Google Apps: Integration in the Start Page header

Google Apps consists of a set of loosely coupled services that can be more or less assigned to a custom domain name. The current set includes email, calendaring, very crude web page authoring and serving (limited file services), and Google Docs. There are also less well known mobile services for Google Apps.

It's great only because it's free. Mostly it's unfinished. It's not at all obvious how one provides users with any kind of unified view of available services.

Turns out, you're supposed to edit the header of the "start page" associated with every Google App custom domain -- for example: MN Sepcial Hockey Personalized Start Page.

Yep, the header. The gadgets don't quite do the trick.

It's very crude, but it's at least understandable.

I do hope Google returns to Google Apps one day. They're only half-way to a 1.0 release ...

Aperture 2.0 is MIA

This week's photo show was the obvious place to introduce Aperture 2.0.

No luck.

Macworld | Creative Notes | PMA notes: Whither Aperture?

...More specifically, the topic is: “Where’s Version 2.0 of Apple’s image management and editing app?” With the the show starting this morning, it seems pretty clear that we won’t see anything announced this week, and the disappointment I’m hearing is pervasive."

With each passing week it's more likely Apple is exiting the high end photo market.

Google BlackBerry calendar sync, the family calendar, and BlackBerry comments

We've had my wife's BlackBerry Pearl for about a week now. Some recent discoveries:

• The predictive keyboard text entry is slow for writing, but might improve with time. It's very tedious when entering usernames and URLs. I need to learn a shortcut to switch out of predictive mode into the standard multi-stroke letter selection.
• A Graffiti One (original Palm Pilot) text entry solution with predictive word selection would really be much better than this keyboard and would use space far more effectively. Sniff.
• The original Palm had hundreds of fine touches that mde working in the small 160x160 display efficient and even enjoyable. It's early, but I don't see anything like this on the BlackBerry.
• The AT&T personal BB service includes what I think is their "push" email. We use this instead of AT&T's costly instant messaging. We use Google's BB Gmail client for work with traditional email. We haven't tried Google Talk on the BB ... yet
• When I enabled the BB email I was directed to "att.blackberry.net" for a web interface. Ooops! Turns out that's not enabled for personal accounts. I've run into a few of these glitches. [1 - see update]
  

Our latest experiment was with Google Mobile's BB Calendar sync

Get calendar alerts - Using your BlackBerry� smartphone's native calendar, you can now access your Google calendar even when you don't have network coverage and be alerted for upcoming appointments with sound or vibration.

Always in sync - Your Google Calendar stays synchronized whether you access it from your computer or your phone. You can add or edit entries right on your BlackBerry� smartphone or on your Google Calendar on the web...

I was indeed able to configure a connection between our family Google Apps domain calendar and the BB. It's very slow to sync however, even with only a few test posts on the calendar. I wonder if this will turn out be a toy. If it works I might make another try to sync Outlook with Google Calendar, though I don't think there's been much improvement on that front.

We've not tried Google Talk yet.

Update 12/30/08: In the midst of a Blackberry debacle I finally figured some of the odd story with http://www.att.com/blackberrystart. AT&T doesn't document this at all. Most users don't need to know about this because when you first connect the phone to the network AT&T auto-configures the push email that's the only interesting feature of their "Blackberry plan" (which is otherwise a generic data plan).

Anyway, if you navigate to the BB Pearl app for "Blackberry Setup", then "Personal Email Setup", you will be taken to an AT&T web page for configuring your email account. Here you set up a password for your account. In the midst of these screens, as of 12/08, there's an option to "create a username". If you do that you will be asked for a password. Be sure to have the password for your email setup already, because you'll be asked for that too as part of this setup.

Once you do this you can go to http://www.att.com/blackberrystart and the username and password you entered via the phone will allow you access to a very limited page for configuring your BB email. The only novel function on this page is you can define email "filters".

I suggest you ignore this "feature", it's not worth the bother. Still, it's good to know what that absurd web page was supposed be for.

Good comment on Parallels versus VMWare Fusion OS X emulation

Nice discussion around an update announcement: VMware Fusion Updated to version 1.1.1 - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW). I really do need to install the copy of Fusion I bought, but I use Win2K so little that it's at the bottom of my to do list. I'm still on an early version of Parallels.

