Tag Archives: iphone

Instacast

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I’ve recently been using a different podcast player on my iPhone to Apple’s “iPod” app, called Instacast.

I’ve tried a few podcast players on the iPhone, but nothing until now has come close to matching the built-in software (which itself isn’t anything special – it’s just solid).

Instacast (made by Vemedio) feels like a polished product (the other apps’ I’ve tried did not).

Here are what I consider to be the pros and cons of this app, followed by a few feature requests that would for me take this far beyond anything Apple has done to date.

Pros

This isn’t a complete feature list, it’s a list of the features I appreciate.

  • You can lock your phone or exit the app whilst a video is playing and you still hear the audio. I’ve been eager for Apple to do this for some time.
  • You can sync podcasts without the need for iTunes or WiFi (ie. it works over 3G).
  • Of the shows you subscribe to, as well as the shows you’ve downloaded, you’re also able to stream shows straight from the net. There are a few key shows I must hear, and so I download (aka Cache) these when they’re released, but for the rest I’ll just stream there and then, or download just in time for my trip home from work. This helps to free up space on my phone and means I can sub to more shows (including video feeds) without any disk space price to pay.
  • It makes it easy to filter the shows you’ve cached from the shows you’ve simply subscribed to.
  • It includes the show notes when you’re listening/watching a show, including the all important hyperlinks. That’s turned out to be surprisingly useful when listening/watching to a show.
  • It provides a chronological order of the newest shows you’ve subscribed to (a “river of shows”).
  • In-app subscription with a decent selection of podcasts to choose from.
  • It makes it relatively easy to move from iTunes to Instacast via the importing of an OPML file.

Cons

  • I miss being able to subscribe directly via my desktop PC.
  • As the option is there to stream or download on demand, I find myself subscribing to more podcasts ‘just in case’. This has resulted in a longer and messier list of subscribed shows. I’m starting to feel like I’m missing out on some shows because it’s harder to get an overview of what I have available.

Feature Requests

  • There are some shows I want to watch each week, whilst there are others that I could skip a few weeks of and not care. Instacast (like Apple’s own software) treats all podcasts equally. I’d like to be able to tag podcasts/feeds, allowing me to organise my podcasts in a similar way I manage my RSS feeds (most importantly with a “Must Read” tag).
  • You can have the app auto cache (ie. Pre-download) podcasts, but from what I can tell this is all shows or nothing. That would soon fill up my disk space with shows I don’t really care about. It would be nice to have it auto cache only certain shows or certain tags (see above).
  • I’ll sometimes jump from podcast to podcast. One afternoon I’ll be in the mood to listening to The Talk Show, but in the morning I might be more in the mood for The StackExchange Podcast. It would be good to have a timeline of what I’ve been listening to recently so I can easily jump back to a previously incomplete show.
  • And of course, my killer feature (as mentioned a few posts back) would be the ability to start a podcast on my iPhone, stop it and the pickup where I left off using a different device (eg. my media pc).

At the moment I’m a very happy Instacast user, and I think it has great potential. It’ll be interesting to see if Apple have anything to announce at WWDC 2011 this Monday that might bring me back.

Tweetbot for iPhone – It’s really very good!

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I didn’t think I’d find an iPhone client for Twitter that topped Twitter for iPhone (aka Tweetie), but after a flurry of rave reviews of Tweetbot (iTunes link) by trusted bloggers in my RSS feeds, I did decided to give it a go.

I won’t go into a big review, but If you want that, then check out Shawn Blanc’s review.

What I will say though are the bits that appear to have converted me. As an overview, it’s the fact I can achieve most of what I did in Twitter for iPhone all from the main timeline (ie. I don’t need to go from screen to screen to find what I’m after). Most of it can be achieved from gestures. Namely…

  • View the tweet’s conversation by swiping left to right on the tweet.
  • Viewing the responses to a tweet by swiping right to left (I don’t believe this function actually exists in Twitter for iPhone, but it’s something I’ve been after for some time. Quite often someone would ask a question and I’d like to see the responses.)
  • Viewing the link contained within a link by double tapping the link.
  • Viewing the user’s profile by tapping their profile picture.
  • Retweeting by triple tapping (this needs to be configured)

Here’s hoping they do an iPad app now.

Tweetbot for iPhone – It’s good!

Shit Luck

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I had a real day of First World Problems yesterday, and it all (possibly) started with a twig.

