Nothing, and I mean NOTHING, frustrates me more with the Windows experience than the “take focus” aspect of a Windows Update “restart now” dialogue box. I realize there are more than a few frustrating things about Windows, but this is the one that has consistently been the biggest pain in my ass for the past decade plus.
The scenario: you’re typing away at an e-mail or other document, you see a momentary flash on your screen (what the eff was that?!), and suddenly your entire system is shutting down because you hit “enter” while typing just as Windows popped up a “restart your computer now?” dialogue without your knowledge.
WHAT THE FUCK MICROSOFT?! This is a HUGE problem with the way the Windows system dialogue works and has always worked (or NOT worked, as it were). Do people not complain about this ALL THE FUCKING TIME?!
This would be such a simple fix… SO FIX IT.
There are a few “solutions” posted on the web that purport to fix this problem, but in my experience none of them work… at all. If you know of something that actually does work, please post it in the comments!
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For a while I was on Bluehost.com until I realized how “set up for crazy mass production” they are… to a horrible detriment. As a web designer with many accounts, many e-mail addresses, yadda, yadda, yadda, I seem to raise all kinds of automated red flags within the Bluehost system. So much so that they actually gave me the boot, even though I NEVER DID ANYTHING WRONG!!!
None of my clients are shady or suspect, and I’ve always paid all my bills, etc., on time.
C’est la vie. I’ve found greener pastures… literally.
Say hello to GreenGeeks.com. I LOVE THESE GUYS.
(full disclosure: I get a referral credit when you sign up, but I’m also telling you, “THIS IS WHO I USE FOR MY PERSONAL HOSTING SERVICES”)
Green Geeks is a smallish outfit based out of the Los Angeles area. There prices and services are EVERY BIT as good as the “top tier” providers. And best of all, when you call or e-mail support >get this< you talk to a person sitting in GLENDALE! How crazy is that in this day and age?! They also make a concerted effort to make “green” decisions, and have been stellar letting me (the client) know any time any adjustments or services are being performed on their servers. It cracks me up when they let me know that they’ll be doing some sort of maintenance on a server that will take it out of service for 10 minutes at 3:45 in the morning on a Tuesday. But I love the thoroughness of their communication!
So if you’re looking for the best hosting for your website, I highly recommend GreenGeeks.com!
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I take a call in Denver from someone in LA who wants to set up an appointment (in LA) with me at 3pm. I put it on my Google Calendar which syncs to my Android phone. When I get to LA, Android/Google thinks they’re doing me a favor by “updating” all my appointments with my phone’s new time setting, so now my calendar is telling me the appointment is at 2pm (since I placed it on my calendar in Denver, where the time is off by an hour).
Why won’t Google fix this massive problem?! Why did they set it up WRONG in the first place? Everyone is complaining about it. Who doesn’t travel these days? Why would you ever enter an appointment time into your calendar for the WRONG time (to adjust for time zone shifts)?! This issue is a result of Google “helping” us, when in fact it ONLY causes problems.
I can’t think of a time when this “shift all my appointments” could POSSIBLY be helpful. If I place an appointment on my calendar, it’s for the time zone of where I’ll be for that appointment. I’m not ever going to “accidentally” be in a different time zone. I guess MAYBE this could be helpful for a phone appointment, but not so helpful that it’s worth screwing up the rest of my appointments as soon as I land in a different time zone (you SHOULD just be able to tick a box to select a time zone for an event if you want it to shift according to whatever time zone you’re in). I also shouldn’t have to set up an appointment and think, “Hmmm. Now what time zone will I be in compared to the one I’m currently in? Now, adjust for the time zone, and I should actually enter the appointment into GCalendar at XX:XX time.” Stupid.
There is a new “world clock” plug in that will display multiple time zones, but it does nothing to fix the issue of Google adjusting all your appointments when you enter a new time zone.
This seems like an INCREDIBLY easy issue to fix, so why the eff isn’t Google fixing it?!
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[see updates at the end of this post]
The nice people over at Markspace.com sent me a copy of The Missing Sync for evaluation. I have to admit I wouldn’t have tried out the software at the fairly steep MSR of $39.95, and I think that sentiment is loudly reflected by the people on various message boards and the Android Market comment space. However, after just a few moments using the program, I think it’s probably worth the cash… even if you’re only after it’s music syncing functionality. The Missing Sync also has me constantly asking myself: “How have Google and HTC so thoroughly ignored the need for music syncing and a back up program for their devices?!”.
One of the first steps in the super-simple install process of setting up The Missing Sync states: “On your phone, follow the steps on the ‘Get Ready To Pair’ screen.” However, they don’t tell you how to get to this screen. It’s pretty simple (click your device’s “menu” button and select “pairing”), but it still might cause some people to stall, so I thought I’d make mention of the omission.
