iPhone syndrome

[MaxBurn]

Airplay music/sound to a PC.


http://sourceforge.net/projects/shairport4w/

http://www.redmondpie.com/turn-your...stream-songs-from-iphone-ipad-and-ipod-touch/

 

[fb]

Or Airplay to your Linn DS device.

It would be nice to get the sound from Angry Birds directly from the stereo.

http://news.linn.co.uk/news/2011/12/songcast-shares-it-all.php

 

[Santilli]

Well, iphones are not waterproof. Roommate dropped his into a puddle during the rain, and, fried phone. He now has a new, but older model iphone. It's much lighter, and thinner then the new one. All I did was enter the code for the WIFI, and, the virtual keyboard was
really hard to do with big fingers.

 

[Handruin]

Well, iphones are not waterproof. Roommate dropped his into a puddle during the rain, and, fried phone. He now has a new, but older model iphone. It's much lighter, and thinner then the new one. All I did was enter the code for the WIFI, and, the virtual keyboard was
really hard to do with big fingers.

Very few phones are waterproof. I hope you did not hold the belief that the iPhone 4S was waterproof. Unless if he got a first-gen iPhone, I don't recall the others are being much lighter or much thinner. I have decent-sized fingers and the virtual keyboard is never a challenge to us. Compared to my only other device with Android, the keyboard on the Kindle Fire is very frustrating to use in terms of accuracy and responsiveness when compared to an iPhone virtual keyboard. I know this doesn't speak for all Android-based devices, but there is a notable difference between these two devices.

 

[Mercutio]

You're talking about a $600 phone from a tier 1 OEM vs. a deliberately inexpensive lowest common denominator 1st generation device.

 

[Handruin]

You're talking about a $600 phone from a tier 1 OEM vs. a deliberately inexpensive lowest common denominator 1st generation device.

Is the virtual keyboard significantly different on other Android devices?

Edit, for whatever it's worth, the same virtual keyboard can be had on a $50 iPhone 3GS.

 

[Mercutio]

Actually, yeah. There are several different virtual keyboards to choose from. I prefer Swype. One of my frustrations with the Fire is the fact that Amazon doesn't have any other keyboards for it in its app store.

 

[ddrueding]

Swype is awesome. I don't think I would use a tablet or phone that didn't support it or something similar.

 

[timwhit]

I prefer SwiftKey X on my phone. It's available for the Kindle Fire.

 

[ddrueding]

That does look nice. Not compatible with 1.5 though

 

[Santilli]

FULL STORY ON THE IPHONE

The phone was dropped in street, in the pouring rain, at the SFO passenger loading area, as he dropped off a client. This was very early in the morning, it was dark, and the phone is black. He came back four hours later. The phone had been run over a number of times, the screen was severely cracked. The phone actually started up, he got a few messages off of it, and then it died.

It's now being worked on by two experts in the bay area, trying to recover the phone.

The good news is all his contacts and stuff are loaded to the 'icloud', so, as with google, he didn't loose any contacts when he lost the phone.

The phone he replaced it with is also a 4s, so it was just my groggy perception that the phone was tiny, which it is, compared to my HTC 4g Slide, Khaki.

Still, I'll take the extra weight and size, and being on my second day on this battery charge, and, I still have 68% of the charge left.

He said almost the same thing Merc's clients did:
"It's just SO easy to use."

 

[Handruin]

The phone was dropped in street, in the pouring rain, at the SFO passenger loading area, as he dropped off a client. This was very early in the morning, it was dark, and the phone is black. He came back four hours later. The phone had been run over a number of times, the screen was severely cracked. The phone actually started up, he got a few messages off of it, and then it died.

It's now being worked on by two experts in the bay area, trying to recover the phone.

The good news is all his contacts and stuff are loaded to the 'icloud', so, as with google, he didn't loose any contacts when he lost the phone.

The phone he replaced it with is also a 4s, so it was just my groggy perception that the phone was tiny, which it is, compared to my HTC 4g Slide, Khaki.

Still, I'll take the extra weight and size, and being on my second day on this battery charge, and, I still have 68% of the charge left.

He said almost the same thing Merc's clients did:
"It's just SO easy to use."

So...you're telling us the phone was laying in the water and rained on for four hours, driven over a number of times, and cracked...yet it still turned on and he was able to get messages for a short amount of time? That's pretty impressive. The iCloud feature will restore the entire phone's configuration, not just contacts. I know it's not a new concept, but it does actually work pretty well.

It isn't fast. It looks like another Apple charge a lot, give you terrible, low standard hardware that barely runs the software.

ok...sure. :erm:

 

[ddrueding]

I prefer SwiftKey X on my phone. It's available for the Kindle Fire.

Now typing this with SwiftKey on the transformer. The idea that it personalises predictions based on usage is nice. Pulling that data from your accounts is clever, but I am not giving it access to my Gmail account.

It isn't anywhere near as quick as swype yet, but but I'm willing to test it for a week and see what happens. If my posts start to resemble lunar's you'll know what happened.

