Kibbles & Bytes Blog

  • App Review: Colin McRae Rally

    When I was a kid, my favorite video games were always flight simulators and racing simulators. I never really liked games where you were controlling a character. I guess I thought it was inherently unrealistic. At least with racing and flight simulators they were based off real-life models and physics.

    In the mid 2000s one of my favorite games was “**RalliSport Challenge**”:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RalliSport_Challenge. I believe originally it was written for Xbox in 2002, but it was a Microsoft Game Studios game, so there was also a Windows port. I didn’t have an Xbox, so I played the Windows version. I **loved** RalliSport Challenge. The racing aspect was so fun and hearing the co-driver call out pace notes to you as you flew through icy, snowy or gravel road courses. It felt just like you were racing in the WRC (“**World Rally Championship**”:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Rally_Championship) which I was very into at the time.

    Of course now, that game looks dated. When I got my iPad Air I was excited about the prospect of playing really nice games. I’d seen lots of demos of how well the 3D engines ran on iOS and it seemed like a perfectly capable gaming platform to me. Sadly though, I never really found any games, especially racing games, that I genuinely enjoyed. Too many of them seemed to be of the free variety with micro transactions and in-app purchases to get upgrades. I don’t like that model. I’ll happily pay for a game if it’s good and fun to play.

    p{text-align: center;}. !http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4653.png!

    So last week I took to the app store with a simple $5 budget looking for a game that would be fun to play, and maybe take me back to my teenage years playing RalliSport Challenge. I was quite surprised to come across a title called “**Colin McRae Rally**”:https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/colin-mcrae-rally/id566286915?mt=8. Back in the mid 2000s, there was a PC game called Colin McRae Rally. It was really cool and far more realistic than RalliSport Challenge. But this game in the app store couldn’t possibly compare to that, right? I looked at the extra details. It was created by The Codemasters Software Company…the same company that created the original Colin McRae Rally game. I checked out the screenshots and the videos. It seemed to be the real deal and at only $3 it was under my $5 budget. No in-app purchases. Just racing.

    What’s my verdict? Really, really cool! The graphics look great, the cars look great, the physics are very realistic and even the rally gameplay is very true to life. Each rally is composed of several stages. After every two stages, you are given a time budget to repair your car. If you don’t repair it, believe me, it drives noticeably worse. If you can keep the car together and beat the clock through enough of the stages, you’ll win the rally.

    p{text-align: center;}. !http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4654.png!

    Like many racing games, you’re only allowed one car choice, and one rally at first. In Colin McRae Rally it’s the Ford Focus and the Australia Outback rally, respectively. Once you come in first place in a rally, you are given another car choice, and ability to enter other rallies. Cars available in the game include the aforementioned Ford Focus, Subaru Impreza, Mitsubishi Lancer Evo, and even a Group 4 (the precursor to the infamous Group B) relic, the Lancia Stratos.

    The controls are pretty good but the realistic physics take some time to get used to. This isn’t an arcade-style racer where you can just lay on the throttle and never use the brake. When I play it on my iPhone, I prefer the accelerometer tilt-to-steer controls. On my iPad, I like the onscreen left/right buttons. Regardless of steering method, you also have onscreen controls for the throttle, brake and handbrake.

    Overall, I’m really happy to see such a realistic and fun game being offered in app store after being so disappointed with so many others. If you’ve ever been interested in a nice, worth-the-money game in the app store, I’d have no hesitation recommending Colin McRae Rally.

  • _Hello Friends_,

    It is hard to believe that it is February already. There is almost no snow up in Vermont and Artie is reporting that farmers are already gathering sap from the maple trees to make syrup. The Iowa caucuses have come and gone and on Tuesday the first in the nation primary is next door in New Hampshire. Being a leap year my granddaughter, Gracie, will have her 4th real birthday on the 29th. She was recently chosen as guest composer on Vermont Public Radio. You can hear her interview and one of her “**compositions**”:http://digital.vpr.net/post/student-composer-showcase-gracie-bangoura#stream/0 online. 

