Goodbye iPhone, Helloooooo Nexus One!

The day has finally arrived! Along has come the Nexus One: a contender for my smartphone affections, eclipsing the iPhone 3GS.

Back in 2007, after over a decade of using, working on and playing with computers of all kinds, and plenty of toiling with various Windows versions, I made the plunge headlong into the world of Mac OS. If I really have to boil it down, the key reasons were few and simple: Mac OS is stable, it’s efficient and it’s beautiful. I’ve never since looked back upon my years of using Windows as my primary OS and felt even an once of regret. It’s now the 3 year anniversary of my conversion and my trusty Macbook Pro w/ 2.33 GHz Core 2 Duo (upon which I type this article) is still running like a champ, with only about $100 in total upgrades and maintenance since. My techie heart loves this computer – and I don’t know how I ever lived without it!

It was a natural progression for me that in my recent technological conversion I’d begin an interest in the Apple iPhone. I mean, if Apple could have really made a phone half as innovative and high performance as their Mac series then it’d have to be one Palm- or Windows Mobile-butt-kickin’ device! In the early summer of 2007, my wife and I were living in Jacksonville, Florida where, conveniently for me, Apple had one of it’s gorgeous Apple Stores. During the week of the debut there was a seemingly endless line of people streaming from door of the Apple utopia down around the pedestrian mall block. As excited as I was about the iPhone, I wasn’t ready financially to buy an iPhone nor add another $20 to my calling plan. I was going to have to settle for a free t-shirt, which I lined up for and received with joy. I still wear it from time to time.

Now let’s fast forward two more years. It’s June 2009, I’m living in Redding, California and I’m now a smart phone owner. At the time, I had a cherry-red Blackberry Curve 8310. Though it could never sport 3G speeds, I had grown dependent upon it’s ability to instantly deliver my email, chat without limit with my friends in So Cal on BBM and settle trivia disputes with dead-on accuracy. It was to be the third year in a row that Apple was going to rock the phone world with a groundbreaking iPhone release. 2007 had been the original iPhone, 2008 saw the advent of the iPhone 3G. And now, in the year that I was eligible for an upgrade, and just before monetary gift-bearing birthday cards would grace my mailbox, Apple and AT&T were going to release their third and greatest iPhone models to date: the 3GS, sporting 16 and 32 GB of onboard storage, a faster processor and an expected longer life battery. All things considered, I decided this was the year I would jump on board and Oh Boy did I! In July 2009 I got my first iPhone.

It’s fair to say iPhone 3GS has been a great phone, perhaps one of the best models ever made. In a lot of ways it has certainly blazed trails and innovated its way to inspiring an ever-increasing worldwide hunger for high tech smart phones. With that said, after 9 months of owning one, I have to say that it’s just not cutting if for me. I own much of that sentiment to the fact that I’ve been working for Verizon and specializing in Motorola Droid demonstrations since December 2009. Having the iPhone 3GS in my left pocket and the Droid in my right has given me all the opportunity necessary to realize that Android, in my humble opinion, is a far superior phone operating system to even iPhone 3.1.2.

In articles to follow shortly, I will elaborate further on how I came to this realization. Before I conclude this article, I will tell you that my 3GS is currently on eBay with roughly two days to go, 17 bids bringing the auction to over $500 already and I can’t wait to get this thing into a box to who knows where so I can click that glorious ‘Get Your Phone’ button at the Nexus One ordering site. The following are 5 of the reasons are why, in no particular order, that I am jumping ship from the iPhone to climb onto the megayacht of Google Android:

1. Android natively runs Google Voice – a free service that has become a staple in my business communications. Apple has thumbed its nose at it.
2. Android is at the very least semi-open source. The iPhone OS is severely locked down with proprietary controls.
3. Google releases regular and desirable updates over the air for their phones, each time releasing more features.
4. The Nexus One can, and is allow to, multitask as it boasts a 1GHz Snapdragon processor, almost twice as fast as its iPhone counterpart.
5. Android phones pretty much let you do whatever you want to do – from customization to carrier work-around apps, not prevent you from realizing is full potential.

Please check back for future articles on this topic! Thanks for reading.

Overview of New Features in Android 2.2 – They’re HOT!

