Sustainable Softworks Blog

Thoughts on choosing a backup disk

2012-01-04T10:37:00.001-05:00

As a long time computer professional, I know backups matter and that hard drives do eventually fail. So how do you choose a good hard drive for Time Machine or other backup?

10 years ago, LaCie was a popular goto vendor for Macintosh compatible hard drives. After a few of my Lacie d2's failed, I decided to try a different hard drive case and found some pleasant surprises. The Macally unit below is the one I chose.

Macally Hi-Speed eSATA/FireWire/USB 2.0 Storage Enclosure for 3.5-Inch SATA Hard Disk G-S350SUAB2 (Silver)

Priced at $65, this is attractive for a high performance Firewire 800/400, USB 2.0, and eSATA hard drive enclosure. Compared to my LaCie d2's, I noticed several improvements.

It's fan-less which makes it very quiet unless the disk is active.

I like that it includes both Firewire 800 and Firewire 400 on the back.

The power supply is a standard 12v wall wart instead of a separate dual voltage unit (12v and 5v) that sits on your floor or desk and uses a custom DIN connector. LaCie had a run of bad power supplies, so I like that the power supply is such a standard part.

The internal design is actually simpler than the d2 since the drive mounts horizontally and plugs directly into a controller card with interface jacks on the back. The aluminum casing is thinner but not insubstantial and much lighter weight. As an external enclosure, there's no issue with voiding the warranty by opening the case. In the LaCie d2, the drive mounts vertically and needs a ribbon cable (or daughter card) to run from the bottom of the drive to the controller with jacks at the back of the unit. A "warranty void if broken" label covers one of the screws you need to open the case.

By choosing a separate case, you can pick any specific hard drive (and warranty) you like instead of taking your chances with whatever the vendor has on hand.

I tried a NewerTech Voyager S2 USB drive dock for a while, but it wasn't reliable enough for Time Machine backups. Every few days it would report some file access error and need to be hot plugged. The Macally case with included Firewire 800 cable has been flawless for weeks (using the exact same hard drive).

As for bare drives, I've had good results with Hitachi drives ordered from OWC.

What About RAID and NAS

RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) and NAS (Network Attached Storage) get a lot of attention for business critical applications. In my opinion, these are not a good investment for home office or small business backup. In theory, RAID allows you to hot swap a failed drive without disrupting your storage array, while NAS can be used to backup several computers from a single convenient appliance. In practice, these are embedded computer systems (typically running Linux) with their own set of software compatibility and upgrade issues. When things go wrong, and they sometimes do, the added complexity makes it much more difficult to recover.

My preferred approach is to make sure any important data is backed up on at least two separate hard drives, with the most critical data also backed up off-site or in the cloud.

Drive capacities are growing so quickly that the current generation large capacity hard drive will often exceed the capacity of a drive array from only two years ago. Unless you need all that capacity on-line now, it's simpler and less expensive to buy a bigger drive any time you are running out of space. If you want the convenience of network attached storage, it's easier to configure an aging Mac as a storage server, than maintain a Linux based network appliance.

By investing in a flexible moderately priced drive case, you can simply upgrade your drive mechanism every few years, and deal directly with the drive manufacturer for any warranty issues.

Enjoy!

The Controversy Around Sandboxing

2011-11-06T12:42:00.001-05:00

To understand the controversy around Mac App Store Sandboxing, it helps to compare and contrast the problem Sandboxing was designed to solve for some Apps, with the problems it creates for others.

First, consider the problem sandboxing was designed to solve. For a web browser or Email client that handles many kinds of complex media downloaded from the web, how do you protect yourself against deliberately malformed data that uncovers a program vulnerability? With sandboxing, even if an attacker finds a vulnerability in your XYZ media code, it's much harder for them to access other parts of the system. Voluntary sandboxing is a good solution for protecting systems against unknown data from unknown sources.

Next, consider a program like Phone Amego which doesn't download media from untrusted web sites. Its reason for being is to provide Mac to phone integration by working with many other tools (including Bluetooth connectivity to iPhone). It wants to integrate with Apple's Address Book, Daylite, Contactizer Pro, Launch Bar, Finder, Dropbox, FileMaker, EagleFiler, and be scriptable. Forcing an application like Phone Amego to be sandboxed puts the developer in the awkward position of choosing between dumbing down the application by removing features, or abandoning the Mac App Store version including the thousands of customers who have already paid for the application and expect future updates and support.

Mandatory sandboxing without careful attention to the needs of 3rd party developers is not always helpful.

Is Apple prepared to announce that hundreds (or even thousands) of existing Apps in the Mac App Store will no longer be fully supported after March 1st?

If not, who at Apple is listening carefully to what 3rd party developers need to make this work? What should we tell customers who are not sure whether to buy the Mac App Store or "Website" version of our Apps? Is the Mac App Store a trustworthy venue for buying Mac software?

On the whole, I think 3rd party developers want Apple to do the right thing for our mutual customers. If Apple can't sandbox Xcode, Finder, iTunes, Disk Utility, and Time Machine, and has just announced a 4 month schedule slip, is it not reasonable to infer that their sandbox model might not be ready, or some exceptions are needed?

In my view, Apple should be moving in the direction of allowing more Apps into the Mac App Store, helping them to be more secure (through vetting, signing, sandboxing, and entitlements), and making a distinction between Apps intended for General Audiences (G), and Apps requiring more extensive system access. Sandboxing could be big win for users, but only if it's applied judiciously.

The alternative sends a message that the Mac App Store is the best place to go for family entertainment, but not for prosumer or business computing.

Enjoy!

Smart Shoppers Guide to the Mac App Store

2011-10-19T11:49:00.001-04:00

Follow these tips to find the best deals and avoid paying for Apps that aren't right for you.

Check out the developers website. Many Apps have free trial version or generous return policies if you prefer to try before you buy.
Most small developers are happy to answer questions directly, but are restricted in what they are allowed to say in the Mac App Store. Mac App Store reviews may contain inaccurate or incomplete information. Since developers are not permitted to respond in this forum, show your good judgement by not posting questions or rants here.
If you are unsure about how an app will work for you, please reach out to the developer before rating it poorly for not working the way you expected. That's why the developer's Website and Support link are provided.
The Mac App Store may issue refunds in response to reasonable requests that explain why the App failed to work and what you have done to resolve the problem (such as contacting the developer).

Mac App Store developers want you to be happy with your purchase and will go out of their way to help, but you have to take the first step since Apple is there to protect your privacy and streamline the process.

Enjoy!

Sandboxing and the Mac App Store

2011-10-11T00:40:00.001-04:00

In a recent Macworld Editorial, The App Culture, Jason Snell argues that an overly restrictive approach to App security "risks dumbing down the Mac app ecosystem as a whole".

A good example is system preference panes or plugins which are not permitted [Apple guidelines 2.15 Apps must be self-contained, single application installation bundles, and cannot install code or resources in shared locations].

In recent months, I've seen two former system preferences panes rewritten as status bar items to the consternation of their existing users (PinPoint and Growl). The right hand side of the system menu bar is being over-crowded with "status items" that don't easily fit anywhere else. The status bar is intended for items that need to present system status and be available at all times without disrupting other applications, not as a mechanism for accessing system preferences. Unfortunately, the mechanism designed for accessing 3rd party system preferences is no longer permitted.

My own Phone Amego for example is a status bar item because I don't want to interrupt whatever else the user might be working on each time the phone rings or you want to make a call. Keyclick on the other hand is a System Preference pane because it reflects a system wide preference that runs in the background, not an application you need to interact with frequently.

The problem Apple is trying to solve is how to make finding and installing software safe for non-tech savvy users, but the challenge is how to apply this without dumbing down the Mac user experience.

By limiting what applications are allowed to do, their security exposure is greatly reduced. But some applications need or want to do more, and this is where things get interesting. Apple has already defined a set of "Entitlements" that allow applications to declare specific types of system access or privileges they need to do their job, so the application can be granted just enough access without exposing any more of the system than is necessary. The combination of sandboxing and entitlements defines a contract between the application and the system, so that even if an application is compromised, it can only do the limited set of things it was designed to do and nothing more. The issue is what entitlements to allow in the Mac App Store and how to present this information in a way that allows users to grant their informed consent.

Apple's current policy is to disallow installing plugins of any type, but this might not be the best answer since users can already install any software they want directly. The effect of banning plugins or startup items is to dumb down applications and push developers and users outside the Mac App Store. My own Phone Amego for example points users to a web page where they can download a set of "Phone Amego Extras" to manually install the pieces the Mac App Store wouldn't allow.

The combination of application sandboxing and entitlements could provide a more elegant solution if it is applied carefully. Apple doesn't need to solve the entire problem all at once, but it does need to recognize there are important applications beyond self contained productivity or entertainment, and begin thinking about how to include some of them in the Mac App Store.