    February is also Black History month and each week in Kibbles and on our “**blog**”:http://blog.smalldog.com we will be honoring Black History. It is fun researching and writing these little bios of Black American heroes and heroines.  

    Florida’s governor declared a state of emergency in four counties regarding the horrible tragedy unfolding in Brazil with the Zika virus. One thing that is not being widely reported is the apparent link to genetically modified mosquitos and the microcephaly disaster. Apparently, Brazil was the site of a massive experiment with genetically modified mosquitos that were released into the wild. They were proposing a similar release for here in the Florida Keys but it has not happened. The Zika virus has been around since 1947 and this is the first big outbreak of microcephaly. You can “**read more about it,**”:http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2987024/pandoras_box_how_gm_mosquitos_could_have_caused_brazils_microcephaly_diasaster.html regardless of whether that analysis is true, I think releasing genetic mosquitos is a bad idea.

    I am happy to announce that Small Dog Electronics will be offering GoPro cameras and accessories in our stores this month. We have had lots of requests for these action cameras from our customers and we finally have secured the line for our stores. We will talk more about GoPro as we get them into stock.  

    This week’s Kibbles & Bytes special is a “**Hammerhead charging bundle**”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900002149/special-save-20-on-hammerhead-charging-bundle As you know we manufacture rugged braided lightning cables that are certified by Apple with their MFI “Made for iPhone” designation. This means that our manufacturer has passed all the tests with Apple and use genuine Apple lightning connectors. You do not have to worry about compatibility with MFI designation. This bundle includes two of these braided cables, our Hammerhead 2-port home charger and Hammerhead 2-port car charger. Each of these chargers have the capacity to charge an iPhone and an iPad simultaneously. Sold separately, this bundle would be $72.96 but exclusively for Kibbles & Bytes readers this week you can have this handy bundle for only “**$49.99!**”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900002149/special-save-20-on-hammerhead-charging-bundle 

  • Terminal Tidbits: say command

    Apple’s built in text-to-speech can be a useful tool, or just a lot of fun for pranks. This can be triggered via Terminal. When you go and open Terminal (found in the Applications > Utilities folder) you get a blank screen with a blinking cursor. Type *say “what you want you Mac to say”* and your Mac will speak to you. And you didn’t even have give it a treat!

    The say command has options like change its voice to something different. To see the options available in your OS, navigate to *System Preferences > Dictation & Speech > Text to Speech* and there is a menu with all of the available System Voices. To choose a voice in Terminal type: *say -v “Voice Name” “what you want your Mac to say”*

    You can also export the voice clip as audio file. To do this use *-o* and specify the file path. The command would look like this: *say “Hello World” -o hello recording.aiff*

    For more info type the following command into Terminal: *man say*

  • Life Expectancy

    It is well known that computer have a life expectancy. When I refer to the life expectancy of a computer I’m not referring to how long it will work, I’m referring to how long you can keep it up to date with supported software and get it serviced. Many machines will work for years past their life expectancy. If you are reading this on the model pictured on the right, your machine is definitely past its normal life expectancy.

    There are two terms that Apple uses for machine that they no longer have hardware support: Vintage and Obsolete. Apple usually classifies a machine as vintage once it reaches 5 to 7 years past its initial release and obsolete models are those that are 7 or more years old. Apple doesn’t provide hardware support for vintage and obsolete models, however most models that are vintage can support the latest software and receive updates.

    Once a machine becomes obsolete, however, it usually will no longer will be able to support the newest OS X and security updates. Once a machine has unsupported software the machine starts to be become more susceptible to security breaches. A common security breach comes from exploiting older software that has a known issue. Once your computer can’t accept a supported OS X (which is currently 10.10 Yosemite and 10.11 El Capitan) it reaches the end of its life expectancy because the machine is no longer is repairable by Apple and the machine cannot receive software updates.

