Chapter 9 – Secure Android Messaging
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
Now that I’ve upgraded to a newer Android phone, I’m testing out secure messaging applications for mobile devices.
Open Whisper Systems make two products I’m trying out – TextSecure and RedPhone. They offer secure texting and voice calls, and both products are open source. I’ve replaced my messaging app wigth TextSecure and have a couple of contacts already using it.
Posted on March 11th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
A $35 computer that could change the world…
Barring a significant change in course, history tells us that the computers of tomorrow will be faster, smaller, better and cheaper than the computers of today. We began with warehouse-sized machines that were barely capable of basic algebra, and we’ve arrived at the Raspberry Pi. For those unfamiliar with the term, it’s a full-fledged computer that can fit snugly inside of an Altoids tin, and it costs just $35. Contrast that with the towering beige box that millions of Americans were purchasing from the likes of Dell and Gateway a score ago, and you’ll realize that we’ve come a very long way in a brief period of time.
[more here, via gearpatrol.com ]
Intriguingly, Microsoft has announced that Windows 10 will be available for free through developer channels for the Raspberry Pi.
Posted on February 28th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Moto E Review – a nice cheap Android phone?
I’m looking for a cheap 4-inch android phone with a newer OS, expansion, and decent hardware. There’s a ton of no-name import quad-band phones out there, but when digging deeper into the specifications, find out it’s got a 2 megapixel camera. Or it’s 3G only. Or it’s all plastic.
I read this review of the Moto G, and I’m impressed. My Motorola Atrix 4G which was part of my iPhone to Android experience was a great little phone, and Motorola did some interesting things with their MOTOBLUR interface.
Back to the Moto E — the current incarnation is 3G only, but the 2015 model is a solid feeling, unlocked Android phone running Android OS 4.4, 8 GB of storage, a 5 megapixel camera and selling for $119 for the 3G and $139 for the LTE version.
Posted on February 26th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Dear FCC: Rethink The Vague “General Conduct” Rule
For many months, EFF has been working with a broad coalition of advocates to persuade the Federal Communications Commission to adopt new Open Internet rules that would survive legal scrutiny and actually help protect the Open Internet. Our message has been clear from the beginning: the FCC has a role to play, but its role must be firmly bounded.
Two weeks ago, we learned that we had likely managed the first goal—the FCC is going to do the right thing and reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service, giving it the ability to make new, meaningful Open Internet rules. But we are deeply concerned that the FCC’s new rules will include a provision that sounds like a recipe for overreach and confusion: the so-called “general conduct rule.â€
According to the FCC’s own “Fact Sheet,“ the proposed rule will allow the FCC to review (and presumably punish) non-neutral practices that may “harm†consumers or edge providers. Late last week, as the window for public comment was closing, EFF filed a letter with the FCC urging it to clarify and sharply limit the scope of any “general conduct†provision…
[read more here ]
Posted on February 26th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Android for Work program announced
We’ve all been doing it, to the dismay to some of our bosses: Employees have long been bringing their own devices to work, reading corporate mail on the same phone that also is used to run their favorite games, snap their family photos and browse the web at large. Now, Google wants to legitimize BYOD, as the bring your own device is being called within the industry, by making Android more secure for work.
The company launched a new Android for Work program Wednesday that promises to not only make new and existing work devices more secure, but also bring enterprise-strength security to more than one billion Android handsets and tablets that consumers have acquired on their own. “Every employee should have a work-enabled mobile device in their hands,†said Android for Work Product Management Director Rajen Sheth during a press briefing in San Francisco Wednesday.
The basic idea behind Android for Work is to offer enterprises and their employees a secure area within their Android phones and tablets that can be managed by a company with dedicated policies and easily accessed by a user. For example, users can access a work-specific version of Google’s email client, and then simply switch back to their personal email client. Work apps are visually set apart from personal Android apps through a small suitcase icon.
[via gigaom ]
Posted on February 25th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Chapter 8 – Android OS on Modern Hardware
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
I’ve traded in my Motorola Atrix 4G for a Samsung Galaxy S4 Active. The Atrix 4G is a 4 year-old Android phone with an interesting design that included a dual-core CPU, fingerprint reader, a “webtop” app that let you use it docked like a desktop PC and media center, and a laptop shell that used the phone to drive a keyboard and screen in an ultrabook laptop form factor.
While I liked the form factor (smaller than an iPhone 5, although a bit thicker) and liked the flexibility of being able to load other launchers and the variety of apps available on multiple app stores. I missed a couple of applications that weren’t supported — the Atrix 4G ran Android OS 2.3, a far cry from the current state of the OS.
The Samsung is running Android 4.4.2 on modern hardware – a quad core CPU, HD display. While I still have a soft spot for the Atrix, I’m going to try this out and see how the newer OSes compare. Already in the first few hours of playing with it, a handful of apps installed that wouldn’t work on the Atrix, and while I haven’t found the VIP notification capability on iOS, I can pick separate alert tones for incoming emails from selected contacts.
