is a good defence.

If you have Windows 7 or newer, you already have built in antivirus software that auto updates, and it’s free.
Some reports seems to indicate that the latest version of this is very responsive to threats discovered:
So why use the free antivirus from Microsoft, surely the paid ones are better?
Very nerdy articles here that explain why this isn’t always the case, but in short, because of the way antivirus software tangles itself into your machine, it can actually introduce more bugs and exploits than it stops.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/01/antivirus-is-bad/
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/07/what-amateurs-can-learn-from-security-pros-about-staying-safe-online/

What you should really be worried about

Here’s what you should focus on to keep your pc safe when you’re online:

• Keep your pc’s software up to date. Set Windows and Mac OS to auto update themselves, and if they tell you they need a restart to update, so it as soon as practicable. This applies to your phone as well (it’s just a computer now)
• Use Chrome or Firefox as your browser on your PC at home (they’re both free and auto update themselves in the background to keep out vulnerabilities)
• Don’t use the same password for everything. Most online issues are caused by using the same password for your email/iTunes as you used for some shady website that asked you to sign up. If you want to check, goto https://haveibeenpwned.com/ (it’s run by a Gold Coast security expert Troy Hunt, who is very well regarded) and you can check if your email address and/or password has been leaked by something/someone. https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords will also tell you if your password has shown up somewhere else. If it has, change it.
• Use a password manager program (I recommend lastpass https://lastpass.com or 1password https://1password.com ) to store your passwords. It will also randomly generate good passwords for you to use. It has iPhone apps, as well as plugging into your browser to fill in passwords for you.

I’ll cover off on the password thing in a later article in more detail.
Safe browsing everyone!

Sunday update November 5th 2017

They say the hardest part of starting a blog is starting. So I just started.

The second hardest part will be keeping it going. I can’t comment on this part yet.

iPhone (e)X released

The new iPhone was released to the public on Friday morning. The review situation has been interesting at best. It appears most of the “usual” suspects didn’t get their review machines until 24 hours before the embargo lifted, leaving little time for what I would call a “full” review. I really can’t follow the logic on this at all, but it’s Apple’s call on this, and I’m sure a multi-billion dollar company knows more about marketing then me. Good reviews so far at The Verge and some roundups at John Grubers Daring Fireball.

I got a chance to play with a good friend of mine’s space gray model, and my quick summary would be:

• Screen is typical Apple (ie, looks great)
• Can’t really see the OLED difference between it and my 7+, but I’m told outdoors it’s better
• It’s effectivly iPhone 7/8 (non plus) screen size. Even though there are more pixels lit up, the wierd top and bottom stuff they do means your effective screen real estate is about the same in 90% of instances.
• The notch is fine
• It feels hefty, in a good way

I’ll probably hold off getting one for little while, as I’m interested in battery life, which of course no-one can firmly comment on yet. Plus my 7+ handles 95% of what this phone does. (I’m happy to be audience to animojii, not a performer.)

@realdonaldtrump’s twitter account deleted.

It seems someone on the way out at twitter decided to go out in style, deleting the Tweeter-in-cheif’s account as his last act of “see ya later”.

Twitter responded:

A lot of people had a good laugh. Some where concerned about an apparently low level employees access to being able to do this. All in all, 3 things stand out here:

• Twitter again doesn’t seem to have the systems in place to deal with the growth the platform has had (it’s bullying/ToS violation dealings in the past give some evidence to this)
• Twitter was never designed to be a source of truth for people in power.
• No world leader should be using it as anything serious.

XBox One X out next week

Microsoft’s new console will hit shelves next week. It’s a strange turn of events that consoles are getting mid-life performance upgrades, but given the fast pace world we are in, it’s sort of not surprising.

Wikipedia has a good roundup of Enhanced 4K games that will take advantage of the new machines grunt. Early evidence points to it being able to load non-enhanced games a bit faster anyway, as you would expect from a significant machine upgrade.

That’s it for my quick roundup this week. I’ll endeavour to complete this each Sunday, with possibly more in-depth coverage.

My Galaxy Gear review. Late to the party.

I finally got my own Galaxy Gear.

After reading review after review lambasting the device for its lousy battery life and wasted features, I was still drawn to the idea of a wearable device. I was aware of a number of software improvements to the device, but there wasn't really an updated review of the device.

