The Irony Is Lost on Verizon
Writing for the Verizon-owned SugarString “news” site, Nick Douglas begins:
Hungary’s parliament is considering a bill that would impose a tax on internet use, a hefty 150 forints (US $0.62) per gigabyte. And the internet is pissed.
and concludes:
An internet traffic tax is an innovation tax, and any such tax, no matter how small, would be philosophically devastating.
I totally agree. My issue comes from the fact that Douglas rails against the constantly increasing price of internet access while collecting a paycheck from the biggest culprit of arbitrary internet price increases in the US. I’m surprised they didn’t ban this story, too.
Apple September Event
Regarding tomorrow’s Apple event at the Flint Center in Cupertino…
Well, I’ve put it off yet again. In about 12 hours, all will be revealed.
The Short Version:
What We Know
- Nothing.
What We Expect
- New iPhone(s) 6 revealed.
- iOS 8 ship date
- OSX Yosemite ship date
- HealthKit demos
- HomeKit demos
What We Kinda Suspect
- 2 iPhone sizes, 4.7" and 5.5"
- iOS will ship tomorrow, Yosemite will ship next month
- Some sort of wearable “iWatch” will be announced, but not released until much later.
- A new NFC-based payment system using the wearable as the second-factor authenticator.
My Abbreviated Thoughts
I’d like to go on for a few thousand words about what I think, but there are a few reasons why I don’t.
- I have a real jobby-job now and can’t spend hours blogging.
- Most of what I think, other people have already written about. (see links below)
- I’m regularly wrong about a lot of this stuff because I predict what I want, not what people want.
- Now that I live on the west coast, when I blog after work, most of the country is already in bed, so they won’t see this anyway.
So, here is the long version of the short version.
iPhone 6
All signs point to two phones being released. There will apparently be a 4.7″ and a 5.5″. Recent talks have predicted that the 5.5″ will have a landscape split-screen view. If a 5.5″ iPhone with iPad-like app behavior happens, I may have bought my last iPad mini.
iOS 8
The beta has been very stable. I see no reason not to release it this week. The new phones will obviously ship with iOS 8, so we’re within 10 days anyway.
HomeKit
This is what I’m most excited about. I have a terrible addiction to home automation, and would love to get it all in one place under one app. I believe that giant white building Apple built outside the Flint Center is a “home” they set up as part of their demo area. If his iWatch thing is a thing, I would love to control things like that. I already control my Hue lights through my Pebble watch. It’s a little hacky, but it works and makes me smile every time I turn the living room lights off from bed.
Mobile Payments
I know what you’re thinking. “iCloud was just hacked, putting hundreds of celebrity nudie-pics online!”. Let’s get this straight. THAT’S NOT TRUE. Dozens of celebrities use shitty passwords and someone guessed the passwords. Nothing was hacked, people were stupid.
Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk payments. Apple has 800 MILLION credit cards on file. That’s a lot. If rumors pan out, Apple has made deals with credit card companies and big retailers for tap-to-pay systems using iTunes payment accounts and tokenized security.
Tokenized security means each transaction transmits a unique code. Basically, every time you make a purchase, you use a different account number. This way, even if a hacker gets your account number in transit, it won’t matter. That account number is only good for one transaction, it’s already been used.
With an iWearable, a modern iPhone, or both, there is built in security. You will be able to set it up so that tapping your wearable on the payment pad only works if your phone is there. If using your phone, you can hook it into TouchID, so it will only work with your fingerprint. Security is built in to iOS, despite the publicity that certain breaches get.
Hopes and Dreams
Pretty simple, really. Give me a big iPhone, and a wearable that works with it. Give the iPhone an iPad-like 2 pane view. Not two apps, but a two pane view of a single app, a sidebar and a main view. I don’t care about NFC, as long as there is some sort of payment system. The wearable should have the typical activity trackers, tell me what time it is, show me notifications, and have basic control over basic functions of the phone.
