¶ Notifications

I have been thinking a lot lately about notifications on my devices — both Mac & iOS. Today, after a conversation with some friends on Path, I finally tied it all together in my mind to share with you.

Let’s start with the Mac.

Mac

The Mac’s notifications are all over the place. In the Dock, you can have badge notifications, and apps can bounce up and down like a Jack Russell Terrier for your attention. Badge notifications have also crept into Launchpad, which isn’t easily discoverable. One last place for badge notifications is the apps residing in the menu bar.

Then there are modal notifications that pop up over whatever you are currently working on.

This is the same sort of mess that we had in iOS until banner notifications and the Notification Center came into play in iOS 5.

On top of the frenzy of notification placement, some of these just look plain outdated. For instance, iCal notifications look like this:

iCal Notification

What era is that clock from? It even annoyingly shakes. It is an eyesore on the beauty of the rest of OS X.

OS X Lion was billed as being the best of iOS being brought back to the Mac. And in many ways, it is. Take full-screen apps, for instance. I use them all the time (like right now, as I write this in Byword). I keep Safari, Mail, iCal, iTunes, & Reeder in full-screen almost all the time.

Notification center and banner notifications would be awesome, especially in full-screen apps. Give me a keyboard shortcut or trackpad gesture to quickly see all my notifications on my Mac, and subtly show me reminders and alerts without demanding an interruption to my workflow.

iOS

I have very little to complain about regarding iOS notifications since iOS 5’s revamp of the system. But there is one.

I do not always have my MacBook Pro with me. And when I am on the go, and at night, it is closed, making notifications impossible. This is not the case with my iPhone. It is always with me, always on, and charges in a little tray on my nightstand. It serves as my alarm clock.

But emails and app notifications roll in throughout the night, making noise and briefly turning on the screen.

There are only two types of notifications I want while I am asleep: the alarm that I set and phone calls (in case of an emergency). Everything else needs to shut up.

Here is what I propose: a global Do Not Disturb setting for iOS notifications. This would prohibit notifications from turning on the display or activating the speaker during hours that I set (like when I am sleeping). There would be a list of exceptions that I could set, such as alarms or phone calls. For everything else, it can stack its notifications in the Notification Center for my review in the morning.

The ring/silent switch works great for things like meetings, where you can be alerted to something via vibration if need be. You’re still active in that situation. It doesn’t work that well for sleeping at night, though.

Being able to tell our apps that we do not wish to see or hear them right now would be great.

Update

on 2011-12-30 21:01 by Chris De Jabet

Just a quick addition to note that Airplane Mode isn’t enough to solve this problem. Some apps, like games, will use local notifications that do not require a network connection. My wife likes to play Tiny Tower, which will use local notifications to update her on when something needs restocking or a new level of her tower is ready (it’s simply using time calculations for all this).

Also, Airplane Mode would disrupt the ability to receive calls. And we all know the moment you disable calls is when the crap will hit the fan.

How to Perfectly Reheat Pizza

I used this tip on how to reheat pizza today for my lunch. I dare say my pizza tasted better using this method than when it was freshly delivered last night. Sure, it takes a lot longer than zapping the pizza in the microwave, but it is definitely worth it.

[via TBR, a long time ago]

NORAD Santa Tracker

One of my fondest childhood memories of Christmas was calling the NORAD Santa tracking hotline to check and see where St. Nick was at. I also greatly enjoyed using the [website] in the late 90's even though I was well beyond the childhood tales of Santa.

Here is how the story behind NORAD tracking Santa goes:

The program began on December 24, 1955 when a Sears department store placed an advertisement in a Colorado Springs newspaper which told children that they could telephone Santa Claus and included a number for them to call. However, the telephone number printed was incorrect and calls instead came through to Colorado Springs' Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Center. Colonel Shoup, who was on duty that night, told his staff to give all children that called in a "current location" for Santa Claus. A tradition began which continued when the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) replaced CONAD in 1958.