Obviously the design of the watch hasn't changed, but most people never really had an issue with the design anyway. I was concerned about the speaker at the bottom causing issues with typing, but it's actually better than my current G-shock watch for that. It's quite unassuming on the wrist, and I only get asked about it if it lights up with a notification of some sort.

Speaking of notifications, the original software only had notification support for a handful of apps. The current version however supports any app that has notifications, although certain Samsung software plugs in with a few extra features (SMS is a good example of this). You can pick and choose which apps push notifications to the watch, and the watch basically reflects the text that is displayed on the notification on the phone. The watch also gives you the option to open the app on the phone, which is effectively the same action as tapping on the notification.

You can also answer and reject calls on the phone. When I was researching the gear, I fully expected to use the reject option when in meetings, but I didn't envisage that I would be taking calls at all. Running late for a flight home, arms full of paperwork with my phone in my pocket soon changed those preconceptions.  It's effectively like having your phone on loudspeaker mode, just sticky taped to your wrist. It's really handy in those awkward situations when you find it a challenge to dive into your pocket to get your phone.

The battery lift on the watch is also much improved over review opinions. While I charge the gear every night (it just forms part of my usual "plug everything in" routine) it's usually finishing the day with 75% battery remaining, which says to me that it should last 3-4 days. I know some people complain that a watch shouldn't need charging every few days, but this isn't a watch, it's an add-on to a mobile phone that happens to tell time. Complaining about having to charge a smart-watch is the same as complaining that you have to charge a mobile phone, when your landline never needs charging.

Overall I'm very happy with the device, and I look forward to trying the new Gear 2, Neo and Fit. While the move the Tizen on these devices means that some of the backend android functionality will be lost, I think the main selling points of these devices are still there.

Switching to Linux, and how to scare everyone on the way in.

I wrote a few weeks ago about the fact that I was jack of windows, and I was switching to Linux (more specifically Ubuntu) now that some issues I had with video card drivers had been sorted. It's been going very well for the past few weeks, everything running smoothly, my work related stuff was fine, and the few issues that have cropped up, a few Google searches later and I'm usually on my way.

That was until I went to lodge my tax return this year. The ATO's eTax software, which allows you to lodge your annual return, is Windows and Mac only (and Mac was only picked up this year). The usual Google searches didn't help me at all, mostly directing me to threads where a few people were suggesting to write to the ATO and demand they support Linux. I usually avoid these threads, as they're not much help. I found a solution buried deep on a forum somewhere, and it worked. Given the difficulty I had in sourcing the fix, I posted it here.

The first few posts were some techincal discussion, and then the usual ATO bashing started, again, not unexpected.

But then over the course of the next few posts/pages, the 2 camps I've been specifically avoiding showed up.

Are you serious? Do you honestly expect the ATO to fork out thousands of dollars to port E-Tax for the 20 or so neckbeards who might use it on linux?

Not to mention the ongoing support effort and costs for a shoddy poorly designed operating system that even large projects, e.g. Google chrome, struggle with.

Wow. Wasn't expecting "this guy" to show up so soon.

I've had experience with what I call a FTH, or a Full Time Hater, before. In the wild, they are best ignored, lest they be fed and they turn into a full blown Troll. I believe his point was that given the small userbase of Linux, it probably isn't prudent to spend the money to develop the required software.

Then, the "other guy" showed up:

Who cares if they make e-tax for GNU/Linux, it's proprietary software, it doesn't respect your freedom so don't use it. You don't have full control over it anyway until it's source code is published and under a permissive license. Then even if the ATO doesn't want to fund it's development a fork of the software which does successfully submit applications can be run with nothing embarrassing hiding in it's source code.

Please refer to the free software definition when using the name free:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Ugh, the free software guy. I've come across these people in Linux forums on many occasions, and again, successfully ignored them. The one thing that intrigued me however was the link, so off I went. 

When users don't control the program, the program controls the users. The developer controls the program, and through it controls the users. This nonfree or “proprietary” program is therefore an instrument of unjust power.

Thus, “free software” is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of “free” as in “free speech,” not as in “free beer”.

Proprietary software is an instrument of unjust power.

What.

The.

Actual.

Fuck.

This attitude is very VERY wrong to carry. I agree with the benefits of "free" software. Things can be modified, improved, distributed, shared etc, and all that is wonderful, and gave birth to Linux (I read the part about calling it GNU/Linux). However, carrying that attitude about non-free software will keep the plain everyday users at bay. Nobody is forced to use non-free software, but by using it, it will make your life easier. I would hate to think what my Linux experience would have been if I didn't have MP3 support, or my ATI drivers.