If you’ve recently had your ear to the tracks of the smartphone railroad, then certainly you have been aware of the emerging [dominating?] Google Android presence. The summer of 2007 marked the dawning of the Apple cell phone era. Three years later, perhaps not unlike Julius Caesar’s long ago, the Steve Jobs-lead empire may be finding itself ridden with dissention and unrest. Many long-time loyal followers of the Apple iPhone are emigrating to Android smart phones like the Droid Incredible, EVO 4G, Ally, Droid and the popularly un-branded and unlocked Google Nexus One. The features chronicled below in no particular order may be good examples of the reasons why.

Android 2.2 is a feature-packed powerhouse of juicy new features and just plain telephonic glory.

1. Native tethering support including Wi-Fi hot spot function for up to 8 devices simultaneously.
   It bears little explanation as to why this features kicks [donkey]. While an Android user might need to be selective about which carrier and device to choose in order to use it to it’s full potential, Android now packs the heat necessary to provide wired or wireless internet connection to a laptop or desktop in exile. In the case of the Nexus One for both AT&T and T-Mobile, Android 2.2 delivers 3G to your computer without inherent cumulative bandwidth or speed limits . I personally have the AT&T-supporting version of the Nexus One and have found it not only easy to use but a surprisingly fast internet connection – that is, when I’m in an area where AT&T is providing a strong 3G signal.  Luckily I am “grandfathered-in” to the now discontinued unlimited smartphone data plan on my carrier. Unfortunately, those of you seeking to use Android 2.2 on a device procured from your carrier or branded with its mark may have no choice but to contend with mandatory fees or caps in order to use this feature.
2. Flash 10.1 Support – embedded videos can now play in your browser of choice!
   Despite recent propaganda dished out by the fruit-named giant, Adobe Flash is not dead nor is it antiquated. I will admit it isn’t necessarily recent or cutting edge technology at present, but Flash is alive and kicking. And perhaps more importantly [Are you listening Steve?]: the people want it! Before I step off my soapbox, I’ll offer just just one personal theory as to why Apple doesn’t plan or want to permit Adobe Flash on their mobile devices: Flash is difficult if not impossible to put on a leash. In essence, the media machine’s iTunes sales of both multimedia and applications would be severely challenged if Android developers could deliver Flash-based apps and streaming media without the proprietary clutches of a market like the App Store or iTunes.
3. Enhanced Exchange Server support
   That now means corporate businesspeople can see beyond their Blackberry phones. In recent months when asked the question “so what’s the difference between a Blackberry and an Android phone?”, my usual reply highlighted that Blackberry was usually the best choice for the employee of a large business that relies heavily on a MS Exchange Server while Android is often best for those who want virtually everything else. Namely, Android has been very strong for music and video delivery and has had the 2nd largest marketplace in the world for applications. Now that Google is making the stride into Exchange Server support, even working stiffs can have fun on a killer smartphone.
4. Performance improvements – now often clocked at over 400% faster on some handsets.
   Android 2.2′s utilization of a just-in-time (JIT) compiler for the Dalvik VM and their V8 JavaScript engine have vastly improved smoothness, snappiness and overall stability of the operating system and web browsing experience respectively. Personally, I have found my Nexus One to be significantly more responsive and continuously.
5. Permanent home screen buttons for most widely used functions: Phone and Browser apps.
   It seems simple, but it has improved the Android experience to have these buttons dwelling in the intuitive location at the bottom of the screen. Now a user can remove both the phone application and browser shortcut icons from their custom home screens. Previously it felt not unlike making a phone call over VoIP on a PC having to launch and “run” the phone application on my… well… phone. Now both surfing the web and ordering a pizza are much closer at hand.
6. Greatly improved Camera Application functions – especially those relating to navigating through it.
   If you had asked me a month ago to name a weak link in what should be pivotal functions of Android 2.1, I’d have named the camera application. On the fly, in order to play photo snob while snapping a photo of my kitty, I had to awkwardly slide out a drawer from the left side of my screen. Therein one would find the essential camera controls such as flash mode, white balance and others. As of 2.2, the camera app has been intuitively improved to have buttons ever present on the right of the screen that can call toggle such functions with much greater ease and consumer camera-esque simplicity. Whether these functions are new or just previously buried, I can now easily turn on and off the flash or geotagging, toggle the digital zoom, focus mode or white balance settings and adjust exposure. In brief: it’s sweet!
7. Bluetooth contacts sharing now enabled.
   This is pretty neat seeing as previously Android was a bit more stingy about sharing contacts to other phones. There are, of course, other methods to share this type of data such as with apps like Bump and over both email and SMS.
8. Installed applications can now be stored on external media such as a MicroSD card.
   It used to be that you had to store all your apps on the Android device’s internal (and finite) memory. Version 2.2 now allows the user, provided that the app developer approves and has enabled the function, to store their apps on inserted or external memory. This feature allows a greater array of apps to remain installed concurrently on the device with a conceivable storage limit in gigabytes rather than megabytes.
9. Applications can now be included in cloud-destined backups.
   This new feature lends the user a greater potential for peace of mind and security to know their apps are being backed up to remote servers along with other previously-permitted data. Like the above mentioned feature, this requires the consent and inclusion by the application developer. Users switching to a different device or replacing a destroyed/lost/stolen device can be back in business with greater swiftness when using this feature.
10. Application bug reporting helps to improve the user experience.
    Developers have a hard time fixing things they don’t know about or that they can’t see occur in the field. With 2.2′s bug reporting abilities, diagnosis will be easier for developers to accomplish and application enhancement will likely be well benefited.

