a view through my own eyes

Today at the Lambeth Conference is the discussion on sexuality, with the contrasting views that are polarizing the Anglican church I was highly amused to find the following in the campus shop.

A while ago we decided to buy a birdbath with which to keep the local birds happy….

At lunchtime today the wife and I wandered around the exhibition centre for the Lambeth Conference. I was highly amused to see the following sign:

A side effect of starting work early means that we finish early and so Mrspao really suffered this afternoon with tea and cake.

Earlier today I went for a stroll. At one point I sat on a bench in a churchyard and this was the view.

Friday eventually after the usual trials and tribulations* that seem to plague me, saw the arrival of the replacement phone.

There are many many reviews of the new 3G iPhone, here are a few plusses and minuses that I have come up with:

the good:
- the antenna is vastly improved, I now for a novelty get reception at home (bear in mind that we live in the sticks) around most of the house, rather than just on the toilet upstairs (best not to ask about that discovery of mrspao’s).
- the shape is rounder and it is nicer to hold.
- 3G is grand and probably should have been in the original iPhone – I don’t think I suffered in not having it, but I do appreciate having it, data does download quite a bit quicker.
- GPS hooked into Google Maps with the 3G data stream works really well – I know that GPS map units have been around for years, but the implementation here works really well. Also having the satellite images downloaded is good for being miles away from roads.
- wifi vastly improved – WPA2 Enterprise should have been available from the start at last I can now use the wifi at work.
- mail client is improved – bulk delete at last
- the biggest thing though is the AppStore – applications applications applications – the phone now really is a mobile computing platform – Aurora Feint is excellent fun – Super Monkey Ball rocks (note that I mentioned productivity tools there).
- MobileMe – seems to work really well now that it is fully operational – am using the now 90 day free trial – so will post more about this another day.

the bad:
- the back is plastic – the old metal back felt really nice and solid in the hand – maybe it was the cooling metal feeling, but it certainly felt better
- bluetooth – cannot be used as a modem to a laptop (well not yet anyway) – which is a pain since the O2 contract includes unlimited data – some things would be better done on a laptop than the phone
- the battery life is noticeably shorter, if I leave, wifi, 3G and location services (GPS) enabled all day I need to charge it every night, switch those items off and it is around the same as the first generation phone.
- they have disconnected the 12v charging feed – so I can no longer charge the phone using an old iPod firewire charger – I suspect that damage may ensue otherwise, but it is annoying as we are now effectively two chargers down – which were handy
- small point but the packaging feels cheaper, the main box is fine, but the plastic tray that held the phone is now opaque and a bit flimsy – I likes the thick clear plastic of the old one, also the polishing cloth is definitely not of the same quality – I know I won’t look at the packaging again but that is not the point – Apple are known for doing nice packaging and standards are slipping slightly.
- no dock – and the old dock is the wrong size so the new phone does not fit – a new dock costs 20 quid

the wishlist:
- cut and paste – I know that there is a lack of buttons but a cut and paste icon cannot be too hard to implement.
- GPS logging – I would like to log where I have been, particularly when I go for a walk as there are loads of public footpaths for miles around where I live and so would like to contribute to openstreetmap.org. Whether this is something that Apple will have to do or a third party via the AppStore I do not know – those the SDK allow access to the GPS?
- allow the bluetooth unit to be used as a modem.
- allow VOIP over wifi – I get plenty of inclusive minutes on my contract which covers most needs, but sometimes Skype would be handy and using wifi means that O2 don’t get hit on data charges.
- allow caching of the Google Maps – that way I can go for a walk, use the GPS and not have to have a mobile phone signal. I don’t mean caching say the entirety of Google Maps – but maybe an option to download an area of a few square miles of the current location.

conclusions:
All in I am happy with the new phone, the good is good, the bad seems to be cost related, the wishlist should be entirely possible through software. Software is at the end of the day the really big thing about the new phone (and the old since the new OS can be installed for free), but not the software that is available now, but the software that will be available from third party authors. However to expand these possibilities Apple need to ensure that non Mac using programmers can get to and use the SDK – at the moment you need a fairly recent Mac and I suspect that will put of many potential authors. It should also be noted that this phone cost me a damn sight less that the 1st generation phone due now to telco subsidies – so from that view the lack of a dock can be lived with. Now to decide what to do with the old phone, keep it as an object d’art or bung it on eBay where they go for a more than reasonable sum at the moment. Dunno yet – will think about it.

