An iPad 1 with a forward facing camera … and with 128 GB memory?

Posted on 2012-03-06 by Jon Leirdal

When I write this the supposedly new iPad 3 might be released in about one day. In honour of that event I would like to share some pictures of another similar device.

Not an iPad 1

I do not buy pirated products, but occasionally I get to see what other people have found out there. This is one of those times. I recently got the opportunity to see a device that supposedly was an iPad 1 with 128 GB memory, a built in camera and what seems to be an SD card reader. “What the …” you say? Where might one find a device like that? Well, China seems to be a safe bet, and in this case it is the truth as well. In the sake of anonymity we will just say that the owner of this device visited China last year and found this device in a market in Beijing. From a distance and while turned off it looked like an iPad and it was cheap. It even was packed in something with a superficial resemblance to the real packaging. Now after the bargain had been struck and he arrived at the hotel to check it out he found a few strange things. It had a separate charger pin input. The regular iPad connector could be refitted with an adapter that made it possible for the device to connect to a regular network cable, an USB cable and (updated, see below) ~~several other cable types~~. All in one adapter! That was kind of neat. Oh and it ran Android!

Not an iPad running Android version 2.2

Android? On an iPad?

Yes …. and no. This is of course no iPad. It might look like one but the there are several things that these images do not tell. Among else it is made of plastic, and feels cheap. Another tell was that it stopped working after a week. Now it only gives you the startup logo and then nothing happens.

But as a curiosity it may now live for a long time on the internet.

Not an iPad with more than one connector

Not an iPad with 128 GB memory

Not an iPad - backside

Not an iPad with a forward facing camera

Update 2012-02-06: I managed to take a few pictures of the included dongle as well. I remembered slightly wrong though, It only has two USB ports and one ethernet port available.

iPad dongle

Posted from Oslo, Oslo, Norway.

A wish for corporate social software

Posted on 2012-01-12 by Jon Leirdal

I attended an IXDA meetup yesterday discussing among else “Collaborating in the stream”. Pete Lacey from Podio showed us some of their ideas regarding different communication types in different activity streams or different applications. The catch though, everything runs on their server; in the cloud.

Now personally I use the cloud for several services, and I feel that such services may be very useful and probably secure enough for me as an individual. The problem is that there are several reasons for not thrusting your corporate or business data to an external service provider. The most obvious ones are based on regulation, in Norway government entities probably will not be able to put their data on servers located outside of Norway, or worse, outside of Europe. There might be risks regarding this even for private companies, foreign governments might insist on access to data stored on servers located within their countries, either for security or legal reasons. Another issue might be the security of the information itself, other companies might be able to break into the service and gain access to your corporate information. Several security officers at different companies are also very protective of their information and data, and would never accept that anything like this should be available externally. All reasons may be resolved as the solutions and regulations evolve, but as an IT-consultant doing business right now, I would like to have the following framework available when dealing with cloud based services.

Intra-social: I need to be able to implement a copy of a cloud based social service or product internally in an organisation. Using all the normal protections and security that the different corporations demand I follow. Examples might be protected sub-groups, protecting content, firewalls, single-sign-on and so on.
Extra-social: I need to be able have a “demilitarized” version of this product available for partners and other external participants that make it possible for them to collaborate securely and share information trough the same services that the companies are using internally. These users should probably only be able to access a subset of the information available internally. I would like to be able to enforce encryption of the communication and use strong log-in features. Of course it should be possible to protect content and have access-groups here as well.
Inter-social: Now the big differentiator is the connection to open services on top of this. By using semantic technologies and other modern integration techniques I would like to intelligently be able to integrate these internal and external parts of my social software with the corresponding public service. Sharing information and collaborating on open issues should still be possible, and this would make it possible for the users to use the same tool for collaboration both internally, externally and on the open internet.

Do you have any comments? Please tell me your feelings on this below.

Posted from Oslo, Oslo, Norway.

My favourite iPhone apps

Posted on 2011-09-05 by Jon Leirdal

A few months ago I wrote an article on my favourite iPad applications. I found that I probably should write one on my favourite iPhone apps as well. Some of the applications are present both for iPad and iPhone, but I have not included any games for iPhone. The main reason was that I wanted to focus on utility applications.

Productivity

Week Cal, is a small app for showing a week view of your iPhone calendar. It works great.
1Password, is an app for storing passwords securely on your iPhone. This app can synchronise your passwords with your iPad and Mac, but can be a bit pricy.
Occasions, is an app for reminding yourself about all those birthdays and other important occasions. It can even synchronize dates from Facebook with your contacts.
Den Norske Almanakk, the only reason for getting this is if you want to have an updated list of when different Norwegian holidays are celebrated during the year. Hopefully they will include the iPhone calendar entries soon and make this app very useful.
Meetup, I attend several meet-ups, and this little app is quite nice to have if you are an user on meetup.com.
Gule Sider, this app may be the best phone directory for Norway on your mobile.
Instapaper, even better on the iPad, but if you ever need to store something and read it later, this is one of the better apps. This app lets you read the article or document on your mobile phone. There are several ways for you to be bookmarking/storing things both from mac, pc, iPhone and iPad, and from within your different browsers.
Dropbox, if you use Dropbox.com for sharing some files, then this little app is a very cheap (free) companion.
Wunderlist, is quite nifty if you want to share a shopping list or todo list with your girlfriend/wife/friend.
iFiles, might be a bit more powerful than Dropbox, and let you, among else, store attachments from mail inside this app for later reading or retrieval.