 

[timwhit]

Now typing this with SwiftKey on the transformer. The idea that it personalises predictions based on usage is nice. Pulling that data from your accounts is clever, but I am not giving it access to my Gmail account.

It isn't anywhere near as quick as swype yet, but but I'm willing to test it for a week and see what happens. If my posts start to resemble lunar's you'll know what happened.

I used Swype for about 6 months on my Evo, it pissed me off on a daily basis. I find SwiftKey much less infuriating.

 

[Mercutio]

The nice thing is, at least Android people get a choice.

 

[Handruin]

The nice thing is, at least Android people get a choice.

True, but it's unfortunate you need it in the first place.

 

[Santilli]

Whatever.

I don't care if it survived being run over by a tank, I'm not getting into another appl closed system.

 

[Mercutio]

True, but it's unfortunate you need it in the first place.

There's obviously enough divergence of opinion in what makes a good on screen keyboard that ithing people could probably stand to see some choice in the matter as well.

 

[Mercutio]

appl

Is it really so hard to type out the name of a company rather than its ticker symbol?

 

[Howell]

Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose...

 

[Handruin]

Whatever.

I don't care if it survived being run over by a tank, I'm not getting into another appl closed system.

This wasn't the original post you made before editing was it? For whatever it's worth...I'm not trying to ever get you into an Apple products. If you believe for a single moment that Android is open and free and Apple is the only closed platform, you're clearly mistaken.

You were fairly adamant to make some bold hate-claims and pass on some clearly incorrect data about a phone in numerous occasions and you had it set in your head that the phone was such a terrible POS compared to everything else out there. You weren't able to reasonably argue with logic and fact which made for a lot of the replies to your posts.

I honestly do not care if you buy the phone or any apple products. I don't even care if you hate the company. None of that is why I post in response to your apple-product-hate. I really just disliked the continuous repeat of false information as it was fact. We're all guilty of it to some extents, but you wouldn't let up...so I wouldn't let up. Childish of me...perhaps.

Perhaps you couldn't perceive it, or maybe based on past discussions with you hating Apple, it was hard to interpret any of what you wrote as a post of contrary or positive opinion to an apple product (which you removed from your now-edited post). You said you went out of your way to post something positive...but if you reread the first of your two-part phone dropped in water experience...it's got nothing but negative written all over it.

 

[Handruin]

There's obviously enough divergence of opinion in what makes a good on screen keyboard that ithing people could probably stand to see some choice in the matter as well.

Options are nice to have...it's interesting that among the few replies related to alternate keyboards, that there is no clear opinion...except that the alternatives made things better than the default original keyboard. How does the default virtual keyboard compare to the iOS5 virtual keyboard?

 

[ddrueding]

How does the default virtual keyboard compare to the iOS5 virtual keyboard?

Nearly identical in my (limited) experience. Some androids are faster than others. I have always wished for swype on iPad, and apparently it is possible.

 

[Mercutio]

They're both acceptable. Swiftkey probably is too. I'm used to Swype on my phone and that's what I prefer work with.

The biggest annoyance I have between on screen keyboards is the mild lack of standardization about which non-QWERTY keys go on the primary screen. The default keyboard the Xoom uses, for example, has the underscore ( _ ) on the main QWERTY screen but the much more useful hyphen ( - ) tucked away with the numbers and symbols.

I probably wouldn't pay much attention to any of that except that I actually have a stack of these things sitting here.

Even in the world of x86 hardware, keyboards aren't 100% standardized. It might be asking a lot to try to get everyone to come together and agree what on screen keyboards look be like.

 

[Handruin]

Nearly identical in my (limited) experience. Some androids are faster than others. I have always wished for swype on iPad, and apparently it is possible.

They're both acceptable. Swiftkey probably is too. I'm used to Swype on my phone and that's what I prefer work with.

The biggest annoyance I have between on screen keyboards is the mild lack of standardization about which non-QWERTY keys go on the primary screen. The default keyboard the Xoom uses, for example, has the underscore ( _ ) on the main QWERTY screen but the much more useful hyphen ( - ) tucked away with the numbers and symbols.

I probably wouldn't pay much attention to any of that except that I actually have a stack of these things sitting here.

Even in the world of x86 hardware, keyboards aren't 100% standardized. It might be asking a lot to try to get everyone to come together and agree what on screen keyboards look be like.

If you say they're nearly identical, then I don't know why I find the Kindle Fire's keyboard to be a rather frustrating experience at times. The auto-correct prediction and implementation does not seem anywhere near as refined as the iOS virtual keyboard. Nor do I feel the local key sensing prediction abilities seem to be as refined.

I have also noticed the key-placement and default non-QWERTY key (lack of standardizing) to be annoying. I can't blame that on either virtual keyboard because that just becomes a thing of memorizing and familiarity.

 

[ddrueding]

In my experience, the Kindle Fire is not the quickest UI out there, and it seems to really make a difference with the feel. It may even affect the prediction capabilities? It would make sense that a machine with less horsepower would be less capable.