Now you can share the fun of tracking Santa with your kids on your iPhone or Android phone. Get it on the App Store or Android Market.

Speaking of Android Software Updates

Vlad Savov:

Samsung has just distributed the worst news of this Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade cycle: the popular Galaxy S smartphone that sold 10 million units last year and the 7-inch Galaxy Tab tablet won't be upgraded to Android 4.0. The company's argument is that they lack sufficient RAM and ROM to run the new OS alongside TouchWiz and other "experience-enhancing" software. This will come as a massive blow to the great many users of the Galaxy S, who would have rightly expected the 1GHz Hummingbird processor and accompanying memory to be able to handle ICS — it's the same hardware as you'll find inside the Nexus S, and that phone is receiving Android 4.0 over the air right now.

The difference is the Nexus S runs pure Android, and the Galaxy S runs Samsung's own TouchWiz skin. Samsung (and other manufacturers who skin Android) always claim these skins enhance the experience. Those must be some wicked enhancements to forego the next generation of the OS.

A Good Smartphone Comes But Once a Year

Chris Ziegler writes an amazing editorial at The Verge about the effect of dozens of Android phones released each year compared to one great iPhone.

One of the greatest detriments is not being able to update those seemingly countless devices in a timely fashion (if ever).

This one’s just simple math: more SKUs means more firmwares, and more versions of those firmwares. Each of those versions needs the care and feeding of an engineering team, and there are only so many engineers to go around. If a particular model is unpopular — which is more likely when you’re releasing a countless array of them — long-term support becomes an even greater risk.

Compare that to the iPhone 3GS, 4, & 4S, which are all capable of running iOS 5. The 3GS was released two and a half years ago. Can any Android phone make that same claim?

Best Buy Cancels Christmas

Downright shameful.

Shawn Blanc Reviews the Galaxy Nexus

Shawn Blanc, who has used an iPhone for 4 years, used a Galaxy Nexus as his primary phone for the past week. Some of his findings didn’t really surprise me.

Regarding the screen that is so large you could serve a lunch on it:

This gives the Galaxy Nexus an aura that makes me wonder if it’s supposed to be a tablet that makes phone calls or a phone that you need two hands to use. I realize that’s a goofy and exaggerated statement, but I exaggerate it to make a point I am serious about: the phone is simply too big.

If this were my full-time phone, I’d be sad.

And 4G LTE’s effect on battery life:

Earlier this week I spent some time driving around Kansas City in order to field test the turn-by-turn navigation, the LTE network, and the battery life. At 11:30 AM I started out and the battery of the Nexus was at 43-percent. After 25 minutes the battery had drained down to 33-percent even though it was plugged into a car charger.

Think about that. If you’re on a road trip and want to use the 4G LTE network to provide you with driving directions, your drive had better be shorter than 4 hours because even when plugged into a car charger, the battery will not last.

Shawn poses a great question, which nerds should pick up on: Who is fighting for the users?

…the Galaxy Nexus seems more like a phone that its makers can brag about making rather than a device that its users would brag about owning. It has all sorts of features that seem great on posters and billboards and board meeting reports, but none of those features enhance the actual user experience.

And regarding the difference between Android and iOS:

Android has options for just about everything. But, in spite of all its options and ability to customize, I didn’t find Android to be more powerful than iOS. Of all the options and choices that I was given by Android, there was nothing in Android that I could not also accomplish on iOS. In fact, the options and choices usually got in my way.

Moreover, of the millions of users on Android, how many exercise this freedom of choice that is a part of the Android OS?

This has always seemed to be the crux of the whole Android/iOS debate to me. Android seems great for nerds who love to tinker, or who have a hard time ceding any control over anything. iOS is far more simplistic in that Apple tends to make the decision that will make most people happy, not just the vocal minority.

I’d even go so far as to say even iOS offers far more things than the average user will ever discover. But the absence of discovering these little features will not interfere with the normal usage of the device.

