ThaGeek Fall 2013

ThaGeekFall 2013 The Magazine Iteration of thadailygeek.com

BlackberrY Hate

Date A programmer

Is tech the new green gold?

Everybody hates blackberry

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Contents

Geek Articles05 21 reasons to date a pro-grammer21 solid reasons why you should date a programmer.

06 thE time is nowA synopsis on the riveting lecture by The Right Hon. Dr. Keith Mitchell

08 apple lover tries android Pt 1A surprising look into the switch from iOS to Apple.

10 the old and new microsoftDelano explores the Microsoft that we knew and loved.

12 tech is the new green goldAre we looking in the wrong place for our gold mine?

16 why i hate whatsappWhy this geek hates the ever popular messaging app.

16 apple lover tries android 2Part 2 of the switching saga

18 everybody hates blackberryBlackberry, once the popular kid is now alone at the lunch table in the cafeteria

20 why we dont care about digital piracy.Finding the middle ground between natural and artifi cial light.

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thageek

EDITORIAL TeamJanique-ka John

EditorLayout and Artwork

[email protected]

Maurice John Organization and Design

[email protected]

Delano RodgersCheif Layout Editor

[email protected]

ADVERTISING MANAGER ThaDailyGeek Team

[email protected]

PHOTOGRAPHY Cover Photography by Janique-ka

John Photography for ‘Digital Piracy’ by

Janique-ka John ‘Time is Now’ Farley Hill - Pho-tography by Janique-ka John

‘Apple Lover’ Android Phone bgr.com

Screenshots by Maurice John

‘Old and New Microsoft’Photography by Robert Scoble

Tha Daily GeekRead. Share. Discuss.

Letters, Questions, Queries

EDITORialTha Daily Geek has really come a long way its nine months of existence. Racking up well over 45,000 total views since launch, its hard to believe the idea for this blog was hatched during a study break. Here in ThaGeek, the first in a series of quarterly publications, there is both exclusive and original content featured in a more graphic format than you’re used to. We hope you like it! Also, don’t forget this magazine is totally interactive online so feel free to click active links! Email [email protected] if you are interested in advertising in our next publication. On the light from top to bottom, you would see the Geeks behind it all! Maurice John, Janique-ka John & Te-Je Rodgers.

- Geek Jan

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21 Reasons to date a Programmer by Te-jé rodgers

Programmers are known for being somewhat esoteric. We get a bad rap for sometimes being anti-so-cial or inattentive partners, but I think the perks of being hinged to one of us can often be overlooked. Well, that’s been going on for far too long. Allow me to shed some light on why you should dump your current partner and date one of us.

1. They’re great listenersIf by listening, you mean sifting through program output and nodding oc-casionally while you rant on about your problems.

2. They’re great at prob-lem solvingWe’re not just good at lis-tening either; we can devise ingenious, elegant solu-tions to the problems that plague you. Just don’t be sur-prised when we try to apply an algorithm to nosy Sally.

3. They know how to conduct themselves at crowded din-ner tablesJust think how handy this will be when you take us home to meet your parents.

4. You’ll get your space (whether you like it or not)We spend a lot of time glued to our computers. That should give you plen-ty of time for other activities like hik-ing, socialising and nagging us about not spending enough time with you.

5. You don’t have to be a good cook to satisfy themOur diet mainly consists of junk food, so pretty much anything is a step up. Plus, if you really screw up, chances are we’re so caught up with tracking down bugs that we’ve forgotten about eating anyway.

6. They’ll give you Ruby’s and Perl’sThough, you probably won’t like them.

7. Fame and fortune might just be one magnificent beard awayWhat more could you ask for?

8. They always read the documen-tation. Even when it’s bad.Reading bad documentation is pret-ty much in our job description. We’ll install that Alarm System 3000 from Russia for you - the right way.

9. And when that fails, they know how to reverse engineer.Reading documentation that isn’t there is in our job descrip-

tion too. We’ll get that old hand cranked mixer working in no time.

10. They’ve got talented tonguesMost of us speak five or six different languages.

11. You won’t understand them half the time, but it’s okay.No one really expects you to with all that “jargon”. In some warped way you’ll be praised for doing the absolute minimum and just barely trying, while we struggle to keep up with all of your mundane interests.

12. They’re lazy, but in a good way.We’ll find interesting short-cuts for all the boring, repetitive tasks you do from time to time.

13. They can use tools like touch, unzip, grep and Python to great effect.‘Nuff said.

14. They can give you a lifetime supply of cookies.You won’t even know what to do with them.

15. They’re very eco-consciousWhy else would we spend so much

time seeding, or building trees?

