Feline Aviation and Beyonce for the Win

We're fighting with the cat again.  Still.

To be honest, it's been a battle from the beginning.  I'm not what you'd call a cat person. This one, however, is at least quite personable.  Unfortunately this doesn't balance against his propensity for destruction, evil, and general bone-headedness.

Ren earned the nickname Satan when we first got him.  He would leap onto the stove, turning on the gas on the way up.  Apparently the little bugger was trying to blow up the house with himself in it.  We had to remove the knobs for a few months.

Then came xmas and xmas trees.  Satan disembowled every xmas tree we put up, year after year until we gave up.  He ruined many old, treasured ornaments by hurling them to the ground, where they smashed into pieces too small to repair.

He is not allowed to sleep in the bedroom because he claws the bed or my wife when he's hungry and won't stop until you feed him.  Note that the dog does not do this, preferring to sleep in with his people.  The worst thing Marshall does in bed is steal a pillow or blanket.

Cat Food Ballet<tm> is getting past the point of frustration in the house lately.  Ren gets fed in the kitchen, with the door closed, then Marshall gets fed in the living room.  Marshall doesn't care, instead spending all of his time in front of the kitchen door, waiting for the Cat Food Gods to open the door so he can lick the bowl clean.  There aren't even microbes of cat food after Marshall is done.

Meanwhile Ren then runs over to Marshall's food and starts eating it.  Ren was pretty much cured of diabetes and is not supposed to be eating dog food so we tell him to move.  MOVE.  I SAID MOVE, YOU LITTLE BASTARD.  He doesn't even look up.  You have to physically get up and make a move toward him before he takes off.

Five minutes later, he's back, as if we never said anything to him.  If I had a squirt gun, I'd let it loose on him.  Instead, I have to keep getting up.  Yesterday I threw a shirt at him, which moved him a bit and he was back a few minutes later.

If the kitchen door isn't shut correctly, Marshall will open it and force his way into Ren's food.  You have to physically remove him from the bowl, in the most spectacular case of Selective Hearing I've ever seen.  Neither of the little bastards listen, except when convenient.

Meanwhile, Ren has also taken to urinating randomly on the rug.  He has two litter boxes and it doesn't matter.  He is in perfect health so this is simply an attitude problem.  One of his new nicknames is Caboose because he's the last cat we will ever have.  My house should not smell like cat urine because the feline who lives there has a bad attitude.

Ren has also discovered the out of doors and apparently doesn't mind rain or snow.  He has spent several nights outside.  He has all his claws so we're not worried about him protecting himself.  In fact he reminds us about his claws on the furniture all the time.  No matter how much we express our dislike for this annoyance.

Just to even things up a bit, Marshall has discovered Catbox as Snackbox.  Suddenly dog kisses just aren't the same.

Marshall is also inordinately fond of trash.  When he's not cleaning the cat bowl, he's trolling the trash for interesting morsels.  Marshall is a very interesting test of housekeeping.  If you can't see or hear him, he's in trouble; which was caused by one of the humans not putting something away.  Or he took yet another package of popcorn off the dining room table and ate most of it.  He has a genuine love for kettle corn (and sweets in general, like his daddy).

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HEY EVERYONE - did you watch the Superbowl?

C'mon, you know I am the AntiSports.  It's only mid-day and already I'm sick over my head of hearing about the Superbowl from my coworkers and online.  Rome is burning and all we talk about is WOW -that halftime show!   Some of us are actually watching tv for the commercials.  Some of us are so vapid that we must spend all our time talking about how fantastic Beyonce was and how fabulous it was that her old group showed up and how about their outfits and dancing?

Bread and circuses indeed.

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For some unknown reason, my company was meeting with people from Apple.  Overheard at the meeting: We don't really listen to customer input.  We create the future and everybody can just catch up.

That fellow must be in charge of the Kool Aid.

In other news, I jailbroke my iPad.  Went smoothly, worked on linux, allows a lot more freedom.