I was out mowing the front lawn with my pride and joy (the Bosch Rotak 34). A couple of hours earlier me and Becky were commenting on what a great investment it was. Handles even the longest of post-winter grass, can hold about a lawn’s worth without having to empty it and seems sturdy enough to last for years. Well worth the ~£100 we umm’ed and arr’ed about paying.

I was cutting over a twig when I cockily thought to myself “that twig would have broken my old lawn mower’s blade – not this bad boy though!”. With that, the noise the mower made changed. The vacuum was working, but the blades had stopped.

After much arsing around, we deemed it faulty. So Becky said she’ll call Focus to find out what we can do given that we have no receipt.

“How am I going to find the number?” she asked. As I often do, I got my iPhone out and did a quick Google. Passed her the phone and she tapped the number to call.

After the call, she put the phone back down on the recycling bin outside. She started telling me what Focus said, and then it happened: my iPhone slid off the bin and on to the concrete floor.

“Fuck!!” I shouted. The neighbours behind us laughed. Cretins…

We checked the phone and the front screen had been completed shattered.

Gutted. The iPhone was/is probably the greatest thing I’ve ever purchased. I use it all the time for all sorts of situations.

After giving 3 a call – who passed me on to Apple – I was told that I’d need to pay £140 to get it replaced. As I was thinking more >£500 I thought that was reasonable – not that we can afford it (along with a new lawn mower and other things that have gone wrong recently (boiler, PC power pack, replacement car wheels etc)).

Still, I get the replacement phone on Thursday.

Until then I’m phoneless. It’s really quite an odd feeling. Other than the fact I go to grab it every 10 minutes, it’s also weird being without SMS – or more to the point, not having the occasional non-important text from Becky. I wonder what sort of day she’s having? Mine is a bit meh, and I’d quite like to inform her of that fact…

It’s also meant I have nothing to read on the train or in the bath (for some strange reason the iPad doesn’t get signal in the bath – it does on the toilet though half a meter away though..). Which isn’t such a bad thing. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t like knowing there are RSS feeds going unread, or that I’m completely out of touch with what’s happening in Libya and the rest of the world. But if I had one complaint about the iPhone (or rather, smart phones in general) it’s that it’s stopped me reading books. And so I’ve taken this opportunity to have a crack at reading a book.

I’m hoping I get so engrossed in the book by Thursday that I’ll stick with it rather than revert to the quick and easy win of a web page, or quicker and easier still: a tweet.

The book I’ve chosen is one my brother got me for Christmas a couple of years back. Days of War, Nights of Love. I’m only a couple of chapters in, but it’s quite an eye opener. From what I gather, it’s a series of essays written by anarchists explaining their beliefs. I’m quite susceptible to other people’s views so it feels almost dangerous to be reading it. One thing it encourages is for you to stick it to The Man. Hopefully I don’t do just that the next time my boss speaks to me. I need my job.

They do speak a lot of sense though, but their views tend to contradict my own so right now I’m confused what to think. My political and moral views are already deemed a bit of a joke in work, so I wonder what they’d think if I started preaching the book, which is far more extreme than what my colleagues already deem extreme.

Still, if I do turn to anarchy, I’ll blame that ruddy twig!

PS. Enjoy this post’s name-sake embedded at the top of the page: a bit of classic Modest Mouse, before they polished up their act.

Short Film: Forever’s Not So Long

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I’ve always said I couldn’t watch a tv show or film on an iPhone. In fact I’ve said the same about a laptop and a PC monitor. There’s something about watching content on a device you instinctively want to play/work with (whether via a mouse or a touch screen) that in theory doesn’t work for me.

However, after listening to the Pipeline podcast with Garrett Murray as the guest, I wanted to check out a short movie he had made: Forever’s Not So Long (the film is embedded at the bottom of this post).

(As an aside, I found it a really good show this week. As well as a maker of short movies, Garrett Murray is a software developer who creates apps on the side of his day job. I found it quite inspirational)

As my train was delayed by 16 minutes this morning, and as the short film was 12 minutes long, I decided to try watching it on my iPhone 4 whilst standing on the platform.

I have to say, I had no issues doing it. From a technical point of view the bandwidth held up well enough that it didn’t once pause, but more importantly from a personal point of view I found myself getting lost in the film. I’d totally forgotten that I was stood on a cold platform watching it on a tiny screen with earphones in. Who’d a thought it?

