I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that you’re a much more organized person than I am. Over the thirty-plus years I’ve been alive, the lessons I have learned taught me some very important things about what I do and do not do well. Making lists and making sure the tasks of the day are accomplished on time falls squarely into the latter category for me. I’ve simply come to accept my shortcomings as one of my endearing personality quirks. I’m not so sure, however, that this is as endearing to those waiting on the projects as it is to me. Which is why Things, by the fine folks over at Cultured Code, has been such a godsend to me. (more…)

I’m not sure about the state that you live in, but I happen to live in one that throws a pretty hefty fine at you for texting while driving. It’s something that I’m completely supportive of, by the way, as the habit is both amazingly stupid and hazardous to all involved. However, I don’t know about the people in your life but I happen to have a wife who texts me all the time. These texts, more often than not, seem to catch me when I’m on the road. To be fair, my wife texts me for valid reasons and it’s usually regarding something that needs an answer in a reasonable amount of time. On my rather long commutes, waiting until I get home is often too late for an adequate response. Pulling over is, of course, the proper thing to do but I am a lazy American and would rather keep driving.

Enter Dragon Dictation. Brought to us by Nuance Communications, Inc., Dragon Dictation is a voice recognition program that turns your voice into text that can then be brought into other applications on your iPhone/iPad. Many of the PC centric among us may already know of Nuance Communications popular program, Dragon Naturally Speaking. This iPad/iPhone application uses the same technology, this time to serve the needs of the mobile user.

The Dragon Dictation interface is amazingly simple. A big red record button is in the middle of your screen. Hit that record button and start speaking. A handy level meter is provided to show you just how loud you are talking and when you’ve finished, hit the stop button. The program quickly processes your voice and turns it into text.

Dragon Dictation then gives you three choices as to what you want to do with your newly created text. You can push “Email” and Dragon Dictation opens up your iPhone/iPad email application with the text already in there, ready for you to address and send. You can select “Text Message” and your SMS program opens, propagated once again with your text. The final choice is to simply copy your text to the Clipboard to be pasted into any application that utilizes the Cut, Copy and Paste feature.

So that’s what it’s supposed to do. The reality is that most of these voice recognition software programs are sketchy at best. When you use one of these voice to text programs, you really don’t have time to mess with a lot of editing, so making sure you get as close to 100% is ideal. Dragon Dictation, I’m happy to say, is one of the most accurate programs I’ve found in this category. That’s not to say that you’re not going to have to edit the occasional complicated phrase or two. The program, as you would imagine, has a keyboard button at that allows you to edit your text in order to accommodate this. However, after using Dragon Dictation for a few months now, I’m consistently surprised at how little I have to use it.

I, personally, find Dragon Dictation to be a must have for anyone who uses text as a basic means of personal/family communication. If you have an iPhone wielding teenager who’s driving, I can’t think of a more important tool for them to have when they travel. Anything that can be done to lessen the amount of texting and driving that is being done on the roads is a good thing and Dragon Dictation is one of the best. Not only is it a time saver but more than likely, it’s been a life saver too.

The best part is Dragon Dictation is a FREE application for the iPhone/iPhone and is also available for Blackberry phones as well. You don’t even have to think about this one. Go get it.

Okay, okay. So I’m calling it iApp of the Week and everyone hates the “i” at the front. I get it. I’m just getting sick of saying and typing iPad/iPhone every time I want to talk about a cross platform Apple App. And now look. You’ve gone and made me type it anyway. Thanks.

This, in what I hope to be a weekly occurrence, is a way for us to highlight some of the better Apps that you can buy for your Jesus Phone that stand out from the crowd. Overall, the programs highlighted here will be Apps you can use on a regular basis and make your life a bit easier.

The App that I’m talking about today is called Good Reader and it is a rather full featured PDF viewer for your iPhone/iPad. Brought to us by Good.iWare.LTD, Good Reader has become an essential part of my daily iPad use. The main reason I acquired an iPad was for use as an instructional tool in my job as a teacher. In order to use the iPad effectively in my classroom, being able to read PDF files is a must. The one big problem with something like the iPad, however, is getting files onto it that are not Apple specific or do not fit into the common flow of Mac centered programs. The lack of any sort of USB port or CD drive being the biggest detriment to this workflow.

