8th
Lunch with the @doschinos and @limetruck (@ Street Chef Stop) http://t.co/qF1KX4S
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a compilation of info from our families various sites and other random info from around the web
Twitter: tomcapote
Website: capotefamily.com
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I just ousted @lackeymark as the mayor of Portola Clubhouse on @foursquare! http://t.co/Y5KOxTP
There’s been a lot of talk about how to get the OS X Lion Installer after you installed Lion. The main purpose of this may be to get the Installer dmg to create a bootable Installer disk, as described elsewhere. Many missed doing that before installation, me included.
But actually this hint will work to force download any purchase on the Mac App Store.
There’s an easy method to force a download within the Mac App Store without any tinkering. It seems to be the official method, although I found no description of this in any of Apple’s documentation.
So here’s how to do it:
- Open the Mac App Store.
- Navigate to your Purchased page.
- Hold down the Option key on your keyboard and click on your ‘OS X Lion’ purchase link (not on the ‘installed’ button).
- You see the Lion product page. It should say ‘Installed,’ but that button is clickable. Hold down the Option key again and click on ‘Installed.’ If you don’t hold the option key it will tell you there’s already a newer version installed.
- Enter your login credentials.
- Download.
It’s important to hold down the Option key twice. Once on the Purchased page, once on the Lion page. You also can’t navigate to Lion directly, you need to open it from the purchases page. But if you follow this procedure you should find the Lion Installer within your Applications folder.
via 10.7: How to download the OS X Lion Installer on Lion - Mac OS X Hints.
Ironman Dinner and the Word! Gonna be an awesome night! Calvary Chapel San Juan Capistrano http://t.co/oyDmahY
In 2006, Google was internally testing a project codenamed “Platypus”, an online storage service. When it was accidentally disclosed during an analyst meeting as “GDrive”, it quickly captured the web’s imagination. Google seemed on the verge of transforming their servers into our own personal hard drives in the cloud. Plenty of startups were working on this (and still are), but the presumption was that Google would be able to scale this beyond anyone else and do it for free, or very cheap. Google refused to talk about it, but story after story after story kept coming.
Then something weird happened: GDrive never actually launched.
It wasn’t until earlier this year that we found out what happened, thanks to Steven Levy’s book In The Plex. In 2008, GDrive was about to launch under Bradley Horowitz (now a lead on Google+), but Sundar Pichai (now the SVP of Chrome) convinced Google’s top executives not to launch it. The reason? He felt like the concept of a “file” was outdated (sounds more than a bit Jobsian) in the cloud-based universe that Google was trying to build. After some debate, the powers that be at Google agreed and GDrive was shelved, and the team moved over to the Chrome team.
End of story, right? Not so fast.
Something curious appeared this evening in the Chromium Code Reviews issue list. As first noted by Nick Semenkovich on Twitter, there was a ticket to add the URL drive.google.com to a list in the browser’s code. This URL (which is not yet live) lead to a Hacker News thread wondering: “Google Drive coming soon?“
Diving a bit deeper into the code reviews, what’s most striking is that drive.google.com doesn’t appear to be referenced anywhere besides this one exposed ticket. This suggests that it’s either no big deal, or that Google is keeping this very secret.
I don’t think it’s the former because the messaging in the one ticket indicates that drive.google.com has been added to the HSTS (HTTP Strict Transport Security) list alongside other key Google apps like docs.google.com and spreadsheets.google.com. Another bit of code puts it alongside Android Market and Google Analytics.
Google information security engineer, Chris Evans, completed the ticket this evening. And Chrome engineer Adam Langley approved it with the message “LGTM” (Looks Good To Me).
I reached out to Pichai (who again, is now a Google senior executive in charge of Chrome), but he declined to comment. A Google spokesperson would only say, “The team is always testing out new features, but we don’t have any details to share at this time.”
It sure seems like something is up. At the very least, Google does appear to be close to doing something with the drive.google.com domain. My best guess — which is pure speculation — is that it will be some sort of new Google app for syncing files over the web across a range of devices. PCs, Macs, Chromebooks, Android phones, iOS, you name it. Think: Dropbox.
But wait, doesn’t Google already offer cloud storage functionality as a part of Google Docs? Sort of. But since that functionality launched almost two years ago, it seems that very few people use it like they use Dropbox — hence, Dropbox’s $4 billion valuation and Box.net’s $550 million valuation.
Google is putting a lot of weight behind Chrome OS and Chromebooks. So far, it seems they haven’t exactly caught fire in the sales department. But they’re iterating fast, and one area of focus has been the file system (despite Pichai’s hope they wouldn’t need one — remember, they’re going after PC users here). One that is built into the core of the OS and tied to the cloud could be very useful to those hoping to switch from traditional PCs. That’s especially true now that Google is finally making their apps fully available offline as well, as they did with Gmail, Docs, etc, this morning.
More to come on this, I’m sure.
via Google May Be On The Verge Of Resurrecting “GDrive” | TechCrunch.
Google is launching a new Gmail web app and updates to Calendar and Docs, in an effort to increase its products’ offline utility.