I really hope there is some really earth-shattering news. I want to be blown away by something nobody ever predicted.
We’ll find out in a few hours.
Smarter People’s Thoughts
It's real flat out here.
This has been our view for about 7 hours. It’s real flat out here. #LittleTravels #NYtoLA @carlybracco @TheBugDog
The Obligatory pre-WWDC Prognostication
What We Know
We know (based on posted pictures) that Apple will announce iOS 8 and the next version of OSX. (That’s OS Ten, not OS “X”, people. Let’s get it right this year.) Since 8 comes after 7, that makes sense. So does version 10.10 of OSX, since the last version was 10.9. Math nerds get upset at that, because 10.10 is not a real decimal. But 10.10 isn’t a decimal, it’s a version number, so shut up about it already. I get mad at it because I have to say “oh ess ten ten dot ten” over and over again.
And, that’s all we know. And I am happy about that. Apple announcements are an exciting time for nerds and geeks. We wait months to see Apple (and other companies, for that matter) walk out on stage to show us what’s coming down the pipe in the near future. It’s fun to watch, and when too much information leaks early, it takes the wind out of the sails. This WWDC is still pretty much up in the air.
Software
iOS 8 has some rumored changes. It won’t be a big visual overhaul like 7 was, but there will be some new consumer features, new developer APIs (for Healthbook, CarPlay, iCloud, etc.), and maybe a couple of new stock apps.
Healthbook
Healthbook is rumored to be similar to Passbook. It will aggregate data from different sensors and apps into one place, much like Passbook does with loyalty cards, airline tickets, and Starbucks. It seems these are both the baby steps to a bigger thing Apple is working on. Passbook is step one in mobile payments. Apple is obviously getting people used to paying with a phone, and will expand that service in the coming years. Healthbook is step one in Apple’s wearables strategy. Healthbook now, then come this fall you’ll be buying a health sensor band to go along with it.
Siri, what song is this?
Shazam has partnered with Apple, and it’s pretty obvious that it will be used with Siri.
Maps
Maps get better all the time. I haven’t had any of the problems that plagued the app in the beginning in quite a while. Apple has bought HopStop, Embark, and BroadMap in the last year so in-app transit directions are almost guaranteed. And very welcome for us city dwellers.
iCloud Improvements
Have you ever saved a PDF on iCloud in Preview on your Mac and wanted to view it on your iPad? You can’t. Same goes for simple text documents in TextEdit. I am a plain text fiend. I use NVAlt and several iOS apps through Dropbox to keep it all straight. If I could do it through TextEdit, I’d be much happier. I try to keep things simple and use as few apps as possible. These would both be a big win.
OSX 10.10
The banners reveal El Capitain, which is in Yosemite National Park in California. Best guesses indicate the next Mavericks will be called Yosemite. Because spelling Mavericks was too easy. Changes are said to include minor performance and battery improvements, AirDrop between iOS and OSX (finally!), and a more iOS7 aesthetic. I don’t see them going all flat and white and Helvetica Neue on everything, but expect some changes.
Mockups of some of the leaked information are all over the web, but none of them really jibe with each other, so it’s anyone’s guess as to what it will look like. Safe money says more transparent overlays, less grey linen, and flatter icons. Anything else is a wild guess.
Last Minute Addition!
This one really gets my motor revved. iMore, among others, have recently said that Apple is working on a Made for iPhone/iPad/iPod (MFi) style certification system for home automation.
I love home automation. I have Z-Wave switches all over my apartment. I use iPads and Kindle Fires as touch screen controllers. I have Hue lights, and I use the heck out of IFTTT to trigger things. I have a Vera that controls my lights, and a infrared to ethernet adapter that makes my WiFi things talk to my stereo, TiVo, and everything else. I also have a dozen or so apps in a folder that control all this stuff in wildly different ways. The TiVo App simulates the actual TiVo remote, the Vera App is a page of switches and sliders, the Onkyo App is just horrible in every way. The Hue App is great, but works differently than expected sometimes.
