The first trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness has been released. Go watch it.
I’m excited, really excited.
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Category: Life
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Rural Uptake of Technology
Two posts this morning crossed my desk and I thought I’d just comment briefly on something neither of them talked about.
The first was MG Siegler’s iTunes 11 article at TechCrunch. Go ahead and read it if you like, but I’m going to pull out a choice quote anyway.
Again, it works a lot better than the previous versions of iTunes for this, though performance still leaves a bit to be desired. For example, clicking a track to play it from the cloud always seems to result in a couple-to-few second delay. Not huge, but not as fast as say, Rdio.
He does mention the “performance issues” a few more times, but more on that later.
Finally I saw another article on Ars Technica titled The rest of the Internet is too slow for Google Fiber. I didn’t read much of the article, but the idea of an ISP being too slow for the rest of the internet blends in quite well with what Siegler was saying and what I’m going to write about.
In a time and place where you can get almost limitless amounts of information at any time, we’re very quickly getting into a technology disparity gap that is going to end up rivaling the wealth gap we continue to hear so much about. It has always been there (sound familiar) but it is getting worse (now I’m just playing with you).
The main issue right now is the lack of wired bandwidth to rural communities. It is sad to see smaller communities seemingly accept cable and DSL as acceptable “broadband” solution for every business. The lack of high-speed, wired, fiber bandwidth is not just a problem for consumers, but for businesses as well.
I think it is fairly safe to say that the world is not going to become less connected than it is right now (barring any unforeseen circumstances), but in order for those new communication platforms and mediums to takeoff, the latency and speed of consumer and business connections need to increase drastically … and nowhere more-so than in rural communities.
I don’t have answers, but putting all of our hopes on wireless technologies isn’t going to cut it. If you want to break the backs of incumbents in almost any industry, you’re going to need to get rural areas up-to-speed or things are never going to get there.
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Fear of Imperfection
When I get stuck, I tend to try and think my way out.
As my wife of almost six years would tell you, that’s probably not the best thing for me to do. However, it is a habit I cannot seem to break.
In my current rut of which I am stuck in I’ve been doing some reflection on why I’m in this rut. It is not a fun rut. I really don’t like being here and I know that things are better when I am out of this said rut but … here I sit. Stuck. In a rut.
Here’s the thing, I’m afraid.
I’m not afraid of failing, per say, or of the unknown (because who really knows what is going to happen even when we do think we have a decent idea of where things are going). No, I’m afraid of doing some imperfect.
Mainly this revolves around programming. What is stuck in my head is that I can’t do anything unless the entire project, from start to finish and every step in between, is going to be perfect. Every step clear. Every decision the correct one. Every line of code exactly where it should be and typed the correct way the first time. Having to clean up later or remove code that really didn’t need to be there is not acceptable. In my head, it shouldn’t be that way. Not that this should be easy, but that I should be able to, somehow, do it perfectly even if it is hard.
I’m not wholly sure where this has come from or how long it has been here, but that is what has been surfaced during my current reflection. It is amazing what a person can find out about themselves even after 26 years.
So what to do? Really, it is to get the fingers moving and the code going again. It is to force through even if things aren’t going perfectly. Embrace the ugly, as it may be in a way. Focus on small wins.
All stuff I know.
It also means putting down the books and tutorials, at least in the obsessive, “this will surely teach me the perfect way” style that I have been reading books recently. What good is the knowledge if not harnessed for something bigger, for moving ahead? It isn’t worth anything except to help me sound smarter when sitting around the table.
What good is that last part anyway? Meaningless.
So I move ahead, with fits and starts, with ideas. With failure behind and ahead and move forward, hoping to find something and knowing that going anywhere is infinitely better than standing still.
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Separate Computing
With the addition of the Mac mini into my computing environment, I now will get to test out a theory I’ve had for a little while. Also, Ben Brooks published an article in the most recent addition of The Magazine title One Computer Worked Better which flies directly in the face of what I am trying to accomplish, so it will be interesting to see how it works out.
Basically, I’m splitting my computing needs in two, or at least working with two computers and two mobile devices.