The Complete Guide to iPhone Car Integration

Via TUAW: The Complete Guide to iPhone Car Integration. Excellent work, clearly there are going to be a lot of products aimed at this issue. I guess Bluetooth headset is what Apple engineers imagine us using.

Enroll in a Google search experiment

Google's Experimental Search now allows users to enroll in one of the experiments. Like most people, I opted for "alternate views". Now all my http://google.com/ig searches have a new drop down on the right side that allows me to apply alternative views to my results. (This, of course, works only when I'm logged into the Gmail identity associated with my personalized search pages.)

Definitely worth doing, I don't see any downside. You can provide feedback.

iTunes 7.6 patches one of my biggest OS complaints!

I posted about one of my biggest OS X complaints a week or two ago:

Gordon's Tech: Multiuser machines and devices: the next most messed up part of OS X: "The real problem shows up with iPods however, and presumably with an iPhone as well.

Each user account tries to seize control of the iPod. So if I sync on my account, then switch to my wife's account, the iPod can go into a limbo state. It thinks it's attached, but the OS says it isn't."

Well, iTunes 7.6 now has an option to TURN OFF iPhone and iPod sync. I set that option for every user on the multi-user iMac.

Big problem made smaller.

BTW, they also fixed the $$%!$ broken smart playlist functionality.

BlackBerry Pearl, iTunes and Missing Sync play well together

This one got a delighted laugh from Emily, so I know it's good.

I discovered tonight that Emily's BlackBerry Pearl will play AAC encoded music (not FairPlay, just AAC). Who knew?

So I re-enabled disk mass storage support in the BB advanced options, reviewed the warnings from Mark/Space about USB mounting and told Missing sync for Blackberry to sync my new "BlackBerry" iTunes Playlist. [1]

Worked like a charm.

I absolutely did not turn The Beatles "Any Time at All" into a ringtone for her Pearl. I know that would bring Homeland Security to my doorstep.

Now I'm ordering a 2GB Micro-SD card and a 2.5mm to 3.5mm stereo out converter cable. Emily will be able to play the kids audio books on demand from her phone. Using the speaker phone if necessary.

[1] Ok, one more complication. Our iTunes music library lives in my Public folder on the iMac server. Emily has to sync the Pearl with her account. The solution is easy. I configured her iTunes to reference tunes in place, not to copy them. Then I dragged my entire music library on to her iTunes Window. Ten minutes later she had her own access list suitable for sync to the BB. Of course it won't stay in sync, but I've done this before. I just need to periodically delete all. (Actually I've done much more complex things before ...)

Update 12/30/08: Be very careful. Missing Sync stores the iTunes on your phone's main memory area -- which is pretty damned limited. If you sync infrequently, the "leave at least 5MB" default setting can start to become small, with very bad consequences ...

BlackBerry Pearl - usage tips

For us the BlackBerry Pearl is a waystation on the way to iPhone 2.0, but Google is making it at least interesting. So I went hunting for tips, and found a few on "Tong Family Blog":

• Video and music codecs
• Shortcuts

The codecs include AAC! I just tested it and they work very well.

Some of my favorite shortcuts (mostly from the Tong list but I've since added a few of my own):

• To move to the top of a screen (web page esp), press 1.
• To move to the bottom of a screen, press 7.
• To change text input methods when in a text field: Press the Menu key and then Click Enable Multitap or Enable SureType. (SureType is very unsure when entering URLs and usernames.)
  
• To switch applications, hold the Alt key and press the Escape (back) key. Continue holding the Alt key and roll the Pearl to select an application. Release the Alt key.
• To return to the Home screen, press the End (hang up) key.
• To lock the keyboard, from the Home screen, hold the asterisk (*) key. To unlock the keyboard, hold the asterisk (*) key and press the Send key
• To switch between the Default and Vibrate notification profiles, from the Home screen, hold the pound (#) key.
• To assign a speed dial number to a key, from the Home screen or in the Phone application, hold the key you want to assign. Type the phone number.
• To insert a period, press the Space key twice. The next letter is capitalized.
• To insert a period (.) in the Go To dialog box, press the Space key. To insert a forward slash (/) in the Go To dialog box, hold the Shift key and press the Space key.
• To open the bookmark list from a web page, press 5.
• To add a bookmark from a web page, press the question mark (?) key.
• To view a thumbnail version of a web page, press X. To return to the normal view, press any key. You can navigate a long web page by scrolling the thumbnail.
  