16. They can endure the worst kinds of tortureIf we can put up with coding in PHP and parsing XML–or worse, parsing HTML–, then there’s surely nothing we won’t be able to take on for you.

17. They know tons of algo-rithms to help you find your keys.Related: you know how to turn your environment into a search tree, right?

18. You can take them camp-ingTracking down bugs is in our job description, so when those critters come out just let us loose and watch the magic happen. Just be sure to provide us with an API.

19. Their fingers get tons of exerciseAlthough, I can’t imagine how that could possibly come in handy (Oh, hey mom!).

20. They’re real geeksWhy settle for an imposter when you can have the real deal?

21. You’ll never make stupid buying choices ever againWe’re well adept at grasping technical specifications and how they fit with your needs, and won’t hesitate to scold and mock you when you make silly buying choices. Just watch out for oc-casional fan-boyish ranting or gushing over certain products.

by Janique-ka john

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The Right Hon.Dr. Keith Mitchell made a timely presentation on the topic “The Use of Technology in Un-locking Caribbean Potential in order to Create Further Development” at UWISTAT’ s (University of the West In-dies – Students Today Alumni Tomor-row) Annual Prime Ministers lecture in April,2013 . The Prime Minister highlighted the importance of un-locking the potential of Caribbean in Technology. According to Dr.Mitch-ell, the rest of the world is rapidly changing, and we in the Caribbean must catch up in ICT (Information and Communications Technology) on both a National & Regional Scale,

The Time is nowas well as revolutionize our Educa-tional and Governmental Systems.

A Changing Society

In his presentation, Dr. Keith Mitch-ell gave a little background on the propelling force behind this recent rapid development in mobile tech-nology, attributing it to advances in micro-electronics – “The ability to fit processing power on finger-nail size chips”. Accompanying this is the advancement in opto-electron-ics, giving rise to HDTVs and broad-band internet. These advancements together was the perfect recipe to

propelling a rapid change in so-ciety and life as we knew it – with things like Google, Youtube and blogging, “breaking the constraints of time and space in the past”.

Dr. Mitchell went on to show the outcome of this change –” Relation-ships these days are now defined by common interests and goals, rather than geographical location. We are now ourselves information publish-ers, rather than solely information processors.” Businesses the world over have also changed to have “a wider reach, teaching has evolved to be more student centered and gov-

Relationships these days are now defined by common interests and goals, rather than geographical location.

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been a transformation in the rest of the world concerning “how and by whom wealth is created as well as where things are being manufac-tured”. After highlighting how quickly the rest of the world is being changed by the advent of this technology, Dr. the Honourable Keith Mitchell then posed a pertinent question. How do we in the Caribbean leverage this?

Changing the Caribbean

”The Proposition: Caribbean will be shaped not by the technolo-gy itself but the choices we make on how we use these technologies to access information, and regu-late our activities to provide eco-nomic prosperity and sustainable growth by developing our economies to become globally competitive.”Dr. Mitchell referred to a paper titled A Time to Choose: Caribbean Develop-ment in the 21st Century, 2005, which confirmed the need for the Caribbe-an to step up to the plate. The paper according to Dr.Mitchell pointed out the Caribbean’s reduction in compet-itiveness a decline in the growth of tourism as a percentage of GDP. It’s clear that we need to let go of things of the past and make a change! In a test of e-readiness of the Caribbe-an, where would we place? Accord-ing to Dr. Keith Mitchell, we have work to do in “e-governance, e-ed-ucation, accompanying legislation, content, e-business and e- health”

The arena of education was identi-fied as the single most challenging problem to fix. “Old strategies are no longer appropriate”. We need to break from the past. Dr. Keith Mitchell went on to point out that the people of the Caribbean are leaving the ed-ucation system with knowledge, but still unprepared – “without the right skills and attitude to grab new oppor-tunities”. This is of grave concern, as experts predict that the future work space would have “more freedom and individual responsibilities, which in turn would lead to a flood of innova-tion and ideas. The future work space would require continuous learning and teaching, knowledge workers.”

In terms of the Government, Dr.Mitch-ell identified the way forward. “It is important for government to create healthy environments for SMEs(Small and Medium Enterprises) to survive,

ensuring easy setup and equal treat-ment for national and cross-border enterprises”. He warned however that business models based on IT just for the sake of it would not be sus-tainable. “On a regional level, there is a need for coordinated, sustained in-formation sharing and collaboration”

The Right Hon.Dr. Keith Mitch-ell concluded by impressing on the crowd that the time is now. There is nothing more important than to use ICT as the great equal-izer, “in hopes of satisfying the needs of the Caribbean people”.