Enter Apple. If this Home Automation convergence is really going to happen, it has to be easy for normal people. Most people won’t mess with a dozen apps to watch a movie.
Imagine if the AppleTV gets a software update to be the controller for the home. Now, when I choose a movie on the AppleTV, it knows to turn down the lights. If I tap a “Leaving Home” button on my phone, the phone can talk to each individual app and turn off the lights, lock the door, set the alarm, and turn on the security camera. Your phone is with you always, so it could do this automatically when you leave home, based on location services. I do a lot of this already with IFTTT, but it’s fiddly. People don’t like fiddly.
I’m all for this. It’s not a “you need an iPhone to operate your house” kind of thing, it’s a “if you have an iPhone, operating your house is better” kind of thing. Hue, Vera, Samsung, and all the rest will still have Android and Windows Phone apps, but the iOS apps will just be better and work together.
Hardware?
WWDC is the Developer Conference. It’s to show developers what new software they will be working with for the coming year. Apple has released new hardware at these events before, but it’s never expected.
Bigger iPhones
Many bloggers are posting pictures of parts from the next iPhone. Yes, it’s coming, it’s bigger, and it will probably be called the iPhone 6. Duh.
It won’t be released at WWDC. There will probably be hints, like Apple encouraging developers to design for more varied screen sizes and resolutions, but a real hardware announcement for the phone is a non-starter.
iPad Pro
See above. Rumors of a 12″ iPad have been circulating, but don’t expect anything concrete here, other than references to variable screen sizes. Bonus points: The rumored split screen apps for the iPad is said to be a no-go right now. If the iPad Pro is a thing, expect split screen apps to be added to 8.1 or 8.2 in the fall when the new iPads are announced. It will be an additional feature for new hardware, much like the M7 chip in the iPhone 5S and iOS 7.2.
12″ Retina MacBook Air
I could see this happening. Many developers code on an Air. I use an 11″ Air as my daily computer. The 12″ is said to be more like a mini 13″ MacBook Pro. More blocky and less tapered. They’ll need the extra volume to fit in more battery for the screen, I’d guess. Apple recently lowered the price of the MacBook Airs $100, so this would leave room in the pricing structure for a new model. And retina screens are so pretty.
Retina Thunderbolt Display
The old thunderbolt display needs an update. It’s currently thicker than an iMac. While a Retina/4K Thunderbolt Display would be awesome, Apple currently only sells 2 computers that can run it, the 15″ Retina MacBook Pro with discreet graphics card, and the Mac Pro. It’s a maybe, but a low-volume seller to be sure.
iWatch
While I would love to see it announced, I find it unlikely. Something this anticipated by nerds would probably get it’s own hardware event, or be bundled into a hardware event with other new stuff. That being said, a wearable of some sort would need developer support, and Apple currently sells nothing like this. Announcing it now for a fall release makes sense. It would give developers time to get apps ready for day one, and Apple would be losing any sales by pre-announcing a product they don’t have an older version of.
Pie In The Sky Thoughts and Wishes.
Inter App Communication
We need this. Say I have a text document, which as I’ve already pointed out, I have several. I see that document in my DropBox App, and tap the “Open In” button to open it in Byword. It works fine. I edit the document, but need to preview the Markdown syntax in a code editor. So, I tap “Open In” in Byword, and open the document in Diet Coda. It works, and I happily see my color-coded brilliance and send it off to Editorial, which is a text editor that runs simple code. All is well and good, except now I have a copy of that document in Dropbox, Byword, Diet Coda, and Editorial. This is an extreme example, but it happens. Well, not to me, I’d just do everything in Editorial, but that’s for a different day. Take a photo, import it into a photo editor, then slide it over to an app that will put meme-text on it, then publish to Instagram. Four copies of that picture are now in four different apps. It happens all the time.
iOS needs a “Send to” command, not an “Open in”. Select a picture, send to iPhoto, then send to Meme Gen, then send to Instagram. When it leaves one app, it’s gone. Same with documents. If I open a Pages document in Word, close it in Pages. I don’t need both versions. Android and Windows Phone both do this to varying degrees of success, and Apple can do it better.