• To toggle the banner on a web page, press the exclamation point (!) key again.

I also liked the pointer to the 2GB Sandisk microSD card with an SD adapter.

Now that I've shown the BB really can play AAC I'll get a 2.5mm to 3.5 mm stereo out adapter and a 2GB SD card.

Time to switch to Nikon?

The new Digital Rebel is out.

Prominently missing from the marketing blurbs is anything like "greatly improved light sensitivity".

The ISO range is unchanged from the last two releases:

Canon EOS 450D / Digital Rebel XSi: Digital Photography Review

• ISO 100
• ISO 200
• ISO 400
• ISO 800
• ISO 1600

So it's 12 megapixels now. Big whoop.

Nikon is kicking Canon around the ring, so I won't be buying a new Canon dSLR this year. Instead I'll be seeing what the new consumer end Nikon looks like. I can probably get a decent price for my Canon IS lens ...

The laptop stand, a tripod and a treadmill - exercise for geeks

Andrew routinely violates Gordon's Laws of Acquisition.

This is good, and I thank his suffering spouse for her patience. Andrew is my one man research department. Today he brought me a great one.

Andy has assembled several pices into an obviously practical geek exercise solution:

1. The Laptop Stand from from Pfeffer Industries: $35
2. A camera tripod - thereby justifying purchase of a good tripod
3. Netflix video-on-demand
4. iTunes sharing (podcasts)
5. A laptop (OS X needs Parallels or VMWare and XP to use Netflix's evil XP-only VOD solution)*
6. A treadmills or eliptical trainer (Our ancient Nordic Track will, alas, strike the tripod).

* OS X users who are not current Netflix customers are probably going to substitute Apple video rentals, but note that the Netflix solution is a "freebie" for Netflix current subscribers. Apple video rentals cost money.

The key is the stand fits a rugged tripod quite well. Andy certifies it works in practice.

This might just cost justify our purchase of both an elliptical trainer and good tripod.

Google's Photos Screensaver

This is bundled in Google's "Pack", but I think you can now download only portions of the pack -- like this:

Google Photos Screensaver: "Google Photos Screensaver turns your computer into a digital picture frame that lets you:

• Display photos from your PC and photo sharing sites
• Stay connected to friends and family with photo feeds
• Watch cinematic slideshows with the new Pan & Zoom transition
• Flip through photos with easy on-screen controls

For years I've used an old version of gPhotoShow to display images (later versions had malware features). It adjusts to multiple displays, but the regular XP screensaver only puts an image on one screen.

I'd like to see how well this works. If I get a chance to try it I'll report back ...

Remote desktop control market improving

There's not much I envy from the Windows world, but Microsoft's (was it a Citrix offshoot) superb remote desktop protocol is on the list.

It was a work of genius. I don't have OS X 10.5, but I suspect the VNC dervied remote control features there are a pale shade of terminal services.

So, yes, I'm jealous. On the other hand, the good news is the remote desktop marketplace is expanding. Maybe news like this will convince Apple it's time to build a XP quality remote control solution for OS X.

In the news recently:

• WebEx PCNow: Costs $13/month, no per-use cost
  
• CoPilot is now free on weekends

I'd like to try out PCNow, but I didn't see any hint of a trial version.

Nokia 6555b: the pleasant surprise, and its iSync Plug-in

The euphoniously named Nokia 6555b was to be a brief engagement after my divorce from the Motorola RAZR.

Ahh the RAZR. A pretty thing, but beneath the smooth face a twisted psychopath with a borderline personality disorder. Mercifully the memories are fading.

The Nokia isn't angular and slim. It's a bit lumpy in the pocket frankly. And yet ...

It's warm. Comforting. Smart. Most everything has been well thought out. (Note to Nokia: The quick dial UI fails when two numbers for the same user are entered. You're missing an iconic indicator to distinguish the user-number relationship.)

And, rather to my surprise, I was able to easily sync the Address Book with my OS X Address book using the free Nokia 6555 iSync Plugin by Code Crazy (see [3] to obtain).

Even the Blackberry won't sync to the Mac using Bluetooth, though it DOES have a nice, standard, USB cable. I have to buy one of those $5 Motorola Micro-Mini USB adapters for the Nokia so I can travel without the charger. Yes, it will apparently charge from the micro-USB port. It even has a standard 2.5mm earset jack. A good alarm clock. Vibrate mode. Even some sample games for the kids.

