Smartphone voor Dummies - de Cloud in

Regelmatig krijg ik via sociale media de vraag of ik mijn telefoonnummer weer even willen doorsturen want hij/zij heeft een nieuwe telefoon en is alle nummers kwijt. De vraag of de nieuwste Nokia 3310 (anno 2000) goed bevalt ligt dan op mijn lippen toetsenbord. Er worden schrikbarende bedragen uitgegeven aan iPhones, HTCs en Samsungs die krachtiger zijn dan je PC uit 2005, die volgestopt zitten met Cloud-diensten en Cloud-Apps. Maar de basis-functionaliteiten, zoals het synchroniseren van het adresboek wordt op de één of andere manier overgeslagen. Dat ding heet smartphone maar wordt zo blijkbaar niet ingezet.

In deze series van blogs zal ik ingaan op de mogelijkheden die de moderne smartphone anno 2014 biedt en die mijns inziens dus onvoldoende benut worden.

De "CLOUD"

De "Cloud" is kort-door-de-bocht dat stukje internet waarin jij jouw data kunt zetten zodat die altijd bereikbaar voor je is, mits je maar online kunt. Dat wil dus zeggen dat de data/informatie niet meer alleen op je computer of telefoon staat maar dus ook ergens op servers van bijvoorbeeld Google of Microsoft. Met als grote voordeel dat al jouw apparaten (pc, laptop, tablet, smartphone, etc) met die centrale kopie in de Cloud in verbinding staan en het bestand dat je zoëven op je PC via Dropbox (ook een Cloud-dienst) hebt opgeslagen binnen een paar tellen ook op je tablet beschikbaar is en je er onderweg in de trein aan verder kunt werken. In diezelfde Cloud kun je ook je contactpersonen, afspraken, muziek, foto's opslaan, en je email!

my multimedia server based on Synology

In this blog I explain you how I created the (for me) ideal environment for keeping my important documents save and backed up and at the same time benefit from some extra features the Synology server offers.

first a bit of history: 
My geeky side always wants to try out professional stuff and use it at home. So for years (2002-2009) all my files, consisting of a few gigabyte of business & personal documents and hundreds of gigabytes of music, videos and photographs where hosted on a Windows Small Business Server (SBS) in our basement. But when I realized what the power-consumption of my 24x7 standby Quad-XEON server was I decided to downsize and move everything to a WD MyBook WorldEdition, a small 1 disk NAS. With a 2TB hard-disc in it, the important documents also safely in the cloud with DropBox and/or GoogleDrive, this offered enough space. My unstable Exchange-Outlook environment was migrated to Google Apps with GMail and this turned out much better then I ever hoped. My XBMC-devices around the house could access the media files on the MyBook via LAN or WiFi. 

Until one day the disc in the MyBook started making strange noises, rebooting, taking hours to re-index all media-files and in the end I even lost some pictures I'd rather not had lost. It was finally time for Synology. I already heard a lot of it from friends (via social media) and I quickly opted for the DS213+ model, a pretty fast 2-disc NAS, so possible to mirror the data. I started building it with one 3TB WD RED (specially developed for NAS-purpose) and when everything worked I added a second 3TB WD RED disc so my data would be constantly mirrored (Raid1). Maybe a 4-disc NAS with a Raid5/10 scheme would've been better and more efficient but that also comes with a different price-tag. 

So now I have my Synology DS213+ up and running. It keeps copies of my personal and business documents which I now primarily store in the GoogleDrive and Dropbox clouds so I can access them from wherever I am and from whatever device I am using (PC at home, laptop at work, tablet or smartphone on the road). The Synology Operating System or DiskStation Manager (DSM) as they call it is a very powerful Linux based OS which allows even non-Linux users to benefit from a real server. It is amazing if you see what you can get out of this little box. All my printers are shared and we can directly print from the computers, iPads, iPhones, Android tablets and smartphones. Video and music are streaming to DLNA devices like our smart TV, tablets and phones. We're browsing through all our digital pictures/albums on the TV or tablet. And I even connected an outside IP Security Camera which I can see from wherever I am on my smartphone. You can manage users and groups in case you do not want everyone to have access at everything.

