Getting USB devices to connect to the guest OS in VirtualBox can be a bit tricky. I run it on Windows so it might work differently on Linux, but anyway…
The key is to understand that in order for the device to be detected it has to be connected while the guest OS is running. If it is connected before it is started then it won’t attach. It will say it is, but it won’t be seen by the guest OS.
This small but vital fact is not made clear in the documentation.
I have spent some time with my HTC Hero and thought it was rtime for a review.
I am on contract with T-Mobile and have unlimited data. You really need a good data plan, even if you have WiFi at home and work. Android loves data. Unfortunately T-Mobile’s coverage is crap.
First the phone itself. The design is generally good, and the “chin” makes a lot of sense when you use it. Build quality is good. The only issues I have are that the the volume buttons are too easy to press when using or fishing the phone out of your pocket, and the ringing volume is not loud enough. The latter would be okay if the vibration was powerful enough, but it isn’t. I sometimes don’t notice it.
Sound quality on calls is good, including the speaker phone. The headphone output is rubbish though. Sound quality is below par and there is constant hiss. It makes listening to audio books at low volume a bit annoying. My old N97 was much better. Still, it is usable and at lest there is a standard socket instead of the stupid Nokia pop-port.
Speaking of standard ports the Hero has mini USB. Even better it mounts the SD card as a standard flash drive. No stupid sync software or special modes required. There is a sync app which is on the SD card and is portable (does not need installing). I have not tried it because it does not work on XP x64.
Battery life is pretty good. I normally charge the phone in the evening and then keep it on overnight. I then have the WiFi on all day at work and when I get home the battery shows almost no drain. Of course these meters are often highly misleading but I have been really pushing it lately and it doesn’t suddenly drop right down like my old ipod does. Even with WiFi a.d GPS on for wardriving it comes well. It is easy to charge over usb.
WiFi deserves a paragraph or two. It generally works pretty well, although roaming could be a boy more aggressive. It seems to struggle with very low signal access points. Seems on a par with other phones though.
The most frustrating thing is that it is such a missed opportunity. Android is based on Linux and so in theory a port of aircrack is possible, but lack of driver support is holding it back. Even if there was just a packet capture app… A slightly better antenna would make a big difference too.
The version of Android on the phone has the HTC Sense skin on it. It isn’t that different from normal Android, the main differences being the home screen and they virtual keyboard. The home screen works well. You can customize five pages of. Mixed apps, widgets and shortcuts. I mostly use Android or downloaded ones rather than the HTC widgets as they are q bit big and flashy.
The keyboard is generally good. Vibration feedback is provided buttons make it less responsive. Prediction seems to be excellent and does not overly favour user dictionary words like my Nokia did. After I sent some DNS settings by text it always put ‘DNS’ instead of ‘for’.
The HTC keyboard is a bit different to the standard Android one. I have not really used the standard one so can’t compare, but I hear the HTC is usually judged favorably against it. It lags a bit with the vibration or sound feedback on which sometimes causes it to think you long-pressed a key when you only tapped it. There is no pound key either – a major omission!
I can type pretty fast one or two handed with it. I wondered about getting a hardware keyboard but I don’t think it would be worth it.
Now, the apps. There are so many fantastic apps, and most are free. You are not limited to the app store either, you can install them from any site or the SD card. Apple recently deleted all the WiFi finding apps from their app store and reject a lot of good stuff like emulators and replacements for the built in ones. None of that nonsense here.
One of the best features is the detailed permission display when installing an app. It tells you exactly what the app is allowed to do. The comments system on the store is also very good, and bad reviews are not censored.
The Google apps are pretty good. You obviously need to have a Google account but you can use POP or IMAP etc. with other providers.
The apps all tie together well. For example your contacts brings together gmail, Facebook, Twitter and more. If you install a file manager it can be used to choose files in other apps. All apps can use the notification system.
I only wish the was a WiFi packet capture app, or even better a port of aircrack.
One of the most useful apps is RMaps. It is similar to The built in Google Maps app but can use offline map data. I downloaded all of they greater Tokyo and surrounding areas so that I can have maps when I don’t have am unlimited data connection. The GPS works pretty well once a fix is acquired but it does help to be stationary at first.
The BBC changed HYS. It is just a blog now with moderated comments.
On the one hand it’s good that the BNP can’t use it for propaganda so easily, but the lack of structure means you have no chance of being read unless you post in the first minute of the debate.
The BBC seems to hold the opinions of the general public in high regard. Unfortunately most people are ignorant but still want their say, so some ranking is required. Otherwise you might as well talk to a brick wall for all the good it will do since no matter how insightful and considered your words are no-one will read them.
It also results in a lot id reparation. If people replied to each other the debate might move forwards. Wait, what am I saying? This isn’t a debate.
Just got the first XP machine with the Browser Ballot update on it.
I clicked “next” and IE8 came up with a window asking me to choose my settings. I closed it and selected Firefox from the available options. Internet Explorer opened and downloaded Firefox. I installed it and the browser ballot window was still there. I closed the ballot window and rebooted.
The ballot came up again, but this time even worse:
This thing is horribly broken. Even when you have installed another browser it tries to force you back to IE. It didn’t delete the IE icon off the desktop or Quick Launch either.
Today I discovered why I have been having a few compatibility problems with my Playstation interface code.
The PSX uses a SPI bus. The device is supposed to put data on the bus when there is a high to low transition, then read the command on the low to high change. Sure enough the official controller sets the data line within 0.3us of the clock transition.