Choose Default Apps
We need a simple screen in Settings to choose default apps. I use Mailbox for email. I use Camera+ for most of my pictures. I use the Safari web browser. I like CoBook for my contacts. Some like gMail, the stock Camera, and Chrome. Certain apps should have user-defined defaults. Bury a screen in Settings to set default browsers, email clients, text editors, cameras, and online storage providers. It won’t add complexity to novice users, because they will never change the settings. Advanced users can choose to open links in a different browser, or have a Mailbox sheet pop up instead of the default Mail.app sheet when composing an email within an app. It’s easy, and developers would have to support it per app. Mailbox would have to create a popover sheet for composing a message within another app, but it wouldn’t be an undue burden, and could be a marketing advantage.
More iCloud Storage
We need to get more iCloud storage. I can buy a 64GB iPhone and a 128GB iPad. Then, I can buy up to 50 GB of iCloud storage for backup. I can’t even do a full backup of my phone. I know, I know. You don’t back up EVERYTHING. Apps, music, and movies can be re-downloaded from iTunes. But what if I have several gigs of video and picures in my Camera Roll? What if I have 200 Keynote presentations? What if my workgroup uses iWork to collaborate on multi-gig projects? I need to be able to have enough storage to handle that if Apple wants me to use iCloud. Right now, stuff is all over iCloud, Dropbox, Box, and Google Drive. Would it be so hard to say “You bought a 32GB device, so here is 32GB of storage. It costs $25 a year.” If you buy a 128GB device, you get the same deal. Apple makes money on the memory upgrades, $100 for every doubling. (an 8GB upgrade from 8GB to 16GB is $100. A 64GB upgrade from 64GB to 128GB is also $100. I don’t get it…) At least give us a cloud to go to.
Improved photo workflows
Something, ANYTHING better than Photo Stream, please. Where are my pictures? On the Camera Roll, in the Photo Stream? I delete the picture from the Camera Roll, but it’s still in Photo Stream? What if I delete it from Photo Stream, will it delete it from iPhoto back home? Who knows…
Customizable Control Center
Let me choose the 4 apps in the Control Center, just like I can choose the four apps in my Dock. I never use the flashlight or the Calculator. Just let me put OmniFocus in there, PLEASE.
Notification Center
A few things: Lose the weather sentence and show me an icon and a number. That’s all anyone needs. Also, let me dismiss all notifications at once, and let me reply to messages and delete emails by swiping around Notificaion Center.
Actionable notifications
When a text pops up, let me reply. I don’t need to open Messages to do it. Same for reminders, calendar invites, Twitter messages, etc.
On board Siri
Remember Voice Control? You could open apps, play songs, and look up contacts and call people in your address book. All with the on-board processor of the iPhone 4. Here we are years later, and apparently the magic Siri cloud is necessary for these simple tasks. Move the easy stuff back on to the phone.
Why Do People Give Money To Trip Chowdhry?
From a CNBC story on March 20, 2014:
“They only have 60 days left to either come up with something or they will disappear,” said Trip Chowdhry, managing director at Global Equities Research.
Cut to 60 days later…
Chowdhry is supposed to be a financial analyst in the tech sector, but he is constantly wrong.
On a funny aside, as I was typing this post on my iPad, autocorrect changed “Chowdhry” to “chowderhead” twice. Then, it learned it was wrong and stopped.
Unlike Chowdhry.
Somebody at USPTO Should Be Fired
On March 18, 2014 the US Patent and Trademark Office officially jumped the shark.
Amazon has patented photography against a white background.
