[OT] Was: totally satisfied :D

[Steven Schveighoffer]

On Tue, 25 Sep 2012 01:55:54 -0400, Nick Sabalausky  
<SeeWebsiteToContactMe at semitwist.com> wrote:

> On Mon, 24 Sep 2012 21:52:05 -0400
> "Steven Schveighoffer" <schveiguy at yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> There is a master volume control.  It has two volumes, on and off, and
>> it's called the silent switch ;)
>>
>
> Calling that a master volume control is a stretch.

Yeah I know.  But it's about the closest thing you can get to a physical  
master volume on the iPhone.

>> >> They aren't?  They make complete sense to me.  You even admit that
>> >> it makes sense to have find my iphone play its alerts as loud as
>> >> possible.
>> >
>> > No, only the "find iPhone" one. The iPhone has no fucking idea what
>> > environment I'm in. I *definitely* don't want it screeching "PAY
>> > ATTENTION TO MEEEE!!!!" indiscriminately whenever it damn well feels
>> > like it.
>>
>> When does it do that?
>>
>
> I thought you were just saying that the iPhone plays it's alerts as
> loud as possible?

The only alert which is not played at the set ringer volume that I know of  
is the find-my-iphone alert (which I think you agree makes sense).  All  
the other alerts (alarm, message notification, timer expired, etc.) play  
at the ringer volume.

>
>>
>> I just discovered through testing that timer has the same feature as
>> alarm.  I find that incorrect.  If I have the silent switch enabled,
>> the timer should just vibrate.
>>
>> In fact, I don't think there's a way to make the timer "just vibrate"
>> in any way.  That's counter-intuitive and I will agree with you on
>> that one.
>>
>
> Yea, see there's just too much "surprise" involved, IMO.

To me, that is not a critical issue.  I've had an iPhone since June of  
2010, and I didn't even realize this until now (and I use my iPhone for  
pretty much everything).  But if you are *looking* for problems, this  
certainly was not as well thought out as the other sounds.

>> I have seen strange things there, sometimes a photo/video comes in
>> rotated (I see it pass by the Windows photo import preview), but then
>> when I look at the photo in Explorer, it's correctly rotated.
>>
>
> I'm looking at the photos on my iPhone through Explorer right now and
> aside from the screenshots, the majority of them are either sideways or
> upside-down.

Wait, did you *download* them?  Or are you just browsing via the USB  
cable?  When you download them via the camera import feature of Windows (I  
think XP has that), it corrects the rotation.  I have no idea why it waits  
until then.

> The bizarre thing is, when I look at them through "Photos" on the
> device itself, it actually shows them all correctly. Which means that
> the device *knows* how they're supposed to be but doesn't bother to
> actually save them correctly.

I don't think the photos are meant to be browsed that way.  See this  
thread here https://discussions.apple.com/message/16514340#16514340

I think explorer must not be using the rotation field (seems odd), but the  
camera import rotates the picture on import.

>
> Doesn't protect the lens though, and it doesn't provide a physical
> button which would obviate the need to hijack the volume button. (It
> *is* at least a little better than not being able to access the camera
> from the lock screen at all.)

Weren't you the one advocating a case?

And the hijacking of the button, as I said before, is a misfeature.  It  
doesn't really hurt, but it's too poorly positioned to be useful IMO.

>> I have to say, this is one of the better improvements, especially with
>> those of us who have kids.
>>
>
> Yea, one-size-fits-all design :/

Oh, it was annoying when the kids were doing something cute, and you have  
to type in your code to unlock, then go find the camera app, wait for it  
to load (I think they actually improved the load time too) and by that  
time, it was over.  One of the perks of having a camera on your phone is  
you always have it with you.

> That said, I do like to use "kids" as an argument for having an
> OS-level "disable software eject" option for optical drives. ;)  "Ok,
> I'll just leave that to burn..." Walk away. It finishes and ejects. Kid
> waddles by. "Ohh, a pretty shiny object! Should I eat it or flush it?"

Or use it as a frisbee :)  Then you can damage two things at once!

>> While viewing a photo, tap the screen to bring up the controls.  Click
>> "Edit" (upper right corner), then you can rotate the photo.  Don't
>> think you can do the same with a video.
>>
>> Don't think I agree that an Edit button on the main photo viewing
>> screen is not realistically discoverable.
>>
>
> I don't see any rotate there:
>
> http://semitwist.com/download/img/shots/IMG_0859.PNG
>
> I just see the "Back" button then...umm "Do a Magic Trick?" (WTF?),
> then I'm guessing maybe "Anti-Red-Eye", and...ok, I'm pretty sure that
> last one's crop, I remember seeing it in one or two image editing
> programs.

