geoff – Page 10 – Geoff Arnold's Blog

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery – unattributed copying, not so much. Keywords: evil, religion, Android

If you are reading this at geoffarnold.com (directly or via RSS feed), you can ignore it. Nothing to see here, move along, etc.
However there is a good chance that you’re seeing this text in some other blog or feed. There are many sites which monitor blogs for posts meeting certain criteria and then repost them, in whole or in part. I find that most of them cue off the “Atheist” in my tag line (or the fact that this blog is include in many atheist blog-rolls); others scan the posting for keywords like “Android” or “smartphone”.
None of this should be surprising, so why am I even bothering to write this? Well, I just came across a blog which reproduced an entire posting of mine (minus the formatting, links, and Creative Commons license) without any attribution whatsoever. The site in question is “In God We Lust dot com”. (I’m not including the actual URL; you can work it out.) I decided to write this posting simply to see how mindless the scraping bot is at that site. I’m including a statistically improbable phrase – strontium warhorse eaters – to make it easy to search for non-attributing scumbags.
So if you’re reading this and you don’t see a link back to geoffarnold.com, you now know what kind of site you’re looking at.
[UPDATE, 12 hours later] Looks like this scraper site is even more dumb than I thought. It’s pulling stuff off PlanetAtheism (which reposts my stuff with attribution) and reposting it twice. And it is possible to get back to my site: the link looks like a PlanetAtheism FeedBurner, but through some kind of magic it leads back to my original.
Speaking of PlanetAtheism, I would prefer it if they would post excerpts, with clear links, rather than reproducing full articles. I don’t rely on advertising, but many people do.

Evil defaults: Google+ on Android handsets

As I mentioned earlier, I have acquired an Android phone, complete with lots of Google apps. I have also signed up for Google+, and I’ve been getting regular alerts from Google (via the red box at the top right of various pages) of new friend requests and other stuff.
This morning, Kate and I went with some friends to a winery. While there, I snapped a number of photos on my Android phone, as one does.
This afternoon, I visited Google Reader to check out some blogs, and it alerted me to the fact that I had some Google+ updates. To my surprise, the “update” was an uploaded library of the pictures I’d taken this morning. Yes, the library was still unshared, but WTF?!?!

Why did it do this?

When did it do this?

Did the phone wait until I was connected by WiFi, or did it use some of my (capped) 4G bandwidth to upload the pictures? (And was this one source of my unexpected battery drain?)

Eventually I discovered a Google + app settings screen that I had never seen before, which confirmed that the app was configured to upload all photographs over any available data connection, cellular or WiFi. I reconfigured it immediately to upload only on demand, and only over WiFi.
So if you own an Android phone, and you’ve joined Google +, I strongly urge you to check the settings for the Google+ app on your phone. It could be uploading all of your photos, wasting bandwidth and depleting your battery. This strikes me as a very stupid default configuration.

Changing my religion? Well, not really…

On September 12, 2007, I bought my first iPhone. At the time, I described the move as “inevitable”. Over the next few years I upgraded, first to the iPhone 3G and then to the iPhone 4. And I loved them all.
But a couple of weeks ago, I switched. One year to the day after getting my iPhone 4, I visited my local AT&T store and bought a Samsung Infuse 4G. And since I did this, many people have asked me the same two questions: “Why?” and “What’s it like?”
First, why. In a word, curiosity. I wanted to see what things were like outside Apple’s walled garden; to experience the chaos of competition in handset design, carrier features, and application delivery channels. I had used an Android G1 while traveling in China, and I’d found it intriguing and quite capable. I was fascinated by the attempts by Samsung, HTC, and Motorola to push the technical boundaries in such areas as screen technology, multicore CPUs, 4G wireless, batteries, and cameras.
I might have been more reluctant to make the move except for the fact that I wasn’t going to be giving up the iOS world entirely. I still have my iPad, so I can still run almost all of the apps that I had become used to. And where it counts I’m as much of an Apple fanboy as ever: I still live my life on a MacBook Air and an iMac, running MacOS X Lion (and testing iCloud). My work machine is a top-of-the-line MacBook Pro. So in a sense this represents addition rather than substitution.
One other point: unlike my heavily-hacked G1, I decided not to unlock the Infuse. I wanted to be able to use it for corporate email without violating company security policies…
So what’s it like?