With the Good Reader app, this problem is solved in a number of usable ways. First off, if you have a pointer to any PDF file on the web, you can enter this URL into the Good Reader app, and it pulls down the file to your iPad/iPhone. This is a very handy tool and many websites are actually providing pages for doing exactly this. For instance, this page over at Sweetwater.com is an example of this. Sweetwater is a store that specializes in recording/music equipment and have made their catalogs available online for a long time now. However, this iPad specific page shows just how easy it has become for companies to deliver things such as online catalogs to the iPad. In addition, if you have a local file hosted on your WiFi network, you can also download from there using the WiFi Transfer option that is built into the App.

Browsing your PDF files on your iPad is a pretty easy affair, with everything laid out in a very organized fashion. The app is very quick and responsive and I noticed very little load times despite the PDF files being pretty large. I must admit that this was all done on an iPad, however, and your results will be slower depending on what Apple product you happen to be using. Files are easily viewed using built in tools from zooming the pages to changing page orientation. Bookmarking pages (a must for going back to a certain set of pages in a large PDF document) is easy and intuitive as well. The Good Reader app also supports high resolution files, Office and iWork documents, HTML archives and audio/video files. It’s all laid out in a clear and concise way and if you get stuck, a full featured Help section is also available to guide you through any questions.

The Good Reader is available in the App Store for $.99 and it’s a must have for anyone needing to view large PDF files on their portable device.

It’s that time of year where I get to, once again, put out the disclaimer that a self-proclaimed Apple fanboy is writing an article on a new piece of Steve Jobs tech. I’ll try my best to keep any hyperbole to a bare minimum and instead try my hand at a rational explanation as to why anyone should care about this new Jesus Slab.

To many of us, fanboy and hater alike it seems, the idea of an Apple tablet that does shit all your other shit already does was a head scratcher at best. I believe my own Twitter record has me stating something to the effect of:

“Great, so I have this already. Only it’s smaller. And called an iPhone.”

That rather snarky statement, however, isn’t far off from the reality of what the iPad actually is. Sure, there are some new features that the iPhone doesn’t have and it clocks in as a much faster machine. Yet, even with those things, any iPad owner is going to have a tough time trying to defend the Apple tablet as the next level convergence device at face value.

The truth is, I already have plenty of books, CD’s, DVD’s and Blu-Ray filling my house. I have at least three physical calendars hanging around my home. I have a fairly up-to-date laptop and a larger Mac that serves as the all purpose family computer. I have an iPhone that serves as my convergence device and my entire life seems to be housed on it. I have more games than I have time to play and boxes upon boxes of comics and magazines stored away. I have boardgames, card games and library card. I have high definition television, FM radio and photo albums full of both embarrassing and adorable pictures in equal measure. All of these perform their individual functions exceedingly well and I have nothing but tiny complaints about each of them.

So why own an iPad? For me, the answer has less to do with what the iPad does as a list of individual features and more about how the device combines these things into a cohesive and multi-faceted electronic tool. It’s what the iPad represents as the logical continuation of Apple’s philosophy that makes the tablet stand on its own. For this reason the iPad becomes a difficult thing to talk to others about in a convincing way. All the regular benchmarks we use to evaluate electronic devices don’t amount to much until you’ve used the iPad as a part of your daily life. A list of bullet points fails to demonstrate what using the iPad elegantly reveals: the whole is truly greater than the sum of its parts.
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creative editing ha-HAAA!

Word on the street is Android mobile OS is battling iPhones at 50/50 market share nowadays. Little snippits like paying $20+ less per month, cheap-ass phones, running on services with actually working internet, and a giant apple not dictating how to use your device may influence you to switch to this brand. Probably more likely is somebody less techie close to you is gonna switch to the bad guys and (re-)introduce themselves to the wonderful world of touching an out-of-the-way icon to make a phone call; behold the new world of apps. The same as the old world of apps.

The problem with these application stores is that both of them suck harder than Microsoft in organizing the goods. In Android’s case, once you get the top 30 or 40 programs you see featured in the Market all the time, discovering new reliable shit becomes crazy difficult after it’s buried. We’re back to the wild west of word of mouth blog to pull users in any direction to get their goods. *pfft* what do I mean “back to”? We’ve been like this for years.

Well sure, I’ll help out. Here’s a mashup list of all the apps I use that you should go on a Market download spree to get a hold of. Like, meow!

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The wonder of rubbing our smart-phones with a fingertip to do stuff has been upon us for several years now, as well as the glory of the App Store, a treasure trove of stuff that you can do in your browser with badly-written flash made into programs. As such, I thought I would consult you plebeians on what you feel is worthy to keep in your iPhone, and instruct you on the greatness of my own.

Or, in not seventy-six words, here’s the standouts on the iPhone I keep coming back to.

Pandora: Streaming internet radio of pretty much every genre imaginable over 3G. This is why I don’t listen to radio anymore. This app has stayed on my front page since I acquired it, and I use it almost daily.

