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Codejunkie
Monologues of a mobile retro coder.
skeezix[at]codejedi.com
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Wed, 09 Apr 2008
A quick post here to bitch up some nagging thoughts. (Life continues to be busy with the packing and so on, but I'll try to post a few things :)
The Apple iPhone does feature an impressive interface, and anyone who suggests otherwise is a hateboi, but that UI really is just the appetizer - when it comes down to it, the main course has to stand on its own. As a long time handheld developer and user I can safely say .. this is typical Apple. Its minimalist and slick, hot and sexy, and when you get right into the gears.. its not as impressive as it looks.
- Non-standard headphones. The iPhone is also an iPod, and a very expensive one, so playing games with the headphone connector just so you can sell your own headphones .. thats just lame. You can play games with the razer blade market because you're going for cheap volume, but when a customer lays down $500 or more for a device, it better work. Wait, isn't Apple's catch phrase "It just works"? *busted*
- iTunes and Syncing; iTunes is the new and hotness supposedly, and as with Apple's "just works" mantra, its supposed to be easy and just do its job. Now, I could flame the living hell out of iTunes (the application) itself but thats an entire book right there (it is badly designed in so many ways, which is very un-Apple). But aside from all of that, you would think they have syncing down. (ie: You flag a bunch of music, videos, your calendar and so forth to go to your iPhone, and it goes over there.) For one computer. I set up the phone at work, synced over some contacts, thought Great! Went home and later tried to send over some video files from my PSP.. no go. How curious.. oh wait -- iTunes requires you to 'erase' your iPhone to sync to another computer. (Apple diehards will suggest iTunes can be set to let you manually manage your files and work around this.. but no so with the iPhone.. other iPods, sure. Extra lame!) So here we have a feature that Palm has been doing for more than a decade (if not well), and iTunes just says 'Nope!' .. lame!
- Workflow -- the iPhone UI is fracking awesome, for sure. But once you start using it, a few of the nits show up -- Palm and Microsoft have done minimal (and ugly) UIs for years, but they have learned something -- making things work with one hand, and minimizing the tap-counts. The actual day to day workflow on the older devices is just smoother. (Not to mention the actual physical keyboards most of the smartphoens have and the iPhone does not.) Granted, Apple is new to the game, but when looking at converting from a Treo to an iPhone, this will stand out. *busted*
- On the other hand, Palm still sucks. I figured I would export vcards and vcals of my Palm information and import it into Windows Addressbook and so forth and sync it into the iPhone. Not so, since Hotsync Manager and/or the handheld will crash when I try to sync the Treo. Fine, I moved the data over to my Palm T|X.. and same. The only success I'm having is to do some evil developer tricks and extract the data through a Palm Simulator. Just peachy.
- Ringtones; as usual, ringtones are the whipping boy -- Apple wants you to pay an extra buck for a ringtone (which is by definition not a whole song even, so shouldn't it cost _less?_). ie: If you already own a song via iTunesMusicStore and want to ringtoneify it, its a buck as I underdstand it. Or $2 if you don't own the song. (God firbid you own the song on a CD or from another service of course.) But you need a custom ringtone, since the built in ones are very quiet, and are basicly generic. *lame*
- Video codecs; the iPhone and iPodTouch are studly video players.. but alas, like most devices, do not play divx. WHY? Again, when people are laying down $500 or more for a device, put the few days of effort it and bring the divx. It annoys the living hell out of me that PSP and iPods and most other devices simply cannot play divx, probably the most common format of downloadable video. Palm and Windows Mobile can do it through free open source players. I mean, OPEN SOURCE. C'mon Apple, Sony etc.. get with the programme and port it. Tip for the wise -- its not a hard port, and probably a licensing issue if anything. Get on it. Frankly, I don't know why one of us devs doesn't jump on it (I would, but I'm busy moving and have a little baby around, so thats my excuse.) *LAME*
- More Apple control issues. As all I know, I hate DRM with a passion - humanity is a species of tinkerers so don't lock us out. Anyway, it appears the iPhone doesn't support the standard bluetooth profile for stereo headphones... unless they're Apple headphones. So non-Apple bluetooth headsets will be in mono. *screw you guys, becuse you screw us*
- Edit: Drive-mode too .. most iPods can plug into USB and work as an external drive/thumbdrive. Not so with the iPhone.. wtf were Apple thinking?
- Edit: So many, it was hard to remember them all -- no 'text hilight'. The virtual keyboard is difficult to get right (maybe with practice?) due to the lack of tactile response from the display and lack of hardkeys to 'feel out.' As such you make lots of mistakes .. and if you're a few letters down it is hard to place a cursor, hard to move the cursor (no left/right cursor motion?) and hard to select a region to keep or ditch. No copy/paste either - wow!
- Edit: No ToDo application (!!) Firs th ing I installed after 'jailbreaking' was a ToDo app (terrible, but then I suppose I am biased in that arena) and some password stores.
- Edit another day: iPhone bluetooth doesn't support anything but headsets; trying to find _SOME_ way to move data from my Treo to my iPhone.. but alas a bluetooth calendar and contact transfer won't be the way. BLOODY HELL they make this hard...... ie: why are we trying? :)
Anyway, so here I sit considering using the iPhone as my mains so I can get a bearing on it for developing applications for Codejedi with it. But right at the onset -- it doesn't work with my headphones, doesn't accept my video files, doesn't sync in multiple locations and so screws up my calendar and address book options. Certainly, trying to migrate from any device to another is hard, but this is extra tedious.
As I've said for a year -- my 3 year old Treo does all these things. Sure its ugly in the UI, but it works. And crashes a lot, but fine, I have a backup tool. (Crom knows what happens when an iPhone crashes hard.)
[ Category: / technology / apple / iphone ] [link] [Comments]