I’ve got Skype on my iPhone bur haven’t used it much – which is probably a good thing.
I just tried a video call while lying on the bed and the slight floor is that while I can see the other person, all they can see is my feet because of the camera position.
Oh well.
Apple announced towards the end of last year that it was dropping the Xserve – it’s rack mounted server that runs OS X Server. Although Apple hasn’t given a specific reason, a lot of people are saying it’s because the Mac Pro and Mac Mini are quite capable alternatives to the Xserve. And this sounds very sensible to me.
Rack mount servers are used in large organisations where you need a lot of server power and need to save space. But in this kind of environment you would be unlikely to find every user on the network to be using a Mac – they’re likely to be on Windows and if not, more likely to be on Linux than all on Macs. So if most users are on Windows or Linux, the rack mount servers are likely to be running either Windows or Linux (or Unix). I can’t see anyone wanting to pay the extra for an Xserve to use in a mixed network.
So the Xserve is only likely to be used in an environment where most of the machines on the network are Macs and they want a central server for file sharing and other services that can be easily set up and used. There are a few problems with this as well though. Firstly, in this environment – most likely creative studios – there’s only likely to be ten or twenty client machines so the only piece of equipment that would be rack mountable would be the Xserve. Secondly, it’s not likely that a network of this size would require the hardware provided by an Xserve to meet their needs. That’s why most people are saying that the effectiveness of the Mac Pro or Mac Mini as server hardware when the server software is available for these (and other) hardware configurations, is a sensible way to go. It saves on hardware costs, fits in with their office network setups and in some cases the Mac in question can be used as someones desktop machine – we used our old Mac Mini running Server as a way of showing clients websites on the board room TV!
I like that Apple hasn’t tried to push the Xserve onto existing customers but let in die in favour of letting us use what we want to use. This fits with the way I’ve set up networks in the past (confession time). I’m actually relatively new to the Mac world – I’ve been using them since I started working here about 8 months ago. Before that it was Windows and Linux. In most of the past networks I’ve been in charge of I’ve opted for using Linux on a relatively cheap and low spec PC to provide network services instead of getting expensive dedicated hardware. At the last place I was at we had an ex-display Campaq desktop from Dixons bought for £70 and it’s been running Linux and doing it’s job for about 6 years.
So good bye Xserve – I am slightly gutted I never convinced any of my managers to let me have one but that’s OK. Next week I’ll be getting one of our old iMacs that isn’t useful any more and installing Snow Leopard Server on it.
I’ve gone completely Apple native – iPhone, Macbook Pro from work so I can do stuff at home, iMac at work and now I’m trying to any of our clients I meet that their business would be somehow better if I had an iPad. The only thing I miss from the world of Windows is the ability to hibernate the PC.
The Macbook is vastly impressive when it comes to power management – you close the lid and it goes into sleep mode – open the lid and it wakes up nearly instantly. The best bit is that it also goes into what Apple calls Safe Sleep. I can just about go an entire weekend where I may not use my Macbook and so on Monday morning when I go to work it it’s just got enough juice to wake up. The best bit is if it’s run out of juice. While it goes into sleep mode (low power with everything stores in RAM) it also copies everything onto the hard drive so if the battery dies, when you power up it still has everything the way you left it – i.e. Hibernate.
What I wanted though was the same functionality on my iMac since if I have some Flash to do at the weekend I’ll occasionally take my iMac home and having to close everything down and start it all up again is a pain. Well turns out that there’s a dashboard widget that does the job called Deep Sleep which puts a picture of the moon on your dashboard and when clicked, copies everything to disk and shuts it down.
Just be warned that a iMac does not have a battery – make sure it’s finished copying everything and turned off before you pull the plug!
As mentioned previously I’ve started working for a new company which exclusively uses Macs and I’ve got to say, they are superior to PCs in every way I’ve found so far.
