OS X 10.7 UI idea: stacks on the desktop

I've sent some suggestions to Apple earlier, and they actually replied with "please don't send us suggestions" email. They are afraid of getting sued later, I guess.

Anyways, people should be able to give feedback and ideas of UI design. Hey, Microsoft proudly says they did this in making Windows 7 so good (which it is). SO, here goes Apple.

STACKS ON THE DESKTOP

The desktop is a perfect place to clutter your life. Position keeps different kinds of things apart - upper left corner for handy links etc. - left edge for to-be-done business things. Right edge for personals. Center for ASAP stuff.

Only, there's often more stuff than necessary when living this way. What is the way in OS X to hide such stuff, yet keep it "there". Stacks. :)

But stacks only exist in the Dock. So I'm supposed to place all my categories of stuff in different stacks in the same positional place. I'm losing something of the desktop arrangement, here.

So, make it possible to have stacks everywhere. Actually, make it possible to show a directory as a stack and that's it. This way, also command line usage would work fine.

Why not simply place folders on the desktop? It simply feels more elaborate. It opens new windows when the stuff is accessed. Don't like that.

If you know of an existing OS X tool that already provides "stack everywhere", pls. let me know.

Keeping a mouse alive...

Are you one of those people - like me - who just finds it irritating when things seize to work. This writing is about my Microsoft "Intellimouse Optical" (nothing much intelligent about it, though).

It's a good old wired mouse that I originally bought to my first Mac. Somewhere like 2002. It's still working, but the roll of it started getting stuck a year back or so. It's irritating; the symptoms are that the roll rolls.... then not... then again. Like there was some place alongside it that's sticky. This of course is quite an annoyance for using it on websites or anywhere.

Now. What's interesting about this is that *nothing's wrong*. I've analyzed the glitch and I suspect all Intellimice of this age would be affected. Here's what.

The roll is too close to the right edge. If one moves it slightly left (it has a gap of around 0.5mm) all is fine. So - I opened the mouse and made the case opening bigger. About 20 times. What's funky about this is that in order to feel if the cure is enough one has to put back the screws and all. :) Before that, it was always okay. After tightening the screws, not so. :)

So, here's the advice if your mouse has the same glitch:

- case opens by detaching the lower glued pads only. Below them are two screws.
- try scraping some off the right side of the mouse wheel first. Doing this would have no visual effect on the mouse, if this is enough, be happy.
- scrape the mouse opening from "outside in" to keep visual effects minimized. I had to remove rather much until it finally worked. But I wasn't having this guide. ;P
- once the cover is back on (but not the pads) try to "free wheel" the wheel. It should give a high pitch and roll a few rounds. It should feel light.
- don't tighten the screws too much. You can even leave them loose. Tightening makes the problem worse.

Naturally, instead of doing all this one could just go and get the latest Apple Magic Mouse. But it feels good to have old stuff working, and it feels good to be able to fix things.

p.s. If you know how to make the right extra button (mouse button 5) do "Exposé - show desktop" I'd be pleased. Running OS X 10.6, Microsoft Intellipoint 7.1.0. It just does not work (tried both assigning at Intellipoint and 'Handled by Mac OS'); used to about a year ago. Maybe an OS X update has killed that?

Blogging from Transtec 2010 Delhi

The upcoming week I'll be in Delhi, exposing the BM Design PRT project at a speech.

I'll be blogging from the event, which is about sustainable transport in developing countries.

http://www.ewebevolution.com/transtec/

Cont'd: I wrote some remarks on the individual presentations but haven't typed them in, yet.

Some of the pictures I took are available in Flickr.

My own presentation slides are also online.

Now, need to pack & fly. :)

WLAN interference from a USB stick :)

Recently, we bought the Acer Revo to my Mom and Dad for a browsing machine. It's otherwise okay, but the internal WLAN antenna lets you wish for more.

Mom had reported Internet to be stucky, so I had a look. With the help of the InSSIDer program I found out reception to be around -70dB. But what was amazing was that plugging in her favorite USB stick (old, transparent, probably USB 1.1 era) made reception fall at least 5dB. Essentially, it makes the difference between 4 bars and 2 bars in the Windows internal gauge.

Telling now these old sticks must go. I bet many users around the globe never come to think their USB sticks might interfere with their WLAN. I checked them all, now. Out of our collection, 2 kinds drop the reception and one actually seems to raise(!) it somewhat. The USB port in question is not even close the WLAN antenna.

So, if you're considering an external antenna to your Revo, check your USB sticks first!

Wow, What a Globe Screen!!

I visited the Heureka science museum today and they had this amazing, animated globe hanging in the air.

I was told it's technology prepared by the American NOAA organization. Four projectors carefully aligned to make the globe act as one screen. The resolution was sharp and the experience is flawless. One can walk around the globe and study it from any angle.