Dr. Mitchell made some very im-portant points, which would not be foreign to many Computer Science majors. It was rather exciting to hear a Prime Minister recognize that ICT can provide avenues for economic growth and propel the Caribbean to be globally competitive thus con-tributing to the overall wealth and well being of the Caribbean. I have long since realized the value of tech-nology, and the power we now have to create a globally competitive Car-ibbean, in areas other than Sun, Sea and Sand. I worry however that the ideals coming out of the presentation may not have hit home. This was evi-dent during the question and answer segment, as hardly any of the ques-tions asked by the audience had to do with technology in the Caribbean.

It is time we realize that this revolu-tion is placing the power in our hands. The Internet and new technology has removed the barriers which existed before, where only certain people could do certain things. Knowledge previously reserved for the most learned are now available to anyone who is willing to learn. Sharing is no longer confined to geographical lo-cation. We must realize that this is an important gateway for us as Car-ibbean people, our size and location, something that has always been perceived to hold us back, has no bounds in the world of the Internet!

Only when we break free of the mentality of the past, can we catch up with the rest of the world.

ernments have become more transparent,

with citizens hav-ing more ease of

access to its ser v ices”.

With ICT there

has

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I look on with envy as Android progress-es forward “graphically” and feature wise

Apple Lover tries androIdI have found myself in a rather peculiar position of late, I am now using an Android de-vice – the Nexus 4 to be exact and I’m loving it! Now, for my friends this might be the part of the movie where we all get down on our knees and pray for the forgiveness for those dreadful sins we have commit-ted, because “iRice” just ad-mitted he likes Android. It’s not the end of the world just yet but heck prayer is good right?

My dear friend and DailyGeek partner Janique-ka took time out from her busy schedule to create this “fitting” meme (right)

So here’s my story...

I sold my iPhone a few days ago. To be honest iOS contin-ues to feel bland, unimagina-tive really within recent times.

I look on with envy as Android progresses for-ward “graphically” and feature wise Even the slow to everything Win-dows & Blackber-ry have found a way to become relevant again. I promised myself my next device would be a Black-berry OS 10 de-vice but its seems like I would have to delay that jump.

by maurice john

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The price of the Z10 just isn’t worth it. The OS is a huge jump but the hardware just isn’t up to snuff plus the App eco-sys-tem leaves much to be desired. The thought of shelling out that much cash escapes me. Next on my list of OSes to try was Windows phone 8 but I thought, I rarely kept a device for an extended period of time and no one will buy a Win-dows phone in the Caribbean. So Windows phone for now seemed like a wasted invest-ment. The next option Android. The choice now came down to the device. I would never buy a Samsung device. Never Ever!! I love HTC but I wanted some-thing cheap and as close to the Android stock experience as possible, so the Nexus 4 was my best option.

Android has certainly come a long way since I owned the HTC one a few years ago. Everything just works and smoothly too, well on the OS end. My first frustration came

in the form of the Google Play store, when I fired up the store I found myself trapped in a barrage of mostly irrel-evant apps. Suspecting this must be due to my Caribbean

IP address, I fired up my VPN client and browsed the play store from my PC. Since the Play store is set up so you can install apps directly to your de-vice from your PC this solution worked perfectly. Cool Apps Checked.

Next step custom ROM. From my time spent reading the various tech blogs I am familiar with the process of rooting and installing custom ROMs. I know Cyanogenmod is one of the most respected ROM of the lot so I fired up YouTube and then flashed CM10.1 on my device.

Next up, Franco Kernel. This

kernel is known not for the boost in performance (Trinity Kernel is best for that) but the strides in battery life perfor-mance. In my book, battery life trumps blazing speeds any day. Now this kernel real-ly gives your battery a huge boost. My device at this point is sitting at 42% after 8 hrs of on time. My device is a little tweaked though, I set the CPU governor to conservative and reduced the maximum CPU frequency.

The ability to customize almost every part of the system is a welcome change for this iOS user. Apple’s ideology, “it just works” sometimes gets a little too easy pushing on borderline boring. Fire up a live wallpaper and get mesmerized by the “awesomeness” that is Android then open an app only to see it stutter.

Up next, A review of the Nexus 4 and my in-dept review of Android.

Life with android

Simple Pleasures

customization heaven

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When Gates and Allen found-ed Micro-Soft nearly four decades ago, they couldn’t have known that their com-pany would rise to heights such as it did. Now a 200 bil-lion dollar enterprise, Micro-soft is a giant in an industry where giants are rare and perhaps ephemeral. A com-pany doesn’t get so far with-out burning a few bridges, and Microsoft burned their competitors with such artful spectacle that they became a force to be reckoned with.

