Practical Technology

for practical people.

August 20, 2012
by sjvn01
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Mutually Assured Destruction: Google/Motorola vs. Apple

Apple has been asking for it, and now they’re getting it.

Cupertino has been doing its best to sue Samsung’s Android tablets and smartphones out of the market rather than compete with them. Now, Motorola — under Google’s control — is returning the favor. Motorola Mobility is asking the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) to ban the import of iPhones, iPads, and Macs.

Welcome to the next logical step in the world of patent warfare: mutually assured destruction (MAD).

For those of you who didn’t grow up during the Cold War between the West and the Soviet Union, here’s how MAD worked.

In MAD-driven foreign policy, the U.S. and the Soviet Union never let things get too ugly between the superpowers because if one of them went too far, the other could bomb the other into the Stone Age and vice-versa. So, yes, there were all kinds of wars from the ’50s through the ’80s — Afghanistan, Angola, Korea, and Vietnam — but the great powers never launched nukes at each other.

MAD was a cold, hard policy; but it worked.

Apple decided to go after Android, in the form of leading Android smartphone vendor Samsung, in what Steve Jobs called “thermonuclear war.” Jobs may have been a great leader and a brilliant thinker, but he was no Henry Kissinger when it came to business partnerships and lawsuits.  

Mutually Assured Destruction: Google/Motorola vs. Apple. More >

August 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Apple TV Rumors: A tale, told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

I like my Apple TV a lot. To me, Apple TV was never as former Apple CEO Steve Jobs said, “just a hobby. Since then, there have been rumors that Jobs had “cracked” the code for a successful marriage of Internet, computer, and TV just before he died. Well, now we have what seems to be the most solid rumor yet about the Apple TV—and I don’t see any code being cracked. I just see a whole lot of business as usual nothing.

According to a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report,  Apple has been talking with the US’ biggest  “cable operators about letting consumers use an Apple device as a set-top box for live television and other content.”

That’s what Apple has been working on? That’s the big news? That Apple is going to take a page from TiVo’s book and offer a combination cable digital video recorder and Internet media device ala the TiVo Premiere line? Oh please!

Apple TV Rumors: A tale, told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. More >

August 17, 2012
by sjvn01
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Why is Apple scared to compete with Samsung?

Most people like some products, but Apple fans love their products. And, who can blame them? I own an Apple TV, five Macs, an iPad, and two iPod Touches because they’re darn good devices—and I’m a Linux fan. So why is Apple so frightened of Samsung and the other Android smartphone and tablet vendors that it’s trying to sue them into the ground instead of competing with them?

Apple isn’t just suing Samsung in the US. Apple has sued Samsung around the world. In Australia, Germany, and the United Kingdom and more than two-dozen other countries, Apple has made the same lousy patent design claims: Samsung has stolen the look and feel of its iPhone and iPad.

These claims are bogus. There’s nothing unique about Apple’s iPad or iPhone designs. That’s not just my opinion. A UK judge told Apple it must tell the world on both its UK . website and in British newspapers that Samsung had not in fact infringed on the iPad’s design.

Why is Apple scared to compete with Samsung? More >

August 16, 2012
by sjvn01
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Windows 8 belongs on older PCs like a fish needs a bicycle

As it happens, I do run Windows 8 on older PCs. But, testing operating systems is part of what I do for a living. Unless that’s also part of your job description running Windows 8 on an older PC is just a waste of time.

Oh sure, Windows 8 does boot faster and it has a few new features, but generally speaking Windows 8 with its “not Metro” interface is junk. I’ve been working with Windows 8 in one version or another for months now and there is simply nothing about it that would make me recommend it over Windows 7 or XP for that matter.

Metro, no matter what Microsoft wants to call it, remains a usability nightmare on a conventional PC. It may or may not be as awful on a touch tablet—I haven’t tried that so I don’t know—but I do know it’s annoying as heck on my non-touch enabled PCs.  The desktop, no matter what Microsoft may want, still works best with a Windows, Icons, Menu, Pointer (WIMP) interface, not Metro’s big, klutzy tiles.

Windows 8 belongs on older PCs like a fish needs a bicycle. More >

August 15, 2012
by sjvn01
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Office to finally fully support ODF, Open XML, and PDF formats

Earlier this week, Microsoft Office standards chief Jim Thatcher quietly announced that Microsoft would add ”two additional formats for use: Strict Open XML and Open Document Format (ODF) 1.2. … [and] support for opening PDF documents so they can be edited within Word and saved to any supported format.”  It took Microsoft long enough.

As Andrew ‘Andy’ Updegrove, a founding partner of Gesmer Updegrove, a top technology law firm and standards expert points out, this “brings a degree of closure to a seven year long epic battle between some of the largest technology companies in the world. The same saga pitted open source advocates against proprietary vendors, and for the first time brought the importance of technical standards to the attention of millions of people around the world, and at the center of the action were Microsoft and IBM, the latter supported by Google and Oracle, among other allies.”

Updegrove continued, “More specifically, the battle had been joined between the supporters of the Open Document Format – ODF for short – developed by OASIS, and then adopted by ISO/IEC, and a format developed and promoted by Microsoft, called Open XML, which it contributed to ECMA for adoption before also being submitted to ISO/IEC. In due course, Open XML was adopted as well, but only after a global battle that, improbably, even inspired a public protest on the sidewalks outside a standards committee meeting.”

The battle was largely over Microsoft’s desire to control “open” document standards.


Office to finally fully support ODF, Open XML, and PDF formats. More >

August 14, 2012
by sjvn01
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The new, improved Klout

You may not buy that your Klout  score matters. Too bad. Employers and bosses do pay attention to the social network “Standard for Influence” measurements. And, since  Klout has just changed its scoring system and is adding new features. you should too.

In a blog posting by Klout CEO Joe Fernandez, he announced that “we’re introducing some of the most significant product updates in Klout’s history. With these updates, we’ve concentrated on helping everyone to gain a clearer, more accurate understanding of how they influence other people through the ideas they share.”

Specifically, “The updated Klout Score now includes significantly broader data sets and signals, including our first steps towards including real-world influence. We now include many more actions from Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and more, and for the first time incorporate Wikipedia as a signal.”

The new, improved Klout. More >