For a long time I’ve been a one-computer user. I’ve had a laptop that I take with me between home and work, setting it up between places with a monitor, mouse, and keyboard wherever I go. This has worked quite well. I keep all of my data on a single machine, back it up daily, and have everything at my fingertips whenever I might need it.
However, I have two purposes. I have a day job and then I have the work that I do for myself and other clients. This means that I can have a co-mingling of data on a single machine.
Which is never good.
As much as I hate to say it, I also don’t like constantly plugging and unplugging my MacBook Pro to take it from work to home and then back again the next day. There is the obvious wear-and-tear on the machine itself, but it also takes just that little extra bit of time in the mornings to get everything setup before I can start work. A minor annoyance, but it is still an annoyance.
The New Setup
There are now four devices that are part of the setup, which does add complexity.
At Home
The base-model Mac mini (Late 2012) sits on a shelf near my desk, attached to a monitor, mouse, and keyboard. Attached to this Mac mini is a bus-powered USB hard drive for local Time Machine backups and that’s about it. It sits there, quietly waiting for me to come home and work.
There is also an iPad mini as the mobile, non-tethered computing for at home. I’ll talk more on that later.
The best things about the Mac mini at home don’t even have to do with the fact that it is a Mac or the benefits of that. No, it is the fact that it is a desktop tethered to my desk that I like the most. I’m not going to pull it up to the first floor and work on something. By forcing me to go work in my office I keep work apart from the family and I also eliminate distractions by “retreating” to my office.
Being a desktop also means I have less chance of component failure due to movement. At least I hope I do. I also have the option of expanding the storage easily using USB 3.0 or Thunderbolt external hard drives.
I am tempted to try a home-made Fusion Drive at some point as well.
At Work
This is where I have the MacBook Pro perched up on a stand and connected to an external monitor. It works well. I wish I had a Thunderbolt Display so that I could eliminate all but two cables (Thunderbolt and power), but I make do with the five hanging off of the side.
Having the portable here means I can take it to meetings if I need to, but that I can also take it on longer vacations if there seems to be a need for that. It has enough storage to get the job done, but if I move all of my personal stuff (photos, music, videos, etc.) to the Mac mini at home, I’ll probably get a smallish SSD just for fun. Development doesn’t always require a ton of space.
On The Road
Here is where it gets interesting. I always have my iPhone with me and that is not going to change. The iPhone 4S has probably been the single best device I’ve ever owned.
However, the iPad mini has now moved into the category of being my main mobile computing device. It can handle the important tasks I need to accomplish and in a smaller package than any laptop I could bring along. It also has the benefit of having cellular internet built into it.
I won’t even get into the fact that there are no moving parts in an iPad either. No fans. No hinges. No spinning disks. Those are all good things.
However, you can’t do everything that I do on an iPad, and so for some longer trips (or trips where I know that I will need to be developing something) I will pack up the MacBook Pro and lug it along. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to eliminate the need to bring along the larger laptop on more and more trips in the future.
It is probably good to just leave work at home anyway.
In Conclusion
Basically, this is an experiment in the syncing and “cloud” infrastructures of today. While there are definite breaks in what data is stored where, there are some things that I have to toss into Dropbox to keep it on both machines. I also keep a lot of stuff in iCloud and … we’ll see how it goes.
You can probably expect a post recanting my current position within six months.
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The Crossover
The Crossover is a new podcast from 5by5. After the dual-knockout that my two favorite podcasts from the network are going to be ended in the coming weeks, I was relieved to hear about some awesome new programming coming up.
Episode 1, You Just Got Curated, did not disappoint at all. Granted, it had Merlin Mann and Marco Arment as the guests, but it really was a pretty remarkable episode. If you are a person who has been on the web for any somewhat-significant amount of time, it is a must-listen. They cover topics ranging from forums to Tumblr to Twitter to … everything in between.
Really, a great episode to start off with.
I am already subscribed and looking forward to the other combinations that Dan can put together for the show. Maybe we’ll see John Gruber show up again on 5by5?