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Apparently most of our newspapers have been hacked by the Chinese.  This is a very perplexing happenstance.   After thinking about it for a bit, I have decided that this is a non-story: even if the Chinese decided to take over our newspapers, they could not do a worse job than the existing ones.  It's win-win for everyone.

The World IS Ending: lefty Evaluates the iPad

Anyone who knows me or reads the blog knows how much I love Apple, Steve Jobs, the drooling fanboys and the products Apple produces.  iHoles, the lot of them.

As it turns out, I'm the lone Android tablet user at work.  Since I'm kinda responsible for security, the boss thought it would be a good idea for me to take a look.  Actually, he thinks he's going to convert me, so I let him believe whatever he wants to.  He's the boss, right?

After weeks and weeks and weeks, the unit finally arrived.  It appears that Apple refused to sell us a certain model of iPad and we had to wait until there were other models available.

Following several sets of instructions and applying the Guess Method at certain points, I got the device registered.  Note that this does not reflect on Apple: this would be the fault of our supplier and us.  Naturally there is no one around to ask for assistance.

The first thing I do with any device is poke around the settings.  This is where I started getting nervous. From a privacy standpoint, there appears to be an incredible amount of data leakage to Apple, at very least.  This was confirmed by one of the fanboys here.  When he found out I got an iPad, he suggested I just save the company money and give it back right away because I was going to hate it.  Funny, he was the same one who, last week, kept telling me to embrace change and come over to the Dark Side<tm>.  He suggested jailbreaking immediately.

My immediate question was how to get data onto the device.  Fanboy said there is no way to install music but iTunes.  This is not acceptable.  My device, my music, my storage.  I do not want to ask Steve Jobs' permission every time I want to put music on my tablet.  No idea how to put non-music data  on- everyone seems to use Dropbox or something similar.

Since email is a rather important item, I went to configure it.  Oops, I need a data plan, in spite of the Verizon icon.  Again, my company, not Apple.   It's most fortunate that we are considering this a test run (because we failed).  In fact, the test run has been halted because the vendor messed things up royally.

Back to the unit itself.  Let me say some positive things, ok?  The battery life far exceeds my android tablet (which isn't fair, as there's something wrong with the android or its battery).  It was easy to understand and operate.  People don't instantly grok 4-5 finger gestures so it should probably be mentioned somewhere.  Personally, I say a lot with a simple one-finger gesture.

I located the market and did some browsing.  It sure costs a lot to operate one of these things.. the great majority of android programs are free, including the ones that Apple charges for.  Since Apple is known to musicians, I went to that section.  There were a ton of guitar magazine apps, a few of which I downloaded free.  Each was an invitation to subscribe.  Uninstalled.  I located a few tv apps, which led to questioning why I can watch episodes of such great shows as Billy the Exterminator and Hoarders on the iPad when I couldn't watch them on my android.

Let's Talk iTunes

I asked around.  Apparently it's near impossible to get content to the device without iTunes.  Sorry, kids; I will not be held hostage by a large, bloated digital rights management scheme masquerading as a content transfer app.  My ever-helpful coworkers pointed out that I could always import my already-purchased music into iTunes and transfer it to the pad.

Why?

Apple has no need to know what content I have, especially the content I did not purchase from them.  What a crock of excrement.  The privacy leakage is obscene across the entire device and there is very little available in terms of stopping it.

The same helpful coworkers told me they use Dropbox for transfer outside of iTunes.  Great... another cloud solution... Another unsafe alternative to keeping content on your own device.

One assistive friend said I `really needed to buy into the entire Apple ecosystem'.  That was by far the best quote on the topic.

If I keep the device, I will use one of the apps that functions as transport and media player.  Emailing myself docs will have to suffice.  Jailbreaking is probably in my future.


Interface

As promised and harped upon, the entire interface is a no-brainer.  I found everything and figured out a few things not noted.  My wife operated it with no difficulties.  My best friend's aging mother has no trouble with it.  The only slight niggle is the lack of a locking shift key.


Let's face it: I am not Apple's target customer, even though all of the IT professionals around me seem to have consumed the Kool Aid.  There will be no iPhone for me.  I'm not even sure how long I'll have the iPad (I prefer the android, thank you).