Yep. Amazon owns white now.
The application covers
a front light source aimed at a background, an image capture position located between the background and the front light source, an elevated platform positioned between the image capture position and the background, and at least one rear light source
Sound technical? Don’t worry. They provided a technical drawing.
Using Keyboard Maestro for Print Layout in Sketchup
In my “real job” as a carpenter, I use SketchUp pretty heavily to do quick and dirty drawings and 3D models to visualize complex pieces.
This is a preliminary sketch, so no judgey-wudgy there, Picasso.
I’m currently working on a playroom, and need a Tansu-inspired stair-step storage unit. That’s not the point. I draw it up in Sketchup and get something like the picture above.
The problem is, there are pretty terrible print layout options in SketchUp. You basically can set a scale, then print what’s in the window. So, I always have to resize the window to be about the size of a sheet of paper in order to get the right proportions.
What do I do when I have to do something more than once or twice?
Automate it!
For this, I use the ever-more-useful-to-me Keyboard Maestro. It’s a Mac app that can do a metric crap load of stuff. It does keyboard shortcuts, window management, it can run AppleScripts, run multiple clipboards, and more. Actions are triggered by hotkeys, time, wifi connection, USB connect/disconnect, or just about anything else you can do to a computer.
For this fun bit, open the Keyboard Maestro editor and follow these steps:
- Make a new macro by clicking the little “+” at the bottom.
- Choose “Triggered by…” Choose This hot key
- Pick a hot key. I use ^⌥⌘L. As you can see by the screenshot, I smash those three down for all my window actions.
- Click in the dotted box that says “No Action” to get the action sheet.
- Drag “Manipulate a Window” onto the No Action Box
- In the “Scale Size By” drop down, choose Resize To.
- Fill in 1190×1050. It seems out of proportion for an 11″ x 8-½" box, but this includes the menubar and title bar. The actual drawing area will be just about letter-sized. [1]
- To limit it to SketchUp, choose SketchUp from the “in” drop down at the bottom. If SketchUp is running, it will appear in the list, if not choose from the “Other” menu.
- That’s it. It should look a little like this:
Now, smashing ^⌥⌘L resizes the Sketchup window to letter-size so I can arrange the drawing appropriately and print.
[1] Yes, this is for US letter sized paper. If you’re using A4 or legal or whatever, adjust the proportions appropriately. Also, the 1190×1050 is nice on my 27″ iMac, you may need to scale it down for your display.
Font or Typeface?
Fast Company explains it well.
Even type experts agree: Typeface and font can be used interchangeably at this point. But if you come across an annoying pedant who cares deeply about maintaining the distinction for the masses, just remember this: The difference between a font and a typeface is the same as that between songs and an album. The former makes up the latter. Remember that and you’re good to go.
Not that it matters to most people, but for us font nerds it’s important. I guess I’m one of those annoying pedants.
Hostile UX on Tech Websites, Part 1
As I tweeted earlier today, it seems that many websites are putting their advertisers in front of their users.
Literally.
I’ve started screenshotting these offenses, and then running them through Skitch and highlighting the important stuff.
Today’s winner:
Macworld on the iPad is horrendous. I like the content, being the Apple nerd that I am. But going to the actual site is a nightmare. Here’s the screenshot:
Let’s go over this together.
- The blue box, you can’t get rid of. That’s just part of the iPad UI.
- The top green box is the site header, that’s acceptable.
- The orange box is the nav bar. Again, necessary and appropriately sized for the screen.
- The Big Red Box is an ad for Tekserve. It’s a great store here in New York and I go there often. But the ad is bigger than the iPad UI, the site branding, and the site navigation COMBINED.
- The next green box is more branding. In this case, it’s a banner with the title of the series, Mac 911. This may be necessary, but instead of a generic tagline, the title of the article would be helpful here, especially given the screen size.