I tend to imagine the exist-ence of small a group of peo-ple (probably not so small by the looks of it). Some are suc-cessful, others destitute, and the rest in between. They’re

completely sane, complete-ly normal people except for one thing; they flinch, shiv-er, or curse in anguish at the mention of Microsoft’s name. I imagine them flying into a fit of rage, breaking things and scaring their kids. And you know what? I completely em-pathize with them, for these are people whose hopes and dreams have been blown away by the big, bad Microsoft.

Do you think lawsuits about rounded corners are bad? Try having your customers bullied into boycotting your products, or having your dis-tribution channels cut off. When my colleague referred to Microsoft as the “mobsters of the tech world”, it was no unfounded accusation. Do you remember WordPerfect? …or Netscape…or RealPlay-er? They’re just a few of the threats that Microsoft identi-fied and extinguished using

dubious business practices.Those practices, along with notoriously buggy software earned them perhaps the sourest reputation of any software firm in existence. You don’t have to look far to find some geek with a seem-ingly never-ending stream of bad things to say about Mi-crosoft. If you’ve ever seen them referred to as Micro$oft or Microshaft (and others that are a bit inappropriate for this blog) then you know what I’m talking about. Ap-parently, Microsoft took no-tice of this too, because for better or for worse, they’ve started turning things around.

At around the same time Vis-ta was released, we began to see a brand new Microsoft. The attention they paid to im-prove the cosmetic appear-ance of their Windows prod-uct line perhaps mirrored the intention to improve the com-

The OLD &New Microsoft

That Microsoft,

Dear Readers, is no

longer with us

by Te-jé rodgers

ThaGeek 11

pany’s overall image. In retro-spect, the most significant ac-complishment for Microsoft in that year might not have been the introduction of their new OS, but the launch of the now dead Zune media player. Sig-nificant because almost every major product that Microsoft has on the market today, even Windows, can be tied back in some way to the Zune. More-over, Zune (both the media player and the accompany-ing services) embodied much of what the new Microsoft represents; it was consum-er-oriented, innovate, some-times brilliant, but also tame and confused. Did it want to set its own trend, or become just another Apple imitation?

When Windows Phone was unveiled, it was a wet-dream to Xbox gamers and Zune us-ers like me (yeah, I rocked a Zune HD). Somehow Micro-soft had managed to adapt

the Zune’s innovative UI to the smart phone in a way that made sense, but more important-ly, we began to catch a glimpse of a vision of the sort of consum-er-oriented company that Microsoft could become. A device that could integrate Xbox, Office and the won-derful Zune experi-

ence? In my pocket, you say? “Well, sort

of,” was the eventu-al reply. While the idea

seemed golden, its ex-ecution left much to be

desired. What’s more, the first version of Windows

Phone while beautiful at first glance was deficient of some very basic smart phone features - A step behind.

Soon enough, Windows 8 was announced, and Windows Phone users like me (yeah, I own one too) rejoiced. “Finally, Microsoft has seen the light,” we thought. The convergence of services that we expected with Windows Phone would finally happen. We would have a PC that would play well with our game consoles/home entertainment systems, and now our phones. Instead, what we got was a confused product trying so hard to be the best of two worlds that it was better at none.

The convergence that we thought would come still hasn’t arrived, or at least on a level that other companies in worse positions haven’t al-ready gotten to. Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 should have been a marriage that made entwined lovers blush; instead we got a few frills here and there, nothing tru-ly special. It’s nice that I can buy music once, and use it on my phone, PC and home en-tertainment system, but hey, Amazon solved that problem ages ago (well, at least if you

live in certain places). Am I wrong to expect more from the world’s larg-est software company?

I’ve found that the new Microsoft has never failed to supply me with dis-appointment, something that was never the case with the old Microsoft. The disappointment, I think, comes from wasted po-tential. Make no mistake; Microsoft’s more recent offerings have all been good (sometimes great) in their own rights, but they could all have been much better if not for one or two brain-dead blunders that seem to plague every single one of them. The funny thing is, Old Micro-soft wouldn’t even care. While New Microsoft is wrapped up in delivering shiny, functional products to consumers and possibly getting on our good grac-es, Old Microsoft would have probably annihilat-ed the competition ages ago and just handed us Windows CE on a brick.

In the grand scheme of things, the new Microsoft is better for us, if only because they haven’t (or couldn’t have) killed off the competition. Who knows, with the direction they’re taking Xbox and its servic-es, they might even even-tually get this whole con-sumer market thing right.

See? I’m falling for it again…

Old Microsoft

would have prob-

ably annihilated

the competition

ages ago

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Tech is the NEw green Gold

is no exception. Can we really com-pete? Should we continue to lambast our Caribbean governments within their limited capacity, can they ena-ble the local man in the ways those companies beyond our shores can?