Granted, it’s only 12 minutes long, but from my point of view if I can get engrossed within 12 minutes then there is a good chance I can do it with feature-length films too.

The film itself was good. The plot is simply that the lead character knows his city is going to be destroyed in a few hours time, and these are his last few hours. There are some nice touches of humour in it. I especially appreciated the pause as they’re cleaning their teeth, and the smoking news anchor.

“The Retina display just isn’t that interesting”

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The Retina display just isn’t that interesting. Yeah, when you’ve been spending quality time with a super-high-res device like an iPhone 4 or Nexus One, you notice that the iPad screen looks a little fuzzy here and there. But who cares? Not the kazillions of people who are buying iPads.

via ongoing by Tim Bray · Tab Sweep — Technology.

I disagree with this. At least from my point of view, the display quality is a big deal. The only issue I have with the iPad is it’s low resolution, especially after using the iPhone 4.

For me the tablet form factor is great for reading. Unlike a desktop and laptop you can’t create on it (eg. for me that’s programming) but the iPad is great for sitting on the sofa, relaxing and reading with – especially when compared to a laptop or desktop.

I’m finding the nicer the screen though, the more enjoyable the read. So if you buy a device to read with, the display should be a feature and not a ‘could be better’.

The Podcatching Dream (for me at least): Cloud Sync

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I listen/watch podcasts in various ways. Mainly via my iPhone, iTunes on my desktop PC and Boxee on a media PC.

The problem I get is I start listening to a podcast on the way home from work on the phone, but before it finishes I’m home.

I then want to listen to it either on the desktop or on the media player. The problem is, they don’t always know where I’m at in the podcast. Granted, it doesn’t take a huge effort to jump to a certain point in the podcast (ok, it potentially can with Boxee due to it’s streaming nature) but it would be neat if the applications knew where I was in terms of each podcast.

Going from the iPhone to iTunes tends to work following a sync. Although strangely it doesn’t work (for me at least) the other way round.

Boxee is completely out of the loop. To try to get around that I installed iTunes on the media PC (thereby completely ignoring Boxee) and enabled ‘HomeShare’ in iTunes. I was hoping that the two instances of iTunes would pass along the meta data required to know how far into a podcast I was. Nope.

So my ideal, would be a place on the internet/cloud which stores the point at which you’re in a podcast, which any podcast playing software can (and does) read from. As a side effect you’d also have one repository of the podcasts you subscribe to. So next time you find a new podcast to listen to, you don’t have to subscribe to it both in iTunes* and Boxee (they’be both read the list of subscriptions from this central repository). Same for removing them etc.

So far I’ve not found a way to achieve this, and due to the closed nature of iTunes and even ignoring that the sheer amount of work involved, I’m not in a position to develop it either.

* Let me be clear. I don’t think for a second that even if such a service did exist that Apple would support it. Maybe if they provided a means to write plugins for iTunes it could happen.

BBC News – Album price ‘should drop to £1′

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The price of music albums should be slashed to around £1, a former major record label boss has suggested.

via BBC News – Album price ‘should drop to £1′.

As the article states, it would be a huge gamble to take because once you slash prices that far, you can’t go back. But from my experience with Apple’s App store, items that cost insignificant amounts (ie. micropayments) can cause you to spend more.

I unknowingly spent £20+ on apps when we got our iPad in a matter of days. If asked when I got my iPad if I’d be willing to spend that much on apps in a week I’d say no, but with each app costing ~£2.00 I didn’t give each purchase a second thought. £2.00 just isn’t worth giving that second thought about.

God knows how much I’ve spent on iPhone apps since I got it, but I’d bet good money it exceeds the amount I’ve spent on CDs during that time. Buying a CD has become a treat – something I need to decide on whether it’s worth it or not, and something I need to pass by the Mrs – but buying an app is a total non-event.

That said, that total non-event feeling is one reason why I don’t download music illegally. I quite like the fact that when I buy an album, it deserves some attention because I’ve paid a significant amount for it.

As an aside, I wonder at which point in my life £7.99 became a significant amount?!

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Sony MDR-EX38iP Ear Phones used with iPhone 3G and iPod Classic 5th Gen [Updated]

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(Catchy title, I know)

Note: View the 24/04/2011 update at bottom for details on iPhone 4 usage

I’m the sort of person sad enough to seek out reviews of something as mundane as earphones, so it seems fit and fair that I’m also sad enough to write those reviews.

