Hacker Monthly

February 22, 2013 | Comment

I have a voracious appetite for technology news which by and large is satisfied by twitter and apps such as the excellent Zite.

An even more hardcore technology news source is Hacker News. This is little more than a collection of user submitted links that are that voted up or down by other users. Eventually interesting and popular stories float to the top of the list. Unfortunately there is far too much stuff there to read it all and sometimes I just want a leisurely offline read. Enter Hacker Monthly.

Hacker Monthly is a curated version of … Read the rest

What a 5 Inch iPhone Would Look Like

February 21, 2013 | Comment

There are all sorts of rumours swirling around at the moment about whether Apple is going to create a larger version of the iPhone. By which I don’t mean just a stretched version (yeah iPhone 5 I am looking at you) but a properly proportioned version.

The suggestion is that later this year Apple is going to release and iPhone with a 5 inch screen. Why that size? Because its dimensions would mean that they could do so without having to change the user interface. Which is exactly what they did for the iPad Mini only in reverse. Marco Arment … Read the rest

Mailstrom

February 19, 2013 | Comment

Think it is going to be a while before my Mailstrom account is going to be ready…
This is what happens when you get a positive shout out from Lifehacker!… Read the rest

Using Google Docs to View PSD files

February 18, 2013 | 3 comments

Spotted this on Twitter today and thought it was a great tip for those, like myself, that occasionally get sent Photoshop images for review but don’t have Adobe’s software to open the file.

It would appear that Google Drive has the ability to read and display PSD images along with the more standard office documents.

More details from Digital Inspiration.… Read the rest

They Look the Same, Work the Same but…

February 9, 2013 | Comment

So these arrived in the post today – a Mini DisplayPort to VGA and a Mini DisplayPort to HDMI connector for use with my MacBook. Both have been packaged to look like their Apple equivalents and I can confirm that they certainly work like their Apple equivalents.

The difference? The Apple originals would have set me back £46.46 while these were £11.78, both prices included postage.

Pair this was a £1 HDMI cable from PoundLand and I am all set?

Is there anyone out there that could convince me that I would be better off buying the Apple originals?

… Read the rest

Google Authenticator Bug

February 1, 2013 | 1 comment

I am a big fan of Google’s Autheticator app which adds 2-factor authentication to a number of popular apps including Dropbox, WordPress, LastPass and, of course, Google accounts.

Since my mother-in-law’s GMail account was compromised and she wasn’t able to recover it I have considered the use of 2-factor authentication as mandatory rather than a nicety.

What this means in practice is that in order to access your account you need something that you know (the password) and something that you have (your phone). This should considerably increase your online security as if anyone does get your password they still … Read the rest

“Hello this is Windows Software Support”

January 29, 2013 | Comment

One of the things that I hadn’t been quite prepared for with working from home was the number of phone calls that I would get from random individuals. It’s actually quite ridiculous the number that feel I need help with my energy supply, PPI reclaim and so on.

However, until today, I hadn’t had one of those fabled calls from abroad telling me that I had an issue with my Windows PC and offering to remotely fix it for me.

Whenever the phone rings and the display says “International” my heart sinks but when this caller said that she was … Read the rest

Moves for iPhone

January 27, 2013 | Comment

Recently I have been getting more interested in my personal health as I try and shed some pounds – so much so that I have even built the website The Chubby Challenge to help me and others do so.

Been a gadget lover this has inevitably led me to look at some technology to help with fitness, weight loss and well-being. Currently there are two players in this market: Nike and Fitbit. Both produce hardware that will record your activity during the day (and night with Fitbit) allowing you to see how active you have been. They both do this … Read the rest

Rule #1 – No Matter How Much Testing You Do Users Will Find Something You Didn’t

January 19, 2013 | Comment

I was casually looking through the database (as you do) for my side project The Chubby Challenge yesterday when I noticed something odd. The latest challenge to be created had a blank end date, something that you are not supposed to be able to do.

I immediately went to my test site to see if I could reproduce the issue and what I found was that even though you are supposed to select a date using a date picker you can still type something, anything, into the associated edit control. I guess that this is precisely what the user had … Read the rest

Embedding docs

January 17, 2013 | Comment

In my previous post I included a viewer that allowed you to page through PDF file. This used the Google Drive (nee Docs) Viewer.

You may already be familiar with this for viewing attachments in GMail and documents in Google Drive but you can also access it directly using the snippet of code shown below:


<iframe src="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8p1gAHHCMytS3ZrazdoRWVZVmc/preview" width="640" height="480"></iframe>

According to the documentation Google Drive viewer allows you to preview over 16 different file types, listed below:

Image files (.JPEG, .PNG, .GIF, .TIFF, .BMP)
Video files (WebM, .MPEG4, .3GPP, .MOV, .AVI, .MPEGPS, .WMV, .FLV)
Text files (.TXT)
Markup/Code (.CSS, .HTML,

… Read the rest