Backup options
Even though my data is stored on 2 different harddrives it is still not safe, what if our cellar floods or the house burns down? My video and music collection is not so important, my documents are stored in various clouds, but the tens of GBs of pictures we shot over the last years is not something I would like to loose. The Synology offers some interesting back-up solutions in different price ranges. For my pictures I choose Amazon Glacier backup. It is a very economic solution, I pay less then 1US$ per month to store around 20GB of pictures on Amazon's servers in Ireland. It is not as easy accessible as other cloud solutions but I will only need it in case of emergency. From my PC I also make a copy to Copy.com where I got a lot of storage for free by inviting friends (follow this link and start with 15+5GB for free)

Bonus for the MultiMedia freaks
For those who like to download movies and TV shows there's a whole bunch of Apps in a community available for the Synology. After some attempts with various tools/apps I came up with this set-up:

• SABnzbd for downloading content from Usenet* (a paid usenet provider will be necessary);
• SickBeard an app that automatically monitors if there are new episodes of my favourite TV Shows (like Dexter, Breaking Bad, the Big Bang Theory) available and if he pushes them to SABnzbd;
• CouchPotato is to movies what SickBeard is to TV Shows.

read this blog to find out more about how to install and configure them on your Synology. I used this manual too and it fitted me right, especially since also I prefer to watch via XBMC.

*) to be able to use Usenet you will need a paid subscription to one of the Usenet providers. I use NewsDemon which offers a good and fast service (I can download at the maximum bandwidth my provider offers). Warning: downloading copyright protected content from Usenet is not legal everywhere so I strongly recommend you inform yourself before doing anything illegal. Oh, and do not blame me of course ;-)

And finally there is COPS, a Calibre-based App for easily accessing all your eBooks and ePubs from your tablet/e-reader on the server.


...and what does this all cost?
The hardware can be yours around 600€ for a Synology DS213+ w/ 2 mirrored harddrives of 3TB, but I also build a solution around the cheaper 1-disc DS112j (250€ incl. one 2TB disc) which works just fine as long as you do not download and stream at the same time.
In case you need help setting it up, just leave me a comment or contact me via the known social media (see right column)

9 months without iPhone

because of questions on Google+ asking for my experience/opinion about a switch from iOS to Android I wrote this response which might also be interesting outside of Google+ 

Over the last 3 years (iPhone3G in 2008, iPhone3Gs in 2009, iPhone4 in 2010) I had spend a serious amount of money in the AppStore (w/ Navigon Europe for €89 being my most expensive App). I had at least €200 worth of Apps on my iPhone4 in september 2011 when Apple did not give me the larger iPhone5 I wanted/needed. Nevertheless the lock-in relation I had with the iTunes AppStore I decided to give other platforms a chance. The most important reasons to move away from iOS start looking around: I was expecting the larger screen iPhone5 and I was heavily disappointed when they showed just the 4s. But more important I was very disappointed in iCloud/MobileMe: not your own email domain (always a @me.com-address), iCloud's Agenda/Mail/Contacts are incompatible with everything out there other than Macs (apart from a 1990s type of synchronization in Outlook) so they already forced me to switch entirely to GoogleApps. And that's were I started to look to Android.



But first I played for about 3-4 weeks with an HTC HD7 w/ Windows Phone 7.5 Mango. It was a true disappointment, apart from the particular interface I couldn't get used too there were no Apps available that could satisfy me. apart from email, agenda and calling my phone needs a good Twitter App... and for WP at that time (October 2011) there was nothing. the WP-designs were too slick and lean. I hope to give the Nokia Lumnia 920 w/ WP8 a try soon to see how HW, OS and Apps have developed in a year time.

Sidenote: I think coming from the Apple iOS springboard (all these icons on your screen) the step to Windows Phone is a giant one. From Android, with all its widgets, the WP-Tiles maybe make more sense, they do not feel so different (good point in favour of Android: it combines the best of both)

So after my short flirt with WP I bought an Android device, the Google Samsung Galaxy Nexus, now 9 months ago (hence the title od this blog). No HTC Sense or Samsung TouchWiz skins to ruin the work of Google's programmers, the real stuff, Google's Android Vanilla interface. It was the the first Android device with OS 4 Ice Cream Sandwich. And OMG how I regretted my choice for at least 1-2 months. OS 4.0.0/4.0.2 was still very buggy (unstable Wifi connections, OS-crashes, Apps crashing). Only when 4.0.4 came I could relax and everything finally worked as I expected and I started to enjoy Android. Since 2 months there's JellyBean available for the Galaxy Nexus and it is fantastic, a few neat enhancement/improvements but above all a much smoother interface, for sure better then iOS5 on any of the iPhones I've seen (so that excludes the latest iPhone5).