Software Development

The world is getting smaller; with a simple internet connection I can throw a digital stone and reck havoc miles away. I believe the next true green gold for our Caribbean peo-ple is wrapped in 1’s and 0’s. It’s safe to assume mobile development will continue to grow as it has for the past three years. Each year the bil-lions paid out to mobile developers gets greater. If we evaluate what it takes to build an application the core tools are all available to everyone. If you want to write HTML5, JavaS-cript, CSS, PHP, Java, Object C, C# and the list goes on, these are not reserved for the privilege. The size of your country does not dictate how well you can write a piece of code. The size of your country does not dictate how well you can design an application. The availability of lands does not dictate the quality of your resulting application. I believe on the development front we are equal.

Dream

I am not trying to portray a dream like canvas where all that is required are skilled painters. The challenges of software development are great, I can begin to list the endless trou-bles associated but I am a firm be-liever in our Caribbean people. None of the challenges are too great that we as a people cannot overcome. As I sit writing this article, Facebook sits in the background, my ticker reads “X person mixed striped Can-dy + Wrapped Candy on Candy Crush Saga”. I have never ventured in the seemingly addictive world of Candy crush but from all reports it is not a game based on new concept but an improvement of that before it. We

need more dreamers who sit think-ing of the possibilities and have the support to make them a reality.

The Opportunity

Software development presents at least four distinct job creations brackets. There is the Design, Cod-ing, Testing and Marketing. Each of these brackets are important to the success of the final product and af-fords a wide employment base. The game of numbers and the impor-tance of having a unified Caribbean comes into focus. Looking at a coun-try like Montserrat with a popula-tion of just over five thousand, it is statistically impossible to create a full-fledged software development firm. Bear with me as I slip back into the dream world. Imagine a software company with its design firm based in one country, it’s testing based in another, is the picture becoming clearer? The perfect synergy, the elu-sive one Caribbean our governments sells us but have yet to produce.

Banana Amnesia?

Let us not be swayed by the winds of the software development and forget what Banana has done for us as a people. I am not suggesting we burn the fields and erect buildings to host our future coders. Howev-er, like a boxer who has passed his prime, for longevity he must pick his battles carefully. Banana will live on but it must evolve into a differ-ent segment of our lives. These said coders must eat too. We must now evaluated our import and plug the holes that exist in the local market to sustained our trusty boxer. Forev-er grateful we are but move forward we must to ensure the next green gold does not escape our grasp.

In Part II, I will describe what it takes to move into the brave new world of Software Development. Evalu-ating India and the role of our gov-ernment for our smooth transition.

“with a simple internet connection I can throw a digital stone and reck havoc miles away.”

Stop for a minute and ponder on this reality. There are scientists the world over at this very moment that that breath escap your lungs, work-ing on ways to make fruits grow faster, last longer on the shelves and dare I say, taste sweeter. Have you ever tasted a ‘sweet’ neutral fruit? That’s the reality we have to face in today’s world, when our local supermarkets import fruits, bite into them and feel your taste buds translated to a “mad scientist sweet lab” somewhere around the world. That’s only one of the issues our Banana farmers of the Caribbe-an face. How do we compete with companies of the world who have far superior technology? The battle lines have been drawn, science is the current driver for almost every segment of our world and farming

by maurice john

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why I hate whatsapp

of the primary devices for commu-nication. Instead of asking, do you have a phone? Everyone, everywhere asks for your number. Whether it be an insurance form, an online regis-tration form, that annoying group member or another one-off contact, your number is hardly private. With Whatsapp, once a number is in your address book, the number is auto-matically matched with the records in Whatsapp’s servers, and Voila! They automatically become a whatsapp contact. For the not-so-tech savy that’s great and contributes to the ease-of-use that probably attracts many of Whatsapp’s users. However, the gaping hole in this system is that you have no control over who adds you. To make things worse, you don’t have to mutually add each other for them to see everything you choose to make available on your Whatsapp profile, from your statuses to your profile picture and that lovely ‘Last Seen at’ stamp. You really have no idea who’s silently watching your pro-file, or worse… saving your pictures. This leads me to my other point…

You are left with the guilt of blocking Aunt Sally.

Let’s face it, there are probably numbers in your phone book, which you don’t want on your Whatsapp but can’t exactly delete from your phone. Thus, the only way to ‘delete’ that person from your Whatsapp is by doing something a little bit more harsh; adding them to your block list. This for some reason cannot be done through the contact pro-file but via some other convoluted means. This leads me onward to an-other reason why I hate Whatsapp.

The app layout is cumbersome.