I’ve just purchased a pair of Sony MDR-EX38iP ear phones.

I use my ear phones on a daily basis for music and podcasts, and a bad pair can really frustrate me. Due to a lack of money, now more than ever, purchasing a pair of ear phones is a big risk. Get the wrong pair and I’m stuck with them for months, if not a couple of years.

It’s for that reason that my previous 3 pairs have all been Sony MDR-EX52LPs. I doubt they’re the best, but to me at least they sounded good, fitted in the ear nicely and didn’t do anything annoying (like tug down as I’m walking). Tried and trusted you could say.

However, this morning the latest pair broke. So it was time to seek out a new pair.

The reason I finally took a risk and jumped the EX52LP ship is because – well – two reasons:

  1. The MDR-EX38iP has a remote for the iPhone and iPod.
  2. I’m impatient and didn’t want to go several days with 1 ear’s worth of earphones whilst I wait for Amazon to deliver a pair of EX52LPs (HMV didn’t have them in stock).

The Review

Sound Quality

First off, to my untrained ears the EX38iPI sound comparable to my old EX52LPs – which I consider to be good. I should stress now though, I’m no audiophile. Heck, I can enjoy a 128kbs MP3 as much as a higher rate one. All I can say though is I’ve heard a lot worst than these.

Comfort and the Cable

The earphones fit nicely into my ear. They provide you with three sized earbuds, so there is a good chance one of them will fit nicely. The default ones work for me fine.

I’m sad to say I’ve had some tug when walking around (eg. I can feel the earphone gently pull from my ear. It never comes out, but it’s still annoying). I tend to have the cable under my shirt. Putting on earphones is now part of the getting ready in the morning experience for me. You’re as likely to find me without a shirt as I am without ear phones.

My biggest gripe with the earphones though is that they have equal length cables for left and right earphones (ie. the upper case Y configuration) rather than a short left hand cable with a longer right hand cable coming off that (so it can go behind the neck – ie. the lower case y configuration). I’ve got use to the lower case y configuration and I’m hoping it doesn’t tug down too much. It’s this sort of thing that can make or break a good relationship with your earphones.

iPhone and iPod Compatibility and Remote Control

So if I were Googling these earphones, this is probably what I’d be Googling for: Does the remote work with my device?

For me, the answer is yes and no.

First off, it doesn’t work at all with a 5th Gen iPod Classic.

My iPhone 3G is a little more complex. On the packaging it claims to work with the iPhone 3GS, so I wasn’t hopeful it would work with my 3G. I was more hopeful it would work with my iPhone 4 when I buy it later this year.

In terms of working with the 3G, it has limited functionality:

  • Volume: Doesn’t work
  • Pause/Play: Works
  • Skip Next/Prev Track: Works
  • Voice Over: Doesn’t work

I’ve read that all 4 bullet points work on the iPhone 3GS. I haven’t read anything regarding the iPhone 4.

I’ve yet to try the microphone attached, but if I do I’ll update this post.

I have to say though, even the limited functionality of the remote has been great. I didn’t realise what a chore having to get my iPhone out of my pocket to pause a track/podcast was (#firstworldproblems). The remote sits nicely on the left ear cable, it’s easy to access and you soon learn to use it ‘blindly’.

An ideal feature (although I really wouldn’t expect anyone to implement this) would be the ability to jump back 30 seconds in a podcast.

Conclusion

So overall, I’m pleased with them. The only thing that comes close to a revelation is the joy of the remote. I’m hoping that makes up for the tug I get when walking with them in (snigger).

But I’m not missing my tried and trusted EX52LP yet.

Update (18/11/2010):

Ok, after more use, I have to say I’m not exactly as keen on these as I was when I first wrote this. Everything is fine, except for the fact they pull. I spend half my time walking to work adjusting them, and pulling the cable out from under my coat. I believe this is as a result of the Y configuration of the cable. My hope was that the remote would make up for this, but far from it. I’m quite looking forward to these failing on me so I can truly justify getting a different set.

Update (24/04/2011):

Just a quick update to note that that mic doesn’t work with the iPhone 4 (at least I haven’t been able to get it to work). Shame. However, all other functionality does appear to work.