In Summary

I want to be as fair as possible in this evaluation, especially considering my great love for all things Apple.  Aside from small bits of frustration that one would have with any device, the iPad user interface is just fine.  The hardware is just fine.  It's just the entire Apple experience that drives me up a tree.  If you could plug this device into any computer and it would act like a storage device, there would be little to complain about.  Apple is downright linux-hostile, which needs to change.

All in all, I prefer the android.  It does what it does better, with tons more variety, control and choice available.  No surprise there.

Samsung 10 Tablet - Is There an Ice Cream Sandwich for Me?

I have written about my trials with the Samsung tablet elsewhere.  I was kind of ok with letting bygones be bygones after my last encounter with Samsung.  The tablet behaves wonderfully and I haven't had any issues worth mentioning.

My T-Mobile rep told me that Ice Cream Sandwich would be available for the tablet in short order, so I waited for the day.  When the fateful day arrived, I hit the UPDATE button, but alas, there was no update.  Two more weeks of the same led me to write to my rep and ask where the promised update was.  The response was that I had to use Kies.

Stupid me.  I figured hitting UPDATE would update the tablet, like it has in the past and like every other device I have.

Not this time, buddy.

I had heard rumblings about this Kies thing but tried to ignore them, as I was having no issues at all.  The first thing I found out was that Kies only works on Windows and Macs: my two least-favorite operating systems.  Not a linux version to be found.  Not that we haven't tried; the Samsung site is chock full of people politely requesting a linux version of the software.

I figured maybe we linux folks don't need Kies, especially after reading the blurbs.  I really don't want to remotely manage my device, thank you very much.  I can do everything I need from the tablet itself.  Unfortunately one cannot update to Ice Cream Sandwich without it.  No one seems to know why.

Holding back disgust, I downloaded it on my work Windows 7 machine.   Have you read the license notice?  It's positively draconian.  Samsung basically owns all of your data, your preferences, and title to your home.  If I wanted a device that phones home, I would have bought an iDevice.

Firing up the software, I plugged in the tablet and noticed that Windows failed to load the driver.  Beautiful.... what a way to start the upgrade!  I tried again and failed again.  The third time was the charm.  Kies then indicated it was making the connection.  And continued to indicate it was connecting.  There was a round orange animated graphic that kept spinning, indicating that it was either working or simply that the graphic designer could make things spin.  And so it went, never actually connecting.

After putzing about with it for a few more minutes (it's tough when you have the attention span of a gnat) I gave up.   Later I went home, booted my laptop into Windows and tried there.  With precisely the same result.

If nothing else, Kies is consistent.

Again the tablet went away for a few days, as I was too busy to bother fighting with it.   Today I got brave and decided to try again.  I uninstalled Kies, reinstalled Kies, uninstalled the drivers, reinstalled the drivers, prayed to various and sundry deities and even brought up the page of the Flying Spaghetti Monster (see links).  Of course it failed miserably.

About to give up hope, I decided to work through the pain and fear and call Samsung.  It was a tossup as to whether to call Samsung or T-Mobile.  Usually the first five or six calls establish who you're supposed to be calling in the first place.  For some strange reason, I got it right - Samsung it was.

When one calls Samsung, one is presented with the typical Press Number Forty Seven phone matrix to talk to a human (or press one for Swahili).  I pressed the number for tablets and was connected in short order to a woman who seemed surprised I was calling about a tablet.  I squelched the desire to tell her that was the number I pressed and tried to behave.  It's not her fault Samsung can't get its phone menu together.

The nice lady was quite obviously reading from a script, as every question I had seemed to completely stump her.  While waiting for Windows to reboot, I asked her if she had ever tried linux.  She responded that Kies was only available for Windows and Mac.

Ok then.

I forgot to mention that the phone rep was a citizen of the US.  Or just outside of it, in Texas.  She finished up her script and very politely informed me she had to send me up to the next level of tech support.

No, really?

While on hold, I was treated to the whole Samsung really appreciates you as a customer bit, along with constant reminders that I could get tech support through the web.  Almost immediately, as in twenty minutes, the next Helpful Samsung Rep got on the line.

