Home Server Upgrade Status

After over a week now of running on the HP MediaSmart Server 3.0 update, I can say the following. I notice very little difference. That's mostly a good thing. I rely on the device to back up my computers without complaint, hold my video and music files and pretty much be invisible. It has remained so. 

I had a few bumps along the way. I believe reinstalling the Anti-Virus software kicked off a full scan of multiple terabytes of data which made the user interface quite sluggish - though I didn't notice any issues copying to or from the device. The UI is a little easier to use, but the old one wasn't awful so that's not a huge issue. I will say that it doesn't seem to squawk about problems updating live domains any longer - but that really wasn't something that should have been affected by the update. Perhaps just reloading the OS did the trick on that one.

Overall it was a good move. I'm sure you're waiting for the "but" though, right? There isn't much of one, but my timing was off by a bit. Lo and behold, Microsoft just announced the public "Vail" beta for Windows Home Server. I'm sure it's based on the Server 2008 R2 platform which has a lot of stuff for Windows 7, etc. I wasn't likely to install the beta anyway, but I might have waiting on doing the upgrade at all if another upgrade was so immediate. I'm quite certain that I'll have to pay for this upgrade as well, but it may or may not be a good thing on this hardware so there may just be a device upgrade in my future. 

Technology marches on...

Instant Personalization = Instant Lack of Privacy

So when Facebook rolls out a change to their system, about 400 million people are affected. And most of them will notice. That is of course, unless the change is buried in the settings that you rarely go to.

I am of course referring to the new "Instant Personalization" feature that Facebook rolled out this week. This feature is supposed to extend the Facebook experience to the larger (though only participating at this time) web. That's actually a pretty good idea, but Facebook might want to watch the world's response to privacy issues as they innovate.

Remember that flap when Google Buzz said, "Hey, everyone wants to share all their information" and opted everyone into Google Buzz? It resulted in a quick change and more than one investigation. Welcome to 2010 Facebook. One of the first items I came across on the web with a search on "Instant Personalization" was this blog, mostly discussion how to remove it. Which I quickly did, by the way.

There are a lot of smart developers at Facebook. Are you really telling me that you couldn't have popped a window up for every user and said, "Hey we've got this great new feature with these partners, but you'll have to send them your information to make it work. Are you up for that?"

Instead, they stuck the information under Account, Privacy Settings, Applications and Websites. I've quoted part of that page below:

"Instant Personalization helps you connect more easily with your friends on select partner sites.

You'll find a personal and social experience the moment you arrive on our select partner sites -- Docs.com, Pandora, and Yelp. We're working closely with these partners so you can quickly connect with your friends and see relevant content on their sites. These sites personalize your experience using your public Facebook information."

The biggest issue here is that Facebook and other social media systems seem to be treating the information you've put into their system as theirs, not yours. It's one thing to put information out there, it's another to have someone put it out there for you and send it to other sites. I know we can't put the genie back in the bottle, but for these social networks to thrive in the long term, they are going to need to put their customers first, socialization second.

Weekend Project - Upgrade Windows Home Server

I saw the other day that HP released an update to its Media Server software. The 3.0 version had long been promised, delayed many times and now was finally available. While not every user who has a Media Smart server can or should upgrade, MediaSmartHome lays out a pretty decent decision tree. This is especially important since the upgrade isn't free. You are going to have to shell out about $30 with shipping to get this particular update.

Once you've decided to go ahead, I recommend this walk-through from the folks at WeGotServed.com. It provides a nice overview of the process with plenty of screen shots. And it works.

I will add a few items though based on my experience. After all, whether you're upgrading a server at home or at work, it still does and has a lot of information on it. You'll want to take care during that process.

• You may need to disable the firewall on your personal computer for the first step. The restore process uses some oddball ports that may create some trouble.
• I recommend documenting your current setup - at least slightly. You probably want to make note of the users you have on the system and what folders they have rights to. I'm sure a lot of people allow everything for everyone, but to those to don't...
• I also advise noting the add-ins you have and what settings they are set to. Make sure you have license files handy, etc. You don't want to restart everything and have a nice and shiny machine that you can't run your AV software on.
• Once you are complete with the restore make sure you re-enable your firewall and get AV installed on your server pronto!

I'll say the interface is much prettier, though slightly sluggish. The latter may have to do with the fact that the server is both currently backing up my computer and probably running its initial AV scan. I'll continue to monitor and see how this new version performs.

The iPad - Two Weeks Gone By

Biggest surprise after two weeks with the iPad? I haven't read a single book on the device. That's not to say I haven't started reading on the device. I have. I've downloaded a significant number of books, mostly free, from both the iBooks store as well as the Kindle store. And, I've read a few chapters of a few books. The reading experience is just fine and I don't find a lot of eye fatigue. Of course, I work on backlit LCD screens all day so perhaps I'm not the best person to ask.