I could have chosed to not use those, and my Laptop would run like shit (the "free" ATI drivers aren't the best. They work, but aren't the best)

I'm sure the fights will continue, but both of the above attitudes will keep more and more users at bay....

....and keep them on Windows....

Week 1 report from the Galaxy S4

So I've had the Galaxy S4 (GT-i9505) for a week now, from Telstra, and I thought I had best share a few thoughts and experiences with it.

I won't dive into too many of the already well publicised details of the phone. Great processor (mine has the Snapdragon 600 SoC, as opposed to what appears to be a poorly executed rushed job Exynos 5 Octa version,) great screen etc. You can read about those in the many millions of online reviews. But more and more I've found that online reviews from well known publications seem to either highlight issues that don't matter, or skim over issues that do, from a day to day, this-is-the-phone-I-have-to-deal-with-every-day perspective. Also, given what I usually do to phones (root, ROM etc) I thought I should cover more on that side as well.

In quick summary of the 2 main points that have been covered in the reviews:

• Screen - looks totally awesome. It's Pentile AMOLED, which I absolutely hated on the Lumia 800 and dealt with on the Galaxy S3. On the S4, I can't tell it's pentile, at all. Works better in sunlight too. I did compare this side by side in the Telstra shop with the HTC one, and I think the HTC is better, but I really shouldn't weigh on your decision to buy, as you'll be happy with either.
• Processor - It's the same as the HTC One. Nuff said.

Now, here is where I start to diverge from the main stream reviews:

Touchwiz
Oh Touchwiz, my poor, downtrodden friend. Most reviews and forums have at best called it the "most bearable" version of the skin, and at worst, have called it "vomit all over android". Complains range from inconsistencies with the experience across difference areas of the device, to laggyness and slowdowns caused by it. At the end of the day, 90% of people really won't care. It works, all the options are there, it still does everything stock android does (plus more, but I'll get to that), and I haven't found it to be laggy at all. On the S3 it used to chug a bit on the launcher screen, but a quick trip to the play store to get Nova soon sorted that out. This is hammered in the reviews badly, but it really doesn't impact by any stretch as far as the reviews point out.

Removable Battery
While the battery life on the S4 is great, and easily goes toe to toe with my wife's iPhone 5 if we have similar usage patterns for a day, there 2 big reasons for preferring a removable battery. This and this. If you haven't looked at those links, the first is a 7000mAh battery for the Galaxy S3. There is one coming for the S4, but hasn't been announced yet. I've used a larger battery on my S3, and it's something I've told everyone who asked that it's something that I cannot live without. To give you an idea, the stock battery on the S4 is 2600mAh, so we are talking more than 2.5 times the battery life. It makes the phone thicker and heavier, but with the phone so thin and light to start with, it's something that I personally don't give 2 hoots about, if it means I can go all weekend without a charge. The flip side of that, and I how I use the extended battery more often, is simply having everything turned on. With the extended battery, Wifi, Bluetooth, gestures, screen brightness can all be left on and turned up, without a worry in the world. The second link is for a stock battery. With the HTC One and the Xperia Z, once those batteries die, it's all over. You can crack them open and replace it, but no where near as easy. This isn't a huge point (not as big as the first) but it's still a factor.

SD Card Expansion
The price difference at the time of writing from a 16Gb to a 32Gb iPhone 5 is $100. A 16Gb SD card is around $20, and falling. When I picked up my S4, I dropped my SD card from the S3 into it, and boom, all my music, photos and videos are there. The Xperia Z has an SD card slot, but the HTC one doesn't, and that's a killer for me. The phone supports up to 64Gb cards as well, so I've always got access to that additional storage. This doesn't get touched on as much in a lot of reviews probably because of the prevalence of streaming music services in the US, but music is only a part of this. Carrying a 1080p camera around is no use if you can't expand the storage.

Build quality
Most reviews have, quite correctly, pointed out that the HTC One is a much nicer looking phone. Compared to the S4, I would agree, but really, it's been weighted in reviews far more than it should. I don't know about anyone else, but my phone usually lives in a case, which negates that straight away. Also, the HTC buttons are VERY poorly laid out (the power button at the top left put me off straight away. Top right and on the right hand side is fine, but not top left....) I also use the physical home button on the S4 to turn it on, probably more so than the power button, and that is far more convenient.

