Friday, July 27, 2007

I didn't forget y'all

Honest... Just been super busy with a research project for a client along with all the usual stuff. The only reason I can post right now is because I have some downtime while I'm sitting in my office salvaging a failed server of a client's.

One month into iPhone, it's still the best phone I've ever used. There are some flaws, but not major. I've had applications crash a couple of times (without affecting the rest of the phone), and the phone itself crashed once. Since my Treo used to crash several times daily I consider this a big improvement. AT&T's service is a little better than I remember (or possibly my first Treo - the 650 - just had exceptionally crappy RF performance). A couple of the dead spots I used to encounter are gone now. Battery life has emphatically not been a concern for me so far. Sound quality is very good, and Bluetooth performance is damn near perfect.

I'm eager to see what the first update (I figure it's due any day now) will bring.

In our personal life, David has adjusted well to summer camp and now claims to enjoy it. The first week? Not so much. He's also starting to come to terms with the idea that he is Not Going Back To His Old School. Period.

Everything else is a work in progress.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Farewell

RIP Mr. Butch. He died this morning in a scooter crash - the man was a fixture of my Boston days, and rare was the morning that I didn't see him and at least wave "hi" as I'd walk to work in Kenmore Square back in '87 (before it was gentrified by BU and Butch fled to Allston). He was one of the last from an era when the homeless guy in the neighborhood was a part of the community - not just someone you called the cops on. Adios, Mr. Butch. Boston is a poorer place without you.

Monday, July 09, 2007

iPhone - 1 week later

A week into iPhone, I've used it extensively and also deployed about ten of them at various client sites to boot. Here's some of my experiences, likes, and peeves:

- I rode the Acela down to Philadelphia on the fourth in order to rejoin my wife and kid during their vacation in progress. Other than a dead area coming out of Boston initially and underground in 30th Street Station in Philly, coverage was excellent along the whole Northeast Corridor (I was able to use my EVDO card, too). And battery life is terrific as well - I was listening to music pretty much the whole way and making a batch of calls too, and never dropped the power below 75%. I didn't recharge until I made it to Cape May.

- Power is a little flaky. It doesn't charge quickly unless you're using the AC adapter. When it's plugged in to a Mac it charges, but slowly - and if you're using a car power adapter for an iPod (I already had one stashed in my car from before) it pretty much just keeps the power from draining down if you're on the phone.

- I forward my calls to the iPhone from my office phone - and I've noticed that I will usually get a little popup that tells me a forwarded call is coming in. It's annoying, because it gives me an extra tap to dismiss that before I can actually pick up the call. But it doesn't happen every time.

- The keyboard click is sort of loud. Most of the other sounds are subtle.

- I still am annoyed about the lack of Notes support on the Mac side.

- I want support for password-protected PDF files to make up for it. Right now they'll load as blank pages.

- The more I think about it, the more I wish iPhone had access to location info (even E911 info from triangulated towers) in Google Maps.

- EDGE really isn't bad. And AT&T still has the same dead spots they had when they were Cingular. Not horrible, mind you, but a few annoying ones. Verizon has their share as well.

The iPhone still rocks, though.