To help get the conversation started, I'd like to suggest a rating system similar to the already familiar film-rating system:

   "G"  for General use or everyone

   "PG" for Parental Guidance suggested
        (security implications should be noted,
         such as anything that installs a plugin)

   "R"  for Restricted
        (requires more extensive system access
         such as a network or disk utility)

The point here is that Apple could offer a better user experience by allowing a broader range of integrated solutions to be offered in the Mac App Store.

When Market Share is used to Mislead

2011-10-09T18:19:00.001-04:00

I've noticed a number of blogs and forum posts that keep citing Android market share as evidence that Android is catching up to the iPhone, or even surpassing it. This is misleading so I'd like to put it in a broader context.

Back in the 1960s, when U.S. manufacturing was thriving, business studies showed that doubling production allowed one to reduce per widget cost by around 10%. If you were able to sell twice as many widgets as your next closest competitor, chances are you could produce them more efficiently and enjoy higher profits. The implication is that in each market, there is only room for a few producers with sufficient volume to be the most efficient and profitable manufacturers.

In the case of Android smartphones however, we are comparing a "free" operating system adopted by many manufacturers and carriers, with a specific product from a single vendor that is actually for sale. Any market share comparison that is not related to scale, efficient production, profitability, or customer satisfaction is largely meaningless.

The iPhone is by far the best selling smartphone, has the highest production volume, has the most efficient supply chain, has the greatest share of industry profits (to fuel ongoing development), and enjoys the highest customer satisfaction and brand loyalty. No other single product comes close.

But it goes deeper than this. Many reviewers don't even realize what the product is. They still believe the iPhone or iPad is mostly a hardware product defined by its specifications. Apple has invested 10 times more R&D resources to create the iOS software and supporting eco system than its hardware. Apple didn't design the hardware to match some feature checklist, they designed it to make their software amaze and delight customers, to create an emotional connection that effects peoples lives. To compare the iPhone or iPad to other products primarily on their hardware specifications is not representative of the quality of experience users are likely to have with the product.

What happens if you lose your phone or tablet or wish to upgrade to a newer model? Will all your applications and data move seamlessly? What if you want to share data with others or between your tablet and phone? Can your tablet be upgraded to the latest OS? Will the software you want be available and work smoothly on your new tablet? What about malware? What if something goes wrong? Is there a store where you can take your tablet to get help? These are important considerations consumers see clearly, but the tech press largely ignores. Is the iPad a next generation mobile computing platform, or just the latest cool gadget you're going to replace in a couple years?

Why is it so hard for the tech press to see the iPhone or iPad objectively, and why do they keep promoting the next most promising rival as serious competition when there isn't any?

First, there's the familiar archetype of rooting for the underdog. Apple has become a giant corporation with little need for sympathy to spread their message. Most people already know of Apple's success, what they are less likely know is where Apple has failed or been challenged. Highlighting Apple's weakness is an interesting angle that draws more attention.

Second, disruptive innovations take years to develop and unfold. Not every Apple product or event can meet the hopes and expectations some users have imagined.

While this might explain some of it, in many tech blogs and forums there's an element of resistance around Apple's success. A belief that Apple's customers are somehow being deceived into choosing Apple products over others that are just as good. Or that Apple's tight control over their software eco-system is a threat to user freedom. Or that Apple's singular success concentrates too much power in too few hands. There's an underlying meme that the market needs a worthy competitor, even if that means propping up weaker alternatives.

It's worth noting that Apple has deliberately chosen to serve the less techno-savvy consumer market. By carefully controlling their software eco-system, Apple has made it easier to find and buy computing solutions with less risk of malware or expensive complications. The IBM PC was originally conceived as a less expensive business computer, and more specifically to stop the Apple II from gaining a foothold in the corporate world. The popularity and rapid evolution of the PC meant that consumers were subsidizing cheap business computing. With the emergence of the Post PC era, that subsidy is ending. Nobody likes having their subsidy taken away, including nerds. IT departments are now being told to support iPhone and iPad regardless of their previous support policies. They are losing control over their employees choice of technology.

But there's a deeper reason. As a developer, I've invested years of my life and livelihood in Apple's vision of computing. I left my day job in 1996 to become a Mac developer back when Apple was doomed. For nearly two decades, Mac users and developers have believed their computers were better, while PC advocates argued successfully that their computers were good enough and offered a better selection of business software. It wasn't until Apple switched to Intel processors capable of running Windows that mainstream business users began to take notice.

If you have 10 years of your life invested in Microsoft technologies, the idea that Apple is 5 years ahead of the industry and could dominate the next wave of personal computing is frightening. To admit that you have been out-thought, out-maneuvered, out-marketed, out-executed, and are no longer able to compete effectively is unthinkable, yet this is the very real possibility that the PC industry faces if it concedes portable music and gaming (iPod Touch), smartphones, tablets, and the ultra notebook category to Apple. It simply can't afford to do this without a fight. You have to believe there is a consortium of vendors that can challenge Apple. Otherwise your business and career are at risk.

These factors combined help explain why the tech press is reluctant to embrace Apple's Post PC era. With Apple doing so many things right, the best defense may be to sow market confusion until a worthy challenger can arise.

There is a way to challenge Apple, but most of the industry still doesn't see it. They think Apple is competing on hardware features and price, but they are wrong. What Apple has done is they have gotten serious about creating a portfolio of great software products that delight customers in ways they haven't seen, and then combined this with elegant mobile hardware. Apple is winning in music, photography, home video, phone, App store, mobile gaming, and video conferencing. The iPhone 4S and iOS 5 will add Cards, text messaging, and Siri voice interaction on top of that. You will not be able to challenge this portfolio with more megahertz, pixels, or bytes. Consumers are smarter than that.

When Tim Cook says "Apple loves music", the subtext is that Apple makes the best music players on the planet. If you love music, you should have an iPod, iPhone, or Mac (and once you've tried one, you won't look back).

Android may be strong in mobile web, GPS navigation, and Google app integration, but none of these have the emotional appeal of music. Amazon is starting to figure it out. If you love books and reading, you should have a Kindle. Microsoft is re-imagining windows for mobile, but it's less clear if they realize they need a portfolio of consumer applications with emotional appeal to challenge Apple's. Focussing on the enterprise won't be enough. The next generation of mobile business software is already starting to be written for iPad.

If you don't agree with Steve Jobs approach of serving consumers first, you are free to design a better alternative and let the market decide. For more background, see Thoughts on the "Post PC" Era.

Enjoy!

Thoughts on the "Post PC" Era

2011-09-17T13:47:00.001-04:00

In recent weeks I've seen several editorials and forums discussing the "Post PC" Era. Having lived through a similar transition to the PC era, I'd like to offer another perspective.

First, desktop PCs aren't going to disappear anytime soon. They have many wonderful advantages, but they'll gradually become less dominant in the supply chain for hardware and software.

20 years ago when I was at DEC, we used to have these arguments frequently. What's the difference between a PC and a workstation? The temptation was always to elaborate the hardware differences. Bigger CPUs, virtual memory, multi-tasking, and so forth, but these were all wrong. The difference is the software it runs and the user experience. Everything else is a temporary distraction.

In the early 1980s, Digital tried to build their own PCs but failed to understand the importance of 3rd party developers and creating a sustainable software eco-system. Not unlike some cell phone makers.

By the late 1980s, PC software was already dominating the software
industry. There were simply so many more developers writing clever,
gorgeous, affordable applications, that the established mainframe
and minicomputer software business couldn't keep up. If you wanted
the coolest, most cost effective information solutions, that meant getting a desktop PC.

By 1990, Digital realized it couldn't win by building its own PCs (running DOS or Windows), so it tried to bring the best of the PC world to VAX/VMS through X-Windows (aka DECWindows), and put VAX/VMS on a 64-bit RISC chip called Alpha. While these were impressive engineering accomplishments, it's much easier to grow an eco-system up than to grow down.

It didn't take long for the user experience (including the cost of the tools) on the PC to challenge what you could do on a workstation. I remember around 1995 DEC standardizing on Interleaf, a $20,000 word processor that ran on workstations for all their technical publications. I couldn't believe it. Hadn't these people heard of MS Word and PDF? What did they think was going to happen to Interleaf in 5 years? The business model of these systems simply couldn't keep up with the much more affordable Windows/Intel eco-system.

The similarity with today's Microsoft trying to squeeze Windows 8 into a tablet form factor is striking. If history is any guide, this will be extremely difficult. Not because the engineering can't be done, but because the user experience and business model will not be compelling compared to alternatives that were designed for Mobile from the ground up and have a 5-year head start. How will tablet makers feel about paying $40 to license Windows? How will Microsoft get $100 for Word or Excel when Apple charges $20 for Pages or Numbers? Can Microsoft afford to match Apple's business model?