In addition, I've downloaded the Zinio app which delivers magazines electronically. It's effective for what it does, but that's fairly limited. It is literally a one-to-one representation of the printed magazine. That's nice so you don't need to haul a stack of magazines with you when you travel, but the power of the device is far greater than just a printed page. I'm sure this is just the beginning.

But, back to my original statement. I haven't read a book. In my defense, I've been distracted. The iPad is really a very, very entertaining device. The web browsing is very fast and now goes anywhere in the house. The games I've downloaded such as Harbor Master, We Rule and even some of my old standby's from the iPhone are very compelling on this screen and in this form factor.

Last comment after two weeks? I originally bought my iPad with the Apple iPad case. Apparently, this thing is in amazing demand with multi-week back-orders nationwide. What do I think about it? Well, it's a good approach to a case, as it has a built in stand as you can fold back the cover to prop up the case in two different ways. But, the material has an odd soft, fuzzy feel and I have the feeling it's going to be a nightmare to keep clean. I also would prefer the edges to be a smooth wrap around style rather than sort of pursed together.

At this point it's better than nothing, and certainly makes the device much more stealth than it otherwise might be.

The Next Generation of Insurance Tool, or a Solution in Want of a Problem?

I read an article yesterday on Insurance Networking News about how a company felt that the emergence of the iPad would be a jump start to drive electronic or e-signatures with insurance agents. Now, I'm a huge proponent of technology sometimes for technology's sake alone, but in this case I couldn't disagree more.

First of all, the iPad doesn't support a pen interface. The article references the ability to "click to sign" but why would that be ok? If I'm sitting across from someone, why wouldn't I want to get an actual signature captured?  E-signatures have their place, but to me, they are a compromise. Why not do it right? The technology out there today, mostly PC tablets, already support a pen interface and can capture signatures just as you might do at millions of point of sale terminals all over this nation.

Second of all, the article cites limited internet connectivity as an issue that has limited acceptance of the tablet solution. How does the iPad address issue exactly? Sure, there are models with AT&T 3G built in, but  coverage on AT&T's network is hardly ubiquitous. On a regular tablet PC your choice of carriers are only a USB device away.

Third, the iPad, for all that I love it, is NOT a good device for heavy data entry. At minimum, an agent will want to create a quote or fill out an application and the iPad without a regular keyboard is not a good way to do that. Of course you can argue that you can add a keyboard to an iPad, but aren't you just buying a standard tablet in two pieces? 

I'm sure that there are other reasons for purchasing the solution mentioned in the article, but it seems like a solution in want of a problem at this point.

The iPad - A Week in Review

There's been plenty of media saturation of Apple and it's assorted gadgets over the past week, so likely folks could do without more iPad stuff, but I wanted to wrap up the first week with this new device. From here on out, I'll only post on the iPad as warranted.

The performance of the iPad is still fantastic. Crisp navigation without pauses, fast graphical rendering and great video playback. Speaking of video playback, Apple clearly did not skimp on the speaker on this device. While it could be louder given the fact that it points out to the side (or just point it toward the viewer!) when watching video, it has a much wider sonic range than the tinny iPhone speaker. You can actually feel some bass on this baby. 

In addition, even with this giant screen, battery life is very good. It has certainly lived up to the 10 hour+ claims in my experience. I suspect this will be better tested on my next long flight. 

Most of the folks I've shown the device to are quite impressed, though few are willing to part with the dollars needed to purchase it. I suspect the device will really come into its own with the upcoming iPhone 4.0 operating system.

Would I buy it again? Yes. This is the first device in a long while which is useful to me in a lot of little ways. I look for different ways to use it throughout the day and think that there is very much a place for a slate style form factor. The available app count continues to rise and I think I'll be purchasing iWork once they've addressed some of the user issues out there.

I also suspect it will take some time to balance usage between the iPad and the iPhone. This will be even more so when iPhone 4.0 comes out. It should be an interesting time.

The iPad - Day 6

On Day 6 of the iPad's short life, the future was revealed. The iPhone 4.0 OS was revealed and since the iPad too, runs this OS pretty much all of the non-camera features should make it over to the iPad. Sadly, it sounds like that won't happen until Fall. Assuming, we're following the standard calendar, September 22nd is technically the first day of Fall. That's about a half year away at this point, but not exactly out of line for an upgrade cycle to a device just released. Still, the features are many and it provides some welcome changes including the multi-tasking updates, unified inbox, etc. These will especially come in handy on the iPad, though will require me to upgrade from my iPhone 3G to reap all of the benefits.