You know, maybe I'll wait a bit on the iPhone. We've turned Emily's Blackberry Pearl into a proto-Android, and it works pretty well that way. So we have a data phone with Google Maps, Google Talk, Google Mail and some other odd Google things.

And ... EDGE on the BB, it turns out, is damned slow. The iPhone deserves better. I'll have to keep carrying my Tungsten E2 for a while anyway -- the iPhone doesn't do tasks or much of anything without a data connection.

The 6555b doesn't need an expensive data plan to be happy.

This could last until iPhone 2.0.

Or beyond. After all, GSM does facilitate polygamy ... [but see the March 2009 update! Evil.]

Update 2/4/08:

• The phone continues to work well, but at times the battery has drained faster than expected. I'm going to turn off bluetooth and see what effect that has.
  
• I installed an old 64MB memory card (2GB is $25, this was lying around) which enables mounting as a mass storage device via USB (below) on a Mac [1] (On a PC it's supposed to enable sync with Windows Media Player and to work with Nokia's desktop apps.).
  
• I ordered the Motorola micro USB (EMU) to mini USB adapter ($3.50 + $6 shipping from an Amazon affiliate). I found with this cable that while the phone does not display a charging icon, it does indeed appear to charge when connected to a Mac. [2] This cable also supported USB mounting [1]. It did NOT, however, support iSync connection via a USB cable. So my iSync connection is Bluetooth only.
• More on music and AAC support on this phone.

Update 2/18/2008: I really don't like the startup/shutdown fanfare; I've learned to palm the device to suppress them. Can't figure out a way to turn 'em off. There's more than a few things on the phone you can't do anything with, such as assign some useful function to the Push-To-Talk button AT&T promotes heavily.

Update 3/5/2008: From the comments: "To disable the startup jamboree, go to menu/settings/phone settings/startup tones and turn it off. easy!". A great tip. There's a similar setting on the same menu to disable the shutdown song. Now I don't have to smother the phone between my hands when I'm flying.

Update 4/24/2008: Contrary to my initial impressions, it doesn't charge via the USB port, at least when I use the Motorola adapter. I'm also finding more holes in the UI. Muting is pretty awkward, for example. It's also easy to end up in a UI state where you want to exit out to the primary phone screen, but there's no way to do that without closing the call (there's no universal "escape" button.) I continue to be annoyed by the hard-coded buttons designed for services I don't want, a sign that Sprint was too involved in the phone design.

Update 3/24/2009: There's a dirty little secret to all Nokia phones. They have a particularly evil approach to unlocking. I'm not buying Nokia again.

Update 4/15/09: I've made my copy of the Code Crazy iSync Nokia plug-in available. See [3], below.

[1] Settings:Connectivity:USB data cable:Date storage.
[2] In the past I've found that a Mac or PC won't power a USB device unless it has some device driver integration. It might be that installing a memory card, and then mounting via USB, is required to provide USB power. I have not yet tested with a USB charger.
[3] The Code Crazy domain is gone and the associated iSync Plug-In seems to have vanished. I've made my copy available, though of course if the author asks I'll remove it. A couple of people have tried this and it didn't work for them. I used it with a G5 iMac and 10.4, I no longer use it. It is probably not compatible with Intel machines and/or 10.5.

Missing sync for Blackberry on OS X vs. PocketMac

PocketMac's OS X sync software was bought by BlackBerry, it's a free download. Missing Sync for BlackBerry is made by the same team that produced Missing Sync for Palm -- which we've used for a couple of years. That software costs $40, but I'm eligible for a $20 side-grade.

Both require a USB connection, they won't work with Bluetooth. Both come with ominous warnings of known issues. Only the PocketMac product supports direct software installation, but most BB software seems to be "over the air" anyway.

PocketMac seemed cruder, and it doesn't use a standard OS X installer. That makes me nervous. Sync software is ugly stuff anyway, non-standard installers add risk to risk.

I paid the $20 to MarkSpace. First sync had lots of warnings and issues, but at least the address book sync worked. There's no way a non-geek could ever use these products.

BTW, Missing Sync for BB is not a very trusting product. You must register over the net, and it stores your ethernet card address. One machine only!

No wonder everyone's afraid of the iPhone.