The Scribbler

As you can see, I’ve moved over to wordpress. Tumblr was pretty neat, but they have really been slow to evolve the platform. Also, I tend towards longer posts and posts with code samples where wordpress just does a better job. I’d considered going back to blogengine.net, but I’ve had so many bad experiences and frustrations with the platform in the past that I’m just not interested in going through it again.

I’m hosting with dreamhost, on a trial basis, for now. I’ll post a review of them after I have a few more days to play around with it.

I still have a lot of cleanup to do on the older posts, but I’ll get that finished up over the next few days. Then, maybe, I’ll get back to doing some real blogging.

I’ve been reluctant to write about Windows 8 since the Developer Preview at the Windows Build event. I was NOT impressed by the preview, but I’m waiting to see an actual beta release before I get too invested in a well thought out opinion on Windows 8 itself.

But one aspect of the strategy around Windows 8 really does bother me -the Windows App Market.

With the phone and X-Box, Microsoft has followed Apple’s app store model far too closely for my tastes, and from what we’ve heard from official sources so far, it seems that the Windows 8 App Market will continue that pattern. The current intent is that all metro style apps will be distributed ONLY though the official Microsoft app market. It will be policed, not just for technical issues, but for content and functionality. Basically, if Microsoft doesn’t like what the app does, how it does it, or the content they will refuse to distribute it.  

Think about that for a moment.

They’ve already established an “objectionable content” (no-porn) policy. So imagine it is 1998, and apps are coming from an app store like what microsoft is proposing. Would Duke Nukem have been approved? What about Grand Theft Auto a few years later? What about a Hustler subscription app? What about an app that displays the naked human body for use by human anatomy students. What about apps dealing with human reproductive biology? And that’s just the censorship arguments.

What about apps that compete with Microsoft’s own?

How long before my ISP, or the MPAA, starts paying Microsoft to reject or pull BitTorrent clients?

Even the pro-security arguments in favor of policed app markets are problematic. What about apps that have new capabilities no one’s seen yet? Imagine an app market back in 1993. Now consider the Trumpet Winsock TCP/IP suite, which allowed windows 3.1 to talk to that brand new internet thing. Would that kind of insecure network stack have been an approved app for distribution in a Microsoft policed app store?  

And how long before governments start passing laws policing those same centralized app stores too? 

I understand the arguments for better quality control, policing against malicious apps, easier app discovery, etc. I don’t have a problem with the default setup preventing most consumers from installing apps from 3rd party sources. But there needs to be a way for people to unlock their devices and use 3rd party markets if they choose (without paying Microsoft, without being a developer, and without having to register with Microsoft to unlock the device).    

Currently Microsoft is playing these concerns off by pointing out that these restrictions only apply to the new metro-style apps. You can still load and distribute traditional desktop apps without going through the store. That’s a bullshit argument though. It limits the free-exchanges for apps to “legacy” technologies, which Microsoft’s incentive will be to eliminate one-by-one over the next several years. If they are successful with a Microsoft exclusive, locked-down market for Metro-Apps, it’s almost inevitable that future versions of windows will do the same to traditional apps too.      

I’m all for there being a nice safe, secure, and policed Microsoft app market. But having that as the ONLY option is probably the scariest proposal Microsoft has ever made.    

Google+ could kick facebook in the teeth, but one of the key reasons it has a chance is the presence of a feature set that very few people are likely to ever use —Data Liberation.  

Google has an entire team of engineers, called the Data Liberation Front, whose job is to protect users by making sure that Google’s products all provide export functionality. Their web site provides information on which of Google products have been liberated so far, as well as information on how to use those export features. 

In the Google+ settings menu, under the heading ‘Data Liberation’, you will find a unified export tool. This appears to be a variation on a new tool from the Data Liberation Team called Google Takeout (this link is for the non-Google+ specific version). The tool allows you to export all of your data from a variety of Google’s services all at once. Currently, only the major social products related to Google+ are included, but they plan to add other services to the takeout utility over time.    

Even though few people will export their Google+ data, the fact that an export feature exists at all has significant appeal. Google isn’t free of privacy, security and customer abuse concerns, but high-visibility features like this go a long way towards reassuring people.

In Google+, data liberation features pair well with an excellent set of privacy and security features. While the UI and functionality of Google+ are critically important, it’s the less visible details like data liberation that will decide if users are comfortable enough to even consider a switch from other social services.   

The Impact of Windows 8

This is a really good early developer analysis of Windows 8. The most interesting point made though is one I’d not considered before; the fact that windows is no longer restricted by the terms of the anti-trust settlement.

Still though, Windows 8 had better be more than just be incrementally better if they plan to hold on to their user base, especially considering the insanely long development cycle.

I’ve had the official Droid X Gingerbread 2.3 update for a couple of weeks now… and I can say with full confidence that it sucks complete ass!

The new software should be faster, slicker, have more features, and be more stable. For every other Android device by any other manufacturer this is true, but not for the Motorola Droid X.

The UI lags, sometimes locking up for as long as an entire minute. Pretty much all animations are jiggy to the point of being more disorienting than fun. The stock keyboard lags even worse than it did in the last software versions (which seriously, is a problem that will drive you insane after a few days); and 3rd party keyboard apps suffer the same fate on the X too. And to top it off, about twice a day it will randomly hard-crash and reboot itself for no apparent reason, sometimes when I’m doing something, sometimes not.

I’d just replaced my Droid X (the old one had a faulty speaker) before the update too, so I don’t have a lot of my apps installed yet, and certainly nothing major like alternate launchers or anything.

Motorola makes good hardware, but their software is so bad it ruins the whole experience; and their competence clearly does NOT improve over time. I miss my HTC Incredible.