It’s big. 5.15 x 2.77 x 0.36 inches. It works for me, but several people have said that it’s too big to fit comfortably in the hand.
The screen is big and gorgeous, though it washes out badly in sunlight.
It’s noticeably less stable than the iPhone. I’ve had to reboot it at least once a week.
There are several stupid “features”, mostly due to Samsung. When you put it in the charger cradle, it automatically beeps and starts a fancy cradle app with lots of colourfulwidgets. You can turn off the screen, which reduces the distraction. However when the battery finishes charging, the phone beeps and turns on the display, with a message to remind you to unplug the charger. This is intensely annoying at, say, 2AM. And that’s about the time that recharging finishes, because…
… battery life sucks. That is to say, I can just about get through a full day on a charge as long as I don’t do much with the phone. However, since I use it for reading personal and work email, and for managing my calendar, I usually find that the charge icon is orange by the end of the afternoon. I’ve reluctantly bought an extra charging cradle for use at work…
It’s chatty. Lots of notifications all the time; lots of background processing going on.
Some of the major apps are horribly intrusive. The Facebook app seems to take over various media types, preventing me from playing music or videos. UNINSTALL. Skype wouldn’t just restrict itself to handling explicit requests; instead it tries to take over regular telephone functions, like dialing from my contacts. (This “feature” interacts horribly with my car’s BlueTooth phone feature.) UNINSTALL.
Integration with MS Exchange Email and Calendaring at work is better than the iPhone. I’m using the built-in software; I didn’t bother to explore any add-on email clients.
When I can get 4G coverage from AT&T, this sucker is fast. Very nice. And it’s a slightly better telephone than the iPhone 4.

More anon.

Expectations

I was looking over a business plan for a software startup, and I was struck (more accurately, startled) by the fact that it did not mention “open source” anywhere.
Once I’d got past my surprise, I realized that I couldn’t immediately tell which of two explanations was correct:

No reference to open source because the project was not going to involve any open source activities.
No reference to open source because, well, OF COURSE they were doing open source – how could anyone assume anything else?

Testing the Android WP client

Nothing to see here for now. But I am planning to reactivate this blog.

Laureles Grade

Last Sunday I achieved a 20 year ambition.
Many years ago my in-laws moved to Carmel Valley in California. Their house was about 15 miles from Carmel, east of Carmel Valley Village. Over the years I visited them many times, and got to know all of the different routes to their house. And to get there from Salinas, or to avoid traffic around Monterey, the key was Laureles Grade: a 5.6 mile road over a 1200 ft. ridge between the Monterey-Salinas Highway and the Carmel Valley Road.
It’s not a particularly fast road – the posted limit is 55, but it’s too twisty to work up much speed, and it’s easy to get stuck behind a slow vehicle. And the scenery is unremarkable, except for a brief vista of Salinas. But it’s a driver’s road. The experience of driving it fast, with concentration and precision, is immensely rewarding. And I know that it isn’t just me. The northern end of the grade is just a couple of miles from the Laguna Seca race track, and on race weekends, or around the time of the ~~Monterey Historics~~ Motorsports Reunion, you’ll see many new and classic sports cars on the grade, from Porsches to Ford GT40s to a certain replica Jaguar D-type.
I loved driving the Grade, but there was always a problem. I lived in Massachusetts, so whenever I visited California I drove a rental car. I had some nice cars back east, including a pretty little Mazda Miata and an AWD turbo Subaru Legacy GT which could go through any turn as if it was on rails, but I never got to drive any of them over the Grade. And the rentals were all the kind of car that a corporate travel department would approve of…
A few months ago, just after Christmas, I finally got to drive the Grade in a car of my own: my Toyota Prius. Now the Prius has many admirable qualities, but handling is not one of them. As I blogged at the time, it wasn’t fun, and shortly afterwards I replaced the Prius with a Hyundai Genesis Coupe. 3.8L, RWD, 300+HP, loads of fun.
Last weekend we drove down to Carmel to attend a wonderful musical event: a reunion of Al Stewart and Peter White, the guitarist who accompanied Al on many of his biggest hits, complete with band. It was a great show, and we stayed overnight in Carmel. On Sunday morning we were trying to decide what to do, and how much time we could spare before I had to get home to work. We were thinking about Point Lobos, or bird-watching at Moss Landing, or maybe an early lunch in Santa Cruz… and then Kate made a simple suggestion: “Let’s drive over the Grade in the new car.”
So we did.
And it was magical.

The week's twitterings – 2011-04-03

Finally got around to seeing K-Pax. Now I understand why people (quietly) raved about it…. #
“@reillyusa: @jamesurquhart And the woman that runs it could frighten a drunk cowboy.” < That sounds like a compliment! #
Why is everyone misunderstanding the EC2 announcement? It's "unshared", not "dedicated". Just another QoS feature, not "un-cloudy". Sheesh!! #
Words of wisdom: Om Malik on Why There Are No Second Chances on the Internet http://t.co/KaUndAs #
Here's a powerful piece by Eric MacDonald which comprehensively demolishes the (incoherent) concept that "God is love": http://t.co/DcX4Y3Q #
“@alecmuffett: "You have a cryptographic failure, and then the terrorists take advantage of it and then there's a bomb…"” < said who? pwc? #
Everyone who wants @Skype to fix the dysfunctional UI in Skype 5 , please retweet this piece by @lkm http://t.co/nXHPCgW via @tidbits #