  • Locate with the Terminal

    Unlike the Terminal *find* command, *locate* provides indexed search results which is faster than find. Before using locate, you must build a database of system files, which will allow you to search by using the locate command. To build the database type the following command:

    *sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.locate.plist*

    After the database is built you can run the locate command using the following syntax:

    *locate name*

    Locate does not search the files on your disk, instead it searches for file paths in a database. One downside of locate is that the database must be constantly updated in order for your new files to be included in the search. Now this should be updated automatically in a cron every morning but if it is not, you can manually update the database as a root user using the *updatedb* command. This will ensure your database is current. Please see the example below using locate to search for a particular file:

    !http://blog.smalldog.com/images/4655.png!

  • _Hello Fellow Technophiles,_

    Sometimes it seems like new operating systems appear more and more frequently. In reality, Apple has been on a pretty regular schedule of releasing a new OS once per year. Every time that they do, I get the same set of questions:

    * Should I update my machine?
    * Will my software/hardware be compatible?
    * Is it going to look really different?

    My answers are “maybe,” “maybe,” and “not really..but if you are on an old enough OS now…maybe?” There is no hard and fast rule for this. Of course, the decision may be made for you if your machine is not compatible with the newest OS. To complicate this whole thing, once you upgrade it can be very difficult to revert the machine. There is another way, though.

    You can add a partition to your drive and install the new OS there. This allows you to take it for a test run without upgrading your normal startup disk and its associated user accounts. As with any time that you are going to install a new OS or change your partition scheme, it is essential that you back up first. But assuming nothing goes wrong, and you decide you don’t like the new OS, all you have to do is remove the partition and you are right back to where you were.

    This week our techs bring you articles on using Terminal to locate files, an explanation of Apple’s designations of vintage and obsolete, and a way to get your computer to talk back to you.

    Mike
    “*michaeld@smalldog.com*”:mailto:michaeld@smalldog.com

  • I have been hosting phone bank parties for Bernie Sanders at my house as we head into the first caucuses and primaries. It is fun talking to folks out in Iowa and now New Hampshire to see who they are supporting and to tell them about the Senator from Vermont. I like being involved and feel if you are not involved, informed and voting you do sacrifice your right to complain about the results.

    Thank you for reading this issue of Kibbles & Bytes! We know it is YOU, our loyal customers that ultimately pay our wages and appreciate the support!

    Your Kibbles & Bytes Team,

    _Don, Dean, Emily & Scott_

  • Errata

    Last week a typo slipped by our proofers. Command+M is not open a new document but that command is Command+N. Sorry about that. To make up for it here are a couple more keyboard combinations you might find handy:

    **Command-Option-Esc** – If an app stops responding, you might need to force it to quit. You can do that with a right click on the app icon in the dock, but it’s even easier if you hit this keyboard shortcut. This will bring up the Force Quit dialog, which you can then use to make that non-responsive app quit. You might need to Command-Tab you way out of an active frozen app first, though, or use **Command+Shift+Option+Esc** to quit the currently active app.

    **Command-Option-P and R** – Here’s one that might challenge your fingers dexterity. Fortunately, you will hardly ever have to use it but it is used to reset your non-volatile random access memory (NVRAM). Information stored in NVRAM can include speaker volume, screen resolution, start-up disk selection and recent kernel panic information. If you are asked to reset your P-Ram or NVRAM here’s how you do it.

    1) Shut down your Mac
    2) Turn on your Mac
    3) Immediately after you hear the start up sound, hold down the command, option, P and R keys
    4) Hold those keys down until you hear the start up sound again and then release them.

  • iPhone 6s: First Impressions from a Smartphone Holdout

    Back in January of 2015, I decided that I was going to shift up both my cell phone and my cell phone plan. Prior to that I had been using my sister’s old flip phone. I had become jaded after my experience with my HTC Incredible that I bought after graduating college in 2010. It held so much promise at the time, as did Android. I had spent much of 2010 developing Android applications in school and was excited about the operating system.