Now Playing: A listing of movie releases and DVD releases that is fully integrated with rotten tomatoes and imdb reviews as well as Netflix. It does trailers, too. The app will find you and show you all the nearby theaters, what’s there, and what’s worth watching. Or what to ignore at the theater and throw on Netflix. It’ll also throw it on Netflix for you.

Urban Spoon: There are many, many better restaurant finders on your iPhone (AroundMe and the Google Maps app to name two), but there’s something compelling about rolling the slots and taking what comes up as your dinner choice.

Kindle/Stanza: I have both, but which you use will probably depend on what you like. Stanza has the best selection of downloadable, free, e-books available for the iPhone. The Kindle app syncs with your Kindle and remembers your place across both devices. This is witchcraft and utterly delightful.

Facebook: Yeah, if you have an iPhone you probably already have this app, but it bears mentioning as it works really, really well. Often better than the site itself. How about that?

Lux Touch: I mentioned this in one of the very first things I wrote for the site, and it’s been on my phone getting playtime since then. The free version of this app is Risk with AI bots. I’ve never bought the full version because this is all I need. Controls perfectly, runs well, and it’s Risk. What more do you want?

RogueTouch: This was a dollar or some such amount when I got it. Now it runs for $3. Totally worth it. It’s Rogue, the old-school dungeon crawl, on your phone, with a decent interface. Rogue has about fifty levels, and is in the “I hate your family” level of difficulty. This means that you’ve got a lot of replay value if you enjoy this sort of thing. Also a ton of variety in loot and a fairly large number of baddies to face. Saves anywhere, but you die and it’s back to the beginning.

Field Runners: Field Runners is a $3 tower defense game. When it came out initially it was barely worth that. Since then they’ve added new units, two new maps, unlockable game modes, and a ton of game modes. It has a pause/save anywhere function that is delightful (and should be on every game app, period).

Words/Chess with Friends: Every multiplayer iPhone game should play like this. ALL of them. It’s pass and play (or play by e-mail, if you prefer that image) Chess/Scrabble/whatever else they come out with that I will totally buy on your phone. The beauty of this is that you can take a turn anywhere.

Frotz: This one is hard to recommend for everyone. Frotz is Stanza, only for text-based adventures. If you can get by the iPhone keyboard (it has some shortcuts to help), this is a treasure trove of nostalgia. If not, you’ll hate it. Potentially has unlimited playtime, but again, some of the text-games are…not good. Free, so worth a try.

AP News Feed: Another one I’ve spoken of before, but this is a great little tool. Customizable homepage with stories from your area and all over. Video and photo. Updates and will do push notifications. If you want mobile news this is probably your best bet.

Midomi/SoundHound: Two names, one app. SoundHound literally listens to music you play/sing/hum for it, then finds you a title and group. Not as much useful to me as simply witchcraft. I can now hear a song in passing, identify it (provided I can listen to or hum 15 seconds of the tune), then purchase it myself (Midomi is linked right into your iPhone purchases, because these guys aren’t idiots). You also get a full lyrics page and links to YouTube videos, as well as Pandora radio tie-ins and similar artists. Essentially this is Now Playing for your music, as it can work with all your other cool music apps and devices to provide an awesome experience. I really should use this more.

Anyway, while I have six pages of apps on my iPhone, these guys are the standouts, and most of them are totally free. As of last look everything but the games can be acquired without paying a dime, and at $3 a pop you’re out lunch at Five Guys if you buy everything here.

So what’s on your phone?

Finally, the first documented example of real progress in green technology.  Powered by grapes and gravity, this is the greenest car you’ll find this side of the sun.  Just don’t buy a house on a hill.  You can learn more about this remarkable visionary’s love of the road and the fermented arts here.

Celebrate it’s smooth lines, aggressive stance, and big, fat barrels.  May he be blessed this holiday season.

Science.

Recently I received a Kindle as an early Christmas gift. Given last week’s talk of e-readers and comic books (and John’s inexplicable urge to put anything I write on this website), I thought I’d give you some impressions.

Overall: The new Kindle is about as thick as a cheap pocket calculator and roughly the size of a larger paperback. For an easy reference based on this audience, roughly the length and width of the paperback zombie survival guide. The viewable screen is about 2/3s of that, meaning you can get as much on a page as you would with a cheap paperback. A large version is available, which has more buttons and such, but that’s about all I got on it.