Would I do this switch again? Knowing what I know now: yes, for sure! The integration with the Google applications (Gmail, GDrive/Docs, Picasa, etc) is perfect, I love the flexibility of Agenda/Calendar, Contacts and Email. I wouldn't be able to live again with iOS shortcomings such as having to launch the Calendar-App to see if you have any upcoming appointments (why not on the lockscreen?) or the lack of a some simple buttons (widgets) to switch WiFi on/off, or datasync (in case of roaming), etc. I would probably end up jailbraking the iPhone again (as I did with all my iPhones) in order to get the iPhone to do what I want it to do. In fact one of my best read blogs ever (from Dec 2009, in Dutch) is about how to get more out of the iPhone. But my experience with Jailbraking is that it does make the iPhone unstable (not the JB itself, but some Cydia Apps do). I had to (soft)reboot at least once or twice a day.

my main homescreen with 
Calendar, Gmail and 
Evernote widgets 

Now to the Apps: I like to play around and test a lot of Apps, just for fun. I do not hesitate to buy any App cheaper then €1,99 if I think it could help me and if there's no Free version to test available. So I have spend already a lot on Android Apps as well (all from the official Google Play Store), probably around €100 in a year time. I have seen the Android Apps grow, they're getting mature. But there's also still a lot of rubbish in Google's Play Store, more then in the iTunes AppStore is my impression, especially from a design point of view. For almost all of my iOS Apps I found (cheaper/free) alternatives on Android. All my key Apps work perfect, look great on my Galaxy Nexus. For a long time I have been searching a Twitter App that could match the design, versatility and functionality of TweetBot (only available for iOS) but the latest version of Plume and the final version Boid are very promising!

Switching from iCloud to other alternatives is easy and you only get more functionality. Both Dropbox and Google Instant Upload offer a better alternative to PhotoStream. Better since it's far more easier to get access to your "photostream" from other platforms, my main problem with all Apple-Apps is they offer no or bad support for other platforms then iOS/OSX. Gmail has always been better (and more versatile) then your @mac.com/@me.com account, accessing a Google Agenda is possible from anywhere and from a wide range of devices/apps and you do not need an iPhone to get access to a shared agenda. Google Drive/Docs and all the plugins/extensions make your life a lot easier.

Conclusion: if you do not care about throwing away the money spent on your iOS Apps your life will get better on Android ;-)

PS: my wife and kids still use all those iOS-Apps I bought over the years on my 3 old iPhones and iPad1. And I still haven't replaced my iPad2 with an Asus Nexus7 so on the couch I can still enjoy TweetBot!

the Jelly Bean experience

I have used Jelly Bean (Android OS 4.1) on my Galaxy Nexus for a couple of days now and I can only say it offers a great experience! 

• Google managed to get the interface more fluid and have it respond faster (Project Butter is a succes)
• The new notifications (with previews) are beautiful and much more useful then the old ones
• The improvements on how App-icons and Widgets are placed was not more then necessary, even Apple managed to do that smoother ;-) (only with App-icons of course, iOS still lacks Widgets)
• Google Voice Search works great and I think I even might start using voice commands for the first time. I still have to see if it works via my bluetooth carkit. I just ran outside and tested it via my Parrot carkit and that works too. I've seen some comparisons on YouTube on how much faster and better Google Voice is compared to Apple's Siri (in the case of the 1600 questions you really see how bad or useless Siri really is).
• I haven't had a change yet to really experience Google Now yet, but like Google explains it has to learn to know the user to predict what he/she might need (travelling directions, etc). But I really like how it already relevant information like your current or next appointment, last searches, etc.

side note:

I've never been a fanboy of either Apple nor Android, in fact I still use my iPad2 a lot and prefer certain Apps on iOS over those on Android (TweetBot for example), too n00bs I still recommend the iPhone in stead of an Android. But with the way Apple tries to force us to use all of their products versus the liberty that Google offers me (f.e. iCloud vs Google Apps) I'm becoming more and more anti-Apple!

my Twitter Clients

screenshot TwitBird (Pro) on iPhone

When I started tweeting in April 2009 I did so from my iPhone; I evaluated some Twitter Apps and if I recall well Twitterific was my first favourite. I didn't tweet so much and hardly ever on a PC/notebook, so the twitter.com website was -and still is- somewhat unknown to me. Until I discovered TweetDeck, a nice client for Windows and Mac with some interesting features and a nice look-and-feel (user interface I should say). So from behind my desk my tweets started to become more frequent, I got more followers, causing more tweets, and so on.



TwitBird

screenshot TwitBird (Pro) on iPad

A year ago, beginning of 2010, my twitter frequency shot sky high when I started working in Switzerland, I was a lot away from home and discovered foursquare. The number of followers and tweeps grew and I needed to organise it a bit better. I starting using lists, first too many people in one list, then too many lists until I found the right equilibrium. I now have about 5 favourite lists with my favourite tweeps (although I sometimes forget to update them) and some lists with people I find interesting to follow but who need to be grouped together (in a list). Anyway, using lists I discovered the power of TwitBird (Pro), unfortunately (for some of you) only available on iPhone/iPad. Like most Apps it gives you access to your lists but the power of TwitBird is, is that you can filter already read tweets. So if I first scan my favourite lists, and then start reading my TL with all tweets I can filter the tweets I already read in the lists. This enables me to scan quickly if there's something interesting going on in Limburg or in Switzerland or in any other region, subject that I've created a list or search for and also browse what else is going on in the TL without having to read the tweets I already read twice!