I’ve had to get used to bits but on the whole I’m never ever going to back to a PC or laptop. Today’s challenge for the Mac was how to get my MacBook Pro to hibernate. I used to it on my Windows laptop all the time – it was invaluable. Being able to press the power button and wait for it to turn off then press the power button again and have all your documents and applications still running was an invaluable time saver.
So I wondered if the same was possible on the Mac and did some Googling. It turns out something similar is possible – it’s called Safe Sleep. With any Mac Book Pro made in the last 5 years or so all you have to do is close the lid and it puts it into Safe Sleep. Then you just open the lid again later, press any key and it restores to the state it was in. Perfect.
Since I’ve got a background in electronic engineering it’s obvious that this would require some power consumption and therefore had a limited time span to work. I asked my boss, Phil, if he’d done it and he said he’d unplugged his, closed the lid and taken it home for a three day weekend and when he came back in on Tuesday it still had about 50% power left. Perfect.
It’s only been two weeks but let’s see if there’s anything that the Mac doesn’t do better. Well worth the extra costs.
So I’m half way through my second day at my new job at Fluid Ideas and I’m starting to get a handle on things now. As I was replacing someone without a proper handover the first half of yesterday involved me trying to find out where stuff is hosted, getting the login details and then trying to change the passwords without cocking everything up. I nearly managed it.
Luckily after fixing the few problems I created yesterday things have been going better. I’ve actually got on and started doing proper work and things are good.
The biggest problem I’ve had has been the change from using a PC to using an iMac (for the first time ever). After getting used to some of the keys being in a different place I’ve been going through and finding out how to do all the things I took for granted on the PC.
The biggest ones are:
Copy, Paste, Select All, etc..
Yes, this I did have to look it up on Google. Macs don’t use the CTRL key as in Windows but instead use the CMD key – it takes a bit of getting used to it but luckily all the shortcuts appear to be the same.
The mouse scroll
The mouse I had wouldn’t scroll up for some reason. Someone else in the office said that her’s wouldn’t scroll up either so I assumed that was the way it was supposed to work. I looked in the settings for the mouse and keyboard but there was nothing in there. After a little Google it turns out that the way to fix it is to turn it upside down and roll the ball on a piece of white paper. Brilliant.
Back to work.
With about 4 remotes, two Wii controllers and an Xbox controller, I thought it was time to get rid of at least one and programme the Sky Remote to do the TV functions on my Sony Bravia KDL-37P3020 TV. The below code works with this specific model of TV and my Sky remote which is apparently Rev 8 (Version 8 ) of Sky something or other.
Here’s what you do:
Simples
Bear in mind that I’m not a journalist – I haven’t been given one to try or even seen it in actual real life. I just blog in my spare time. That said, I have seen all the videos and news articles that everyone else has and do have an opinion.
Many people’s first comment on the iPad is that it looks like a big iPhone – in actual fact it’s more like a large iTouch. An iPhone without the “phone” functions built in. My opinion is that the iPad IS a large iTouch – it performs the same functions as the iTouch with the advantages of a much larger screen:
That’s it. Yes, there’s going to be the iBooks store allowing us to download e-books but surely this will be available on the iPhone and iTouch as well? Otherwise they’re limiting their customer base. Yes, the smaller devices will offer a less pleasurable reading experience but it should still be possible and that takes us back to what the iPad is – a large screen version of the existing products.
So if the point of the iPad (as the name suggests) is to be a large version of a very innovative collection of technologies and design, will it be successful? I think it will. As I’ve written again and again – most people only want a “device” to get on the internet, manage some photos, access videos and music and not a full PC. Currently that leaves you with a smartphone, some internet enabled device such as an Xbox, a laptop if you want a full PC just in case, or a netbook for those not wanting to shell out more than they have to.
Apple say that there is a gap in the market between laptop and smartphone – currently filled by netbook, however depending on pricing the iPad could easily move existing netbooks to a niche market. If the iPad becomes an affordable solution (as the iPhone has) then why would anyone want a netbook?