    It just wasn’t meant to be though. After not that long I had problems with random crashing and progressive slowdown. My phone is the one piece of tech I need to be 100% reliable. No funny business. Before I ever had any kind of smartphone, I used my Palm device in conjunction with a flip phone. I was used to the Palm’s rock-solid performance.

    In deciding what to do, I chose to pick up a Palm Pre 2. In 2015, 5 or so years after it’s initial release, they could be had new for very cheap. To me, it was a smartphone that was going to be solid (thanks to WebOS) but that didn’t have any bells and whistles I didn’t really want or need anyway. I used it for the past year pretty successfully, even though the very last semblance of any WebOS updates or support was officially sunset in February of 2015. Pretty much none of the apps that depended on web-based services worked anymore.

    So a week ago, I came to the conclusion that I was officially satisfied with iOS and where it was headed based on my almost 2 years with my iPad Air. I went out and picked up an iPhone 6s Plus. Why the plus? Because I hate tiny screens and I need to do a lot of systems administration when I’m out and about. A bigger screen makes VNC, SSH and other management tools a lot easier to use.

    Now that it’s been a week, what are my impressions? I really like it. I actually think Apple nailed the physical design with the iPhone 5, but the design of the 6s is still pretty nice. This is my first device with Touch ID too, and I have to say, the speed on the 6s Touch ID sensor is amazing. I push the home button just like I always would, and it turns on and unlocks. It’s seriously snappy.

    I was surprised how much I liked the Health app. I didn’t even know it was there. I’ve been watching my health more closely lately, and I was immediately interested when I saw the phone counting my steps and helping me set goals for movement. I actually liked it so much, I picked up a “**Misfit Shine**”:http://www.smalldog.com/mfg/?MfrName=Misfit to augment it (and so steps are counted even if I’m not carrying my phone). It’s always hard to fix something if you don’t know what’s going on. I hope that by getting better data about my movement and exercise I can better work on my weak spots.

    As far as iPhone 6s specific features, I do think 3D Touch is pretty cool. When it was announced I thought it would be a gimmick that wasn’t very useful, but I really like the “peek” feature in mail. I often just quick glance over mail messages and then file them away. 3D Touch lets me do this in one step, and I find it really useful. 3D Touch also allows for what is hands down THE BEST control over text editing in iOS yet. Basically if you press on the onscreen keyboard with force, it turns into something more like a computer trackpad. With a light press you can move the cursor around and with a harder press you essentially “click” to start selecting text. This is an incredible feature that makes text editing on iOS not only reasonable, but actually enjoyable.

    Live photos I could take or leave. They’re neat, and I’ll probably leave the feature on just because, but I’m not sure if I’ll ever feel like “wow, I’m glad I had live photos there!”

    I know this is probably old news to a lot of readers, but I’ve actually been pretty slow to get onto the smartphone train, despite smartphones being particularly useful to someone like me. I’m looking forward to giving Apple Pay a try and I’m also excited to add the iPhone’s camera to my video recording arsenal.

  • The Most Profit Ever in a Single Quarter

    Apple posted record earnings and profit for the holiday quarter disappointing those analysts that predicted less than stellar results. Of course, the realistic guidance for the next quarter sent Apple stock plummeting while those same analysts maintain a price target that is $40-50 higher than the current price of the stock. Okay, so Apple’s profit and revenue were all time records for the company but the remarkable tidbit is that no public corporation ever has posted that much profit in a single quarter. Let’s see how Apple did that.

    First of all, Apple sold 74.8 million iPhones in the quarter. Not too shabby and that revenue is nearly 70% of Apple’s total. The average sales price (ASP) for the iPhone was up to $691 which also led to slightly higher gross margin. To put that is some perspective that is an average of 34,000 iPhones sold per hour 24/7 for 13 weeks.

    They finished the quarter with about $215 billion in cash which represents about $39/share. Macs sales were down a bit at 5.3 million units and the iPad continues to do moderate in sales with sales dropping year on year from 21.4 million units to 16.1 million units.