Certainly there is more to Android 2.2 than I have thought to name. Stay tuned for more as it is discovered.

Supporting sources for this article included: developer.com, cnet.com and laptopmag.com. Thanks to the authors for their education postings!

How to Log In to Your WordPress Admin Dashboard

Let’s face it: when you’re still new at WordPress, even the easiest of tasks to even the brainiest of computer geeks can be like solving a word puzzle devised by some superior alien race.

Don’t worry, I get it. I was there not so long ago myself. So lets take a look at how to login to your WordPress administrative control panel, affectionately named the “Dashboard”.

Here are your super-simple 3 easy steps:

1. Assuming your WordPress installation is in the root of your public folder (“public_html”), your administrative login is located at http://www.yourdomainnamehere.com/wp-admin
   • For regular non-jedi users like the commenting public – it’s at http://www.yourdomainnamehere.com/wp-login
2. Enter your WordPress user name into the ‘Username’ box
3. Enter your WordPress password into the ‘Password’ box, then click ‘Log In’
4. Voila! You’re in. Ok, that’s not really a step. But just the three steps just seemed so lonely without this one

Amazing Black Friday Deal + My Coupon Code: Website Hosting on Hostgator.com

If you have a website, need a website, were ever thinking of having a website or have a cousin who’s got a roommate who has a friend that could conceivably want a website… you need to check out this deal!

Any day of the year you can get excellent web hosting services from me provided by the excellent folks at Hostgator.com. As a reseller, I provide my clients in Redding, California and beyond with my personal support of their web hosting accounts for the event that they might have questions or a problem. Additionally, as a Hostgator.com Affiliate, clicking on my links on my website to Hostgator.com‘s website is another way to support my small northern California business.

But tonight I’m writing to you with this simple plea:

PLEASE! LET ME HELP YOU GET AN UNBEATABLE DEAL ON YOUR WEB HOSTING!

I have never seen a deal as good as what Hostgator is offering on their Black Friday 2010 specials!

Here’s what Hostgator.com is offering for it’s Black Friday hosting deals, as described straight from Hostgator:

We’re offering 50% OFF EVERYTHING From 12:00AM CST – 5AM CST That’s 10:00PM – 3AM Pacific

We’re offering 80% OFF EVERYTHING From 5AM – 9AM CST WHILE SUPPLIES LAST (first come, first receive; so definitely don’t miss out!) That’s 3AM – 7AM Pacific

From 9AM – 11:59PM CST OR after 80% OFF accounts have sold out, we will continue to offer 50% OFF EVERYTHING That’s 7AM – 9:59PM Pacific

This applies to ALL Accounts and ALL Term Lengths. So [my] visitors and friends will have the opportunity to receive up to 80% off of up to 3 years worth of Hosting! That would come out to $35.64 for 3 FULL YEARS!