Posted on February 24th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Chapter 7 – Switching Gears
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
I’ve spent the past two weeks with a 4 year-old Motorola Atrix 4G phone instead of my almost-latest-and-greatest iPhone 5. I started using an iPhone in 2011, about the same time the Atrix was manufactured.
While the comparison was stacked in favor of the latest and greatest iPhone OS, The old AndroidOS showed promise.
Android Wins:
If you like a wide open ecosystem for a computer platform, Android is it. There are several app stores to choose from, and there’s no requirement to settle for one. I chose the Google Play store and the Amazon store and found an astonishing number of free and paid apps. If you make a security setting change to your phone, you can load your own apps by copying them to the system.
Android media support was simple — plug the phone into a computer via USB cable, and drag and drop media onto the phone. Ironically, having to use iTunes over the years forced me to organize my media to the point where copying the files over to an Android phone would be a workable solution.
I bought music during this experiment on Amazon, and unlike the iTunes store, the music is primarily DRM free.
Firefox for Android. I use Firefox at home and at work, and having my bookmarks and environment synchronized across home, work and my phone was helpful.
iOS wins:
Notifications — iOS’s VIP feature is a close approximation to BlackberryOS’ ability to filter what email gets forwarded to your handheld. ActiveSync is an all-or-nothing sync protocol, but with the VIP feature of iOS, you can set up stakeholders in your work life as VIPs, have their email notifications sent to the lock screen and not notify if anyone else emails. This one feature has allowed me to take my weekends back by prioritizing my off-hours contacts.
Connectors – the Lightning cable, while seemingly part of the connector conspiracy, is a nice connector. It’s small, fits either way, and feels solid. Micro-USB, while widely used, is more fragile and more difficult to connect.
Podcasts – iOS comes with a full-featured podcast client and the iTunes store is the largest collection of podcasts. I had to search for an Android podcast client, and didn’t find one that met my needs.
Next, I’m planning on moving my data and plan to a modern Android phone and compare it to its predecessor and to the new iPhone.
Posted on February 18th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 6 – Messaging
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
If you search for the phrase “Can’t receive picture text messages” on the web you’ll find a ton of pages – about 9,000,000, according to Google. I ran into that problem this morning — I could receive text messages, but MMS (Multimedia messaging Services) messages wouldn’t appear. I’d get a box asking me to download the message, then it would time out without downloading the text.
Some pointers suggested turning off wifi, but another suggested checking the APN (Access Point Name) settings. The phones use APN settings to tell it how to connect to the mobile network.
A look at my phone revealed a possible problem — the APN settings pointed to Cingular, a previous incarnation of AT&T wireless. Since this phone is 4 years old, it’s entirely possible that the setting are no longer valid. Another quick trip to Google turned up this page, intended for someone bringing a phone from another carrier to AT&T. I created another APN under Wireless and Networks -> Mobile Network Settings->Access Point names, and set the new one to default. Picture messages now work.
| Smartphones | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Posted on February 15th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 5 – Notifications
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
It took iOS several iterations to get notifications right. When I first moved from a Blackberry to iPhone, there were several instances where my iPhone alarm didn’t go off because I’d received a text message that was waiting acknowledgement.
iOS has configurable notifications for each application, and can include a popup, a message in the notification area or some combination of the two. Either are available when the phone is locked.
Android 2.3 has a notification bar that is available when unlocked, but you have to pull it down from the menu.
I’ve gotten spoiled being able to sit my iPhone up near my desk and use the locked screen meeting/calendar reminders to keep me on schedule. This is something I’ll look forward to testing with of the operating system, as I’ve seen screen shots that look like what I’m looking for.
Posted on February 12th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 4 – Gingerbread
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
I’m trying to do a fair comparison between my year-old iPhone 5 and an Android phone, but a disclaimer would be appropriate — my Android phone is almost 4 years old.
I didn’t want to buy a new phone to start this experiment off, so I thought I’d start with a used phone, learn the environment, see where it came from, and then look at the differences between Gingerbread and the new OS on a new phone.
Google’s “Gingerbread” OS was released in February of 2011, and is still in use on low-end phones manufactured today. While missing some of the features of newer phones, it’s still a viable release. I’ve found versions of most of the programs I use on a day to day basis, Firefox seems to do a good job rendering web pages on the phone, and there are theme add-ons to make Gingerbread look like the newer releases — or iOS if you’re so inclined.
There are some software compatibility issues with Gingerbread; I had to do a search to find OneNote 2010 and side-loaded it onto the phone; OneNote 2013 wouldn’t run on it. Dropbox wouldn’t either, but I can work around that. Snapseed, my favorite iOS photo editing app wouldn’t load, either.
Posted on February 12th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 3 – Sync
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
Being able to bring my contacts, calendar items, notes and tasks into my phone is what makes it a Smart Phone. Android uses ActiveSync to connect to Exchange mail servers, and the capabilities are on par with other ActiveSync clients like iPhones and the new Blackberry phones. With it, my mail is synchronized, as are my contacts, address lists and calendar items.
