Two:Thirty AM

It has often been said that Apple hardware is a thing of beauty, and I have to agree. Just look at this Apple Xserve RAID array, stunning!

Aperture: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/125
ISO: 200
Focal Length: 35
Camera Body: Nikon D40
Camera Lens: Nikon 18-55

Time to get all conspiracy theory on you! This may be way out in left field, but I am just shooting from the hip here and telling you what it looks like to me on the surface.

It seemed to take forever but a couple weeks ago we finally got Skype for the iPhone! Sure it took longer than it should have but what on the iPhone doesn’t? Well, after the first install, we came up against the app crashing upon starting, consistently. Well long story short, it turned out to be some kind of incompatibility with Jailbroken iPhones and MobileSubstrate. So we were back up and running just fine after a MobileSubstrate update. So it was MobileSubstrate? Well no, take a look at the lengthly article by Saurik on the matter.

So fast forward to today, a new Skype app update, cool, so I install it. Upon launching the app, I get the following message “This version of Skype is only supported on unmodified iPhone OS 2.2″ which you can see in the screen shot.

Bottom line, what is this app doing that no other app is?
Why is this particular app so different in the way it works?
Do they not work with the same SDK that everyone else does?

I really hope this turns out to be no big deal and I have blown it way out of proportion to be honest.

With all the talk of actions being taken to make Jailbreaking “illegal” and so forth, I don’t want this app to turn into a fact finding mission for Apple/AT&T to begin shutting off service for iPhone users that are “breaking the rules”.

Comment below, tell me I am over reacting…please :)

(the app seems to work ok, but is this the beginning? Because obviously if you have Jailbroken your phone, you know that you are not going to get technical support on anything)

This week’s photo comes from our Mexico trip as well. This was from the day we went out to look at some California Gray Whales. It was a fantastic trip, and we saw a pretty good amount of whales. :)

Click the image to see larger

Here is a link to the whole trip gallery. Mexico Trip Feb2009 – Whale Watching

Aperture: f/7.1
Shutter Speed: 1/800
ISO: 200
Focal Length: 85mm
Camera Body: Nikon D40
Camera Lens: Nikon 55-200

To continue with the “Concept Corner” series, this week we have a short write up about car tail lights. What about them? Well, an idea I had a while back to help with traffic flow and safety.

Living in California, I see horrible, horrible, HORRIBLE drivers everyday. Because of this, I am always looking for ways to make driving safer for those of us that can handle driving a car. This idea is actually rather simple, but could prove to be rather useful.

As I am sure you all know, when you are driving you have generally have two states that you are in: accelerating or braking. When you are accelerating you have no means of letting others know you are doing this other than the fact that they can see you moving. On the other hand, when you are braking, you have brake lights on the back of your car to indicate your action. This means that from the other driver’s point of view there is effectively no difference in what they see when you are accelerating, maintaining speed or have taken your foot off the accelerator and are coasting.

This is where yellow brake lights come into play. This would be another 1 or 2 indicator lights in the back (perhaps side markers as well) of you car that would illuminate when you are neither breaking nor accelerating but simply coasting. This would give other drivers insight into what your actions are most probably going to be. If you take your foot off the accelerator pedal in your car, you are most likely trying to slow down or are getting ready to apply the brakes. This yellow light would give the other drivers around you the opportunity to react accordingly.

I realize that in order for a system like this to work, we need to have an educated and intelligent populous when it comes to driving. This unfortunately doesn’t seem to be the case around here. People around here seem to have the idea that you are either pressing the accelerator or the brake; there is no in between. If only people understood the concept of throttle control..

I would love to work out a prototype of this system and do some real world testing. Unfortunately, due to cost and the vehicle code laws, I don’t think I can make that happen at this time. But, as always, feel free to contact me if you are someone that feels there is something to this, and we can work on getting it pushed forward. Of course, if you feel the opposite I would love to hear your feedback as well.

With the recent launch of the Amazon Kindle 2, the eBook reader market is a hot topic once again. I have been interested in the technology behind eBook readers and e-ink for a while. The offers have been pretty slim in years past, however. I was at Fry’s Electronics the other day and happened to pass by what was now an “eBook reader section”, so I stopped and looked. Now, they of course did not have a Kindle to play with since you can only get it through Amazon, but they did have several others. They had three that utilized e-ink technology; 2 Sony, and an Astak EZ Reader. For the most part they were the same, and unfortunately that means they all have the same screen flicker that comes with the territory when you are using current e-ink technology. The fourth unit they had was a Jetbook from ECTACO. This unit was different in that it didn’t use e-ink, but rather a VGA monochrome reflective-type TFT LCD. This screen is very easy on the eyes and does not suffer from the same screen flicker “problem”.

Overall I really enjoyed the unit, it was very portable and easy to carry. Had a quick power on time and was comfortable to hold. For page turning, you can use the 2 page turn buttons on the bottom face of the unit, or a thumb slider on the left hand side of the unit. Both worked quite well. After the first few days I was sold on the unit, until, yes unfortunately there is an until, I looked at a PDF book. Up until that time I was reading a .txt text eBook. With text files, the page flips were instant, very clear and fit the screen perfectly. Now, when you move to PDF books, it’s a whole different game. PDFs don’t fit the screen very well, and unfortunately the page flips take considerably longer, making it just about as uncomfortable as the e-ink flicker.

Finally, price. With the Kindle coming in at a hefty $359, the Jetbook is cheap at only $199. However, with the limited number of book formats it works with, and the inability to display PDF eBooks as well as .txt files, it makes it still too pricey for what you get. If this unit was $99, it would probably be worth keeping for text files.

For now it looks like I am back to Stanza and my iPhone for eBook reading, at least until the Kindle (or other models) fix the e-ink flicker and page change delay. It’s coming soon though, I can feel it!