That includes Shared Hosting, Reseller Hosting, VPS Hosting AND even Dedicated Servers!

[...]

This will apply to the client’s first invoice (first term length they sign up for whether that be 1 month or for 3 years).

Now here’s the part where you get a deal even if you already have hosting!

Hostgator will transfer your data, databases, email accounts and the whole shebang for you FOR FREE! So if you’re on another hosting provider already that costs any more than these deals - and trust me – you are! – then you can still get in on this deal and save some major money.

Some examples of the ridiculous deals that you can get on Black Friday, this week:

1 year of UNLIMITED storage and UNLIMITED bandwidth hosting for as many domains pointing to the site for $23.88!
(Baby Plan – 12 months prepaid)

3 years of UNLIMITED storage and UNLIMITED bandwidth hosting for $35.64
(Hatchling Plan – 36 months prepaid)

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me via Email, Facebook or Phone and I will be glad to help!

And remember… you’re gonna have to get up early – but it’s the early bird that gets the worm!

Use coupon code “graphicpilot” when you sign up so they’ll give you the ‘special treatment’!

FREE Font Generator – Make Your Own Font with Your Handwriting

I posted a year or two ago on my original blog about this, but since I revisited the site today I figured it was fitting to shout it out again. To my knowledge, this is the best free utility out there for creating a font out of your own handwriting… or any letters that you can draw on their template for that matter! It’s free, really cool and pretty darn easy. Make sure you read (and follow) the directions.

Try it for yourself:

WP Tip: How to Know What Version of WordPress You Are Using

If you’re like me and have realized the impressive power of WordPress, whether as a CMS or just simply a blog, then you’re probably quite familiar with the frequent WordPress update notifications in your dashboard. And probably also like me, you’re zealous about always being up-to-date and taking advantage of the latest featured and newfangled functions.

WordPress makes it super easy to do an automatic update to your installation (and even to your beloved plugins). So why not just do it?!? I’ll tell you why:

because your theme might not support the new version yet.

Before upgrading to the latest and greatest WordPress update, you’ll want to check in with the WordPress theme author for compatibility before you go and make the leap.

Question: How do I know what version of WordPress I’m currently using?

 

Answer: The answer is right under your nose! Simply login to your WordPress admin dashboard (in most cases, located at yourspecificsitedomain.com/wp-admin) and it’ll be displayed in the upper section of the dashboard home page.

Don’t worry… You’re not alone. I overlooked this for years.

Sometimes we just like to over-complicate things for ourselves, don’t we?

If you’re looking for assistance with your WordPress based website or perhaps a brand new web design in Redding, California - please feel free to contact me using my easy contact form!

How to Repair Mac Hard Drive and/or File System When Disk Utility Can’t

Hard Drive Issues on a Mac – A Rarity, but a Pain Nonetheless

Earlier this week I received a call from a local business client who was having problems publishing a self-maintained website for their store. Although my service call began with troubleshooting a problematic website, the situation promptly escalated to showing symptoms of a serious hardware issue.

At first it seemed like the Macbook Pro owner’s issues were purely related to iWeb and needing to be properly configured for their web hosting account. It wasn’t long before I discovered that her Mac was having issues accessing files from its hard drive. And that’s when it happened…

Upon a system restart, the Mac would not boot past the initial gray screen with Apple logo, spinning wheel and frozen progress bar.

It was quite obvious the computer was not successfully accessing its operating system files but it was too early yet to be sure whether it was due to mechanical issues with the hard drive or motherboard, missing or corrupted files stored on the hard drive. I was going to have to narrow it down before making a diagnosis that could cost the client unnecessary data loss, expenses for hardware or labor.

I would suggest the following steps that I tried prior to assuming a hard drive failure:

1. Attempt to repair your system drive using Disk Utility.

Obviously if you are stuck at the gray screen of agony, booting past it isn’t an option. But you can boot from your system disc labeled Mac OS Install DVD. To do so, pop it into your optical drive and hold the Alt/Option key while you power up the computer. Keep holding it til you see your boot drive options and then click the Mac OS Install DVD to boot from it. Once past the language selection, you can access utilities from the top menu. Disk Utility is the one you want. When it opens, click on your hard drive in the left column sidebar and the click Verify Disk followed by Repair Disk under First Aid. If your computer completes its process, then it might just be your lucky day. You should now initiate a normal restart to see if your problem has been resolved. But if your situation is like mine, you might get failures indicating the hard drive is unreadable. Pass go, but do not collect $200.