Rather than favourites being what

it implies, it is actually a list of your contacts who use Whatsapp. On iOS you can edit this list, but that still leaves you to clean it up every time you add someone to your ad-dress book. There is no real control over quickly accessing your favourite contacts, save for the Chats window being sorted by most recently sent/received messages. What’s more cumbersome about the layout is that people are not really the focus of the application. In order to see some-one’s status, you have to go into their profile, or scroll through the contacts tab. Updating your status and profile picture are done through two different menus and your pre-vious status is automatically saved, leaving you with a long list of status-es if you don’t bother to clean it up.

Undoubtedly, Whatsapp is one of the most popular ways to communicate these days, as the advent of smart-phones mingles with legacy phones. It is one of the few, if not only ser-vices which allows you to communi-cate for (basically) free with all your friends, whether they tote a Black-berry, iOS Android or even Windows Phone device. However, for me this doesn’t mean this service is ideal. With Whatsapp moving to a yearly subscription service on iOS, surely some of the money can be put to-wards modernizing the interface, and more regular updates to the app. Though they have only recently add-ed the functionality of sending more than one photo at once, the actual functionality remains rather slow. Hopefully, especially with the up-coming iOS 7, Whatsapp’s interface would be modernized and organized.

What about you? are you really sat-isfied with Whatsapp? or are you just happy you can use it to com-municate with virtually anyone?

Now before you get thrown by the headline, know this. I am just like you, you and most likely you; One of the 250 million active users in the world who use Whatsapp. However, that does not neccesarily mean I am satisfied with the app. We as consumers sometimes forget we have the power in our hands. Don’t believe me? Just look at how quickly users have abandoned Vine in favour of a service that they seemingly prefer, or how Micro-soft has responded to the people’s complaints about Windows 8. In the case of Whatsapp, I believe its success is due to convenience and popularity rather than an expres-sion of the quality of the app. Popu-lar? Yes. Great? Well… let’s find out.

All your messages can be sniffed.

In 2011, Whatsapp came un-der fire when a securi-ty hole was discovered in

their service and up until August 2012, all of your messages were sent in plain text. Meaning anyone who was able to intercept your messag-es as they were being sent/received could easily read everything you have to say. Today, Whatsapp claims that “WhatsApp communication be-tween your phone and our server is fully encrypted.” However, a group of researchers have described the encryption method chosen as “bro-ken”, and that a user’s account can be hacked by logging in with the MD5 hash of the reversed IMEI num-ber. Simply put, your messages are locked, but the keys are lying around.

Your profile is easily accessible.

These days, everyone has a cell phone, and it has thus become one

ThaGeek 15

by janique-ka john

16 ThaGeek

Apple LoverTriesAndroid Pt 2Now that I have been using Android for a few weeks, what do I think? My mind reverts to a discussion I had with my colleague, Janique-ka. At the time she was using an iPod and was adamant that iOS was lim-ited. The Apple lover that I ‘was’ al-ways provided what I thought was a good reason for any limitation of Apple’s operating system. Now that I have been using Android I can no longer excuse some of their faults. Android has matured to the point that it embodies Apple’s ideology better than iOS does, I would like to humbly submit “Android just works”.

Nexus 4The Nexus 4 is not the pinnacle of modern engineering but the quality of the build goes beyond it’s price tag. Sitting at 300 US dollars no one would expect such a well built de-vice. The insides are sandwiched between glass, mimicking the con-struction of the iPhone 4 & 4S but with a reduction in weight. Coming from the iPhone 4S I have come to appreciate the weight reduction despite the fact that the weight of the 4S adds to the premium feel.A week into my using the Nexus 4 I encountered a problem. The phone died and refused to charge, I did a search online and found many re-ports of other Nexus users having the same problem. The “red light of death” it was referred to as on the forums and on youtube. Now here I

was with a dead phone, added to my dilemma I lost my receipt so no help from the store I bought the device. I found a video on youtube which sug-gested a simple fix, opening the phone and recon-necting the b a t t e r y t e r m i -n a l s . Having noth-i n g t o

by maurice john

ThaGeek 17

with the basketball scores but don’t let my girlfriend know that. I was greeted with a “card” telling me how far I was away from home, how long it would take to get home and also the route I can take to get home. Goog-le Now smartly recognized where I lived and also I was away from home for an extended period of time.

SystemNow moving onto Android as a day to day platform. “Point of action”, that’s the best way to frame my next point. I take a picture with my camera and I have several options: Instagram, dropbox, Facebook, the list goes on. I should not have to jump out of one app then jump into another to in-teract with that image. It just works. Moving along to the desktop and app drawer metaphor. This duel struc-ture represents a different approach to Apple’s single home screen but they are both the same in my eyes. For me and I’m sure for my many oth-ers each home screen is organized by the type of apps. Social, Utility, Games etc on Android you put your most frequent apps on the home screen but on iOS I would use folders to hide Apps that are not frequently used. Next up Widgets, I have a to-tal of five; my clock, emails, power control, battery and google analyt-ics. I love Widgets, quickly viewing my emails without opening them is a welcomed change and having pow-er toggles reduces my “click count”.