They presented multiple data sets, some having to do with weather (in the picture). Others showing flight patterns and even individual airplanes depicted as little beams of light. The globe can be span around using a Wii remote.

Even better, this Finnish invention could be used to roll the globe, and even squeeze it! :)

Zune-alvelu XBox 360:llä

Microsoft avasi tänään videovuokraamon nettiin myös Suomessa, ja katsomani pätkien perusteella (Welho 5M yhteydellä) kaikki näyttää hyvältä. Paitsi lisenssisopimus, joka on vähintäänkin "kuvaava".

Jos yrityksellä ei ole halua, aikaa tai osaamista lukea omat lisenssitekstinsä kuntoon ennen palvelun (sorry: alvelun ;) aloittamista, niin sietää mennä itseensä.

Lisenssissä on muuten 28 kohtaa (muistaakseni) ja sen läpi skrollaamiseen menee arviolta 4-5 minuuttia (lukemiseen ehkä tunti).

Parasta tietenkin olisi, jos MS ystävällisesti (ja vähintäänkin auttaakseen itseään) tarkistaisi lakitekstinsä ja pudottaisi sen järkevän kokoiseksi. Säästäisivät käännöskuluissa kenties miljoonia. Mutta he ovat lakiosastonsa vankeja. "Kun ei vain sattuis mitään", kuten kolleegani tapasi sanoa.

Tällaiset lakitekstit eivät istu nykymaailmaan.

Itse palvelu on silti hyvä ja sopuhintainen. 240 MS-pojoa HD-filmistä saa ainakin itseni katsomaan "V for Vendettan" tänä iltana. DVD:t taisivat muuten juuri kuolla. :)

Hot in India!

I'm writing this at a terrace in Mangalore, India. This is my third visit to the country, but I had either forgotten how hot it is, or this time it's simply a bit hotter. Maybe both. Anyways, some of the clothes I have with me will probably not be needed at all. A shirt a day; yesterday I used 3. Lot of laundry for someone.

This made me think - US has similar climate which is coped with huge amount of air conditioning. It's either hot (outside) or way too cool (inside). And of course it uses up huge amounts of energy.

Part of India is like that, too. Hotels would have AC. Normally, they tune it way too cool, maybe because they think that would be "elegant" or "western" or whatever. If all the big private houses (like this one) would do AC, the country's electical grid would collapse (ehem, collapse more often than now :).

The solution is two-fold. Be smart about how to live in the climate. I will surely learn that in a week - i.e. sitting on the terrace now is comfortable. Indoors, it's not. Shopping is done in the evenings, not at bright daylight. Any Indian would know this! Instead of using the technology (AC) to its maximum, use just as much as is needed. This is something *Indians* should teach the US people, not the other way round!!!

As to those newly built colossal houses with absolute need of AC, they should be self-sufficient with electricity. Put sun panels on the roof and living can go on despite shortages in the city electrical grid. I *really* doubt they do this. They just have big batteries somewhere in the basement and that's it. Indians aren't very ecological as far as I can think, but in this climate, they could be. It's just a matter of opinion, learning and appreciating!

A better solution for this climate would be appartment houses with smallish terraces covered with plants. US has had some prototype houses like this; the amount of cooling the plants on the outer walls cause is huge (something like 30-50% less AC need). And they give shade and they are according to the local building tradition.

Currently I have not seen any such compound in India. I was googling for "ecocity India" and it gives some faded hits. There should be a Masdar for India, soonish. Otherwise this will simply become a copy of the US apartment + enough AC + integrated garage model that eats up too much common resources.

Currently, India still produces about 1/5th as much CO2 as US or China (which are pretty even)*. In order to keep it like that, *smarts* is needed, not greedy copycatting of the west. India is known for being smart, so we still have hope. On the other side of the coin, energy here is abundant if we just start collecting it. My sweat confirms that!

*) http://rainforests.mongabay.com/09-carbon_emissions.htm

ps.
Nanosolar is the manufacturer of roof top sun panels that I would actually consider using. They have started manufacturing but are not selling to individual houses, yet. But they will. Anyone in India reading this, being their installer / distributer will be a big business in 2-10 years. Sign in.

About Ecocity India, the closest I've found is Falcon GEC (Global Eco City). They seem to compare it to Masdar and similar Chinese projects, but it kind of has a wanna-be feeling to it. I wouldn't trust that project, yet.

pps.
A document on Pune from 2006 looks more interesting. Pune is a university city in Maharashtra and by the reputation of it would make a splendid big-scale sample on how a complete city can be remade to be more sustainable. Let's wish them luck and hope the project proceeds.

More: ecocities-india.org lists some cities which are going to do general "clean up" for making them more enjoyable, healthier and ecological. This is an incremental approach and should really be part of any city planning, anyways.