The computer industry has gone through several similar transitions and it's challenging for the titans of one era to be nimble enough to innovate and thrive in the next era. Consider the following sequence:

  Mainframe-computer ->
           Mini-computer ->
                     Desktop PC ->
                          Internet PC ->
                              Mobile Internet ->
                              (Multi-Touch + cellular)

While we describe each era in physical device terms, this is misleading because the real transition is the user experience and the software that runs on these devices. The iPhone and iPad provide mobile Internet and productivity apps, but they do much more: music, pictures, video, movies, GPS navigation, books, games, and a large App library. Nearly as important are the many ways they do less: very little malware, no visible drivers, no extension conflicts, no file system, no hard drive, minimal configuration, compact, lightweight, low power, and no fan.

Squeezing windows into a tablet form factor is unlikely to match the best in class mobile experience in each of these areas, but that doesn't mean it isn't worth trying. There's a huge base of developers and business customers who would love to access their familiar Windows tools from a mobile platform. The difference is whether this can attract the mass consumer market.

So what does it mean to say we're in a Post PC era? The focus of innovation, growth, and profits has shifted along with the attention of the masses. Traditional PC software (and hardware) isn't going away, it's just no longer the most dominant thing driving the industry.

The PC emerged in part as an expression of personal freedom and will remain popular for managing and storing your own data; writing your own programs; and running software you own rather than submitting to the whims of the Cloud. PCs have great displays, file management, and input capabilities. Where the PC has suffered as a consumer product is:

Being too complex for what users need most of the time

The need to deal with malware

Ease of finding/installing/updating software

Lack of mobility

Ease of backup, restore, migration, and replacement

Ease of service when things go wrong

Value when just the basics are enough

How these trade-offs are managed will define the Post PC era.

Enjoy!

P.S. Many of these PC limitations are not addressed by Android tablets which are having a hard time gaining traction in the market.

Migrating from Palm Desktop to iPhone (or iPad)

2011-04-06T21:54:00.001-04:00

I have a client who recently purchased a Verizon iPhone and wanted to migrate his Contacts, Calendar, Tasks, and Memos from Palm Desktop to his new iPhone. Contacts and Calendar migrated easily enough, but there's no built-in support for tasks and memos. In this post, I'll describe how I resolved this problem.

From Palm Desktop you can export your contacts in vCard format and import them into Apple's Address Book on your Mac. You can also export your calendar in vCal format and import it into Apple's iCal on your Mac. Address Book and iCal can be synced easily with iPhone or iPad.

The hard part was finding a solution for Tasks and Memos. Google searching turned up recommendations to use Outlook which can sync to the iPhone on Windows, or downloading a trial version of Missing Sync for Palm OS to export your Tasks into Apple's Mail.app, and your Memos into Mark/Space Notebook. Once your tasks are in Mail.app, you can sync with MobileMe and then use BusyToDo. Missing Sync also supports Bare Bones Yojimbo and Entourage, but these are incomplete solutions since Yojimbo is for iPad and read only at this time.

If you try this (as I did), make sure you backup both your Address Book and iCal data as described before attempting your first sync. On my first attempt, when I enabled MobileMe synching, it quickly duplicated every calendar entry. Yikes! I turned off synching and restored the calendar from the backup I had made earlier. If you sync your calendars, you have to be careful about local copies and what else might be lurking when you use Missing Sync. I decided to look for another solution.

When I searched the App Store for "Palm Memos", I was thrilled to find Notebooks and read the description of how to import memos from Palm Desktop. Nice!

Notebooks is actually a pretty interesting app for keeping notes compared to anything else I've seen. It has extensive synchronization features (DropBox, WebDAV, WiFi, iTunes,...) and works with many data formats including iWork, MS Word, PDF, html, etc. You can only edit plain text or "mark down" on your mobile device, but you can store and view most things you're likely to be interested in. It supports nested notebooks to any level, ToDos, and allows you to re-arrange your notes and books any way you want from your desktop or mobile device by synchronizing moves and deletions.

Notebooks recently added support for ToDos, and with some tweaking, I was able to capture the text of my clients ToDos, their category, and last modification date. Hopefully, Notebooks will add proper support for importing Palm Tasks. Here's what I did:

1. Exported my To Dos from Palm Desktop, format Tab and Return, name "ToDos.palm"
2. Opened my ToDos in AppleWorks as a spreadsheet
3. Cut column 4 and pasted over column 5 (without removing column 4)
4. Copied column 1 and pasted over column 2

If you press the "Columns" button while configuring your Palm export, you'll see the list of columns exported by Memos versus To Dos. I just mapped the To Dos columns to mimic Memos so I could import them into Notebooks. Using DropBox for synching, this worked well in my simple test run with a few dozen Tasks and Memos.

When I tried to transfer my clients hundreds of Memos and Tasks, the Memos failed to load part way through, and the resulting Tasks folder caused an error when I tried to sync using DropBox. It turns out there were problematic entries in the files I exported from Palm Desktop. Using Bare Bones Text Wrangler, I was able to study the progress or error messages and find the corresponding problem records in the exported Palm Desktop files (by line number or text snippet). Category names must not end in a space, and records must contain a valid title or body. After a few attempts at cleaning up the files and converting to UTF8 encoding, I got everything to transfer successfully.

Once the Tasks have been extracted by Notebooks, you can tell it to display each book as a task list to allow checking off individual tasks.

Finally I learned from the Developer of Notebooks for iPhone and iPad (Alfons Schmid) that he is working on a companion Mac version to create a complete and elegant solution. Currently every Memo or Task is represented on the Mac by a plain text file you can edit directly, and a ".plist" file containing various properties (which you can also edit). While not a perfect solution, it was good enough to ease the transition to iPhone and better than anything else I could find. With a Mac version of Notebooks, iPhone will finally be able to approach the elegance of the Palm Treo and Palm Desktop for keeping Tasks and Memos.

Which iPad to Get?

2011-03-09T10:14:00.001-05:00

With the iPad 2 going sale this friday (11-Mar-2011), many people are thinking about which iPad to get and whether it is worth upgrading. I have an iPad 1 3G with 16 GB and am thinking about this as well.

3G or not?

3G gives you the freedom to access the Internet anywhere there is cell coverage. In the car, around town, shopping, or in a waiting room. To me, this is a big part of what makes iPad so useful. In addition to Internet access, the 3G model includes a GPS receiver and compass to support location-based services. While you may not rely on the Maps application, location-based features include getting local weather, theater listings, social networking and so forth. A lot of things become easier or even possible when the iPad knows where you are. The 3G model also synchronizes the clock to the cellular network avoiding possibly awkward clock drift of 10 minutes or more.

Put simply, the 3G model is the full iPad experience Apple envisioned. The WiFi only model is a necessary compromise to achieve the psychologically important $499 entry level price.

If cost is important, consider skipping the iPhone in favor of a prepaid feature phone. With the money you save, you can buy 2 iPads including mobile Internet. iPads can make and receive phone calls, handle Email, SMS, IM etc. From my perspective, the iPad with 3G offers a richer mobile computing experience than any smartphone at a fraction of the cost if you are willing to carry it with you.

I love the iPhone, but spending $2000 on voice and data is a big expense for many. With the iPad 3G, $15 month gives you the best of the mobile Internet with no contract.

16, 32, or 64 GB of Flash Memory?

Unless you have a large collection of music, photos, or video you need to carry with you, stick with 16 GB. 16 GB is plenty for most uses, and the technology is changing so fast you'll most likely want to upgrade in a couple years anyway to get a newer radio (LTE), faster processor, more memory, etc.

AT&T or Verizon?

Advantages of AT&T:

(1) If your cellular data needs are modest since you will mostly be using WiFi at home or work, AT&T is less expensive at $14.99/month for 250 MB. Apple had a hand in creating this plan and it really is $14.99 per month with no surprises. You can start or stop any time you like again with no surprises. Verizon's plan starts at $20/mo for 1GB, but beware of fees and taxes. If you plan to use Verizon, ask around to determine your actual monthly bill, including starting service, stopping service, and going over your monthly allotment.

(2) AT&T's data service can be faster under good conditions.

(3) If you travel outside the US, especially in Europe, GSM is widely available. Verizon's CDMA is not.

(4) GSM can handle simultaneous voice and data on the iPhone. Not an issue for iPad.

(5) Apple has more experience with AT&T so the product and service is more mature.

Advantages of using Verizon:

(1) Verizon has the largest network and better coverage in many areas (but not always). If you travel extensively around the US, Verizon has more coverage in more places including the Metro in Washington DC. If you mostly stay within a single geographic region, ask the locals how the respective coverage works for them.

(2) If you expect to use more than the minimal data plan, Verizon could be less expensive.

(3) Verizon's CDMA radio technology (from Qualcomm) is more efficient, so the GSM camp adopted it for their 3G. Verizon has better 3G frequencies in many areas, which means better coverage indoors.