I'm sure you notice that whenever you get transferred from one helpful person to another, they always start by asking you for information that the previous rep already asked.

"Can I have your phone number?"

Why?  Do you suppose it changed between the last service rep and you?

Helpful Samsung Rep #2 began by asking how he could help.  Never one to miss an opportunity, I told him I wanted to get my tablet updated to Ice Cream Sandwich without benefit of that lovely Kies software, which doesn't work anyway.

He was immediately not impressed and mentioned that we needed to use Kies.  I countered by asking him for the executable and I'd get it to the tablet myself (clever fool that I am).  He simply insisted on Kies.

Realizing that I wasn't going to get anywhere by asking outside of the box, I let him drive.  We did the whole thing about uninstalling and reinstalling Kies, making sure the version was the latest; uninstalling and reinstalling the Windows drivers and of course, rebooting Windows.

I hate Windows.  No, really.  Every time I use it, I hate it more and for a different and better reason.  Windows turns out to be a very welcoming operating system, and I say this because when Windows boots up, the Welcome screen stays up for quite a while.  I feel very welcome whenever I reboot (which is way too frequently).

So we went through the entire Level Two Script for no apparent reason other than as an exercise.  Finally the genuinely helpful fellow said he had seen this before and I had two choices: try resetting the tablet or ship it to Samsung and they'd update it.

I wanted to make sure I understood what the rep was offering in the way of assistance.  I listed out and expanded upon his suggestions.

1. Reset the device: meaning I would delete all of the information and customizations I have on it.  With no actual guarantee that the device would upgrade.
2. Ship it to Samsung (again): meaning they would delete all of the information and customizations I have on it.  But they'd guarantee Ice Cream Sandwich would be there.

As it turned out, I correctly understood his offer.    I told him that neither of the suggestions was acceptable, at which point his typing increased speed and volume in the background.  He informed me that this was pretty much it.

Yay, Samsung!

I tried valiantly to understand the process.  The reason for Kies seemed to be that the update file was too large to get to the tablet via 4g.  I suggested that if he could tell me where to get the update, I would be happy to transfer it to the tablet myself.  He insisted that there was no update file.

If there is no update file, what does Kies download from the internet and transfer to the tablet?

The tablet indicates it is connected via MTP, media transfer protocol regardless of what Kies says.  I can get MTP working under linux so it shouldn't be a big deal to transfer the file (not to mention FTP and several other transfer protocols).

Either Kies does something with which I am not familiar or no one thus far understands what's happening.

I'm guessing the latter.

Friends don't let friends use iDevices.  Don't be an iHole.

I hate Apple.  I hate Apple products.  Even more than I hate Windows.  I have nothing against anyone else using iDevices: I just won't use them.

I have used android devices since the first Droid phone: I am a huge android supporter.  But I have to say that these kinds of experiences are precisely the kind of experiences that drive people to The Dark Side.  I don't want to go to The Dark Side.  I can't become an iHole.  I am the lone android tablet holdout at work for precisely this reason.  Everyone else has an iPad: even people with android phones.

SO....

I have gone to some forums for help as well as sending my T-Mobile rep a little love note.  I suppose I could root the tablet and install ICS that way but I really wanted to perform the update the normal way first (for once).

Stay tuned.  Hopefully something will emerge in the way of assistance.

Heaven knows it's not going to come from Samsung.



UPDATE

I finally gave up, backed up, and reset the device.  It attached immediately to the pc and Kies and told me I had an update.  It was all over but the shouting.  The shouting actually took place while trying to locate my Samsung information.  I tried the bloody website but every time I told it to email me my password, it told me the email address (which I typed twice to confirm) was incorrect.

Samsung is developmentally delayed.

I have an Ice Cream Sandwich device now.  The first thing I did was to disable the apps that annoy me (most of them).  Then I discovered the backup I made with RER Backup refused to restore.

It's been a long and painful experience.  Nothing has gone smoothly.

I will report on ICS as I mess with it.

Brand New from Apple!

