Category: software

  • Using an iPhone 4S without iTunes – ever!

    For reasons that shall be dealt with later, I’m the owner of a new iPhone 4S. Having had more than my fill of iTunes annoyances, delays and freezes, I’m trying to go without ever syncing my new iPhone to my Mac. In the first few days, it’s mostly gone smoothly. Email/Contacts/Calendars I’m using both Apple’s…

  • Lion upgrade today? No way

    Over on my commentary blog, The Orange View, I’m laying out the case to wait on installing the Mac OS X 10.7 Lion upgrade for a couple of days to let the bugs out: Lions eat guinea pigs for breakfast. Don’t be one. It’s the same solid advice I gave in one of my very first…

  • The iPad as digital library and other lessons of the first year

    Well, we’ve been very satisfied iPad owners for just over a year now so it’s a good time to look back and review. My intention is to dig a lot deeper than the usual gadget reviews and give a sense of what it’s like to have an iPad day in and day out for a…

  • Android reinstall not as easy as can be

    In the midst of a very fun evening in New York City the other day, I dropped my Nexus S in a cab and lost it forever. After a bit of research and due consideration, I decided to replace it with an identical model. The upcoming Android phones don’t have anything on the Nexus S…

  • Amazon’s cloud drive pricier than Google but cheaper than others

    Amazon announced a cool new service, or combination of services, really. The new cloud drive stores your stuff in an easy-to-access online “locker.” A related cloud music player lets you upload and download music to the locker as well as live stream any songs you’ve already uploaded. Streaming is limited to web browsers on computers…

  • Review: BitBop offers dream of great video on Android someday

    Have I mentioned there are a dearth of options for watching TV shows and movies on Android devices? Yeah? Well, while we wait for the possible arrival of Netflix and Hulu Plus for Android, I’m just trying out a new offering called BitBop on my T-Mobile Nexus S. It’s very early days yet but it…

  • Rock, paper scissors: Should I get a Kindle, iPad or MacBook?

    Well, we’ve been Amazon Kindle owners for almost four years now at our house, we’ve had Apple’s iPad for almost a year and we’ve had Mac laptops since too long ago to remember. So we’re getting asked a lot now: Should I buy an iPad or a Kindle? Can I use an iPad instead of…

  • Chrome browser, Pinboard site lead the list of recent changes

    Spent some time housekeeping on the blog tonight, including updating the software and services in use page. Google’s Chrome browser, version 10, has replaced an increasingly buggy Firefox. I am really digging the way extensions have their own little button row. I’ve also noted that I had to dump Mozy for Crashplan last month after…

  • Review: Subtle but useful improvements in WordPress 3.1

    WordPress kicked out the latest upgrade to its popular blogging platform software this week and I upgraded GravitationalPull.net yesterday. So far the improvements are subtle and useful. Almost as important, nothing appears broken, particularly among the dozen or so plug-ins I have installed. WordPress posted a complete list of all the new features and tweaks here.…

  • Getting iTunes to sync standard def videos to your iPad

    We’re big fans of the recent PBS Masterpiece series Downton Abbey and bought the high-definition version from iTunes to watch on the big TV that is connected to our Mac mini media server. But when my wife asked me to load the series onto her iPad recently, I ran into an annoying syncing problem based…