(4) Verizon is not AT&T. If you already have an AT&T iPhone, you can gain some redundancy and additional coverage by adding Verizon.

(5) Verizon has many corporate customers (including the federal government), so your employer may already have a deal with them.

iPad 1 or iPad 2

I'm still ambivalent around this. The iPad 1 I have works really well and I love my ZeroChroma Vario case. It lets me rest the iPad almost anywhere and adjust it to just the right angle, or hold my iPad more comfortably. A refurbished iPad 1 with 3G is available directly from Apple for $479 ($150 savings) which is pushing down iPad 1 resale values.

The selection of cases for the iPad 2 is likely to be slim at first. While I like the idea of Apple's smart cover, I carry my iPad almost everywhere and appreciate having a shell to protect it from the minor dings of everyday use.

On the upside, the iPad 2 represents the leading edge of mobile computing and affords new applications I haven't even imagined yet. The combination of geo-tagged photos, video, gyroscope, and dual core processing will open many doors. Being able to mirror anything to an external display will be invaluable to some.

I'll probably wait a month or two to hear how the iPad 2 is received and then make a decision.

Enjoy!

Will Apple do a 7-inch Tablet Device?

2011-01-01T12:07:00.001-05:00

I don't think so. Apple could easily do a 7-inch "iPhone XL" if the 7-inch form factor becomes important, but nobody can do a 7-inch iPad like tablet because too much software that defines the iPad user experience won't work.

Anybody who proposed making a PC that couldn't run a decent spreadsheet would be promptly dismissed as out of touch with business reality, yet people talk about 7-inch tablets as if they're going to be a defining market segment. The not-so-subtle underlying message is that the emerging crop of 7-inch devices are mobile computers in the iPad category when THEY ARE NOT.

iPad shipped with a capable spreadsheet (Numbers), Word processor (Pages), and Database (Bento) from day 1. The difference between a PC, cell phone, and tablet is the software it runs in addition to the form factor.

When it comes to touchscreen tablet computers, there is only one well stocked App Store. The emerging crop of 7-inch devices is unlikely to change that. If you want to apply the Windows analogy, Apple has the biggest base of software and developers which is attracting ever more investment. The window of opportunity to create a market leading alternative will not remain open indefinitely.

Some (like Google Chrome) have proposed cloud based services can take the place of native applications. Others have dubbed this "careless computing" (somebody somewhere has your mission critical data and you don't care).

Some have suggested that a high performance mobile web browser is enough (BlackBerry PlayBook). Native apps to access the web add an unnecessary layer of complexity.

In my view, it's the user experience that matters most, and Apple is leading in many areas that others can't easily replicate. In politics, there's an old game: "If you can distract people by asking the wrong questions, the answers don't matter."

Replacing Apple Downloads with the Mac App Store

2010-12-22T10:47:00.001-05:00

Apple is correct to recognize that the Mac App Store offers a way to create more value. But their letter to developers asserts:

"Because we believe the Mac App Store will be the best destination for users to discover, purchase, and download your apps, we will no longer offer apps on the Mac OS X Downloads site."

This statement is subjective and depends on who "your apps" is referring to and what the user is looking for. The Mac App Store is open to self contained productivity and entertainment apps that may access the Internet. Based on Apple's published guidelines, the Mac App Store IS NOT open to system utilities, disk utilities, network utilities, software that attempts to enhance the user interface of existing system facilities, or most plug-ins including browser, Email, and Address Book plug-ins.

Why? Placing code or resources in any shared area or requesting privilege escalation is prohibited.

In order for Apple's assertion above to be broadly true, Apple would need to offer a "Mac Utility Store" or other venue for applications that cannot meet the Mac App Store restrictions. This would include many award winning tools like Disk Warrior, Super Duper!, Default Folder X, 1Password, and other system maintenance utilities and plug-ins. Ironically, many Macworld Editor's Choice Award winning products are not eligible to appear in the Mac App Store. To say the Mac App Store is the "best destination for users to discover, purchase, and download your apps" is understandable marketing speak, but it's not the whole story.

I understand the hype machine can only focus on one thing at a time, but I hope Apple will consider expanding the scope of their Mac App Store(s) to truly become the "best destination" to discover great software.

Respectfully Submitted,

- Peter Sichel
Sustainable Softworks

Network Neutrality Made Simple

2010-12-22T09:44:00.001-05:00

Much of the debate around Network Neutrality has tended to obfuscate what is essential to regulate with what is controversial, so I'd like to spell it out simply.

(1) Wireless airwaves and landline right of ways belong to the public.

(2) Government has granted a small number of business organizations a license or charter to provide voice and data communication services to the public based on these public resources.

(3) Building and operating the nations communication networks gives these organizations certain powers which the public has an interest in regulating. The charter granted to these business organizations to provide voice and data communication services to the public prohibits any attempt to give themselves or anyone else an unfair competitive advantage over any other lawful communication service that runs on top of these network facilities. The public's interest in an open Internet that supports efficient innovation requires this.

Point 3 is the crux of Network Neutrality. Certain carriers have tried to obfuscate the issue by saying they need the ability to offer premium services and manage the network which Network Neutrality would somehow prohibit. I respectfully disagree. The issue is whether Internet data carriers can grant themselves an unfair competitive advantage by virtue of controlling the pipes. The answer that best serves the public interest is "no".

For example, Network Neutrality says that Comcast may not restrict access to Netflix or charge a premium for such access so as to make their own video on demand services more competitive. They can manage the bandwidth available for streaming, but they must not discriminate based on the content itself or who provides it. The user decides what services they choose to access.

Does Android Compete with iPhone?

2010-10-13T10:47:00.001-04:00

The race is on, Android sales are catching up with iPhone, and we all know a race implies a winner. The question that's not as widely considered is how much these products actually compete? First, Android is an operating system used by multiple vendors, so we need to consider Apple's iOS eco-system and what these respective products bring to the market.

If you are a cell phone maker looking for a low cost licensable OS, Android is a clear winner. If you're a cell phone carrier looking to offer a family of attractive "smart phones" you can customize to add "carrier value", again Android is a winner. But what do these respective products offer to the people who actually buy and use them?

Android

- A cell phone available on multiple carriers.

- A flexible Internet communication device that offers mobile Web, Email, Maps, navigation, social networking, and the ability to run 3rd party apps.

- Lower cost in some cases but not others.

Android is a remarkable product, and if it weren't for the iPhone, it would be far ahead of anything else in its field, but the iPhone and iOS mobile platform arrived first.

iPhone/iOS

- A cell phone currently available through some carriers.

- A flexible Internet communication device that offers mobile Web, Email, Maps, navigation, social networking, and the ability to run 3rd party apps.

- A best in class App store available in 60 countries.

- A best in class portable music platform (iPod).

- A best in class mobile gaming platform (iPod Touch).

- A best in class mobile tablet (iPad) that serves as a book reader, electronic publishing channel, and is well suited to other business applications.

- Best in class battery life.

- Best in class retail product support.

- A consistent user experience that is always responsive and not bogged down by crapware.

- A restrained design that does not overwhelm new users with all the things it can do before they experience finding and downloading software from the App Store.

- A vast eco-system of product accessories.

- A consistent upgrade path.

- A broadly supported mobile computing platform that offers a consistent target for mobile application developers.

The next question one might reasonably ask is which of these differences are sustainable? The surprising answer is most of them. Some are based on long term investments which cannot be easily replicated (iTunes + iTMS, over 300 Apple retail stores, Mac desktop, Xcode developer tool chain). Another big factor is profitability to sustain ongoing development and innovation. Apple's vertically integrated business model has proven to be highly profitable at almost every level. In contrast, Android development is largely funded by Google's Search business. Whether this business model can expand to support an iOS like eco-system is an interesting question.

Today, both Android and iPhone/iOS are clearly successful. It is not my intention to predict a winner, but to point out how these products address very different market needs with relatively modest overlap. Both products have enormous growth potential. Android offers a powerful Internet enabled smartphone that is not locked down by a single vendor. iPhone/iOS offers a powerful, easy to use mobile computing platform that was not previously available.

As a smartphone OS, Android is a huge success. As a mobile platform OS, iOS has more developers and more software which is attracting ever increasing investment. When it comes to mobile touch screen tablets, there is only one well stocked App store with software designed specifically for the tablet format. If Android fails to attract significant tablet software over the next year, while Apple remains on track to sell over 40 million iPads, the difference will become more apparent.

Why Do Companies Release Products Before They Are Ready?

2010-09-20T14:25:00.001-04:00

In his Personal Tech column for 16-Sep-2010, New York Times columnist David Pogue asks:

"Why do companies bring products to market that they know and even admit aren't ready?"

Having worked at one such company, I became all too familiar with the pattern. At most companies, managers are judged on their ability to deliver on schedule, yet it's not until you actually start using the product that you discover many of the things that don't work right or need to be improved. The pressure is to follow the schedule and make the best of it. Nobody wants to be a complainer.