The "back button" is the rotate.  I agree it's not very well drawn, it  
should be more like a quarter-turn and less snazzy (just a quarter circle  
arrow would be better).

The button on the top that says "Cancel" is actually the back button.

Besides, I don't think rotating that picture will help much ;)

>
> Android has an actual button for "Settings". Much easier to discover
> (despite not actually saying "settings" - or anything at all, really).
> And easier to use since it usually brings up a list of real words
> unlike the contrived hieroglyphs used throughout most of Android and
> iOS.
>
> Or...at least the older Androids did. The damn newer ones replaced the
> few buttons it used to have with on-screen touch abominations. At
> least, for the buttons they didn't eliminate outright in their quest to
> clone the iPhone misfeature-for-misfeature. The settings button might
> have been one of the ones they killed off entirely, I don't remember
> offhand.

My brother has an android with dedicated buttons, but they are part of the  
touch screen (they aren't displayed, they are inlays, but are part of the  
whole touch sensitive screen).  They misfunction sometimes, and it  
annoys.  He wishes they were real buttons.

I can't deny that the home button is overused for things, and it would  
make more sense to have a dedicated menu button.  It's not like there's no  
room on the bottom of the phone...

>> >> So no, I'm not a MAC person, I'm a Unix/Linux person.  But Mac
>> >> seems to have done Unix better than Linux :)
>> >
>> > That was never my impression with macs. For example, I'll take even
>> > a mediocre linux GUI over Finder/etc any day. I don't understand why
>> > mac...*users*...inevitably have such trouble with the idea that
>> > someone could actually dislike it when it's (apperently) so
>> > objectively wonderful.
>>
>> Finder could be better, but Nautilus sucks.  I'd rather use command
>> line than Nautilus.  And actually, I did :)
>>
>
> I agree Nautilus sucks (and back in the day, it was bloated as hell,
> too).  Best one I've found on Linux is Dolphin, and I'm not real big on
> that either. Out of all of them, Finder is easily still my least
> favorite though. I actually *liked* one of the views it had (the
> multi-column one) until I actually started using it firsthand.

That is the default, and I absolutely love it.  However, only with my  
trackpad, where I can easily scroll horizontally.

I really would like to have a folder view on the left though, for copying  
files like in Windows.  You know how you can open the directory you want  
to copy from, then go find the folder you want to copy to, but not open  
it, and just drag the files?  That is perfect.  With Finder, I have to  
drag the file to "Documents" shortcut, then wait until it pulls that up,  
then go navigating through subdirectories while holding down the button.

>> However, I think Finder is only usable once you force it to show you
>> all hidden files.  It pisses me off royally when an OS decides I
>> don't know enough to allow me to see hidden files.
>>
>
> Yea, "Show hidden files" is one of the first things I do when I install
> a new OS. And "Show my f*** extensions" on windows.

Hells yeah!  It always strikes me as comical that MS created that  
"feature" and it created a whole class of openme.txt.exe viruses.  Yet  
instead of just removing that misfeature, they built legions of extra  
CPU-consuming mail filtering and anti-virus software to prevent people  
 from having any files with multiple extensions, only to piss off people  
who tried to use .tar.gz files :)

It never seemed to bother *anyone* in DOS or Windows 3.1, I think that was  
a huge design mistake.

>> >> It was an example.  But it was one that I noticed right away coming
>> >> from Ubuntu with Unity.  Unity tries to be very MAC-like,
>> >
>> > That's why switched to Debian for my linux stuff instead of
>> > upgrading to the newer Ubuntus, and also why I'm not moving to
>> > Gnome 3. Too much Apple-envy for my tastes.
>>
>> For my VMWare image for work, I chose Linux Mint with the default
>> GUI, and it works pretty well.  I like it better than Unity.
>>
>
> I don't know what Mint uses, but I always thought Unity was a bit of a
> misstep for Canonical. It's like Canonical pulling a "Metro".

I liked unity at first, and I like the design of it.  But it doesn't work  
right, because apps are not built to use it.  That was my point.