Cases are available, but I’ve had mine bouncing around in my manpurse with a netbook and a number of notebooks, power adapters, etc. and it’s held up just fine. The screen is slightly recessed from the outside casing, meaning that something is much more likely to come against the white plastic case or (relatively scratch resistant) metallic backing. Overall the device is pleasing to the eye and inoffensive, which is what you want from something you’re going to stare at for hours. I got a number of impressed comments while reading in line.

The USB cable with power outlet dongle is also slim and easy to store. Kindle can charge off the wall socket or your PC. I let the power adapter live on my nightstand because I never really plan on merging my Kindle and PC.
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Ever wonder what sort of equipment we use to record the podcast? I know it seems strange that recording what is essentially a parade of dick and fart jokes requires any sort of thought, money, or know-how, but the truth is that we – (mainly Hilden) – have invested loads of cash into our equipment.

So if you’re curious about what we use, how we use it, and how it’s all set up so we can get that patented Drunken Gamers Radio so-filthy-you-can-taste-it sound, check out the new article over at CastMedium where Hilden lays it all out in great detail.

Thanks to the guys over at CastMedium for continuing to treat us as though we’re somehow relevant.

A box of tiny awesome arrived on my doorstep last night in the form of the a Dell Mini. This is Dell’s aswer to the crazy tiny laptop market that has sprung up, and it’s definitely better than Armored Core’s For Answer.

The first thing you’ll notice on the mini is the incredibly glossy top section. Seriously, this thing is practically a mirror. And fingerprints if you look at it wrong. Just plan on this happening, you will not avoid it. If you’re obsessive about keeping things spotless and smudge-free, the mini-9 will have you scrubbing constantly.

Regarding functionality, this thing is pretty solid. The netbook’s selling point has consistently been the amount of power packed into a package roughly the size of a thin hardback book, and this unit offers the same 1.6ghz processor and 1gb memory stick as the rest. A solid state hard drive limits the storage, but also frees the passively-cooled mini 9 of any moving parts (or noise) whatsoever. Power-wise, it’ll run open Office, Hulu, Pandora, etc. with no worries.  My unit (hehheh, unit) came with a 1.3MP webcam, which works great in a well-lit room.

Other features include the standard microphone/headphone jack, a VGA port, 3 USB ports, and an SD/all-in-one port.

Other hardware on the laptop works well, too. The keyboard is the most noticeable con here, with a variety of bizarre key shifts and shrinks to accomodate the reduced size. None of these are deal-breakers, though. I’m currently writing this on the mini and while my typing speed isn’t the same as with a full keyboard, for something that takes up about as much space as a folded t-shirt it’s perfectly acceptable. The battery lasts about three hours according to the PR stuff, and I’ve gotten that on the initial charge while setting up XP and installing a variety of software. Off and on use with the speakers off today has burned up 20% of the battery in about an hour and a half, so your mileage may vary.

The trackpad deserves its own mention, as it’s fantastic. Pointer movement is precise and the buttons have a great tactile feel to them. Given the lukewarm reception of so many of the other netbook touchpads have had this is a pleasant surprise.

Internally, everything you’ll want to access is super modular. The (one slot only) memory and (solid state) hard drive are easy to get to, and by other reports quite simple to swap out. A 2GB RAM stick isn’t available through Dell, but is apparently supported. Hard drives go from 4GB to 32, and 2GB of online storage are bundled with the system. Given that I store my music on an external hard drive, the 16GB solid state drive I ordered proved plenty for a few applications and a pile of documents. Transferring 5GB of documents from the drive to the SSD took about 5-10 minutes.

Overall this is a fantastic little device. It doesn’t have enough horsepower to run anything recent, but old-school gaming is a great fit for this ultraportable. My Mother 3 emulation (I bought the game, stop glaring at me) worked perfectly and looked gorgeous on the 9″ display.

So, final verdict: pretty solid. This is not a device for everyone; some people will hate the shrunken keyboard, and some just need more horsepower than this even on a portable device. I highly recommend trying out a test system in a store and using the keyboard thoroughly (open up notepad and start typing) before you take the plunge. For those looking for an ultraportable for office applications, e-mail, taking notes in a classroom, etc., this is a pretty solid buy. Particularly considering stripped-down netbook is roughly the same price as a Wii.

(Pro tip: order a refurbished unit to get the same warranty and hardware for significantly less money.)

Webcams, bluetooth, Linux OS, and external CD/DVD drives are all available, and Dell is hinting about wireless broadband cards for future models. This doesn’t have the storage or absurd batterly life of the Asus 1000HE, but is significantly  lighter (about a pound) and has a smaller footprint.

So yeah, not a bad tinyass computer. Toodles for now.