I made it into Google+…first impressions

Today I finally got into Google+ after trying to catch the invite windows. I’d been sitting on 2 invites since day one, but never managed to hit registration when it was unlocked. Today that all changed, and now I get to experience what other techies have been on about.

My first impressions:

• UI – an emphatic +1. I’ve already changed my gmail theme to ‘Preview (dense)’ because I love the clean simplicity and minimalism; beyond that everything is beautiful and make excellent use of HTML5, CSS3, and all those other web goodies to provide a beautiful interface.
• UX – again, an emphatic +1. Here, I would have to use the word ‘graceful’ to describe their use of HTML5, CSS3, et al to provide an exceptional user experience. Nothing is in your face about its activity; but the more you look, the more you see.
• Circles – I like this implementation of what many are calling Facebook Groups. Other than the lovely way of implementing your groups, the UI provides for much better control and understanding of both your own Circles, as well as the Circles that you have been added to. +1 from me.
• Hangouts – the hangouts interface is smooth. An intuitive, clean interface that doesn’t beg for lots of assistance. It just gets down and does what it’s meant to do. I’ll have to wait til I’m at a real computer (with a web-cam), but then I’m all up for some serious testing of this.
• Chat – pretty much just the same as Gmail Chat from my first look. That said, gmail chat is a good IM client anyway, so all good.
• Photos – again, the interface is well implemented. I’ll need to have a decent play over the next few days, but I can’t say I expect to be disappointed at all.

It’s pretty obvious that the word-of-mouth surrounding Google+ and the features it is offering forced Facebook’s hand and made them bring forward the “awesome announcement” that they were integrating Skype into their framework. However, it already makes them look like they’re playing catch-up to Google+; as XYZ said the other day: “they aren’t the first to integrate video calling with social, MySpace did it in 2007, but now it’s the right timing for the product”. Google+ seems to have opened the gate first, if only by a couple of days. Facebook is already having to justify why their implementation is better (“most people only want to use person-to-person”).

The converse is also true though, as it seems Google+ is already fast-forwarding their Beta schedule and allowing more and more invites to be cashed in. This is possibly in response to Facebook’s moves; or, it could just be a response to public demand and the quality performance of Google+ internally for Google. They would much rather offer a schedule of months, and deliver in days or weeks, than the other way around. This is afterall the Google who still had gmail in beta 5 years after launch, but had been fully open to the public for 2 and 1/2 years of that 5 years (Wikipedia).

I’m going to be having a dive into the features as much as possible this weekend, I can’t wait. Here’s a vid:

embedding a dynamic map of foursquare check-ins into your website

I’ve just been working with embedding foursquare locations in a website, and displayed on a map. After a bit of a fiddle around, I’ve come up with, what I think is, a very simple and dynamic solution. Simply go to http://foursquare.com/feeds/ and get your KML link.

To the end of this append ?count=ABC (where ABC is the number of results you want); e.g.:

http://feeds.foursquare.com/history/[YOUR_PERSONAL_CODE_HERE].kml?count=1

Be warned that you should keep this link private, as it gives access to your foursquare data.

Now, head across to Google Maps and past this link in the search box and click ‘Search’. You will end up seeing a map with your most recent (in my example I used ‘1’) foursquare check-in pin-pointed. This link is dynamic, in that it requests the most recent check-in from foursquare at time of use.

With this you can then grab the embed code from Google Maps and paste this into your site to provide a currently updated map showing where you last checked-in to foursquare. Again, be aware that the link to your foursquare data will be visible if someone knows how to inspect the source code of your page. For this reason, I recommend doing what I have done below, and pasting the check-in/s as images. This is not dynamic, but it is secure.

Loving Google’s logo today

I’m loving Google’s logo today in honor of Jules Vern’s birthday. Fully interactive, with the little joystick off to the right. This means you can navigate your submarine while watching out the windows. There is a treasure to find too (which you can see through the ‘e’ window).

my iPad app round-up

So, I’ve had my iPad for over a month now, and I felt it was time to review the apps I have on it now. I figure a month is enough time to settle into my usage patterns and have discarded apps that just didn’t do it for me afterall.