2. If you DON’T have a Mac OS install DVD OR you DO have access to another Mac and a firewire cable, try booting in Target Disk Mode.

This is when you boot your afflicted machine as though it was an external drive to a healthy Mac. To do so, first turn on your sick Mac while holding down the T key and you will see a gray screen with a large occasionally moving Firewire logo. You can now connect the two computers via firewire cable and boot the healthy computer while holding the Alt/Option key as described above. Your sickly computer’s hard drive in target disk mode should appear as a boot option on your healthy computer. Choose it and proceed. If you are able to boot to it successfully, you can try again to run Disk Utility from Applications->Utilities and to verify/repair the hard drive. If this works without a hitch, again try and reboot your computer normally to see if your problem has been solved. If not, keep reading.

3. This option is the one that surprisingly worked for me: Boot into Mac Safe Mode while showing its progress in a command line UI.

Your Mac will automatically attempt some more gloves-come-off disk repair measures when you boot into safe mode.

To start up into standard Safe Mode (to Safe Boot), do this:

1. Be sure your Mac is shut down.
2. Press the power button.
3. Immediately after you hear the startup tone, hold the Shift key. The Shift key should be held as soon as possible after the startup tone, but not before the tone.
4. Release the Shift key when you see the gray Apple icon and the progress indicator (looks like a spinning gear).

To start up into Safe Mode with display of the progress in a command line UI, do the same as above EXCEPT hold the Command and V keys along with Shift.

In my case this process worked and I was able to boot into safe mode with the affected computer. You can now restart the computer as normal and you will likely be able to boot now, possibly after a brief progress bar display during bootup. If this works for you, you should still be concerned! Even though your computer is working seemingly normally, you should consider yourself blessed (I don’t do luck). If you’ve found my advice helpful so far, heed my next directive: use your extra life to immediately make an entire Time Machine backup onto a reliable clean external hard drive. You will need this if/when your hard drive crashes if you want to recover your documents and/or applications.

If none of the above worked for you, it may be time to bring out the big guns if you really need to save your data.

4. Try an advanced data recovery software such as DiskWarrior or Disk Drill.

Short of sending your hard drive to an expensive data recovery specialist, this might be your last resort for a DIY fix. These solutions may require you to remove your hard drive, use a live boot cd or target disk mode. You should refer to their respective developer’s website for a thorough outline of the process.

In Conclusion and in Summary

In any case, there is a reason your hard drive is having these issues. Replacing your hard drive very soon should be your plan especially if you have a hard drive more than 3 years old and you don’t have a strong hunch that you caused your own issue in any way.

My Recommended Hard Drive Purchase to Fix or Upgrade Your Macbook

I recommend Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM hard drives and I use them in my own and client’s machines. Replacing my original Hitachi hard drive (which had incidentally NOT failed, but was critically full at only 160GB) truly breathed new life into my Macbook Pro. Not only did it provide tons more storage space for me, but the 7200RPM performance and larger 16MB cache has greater responsiveness and performance.

• 320GB Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM Hard Drive – Price Check
• 500GB Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM Hard Drive – Price Check (The one that I chose for my 2007 Macbook Pro)
• 1TB Seagate Momentus 7200 RPM Hard Drive – Price Check

Instagram for Android finally released! (Or is it?)

Beware of a supposed release of Instagram for Android by a publisher called “App for Android“. It’s not a real release of Instagram at all. I don’t know how this actually made it into the Android Market but I doubt it will take long to disappear.

3 huge giveaways that its fraudulent:

1. The fake app requires you to rate 5 stars before it will allow the use of filters.

2. The app is embedding AirPlay advertisements in the notification area immediately (currently the moat lucrative form of Android advertising)

3. The grand daddy: the screenshots are of an iPhone!

I was so anticipating this app, but alas, it looks like you and I will have to keep waiting.