At Apple, senior management uses the product on a daily basis until they are confident customers will say wow! The rule at Apple is it doesn't ship it until users say wow! Apple still makes mistakes and discovers problems after a product has shipped, but for the most part their stuff works from the users point of view. If Apple does discover a problem, they have resources in place to upgrade or replace defective units in the field.

The key difference in thinking is actually revealed in the question itself. The management at most technology companies believe they are selling a "product" that meets a set of previously agreed upon specifications. It must do A, B, and C, and the sooner we can ship it the better. Apple believes they are selling a "User Experience". The hardware is a vehicle for delivering a great user experience, not an end in itself.

Apple still cares about schedules, but they recognize that the most important learning occurs after they begin using the product internally, and that providing a great user experience is a much bigger competitive advantage than being first to market or having the lowest price.

For years analysts questioned why Apple's didn't have a Netbook strategy. With the introduction of the iPad, we see that while other manufacturers were producing stripped down lower cost notebooks, Apple was doing the real work of thinking about what makes for a great mobile computing experience and what can be left out.

Apple's focus on the user experience also clarifies why Apple insists on greater control over the software that runs on their mobile iOS products. Apple is not merely selling a mobile device that runs software and allows you to make phone calls, Apple is selling a user experience that ties in to a global brand image and "digital lifestyle".

Network Neutrality: What Google and Verizon Should Have Said

2010-08-17T19:48:00.001-04:00

Google and Verizon recently offered a "compromise" proposal that accepted Network Neutrality for wired networks with limited enforcement, but then carved out exceptions for wireless and premium services. Here are the main points I think Google and Verizon should have acknowledged:

(1) We understand that wireless airwaves and landline right of ways belong to the public.

(2) We understand that we have been granted a license or charter to provide voice and data communication services based on these public resources.

(3) Building and operating the nations communications network gives us a great deal of power. We understand that we have not been granted a charter to give ourselves or anyone else an unfair competitive advantage over any other lawful communication service that runs on top of our network facilities. The public's interest in an open Internet that supports efficient innovation requires this.

Point 3 is the crux of Network Neutrality. Verizon keeps trying to obfuscate the issue by saying they need the ability to offer premium services and manage the network which Network Neutrality would somehow prohibit. I respectfully disagree. The issue is whether Internet data carriers can grant themselves an unfair competitive advantage by virtue of controlling the pipes. The answer that best serves the public interest is "no".

Don't Get the iPad? Just wait a little, it will get bigger.

2010-08-02T11:49:00.001-04:00

I've noticed a number of online comments and reports from people who say they just don't get the iPad and seem disappointed Apple has sold so many. Imagine you are back in 1976 and Apple has just released the Apple II, the first off-the-shelf personal computer you don't have assemble from a kit. Executives at IBM and Digital Equipment Corporation were puzzled what the big deal was. Why would anyone want a computer at home? Especially one that does so little? Yet within less than 15 years, PC software was driving much of the computer industry. Why? People did want affordable personal computers at home, while others recognized the opportunity and wrote gorgeous applications that 10's of millions of users could enjoy.

Back to 2010: Why would anyone want an instant on, easy to use, location aware, Internet capable, easy to carry, mobile computer that does so little?

(1) Because it offers a great user experience that wasn't previously available. The iPad is an ideal size for reading, allows you to keep the Internet within easy reach, and offers thousands of Apps to support whatever interests you have.

(2) The focus of innovation has shifted. Some of the best and most creative new software is being written for the iPad.

When I worked at Digital in the 1980's, we had endless debates about the difference between a Personal Computer and a Workstation. Many at Digital would single out some hardware difference: the larger display, better graphics, built-in networking, or even the price. They were all wrong. The real difference that mattered was the software it ran.

When Steve Balmer says "The operating system is called Windows", I think he's making the same mistake.

Don't get the iPad? Just wait a little, it will get bigger.

Some Common Observations

It doesn't do Adobe Flash

Few mobile computers do because 3 years after the first iPhone, Adobe has yet to deliver a version of Flash that works well on mobile devices. Some technologies that don't translate well to a mobile environment will be left behind.

It doesn't include a phone

Yes, and it doesn't include a $70/month phone bill and 2 year contract. Voice is not the primary App for the iPad, but you can use Skype or other VoIP services if you wish.

It's just a big iPhone

A swimming pool is just a big bathtub, but we use it for different things. The iPad is a comfortable size for reading. The responsive touch interface, clever use of panning+zooming, and focus on one task at a time makes the device almost disappear as you become absorbed in the flow of what you are doing.

The landscape keyboard is good enough for lightweight typing, while adding a Bluetooth keyboard accommodates heavy lifting.

It doesn't include a camera

Yes, it's a v1.0 product that starts at $499.

It doesn't do multitasking

I expect we'll see this when iOS4 comes to the iPad later this year.

It doesn't do handwriting recognition

Yes, but there are plenty of note taking apps that will record and even recognize your scribbles if you want that. Part of what makes the iPad such a joy to use is that Apple did the hard work of thinking about what is essential to a great mobile experience, and what can be left out. Fumbling for a stylus to do pixel perfect input is not fun when you are mobile. I believe this is one of the key insights behind the iPad's successful user interface (time will tell). A lot of people choose not to carry a pen in their pocket everywhere they go.

It doesn't synch wirelessly to the cloud for stand alone operation

Providing a great user experience for system backup and restore, software update, synchronizing multiple devices, and managing large media collections is hard. Apple still sees the Mac (or PC) as the hub of your digital life style. Many professionals (like me) are not ready to trust all their personal data to the cloud. Apple's approach feels safe and inspires confidence. If you've ever upgraded from one iPod to another, you know how easy this is. Over time, I expect we'll see more options that migrate services to the cloud.

A Better Response to Growing Markets

2010-07-29T14:35:00.001-04:00

I've written before about AT&T's capped data plans and what I feel is a lame $20/month additional charge for tethering. Since you are already paying for the amount of data you use, why should you have to pay extra for tethering? I suspect there is some marketeer at AT&T who recognizes there's a strong demand for tethering so they can charge extra, why leave money on the table?

What the wireless carriers are missing is that demand for wireless services is a huge growth market. By increasing capacity and driving down prices, they could dramatically increase the size of their business.

The PC revolution is going mobile. We need 10 or 100 times the bandwidth currently available. If you build it and price it right, you'll attract way more business than by trying to monopolize on the current shortage of supply.

iOS4 vs iPod Touch Battery Life

2010-06-20T19:41:00.001-04:00

With the release of iOS4, my iPod Touch (2G) gained the ability to remain connected to Wi-Fi even when locked or in sleep mode to receive push notifications (or VoIP calls in the background). The implications for battery life however are not immediately apparent.

Having lived with iOS4 on my iPod Touch since WWDC, I was initially caught off guard by the significantly reduced battery life. Previously my iPod Touch could go about a week without recharging, as I used it mostly for listening to audio an hour or so a day, and occasionally for looking up other information. After installing iOS4, battery life dropped to a couple days, or even less depending on the application I was in.

It turns out the WWDC application needed to be updated for iOS4 to conserve battery life, but more importantly, it had enabled "Notifications", the 3rd item under Settings. With notifications enabled, an iPod Touch will stay connected to a Wi-Fi network even while in sleep mode, thus burning through the battery much faster than I had previously experienced.

If you use an iPod Touch mostly as a music player and don't normally need notifications, be sure to leave this turned off in the Settings application, or select Airplane mode when you don't want the radios to remain active.

Enjoy!

- Peter

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Update 6/28/2010

Several users report their battery is still being drained while their iPod Touch 2G is sleeping. I believe this means other applications are activating the radio. Since the iPod Touch 2G doesn't officially get "multi-tasking" even with iOS4, this means one or more of Apple's built-in applications which are authorized to run in the background are implicated. I see two solutions so far:

(1) Use Airplane mode to explicitly prevent the radios from powering on.

(2) Review your iPod Touch Settings and disable any background network access.

Settings -> Notifications = Off

Settings -> Mail, Contacts, Calendars -> Fetch New Data -> Push = Off

Settings -> Mail, Contacts, Calendars -> Calendars -> New Invitation Alerts = Off

Settings -> WiFi -> Ask to Join Networks = Off

I hope Apple adjusts the default settings or provides an option to restrict network access while the iPod Touch is locked so unsuspecting iPod Touch users are not left to resolve battery life issues on their own.

AT&T's Capped Data Plans

2010-06-04T10:05:00.001-04:00

AT&T recently introduced a capped data plan for iPhone, iPad, and other smart phones

http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/02/atandt-makes-sweeping-changes-to-data-plans-iphone-tethering-comi/

I see some progress, but also some old thinking. Unlimited data is a thing of the past. Bravo. Everybody knows this was an unrealistic model that is in conflict with the increasing demand for data services. There is a practical limit on how many minutes a person can talk in a month. There's no obvious limit on how much data a person can use. To charge per minute for talk, and offer unlimited data makes no sense.

