Switching to Mac
After several months of deciding which OS I’m going to switch next because I don’t like how Ubuntu is going since 10.10, I have been giving Mac OS X a try.
I bought an old 13 inch Macbook Air first generation from eBay one months ago and have kept using it since then. When I used this Macbook Air which is from 2008 for the first time, I immediately felt love for it.
Perhaps because there are some similarities between Mac OS and Linux commands, working in the Terminal app is like a second nature to me. Plus, with my experience with Windows in the past, I already knew most of the common operations on the Mac.
The main reason I like to try Mac is because of the influence of my iPod Touch. Yes, I’ve still kept my old second generation iPod Touch along with my Nexus One, with the latest iOS installed. After I switched to Android (Nexus One) for a long time and restart using iPod Touch to perform the iOS-specific tasks, I feel that the Android interface is kind of old compare to the iOS’s.
Several weeks after the purchase of Macbook Air, I upgraded to the latest version of Mac OS X, Lion (10.7). I love this upgrade, especially the Full Screen and Mission Control features.
As a developer and programmer, I like trying new programming languages such as Objective C and AppleScript. Oh, except Java, because I think Java is too complicated for me to understand, that’s why I avoid programming for Android. With the Macbook Air, I could use Xcode to learn and experiment with these programming languages in no time.
For future posts, I will explore some of these programming languages. This blog will have the same topic (web-related programming) plus new programming languages. I will redesign the blog corresponding to my Mac usage in the near future as well.
Of course, I will continue to use Ubuntu 10.04 as my laptop is still running it. Right now and for the time being however, I’m using Mac more than Ubuntu because I just can’t resist the Mac OS’s interface 
Not only its interface, I also enjoy using its hardware. I especially chose to buy Macbook Air over other Macbook laptops because of its lightness and fast processing power.
Look forward to my future posts which will be written in the new OS environment.
Do you have any experience on how to use Mac OS X and Ubuntu/Linux together without sacrifice Ubuntu/Linux? Discuss your experience below.
New Blog Title, New Logo
As you already saw, I changed the title for this blog from “Robby Chen Personal Blog” to “Ubuntu Web Coder “as well as the logo.
One reason for changing the blog title is because I’m going to stick to Ubuntu, specifically Lucid Lynx (10.04.1), since I depend on some PPAs to get the updates. Maverick Meerkat (10.10) just doesn’t work for me. I will wait until Natty Narwhal (11.04) is out and see. If this still won’t work for me, I will stay with 10.04.1 and wait for the next release… Anyway, you get the idea.
As most of you who read this blog in the past know, I used to write code in Netbeans until I discovered the hidden potential of gedit for being such a good IDE. That’s why I abandoned Netbeans and replaced with gedit in the new logo. And I renamed blog title specifically to “coder” because I would like to try writing the code in each post from now on.
Besides the gedit logo in the new logo, I have also included two groups of logos, GNU/Linux and PHP. The GNU/Linux logos include Linux penguin, Chrome OS, Android, and Open Source. The PHP logos include PHP, CakePHP, and WordPress. I also included just released HTML5 logo created by W3C. I regularly use these tools and talked and will continue to talk about them in this blog. That’s why I included them in the logo.
What do you think about the new logo, blog title, and background color?
Play Around with Google Nexus One
I received my Nexus One today which I ordered from Google on Saturday. The FedEx delivery of the device was earlier than I expected. They delivered my order 10 AM in the morning, nearly 5 hours earlier than the estimated time of 3 PM.
After I set up the phone, I decided to move the SIM card from my old T-Mobile based cell phone to Nexus One. It only adds basic call functionality to the device since I own the pre-paid SIM card.
GPS on the Nexus One doesn’t require Internet connection. However, the maps must be cached on the device in order to use the full GPS function. Turn-by-turn direction also needs to be cached from the Internet. I have not found any GPS app that supports offline viewing of entire US map that supports different zoom levels from Android Market. Maybe I will create one for myself using OpenStreetMap once I learn the Android SDK But first I must finish learning C.
The 5MP camera works very well. Below is a test photo that I took in the bathroom.
This photo was taken in front of mirror
Click the image to enlarge
As you can see, the picture is very smooth without flashlight. I have not tested the flashlight and video recorder yet, but I think it won’t be very bad. One thing I noticed when playing around with camera is that the zoom level is not great. For the most time, I got pixelated pictures with the max zoom level. However, the problem isn’t visible on the device until I see the pictures on the PC.
Since I have no idea which audio/video formats does Android support, I copied one mp4 and one avi videos to the root of the memory. The gallery only showed the mp4 video. After browsing through Android Market, I downloaded and tried the ad version of RockPlayer. This player supports DivX, AVI, MKV, and Real formats. I watched some avi videos using this app and they all worked fine.
I transferred all the stuffs from iPod Touch and cell phone to Nexus One. From now on, I only need to carry one device in my pocket instead of two devices. I will see how long will Google Nexus One last in my pocket because my pockets usually get water when it’s raining whether I wear different cloths
Finally Ordered Nexus One (Updated)
Update: I received the phone. Please read this post for more information on my first hands-on of Nexus One.
After I heard this morning that Google will stop selling its Nexus One once the final set of devices is sold out, I decided to order unlocked one from the Nexus One web store.
When Google first released Nexus One, I was hoping that the original version of Android could sometimes come to some media players similar to the iPod Touch. Back then, I didn’t know the meaning of unlocked phone. I thought it is some kind of hacks that allows phone to be used illegally.
As time went by, I discovered Zii Egg. As some of you who read the posts during the early stage of this blog may know, I was waiting for Zii Egg to be released as a consumer product for over five months. Within these months, I learned a lot of how the Android operates and different variations of Android. I also discovered the definition of unlocked phone.
Since the unlocked version of Nexus One requires a SIM card and it has wifi functionality, and I don’t use cell phone very much, I could use Nexus One without the SIM card as a PMP (Portable Media Player) device. This idea came to my mind last week.
Since then, I have abandoned waiting for the Zii Egg. Mainly because I want the Android market on the device, and as far as I know, only the original version of Android has this feature. Because of the financial issue and the surprise of the unlocked Nexus One being too expensive, I couldn’t order the device immediately. However, after today’s news, I finally decided to purchase the device using my remaining funds.
According to the tracking info on FedEx, I will receive the device by next Monday at 3:00 PM EDT. I will post an update once I received the device and test it whether it supports operation under none-SIM card condition, as well as some experience with the device as appropriate.
Touch Book is the GNU/Linux version of iPad (Updated)
UPDATE (04/02): It seems that my order is PRE-ORDER. They are currently backlogged. After searching around the net, I think I will wait at least two months before I receive it. If I received the device after one month, I will make a video overview of the device. Otherwise, I might make a video review depending on my schedule.
iPad is going to launch this Saturday and open source community already has Touch Book, an GNU/Linux version of iPad. According to its official website, it doesn’t have hard drive. It depends on the 8 GB SD card that included with the system. You can order it with keyboard or without keyboard. The touch screen is $299, and add $100 more if you want the keyboard. It has 3 external USB ports and 4 internal USB ports. For me, I will use an USB keyboard that I already own instead of spend $100 more for the keyboard once it arrives. I think those 4 internal USB ports allows you to connect other USB receivers. It means that you can take apart of the touch screen by the open source hardware means. It also contains many major GNU/Linux distros on the SD card, including their own OS: Ubuntu, Android, Mer, Gentoo. According to the website, Google Chrome OS and Maemo are coming. For more information, please visit its website. I might create a review video about the device once I received it.