1: Social Networking –

I don’t run one app for all my social networking, some people prefer to but I have found it better to have apps that focus on one thing, and do what they do do well. For Twitter, I was originally using Twitterific, and had just upgraded to the paid version the day before Twitter released their own app. Since then I have been devoted to the official Twitter app which is clean, intuitive, and just pretty much perfect in my book.

For Facebook, I am still floating between two apps; Friendly and the official Facebook iPhone app. Both are pretty good, Friendly is more aesthetically pleasing due to being designed for the iPad form-factor, while the official FB app seems a little more intuitive and “like” Facebook itself (as you would expect).

I’m also running FourSquare on my iPad, as I don’t have an iPhone (still!!).

2: Utilities / Lifestyle –

I have quite a few utilities set up on my iPad, for news I am running the fantastic NYTimes app, the TVNZ News app, and the NZ Herald app. I also use GeekNews to pull all my geeky tech blogs together into one streamlined place. The Mashable! app is great for a quick check up on what is trending or popping up online currently.
I am currently using PrinterShare for printing directly from the iPad on my home network. This will hopefully change when iOS4 is released for iPad (rumors indicate late November 2010 maybe).
I also have Google Earth, the IMDb app, and a great tracking app – Parcel – which allows you to just put in your tracking code allocated to the delivery you are expecting. Saves having to visit different websites and remember your tracking numbers for different companies. Some other little gems are:
– Epicurious
– Wikipanion
– Evernote
– The WordPress app for blogging on the go
– Shazam
Then for a bit of creative fun, I have GrooveMaker and Drums! GrooveMaker lets you mix tracks, and even create your own tracks on the fly. Drums! is just that, a complete drum set on your iPad – in fact, it’s actually three complete drum sets, as you can choose between Standard, Groove, and Acoustic kits. The sound is true to life, so go get it.

3: Web Dev –

A few free web-dev helpers tucked on the iPad too. I’ve got JsAnywhere and three great apps from Interactive Blasphemy. JavaScript Anywhere is a JavaScript tool which enables you to edit your JS script, adjust the CSS, and then view the results in an HTML page. You can email the results to yourself. From Interactive Blasphemy I have robots.txt, which is just that, a robots.txt generator; Password, which generates passwords of random characters of length and complexity specified; and RGB/HSB/Hex, which enables you to create that perfect shade for you web job, and also then suggests good matching and contrasting colors.

4: Games –

Yep, the main reason most people have an iPad. I am personally a big fan of the logic/strategy games. I’ll list them all, then comment on a few of them, with more in-depth reviews being added, along with links to the iTunes store, later on:
– iFighter – essentially the classic fighter game 1945 remade for the iPad
– Harbor Master
– FlightControl HD
– Canabalt
– Gravity Hook
– Angry Birds
– Angry Birds (Halloween Special)
– Cut the Rope
– Pocket Frogs
– Plants vs Zombies
– Fruit Ninja HD
– Steve Young Football
– Build-A-Lot 2
– Blue Block
– Crazy Traffic: Crashed XL
– Train Conductor 2: U.S.A.
– No, Human
– Trainyard
– UFO On Tape
– Railway
– Chicktionary
– NOM
– Fish Eat Fish
– Dismount
– GearedHD
– Air Hockey
– TicTacDojo
– Little Metal Ball
– Soosiz HD
– Physics HD
– Gravity HD
– Tilt to Live HD
– NinJump
– Red Bull RC
– Asymmetry
– 8Bit Rebellion (the Linkin Park game)

Surprisingly enough, I have found my usage of the iPad to be alot different than I planned for. I have found the games an easy way to take a 5 minute break when I need to, but have found that I actually now tend to jump on Twitter or a news site when I want a 5 minute chill out. I am still just working with iBooks as my book-reader and PDF-reader of choice. Primarily because I have no need of the flasher features of the other readers out there. Overall, I have to say that the iPad is proving itself to be very worthwhile as a tool; and I keep finding new ways for it to excel and prove it’s worth.

Google working on Search As You Type

Google has been testing search results that will change in real time as you type into your Google Search box. When you start typing, the search box is moved to the top of the page and results are updated as you type, kind of like a Firefox page search, Spotlight on the Mac, or Windows 7’s “Search programs and files” field in the start menu.

These live search results are not available to the public at present as Google regularly tests new features with very small selections of users. Some of those features never see a public launch, but some do.