Google users have called bringing Gmail, Calendar and Docs offline an essential step for improving productivity, Group Product Manager Rajen Sheth told Mashable. The problem, he explained, is that when users need offline access to their email or calendar, they really need it.
To that end, Google is launching a new Chrome app called Gmail Offline. Separate from Gmail itself, the new app is designed for accessing, managing and sending email while you’re disconnected from the web. “We can build on top of a lot of HTML5 standards, which gives us the capabilities to make it work offline,” Sheth said.
The HTML5 app looks and feels a lot like the Gmail app for tablets. That’s because Gmail Offline is based off the tablet version, which was designed to function with or without Internet access. It focuses on the key features users need to access while offline, including organizing, starring, labeling, archiving and responding to email. It won’t give you access to Gmail Labs features, but it will get the job done.
In addition to the Gmail Offline app, Google is rolling out the ability to access Calendar and Docs offline. The feature, available by clicking the gear icon at the top of the page, lets you view events and RSVP to appointments in Calendar and view documents in Docs. Offline document editing isn’t available yet, but Google promises to find a way to make it work. Part of the problem is finding a way to make sure document edits made offline don’t override edits made by online collaborators.
The apps are only available through the Chrome Web Store at the moment. If you try to use the Calendar or Docs offline features, you will be prompted to first install Chrome. Google says that it intends to roll out its offline apps to other browsers once they support the functionality.
via Google Launches Offline Versions of Gmail, Calendar & Docs.
We are reaching another major milestone in the ongoing expansion of Disney California Adventure park. On Monday, August 29, the Sunshine Plaza area will close to allow crews to start the transformation of the current park entry into Buena Vista Street, reminiscent of what Walt Disney encountered when he first arrived in California in the 1920s.
While the shops will close to make way for Buena Vista Street, guests will continue to enter the park through the new Pan-Pacific Auditorium-inspired turnstiles and follow a temporary walkway which will feature renderings of the future Disney California Adventure park and connect the turnstiles with the Condor Flats area. This area will be the temporary entrance and exit for guests during the transformation of the former main entrance stores to Buena Vista Street.
This entry and exit location will remain in place until Buena Vista Street opens in 2012. To see what’s in store when this area opens, take a look at the renderings below, which were shown this past weekend at the Disney D23 Expo in Anaheim.
To enable hidden files/folders in finder windows:
- Open Finder
- Open the Utilities folder
- Open a terminal window
- Copy and paste the following line in:
1 defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles YES- Press return
- Now hold ‘alt’ on the keyboard and right click on the Finder icon
- Click on Relaunch
You should find you will now be able to see any hidden files or folders. One you are done, perform the steps above however, replace the terminal command in step 4 with:
1 defaults write com.apple.Finder AppleShowAllFiles NO
via MikeSel.info.
A new version of the Android Market has unexpectedly started rolling out to handsets this morning as version 3.1.3. The update includes a couple of nifty new features to add to this already snazzy new store – most notably is the +1 button in app pages and the ability to set a PIN to prevent unwanted purchases of apps on your phone. A nice feature for those of you out there with little ones who like to grab ahold of your phone and frantically hammer on buttons.
Download: com.android.vending.3.1.3.apk
To install, simply download the file from above. When it finishes, tap on it from the notifications bar, tap “Install”, allow it to replace your current market. Enjoy!Cheers to Mike and everyone who sent this in!
via Droid Life.
For those who are unable to use the web-based recovery tool for OS X Lion, Apple has released a new Mac application that allows users to create their own OS X Lion recovery/installation external drives. Specifically, this drive lets you reinstall Lion, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari. You need a recovery HD already setup to create this new drive. Here are the instruction straight from Apple:
The Lion Recovery Disk Assistant will erase all data on the external drive when creating the Recovery HD. You should either backup your data before running the Lion Recovery Disk Assistant, or create a new partition on the external drive.
If you need to create a new partition on the external disk
1. Open Disk Utility, located in the Utilities folder in Launchpad.
2. Select the drive on which you would like to install the Recovery HD and add a partition. Note: Partition should be at least 1 GB in size.
3. Click Options and make sure GUID Partition Table is selected.
4. Make sure the format for the partition is Mac OS Extended Journaled.
5. Click Apply.
Open Lion Recovery Disk Assistant and follow the on screen instructions to create a Recovery HD on the external drive.
When the Lion Recovery Disk Assistant completes, the new partition will not be visible in the Finder or Disk Utility. To access the external Recovery HD, connect the drive, then restart the computer and hold the Option key. Select Recovery HD from the Startup Manager.
The Lion Recover Disk Assistant download is available here.
With Apple revealing iCloud price details along with the beta version of iCloud.com, now seems like a good time to explain what the service is to anyone who missed Apple’s announcement in June.
iCloud basics
iCloud does not replace local storage on iPhones, iPads and iPod Touches. What it does is keep your data in sync between any Apple device or PC that you own. For example, if you’re writing a document in Pages on an iPad, that document will automatically be available for editing on your iPhone or a PC, with no need to transfer files by e-mail or USB.
iCloud also remembers your device’s settings, apps, home screen layouts, ring tones and text messages, so all of that information is available if you upgrade or replace your iPhone or iPad. Think of it like the backup function in iTunes, but through the Internet instead.
