PiHut Advent Calendar

November 11, 2022 | Comment

When I was a lad my advent calendar was a bit of carboard with a Christmas scene printed on it with numbered doors that folded back to reveal a Christmas image. There was no chocolate or other delight behind the door and this bit of cardboard religiously came out every Christmas.

How times have changed and now advent calendars are clearly big business. I don’t normally do advent calendars but when I saw this one advertised from the PiHut I thought that I would give it a go.

It arrived this morning and while I knew that it was going … Read the rest

What to do when your Scanner is no longer Supported

December 20, 2019 | Comment

If you are a regular reader of this blog then you will know that I am a fairly early adopter for new technologies regardless of whether they are hardware or software. Sometimes that works well, other times not so much.

I’ve had and loved a Fujitsu Scansnap S1500M for many years now and have happily been scanning my paperwork into Evernote with it. However, more recently I had been getting dire warnings from MacOS that at some point in the future the Scansnap software would stop working. With the arrival of MacOS Catalina that day arrived and instantly (albeit with … Read the rest

The Paperlike2 for iPad

November 15, 2019 | Comment

If there is any gadget related job worse than cleanly applying a screen protector to a device I don’t know what it is. So it was with mixed emotions when my Paperlike2 arrived in the post this morning.

Paperlike2 is yet another Kickstarter project but one that had a higher chance of success as it it the follow-up to, of course, Paperlike. Basically Paperlike is an iPad screen protector that adds a slightly course layer on top of the screen making it more, well, paper like, and better for writing and drawing.

Application

But before you can get to the … Read the rest

My Everyday Carry (edc)

October 18, 2019 | Comment

Everyday Carry, as defined by wikipedia, are useful items that are consistently carried on person every day. It has become something of a movement with people showing off their own edc which, in many cases regrettably, seems to include a knife.

Always one to jump on a bandwagon when it is passing I thought that I would present to you my minimalist edc which you can see above and includes:

A couple of these items (Spooly and Mu) have been sourced from Kickstarter projects. I have to … Read the rest

HyperCube: Auto Photo Backup USB Device

October 4, 2019 | Comment

The HyperCube is another Kickstarter project but unlike the tardy Spooly this one went from completion on 16th July to delivery in just eight weeks which must be some sort of record for projects I have backed.

The HyperCube’s premise is simple. It’s a USB dongle that allows you to backup multiple device’s photos and videos to some connected media while simultaneously charging. That media could be a microSD card, a USB stick or even an external hard drive. The idea is that it makes backup simple and could replace services such as iCloud thereby saving you money.

The Dongle

… Read the rest

Spooly – the Long Kickstarter Wait

September 20, 2019 | 2 comments

I’ve written about Kickstarter on numerous occasions highlighting both the successes and the failures for me on the crowdfunding platform. Today I wanted to talk about the successful failure that is Spooly.

On June 9th 2016 the self-styled “World’s First Magnetic Charging Cables” was fully funded securing £70,000 more than the project goal. What had attracted me to the Spooly was the size, little more than the connector and a short cable, and that it would stay neatly together using a magnetic cable.

The Long, Long Wait

I handed over my money and waited. And waited. And waited. In … Read the rest

KeySmart Pro with TIle

KeySmart the Tile Enabled Key Organiser

August 30, 2019 | 1 comment

Over the years I have blown hot and cold in my views on Tile, the bluetooth dongle that you attached to bag, keys and other items to keep track of them.

Tile, a History

I was early in and was frustrated by the slow time for order to delivery – over a year at the time of writing this post in 2014.

The fundamental flaw of the original Tile was that the battery was baked in and so when that died you were left with a useless piece of plastic. Tile did offer a replacement facility but the … Read the rest

iPad Pro and Brydge Keyboard

Brydge iPad Pro Keyboard

August 23, 2019 | Comment

Little by little, year by year Apple are slowly turning the iPad into a pretty decent workhorse. And with the ability in iOS 13 to pair it with a mouse even more so. With this in mind I have been looking for a keyboard that would give a more laptop type feel to the iPad.

I already have the Apple keyboard case and that works well but the keys aren’t great for long typing sessions. I also tried using a full sized Apple Magic Keyboard and that was lovely for typing but didn’t have the portability that I was looking … Read the rest

Laptop Stickers

August 2, 2019 | Comment

What is it with developers and laptop stickers? It seems that in every coffee shop there will be individuals scattered around hunched over their (usually) Apple Macs and the lid will be covered in stickers. And you know what? I’m exactly the same!

The laptop above is my old trusty Macbook Air along with its accompanying stickers. In fact since that picture was taken it has gained even more. It has stickers covering all my areas of interest:

  • development (including the “Cutting and pasting from Stack Overflow” classic)
  • music (from Real World records)
  • Evernote
  • Star Wars (from here)

Many … Read the rest

Mouse support in iPadOS/iOS13 Public Beta 3

Mouse support in iPadOS/iOS13 Public Beta 3

July 19, 2019 | Comment

The latest beta version of iOS13/iPadOS was released yesterday evening and I gave it a quick test this morning to see how the mouse support was coming along.

I know form comments made elsewhere that mouse support is not for everyone and some don’t understand why it is even necessary. For me it is a useful tool for when working away from my desk as I find it speeds up my work and make it a more pleasant experience. I still don’t think I could ever use the iPad as a permanent desktop replacement but it is a lot more … Read the rest