    Currency “headwinds” have caused some of these results to be muted. With the exceptionally strong dollar it is more difficult to export US goods and sales suffer a bit. The Euro and British Pound were down double digits and the Canadian and Australian dollars were down 20% or more. It gets worse. The Russian Ruble is down by 50% and Brazilian Real is down 40%. Apple estimated that if it were not for these global currency fluctuations that their revenue would have been over $80 billion representing an 8% increase. But despite those headwinds, Apple posted their best quarter ever.

    Other high points were service revenue which was the highest ever at over $6 billion. Wow, $6 billion in just iTunes, App store and a few other things. That is more revenue that quite a few well known companies and a 24% growth year over year. Other products which include the Apple TV, Beats and Apple Watch also were strong with $4.5 Billion in sales.

    In another milestone that just points to the success of the services side of Apple’s business Tim Cook announced that they now calculate that there are more than 1 billion Apple devices in use worldwide which is up 25% year over year. That is simply incredible considering that there are only 7.4 billion people on the planet!

    What sent Apple stock down was Apple’s realistic prediction that iPhones sales in their 2nd fiscal quarter would decline year over year by as much as 15-20%. Last year’s 2nd quarter was strong because of supply issues that moved some revenue from the 1st to 2nd quarter and the impact of the global currency situation has caused some price adjustments. Apple remains very bullish on the iPhone market and pointed to the fact that in China over 50% of the iPhones sold were to people buying their first iPhone. Apple pointed out that the growth of the middle class in China is unprecedented with the middle class comprising about 50 million people in 2010 and now it is projected to be $500,000,000 by 2020.

    Even if Apple sells “only” the 40-45 million iPhones in this quarter that would still be more revenue that most companies earn overall in a single quarter. To put this in perspective, Apple books more revenue at strong margins, than Amazon, Facebook, Google or Microsoft generate from all of their operations.

    All in all the financial results that Apple announced were an incredible testament to the quality and innovation of Apple products and of a company doing things right. Congratulations to the entire Apple team!

  • _Dear Friends,_

    I have become super aware of mosquitos with all the news about the Zika virus. For some reason biting insects just love me whether they are super tiny no-see-ums here in the Keys or slightly larger ones in Vermont they seem to be attracted to me. The first thing that I noticed about the mosquitos down here is that they are tiny compared to the ones that come out every year in Vermont. Seriously though, this Zika virus seems like a very serious health epidemic with the World Health Organization calling it a crisis. They have a pretty serious mosquito control program down here with guys that go door to door to look for standing water and spraying year around.

    Apple announced their holiday quarter financials and they beat the estimates on the street and posted the most revenue and profit ever for Apple and in a truly remarkable factoid, the most profit generated in a quarter by any public corporation, EVER. I will talk about the financial results below but let’s just say if Apple has reached a plateau it sure is a lofty one! Just to contrast that a bit against the other guys, Samsung reported a 40% decline in profits. They posted about a $15.8 billion profit for the entire year which Apple crushed in a single three month period!

    This week’s Kibbles & Bytes exclusive features the “**Apple Certified Reconditioned 21 inch iMac**.”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900002135/special-apple-certified-reconditioned-21-5in-imac-2-7ghz-w-applecare-for-1099 This iMac is configured with a 2.7GHZ i5 processor 8GB of ram and a 1 TB hard drive. This model has the latest 802.11ac wireless protocol and comes with the same 1 year warranty as new iMacs. We are bundling it with Applecare so instead of a 1 year warranty you get 3 years and instead of 90 day days of free Apple technical support you get 3 years too. Kibbles & Bytes readers can purchase this special bundle for “**$1099!**”:http://www.smalldog.com/wag900002135/special-apple-certified-reconditioned-21-5in-imac-2-7ghz-w-applecare-for-1099 That’s the lowest price ever for a warrantied iMac with Applecare!

  • Keyboard Shortcuts

    I got my start in using computers with CPM operating system and keyboard shortcuts were present there. I used them all the time…