Now I mentioned in the TouchWiz part about people wanting stock Android on their devices. Google has announced the Google Edition of the S4 (which I didn't know about at the time of purchase) which makes me a very happy owner. If (as I assume) the GE version is a GTi9505 (which given it will work on AT&T and T-Mobile, I think it will be) then that gives my even more options from a custom ROM point of view. I've heard people complain that the GE will loose all of the Samsung features (um...didn't you WANT all that stuff gone!), but really, as long as the camera works, it will be fine. The main reason I don't run a rom like Cyanogenmod is the fact that some of the hardware is flakey. If these GE roms give the CM guys drivers/blobs etc to work with, then happy days.

All in all, I've very happy with my purchase. Sure, there's a 100 things on this phone I'll never use, but there's a few that I really need/want, and on that basis, I really would recommend the S4 over anything else sitting in the Telstra shop right now.

A really quick update...from Ubuntu!!

Windows 8 finally broke me. It wasn't any one thing in particular that pushed me over the edge, but more of the fact that I felt as tho I had an OS on my PC that was in a constant war with itself over its identity. I ended up spending most of the time in desktop mode, which worked reasonably well, but I had some issues with drivers not letting my laptop go to sleep.

So for about the 8th time, I bit the bullet and downloaded Ubuntu 13.04.

Installation was VERY straight forward (basically clicking next a few times, fill in your name and a password and off you go,) and I was soon presented with my desktop. Wifi connected straight away (although at slower speeds, it appears the current Linux kernel has issues with dual channel wireless N cards, but I can deal with that.)

The next step is the main reason that I haven't run Ubuntu yet. My HP DV7 runs 2 graphics cards, a "low power" intel based card, and an ATI HD6770 for high power requirement games etc. In windows, the software provided automatically switches between the 2 depending on weather the laptop is plugged in or not. In the past, I've had zero luck getting these going properly, but this time around, using this guide got it working.

So, how has it been? Great. Ubuntu runs far smoother than Windows 8 (and anecdotal evidence seems to suggest probably better than Windows 7 as well). Mouse scrolling in Chrome is one of the big improvements I've noticed, which seems like a trivial thing, but given I spend a fair amount of time in a web browser, I notice it a lot.

I haven't had too many dramas, but the one thing that it brutally annoying is the fact that to create a shortcut in Unity (Ubuntu's launcher thingy) is a manual script writing exercise, which is just plain lazy on Canonical's part. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind the odd bit of scripting, but to create a shortcut...really.....

Anyway, I may report back on future updates soon, but for now, I'm thoroughly enjoying the experience.

iPad mini? You're missing the point....

There's a severe lack of speculation about the "why" of the iPad mini. Apple doesn't make products purely because someone else made one and it's been popular.

My Guess
The focus will be on what a 7" device can do better than the iPad or a phone. Reading books. Apple will drill this HARD at their release event. They'll mention it's great for apps, and Web browsing etc, but the real drill home will be books. I don't know what they will do to make this better than the Kindle (and make no mistake, Apple is acutely aware of this), but whatever it is, they will deploy the famous distortion reality field around it. It might be a better screen, or maybe some sort of special e-ink display (although I don't think it will be black and white, it would be some kind of voodoo that looks like an iPad screen when in apps, and an e-ink display in a book).

I could be totally off the mark here, but Apple's product development method isn't anything special. Find something that someone wants to do, and make something that does it better than what is available.

People want to have a phone that does email and Web browsing, and all that was available was windows phone 6 and Blackberry, so they made the iPhone.

People wanted to browse the Web and do email, but laptops were to cumbersome in some situations, so they made the iPad.

People want to read books on the go, but all you have to do this is an iPad (too heavy) or Kindle (black and white only). You make the connection.
By the way, the above point is the reason the Nexus 7 is popular. The new iPad mini has to do something better than the Nexus 7, and to be honest, I'm excited to see what it is.

Edit - 28th October 2012

Well, it's just a shrunk iPad 2....dissappointing, boring, not what I was expecting, quite expensive. Will sell millions......

*shrugs*

Devices and Services

Listening to Twit in the car this morning, it was pointed out that Microsoft’s homepage listed that they were a “Devices and Services” company. It was argued that if you provide both of those, you’re an OS company as well. That got me thinking about why they would push either side of the OS, when Microsoft is clearly, amongst other things, an OS company.

I think Microsoft might be onto something here. Most average consumers, and probably without realising it tech savvy consumers, don’t care about the OS. That comment will probably draw a “WTF are you talking about” comment from some people, but bear with me.