Looked it up, Mint has two shells, MATE and Cinnamon.  I think I settled  
on MATE, the start menu was like the best of both XP and Win7.

See here:  http://www.linuxmint.com/pictures/screenshots/katya/menu.png

That's a couple versions back, but start menu looks reasonably the same.

>> But I must say, the expensive hardware (quad-core i7) kicks the pants
>> off of any other machine I've ever used.
>>
>
> I recently moved from a 32-bit single-core XP to a 64-bit dual-core
> Win7 (don't remember exactly what CPU, but it's Intel and newer/faster
> than the Core 2 Duo). Video processing is waaay faster, compiling C++
> is slightly faster, and everything else I do is...pretty much the same.
> All of it already ran fine on the old system, so there's not much left
> for this one to improve on speed-wise.

I think my old laptop was centrino with "hyperthreading"  (it was that  
old).

It doesn't hurt that I doubled my mac to 8GB of ram, especially in the  
VMWare dept. :)

>> No, this is a multi-touch pad, not a synaptics touchpad (on most
>> standard laptops).  Way different. The best feature is the 2-finger
>> scroll.  Don't know how I lived without that!
>>
>
> Multitouch is standard on all laptops these days, including mine. In
> fact, this does 2-finger scroll, too (I did it just now), and has a
> bunch of other gestures including 3-finger ones, and all totally
> configurable.

Oh, that's cool!  I didn't know.  I know that I've seen HPs where the  
"buttons" were just drawings on the touchpad.  But they sucked, didn't  
always work right.  And then if you wanted to hold down the button while  
scrolling, didn't work at all.

Must be they got it right by copying apple :)  Or maybe apple copied them,  
I don't know.

> Two-finger scroll is ok, but personally I *much* prefer the
> "circular"-motion scrolling (forget what they call it) - it's actually
> just about as good as a scroll wheel.

What I like about the 2-finger scroll is that it goes all 4 directions,  
it's like panning.  And I don't have to move my finger to a certain spot.

>
>> And I've tried Apple's magic mouse, it sucks.
>
> Is that the one they had five or ten years ago as a "two-button scroll
> mouse" but was touch-sensitive instead of having actual mouse buttons?
> I've only come across one person who ever liked it - and it definitely
> wasn't me.

It has no buttons or visible delineations, you have to just "know" that if  
you click on a certain spot (and you better not have your other fingers  
down) that it will be the correct mouse button.  Not my cup of tea.

If you swipe one finger, it scrolls.

My biggest gripe is that it was very uncomfortable to hold.

And this was after using it for about 30 minutes.

Compare that to the trackpad where you click with two fingers down for  
right-click.  In fact, the trackpad supports way more gestures, and gives  
you a large surface to use.

When I do get an iMac (need to save up some more), I will be opting for  
the trackpad instead of the MM.

>> No, that's not what I'm saying.  I'm saying basing your perception of
>> a new product on your experience with another product from the same
>> brand is not always objective.  And that's not always a bad thing --
>> there's a reason humans learn from their experience.  I never said
>> what's "popular" is good, that's BS.  I'm saying past experiences
>> bias our decisions (all of us, myself included).  I sure as hell will
>> *never* buy another motorola bluetooth headset again.
>>
> [...]
>>
>> Saying you don't like something because it's popular (not saying you
>> are saying that) is *still* an opinion driven by popularity!
>
> All fine, but I don't see how any of it leads you to conclude that I'm
> dismissing Apple products on account of them being from Apple.

Your posts seem to always include a general disdain of all things Apple  
(frankly, all things "new technology").  It's hard to separate the cause  
 from the effect...

I apologize if I was too assuming.

>>
>> I personally will *never* sign up for facebook (sorry Andrei), and
>
> Bizarrely enough, I likely will, but only because these
> multiplayer-enabled mobile games (I'm working on one - hopefully it
> won't suck *too* bad) apparently need (for some definition of
> "need" ;) ) to support facebook-based login these days. So I gotta be
> able to test it.

Hehe.  I almost always immediately delete an app that won't let me proceed  
without logging in to facebook.  There is no reason for that, unless it,  
um... is the facebook app :)  There is a general assumption by many  
applications/websites that *everyone* uses facebook.  I refuse to pretend  
that I have 800 "friends".  I have friends, I know who they are.  I don't  
need to know what's going on with them every second of the day.

Besides, my wife is on facebook, and if any important news happens via FB,  
she'll tell me :)

-Steve