 

[MaxBurn]

On the destroyed phone: with iCloud backup he shouldn't have lost anything at all. The entire phone configuration settings and info were all backed up, right down to what apps were installed and what settings were in them. All he should have had to do is get another handset (with ios5) and sign in, connect to wifi and wait for all apps and backup info to download. I have done it, tested with remote wipe to remove everything. Then restored via iCloud, all worked as advertised. Media files like movies and songs aren't stored in iCloud though.

On the keyboard I have been using the new dictation thing and it works fairly well for posts like this. I still use keyboard for short stuff. As the keyboard is part of the skin of the phone it will never be opened up, that's just the way it is for apple stuff. On the jailbreak front I think there is a swipe like keyboard in cydia you can get. Jailbreak is again available for all apple phones.

 

[Mercutio]

And we're back to comparing a built-to-be-low-cost, first generation device to expensive and presumably refined over time hardware, too.

The Fire has a slow-ish CPU by current standards (It's "only" a dual core 1GHz system) and probably the most customized, eye candy intensive front end of anything I've seen on Android. It shouldn't be anybody's poster child for a typical experience. If I owned one, I'm sure I'd root it and get rid of all Amazon's shit with a quickness but even as it is, it does fine for its primary function as a media consumption device.

 

[Mercutio]

On the destroyed phone: with iCloud backup he shouldn't have lost anything at all.

Likewise Google and Amazon have their own storage services that can be integrated into Android. It's not like "cloud" is something unique to Apple, though AFAIK Apple is the only game in town for comprehensive service on iOS.

 

[Santilli]

I am predisposed to never buy another appl product after OS X failed to support a LOT of very expensive SCSI equipment.

That said, it doesn't mean the iphone doesn't have SOME merits. I mean you can fool everyone most of the time, but still, must be some good things happening to manage to get so many people to go with their phones, maxipads, etc.

I just find a consistent pattern that the stuff I like to do with products like that are usually not what appl wants me to do with their products, and, they essentially are telling me not to use their products, by not supporting what I want to do with them.

That's fine. It's not just me.

 

[Mercutio]

The biggest problem I have with istuff is the reliance on itunes to do everything. I can grudgingly accept locking data to an application and Apple's sealed-box approach to its OS, but itunes itself royally sucks.

At least the iphone isn't locked into crummy phone networks any more.

 

[Handruin]

The biggest problem I have with istuff is the reliance on itunes to do everything. I can grudgingly accept locking data to an application and Apple's sealed-box approach to its OS, but itunes itself royally sucks.

At least the iphone isn't locked into crummy phone networks any more.

That is my biggest complaint also, but admittedly, the usage of iTunes post-setup is extremely minimal for me these days. Even more-so now that OTA updates and backup/restore are all done via the phone.

 

[ddrueding]

I have a user with no computer at all (thence no iTunes). It seems like a nice way to go. Not good for a hacker or a geek, but if that is the case you don't want an iThing anyway.

 

[Handruin]

To clarify, a new user wouldn't need iTunes to setup a new phone. I walked out of the store with a new iPhone and no iTunes was needed. I had to use it the first time to migrate the data from my 3GS. Now a user could migrate using iCloud. The problem comes when you want to add content to the device. They support WiFi synching, but iTunes is still required...I don't know if someone has come up with a way to emulate this, but that would be fantastic.

 

[Mercutio]

The ipad I was messing with wouldn't let me do a single damned thing with it until I plugged it in to a computer with itunes on it. It just came up with a graphic showing a picture of the data cable and an arrow pointing to the word "itunes."

If that's changed recently, it's for the best, but I couldn't figure out a way to put .cbr files on my ipad without itunes involvement regardless.

 

[ddrueding]

A physical Apple store can take care of initial setup for you. If you e-mailed yourself a .cbr, did it recognize and let you do anything?

 

[Mercutio]

The files I have tend to exceed the attachment limits of most mail servers, so it didn't occur to me to check.

 

[Handruin]

The ipad I was messing with wouldn't let me do a single damned thing with it until I plugged it in to a computer with itunes on it. It just came up with a graphic showing a picture of the data cable and an arrow pointing to the word "itunes."

If that's changed recently, it's for the best, but I couldn't figure out a way to put .cbr files on my ipad without itunes involvement regardless.

I have no experience with an iPad, so this could very well be the situation for other devices besides their phones. Adding media to the device may need to come through iTunes...that is undesirable.

 

[Santilli]

I have tried installing itunes once. It lasted about 5 minutes, and was uninstalled.

My girlfriend has an ipad, and ipod. My understanding is you can only do one install of
itunes, on one computer, and must use that computer for loading the ipod?

This was what I was told when I suggested she bring the software over and install it on
a computer in my house, so I could help her with it.

Is this true?

I found the software pretty offensive, and useless for me.

I hate having quicktime on my computers, and won't install any of appl's update software, either.

 

[Sol]

Apparently they've fixed some of the serious problems with getting data on, and more so off, iThings. Or so I'm assured by people who use iStuff more than I and like it about as much.

But the fixes are quite recent and before that iDevices were pretty strictly monogamous.