I’ve written a few articles recently about how I think the technology, in particular computers, will be changing over the coming years with a move towards mobile devices that do everything and dedicated yet versatile multimedia devices in the home – TV recorders, games consoles etc. This does mean that since most people only want a PC for browsing the internet, the desktop PC and in a lot of cases the laptop will disappear from the home altogether as the games consoles and other cheaper TV connected devices will be able to provide the internet experience that most people want – and if someone is using the TV then their phone will do the job just fine.
So, how does this affect the key players in the industry? Up until now the home market has been dominated by the same companies as the business PC market – Microsoft provides the software with hardware being handled by Dell, HP, IBM, Sony and others. However, if everything moves in the direction I think it will the main product there – Microsoft Windows – will go from being the one element that’s included on all the devices sold to a compontent included on some devices – such as a version of Windows being used on some smart phones and obviously Microsoft’s Xbox. This is a major change for Microsoft. If the death of the desktop PC in the home and growth of mobile and gaming devices causes Microsoft to become a minor player in that area then who will become the new major players? Sony? They already produce the PS3 and are a big player in the mobile phone industry. My thinking is no. I think the industry will be dominated by two companies – Apple & Google.
To understand why you have to think about what the customer in the home environment wants – simple, elegant, stylish devices that do everything they want. Problem is “everything they want” is not what it used to be – we don’t want an operating system that allows us to connect extra hardware to perform the functions we need and a million things we don’t. We just want a device that performs functions such as texting, calls, music, camera and as such is small enough to be carried around – anything that this clever little device cannot do is either not worth having or much more likely acheivable through some provider on the internet. Does this remind you of something? iPhone maybe? Apple Inc?
But just because Apple were the first to produce a good, popular mainstream product, doesn’t mean they’ll be the dominant player for years to come. The success of the iPhone has highlighted to the manufacturers you big the market is and as such everyone wants a peice of the pie. So who’s big enough to acheive this? The one company who is innovative enough and is already playing catchup in this area – Google. They have a massive user base both in terms of it’s search engine but also Gmail and it’s other products mean that they have the capital, marketing ability and product design capabilities to make something as good as the iPhone.
Where does this leave Microsoft? Well, the Xbox product line which could become the main living room device assuming they accept the fact that the PC won’t be part of the package, they’ve got the technology to ensure that the Xbox is one of the devices in everyone’s home. That and their dominance in the business software market means they aren’t going to disappear. They just won’t be the biggest technology company in the home.
I personally hope this is the case. I won’t miss going down the pub and being greeted with “Windows has gone and done….”. And I don’t think it will take too long for this to happen – I’ve already got the iPhone and Xbox (and Wii, and Sky) and as such very rarely turn on the laptop except for work related tasks.
Having gotten over the honeymoon period with my iPhone we’ve now settled down together and I’m beginning to see some of it’s flaws. I have to say though, there’s not much wrong with it. Either as a phone, a mobile computing device or a mp3 player it does the job amazingly. OK, but what can’t it do. Well, the first thing is without a doubt the biggest. Flash.
This isn’t a tiny little inconvenience like “My bank has blocked access to my phone” or “I don’t get on with the touch screen”. This is major. If we are truly going to move computing forwards in the ways that everyone is talking about – the TV being the digital center of every home connected to and doing everything, desktop PCs being retired to museums, laptops being used for work and the kids bedrooms and then our phones becomming fully functioning mobile computing devices, then we need Flash.
Adobe, Apple – listen up – I don’t mean a way to convert Flash applications into Apps. I mean Flash within the browser. The Internet is going to continue to be the center of the computing world and if the iPhone or any phone wants be be part of it then it needs Flash in the browser. It’s one of the main technologies in today’s internet along with JavaScript (and thus Ajax).