I have a Galaxy S3, and I’m a big fan of it. My wife has a new iPhone 5, and she is very happy with it. We both like the hardware design of the phones (Devices), and they both have excellent app ecosystems (Services). At the end of the day, if either of these phones lacked one of these (eg, either phone looked terrible, or the app ecosystem was garbage on one of them) then we probably wouldn’t buy. Obviously the OS is important, however almost anyone can pump out a great OS. People love iOS, people love Android, hell, people even loved WebOS, but only iOS and Android have survived because they meet the other ends of the requirements, Devices and Services.

This also plays into the problem with Windows Phone 7/8 and Blackberry. Windows phone has got the Device Side down (Nokia’s are looking great, as well as the new HTC’s), but the Services side is lacking…but only just. With Twitter, Facebook, and good email intergration, it only needs a few key apps and it’s off and racing. Blackberry is in real trouble here though, as their devices are looking extremely dated, AND their app ecosystem is a wasteland.

I think it’s the right idea to focus on devices and services, because that’s what people want.

If you love it, set it free - I'm going back to iOS for a week

So my wife has got her shiny new iPhone 5, and she's very happy with it. It's just like her iPhone 4, but faster, and a bigger screen, and for her phone requirements, that's great. No need to reload/repurchase apps, everything just moved over, and away she went (after re-arranging a few icons of course).

So now there's an iPhone 4 sitting on my desk. Taunting me...looking at me and my Galaxy with a smugness usually reserved for 1% types. "You're using THAT thing?" is says under it's breath.

So fine, I figure I'll give it another go. I had iPhones for near on 4 years, let's tear the new car smell that is the S3 from my hands and plunge back into Apple's garden.

At this point, I really don't know what will happen. I'm not sure if I'll miss the big screen, the widgets, the customisations or anything at all. Only time will tell.

So for the next week, the Galaxy will get parked, and I'll use the iPhone 4. Just to see what happens.

iPhone 5 owners report scuffs and scratches out of the box | The Verge

iPhone 5 owners report scuffs and scratches out of the box | The Verge:

Jony Ive - "When you think about your iPhone, it’s probably the object that you use most in your life. It’s the product that you have with you all the time."

On that basis, maybe designing the thing to withstand being "with you all the time" might be a killer feature to include on your next phone.

I should point out, Apple's not the only one guilty of this. Looking at you HTC

'via Blog this'

..for our customers...

Something I've always admired about Apple's approach to products is their seeming unwavering focus on "the user" or "the customer".

My feeling is the original iPhone was such a hit because it focused on ease of use, and making sure it had 80%+ of the features people need. Subsequent iPhone updates have added features only when 2 main boxed were ticked. Do a lot of people actually want it, and can we do it in such a way that it's easier that the current way for the user to use. Copy and Paste, Multitasking, Video Chat...the list goes on of features that other phones had, but Apple didn't add until it had ticked the 2 boxes.

There are a lot of features on my Galaxy S3 that don't tick either of these boxes. NFC is one of them. Great feature, and when acceptability is around, a lot of people will want it, but at the moment, no-one really cares about it, and there's no common way of implementing it. It's nice to say I've got it, but at the end of the day, I've never used it.

There was 1 decision though in relation to Apple that doesn't seem to tick either of these boxes, and that's the removal of Google's integration into iOS 6. Honestly, the way that Youtube and Google Maps were intergrated into iOS were better than Android. Embeded Youtube in webpages was a far more superior experience than Android (which on some sites still tries to fire up Flash, looking at you Verge), and the Maps solution, while basic, was very smooth, and super easy to use.

It would appear from the outside looking in that these changes were purely based on the current tiff between Apple and Google, and that flys in the face of the 2 requirements for a feature on an iPhone. I haven't had feedback on the impact of the youtube removal, but the Maps change seems to have a fair few people expressing disappointment about this.

Comparison of Maps Apps, source - http://www.reddit.com/user/Steve_J0bs

Now, I would hope that over time, the maps used will update to the point where they are on par with Google's map, but on launch day, this is pretty lousy. This does nothing towards making the maps experience better for the customer. Flyover is a "show off" feature more than anything, and turn by turn is certainly welcome, and knocks another Android feature off the "we don't have that" list. My hope is that the Google versions of apps will fly in and pick up from where Apple left, but this more than anything, makes me wonder if Apple's focus for the iPhone is starting the waiver.