Get it now - iCancer.

Steve has it - why shouldn't you?

Apple is stepping up production on an emergency basis - they don't know if they'll be able to fulfill all the expected orders for iCancer.

[Photo of hordes of the faithful, lined up in Apple Position (supplication, wallet outstretched)]

The executive board of Apple met last night to decide when to offer iCancer: now or later.  Stock is expected to go through the roof if anything unfortunate should happen to Steve.

All over the country, CEO's are scrambling to get iCancer.  Special dispensation has been granted to allow an early preview for Bill Gates.

Purchase iCancer through the Apple Software Store (as if you could get it anywhere else).  Remember - any other form of cancer isn't iCancer.
DRM is checked via DNA.
Directly from His pancreas to yours!
Get all sorts of skins!

Don't forget iCancer Portable - now for iPhones and iPads.
iCancer available on iPad Touch only with $250 iMelanoma upgrade.

Remember - if you don't have an iPhone, you don't have iCancer.

Warning: do not use iCancer in high radiation areas or near medical testing facilities.  If iCancer lasts more than four hours, consult a physician.  Do not fold, spindle, or duplicate without the express written consent of Steve Ballmer.  If your iDevice survives iCancer, you will be charged full price for another copy.  Has anybody seen the bridge?

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Best wishes to Steve Jobs on his health.

Security: Sony, Apple and Android

It's been a hell of a week for security.  When I say this, I mean in the news.  The mess continues whether or not there are articles.

iSpy

Security researchers discovered a file on the iPhone that stored location information.  Apple claims they aren't tracking their users, which is odd, as there is all sorts of location information in that file.

The beast himself, Steve Jobs, admitted that Apple `made some mistakes in how it handled location information', but it wasn't tracking its users.  The file appears on both the iPhone and the iPad.

Mr. Jobs states that this was a bug and that a fix is forthcoming.  The fix will keep the location cache to seven days.  It will also fix the `bug' that didn't allow users to turn off location tracking.

If I were an iDevice user, I'd be asking myself how a file with a year's worth of locations is a mistake.  And why does the `fix' keep seven days' worth of the user's locations on the phone?

Googled

Not to be outdone, Google mentioned that they too keep location infomation (i.e. track their Android users).

Now let's face it, folks... it's a safe bet that we're being tracked.  Only the reasons change.  Leaving privacy aside for a moment (like the NSA), your location is very valuable to advertisers.  All of this data is going into databases to allow more targeted advertisements to be served to you.  Surprised?  You shouldn't be.

Imagine driving by a store and having an ad for that store appear on your phone.  It's an advertiser's wet dream.  Mobile advertising could be a $2.5 billion industry as of 2015.

As the last shreds of privacy have leaked from your phone.


In the interest of disclosure, I own an original Droid and I am not happy with this news, although it comes as no surprise.

Sony Baloney

Sony admitted that a hacker has obtained the personal information of PlayStation Network account holders.  In other words, the hacker now has your credit card number and personal data that you gave to Sony for safe-keeping.  And it took Sony a week to report the break-in.

As a result, the entire network has been down since April 20, while Sony does forensics and rebuilds.

Sony has suggested that people review credit card statements for fraudulent charges.  Allow me to go one step further: if you have an account with Sony, call your card issuer and ask them what to do.

Is This a Handbasket?

Why yes it is!

Technology is a wonderful thing but each advance comes with the near guarantee that it can be used against you.  While you're reading this, Blogger has put your IP address, country of origin, browser and operating system into the stats for this blog.

Don't tell me you don't care.... that's as invalid as the argument that you allow the search of your property because you have nothing to hide.

I'm not for a single person being tracked or hacked but I think the wide press coverage of these three announcements can be used for good.  People are too trusting (some would say too stupid), even after all we've read and been through.  We need to wake up and realize that:

• nothing is free
• we will be sold to, regardless of platform
• we will be tracked, by advertisers and our government
• companies need to answer for this behavior
• we need to ask the hard questions before spending our money

I really want to hear your comments on this.  I also want to leave you with a question:

What about OnStar and other in-car wireless products?