It is, honestly, anyone’s guess as to what the benefit of such results would be. The question that ultimately comes to mind, as noted by TechCrunch, is what effect this would have on keyword-based advertising. Given that the entire context of a word can change based on a few letters, it leads to an interesting outcome when your search changes that quickly; but, Google does make its money by displaying contextual ads based on your searches.

Blogger Rob Ousbey discovered the feature and wrote about it. Video follows.

 

(via Mashable)

next post, my fail, Kanye’s a f%$#tard

First off the bat, I didn’t make it through to Round 2 of CodeJam. The issue I posted about on Saturday reared it’s ugly head again and I kept getting the good old crash due to int not handling 10^18 !! Annoyed me a tad, so I haven’t reviewed my attempts just yet. My small datasets worked perfectly with the identical code, so I’m definitely puzzled. I’ll be posting the code once I have the issue solved. I’ll then be able to point out my epic fail that should have been obvious. Ah well, next year I’ll be back in for more. I’m also contemplating doing it in PHP next time instead of C# because I like the cleanlines of some of the algorithmic features of PHP. I’ve reviewed other competitors solutions in PHP and C# also; the other biggie for me is to review my regular expressions as I don’t use them anywhere near enough, so my code is full of while loops/if-else statements etc.

Moving on, I have to say that Kanye West is a “moustache on a woman” (thanks Paul Henry!!) for his efforts at the VMAs the other night. All the copies of the video keep getting pulled from YouTube, so the best I can offer is this link to mashable. Suffice to say, he’s acting like an arrogant douche and jumps into the middle of Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech to grab the mic and say he thought Beyonce should win!! He got booed off by the crowd, but even so he needs a big slap upside the head.

The video has also been remixed already too:

Other than that, I’m loving MonoTouch!! It’s an interface and IDE essentially which enables you to run your .NET and ASP applications within the iPhone/iPod Touch framework. From the website:

MonoTouch is the Mono edition for Apple’s iPhone and Apple’s iPod Touch devices.  MonoTouch allows developers to create C# and .NET based applications that run on the iPhone and can take advantage of the iPhone APIs as well as reusing both code and libraries that have been built for .NET as well as existing skills.

For example, here is the proverbial “Hello World” demo. So simple and sweet. I definitely want!

That’s enough for right now, but I’ll bring more later today, as well as some updates on launching site in the next few days. 99% done, just final testing now.

quick update: Sen. Al Franken draws US map from memory

I’m busy prepping for Round 1 of Google CodeJam, but I thought I’d quickly post this.

From the blurb:

Senator Al Franken draws a map of all 50 states from memory during an appearance on Minnesota Public Radio’s Midday at the Minnesota State Fair.

This is just plain awesome!!

More goodness later today/tonight. Back to it now.

Apple keynote, Google CodeJam, DNS dramas

OK. The DNS issues are now sorted; it turns out that the settings at the NIC end had not propagated out correctly and that took another 24+ hours to remedy. Anyways, I’m now able to get some testing and such started on the live site. At least I was able to FTP all my files via the IP address in the meantime; so, no harm no foul. Nice learning curve anyway getting to play with “normal” web-hosting and dev issues.

Apart from that, the Apple “It’s only Rock n Roll, but I like it” launch was a bit underwhelming I have to say. So we now have an iPod Nano with a camera, but we still don’t have an iPod Touch with a camera??? And, I’m sure Apple has a plan, but most of their clients are right-handed and they put the camera on the back lower left; ie just where a right-hander’s hand will be whenever holding their Nano. I dunno there, maybe Apple R&D is just full of lefties?? Hmmm. Although el Jobbso did discuss this a little with the NY Times, and indicated that they are seeing the iPod Touch as a game platform instead of an iPhone without the phone (an “i” ?), and that as they want to reduce the price-point for it they don’t want to add more hardware all the time.

Google has launched a new, bigger search box!! You can see a comparison pic here, as well as a timeline of the Google homepage over the years here. I see a movie in the making: “Search Wars”, or maybe “The Pirates of Mountain View”, or even “Google – the pre-Bing years” as a tele-drama. It’s going to be interesting to see how the Microsoft/Yahoo! changes the search market with Bing.