* the trials and tribulations involved O2 on thursday deciding that my phone would be delivered to my home address rather than work, and then not acknowledging or confirming that they would update that address to work. So I had to take a day off. The parcel tracking then showed that the goods would be delivered to home, at 9:30ish I get an email from O2 saying that they have contacted the courier and it would be delivered to work. Then they decided that it would be delivered on Monday to home (fine I have a day off), next it was Monday at work. A few interesting phone calls followed but things were sorted out in the end – for a novelty.

Last monday O2 sent me a text message informing me that I could pre-order a new iPhone on their website from 8am. Being kind of keen I had a go, so did around 200,000 other people that they also SMSed on Monday morning.

As an existing O2 customer I was not allowed to use the normal online shop, I and other upgrade customers were directed to the special upgrade site just for us. At this point things went to pieces as the website took an utter hammering – this was one of those days that I was pleased that I work in higher education.

Stage one involved entering my mobile phone number so that they could send me a magic code. Which they did, several times. Then entering the code (not sure which one) back into the website I eventually (note that the webserver was getting a good clicking) got to the next page where you choose model, tariff etc etc, click for the next part and eventually the webserver times out and errors and then auto re-directs to the oh arse it’s buggered failover page. This is a manual form where you fill in name, address, phone no, model, tariff etc and submit. At which point the webserver falls over.

So at that point I decide that this is silly and call it a day.

Thursday evening I get an email from O2 thanking me for my order and that it will be couriered to me on Friday.

And you will never guess, it was!

So having spent a few hours playing with the phone I noticed a fault, the screen is not fitted properly. Phoning O2 to get the phone replaced is currently a challenge on the grounds that they don’t have any replacement stock as they have no stock at all. After today’s session on the phone to customer services (free from an O2 phone thankfully, rather than a brazillion dollars) it seems that they are happy to do a courier swap and will confirm details tomorrow.

I won’t hold my breath.

In the meantime I am happily using the slightly stunted phone as it works and works well. Never before have I picked up a mobile signal in the machine room – today it was essential (more on that another day).

After reporting the faulty battery for my laptop on Tuesday, the new one arrived Wednesday.

After taking the faulty iPhone to O2 on Tuesday, I was able to collect a brand new replacement today. It even came with a special SIM extraction tool in a ziploc bag: a paperclip. Nice one Apple.

w00t.

I was going to rant when I originally decided what to blog tonight, but letting time pass a bit and pondering I do not think I have cause to rant for a novelty.

Four years ago through work I acquired an eMac, recently it has been doing random crashes and reboots. It is well out of warranty, but doing some nosing around it appears that there was a batch (of which mine is included) where there are dodgy capacitors on the motherboard. Handily on Apple’s website is confirmation of the problem and instructions to take affected machines in that batch to an Apple service depot where they will replace the board at no cost. So I called the local service depot and they confirmed that is the case and also applies to machines out of warranty. All I have to do now is get it to them and they will take care of things.

Excellent.

Just over a year ago I bought a new laptop, yesterday I confirmed that the battery had died. Today I phoned Apple and went through all the diagnostics, short version is that they will send me a new battery despite it not being covered by the extended warranty, all I have to do is return the old one. Using the prepaid courier stuff that they will send me with the new one.

Excellent.

Also my iPhone has partially died in that the internal speaker no longer works so I have to use speakerphone all the time. So as instructed I contacted O2 and explained what had happened. OK they said we will send you another one and you can return the faulty one.

Excellent.

Then I get another phone call from O2, because my phone is older than ninety days it is outside the automagic replacement period so I have to take it to an O2 store and sort things out there.

Not so excellent, but not a show stopper either.

At lunch today I went to the local O2 store, lunchtime means lack of iPhone returns trained staff so I had to wait around for a bit, so I grabbed some lunch which I had planned to do anyway. My phone has noe been sent off to Apple at O2′s cost for repair or replacement and I have managed to wangle a loan phone to use in the meantime. I will get a call in a few days when my phone is ready for collection from the store.

So all in pretty good.

In the meantime I have to learn to use a phone with more than one button!

I cannot really complain, I have just been unfortunate and Apple kit has been great for me over the years and in all cases things will be fixed at no cost to me.