Tethering is $20/mo extra. That's disappointing. Now that you are charging for the amount of data actually used each month, there's no inherent justification to charge extra for tethering. It looks like a money grab.

If I want to use tethering to handle my Email a few times a year because I prefer the larger screen and keyboard of my laptop, AT&T says no dice, that will be $20/month extra. That doesn't leave me feeling warm and fuzzy about our relationship. It feels like you are charging extra for something that doesn't cost you any more to provide.

If you eat the bread with your left hand, it costs $25 per month.

If you eat the same bread with your right hand, it costs $45/month.

Lame.

Corporations and Profit

2010-04-13T15:56:00.001-04:00

"People forget that Apple is a corporation, and that the purpose of a corporation is to make money."

While this cliche is widely accepted, it's incomplete and often misleading. The purpose of a corporation is to create value by serving customers. Often that value is used to reward shareholders, but that's not the sole purpose. The distinction may be subtle, but it is not unimportant as I explain below.

Consider a company that sells a product in the market. The company creates "use value" in the eye of their satisfied customers who buy the product. They then use the corresponding cash value to pay their employees, suppliers, and reward their shareholders. Saying the purpose is to reward shareholders is putting the cart before the horse. Rewarding shareholders or "capitalism" is a tool for raising and concentrating capital. An important tool to be sure, but not the purpose of business itself. You don't go into business to raise capital, you raise capital to expand and grow your business.

The confusion arrises because CEO's often serve at the pleasure of a Board of Directors who are elected by the shareholders, so Wall Street investors like to claim the CEO's job is to serve the shareholders because it gives them more leverage. But before a company becomes a giant publicly held corporation, the original CEO was a self appointed company founder who had an idea to start a business by serving customers.

If you are an engineer or product developer working at Apple or any other technology corporation, what keeps you awake at night? Are you obsessed with how to make money for your shareholders, or do you spend more of your time thinking about how to create something of value for your customers?

Here's a simple thought experiment: What is the purpose of our economy?

A. To organize production in such a way as to provide the goods and services people want.

B. To provide a profit to shareholders.

Business organizations exist within the context of an economy whose purpose is to serve customers. Of course both points of view are valid. They are just different interpretations of our economic process. But B leads to awkward economic distortions like high executive compensation and accounting shenanigans as companies are tempted to finagle their books to make a stock appear more attractive. In many ways, this mis-understanding of business is at the core of our recent financial and banking woes. Even our education system is suffering from confusion over measuring standardized test results ("the bottom line"), versus serving students where they are.

Imagine a CEO of a company with a large market cap who sees their stock price increase by 10% on his watch. To his shareholders, this could be worth billions, so paying the CEO tens of millions is a small fraction of the value created for shareholders. Yet the company hasn't really created more value if it isn't creating more satisfied customers. You could say the shareholders are bribing the CEO to pay themselves (or threatening to fire him if he doesn't deliver).

If you are the CEO of Enron, you might be tempted to sell lucrative contracts to companies that you agree to buy back later and count these sales as revenue. If you are an investment bank, you might be tempted to securitize sub-prime mortgages... Looks great on paper, but nothing of use value has actually been created, only a contract or paper that appears to be something it isn't. All the while your executives and shareholders enjoy a nice windfall and will be very pleased with you until the bubble bursts. The last years I worked at DEC, I saw the company repeatedly mortgage its future to serve its shareholders.

Thankfully many business leaders know better. But the pressure to serve shareholders can be a huge distraction.

---

A good lens to evaluate Apple's competitive moves is whether maintaining tight control of the platform and user experience helps Apple continue to innovate and serve their customers more than it hinders 3rd party developers who would like to help the platform serve those same customers.

A key component of previous business computing platforms has been access to 3rd party solutions that need to work in more than one context to be cost effective and manage risk (other companies don't like being totally dependent on a single vendor either). From Apple's perspective, allowing these cross platform solutions reduces Apple's unique differentiation and ability to advance the platform on their own terms. Apple claims that cross platform tools produce substandard apps, but Apple uses many such tools in its own software and has made code re-use and cross platform UNIX tools and technology the basis of its Mac OS X strategy. If Apple wasn't worried that such solutions could be compelling, there'd be no reason to restrict them. The issue is not whether cross platform tools can be effective, but how they are applied and shape the platform experience.

Apple's usual strategy is to focus on the consumer first while doing just enough to remove barriers to corporate acceptance. Outlawing the use of any(!) platform independent language tools threatens to upset this balance. [Update, Apple has backed off on this issue as expected.]

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Why No Apple In The Food Industry?
"Focus on delighting customers, not on making money"

Another perspective on Adobe's situation

Steve Jobs Solved the Innovator's Dilemma

The Dumbest Idea In The World: Maximizing Shareholder Value

Thoughts on Batteries and Laptops

2010-02-09T13:34:00.007-05:00

Battery life has two dimensions: (1) how much charge the battery can hold, and (2) how this capacity changes over time.

In my own experience, I wore out a 13" PowerBook G4 battery in 13 months, bought a replacement, and saw it wear out again in about 14 months just by keeping the machine plugged in and sitting on my desk most of the time. After the 2nd replacement battery wore out (held less than an hours charge), I got more interested in what was going on and made some changes. The most visible change was keeping my laptop on a cooling stand.

When fully charged, Li-ion batteries have a limited shelf life and lose around 20% of their capacity per year. High charge levels and elevated temperatures hasten permanent capacity loss.

I was stunned to learn this, but it matches my own experience. The combination of normal laptop running temperatures (warm), and a fully charged Li-Ion battery was less than ideal. Contrary to popular wisdom, keeping Li-ion batteries fully charged as much as possible shortens their life.

Where did this popular wisdom come from? First, it is vital not to allow Lithium Ion batteries to completely discharge as this can create a safety hazard and will shut down the battery permanently. For this reason, the power system is designed around the battery used and shuts down when the charge becomes dangerously low. Second, deep discharge cycles are also known to hasten capacity loss. Since there is no "memory effect" with Li-Ion, waiting until your battery is nearly discharged is undesirable. For a typical portable device, this means it's best to charge the battery early and often.

But not all portable devices are used as portables anymore. A glaring omission from typical laptop systems is a feature to maintain the battery at less than fully charged to extend its useful life. My laptop easily spends 90% of its waking hours plugged in. I simply don't need the battery to be fully charged most of the time. As laptops have come to replace desktops for many users, the design of the battery system has failed to keep up with how it is often used. The ideal charge level for storing a Li-ion battery is around 40%.

One of the challenges Toyota faced in designing the Prius was battery longevity. Part of the solution they adopted was to maintain the battery between 40-60% charge as much as possible. The Prius uses nickel metal hydride batteries, but the principle is similar. Batteries last longer if you treat them gently.

You might be tempted to remove your laptop battery completely, but this is not a good idea. Modern laptops use the battery to smooth out spikes in the power consumption. If you remove the battery, the machine will respond by dropping the CPU speed to bring the entire system within the upper limit of the power supply.

Apple's latest designs use integrated Li-polymer batteries, so removal is impractical anyway. I don't know how Li-polymer batteries compare exactly, but the principle should still be valid. It would be helpful to make a distinction between charging for maintaining battery capacity (useful lifetime), and charging for the longest run time.

Links:

iPhone 3GS Lithium-Ion Battery Life

Market Share, Profit Share, and Use Value

2009-11-16T12:18:00.020-05:00

A lot of attention has recently focussed on Apple's success at gaining profit share despite its relatively small market share. For years, pundits were skeptical of Apple's ability to thrive with such low market share and prescribed various remedies which Apple mostly ignored. In this post, I will attempt to clarify these common mis-understandings of business objectives.

Back in the 1960s, when U.S. manufacturing was thriving, business studies showed that doubling production allowed one to reduce per widget cost by around 10%. If you were able to sell twice as many widgets as your next closest competitor, chances are you could produce them more efficiently and enjoy higher profits. The implication is that in each market or market segment, there is only room for a few producers with sufficient volume to be the most efficient and profitable manufacturers. The goal is to dominate your industry and outproduce others at low cost. Having made this connection, it was natural for the trade press to follow the market share leaders and expect them to be the most successful. Market share became king.

How High Tech Manufacturing Changed

By the 1990s, consumer electronics companies increasingly looked to move their high volume manufacturing off shore to take advantage of lower cost labor and efficient supply networks that had evolved to serve high volume consumer electronics production. Through various economic initiatives, China became the global center for manufacturing consumer electronics at low cost. The tight network of suppliers is hard to match anywhere else. In time, this network could even be rented in the form of contract manufacturing. Apple no longer manufactures its own computers, but relies on contract manufacturers in Asia.

