Exciting iPhone news

Well the Pre's time in the spotlight was limited. The device is purely out classed by the iPhone, especially the new ones. I am beyond thrilled with the new iPhone 3GS. Even the software update excites me. I'm most looking forward to the cut/paste and the universal Spotlight search. I use Spotlight constantly on my Mac and know how easy it puts even the most obscure things. I haven't finished watching the keynote from yesterday so expect more thoughts in the next few days.

Not to be outdone is the announcement of updated laptops. I've been on the fence about the latest ones, especially since the executive decision to remove Firewire from the MacBook some time ago.

I have an old MacBook – first generation – and like having Firewire. It desperately needs updating as it's over three years old but I haven't been impressed with the current roster. Weight is important to me as it's my primary travel notebook and I've felt boxed in of late. I wanted the backlit keyboard, LED screen and power of the latest laptops but didn't want the 15" and thought the removal of Firewire from the 13" painted me into a corner. I'm glad that not only did they lower the price, but they also included a Firewire 800 port and an SD port. One less thing to carry with me in my travel wires kit.

I'm a happy camper!

IPhone 3.0 - Eliminating the desktop?

People who know me and readers of this blog, who may be one and the same, know that I am in love with my iPhone. I'm pragmatic about it – it isn't for everyone due to some feature lags – but in general, it's a great device.

One thing struck me with the iPhone 3.0 announcement on Tuesday. All of the new functions are taking the iPhone closer and closer into 'computer land.'

I say this because of how I use the device. There are some things that are just better done at my desktop. Serious web surfing is one of those things as it's easier to take a snippet of a website and mark it up/send it/save it. The new cut and paste function finally limits the need to do that at home.

Entering more than a few lines of text is frustrating thanks to the cramped keyboard. The landscape keyboard capability – combined with copy/paste/undo – will streamline that process. I'm looking forward to having a fully functional Office-like suite on my iPhone.

iPhone aside, it's also hard not to get excited about the direction of the Mac platform. It's clear these are OS X improvements that can live on any device. I'm excited about the Macs/systems coming out in the near future.

Time Machine annoyance

So I'm a big fan of Time Machine [link to Apple site] the automated backup that's part of Mac OS X Leopard. I've never experienced a disk failure but I know so many people who have that it's worth the peace of mind that it offers. I actually purchased a Time Capsule, which is basically an Airport networking base station with an integrated server hard drive. It's mainly for backup but I do keep some stuff on the drive for safe keeping.

The automated aspect of Time Machine is great. However the process often slows down my workflow. Backups occur every hour. In theory that's great. In practice not so great. It takes about 20 - 30 minutes to complete a backup. This means my computer is always backing up. Since my 'landline' is a VoIP Skype phone, the constant backups interferes with my phone service and other forms of network traffic. It is not uncommon for me to have to wait while my browser catches up. I would love to set it to backup every other hour but I can't. 

I hope Snow Leopard, the next OS X, improves Time Machine's efficiency/controls. I don't want to switch it off but sometimes I have to in order to get stuff done. This defeats the purpose, I think. 

Watched the Apple Keynote

I'm sick at the moment – boo hiss. I've been using this downtime to catch up with my favorite company and watch the keynote address, as I always do. If I had known this one was to have been the last one, I would have made an effort to go and see it live. Ah well. End of an era.

For what it's worth, stylistically, Phil Schiller did a great job. He managed to be informed, enthusiastic and most of all natural. These are the three things that Steve Jobs brought to the Keynote. Of course rehearsing matters most. I am in the middle of watching the Palm presentation and they have ways to go in that department. 

With the exception of the iPhone announcements, I seem to go in a cycle with the Keynote. If it's software, I'm underwhelmed at the announcements, particularly as reported by the tech press. Then I watch the Keynote and get excited. Invariably I find something in the announcements that makes me feel as though Apple reads my mind. 

Case in point, there are two new 'smart' features in iPhone 09 that excite me because they mimic and streamline my own processes – Faces and Places. I have smart folders for important people in my life as well as folders for the places that I go. This is partially automated but still requires a bit of work. 

Faces uses face recognition technology to create a smart folder for a particular person. So with a little bit of help at the start, you can see all of the pictures of your Mom, girlfriend/boyfriend, best friends etc. It's truly amazing and I know the technology behind it will extend to other things. 

Places uses geo-tag information to separate pictures by location. The inclusion of GPS technology into phones and cameras means that you can capture where you took a picture. Places uses that data to automatically combine pictures taken in the same location. You can also manually designate a location.

These two technologies will streamline the organization of my pictures and make it easier to include location data in things like those cool books you can print through iPhoto etc. Even cooler, the face recognition data travels with any uploads to Flickr and Facebook. And if someone else tags people in the picture, that data travels back to iPhoto. Amazing. 

I'll be picking up a copy of the next iLife suite as soon as its available so I'll report more on this in the months to come. I also have some good things to say about the iWork suite, which is finally powerful enough to replace the Office suite in many circumstances. More on that in another post. 

Macworld

So I'm one of those geeks that actually watches the Keynote, as I think I've mentioned here. It's on my list of things to watch but I'm not that excited. To be honest, I was disappointed in the announcements. 

Don't get me wrong. I love software, obviously. And I do use iWork and iLife suites and look forward to the enhancements. But I was expecting something new and was sorely disappointed. 

I  thought Apple have a gangbusters MacWorld, this being the last one. Instead they decided to play it safe. BORING!

Noooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!! Last MacWorld next year!

End of an era! Next year's will be the last MacWorld and Steve will not be saying goodbye. *sniff*

I confess to having watched nearly every Keynote from the last 5 years. Steve taught everyone how to present better.

Be simple. Conversational. Fun. Graphic. Having cool products help too. 

I'm sorry to see it go but I understand the rationale behind it. His health has been up and down since his pancreatic cancer treatment and every time he appears in public, the DeathWatch countdown commences. It's a distraction.

I don't mind periodic releases throughout the year rather than the blockbuster event releases. Makes life more interesting for a Mac head like me.