ROMS & Custom Kernels

For advanced users switching ROMS adds to the excitement around An-droid. After a few days with my shiny new toy, I rooted it and load-ed CynanogenMod 10.1. This Rom was stable and it offered a few extra customization options but the bat-tery life was subpar. Then I found a gem called Franco’s kernel which changed everything I was experienc-ing great battery life, it was the first time since the Blackberry platform I can get through more than a day of use. My daily driver now is Par-anoid Android and Franco’s kernel, this combination offers even more battery life and more customizabil-ity. The latest alpha build of Para-noid added a chat heads like notifi-cation system wide which comes in quite handily for quick multitasking.

Final thoughts

The Android experience has been great thus far but would I switch back to iOS? It depends on what Apple comes up with for iOS 7 and beyond. These two platforms are the best of what is available today. They have strengths and weakness-es, some people choose to live with the weakness of the platform be-cause the strengths overweigh those weaknesses. I cannot say Android is better than iOS but what I can is currently, Android works more for me than iOS. I love the freedom of Android, the nerdy tinker in me is drawn to it. So if your using another platform and looking for a change of scenery it’s ok to give Android a try.

lose I did just that and my phone was working again. If you ever encounter this problem that’s the fix I would recommend.

Screen SizeNow I have always been resolute large screen phones was an unwel-comed trend. I would use phones for a few minutes then dismiss them completely but you can never truly appreciate something from minutes of use. I am enjoying the real estate of the N4, I held an iPhone 4S and a 5 recently and I just can’t imagine why I have been subjecting myself to such torture. The highlight of my “big screen” adventure came when I wanted to watch one of my favorite Tv shows, “Criminal Minds”. It was a beautiful experience, the larger screen really made a difference. I am sure no iPhone user likes subjecting themselves to watching 40 mins of an-ything on the smaller screen iPhone.

Play Store

The app eco-system is not as com-plete as that of Apple’s but my favorite apps are there so my complaints are minimum. I consider myself to be an app junkie, back in my iOS days I would just search the store for new apps to try but now my options are more confined since the Play store is riddled with “crap apps”. The gap between great apps and throw aways is quite significant in the Play store.

Google NowComparing Google Now and Siri is best done with this analogy. Siri is your assistant who gives you what you want when you ask for it, some-times it gets it right sometimes it doesn’t but Google Now is the assis-tant who doesn’t wait for you to ask but smartly presents you with what you need. My best experience using Google now, I was out on date night and it was time to go home and I just felt the urge to open Google now, this might be because it presents me

I just can’t imagine why I have been sub-jecting myself to such torture.

Blackberry

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Over the course of the past few days, I realized something. Everyone hates blackberry. Yesterday, smartphones owners were in a chicken coop panic, as BBM for Android leaked, and the official BBM for iOS began rolling out in several countries. Before the end of the day how-ever, this operation was put to a screeching halt by Blackber-ry, and to my surprise everyone turned on the blackberry hate.

But really, why was I surprised? Many people, especially here in the Caribbean, feel betrayed by the company… And have since been bitten by The Brand Loyalty bug unleashed by ri-val smartphone companies. I’m very much against brand loyal-ty as I think it means less choic-es for consumers. I believe that that’s why yesterday, into today, instead of realizing the faults of the android platform, everyone turned on blackber-ry .. Saying things like “dem ain ready yet” ! On the contrary, I think this displays more than anything, why the Android platform is still not quite ready.

September 21st, at 7 am, many things happened, but none was the official BBM for Android

Everybody

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release as promised. Android users couldn’t wait any longer, and managed to get their hands on a BBM .apk file, which then spread like wildfire. According to Blackberry, 1.1 million users got their hands on this unre-leased BBM which was riddled with problems. All Android us-ers had to do was put this .apk file on their smartphones and hit install. Since BBM was never officially present in the Android Google Play Store , there’s no way to know for sure that this was the same version of BBM that Blackberry planned to release that day. Additional-ly, the Google Play store was flooded with fakes, which some unwittingly downloaded.

Let’s pause for a second. Im-agine you’re a bag designer, about to unveil your bag at a merchandising chain for the

first time. The daybbm4all you plan to unveil your bag, this store allowed people to not only sell mediocre bags, but call it a similar or the same name as your bag, which people in turn flooded the store and clamored to buy. To make matters worse, you hear there’s a couple of your own bags floating around which may or may not be bags you designed, but noted had problems and since fixed. Would you still unveil your bag?