Volume, Cost, and Efficiency

Production volume still plays a role in manufacturing cost, but the relationship is more complex. Apple is a fascinating case study. It deliberately produces fewer products that sell in higher volume. It aggressively limits inventory, shipping products directly from the factory to its own retail stores or customers. It contracts with key component suppliers (such as RAM or Flash memory) months or even years in advance to ensure stable supply at low cost.

Shortly after the return of Steve Jobs, Apple dramatically reduced its product line, got completely out of the manufacturing business, cut prices, and focussed on becoming an efficient producer. Long after Apple was selling nearly as many computers of any one model as Dell, HP, or Gateway, pundits still questioned the viability of Apple's low market share, completely missing the point that Apple had become an efficient PC maker.

While Apple has never competed at the low end of the PC market, its products are generally price competitive with PCs offering similar specifications. Apple profits not so much by charging more, but by operating efficiently, carefully considering what can be left out of each product, and using software to replace expensive hardware. Sometimes these decisions are unpopular, like leaving FireWire off the unibody MacBooks, or no camera on the iPod Touch G3. To be an efficient producer, you must focus on reducing cost and reducing waste over the lifecycle of a product. Apple is relentless about making sure each thing it does adds value, and is quick to abandon legacy technologies.

Some of Apple's best products succeed not by doing more, but by doing less really well and eliminating clutter. When Apple first introduced the iPod and later the iPhone, competitors were quick to point out all the things it couldn't do. No 3G, no multi-tasking, no user replaceable battery, no copy and paste, no figamajig. Even to this day, Verizon is running an "i Don't" campaign against the iPhone only a geek could love.

Use Value

The key to understanding any thriving business is how they create or add value for their customers. Apple consistently offers more in "use value" than it charges in "cash value". While pundits questioned the thinking behind a $399 MP3 player, high end consumers loved it because it offered a combination of user experience, convenience, and capability they couldn't get anywhere else. Apple's success with the iPhone has brought this point home.

If your only competitive weapon is low price, you are in a weak position because you don't have the resources to offer a dramatically better user experience that delights customers and builds brand loyalty. There are still pundits who argue Apple needs to cut prices or produce a Netbook to gain market share. While there's always room to improve, Apple is doing quite well with its customers, thank you.

There are others who think the bottom line is king, business only exists to make a profit. I respectfully disagree. The purpose of a business organization is to serve customers. A company that overcharges or doesn't create value for its customers is a house of cards waiting to fall. Their customers are on the lookout for better value and will quickly move when opportunity appears.

If I were to pick an area that needs more focus to build the best in class user experience Apple is known for, it would be the App Store and Apple's relationship with its iPhone developers. Apple is still ahead of its rivals, but there are some ways in which the app store business model is not working for some of Apple's long time friends and partners. Since it's easier to keep an existing customer or partner than gain a new one, this is an important signal.

Why Profit Share Matters (or Doesn't)?

Profit in any market is not a fixed pie, but a reflection of the value being created. When a company like Apple grabs a large profit share relative to its market share, it means the company has an effective business model that is creating value and generating the resources it needs to invest in improving its own products or entering new markets. This is the real world feedback that business provides.

Profit share can also reflect a monopoly or government policy. In my experience, the most successful businesses focus on creating value, serving customers, and being efficient at what they do. It's hard to steer a car forward while looking in the rear view mirror. Like a rear view mirror, profit alone does not provide the guidance business needs to succeed.

The Best Mouse I Ever Used

2009-09-24T14:58:00.012-04:00

I began studying and designing computer mice at Digital Equipment Corporation about 18 years ago. While I no longer design mice for a living, I've tried a lot of mice over the years with an eye toward what offers the best user experience.

In order to track an object smoothly on a computer screen, you need to update the mouse position at least once per frame time. On an 80Hz screen, that means at least 80 updates per second for both the cursor position, and scrolling position. Apple's Mighty Mouse got this right. For the first time, many could scroll smoothly and effortlessly in any direction. But the Mighty Mouse has its limits.

As one of my own mice failed recently, I picked up a Logitech VX Nano. What a surprise, this mouse is amazing. It's quick, responsive, offers high precision tracking, and is smooth as silk. The nano USB receiver is so small you can plug it in once and forget it. There are no wires or dongles to get in your way, and battery life is a respectable 6 months.

The scroll wheel tilts for simple horizontal scrolling, which is not quite as elegant as Apple's omni-directional scroll ball, but let's face it, most of us don't use horizontal scrolling all that often, and a smooth responsive vertical scroll wheel is worth a lot. The tilt control is just enough to slide the part of a window that falls off the edge into view when you need it.

If this is all you want, the Logitech v450 Nano does this beautifully and provides a slightly nicer grip as well as the ability to run for over a year on a single set of batteries. The difference in shape is subtle, but the v450 Nano has a slighter wider rubberized indentation for your thumb and fingers to hold the mouse which I found pleasing. The scroll wheel itself acts as the center button. The v450 Nano also uses a pair of AA vs AAA batteries making the mouse feel slightly back heavy when you go to lift it.

The VX Nano on the other hand has a nicer scroll wheel and two extra buttons along the left top edge. Both mice are superb, but having found the VX Nano on sale for close to the same price, I prefer it slightly.

The scroll wheel on the VX Nano toggles between two modes when you press it down: click detent, and friction free. Both are smooth and comfortable, but when you want to scroll through a long document, friction free lets you flick the scroll wheel at whatever speed you want, and it just keeps going. Since pushing the scroll wheel switches modes, there's a separate center button just behind the scroll wheel.

The VX Nano also features two small buttons along the left top edge that are ideal for "forward" and "back" . If you are right handed, just slide your first finger over slightly to feel them. Otherwise the mouse is ambidextrous.

There are lots of little details that make this mouse a pleasure to use including the comfortable shape, rubberized texture, and balanced weight. The wireless is plug-and-play. I even plugged two mice into the same computer. They worked seamlessly except for getting the machine to sleep. Logitech's LCC software allows you customize the buttons and scrolling behavior while keeping things simple.

There you have it, the best mouse I ever used. It combines wireless portability with the responsiveness and comfort of a desktop mouse. There's no Bluetooth pairing needed, and no significant delays or drop outs. If you're in the market for a better mouse, check it out.

Logitech VX Nano

Logitech V450 Nano

Update: What about Apple's Magic Mouse?

I tried one of these at an Apple Store recently.

I really like that there are no moving parts to wear or collect dirt, and the touch surface recognizes some useful gestures. Certainly Apple's best mouse so far. The overall responsiveness did not feel quite as crisp to me as the Logitech VX Nano, but it wasn't bad (the Magic Mouse uses Bluetooth versus dedicated 2.1 GHz RF). For anything but gaming, this could be a decent mouse with some cool features.

Testing Notes:

I didn't find the shape quite as comfortable in hand. The edges feel low and hard when you go to pick it up.

There's no way to press two buttons simultaneously (a software issue that should be correctable).

The front-to-back orientation is not obvious, although this shouldn't be a problem in most cases.

Bluetooth Phone Tools for Mac OS X

2009-08-18T07:17:00.046-04:00

In Mac OS X Tiger, Apple's Address Book had the ability to connect with a Bluetooth phone to provide two rather nice features:

It could display caller ID information for incoming calls and bring up the corresponding Address Book entry if any.
It could dial out by right clicking on a phone number entry and selecting "dial using name-of-device" from the contextual menu.

In Mac OS X Leopard, these features disappeared from Address Book with nary a trace. As I began looking at what other tools might be available, I was struck by their divergent focus. Each of these tools offers a Status Bar Item with a pull down menu.

ApiMac CallerID emphasizes Caller ID. It works with Bluetooth as well as landline phones connected via modem and networked caller ID servers. Download size is 5.8 MB. CallerID offers 4 panes of preferences. $19.95 for Mac OS 10.4 or newer.

BluePhoneElite 2 emphasizes Bluetooth phone integration. This is a respected app that supports hundreds of Bluetooth phones. Its most unique feature is support for sending, receiving, and archiving SMS (which is not supported on the iPhone). It can even pipe audio to your Mac for use as a handsfree device. Download size is 8 MB. BPE2 has 8 panes of preferences. $24.95 for Mac OS X 10.4.4 or newer.

Dial ectic emphasizes dialing including Internet phone systems. Its most unique feature is that it works with so many VoIP phone services. Download size is 6.3 MB. Dialectic has more preference panels and sub-panels than one can easily count. $25 for Mac OS X 10.4 or newer.

Phone Amego emphasizes simple usability and uncluttered design. It provides on screen Caller ID, Address Book, Google Voice, and Bluetooth phone integration (including iPhone). SMS is supported through Google Voice. It also works with landline and VoIP phones.