Music Sync: [kudos] [update: meh] For this to be a great function, the Missing Sync would need to convert your .xml or .asx playlists to .m3u (which is the only playlist Droid can use). Currently, Missing Sync simply transfers your iTunes or WMP playlists to your device, where they are completely unreadable as they are in the wrong format. So while Missing Sync does transfer your files, you won’t be able to see/read your playlists, only the songs.
Here is where The Missing Sync for Android shines. Note that if you’ve got a big library it’ll take a couple of seconds for The Missing Sync to find and interpret all the information (this is of course to be expected). Once The Missing Sync found all my files… I was in heaven. It was a simple matter of selecting the playlists I wanted synced and that was it! One of the creators of The Missing Sync let me know that he creates a smart list called “top 25 songs” so whenever he syncs his device it automatically updates his phone with whatever he’s been listening to the most.
Another cool thing is that in The Missing Sync, your playlists from all your media programs come up. So my WMP lists appear with a WMP icon, and my iTunes lists are shown with an iTunes icon. It’s very nice that I can sync playlists from both programs to my device (I no longer have to sync my WMP and iTunes libraries to each other).
At first I thought music could only be synced via USB, but you can also sync wirelessly. Another nice feature.
Proximity Sync: [kudos] You can set up The Missing Sync to sync wirelessly at whatever intervals you might like (from never, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hours, 4 hours, 8 hours, every day). Kind of nice to not have to plug in or even remember to sync.
Contact Sync: [fail] Evidently you must have Outlook installed for this to work. There is no mention of this in the “Syncing Contacts” section of their website (I don’t know if they just expect you to have Outlook, or if they’re glossing over the fact that their software won’t work without this awful Microsoft program). This is especially weird because in the “Syncing Notes” section they make it perfectly clear that you need “Fliq Notes” (free) installed before the sync will work. So obviously the need for Outlook is a major shortcoming. I don’t want to install Outlook. More importantly, I don’t want to PAY FOR a subpar e-mail/contact program. Microsoft has enough of my money, and there are PLENTY of (superior) programs out there for e-mail and managing contacts. Why in the hell would I want Outlook? It seems odd that The Missing Sync couldn’t just sync to a .cvs file or something so you could back up your contacts without having to pay for Microsoft Outlook. This isn’t really that big a deal, as my contacts are all synced to my Gmail account, but it is a giant “fail” for The Missing Sync.
Notes: [meh] You have to have Fliq Notes installed for this to work. I probably won’t install another program just for notes. Some people might use notes enough to warrant installing another third party app. I don’t.
Folder Sync: [kudos] A very nice feature for syncing any selected file or folder to/from your PC/Device. Simply select the folder and you’re golden.
Photos: [kudos/pending] [update: fail] At the time of writing this post, I cannot yet get photos to sync. I assume I have something set up wrong, as my SMS and Call Logs won’t sync either (see “Gold Service” section below). I’m going to go ahead and post about the features I can see in the Photo Sync panel anyway, assuming I’ll be able to get things working once I figure out why my device isn’t showing up with a couple of the services.
So… I like that I can not only import from the device, but export to the device as well (so I can take pics from my computer with me to share with people). There’s even a “resize to device’s longest edge” option to save on size. And like with music, it’s as simple as selecting (ticking the box of) the album or photo I want to transfer. There are options for “import all items, including previously imported items” and “remove items from device after importing.” It is however incredibly annoying that the window where you can select which photos to sync is only four folders high and there is NO WAY to resize the window. Sorting through THOUSANDS of photos when you can only see four is way beyond ridiculous.
Videos: [pending] I haven’t checked out this feature yet, but evidently you can set this up to simply sync a file to your device, or use the program to actually convert files to device friendly format.
Install: [kudos] This is a feature that allows you to set up associations between file extensions and directories. For example, you can set “doc” files to always be installed in your My Documents directory. I’m not sure how this will affect installs of programs with ReadMe files, etc.
Ringtones: [kudos] There’s a nice little Ringtone Creator incorporated into The Missing Sync that allows you to chop up songs for ringtones. I wish this extended to device notification sounds (not just ringtones), but I think this may be a shortcoming of the device/OS, not The Missing Sync, as I can’t seem to easily change the device notification sounds even from within my Droid.
Gold Service Option: [pending] MarkSpace’s “gold” customer service came with my install of The Missing Sync. Since I couldn’t figure out how to get my Phone Log, SMS Messages, and Photos to sync (The Missing Sync kept telling me a device had not yet been synced with the program even though I was successfully syncing music?), I used the opportunity to contact the peeps at customer service. Supposedly they’ll respond in four hours or less. It is currently 1:21pm Mountain Time on a Wednesday. This “gold” service also comes with a pin number for instant online chat. I’m gonna wait a bit to check that out though.