The bit that annoys me though is not that the iPhone doesn’t have Flash built in – it’s that it should have and almost certainly could have. I think the reason it doesn’t is business politics, not any technological limitation. My thinking behind this? DOOM. Yes, that first-person shooter from the early niineties. The one that ends up in quite a few “Top 10 Best Games of All Time” lists. I know that it’s nothing special now – the graphics, gameplay and everything else are two decades old – but it is still a 3-D PC game – and I’ve got a copy on my iPhone. If this is possible as a £4.99 download, surely there’s a programmer capable of putting one of the most important peices of software on one of the most important computing devices?
Career Progression
About seven years ago now I finished my degree in Electronic & Computer Engineering, had gained a wide variety of skills in building and maintaining computer systems and was becomming a quite capable web developer. I had also had some years of experience in industry from huge multinationals to small companies with a dozen employees to EU funded projects. I was therefore ready to head out into the world of business to start my career and got a job as a web developer in a small training company.
Seven years later I’m still at the same training company although both the company and me have changed a lot in that time. Although I’m still the only web developer, I’m not the only IT person there now – we have a graphic designer and a media guy too. The main change though is that I’ve moved up to an Operations Director role essentially meaning that I can now call the shots. This is unusual in a company that specialises in the way that humans work – it’s not usually the IT people who would thrive in the company. The reason though is simple – business awareness.
In larger companies you have the ability to work in very specialised roles. The IT department may have a developer, a server guy and several support people whereas in small companies this tends to be one person who has some or all of these skills in the right mix needed for that particular organisation. Within the larger company this means that you can remain in your role, maybe being promoted to department head or above, without too much business sense as there is always bosses above you who ensure the services you provide are serving the company.
In small businesses however, there is going to be very little chance of promotion if you don’t develop a very good understanding of your particular business – the way it operates, the market it operates in and the way in which every department in the company (which may be single people) operates. This will make you more valuable – meaning that you can not only provide an IT service, but also that you understand and are capable of making informed decissions in any area of the business – and hence are able to move up the company ladder to the top.
That’s fine. To get promoted you develop a business knowledge. But what about starting out in small businesses in an IT role? What advice could I give…?
Starting Out
With the benefit of hindsight I would absolutely do things differently than I did when I started out. This is partly due to the experience and insight into the business I have in my new position but mainly from one simple fact. In small business resources are very limited – a point that is highlighted in the current economic environment. For the business to suceed everything must be done in a lean and efficient fashion.
During your training you learn to do things “properly” – to make sure code is commented, to make sure your server is the best you can get, to centralise your IT services for easy user management. However in the small business environment, this is all crap. Commenting code takes time and for the most part a single developer can remember which file or function does what, making the commenting a waste of time. Yes, comments will make it much easier for another developer to learn but commenting takes valuable time and due to the time wasted in commenting and the chance that you will replaced as the developer on that particular project within it’s usuable lifetime are relatively small – it’s probably best for the business to skip it and do something that earns more revenue. This doesn’t just apply to commenting but coding also – we’re taught to use a thorough and robust approach to coding and while I agree that this is the best way from a software approach, from a business point of view sometimes just making it work is what will stop the business from dying.
This lean approach also applies to servers and infrastructure – sometimes it’s best to “just make do”. Spending thousands on a Windows Server will ensure that it is easier to manage, runs 99.99% of the time and will live for years and years, but using an old box with Linux on can provide the same services at a fraction of the cost. Yes, it’s harder to fix when things go wrong but once everything’s set up, that’s a very, very rare thing. And if the entire thing does fail, in a company of say, 20 people or less, it won’t take more than an hour to set up those machines to work without the server so the company can continue. Everything can be changed back later when the server is fixed. And most importantly you’ve saved thousands for the company to use for either marketing to bring in more revenue, or even for more wages for a certain IT person… Get my point?
Although I’m the first to admit that this isn’t the best way of doing things from an IT perspective, it is from a (small) business point of view. Yes, sometimes it comes back to bite you in the ass but most of the time it just works. Still need convincing? Well our companies turnover has doubled every year for the last 3 years. And my wages are 3 times what they were when I started.