In other news, the Camera-A/Camera-B application pair that I mentioned on Day 5 was upgraded to use the standard iPhone 3G so I spent the dollar to get it. This was my first iPad application purchase. It is functional and it does bring a camera like experience to the iPad, but it is excruciatingly slow and I saw some stability and connectivity issues in my limited use. I'll be looking at it more over the next few days. 

I've also purchased my first e-book. Don't get me wrong, I certainly have a lot in my iBooks library as there were quite a few classics available for free plus the included Winnie the Pooh. But, I also downloaded the Kindle application for the iPad which is quite good as well. Amazon provides a quite a few free books and is very price competitive on both. So when I was looking for a book I needed for work, I checked the iBooks store first and then the Kindle store. Amazon was ten bucks and the iBooks store was $23. Guess which one I bought from?

Also, I can't quite figure out why the only place I can browse for books on the iTunes store is on the iPad. Why can't I search through iTunes like you can for apps, music and movies? It seems like a serious overhaul is in order for this aging application.

Is There an App for That?

I was asked yesterday whether my company would consider creating an application for the iPad. Our flagship application is a product that produces insurance rates for an insurance agent that they can easily compare and provide to a customer looking for insurance. It is called a comparative rater. Information is entered once about a person including their cars or their home and then insurance quotes are produced from potentially hundreds of companies.

But, I digress. Back to the question. Would we produce an application like this for a mobile device? Our application relies on really heavy data entry. Each year, in fact, insurance companies seem to need additional information in order generate quotes. The best way to navigate through such a set of requirements (at least right now) is a keyboard and mouse. In addition, our comparative rating ecosystem relies upon integration with other systems to exchange data. Many of those do not, and will not live on a mobile platform because they are designed for a local workgroup environment. Lastly, in order to perform actions like verifying an address, looking up a car by a VIN and producing and submitting rates to a carrier, you need solid Internet connectivity. 

Certainly, the latter issue seems to less and less of an issue as our wireless networks mature, but my final reason for not building an app for that? If you need portability now, you can have it. A netbook with a data plan or a laptop tethered to smartphone or an aircard gets the job done right now. You keep all the functionality of the current products that are in your life - you just get to take it with you. Our product costs do not go up and everyone's life stay simpler.

That's not to say that we aren't looking at ways to move our solutions to the cloud or provide read-only access for mobile devices. It's just that the mix of functionality and productivity in our current solutions are not directly a good fit for these emerging platforms. We'll be keeping a close eye on them though.

The iPad - Day 5

I wasn't going to post an update today, but then fate intervened.

I couldn't connect to WiFi at work. Uh-oh. Look at me, I'm one of those folks affected by the first iPad problem. As it turned out, I wasn't. The router was hung and needed to be rebooted. No harm, no foul.

The second reason, I felt it was worthwhile to provide an update today was that folks are hard at work to solve one of the significant complaints on the iPad - its lack of a camera. According to this PCWorld article, the solution is a mere dollar away for those who have an iPhone 3G or 3GS. This is pretty clever and I intent to try it out for the novelty if nothing else.

Lastly, I was working with an application that we use at work which is a web app and found something interesting. The iPad doesn't realize that every text box actually IS a text box. I was unable to work with the Rally software solution to edit some story descriptions because Safari on the iPad didn't understand what it was looking that. This one is a first for me, but it was disappointing since I was trying to leverage the small size of the iPad at the time. Oh well, maybe next release.

The iPad - Day 4

This should be a brief update as I didn't have a lot of time to work with the iPad today. My typing on the unit is getting a bit better. I find that you need to keep your wrists up straight (i.e. proper typing form) to have the best results.

I talked in an earlier update of some of the things I can't do with the iPad. I had a bit of an epiphany today when I realized that the iPad enables me to do things that a typical laptop can't. 

• Immediate access. The iPad is an instant-on device. There's no boot time, hibernate wait, etc. It's on and off with the click of a button. That means that if you need to check something quickly - it actually can be done versus a laptop computer.
• Portable like no other. The iPad is a pound and a half and slip as heck. I can comfortably carry the iPad in the file folder area of my Tumi backpack and not even notice the weight. On the other hand, how many bags are there than can carry two laptops? And if there were any, who would want to? Obviously, this doesn't affect everyone, but I keep a very strict separation between my work laptop and my personal life.

One other thing I noted today? After using the iPad, the iPhone seems incredibly small. I feel suddenly like I have giant hands and I'm looking at a telescope at my apps and the Internet. Again, though, I'm not suggesting that the iPhone get much bigger - it's just the affect that the iPad has upon me.