Android should be reserved for those who know what they are getting into. If someone I know needs a recommendation for what smart phone to get, I would not recommend Android to them.

To those who want to use Android, I say go for it. I don’t think that choice is wrong — there are many fine things about the Android OS and many things it does differently and better than iOS.

[…]

Moreover, there was nothing on Android that made me feel more empowered compared to using my iPhone.

Sure, there are bits of the Android OS that I like and appreciate, but never once was I wowed or delighted. Which is unfortunate, because those are important elements when you are using a device day in and day out every day of the year.

iOS and the devices it runs on often get teased for being described as “magical”. Guess what? Magic wows and delights. People enjoy magic. After years of using iOS, it still holds me in childlike wonderment.

Skitch for iPad

I’ve been a long time user of Skitch on the Mac. It was created by plasq, which pretty much left it in indefinite beta (though it never felt like a beta to me). The app was recently sold to Evernote,which has expanded the product from being on just the Mac to Android, with the promise of Skitch coming to iOS.

Well, half of that promise was fulfilled today with Skitch for iPad. It’s a fantastic little app for marking up a screenshot, website, map, or photo. It exports directly to Evernote, the iPad’s camera roll, email, or Twitter via iOS 5’s Tweet Sheet.

Most often, I want to share a Skitch markup on Twitter, so this is great for me. Especially since I use Twitter mostly on iOS. The iPad version is great, but I really can’t wait to have Skitch on my iPhone.

¶ The Gift of Geek

Last year I posted about the duty of The Family Geek™ — be as helpful as possible when your family members receive shiny new technology as gifts. I’d like to take this moment to reiterate that, as I know I’ll be drinking my own medicine heavily this weekend.

Some things to be prepared for:

1. Be available. Set aside some time for one-on-one walkthroughs, or time to talk on the phone if your relative isn’t with you this holiday. That doesn’t mean you have to give up your entire holiday, but set aside a few hours for lending a helping hand.
2. Be patient. Your relatives aren’t as nerdy as you are. Keep that in mind, and don’t treat them like an idiot. It’s new to them, and it takes time to learn new things. Also, don’t rush through so much to point of making it impossible to retain. Start with the basics. There can always be more phone calls.
3. Run updates on their devices. One of the things I like to do is make sure everything is up to date on my relatives’ devices. There’s a few of them who never run updates, and there’s a lot that piles up over 6 months.
4. Backups. On the same note, make sure to set up your relatives for data backup in one way or another. This will save you a headache later.

There’s a lot of other stuff to do as the family geek, but these are a few things your relatives will appreciate.

¶ LTE

I don’t think we’ll be seeing LTE in an iPhone for some time. Why? Engadget’s review of the LTE Galaxy Nexus by Tim Stevens serves as Exhibit A (the strong emphasis is mine):

And then there’s the battery life. It’s well known that LTE can put a real hurting on phone longevity and that appears to be the case here as well, our Nexus struggling to hold on to a charge in day-to-day use with all antennas firing. We’ve as of yet had very limited time with the thing, but in our 24 hours of intensive testing we had to reach for the charger multiple times. Using Google Navigation with LTE enabled? The battery drained so fast our in-car charger couldn’t keep up, leaving us unsure of which exit to take off the 101.

Stephen Hackett, in response to another article regarding LTE’s affect on batteries, gets straight to the point:

I don’t think Apple will ship an LTE-equipped device until it can ensure the average user can enjoy good battery life with faster data enabled. Most people wouldn’t know how or when to turn off 4G.

In the iPhone 3G, 3GS, and 4, Apple had a switch buried in Settings.app for forcing the 3G antenna off. The 4S has no such setting. As far as I’m concerned, Apple could have removed it from the 4 as well in iOS 5, but they didn’t. 3G hardware has become efficient enough to forego the need of a manual fallback. Wouldn’t it be nice if Apple never needed to have a manual fallback when it comes to 4G? I think it’s better for Apple to let 4G mature, instead of shoehorning it into what is still the best phone on the market.