I’m still waiting to hear what’s up with CodeJam for the next round. I haven’t had an email, or been able to find any updates on the site, but I’ve now emailed asking as Round 1 begins in 48 hours or so from now. No stress, but it would be nice to know when I’m actually competing. I’m hoping for Round 1A, as that is at 13:00 Saturday for me, as opposed to being at 04:00 Sunday (not a pleasant thought!!). [Update – just as I went to post, Google has replied to me already. They are letting everyone compete in all three sub-rounds until they qualify. I like prompt service!!]

[Updated update!! – It turns out that the info above regarding Round 1 has not yet been released! So, you heard it here first. Google will be announcing this and emailing it out to qualifiers in about 24 hours time. YAY!! My first exclusive!!]

No YouTube for you today, but I will again tomorrow. I guess the best thing for you to do instead is to go check out engadget live from the Microsoft Windows Media Center event. Go to it!

back online again, so here’s a post

Since my last post last Thursday, I have qualified for Round 1 of Google codejam!! Awesome, and now I’m just waiting to hear if I get my first or second choice for my Round 1. I’m hoping for 01:00 UTC Saturday, as this is 13:00 Saturday for me which is kinda conducive to being alert and onto it. otherwise my second choice is 04:00 Sunday (my time) as the only other option I have is 21:00 Sunday (my time) while I am still at work. I’m hoping the 01:00 UTC is not pleasant for most of the rest of the world so I don’t get bumped out of it….

Other than that, I spent Friday finishing codejam qualifying in the morning, and then went to work for the rest of the day. I have seriously never been so tired, I didn’t realise how draining intense coding and screen-staring could be. Saturday AM Naomi and I went to the French farmers market in Parnell for coffee, croissants, and veges – as well as the divine stuffed olives and mini-peppers. Also got some free-range chicken, and planned the menu for a dinner party in a few weeks time. Sampled some absolutely delicious aged balsamic, 10 year-old and soooo sweet. We didn’t get to “sample” the 25 year-old, as that is $190 for a 200ml bottle!

After that cruisy start to the morning, we went back to mine for a few hours while I did some gardening for an agent viewing during the week. Then went to Naomi’s to fix her bike and have dinner, before finally making it to see Inglourious Basterds!! Fantastic movie. Brad Pritt was brilliant as a slightly cuckoo, yet totally debonaire Nazi-killer. He uses his smile so well.

Sunday was church, and then Fathers’ Day lunch for Naomi’s dad, then work. (How’s that for an entire day in 13 words??).

Today, I’m back into siting at varsity (even though it’s mid-semester break) and working on assignments. First one is my ANZIIF (Australia and New Zealand Institute of Insurance and Finance) module assignment as this is due on Wednesday evening. I did discover a few cool videos over the weekend too, so they’re here:

We’ll start with Tiesto himself, beautiful track. I love watching him mix, just brilliant.

And, there’s so much parkour to show, but I’ve settled on this race between a Peugeot 207 and some free runners courtesy of Top Gear

This is just ridiculous….how to show that you are just a bunch of red-neck biggots.

At the Norwalk town hall meeting on health care, Rep. Jim Himes (CT-04) takes question in Spanish from Stamord Bishop Emilio Alvarez. Himes was born in Peru and is fluent in Spanish. The anti-health care people in the crowd display their racism quite clearly

Ok, another from Tiesto, ’cause it’s a classic anthem

That’s about it, but I’ll probably post later today with some comments about the state of the world and so on. And maybe even some more wisdom and insight into possibilities for this Wednesday, you know that uber date in every fanboi’s calendar, September 9th – Apple’s next big announcement.

quick update: Google CodeJam is here!!

Just a quick post in the fifteen minutes before CodeJam kicks off. Qualifying round is from 23:00 UTC Wednesday 2nd September, so I’m lucky enough to be able to step into it at 11:00 NZST Thursday 3rd. AWESOME!! Quite a dignified time for a coder to slide into the whole shebang I feel. I’m looking forward to it this year, and actually feel like I might get somewhere. Lastyear’s effort was totally MEH, as I had no idea what I was getting into, and then got stuck working until 3 hours before the end of the round. That, and being shattered, meant I didn’t even make a proper honest attempt.

This year, I have no excuses; so I better not mess up eh??

Oooh, into the ten minute counter, so I’ll log off here. Update post, and other goodies, later today.

Oh, yeah, I’m doing it in C# this year.