Download size is 5 MB. Phone Amego has 5 preference tabs. $30 for Mac OS X 10.5 or newer.

Spotlight on Innovation

Phone Amego offers several features that have not been previously available in a single convenient package.

Supports Caller ID, Dialing, and Address Book integration.
Reports both inbound and outbound call status in a consistent heads up window. Can cancel a call in progress.
A single uncluttered menu bar item. Phone Amego focusses on the basic things most users want without feeling like an overstuffed sack of features.
One program to work with most common phones (Bluetooth cell phones, landlines, and VoIP).
Augmented Caller ID (Internet lookups).
iCal Logging. Track previous calls in your calendar.
Google Voice integration. Dial from any GV connected phone (indirectly). Send SMS to multiple recipients (free).
Easy to configure VoIP Caller ID.
Easy to configure Caller ID sharing. See who's calling or dial remotely from any computer (running Phone Amego) on your LAN.
Bluetooth Hands-Free speakerphone.
Simple call screening can block unwanted calls based on their Caller ID.
Keep notes about each caller.
Displays phone numbers in Address Book format.
Designed to maximize up time. In the rare event Phone Amego or some underlying system service crashes, Phone Amego's built-in crash reporter will display a dialog offering to send a detailed crash report to the developer, and then relaunch the application automatically after 30 seconds.

Fire Up the DC-to-AC Inverter

2009-07-20T10:57:00.004-04:00

I recently took a family road trip and wanted a way to let my kids watch movies on DVD in the back seat. An old laptop makes a nice low cost DVD player, but the batteries are only good for a couple hours which doesn't cut it. We've all seen auto power adaptors, but with Apple's changing connectors and the need to plug-in additional devices, these can get expensive and awkward to deal with.

An elegant solution is a DC-to-AC inverter. I found a $40 inverter (Wagan Tech) that's compact, quiet, delivers 400 watts (or 150 from a cigarette lighter socket), and includes two AC receptacles that let you to plug-in whatever you want. This kept the laptop running easily, while charging a second small device as needed (Nintendo DS, cell phone, and so forth). I don't know why I didn't think of this sooner.

IPNetMonitorX Featured at TheMacBundles.com

2009-06-29T20:39:00.009-04:00

IPNetMonitorX, my network troubleshooting tool kit for Mac OS X is one of 11 apps in the second bundle of themacbundles.com (expired 7/19/09). If you are in the market for some first rate apps, check out the list below (all for $50!)...

Caboodle - A lean, clean, snippet machine.
MailTags - Transform Apple's Mail into a powerful email organization system.
PrintMagic - Easily select and print just the info you want to print from any program.
ShutterBug - Easily share photos and stories with this easy-to-use website creation tool.
Trampoline - Get to your most important apps and folders faster.
Typinator - Automate inserting frequently used text and correcting errors.
Voila - Capture, annotate, and share anything you see on your screen.
World Clock Deluxe - Easily keep track of time anywhere in the world.

Plus these bonus apps:

Dock Gone - Keep the dock out of the way when you don't need it.
Smart Trash - Selectively delete just what you want deleted on each mounted volume.

Enjoy!

In Search of Affordable Tethering

2009-06-25T17:25:00.008-04:00

My family and I are planning our summer vacation in an area that does not have immediate access to high speed internet. In the old days, I used to maintain a dial-up account so I could check my Email when I was traveling and couldn't find a convenient alternative. It was slow, but it worked. My last dial-up account was $5.00 per month, and I only kept it for a few months at a time.

My latest MacBook doesn't have a built-in modem, so I've been looking for something more convenient. I considered an iPhone, but I'm much more comfortable with a laptop keyboard and screen, AT&T hasn't delivered tethering yet, and I am not thrilled about a two year contract at $70/month for the two weeks a year I really want to use this. When it became time to look for a new cell phone, I was intrigued by reports of successful tethering with T-Mobile (my preferred carrier).

After some research, I've found a solution that works reasonably well, but there seems to be some deliberate obfuscation to keep others from finding it. Here's what I learned.

At the time of this writing, T-Mobile sells one phone that can take advantage of high speed 3G tethering, a Sony Ericsson TM506. Shortly after its introduction last September (2008), users got so excited about the tethering performance T-Mobile got cold feet. As the number 4 carrier, they are frequency constrained in some areas and didn't want power users sucking up precious bandwidth needed to serve more customers (unless they were paying for that privilege). They announced that tethering was not supported and modified the TM506 firmware to hide the tethering feature.

I've always liked the user interface and Mac support on SE phones, so I began reading the forums to see if there was more to the story. Indeed there is. Tethering works just fine on the Mac if you have a corresponding data plan and it was not terribly difficult to configure. Like so many things, there are many ways of looking at this.

T-Mobile lists "High speed data with EDGE" as a feature on many of their phones, and customers have been happily tethering for years. The word on the street is they wont block it but can throttle you to EDGE speeds if you exceed your data plan quota. T-Mobile cleverly redefined "unlimited web" to mean you can access any site on the web directly, but you still have a bandwidth quota depending on your plan.
Now that they are rolling out 3G, T-Mobile has begun offering a separate USB Laptop Stick with its own $60/month data plan (following their rivals), but this is serious overkill for my needs (plus 3G isn't widely available yet). I just want to get my Email on those rare occasions when WiFi isn't available. Perhaps 10 days a year.
T-Mobile is concerned that extensive 3G tethering could adversely effect their network, so does not want to encourage it. If you ask, they'll respond "not supported" or "don't do it."

There appears to be some deliberate obfuscation as carriers scramble to see what the market will bear. Nobody is likely to mind if you check your Email a few times a year and prefer the screen and keyboard of your laptop, but if you start pulling 100s of MB per day using 3G, this could be a problem they don't want to deal with.

The phone actually includes a T-Mobile Email client, but it's designed to charge you 20 cents per message like SMS unless you buy a messaging bundle. The phone also includes a built-in GPS receiver and Telenav service you can enable for $10/month. You are disabled from installing Google Maps or GMail for mobile directly, but you can download them to your computer, copy to your phone, and then use the File Manager to install them, or point your phones browser at wap.getjar.com and download the Java (J2ME) versions.

The SE TM506 lists for $160 (no contract price), and I added a $30/month voice plan, and $10/month unlimited web for phones data plan. T-Mobile gave me a 12% discount off my monthly plan for being a AAA member. I could have gotten the phone for $130 less by agreeing to a two year contract, but I prefer the idea that I'll keep the plan only if it's meeting my needs. I can cancel at any time and revert to pay-as-you-go for 10 cents a minute. Since I'm not under contract, T-Mobile has a little more incentive to keep me happy.

Anyway, here's what I did that worked. First, download the TM506 iSync plugin from here (this installs a Sony Ericsson modem script and iSync plugin). Next, I paired the phone over Bluetooth and selected the services I wanted (sync contacts, use phone as modem, etc.).

Network Preferences:

TM506 EDGE via Bluetooth

TM506 EDGE via USB

The drop in latency makes this noticeably faster. Adequate for checking Email or a few specific web pages, but not great for general surfing. This is what I expect to use on vacation.

TM506 3G via Bluetooth

TM506 3G via USB

The upload speed actually dropped a little possibly due to congestion. 3G tethering is quite usable in either case. Typical web pages are a few seconds slower, but not to the point of being bothersome. T-Mobile's 3G coverage is more limited than AT&T, but it's nice to see they are making progress (YMMV).

Regardless of whether you use the TM506 for tethering, it's not a bad phone. The call quality is surprisingly good, close to that of a conventional cordless phone. The screen is bright, sharp, and offers a reasonable user interface with only a modest lag in most cases. The keys are well spaced and easy to use. Reception seems good even in weak signal areas. Ring tones are loud and clear, and you can add your own by copying mp3 files to the phone.

Enjoy!

Welcome

2009-06-25T16:36:00.003-04:00

Hello and welcome to the Sustainable Softworks blog. I started Sustainable Softworks in 1996 to build a software IP router for the Mac. At the time, it was a big leap. I'd been working at Digital Equipment Corporation for the past 14 years and had never developed for the Mac before. I fell in love with the Mac 10 years earlier, and was part of small increasingly marginalized group of Mac enthusiasts at Digital. I used my own Mac while working at DEC to thrive, developing user interface prototypes in HyperCard, and publishing technical documents, but Digital was shaking itself apart and I needed something to do.

I always wanted to run my own business, so somehow I convinced myself the experience would be worth it regardless of the outcome. Two years later, I shipped IPNetRouter which received a 1999 Macworld Editor's Choice Award and was licensed to Apple Computer as part of the original AirPort Software Base Station.

Much has happened since then, but this blog is still about using Macs, following your dreams, and one developers experience of technology from the inside out. Enjoy the ride!

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USB-to-Ethernet Adaptors for Mac OS X

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Finding and Fixing Potholes on the Information Highway

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