The problem is that some revisions of the PSX hardware don’t wait for the low to high transition to read the data line. They read at some random point during the clock cycle.
It seems to be some kind of bug because Sony fixed it in later revisions. That is of course assuming that the information on the net about the controller protocol is correct. It may be that the controller is supposed to assert the data line within a few hundred nanoseconds but that seems somewhat unlikely. It would force you to use a hardware SPI bus and thus limit the choice of microcontroller. Maybe Sony don’t care about the needs of third party developers…
I saw a PSX dev-kit for sale last year and wish I had it now. Oh well, it’s sorted now. Make sure the data is there before the transition, just like the PSX does with the command line, and it works.
Anyway,
I have been using Google Tasks to make to-do lists and am finding it really useful.
The interface is quite basic. You can add tasks and indent them to give it a bit of basic structure. It gives you multiple lists which at first seemed a bit cumbersome; I’d like to see an overview of all tasks. Having used it for a while I think it’s actually not such a bad idea.
Tasks is integrated into gMail and iGoogle, but I mostly use it via the Firefox sidebar (use https://mail.google.com/tasks/ig) and gTasks on Android.
It’s not as advanced as some services, but it is fast and simple.
Vistaprint got back to me. They refunded the job and have offered to do another batch for free!
I am pretty impressed by this. The order was for about £10 and I’m sure most places would just write it off (hi Weycrest). They have requested samples from the bad batches and samples of how the colour should print. I will send the package off on Monday and fingers crossed they can get it right this time.
The BBC finally got back to me with a response about the BNP hijacking the Have Your Say forums:
Thanks for your further e-mail. Please accept our apologies for the delay in replying. We've raised your concerns with those responsible for managing the Have Your Say board. They recognise the board is open to abuse and there are other systems being used to run forums elsewhere on the web. Nonetheless the moderators do their best to try to ensure a representative response is published. They will very shortly be making some changes to the HYS system which will have an impact on this kind of behaviour. Thanks again for taking the time to contact us with your concerns. Regards Gemma McAleer BBC Complaints
I was hoping for some more concrete proposals to sort this out, but hopefully whatever they are planning will improve the situation.
As a bit of an aside I think this sort of thing is unfortunately symptomatic of the BBC’s attitude towards the viewers. The opinions of the public are held in high regard, and it’s normal for them not to be challenged at all. To me that seems completely backwards. Members of the public are usually the least likely to have any kind of reasoned and informed opinion, while those who can bring those qualities to the debate are interrogated vigorously (as they should be).
With regards to HYS specifically, the decision not to allow any kind of structured debate where people can respond to each other is, IMHO, a clear example of treating the public’s opinion with more reverence than it deserves. If someone says something which cannot stand up to scrutiny or debate then the BBC should not shield them.
I decided to get some business cards made. I produced the design in Inkscape according to Vistaprint’s specification:
A nice shade of red I thought. Unfortunately, Vistaprint can’t print red:
I included a few red and different colour items in the photo for comparison. I was a bit surprised at this as I had followed all the suggestions on the Vistaprint web site, and indeed the site itself seemed to render red correctly:
I contacted them and they kindly offered to try again. I sent them a few samples of the first lot so they could see the problem. The second batch turned up, and it was a slightly darker brown that the first. I contacted them again, and got this interesting response:
We currently do not have persons in place to check orders before they are printed nor shipped.
So they just press print and hope everything turns out okay.
They suggested I try converting the colour to CMYK, so I did. Sent them another proof, which again looked perfect on the web site preview. Third lot of cards turned up and sure enough they are still just as brown.
FFS Vistaprint, is it that hard to print red? Every cheap inkjet can do it, so why can’t you? How can your prints be so far from what is shown on screen? I can understand not being able to match colour to a professional level but we are talking completely different parts of the spectrum here.
FAIL.
My custom userContent.css has been updated. I found a fix for the few remaining stupid HTML mails that failed to display correctly due to using “font: inherit” which picks up the <body>’s text colour (off-white) which is unreadable against the white background. I’m still not entirely sure why the <body>’s font colour is being inherited over the parent <div>’s colour, but regardless of why I have now fixed it by making table > td use black text. It also has the added benefit of filtering out annoying font colours set by the sender.
#viewsource {
color: #f8f8f2 !important;
}
body {
background-color: #272822;
color: #f8f8f2;
border: 0 0 0 0;
padding: 0 0 0 0;
margin: 0 0 0 0;
}
body > pre {
background-color: #272822;
color: #f8f8f2;
}
body > * {
background-color: #fff;
color: #00f;
}
pre {
background-color: #272822;
color: #f8f8f2;
}
pre > a:link {
color: #65ff00;
}
div[class=moz-text-html] {
background-color: #fff;
color: #000;
padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;
}
div[class=moz-text-html] > table {
background-color: #fff !important;
color: #000 !important;
}
div[class=moz-text-plain] {
background-color: #272822;
color: #f8f8f2;
padding: 10px 10px 10px 10px;
}
*[_moz_dirty] {
color: #f8f8f2;
background-color: #272822;
}
*[_moz_quote=true] {
color: #ffcb00;
}
/* Quote Levels Colors */
blockquote[type=cite] > pre {
color: #ffcb00;
}
blockquote[type=cite] blockquote > pre{
color: #fd6500;
}
blockquote[type=cite] blockquote blockquote > pre {
color: #00a000;
}
blockquote[type=cite] blockquote blockquote blockquote > pre {
color: purple;
}
blockquote[type=cite] blockquote blockquote blockquote blockquote > pre {
color: teal;
}