IPhone on yozy//NET

My take on 3D Touch

Tue, 14 Aug 2018 19:30:00 +0000

As the release of new iPhones is approaching, it is time to speculate on new features, or the removal of the old ones. There are rumors that one of the new iPhones will lack 3D Touch capability. To me, this is disturbing as I think that the biggest hindrance in 3D Touch adoption is that it is not omnipresent. Contrary to the opinion that it is broken, I believe that discoverability is a minor issue.

On a desktop interface there are no indicators to show that a particular element can be right-clicked. This is so because:

There are few actions that are only doable by right clicking, mainly thanks to of toolbars and menu bars.
Users intuitively know which elements can be right-clicked.

First point can be resolved by software: I leave it to designers to design a replacement for menus or toolbars that enable advanced functionality which can be then used with 3D Touch. The second point can be solved with users being exposed to 3D Touch all the time. With the current lineup this is a non-starter as it is available on high end phones only—not on the SE, and not on the iPad.

Now is the time for Apple to show if they are invested in 3D Touch or whether it is just a nice-to-have feature.

The one argument for keeping the 3.5mm jack

Thu, 03 Dec 2015 13:20:36 +0000

The rumour about Apple removing the 3.5mm jack in the future iPhone has wreaked havoc around the Internet. There are several arguments for and against it, but I think there is only one that is valid: it would make it impossible to create accessories for iPhone without going through the MFI process.

Case in point, Apple has recently featured this application in their advert “Ridiculously Powerful”.

This application would probably never exist without the possibility to leverage a cheap and universal interface with the device.

Pondering the new iPhone lineup

Thu, 13 Aug 2015 07:12:52 +0000

Here is a theory. There have been quite a lot of rumours about a new “iPhone 6C” which ought to have the 6’s internals in a brand new 4" plastic body. However, with no parts leaks this late into summer, the existence of this model is not a given. (side note: there are no leaks for the iPhone 6S plus out either)

We know that Apple has already broken the pattern of older devices moving down the price range with the 5C. I think this year the pattern could be broken again.

After the iPhone 5C was introduced, the Internet was swamped with articles describing how much of a flop it was. The reality is that most people who buy iPhones in October buy the latest and beefiest one.

So, what if Apple introduced the new, plastic, iPhone 6C in September but only made it available in shops in December for the holidays? This would give them approximately until October to ramp up the production, which would explain the lack of the leaks.

Not only would they protect themselves. But they would also get an excuse for the lower number of phones sold.

Edit 2015-09-14

Well, first predition, first failure. My score so far: 0 out of 1.

Apple's (future) presence in China

Mon, 19 Aug 2013 22:01:33 +0000

Rumours about the new lower-cost plastic iPhone are so prominent that we can, rather safely, take the “iPhone 5C” for granted. Its target is purportedly the cost conscious customer, and according to many articles, Asian emerging markets (read China).

On my recent trip there I came to wonder if this is really the right move to increase presence in China. Walking around, one realises that Chinese people do not necessarily seek cheap stuff; when buying phones the thing that matters most is the size. People do not care that they can not put their massive 6.3" Samsung MEGAs into their pocket because it never leaves their hand. (I wonder what effect on health this will have on the long term)

It is quite unlike Apple to create derivate devices for specific markets. iOS, for example, is the same in every country with all social networking options available everywhere. However it is not a coincidence that all car makers make specific (bigger) versions of their vehicles tailored for Chinese taste. Such an enormous population is well worth additional upkeep expenses.

While the new iPhone will inevitably attract new customers, I would not bet it will help Apple gain much traction in China. The alleged new iPhone will not be cheap, and the price is not the main reason why people in China do not buy iPhones. One reason is the size, the other is that Chinese input method in iOS sucks. What they need is an ugly maxi-phone, which they could sell at a premium price. And buy Sogou.

Push irssi away messages to your iPhone

Sat, 14 Apr 2012 16:05:12 +0000

Using irssi for IRC is quite a must. Add some bitlbee sweetness and you have everything you need for your instant messaging needs. With a handy ssh application like iSSH you will get to a cyborg state when you are always connected. Small problem arises when compared to other IM applications, like IMO, that is that there are no notifications available and you will probably miss a lot of conversations. Fear not, however, for there is a solution for every problem.

Push notification application

First, you will need an application to get any push notification to your phone. There are several of them, I would recommend using the Push4. There is a free version if you want to test it first. Once you have installed it and created an account go to your account settings on your website and go to My Account -> Settings -> Profile to get your API key. You can also make the application send you an e-mail with the key.

Some scripting

You will need to make two scripts to send the notifications. (You could manage with less, of course, but I am too lazy). First one is a bash script which uses curl to send a notification to your phone. Here it is :

curl -d "user_credentials=YOUR_API_KEY" \
 -d "notification[message]=$1" \
 -d "notification[long_message]=$2" \
 -d "notification[title]=New irssi notification" \
 -d "notification[subtitle]=irssi message" \
 -d "notification[long_message_preview]=$1" \
 -d "notification[message_level]=2" \
 -d "notification[silent]=0" \
 -d "notification[action_loc\_key]=OK" \
 -d "notification[sound]=1" https://www.appnotifications.com/account/notifications.json

Do not forget to replace the YOUR_API_KEY by your real API key.

You can test the script immediately, although it might not work for a few hours just after your Push4 account creation. Basically this script sends you a notifications with first parameter as short text preview and second as a long text (which can use HTML markup). A second script is needed to parse the awaylog and send notifications using the first script.

#!/usr/bin/perl -n use HTML::Entities;
if (/(\d+:\d+) (?:([#&][^ ]+)+:)?.*?\/.*?\/(.*?).g.8.*?e(YOURNICK: )?(.*)/) {
    $time = $1;
    $channel = $2;
    $sender = $3;
    $message = $5;
    $message =~ s/\\/:/g;
    $message =~ s/"/\\"/g;
    $message =~ s/[;&]/:/g;
    print `./irssi_notify.sh "$sender : $message at $time" "Message from <b>$sender</b> (<i>$channel</i>) at <b>$time</b> : $message"\n`;
}

Now, to clarify things a bit. What this script does is that it takes some input, and if it is in some format, /(\d+:\d+) (?:([#&][^ ]+)+:)?.\*?\/.\*?\/(.\*?).g.8.\*?e(YOURNICK: )?(.*)/, to be precise, it will parse it and send it via a notification. Note that this works if you did not play with your irssi theme too much, as the awaylog basically copies the format of public and highlight messages. The (YOURNICK: )? part is optional, and it helps to remove the usual prefix of highlight messages. I can not help you much with the regex, you have to find one on your own or you can use this script which basically takes anything in awaylog and sends it as it is (it works well and everywhere).

#!/usr/bin/perl -n use HTML::Entities;
$message = encode_entities($_);
$message =~ s/\\/:/g; $message =~ s/"/\\"/g;
$message =~ s/[;&]/:/g; print `./irssi_notify.sh "$message" "$message"\n`;

Making it all work

Let us run the machine now. You will need to start another screen to run this (if somebody will help me with making a nohup version of the command I will gladly have it). Run a terminal on your shell and run

screen bash tailf ~/.irssi/away.log | perl irssi_notify.pl

Now detach the screen and you are on the roll.

Edit 2015-10-17

The Push4 service is no longer available. I am currently using a solution that uses Pushover. I’ll write up an article on how to use that shortly.