The iPad - Day 3

So after picking up an iPad on launch day, it was an illuminating first couple of days. Since yesterday was Easter, there was plenty of time to veg out, do some couch surfing and get everything squared away on the iPad.

First advice? If you're in a relationship and both of you like gadgets, you better buy two.  It takes quite a while to set it up how you want and get some key applications chosen and configured. I already had about 200 apps loaded and unfortunately once you set iTunes to sync apps it selects all of them. The interface is also rather clunky for a lot of apps. After going through that, adding a few movies and so forth, the first syncs took awhile. After the lion's share were done, it went much faster for subsequent syncs.

Movies and music were a breeze to put on the device. The App store already has over 3,000 apps so there were a lot to choose from. However, a lot of them are quite pricey - FAR more expensive than the typical iPhone app. I have yet to buy an iPad only app, preferring to stick with the enhanced apps that work on both (they are the ones with the plus) so that I can get maximum utility out of my purchases.

Since Microsoft is unlikely to make Office for the iPad, I may give in and get Pages and Numbers. I'd prefer to get the Powerpoint equivalent as well, but only intend to do so if I can buy the iWork suite. Speaking of which, the typing... for those of you who have never met me I'm about 6'2" and thus have large hands. How is the typing on the screen?

Well, it's going to take some getting used to. In landscape mode, it IS relatively usable. I need to keep an eye on my typing though, since it's easy to brush a key on a touch screen. In portrait mode, I have to resort to thumb typing and it's pretty awkward.

I have yet to find anything to hook up to the Bluetooth on the iPad, so I've turned that off. Perhaps some wireless headphones? What would be really great is if I could pair my iPhone to it as a wireless, go anywhere modem, but I'm probably dreaming. The WiFi is working well so far - it's very quick at downloads and rendering web pages. The iPad is also VERY good at knowing where you are by WiFi triangulation. It was a little off when I was out and about today, but incredibly accurate at home.

I've started reading a book on it and find it very easy to use and read. It's not too rough on my eyes. Of course, I guess I'm very used to doing a lot of screen reading at work all day... I do find the screen, since it's shiny, just like the iPhone to be a bit of a challenge in certain light, but still usable.

So that's the update so far. Still happy, still exploring and still tweaking. :-)

The iPad

If I hadn't picked up an iPad today, on the day of launch, I would probably be writing a different blog about how the media has over-hyped the device, that's it's not big of a deal and it's just fine to wait.

After spending the last 3 hours or so with the device, I'll be clear. All of the above is true.

But.

This device breaks a lot of walls down. It certainly delivers functionality that I wanted in my iPhone but couldn't have. In no particular order that is:

1. Much better battery life
2. A much larger screen
3. Faster processor

For a device like a phone, you really don't want to have a giant screen because that means a giant device. But watching a lot of videos on a flight such as our recent trip to Maui gets painful. In addition, when you do want to watch 5 hours of movies, you also get to watch your iPhone battery slide ever downward. When you land, your phone is out of juice.

As of right now, I've been near constantly using the iPad and it sits at 73% battery left. That's from out of the box in which it didn't have a full charge. And when I sync it on my PC, it doesn't charge. Apparently you need to plug it into the wall for that.

I have little else to add that this review, or this review doesn't cover. But, I can tell you that some of the apps I use work far better on this form factor. I can also tell you that I cannot take my online classes on the iPad because they are powered by Flash. Lastly, I can say that while there's a lot more to go, I have a feeling this will finally move me to ebooks for real. We're finally there.

Now, off to play! :-)

Anti-Virus on the Home Server

I had previously written in my review about my Windows Home Server how I disliked the McAfee anti-virus solution that was included. Sure, it was a year of service, but the product wasn't the best and trying to update and extend that subscription actually seemed to be impossible. I tried. For a while.

So I looked for alternatives and the options are limited. I finally located Avast Windows Home Server edition, downloaded and installed the demo. It seemed to work fine and I decided to purchase it once the demo warned me that it was about to expire. As it turns out, that's probably a little too late.

Once the system went into that, "Hey you are about to expire" mode, the console on the Home Server simply hung and was unresponsive. License file in hand or not, you couldn't update it. Luckily, I found a bit of a workaround in the forums. I set the clock back a few weeks on the server. This seemed to allow the server to get back to the point where it could launch the Avast console. Then, I set the date back to the current date. Only then was I able to update the license file and update the Anti-virus to the current definitions.

After getting through this process, I have to say that either Microsoft needs to improve the way software is installed on this thing or anti-virus vendors really don't know what they're doing in as far as WHS. Perhaps it's a little bit of both, but I can say that it's unlikely that an average user would want to grind their way through these kinds of issues.

It's at this point that I'm questioning whether I've just made things better or worse. I suppose only time will tell, but I have a year to find out.