I looked at my phone this afternoon, needed to pull up some information I had saved in my Outlook notes and remembered that ActiveSync doesn’t support notes. iPhones don’t support notes via ActiveSync – there’s a feature in iTunes to sync notes.
I found a program called Tasks and Notes for Exchange, which offers notes sync as well as offering support for David Allen’s Getting Things Done methodology, outlined in the book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
My phone is a Motorola Atrix 4G
The MusicLink service appeared to be a way to sync music from iTunes to the phone. it’s been replaced by MOTOCAST, which also appears to be down; the domain is valid but there’s nothing there. The Music app is hardcoded to look to podcast.com for content, and there’s only a handful of podcasts listed. The domain is for sale. I’m reminded of online ghost towns like Myspace and Tribe.net — the servers are plugged in and online but no one’s there.
Android phones shine when connecting to Google services, I’ll document setting up my personal accounts to sync to the phone in a later post.
Apple has a thriving store for all content and can sync all content from Outlook either directly through ActiveSync or through iTunes.
WINNER: Apple.
Posted on February 11th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 2 – Hardware Standards
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
The first step to getting my phone up and running was to move the SIM card from my iPhone to my Android phone. My iPhone uses a Nano-SIM, while the Android phone takes an industry standard SIM card. While the smaller size might allow Apple to make a smaller phone, it’s still the same thickness (which seems to me to be the more important dimension when designing a phone).
Luckily, there are inexpensive SIM card adapters; I bought a set on a popular internet auction site. While the correct height and width, the combination of the adapter and SIM were too thick to fit in the phone; a careful sanding with 180 grit sandpaper and thorough cleaning fixed that.
Next came headphones. Amazon makes a great ear bud headset, but the controls don’t work on an iPhone. Nor, apparently, do they work on an older Android phone. iPhone ear pod headset phone controls work, but media volume controls don’t. Non-branded headsets seem to work just fine.
The Android phone uses an industry-standard USB cable. One cable works for my MyFi wireless box, bluetooth headset, external battery and phone. One thing that frustrated me with the iPhone was its ability to reject non-certified cables and adapters. I’ve used a variety of car and wall chargers and a handful of USB cables with no complaints.
The battery on my phone may be suspect, but I don’t have enough experience with it to know if the battery is degraded. New replacement batteries are under $5 on eBay. The iPhone lacks a user-replaceable battery.
WINNER: Android.
Posted on February 9th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Episode 1 – Making the Switch to Android
This is a series of blog posts documenting my switch from iPhone to Android. To read the whole exciting saga, click here.
I’ve been an iPhone user for several years. I like Apple’s application support, and I’ve learned to work around the quirks in iTunes, the quirky support for Outlook connectivity and ActiveSync, and quirks with reminders and alarms that I never had a problem when I carried a Blackberry.
Back in my Blackberry/WinAMP days, I kept my music arranged by folders and didn’t pay attention to metadata. iTunes made a mess of things and I spent the better part of a couple of years adding metadata to my music files – including album artwork, using programs to scrape lyric sites to add lyrics to songs, adding genre information, learning how to make a compilation of 300 songs by 300 artists show up as a compilation instead of 300 1 song listings…
I’ve spent a lot of time working around the Apple ecosystem, and wanted to see how Google does things with Android. I picked up an older Android phone from work and will document my findings here. I’ll need to migrate my music to my new phone, migrate personal applications to Android, come up with a photography workflow with equivalent apps to what I have on iPhone and migrate my work email, contacts, tasks and chat/IM to the new phone.
I’m using a Motorola Atrix 4G for my Android phone experiment. The phone was pretty impressive in 2011, but showing signs of age in 2015.
| Modes |
WCDMA 850 / 1900 / 2100
GSM 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 |
| Weight | 4.77 oz  (135 g) |
| Dimensions | 4.64″ x 2.5″ x 0.45″Â Â (118 x 64 x 11.4 mm) |
| Battery | Talk: 9 hours max.  (540 minutes) Standby: 250 hours max.  (10.4 days) 1930 mAh LiIon, Removable |
| Display | Type: LCD (Color TFT/TFD) Resolution: 540 x 960 pixels 4″ Â diagonal Colors: 16.7 million (24-bit) |
| OS / Platform | Android version 2.2/2.3 |
| Processor | 1 GHz dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 AP20H |
| Memory | 16 GB internal storage, raw hardware 1 GB RAM |
| SIM card size | Traditional / Mini (2FF) |
| FCC ID | IHDP56LS1 » (Approved Jan 20, 2011) IHDP56LS2 » (Approved May 25, 2011) |
Posted on February 9th, 2015 in blog | No Comments »
Crossbar
Posted on January 21st, 2015 in digital, iphoneography | No Comments »
Muted
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Big Top
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Faded Door
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Graffiti 66
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Windmill/Moon
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Rock Dali
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