The one thing that every backup/sync program should do, and The Missing Sync doesn’t, is provide a button that will back up my entire device (for simple restoration in the event of complete device failure). On this front, The Missing Sync fails (no “one click back up all” option).
[update 5/27/10] No response yesterday. I did receive a response this morning requesting that I send in my error log. I did so at 10:53am and have not heard anything back. It’s 6:29pm.
[update 5/28/10] I got a response this morning that was basically “try again with your virus protection off.” I did so, and SMS and Call Logs are now being backed up. However, only numbers are listed, not names. A long list of 10 digit numbers is pretty useless to me. Unless the back up can figure out someway to pull in my contact name/number associations, SMS and Call Log back up is going to be a “fail.” Also, Photo backup and/or sync is not functioning, so unless I get a fix from tech support, photo sync will also be a “fail.”
[update 5/29/10] Still no response regarding the fact that photos won’t back up or sync, and that SMS and Call Logs won’t display names (only numbers). To be fair, it is Saturday, but I expected a response to the issue yesterday and did not receive one.
[update 8/10/10] After the holiday weekend the folks at MissingSync got back to me and were actually quite excellent with their communication. However, in the end I’m still pretty disappointed with the Missing Sync. There is no “total device backup,” you can’t sync via USB (only WiFi or Bluetooth, which is much too slow when syncing your entire music library), the photo sync does not work (in either direction), and the music sync would need to convert playlists to the correct Android playlist format (.m3u) for the software to be truly useful. The people at Missing Sync turned out to be great, but the software falls short, especially for the price.
In my opinion, the best option right now for syncing music and other media is called doubleTwist. See my review here.
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9-9-10 update: doubleTwist is the current king. See end of this post for more info.
The bad news is that my new Droid Incredible doesn’t read .xml or .asx playlists, only .m3u. So while it’s relatively easily to sync music to the device (Windows Media Player does it natively, iTunes requires a little program called iTunes Agent), getting playlists to sync is a bit trickier.
You can get Windows Media Player to save playlists as .m3u, but it really wants to save as .asx or .wpl, so it’s a pretty serious pain in the butt (you have to actually “save as” the playlist, and then you have the original .wpl AND the new .m3u in your library, and making sure you then delete the right one is a pain, blah, blah, blah…). [update: Unfortunately when Windows Media Player syncs with your device, it saves the playlist on your device as an .asx, so it’s no good for Android devices. I found this out after a LOT of messing around with exporting my iTunes playlists to WMP via MusicBridge and then saving each .wpl list as an .m3u and then deleting the previous .wpl… only to have the files converted to (unusable) .asx files once WMP synced with my Droid. There doesn’t seem to be any way around this. Even changing the .asx playlist to an .m3u playlist on your device doesn’t matter –it will be re-created as an .asx file on your next WMP sync (the .m3u list on the device won’t be updated –a new .asx is created). Annoying to say the least.]
There is a program called The Missing Sync that is just what it says, the missing sync software that SHOULD come with your Android device (what the hell Android/HTC?). It supposedly syncs texts, contacts, photos, video, music, playlists, ringtones, call history, etc. However, I’m not willing to drop $39.95 to try it out, especially when the Incredible isn’t specifically listed as a supported device on their website (the Moto Droid is the newest device listed). [update: The Incredible is supported, and my review of The Missing Sync is here.]
I used iTunes Agent for a couple of minutes, but then realized it will only sync music (not playlists). iTunes Agent is a little program that sits in your tray constantly monitoring for iTunes. It places a folder for your device in the iTunes playlists, and when you hook up your device it syncs all songs in that folder to your device. However, like I said, there is NO support for playlists. The author has been promising playlist support in version 2.0 for some years now, but considering how long he’s been promising this, I don’t see it happening anytime soon.
THIS IS THE ANSWER TO YOUR QUESTION: There is another program called iTunes Export by Eric Daugherty that does the trick for me. Simply install the program and use the GUI version (unless you’re really into command lines) and then select your library location, select the playlist(s) you want to sync, set your output directory to the music directory on your device (SD card or phone memory), select “include UTF-8 BOM” (or it won’t work), select “copy iTunes Structure” (so files sync into folders that are identical to your music library, the “author – album” structure), and you’re golden! Just remember to run iTunes Export after you’ve made any changes to your iTunes playlists. It’s a bit of a pain having to run a separate program to get your playlists to sync after any changes you make in iTunes, but this is the best workaround I’ve found.
doubleTwist is another program getting some attention, but it’s Moto Droid support is only in Beta, and there doesn’t seem to be Incredible support yet (they do support the Palm Pre though, for those of you looking for the elusive link between iTunes and the Pre).
9-9-10 update: doubleTwist is the current king. With recent updates, you simply install the desktop app, click “iTunes” to import playlists, and off you go!!! It will also convert an video to the proper format for your phone. Just drag any video file into the app and it’ll convert for you. I’ll likely do a review soon.
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