HootSuite

HootSuite screenshot

If only HootSuite would have the same filter-read-tweets-functionality too, it would not be a great tool, but a perfect tool. But it hasn't, but it offers so much more:
*it runs in a browser so all settings are synced on the HootSuite-server, giving you the exact same setup wherever you login;
*tabs and streams: with so many lists & searches TweetDeck was not the best interface anymore, I prefer HootSuite where you can group up to 5 streams together on 1 tab; On a 21" monitor these 5 streams display every well next to each other;
*support for multiple accounts, not only twitter accounts, my personal Facebook account, professional Facebook group and my LinkedIn account as well! And even more if I wanted, but the free version is limited to 5 accounts, and frankly that's enough for my use;
*statistics, it was interesting to see that when I tried to sell my MacBookAir via twitter I suddenly got over 100hits on the URL to the advert;
*in the paid versions of HootSuite you can collaborate on twitter accounts with colleagues, it should be possible to appoint tweets to someone else so he/she can respond/take action. I never used this functionality so so I can't comment on it, but it sounds pretty useful for Social Media active companies.


So what about TweetDeck? After the Xth crash of AdobeAir, missing mentions (some mentions that I saw in TwitBird in my iPhone just didn't display in TweetDeck), responding to the wrong tweet because the mouse pointer/cursor suddenly decided to select another tweet then the one I wanted to respond to I gave up, found HootSuite and that's where I am today.

TwitBird on my iPhone
TwitBird and HootSuite on my new iPad2
And HootSuite on my Windows/OSX PCs/notebooks!

What do you use and why?

Read It Later

I am pretty active on internet, especially on mobile internet! Sometimes I think the iPhone was invented just for me. My most used apps are Facebook, TwitBird Pro (Twitter) and FourSquare. With these applications/services I stay in touch with my real life friends when away and my new on-line friends. Although the iPhone is a nice device for reading tweets, scanning facebook updates and for quickly browsing the internet I prefer to use the iPad or a pc/laptop to read articles. So when there was a link in a tweet I read while mobile I rarely clicked it because I didn't want to read it, not at that moment. I used the Favorite button to mark the tweet for later reading. When I switched from one twitter app to TweetBird (Pro) I noticed TwitBird asked me if I wanted to save the link, or if I wanted to Read It Later, or just Read Now.

It was then when I discovered ReadItLater, a typical why-did-I-not-think-of-that kind of application. Quite simple but so useful! ReadItLater (and also Instapaper by the way) offer you the possibility to quickly bookmark links and webpages. All you need is to do is register and you can save your links, articles, pages, etc. to read them later, when you're behind a larger screen or when you have more time to dedicate. Just login to ReadItLater and you can read everyhting you saved/bookmarked. I've also seen people sharing their lists with others but I just use it for myself, to save those possibly interesting article I can't read now.


The Save-to-ReadItLater functionality is integrated in many (mobile) Twitter apps. But you can also add extensions/bookmarklets to your PC's browser so that you can quickly bookmark an interesting page/article for later, just have a look at all the various options on the ReadItLater homepage.

Digest

Last week I read about the new Digest functionality and I immediately liked the idea of it so I asked for more details. I received an invitation to trial the Digest Beta for a couple of days.

Whereas the standard ReadItLater just lists all your saved links in chronological (or alphabetical) order Digest groups them. Some of the groups are auto-generated, others can be created by the user himself. In Digest the links are presented in a better looking interface, with preview of the text and picture (if available). I have immediately paid the fee (now Early Beta Price) to be able to use the Digest functionality also after my trial period is over.

FlipBoard
One thing that immediately crossed my mind was: can I use it together with FlipBoard on iPad ? I have send this question/suggestion to Nate, the man behind ReadItLater and let's hope he and/or FlipBoard can develop something to have RIL-Digest in FlipBoard. All I need then is permanent access to an iPad (which is now exclusively owned by my wife), so I will probably have to buy one for myself. You don't have an iPad yet and so you don't know what FlipBoard is, take a look at this clip. I think it's is one of the best apps made for iPad. I won't spill any words on FlipBoard here, the clip tells it all!



/edit ON
YouTube just suggested this clip for me (how do they do that?), anyway, see Read It Later explained in this clip:


and a "confrontation" Instapaper vs ReadItLater (including Digest) in this clip:


/edit OFF