thegeekchannel.com

Apple Releases iPhone SDK and Announces Enterprise Tools

geek — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 18:53:27 +0000

Today is that day that many of you have been waiting for. The official release of Apple’s iPhone Software Development Kit (SDK) and the added announcement that Apple is very serious about getting into the corporate world. Nothing terribly new, but some bonus because now you’ll be able to integrate with Exchange, including push email, push calendar, and push contacts. The iPhone will support global address books, Cisco VPN, certificates and identities. Perhaps the most entertaining is that Apple will now offer remote wipe, so you can lose all your stuff at the IT department’s whim.

~Geek

P.S. Apple still says Flash sucks and they’re too good for Adobe. Sorry.

Sharper Image Files Bankruptcy

geek — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:28:05 +0000

I’m not sure why companies like The Sharper Image and Brookstone ever got into the business of rebranding technology with their name or why they would think that the average consumer would assume quality from their name, but I suspect they’re reconsidering those thoughts as BusinessWeek is reporting that The Sharper Image has filed for bankruptcy protection and is planning on shuttering 90 of their 184 stores.

Sign of the times - hard retail market - or destiny? I’ll let you decide. Personally I think that gadget gifts are better received when they have a recognizable name, and if it weren’t for the success of Osim and their acquisition attempts for Brookstone, I believe that they wouldn’t be far behind. Unfortunately, with both of these gadget companies changing, companies like Best Buy are bound to become “more popular” which means that the consumer will have fewer choices for whatever tech gadget they choose to buy.

~geek

The End of HD-DVD is Near

geek — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 16:59:18 +0000

I should have known it would never last, but I was very optimistic when I purchased an HD-DVD player from Wal-Mart last year for the outstanding price of $99.99. I justified it by saying “Microsoft is behind this,” and thinking that worst case I could play regular DVDs on it, too. Unfortunately, I believe that the final nail has been placed against the pine top of HD-DVD’s coffin.

Wal-Mart has officially announced that they will no longer stock or sell HD-DVD media by June. Their HD offering will continue to support the increasingly popular Blu-Ray, and they’re not alone. Netflix and Best Buy are also pulling HD-DVD from their offering, effectively ending any chance the format had of success. So, if the consumer hasn’t spoken, the retailers have. They’ve picked their format and like it or not the consumer is going to have to suffer the consequences.

As always, I would love to know your thoughts.

~geek

Windows Live OneCare - Beta 2 - Finally Removed

geek — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 01:20:39 +0000

For those of you that haven’t heard the news, or braved the beta program, Microsoft’s Live OneCare beta 2 program is about done. After a variety of different frustrations - even when wanting Microsoft to have the single solution of OS and security - I have removed OneCare and resolved to go back to a combination of security tools that are less integrated and, in my opinion, work better. Whether they protect my system better or not is almost irrelevant - it’s making sure that my system feel buggy that is most important to me. OneCare didn’t offer that; with all the alerts I felt as though it was doing too little and I was doing too much.

One of the problems that I encountered during the removal had to do with the OneCare backup files. I couldn’t, by default in Windows Vista, remove them. I tried a variety of different things before stumbling on Laurent Duveau’s very elegant fix. Needless to say, it worked first time for me.

Problem: You reinstalled Live OneCare, or you start using v2 beta, and want to delete your old backup folder, but you can’t.

This is a permission problem, that maybe you can solve with cacls with command line:

cacls “:\” /t /g administrators:F

Sample:
cacls “F:\Windows OneCare Backup\YourComputerName” /t /g administrators:F
Do NOT put a \ at the end of the path.

You’ll get a message “Are you sure(Y/N)?”

This will strip the permissions from the folder and you should be able to delete it.

Will iPhone 1.1.3 Support Copy and Paste?

geek — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 23:19:50 +0000

CTRL-C and CTRL-V have been around for a long time now - years in fact - and I believe that people have become accustomed to being able to take a piece of information that they’ve already entered and put it somewhere else without having to re-enter text. From an input tool like that of the iPhone, this is a no-brainer, and I can’t believe that it’s not there already. Hopefully the rumors will come true and Apple iPhone users will be copying and pasting happily sometime in the near future.

~geek

Is AppleTV the Worst Tech Product of 2007?

geek — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 23:15:34 +0000

Is AppleTV the worst product of 2007? My opinion - yes and no. Yes, I think that the implementation is very un-Apple, because it’s not unique enough to compel Apple devotees to purchase one. After all, most of these users already have a TiVo (or equivalent) and aren’t going to buy something just to watch iTunes content. MTV, for the most part, already covers much of that market.

On the other hand, I think that there is promise here if Apple can get past where they are today and add content for television with the same success that they’ve managed to get musical content. Imagine, if you will, you could go to AppleTV and buy first-run movies electronically instead of on DVD. Perhaps, because you’re purchasing digital content you can even burn that out to a DVD and have the best of both worlds? I believe that people are going this way and that some company will win the battle. Perhaps it’s not too late for Apple, but they need to get moving and promoting with the same passion that they do their other products.

~geek

Windows Home Server Corrupts Files

geek — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 22:58:42 +0000

In what may prove to be one of the biggest snafus in recent years, ComputerWorld is reporting and TheGeekChannel.com has confirmed that Microsoft is warning Windows Home Server users that the new idiot-proof software that Microsoft marketed to be the answer for people wanting to easily share their files is now corrupting those same files.

Article ID	:	946676
Last Review	:	December 20, 2007
Revision	:	1.1

I’m sure that this proved to be a very exciting Christmas bonus for the early adopters, with the only good news being that you might not know what you spent because Quicken, Money and Outlook are on the list of products likely to experience corruption when edited on the Microsoft Home Server share.

~geek

Apple and ThinkSecret.com Settle Their Lawsuit

geek — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 20:12:41 +0000

Chalk another one up for the Apple legal team. A press release was issued from Nick Ciarelli, Think Secret’s publisher today. It read as follows:

December 20, 2007 - PRESS RELEASE: Apple and Think Secret have settled their lawsuit, reaching an agreement that results in a positive solution for both sides. As part of the confidential settlement, no sources were revealed and Think Secret will no longer be published. Nick Ciarelli, Think Secret’s publisher, said “I’m pleased to have reached this amicable settlement, and will now be able to move forward with my college studies and broader journalistic pursuits.”

My thoughts are pretty simple - someone gave him some information that they shouldn’t have and pissed off Apple. He lost. Too bad, so sad.

Geek

B&O Enters Aston Martin

geek — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 01:06:57 +0000

Aston Martin and Bang & Olufsen have announced a “creative and strategic partnership” that is set on revolutionizing luxury automobiles. The press release states that designers, engineers and specialists from both companies will be working closely together in the future.

This could mean a variety of things, but I suspect what it means is that B&O will be putting their sound technology and aesthetics into the Aston Martin product line. Not sure how I feel about this, but it will be be very interesting as both companies are already well known for their high-priced eye-candy. And, of course, if they would like me to demo and review any of their products, I would be more than happy to do so.

~geek

Verizon Gets Palm Treo 755P (Finally)

geek — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 01:00:29 +0000

I will admit to being a fan of Palm. Despite everything, I want them to succeed, because I think that they were ten years ahead of everyone else in their thinking. Unfortunately, I also believe that they’re now years behind the competition and that sticking to their form-factor has limited their success in some senses because they haven’t gone away from the style that made them successful in the beginning. Changing the color just wasn’t enough for most die-hard techies.

On the plus for them, though, Verizon is now carrying and marketing their 755P smartphone that will allow Verizon users to get their fix of this now aged phone. Thanks, but no thanks. Too little, too late in my mind.

~geek