- Next, another Big Red Box with another ad for TekServe. In case you missed the ENTIRE MIDDLE THIRD OF THE SCREEN.
- Finally, in a small box in the lower left, you can see the top half of the graphic introducing the article about iWork. I assume it’s about iWork, because I recognize the icons in the picture. But, nowhere on the page (“above the fold” for you newspaper lovers out there), is any indication of the subject.
I get that websites have to advertise to make money. I also get that no one will read your website if they can’t actually see the content. I’d like to see the click-through numbers on the giant banner ad vs. the tasteful sidebar ad.
If THIS, then THAT
Do you internet? If you do, you should check out If This Then That. IFTTT rhymes with “lift” without the L if you ever find a need to say it out loud, which would be weird.
In a nut, IFTTT will connect all of your various disconnected internet-y things. There are currently 83 “channels” in IFTTT. A channel is basically a service. Gmail is a channel. Foursquare is a channel. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and all the usual suspects are there. So are more obscure ones like Bitly, WeMo, WiThings, iOS location, Philips Hue, and something called “Reddit”.
That’s all well and good, but you’re asking yourself “So what? What can this incredible free service do for me? Where’s my waffle?”
Here’s what I use it for…
- I have a recipe (that’s their word, not mine) that saves my FourSquare check-ins to a Google Calendar.
- If I tweet, post it to Facebook. (For me, Facebook is just the place where you can read my tweets for a glorious second time.)
- When I get close to home (using iOS Location Services with the IFTTT iPhone app), turn on my Philips Hue lights.
- If I forward a receipt to my Gmail with the word “receipt” in the subject line, it adds a line with the attached image to a Google Spreadsheet. I use this to keep track of business expenses.
- If i take a front-facing camera picture (unfortunately called a “selfie”, I hear), it moves it to a separate album on my phone.
- If a certain bit of text shows up in an RSS feed, it goes straight to Pocket.
- Photos from Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook that have me tagged get downloaded to Dropbox.
- My iOS, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter photos all get uploaded to Flickr.
Using it is easy. Just sign in to each service you want to activate, then either build a custom recipe by choosing the “this”, then choosing the “that”. If you’re a little soft on the idea, there are hundreds of pre-existing recipes to do common things. So go ahead and set it up so you get a text message every time a new video of a cat falling over gets posted on Vimeo.
I have 46 active recipes right now. I am an automation nut. If I have to do something twice, I will spend 30 minutes setting up IFTTT, Hazel, or Automator so I don’t have to do it a third time. Go check out IFTTT. They are not a sponsor, or anything. I just use the hell out of the service and I think you should, too. I’ll be posting IFTTT recipes, Hazel magic, and Automator scripts here on Nerd Stuff periodically. I can’t help you with the waffle, though. You’re on your own there.
My Ex-iPad
I have a lot of Apple stuff. Like, an unhealthy amount. I’ve owned every iPad. I’ve had two generations of iPod, an iPod mini, three generations of the Nano, a couple Shuffles, a first generation iPod Touch, and every iPhone from 2007 up to my shiny new 5S. I’ve had three iMacs (the lampshade one and two aluminums), three MacBook Pro’s, a Mac mini, and my current main machine, a 2011 MacBook Air. In my house now, between my lady and I, we have 2 iPhone 5S’s, our old iPhones (a 4 and a 4S, both unlocked), an original iPad in the kitchen, an iPad 3 that stays on the couch, and we each carry an iPad mini around. I love my mini. It’s the perfect size and weight.
Then I listened to many nerd podcasts, as I always do. All the pundits have an iPad Air to review. It’s so much thinner and lighter. It’s super fast. It’s comfortable to hold. “I can barely tell the difference between the Air and my iPad mini”, they say. “This is what the iPad should be”, they say. So, I bought the iPad Air on launch day. I was excited to move back into the world of big screens and more importantly, Retina screens.