The iPad – My First Thoughts

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We purchased an iPad on Sunday. It’s been a long time coming, all based on whether we can managed to cash-flow positive months in a row. After some sporadic use (I’m still mostly in that ‘trying everything for around 5 mins and then moving on to the next thing’ stage – ie. not using it in anger) here are some random thoughts (in no particular order):

  • It’s fast. Very fast. This makes it a real joy to use. Unlike my iPhone 3G.
  • It’s working out well for the reason I purchased it: to browse the net on the sofa (Anything else is a bonus)
  • It ‘boots up’ quickly. Or rather, it unlocks quickly. This is in comparison to a laptop (our previous tool for browsing the net on the sofa) coming out of hibernate. This makes it perfect for those “I’ll just check IMDB/Wikipedia” moments.
  • It badly needs ‘profiles’. This isn’t required on an iPhone as it’s a personal device, but with both me and Becky using it, it would be nice if we could both see only our apps, our email etc.
  • Content looks great on it due to the good quality screen. Along with speed, I think a great screen is key to an enjoyable experience with a PC like device.
  • Photo’s look great on the screen. Big bonus for Becky who loves looking at photos, whether they’re of our son or on Facebook.
  • The width of the device seems about right. One thing I’ve noticed since getting a widescreen monitor is that it’s actually easier to read narrow width text. Readability uses this to its advantage. So does the iPad.
  • The extra screen space makes a real difference when compared to the iPhone. Developers have made good use of it I think.
  • The resolution seems low. I imagine it would look shockingly low if compared to an iPhone 4.
  • The battery charge is great. It’s lasting a long time (I compare this to an iPhone 3G though, so, well..)
  • Flipboard is a bit of a let down after all the hype. I think I was expecting too much, or perhaps I just need to spend more time with it. I think combined with Twitter Lists (which it does) it might be a useful app.
  • The Twitter for iPad app is good though.
  • Having Stan (our son) means we can’t always have it at arm’s reach, which is a shame. It would sit nicely on the coffee table we don’t actually own.
  • Works well as a portable podcast viewer. I got some housework done and brought the video podcasts Screen Burn and Gillmor Gang around the house with me.
  • It’s a great sharing device. When Becky sees a photo she likes, she can easily pass it to me, unlike a laptop.

Overall, I love it. That might be novelty speak, but I honestly think I’ll still be using it in 12 months time for the use-cases I purchased it for.

One flaw in the plan though: Becky really likes it too. Part of me was hoping for this. She agreed to spend a large amount of money because she liked the looks of it – which is surprising as tech really isn’t her thing – and it’s refreshing to see her get excited by a piece of technology. So far for her use cases consist of viewing Facebook on the sofa, doing Internet banking on the sofa, finally having a way to view all our photos (hadn’t got around to setting it up for her) and… Angry Birds.

However, the backfire in this plan is that I’m struggling to find the chance to use it. There is more likely a novelty factor at play with Becky than me, but there is a good chance it’s for keeps. If that’s the case, my so-far joking comments of getting a 2nd iPad just so I can use it might become a real request. Not that we could actually afford that.

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Google Instant

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Google Instant is a new search enhancement that shows results as you type.

via Google Instant.

I’m very impressed with Google Instant. I’m always using Google Search in my job (sometimes it feels like I actually Google for a living), so any improvements are very welcome.

I’m already noticing the difference in how I search and how often I search. As searching is now quicker and easier, I’m even more inclined to try a search that I might otherwise have considered more effort than it’s worth. On a related note, as my iPhone 3G is no longer painfully sluggish, I’m now reaching for that much more than I use to (and probably as much as I did before it got painfully sluggish). Basically, the easier, quicker and less painful you make something the more I think you’ll use it.

Google Instant has led me to make www.google.com my ‘new tab page’ in Firefox. It’s been a while since it’s taken that position, as I usually just Google via the address bar. Thanks to the fact they focus the cursor on the search box that’s working really well.

Now there is just one more step I’d like to see from Google and I’ll be happy: Keyboard navigation of their search results.

The introduction of Google Instant means I want this even more than before. It now feels like I’m doing much more keyboard work when searching than before (I’m probably not), and getting quicker results. I naturally want to hit j and k to navigate the results and continue to get to my target site as quick as possible. Instead I’m finding myself refining my search to a ridiculous degree just so I can “feel lucky” and visit the site by hitting down and right when it’s the number one result.

One final thought… it’s a strange, unnatural feeling typing in your search and reaching for the mouse without hitting ‘return’. I get a similar incomplete feeling when I don’t  have a lingering sugar taste resulting from the final bit of a cup of tea (ie. I don’t finish drinking a cup of tea).

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