Which apps use iCloud?
Apple’s iWork productivity software — Pages, Numbers and Keynote — can sync documents through iCloud. Contacts, Calendar and Mail will also be updated automatically across multiple devices. A new service called Photo Stream allows you to download your 1,000 most recent photos to a computer or other iOS device for 30 days. You can also store a device’s entire camera roll in iCloud for longer.
Third-party apps will be able to use iCloud as well. Rovio, for instance, could make Angry Birds data available across devices so your iPhone and iPad will show the same progress through the game. It’s up to developers to implement these kinds of features.
What’s included for free, and what costs extra?
Apple will provide 5 GB of iCloud storage for free, but iTunes music, apps, books and Photo Stream don’t count against that total. iCloud storage is consumed by documents, mail, app data, your full camera roll, settings and other device information. Additional storage costs $20 per year for 10 GB, $40 per year for 20 GB and $100 per year for 50 GB.
Apple suggests that 5 GB of storage should suffice, but that depends largely on whether you’re storing lots of photos and videos on your Camera Roll, and how much app data you’re backing up. The former should be easy to determine — you can already see in iTunes how much data is used by photos and video — but the latter will be harder to pin down until we see how many developers adopt the service.
Who is this for?
People who own multiple iOS devices will get the most out of iCloud, because it saves the hassle of manually transferring data between iPhones, iPads and so on. Owners of a single Apple device may still appreciate iCloud’s automatic backup function, which makes replacing hardware easier.
iTunes is separate
One possible point of confusion with iCloud is how iTunes purchases factor into the service. When you buy music from iTunes, it can be automatically synced to all of your iOS devices, and it won’t count against your free storage. A paid service called iTunes Match is completely separate from iCloud, and syncs any music you haven’t purchased from iTunes for $25 per year.
When will this be available?
iCloud arrives this fall, alongside iOS 5.
Android vs iPhone by state: Who is on top?
Would you like to know what mobile operating system dominates in your state? Planning to move anytime soon? Here’s a map that can guide you in the right direction! Stats and info graphics are always fun, but today we have something extra special for you.
This map shows which US states are dominated by Android, Blackberry or iOS. Android and iOS are obviously the most dominant platforms in the country, but some states are still Blackberry territory and some others that are neutral.
There’s somewhat of a pattern in this map, as you can see. It seems there’s a sort of an invisible diagonal line separating the distribution of platforms. The map illustrates that iOS dominates in the northern/eastern half of the country, while Android seems to dominate in the southern/western section.
These statistics are very interesting, but we have decided to take things a little further. Aside from just knowing which platform is on top (and where), we decided to see how the numbers relate to other maps with state-by-state information.
See the entire article at Android vs iPhone by state: Who is on top? | Android and Me.
Three finger swipes still work in Google Chrome. The issue you’re having is that default swipes in Lion are two fingers. Go into System Prefs, then into trackpad and change the swipes from 2 fingers to 3. You can also make it both 2 and 3 finger swipes to accomplish the same thing, in which case swiping will work in Chrome and you’ll see get the cool two finger swipes in Safari that have special animations.
Per HTC’s Facebook Page, here are some info on how the unlocking will work!
“The Web tool … requires that you register an account with a valid e-mail address and accept legal disclaimers that unlocking may void all or parts of your warranty. Then plug in your phone to a computer with the Android SDK loaded to retrieve a device identifier token, which you can then enter into the Web tool to receive a unique unlock key via e-mail. Finally, apply the key to your device and unlocking will be initiated on your phone.
In essence, all HTC devices will ship with locked bootloaders which will be unlockable (fully supported by HTC) using the web-based tool. Existing phones will need an OTA update in order to gain this “unlockability” - as expected, they won’t just suddenly all get unlocked automatically.”
**UPDATE 8/3/2011**
“Since our last update, many of you have asked how the bootloader unlocking process will actually work, and in particular why HTC’s most recently released devices still have a locked bootloader. Rest assured we’re making progress toward our goal to roll out the first software updates in August to support unlocking for the global HTC Sensation, followed soon by the HTC Sensation 4G on T-Mobile and the HTC EVO 3D on Sprint. Because unlocking the bootloader provides extensive control over the device and modifications may cause operation, security and experience issues, new devices will continue to ship locked but will support user-initiated unlocking using a new Web-based tool.
So how will this work? The Web tool, which will launch this month, requires that you register an account with a valid e-mail address and accept legal disclaimers that unlocking may void all or parts of your warranty. Then plug in your phone to a computer with the Android SDK loaded to retrieve a device identifier token, which you can then enter into the Web tool to receive a unique unlock key via e-mail. Finally, apply the key to your device and unlocking will be initiated on your phone.
We’re excited to bring bootloader unlocking to developers and enthusiasts, and we feel this new Web tool will meet your needs and continue to provide customers with the best experience. Thanks to the community for supporting these efforts!”