Tools

~~XSysInfo, want to find some information on your phone. This app might be of assistance, but equally important, it can help you clean up your memory usage.~~
UPDATE: XSysInfo has removed the memory clean function, so it is no longer as useful as it once was.

Travel

Trafikanten, find the next bus from your nearest stop in Oslo, Norway.
NSB, actually very quick and simple to use if you are going by train in Norway.
TaxiNå!, another Norwegian speciality. If you have this app you always can get the closest taxi central.
Visitnorway.com, if you want to find something to do in Norway, this app might help you. An overview over the most interesting sights and happenings in Norway.

Social

Facebook, the natural shoe in.
Twitter, also a natural.
LinkedIn, they have upgraded this one and made it even better.
Google+, it is the new rising star. I like it.

GPS

Foursquare, there are several check-in applications for sharing where you are with the world. Foursquare was one of the first, maybe the original?
Gowalla, this app let’s you check in on several services simultaneously. (E.g. Facebook, Foursquare and Gowalla)
Google Latitude, I like this mainly because I can choose who can see me, and I can set it up to updating automatically in the background.
TomTom, is the best alternative when you need an offline map for Western Europe, US, or almost any other region? A bit costly though.
Waze, this is best if you drive regularly from A to B and want to see what traffic issues there are. The social way to handle traffic reporting.
UltimateDrive, BMW have created an app for sharing the best roads.
BensinPris, need to find the cheapest gas prices? A social way for discovering cheap gas.
iTrafikken, the latest news on traffic in Norway.

Weather

Yr.no, my preferred weather forecast.
VG Pent.no, but if I want to compare the forecast from the two largest weather forecasting companies in Norway this is the way to do it.

Food & Wine

Cellar Rat, a quick way to discover good wines on the wine menu in an restaurant.
Fresh Fish, if you want to learn how to identify fresh fish in the supermarket.

Entertainment

IMDB, is this film any good?
Filmweb, easy way to discover where the movie you want to see is being shown. You can even buy the tickets within this app.

EBook readers

Stanza, I read quite a lot, mostly on my iPad, but when that device isn’t available the iPhone works too. Stanza is a bit more open than Kindle, and handles several file formats, and it is easy to create, convert and share eBooks from your computer using Calibre.
Kindle, but when I want to read the latest English eBooks, Amazon comes to the rescue.

Photography

Photosynth, Microsoft have been showing off their Photosynth technology for years, but it was when it became available on my iPhone that I got really interested. This app makes it really easy to create panoramas and other 3D views of the world.
Camera+, is probably the best photography application for your iPhone. Check out the reviews.
Hipstamatic, is one of several apps that creates old fashioned and arty photographs. I like it.
Streetmate, black and white photography. Quickly and easily.
Instagram, a modern day polaroid? A great hit on the web.
Photobuddy, if you want to take photography to the next step you need to learn a few things regarding depth of field and other technical aspects of photography. This app might be of assistance.
The Photographer’s Ephemeris. This app can, among else, tell you where the sun is rising and when. Another photographers companion app, but very well done. A bit pricy though.

Music, Video and Audio

Audible, if you are listening to English audio books this app makes buying, downloading and listening to them a breeze.
Bander, is one of many free streaming and music discovery apps. I just liked it.
Spotify and WiMPmight be the two leading streaming services in Norway.
TuneIn Radio, is probably the best radio app on your iPhone and iPad. It is available as both a free and pro version.

Other interesting applications

Momento, is an app for gathering all your updates on all your social networks into one calendar view.

Posted from Oslo, Oslo, Norway.

My iPad needs

Posted on 2011-05-23 by Jon Leirdal

I follow a Norwegian blog by Hans Petter Nygård-Hansen that speaks of several things that I care about. He recently had a long entry on how the iPad would eat from the paper market share for newspapers. I mostly agree with him, but what really got me to agree was the last paragraph in the blog entry. What he wants from a mobile news app. I do heartily agree, but I have a few extra points that I would like to add. His bullet points were these: (I have translated them from Norwegian)

Give me a digital subscription that does not cost too much, or the option to buy daily issues at a slightly higher day by day price.
Inform me of new articles, but let me choose among my interest for reminders.
Let me download the news article or magazine offline, I want to read it when and where I want.
Adapt the ads to my interests, (based on what news-categories I want reminders for) for higher relevance and less irritation. (Do not forget that the goal of ads is to lead you away from what you really want to read, but if I am reading an article on travel destinations I am a lot more receptive to watching adverts for hotels, airplane travels, rental cars or other relevant offers.)
And I want an app, not a web page optimized for mobile devices.

My additional wants are these.

Let me easily share what I find interesting using whatever tools I like, including email, Facebook, Twitter, Blogs etc.
Let me store my favourite images, articles or videos for later sharing, printing or revisiting.
Create a very simple subscription registration that makes it possible for me to view the content simultaneously on my PC, iPhone or iPad.
And please also consider this little issue on filter bubbles.

If I have I forgotten any, please tell me in the comments!

Posted from Oslo, Oslo, Norway.