The week's twitterings – 2011-03-27

Comprehensive fisking by Dr. Jim of Isbell's weird paper in Bib&Interp attempting to reconcile Genesis with science. http://t.co/PCCAXRo #
AT&T buys T-Mobile USA for $39B http://t.co/rrLL7C8 Will this give me cheap roaming access to T-Mobile voice & hotspots in Europe? #
IaaS: private cloud == public (a box is a box is a box). PaaS: not so simple: lots of coupling into SW lifecycle, edge svcs, change mgmt… #
NEWSWEEK gave 1,000 Americans U.S. Citizenship Test—38 percent failed. http://shar.es/3QPb5
Including Michelle Bachmann & Sarah Palin? #
Following @adrianco I've just claimed my @PeerIndex profile, check it out http://pi.mu/2wwA #
Your tax dollars at work: http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/03/what-corporate-welfare-looks-like.html #
From @ThisIsSethsBlog The real risks and costs: nuclear, oil, coal. Meanwhile the media obsesses over Japanese reactors #
Fukushima scaremongers becoming increasingly desperate http://reg.cx/1Np5
Commonsense stuff. But hysteria sells, so it's not going away #
In contrast to the Register piece I just linked, here's how NOT to talk about Fukushima – no numbers, vague language. http://t.co/6u6Mfu8 #
Streaming video of Aussie GP P3 on @Formula1onSpeed works well. No commentary, but I can watch @sarahholtf1 and @willbuxton tweeting… #
Ouch. Liuzzi's HRT finally sets off, and parks after four corners #
“@davewiner: Bob Herbert's last NYT column. http://t.co/4jaQ2PK” < Very, very true. Time to s/plutocracy/democracy/g #
Just grabbed the music for the new ballet by the Pet Shop Boys & Javier De Frutos: The Most Incredible Thing. See http://t.co/fz1DkCv #
After one saccharine VALUES commercial after another during the Australian GP, I was longing for someone to try to sell something to me! #

The week's twitterings – 2011-03-20

Watched "My Fair Lady" (1964) and "Pygmalion" (1938) back-to-back. Surprised by how closely the musical followed Shaw's screenplay… #
Of course the original was much better than the musical – tighter, wittier, better cast (except for Stanley Holloway) #
People keep saying Fukushima "is now the second worst nuclear accident". This is wrong: the worst was Chernobyl, second worst was Windscale. #
Running into guest wifi issues, but Personal Hotspot on my iPhone works well with my MacBook Air. Time to dump my 3G USB dongle. #
“@ipaxer1: When the solution is simple, God is answering. Albert Einstein” < For some purely metaphorical value of "God", that is… #
Curious why they're not using robot/remote systems at the Japanese reactors. Japan was working on search & rescue robots 10 yrs ago #
Visions of C3PO dragging a very long firehose up to a fuel storage pond… #
Nice piece on the true meaning of elasticity in the cloud http://t.co/P1znlxl #
Just OCR'd a scan of an old article by my mother. Discovered http://t.co/oWvjioG which made it a breeze (and free). #satisfiedcustomer #
I love reading xkcd on the visualization of complex information. This time it's radiation: http://t.co/MYBtX9H #
This is priceless!!! Blowback Mountain? Idaho to Train Saudi Airforce – http://goo.gl/tFCjd #
Just changed my Netflix account to streaming only; now it keeps nagging me about stuff available only on DVD. Any way to turn this off? #
QOTD from Christopher Hitchens: "Once you know that Christians call themselves a flock, you already know enough about this religion." #
Strange sense of satisfaction: completing theTop Gear "Where's Stig?" game on my iPad. I think I need to get out more… #
Intriguing Netflix recommendation (two of them, actually) http://twitpic.com/4b8nm5 #

The week's twitterings – 2011-03-13

“@mfeathers: In the new world, Cobol is Ruby and Fortran is Python.” And in the NEW new world, Java is Node.js. All hail JaveScript! #
Wish I could spare the time for #ccevent – it's just around the corner! – but at least I'll be at the Rackspace party on Tuesday #
“@jimgris: shit” Really? Whazzup? #
“@geoffarnold: “@jimgris: shit” Really? Whazzup?” < Never mind: I see. Tho it's not on earthquake.usgs.gov yet #
“@timhaines: Tsunami has hit.” <Where? http://t.co/QYijwQL is current Pacific warning/schedule #
Just bought our tickets for Al Stewart+Peter White in Carmel on May 7. (My first Al concert was in Windsor, in 1968!) #
"No responsibility" in 21st century USA http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2011/03/another-swat-raid-gone-wrong.html #
Must-read by nay-sayers: @adrianco on How not to build a Private Cloud http://t.co/E7BhRHh #
De Condimentis: Butter. Wonderful stuff! http://j.mp/h8BRHB via @AddToAny #
Glorious example of tea-party ignorance. (Most of them probably couldn't even pass a naturalization exam.) @dailydish – http://t.co/iJCKkyt #
“@myinnervoice: Read comment #6 How not to build a Private Cloud http://t.co/nDQaO0z” <Why? The comment makes no sense. #