Every time I buy a new toy, my first day is so exciting. It’s fast, pretty, and very thin. I was so happy to return to the world of big screens. I dutifully loaded all my apps and documents, then I took it on the subway on my way to work yesterday.
That day, I returned it.
Yep, me. The guy who keeps old iPads around to use as extra remote controls. The guy who has 2 iMacs, a Mac mini, and 3 MacBook Pros in storage. The guy with a dozen or so iOS devices in his “Find My iPhone” list.
There is no room for a 10" tablet on the train. It is shoulder to shoulder crowded, and there is very little room between human flesh to hold a tablet.
I gave my iPad mini to my lady when I upgraded. She had a cracked screen. I’m now using her janky broken-ass iPad mini until “Later In November” when the Retina Mini comes out. It’s thinner-er and lighter-er than the Air, and the physical size means all the world to a New York City commuter who tries to read on the crowded subway.
Is Mavericks Screwing Up Your PDFs?
OSX Mavericks is here. It has been for a few weeks. And it’s still broken in places.
When you click on a PDF in Safari, you used to get a preview in the browser of the thing you clicked on. Now, many are getting a page full of what looks like gibberish. It’s not, it’s the code that makes the PDF, but users should never see that.
There’s a quick way to fix it.
-
Open Terminal (it’s in your utilities folder in the Applications folder)
-
Type this: (Copy and paste, if you like)
defaults write com.apple.Safari WebKitOmitPDFSupport -bool NO
- Restart Safari. All is well.
This is such a simple fix, I don’t know why the bug is still here after three weeks, but until they fix it, this will allow you to read all those ill-gotten comic books.
Daylight Saving and Security
I know, I know. I hate Daylight Savingtime, too. It’s outdated and stupid. There is no reason to move our clocks around twice a year anymore. We have lights, and we know how to use them.
But, Daylight Saving Day is a good reminder to do some housekeeping. Everyone knows you should change the batteries in your smoke detectors when you move your clock. You should also change some passwords.
A lot of us keep most of our lives online. Banking, social, music, contacts, email, calendars… They are all very personal and very vulnerable.
Use an app like OnePassword (my favorite) or Last Pass to remember passwords for you so you can use real, secure, unguessable passwords. I used to be TERRIBLE about passwords. I’d use my dog’s name or my street. Those days are gone. OnePassword (and all password managers) will give you a randomly generated password, then save it. Here’s one:
zy7hiwh9phoz
I asked OnePassword for a random password and got that. No one will ever guess it, and it would take a computer months to brute-force it. And all these passwords I use online are saved offline in the OnePassword file, and all I have to remember is the one password to open OnePassword. They make plug-ins for Safari, Chrome, and Internet Explorer. There are smartphone and tablet apps, as well. They all sync and keep your passwords with you.
Take a half an hour and change the most important passwords. Then, take the next few weeks letting a password manager run in your browser collecting passwords for you. After, say, January 1, go through the app and see how similar all your passwords really are. For most people, if someone gets one of your passwords, they can guess all of them. Worse, if they get your email password, they can reset all your other passwords.
Security isn’t fun, but it can be easy.
Happy Birthday, America.
I believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival, It ought to be celebrated by pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations from one end of this continent to the other.
Word. Go blow stuff up and be safe out there.
I think it's weird when people say Happy Memorial Day...
I think it’s weird when people say “Happy Memorial Day”.
They’re kind of missing the point.
That's A Lot of Plusses!
Paul Thorrott, on his Supersite for Windows:
I’ve often described Windows 8 as Windows 7++, because — and contrary to a peculiarly widespread belief — it’s really just a combination of everything that’s great about Windows 7 plus a ton of new desktop improvements, all tied to a new mobile OS I still call Metro. On that note, Blue is Windows 8++: It’s Windows 8 plus a ton of improvements
So, if we’re doing the math correctly, Windows Blue is just Windows 7++++. Or is it Windows 7+16? I don’t know if we add or multiply made up modifiers.