I thought I would jot a few notes about my recent experiences with tablet PCs (or “Internet Tablets” or just plain “Tablets”)

I should start off by saying I am quite a fan of the Google Android operating system for hand-held devices. I own an unlocked HTC Hero with customised firmware and love the flexibility and power I get from a truly low cost smartphone (bought second hand on eBay). This smartphone seems pre-historic compared with the latest powerhouse smartphones with their fast processors and big screens, but really, it serves me just fine. My main uses are for email, calendar, listening to podcasts and in-vehicle sat-nav. It really does not have the power or screen to run the latest games or video (BBC iPlayer would be daft on such a small screen, although I guess being able to load up the iPlayer live stream News24 would be nice occasionally).

I have also tried my hand at creating some basic apps for the Android platform using Googles App Inventor. I now have two applications that make my life a little nicer and may be of use to others if I ever get around to smoothing all of the rough edges.

Having owned various portable media player / personal assistant devices in the past (Archos PMP, Psion organisers (their name be praised and even a 1st generation eeePC which I am still fond of), I decided that I would rather like to have a Tablet – partly for on-the-move business use and partly for personal information access and media playing etc. Here is an account of my quest to find the perfect device which fits all my needs: Read the rest of this entry »

From Youtube:

I enjoy a bit of Linux dabbling – in part it helps maintain familiarity with the Linux way of doing things (essential for part of my work running remote Linux based web servers), partly because it is free and easy to have a dabble with, and partly because it is very powerful in specific areas where it can be a struggle to get Windows based PCs to do the same sort of thing.

I currently have about three or four different flavours of Linux running on different bits of kit so I am fairly familiar with the pros and cons of the different ‘distributions’. For ease of use and widespread support, Ubuntu is near the top of the list – so for at least one of my systems, that’s what I have installed.

I have been hearing about how the latest version of Ubuntu (9.01) should have some decent improvements (faster boot sounds promising for example), so earlier today I initiated a system upgrade using the built-in system updating tool. This worked well last time I upgraded, however today, it went horribly wrong… read on dear friend for details of this minor pothole on my otherwise smooth motorway of Linux system maintenance… Read the rest of this entry »

The world is definitely changing. Once, email for most people meant having an email client such as Outlook or Outlook Express – and this client would interact with their server to collect the email waiting for them in their service providers email server. Read the rest of this entry »

Cut Join Edit AVC MP4 H.264 video – my little guide to getting it done as painlessly as possible

This could get a little geeky – so apologies in advance. For people with modern consumer AVC type video cameras however, this little guide could be rather useful. Read the rest of this entry »

STOP!! Don’t use email! It is not secure!!

Of course I am joking, but it is of course true, email in it’s most basic form is and has always been an insecure method of communication.

First, a bit of background… Read the rest of this entry »