Undoubtedly, this can lead to many problems for you as the designer. Fakes floating around means that people can leave dissatisfied fully convinced its your product. Faulty and unauthorized leaks can also cause similar confusion. Thus, for Blackberry to release their Android app among that would have led to even greater chaos. In fact, right now, there are still people who think Blackberry released an Android app. I am all for Android’s open-source style, and have always thought this would propel the platform way past Apple, but this shows that openness comes with a price. It is alarming how easy it was for developers to put fraudulent apps in the Goog-le Play store, which speaks to some underlying issues with the administration of the store. It is also of equal concern how easy it is to pirate software on the Android platform; i.e simply obtaining the .apk and installing. Notably, iOS us-ers who downloaded the app before it was pulled are still able to use the app, while An-droid users have been blocked.

While this may the unpopu-lar opinion, and even the oth-er members of ThaDailyGeek team may disagree, it is hard for me not to blame this delay mostly on the vulnerabilities of the android platform. Though its easy to see why most peo-ple are distracted by Black-berry’s recent track record of failure (hey, you don’t expect reform from an ex-con) but I’m pointing my fingers elsewhere.

I think this displays more than any-thing, why the Android platform is still not quite ready.

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Digital Pirates of the Caribbean

When I first heard about the plan to shoot a film called “Pirates of the Caribbean”, I joked that it could easily have been a documentary. All the crew would need to do, was take a few cameras and roam through the alleys of some of our capitals or go touring through some of our schools and they’d have more material than they’d know what to do with. Face-tious as such a joke would always be, it hinted at a very real issue that affects our society—one that no-body seems to care about.Digital piracy has become alarmingly prevalent in our region, to the point where it

Why we dont Careabout

Digital piracy.has been turned into micro-en-terprise. It’s not a challenge to roam through the streets of Bridgetown and find a vendor aggressively peddling bootleg wares. On university campus-es, I’ve seen notices blatantly advertising software and ser-vices that are largely suspect. Meanwhile, most people go about their lives without a sec-ond thought to it—some even participate while in the priva-cy of their own homes. These largely illegal activities have become commonplace, and yet nobody talks about them.

“Because it’s wrong” isn’t a good deterrent anymore

Increased access to computers and broadband has made dig-ital piracy easy. Some might

say that the socio-econom-ic factors affecting our region make it necessary. I don’t think that’s quite so honest, but I will grant that it is convenient. Why spend over a hundred dol-lars on a software package—something you can’t touch and feel—when you can download a free “cracked” copy online? Why spend months waiting for your favorite TV show to start streaming on Netflix (and then paying for it) when you can watch it right now on Pro-jectFreeTV? For many technol-ogy-adjusted citizens of our cash strapped region, these are legitimate questions for which it can be difficult to come up with a convincing an-swer. For them, “because pira-cy is wrong” just doesn’t cut it.This may be because they’ve

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been told that it’s wrong, but not shown how. There’s nothing to tie the sense of wrongdoing to; it can easily appear as though there are no consequences, and that nobody gets hurt. A re-cent study from China showed that most people involved in a specific type of digital piracy don’t think that it hurts anyone. Along with this, it seems that many digital pirates may feel as though they’re being tak-en advantage of by those at the top of the various indus-tries. It’s hard for a university student living on ramen noo-dles to take a studio executive who wears tailored suits—and drives around in an expensive car—seriously when he claims that the student is hurting him financially by streaming an episode of their favorite TV show before going to class. In understandably dismiss-ing the executive’s concern, that student pirate may not even be aware that there are others whom his actions hurt.

But it does hurt..

There’s no escaping this though; the truth is that digi-tal piracy does have its casu-alties. It hurts content dis-tributors (including the music store across the street, or the Cineplex that nobody goes to anymore) and content crea-tors, among others. I’ve found this to be a powerful deterrent. There’s some ongoing debate about whether piracy does have its benefactors too (not includ-

ing the pirates). Nevertheless, that doesn’t necessarily make the damage done to those it hurts go away. I imagine that for each person, the issue simpli-fies down to whether it’s unac-ceptable to have casualties, or whether a trade-off is worth it.

Should we care?

It’s easy to hand-wave away the effects of digital piracy, particu-larly because it hardly seems to affects anybody close to home. In the Caribbean, we’ve become all but immune to the idea that there are real people who are hurt by digital piracy. An activity that’s largely con-sidered illegal by international law is openly practiced in our countries, sometimes for profit.For the moment nobody cares, because to the rest of the world the Caribbean is of little more interest than a seasonal vacation spot. Yet, as the world increasingly globalizes and our regional nations push toward competitiveness in areas where we actually stand a chance, we may begin to attract attention.And it may not all be good.

the truth is that digital piracy does have its casu-alties.

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