CyanogenMod 10.2 and the Nexus 4
I bought a Nexus 4 a couple of months ago when it was reduced to clear, having previously been using a Galaxy Nexus which ran CyanogenMod 10.1, which was based on Android 4.2. This...
Category: Tech
A fortnight of upgrades
The past couple of weeks, I've upgraded the operating systems on all three of the computers I own (not including my mobile phone and tablet). I've a Mac, a desktop PC and a laptop...
Apple needs more than a cheap phone to wipe out Android
iPhone 5C: if Apple produces a cheap phone, it could wipe out its rivals Mic Wright (@brokenbottleboy on Twitter) says that if Apple launches a cheap iPhone tonight (the rumoured iPhone 5C), it could...
Twitter silence is not an answer
Recently in the UK (not sure how many of my overseas readers are aware of it) there has been a major controversy about abuse of women activists on Twitter, which erupted when a feminist...
Korora 19: not a great advance on Fedora
In my review of Fedora 19 (in the last entry), I noted that I thought Fedora had abandoned the idea of end-users using Fedora and were targeting distro developers instead. There is a Fedora...
Fedora 19: clearly not for end users
A few months ago I published a scathing review of Fedora 18, the last release of the Linux distribution which started life as Red Hat Linux, once the version of Linux that everyone who...
Hawking, the boycott and the Israeli CPU
Last week Professor Stephen Hawking pulled out of a conference in Israel, reportedly as part of an academic boycott of Israeli institutions on the grounds of it operating an Apartheid-type regime against its Palestinian...
SwiftKey’s bogus adventure (and not so bogus bugs)
Earlier this afternoon I saw an announcement on Twitter from SwiftKey, the people behind my favourite keyboard on Android: a new way of using their keypad that they called "SwiftKey Tilt", which meant you...
Getting CyanogenMod on the Galaxy Nexus
A month or so ago I bought a second-hand Samsung Galaxy Nexus phone — I had intended to get a Nexus 4, but there were the usual supply problems at the time, and I...
How not to market a smartphone (or: How to not market a smartphone)
Recently I’ve been hearing a lot about the newly revamped BlackBerry 10, which has been appearing in various phone shops (shops like Carphone Warehouse as well as the carrier franchises). It’s also appeared on...
Fedora 18: Dangerous to your Data
Last month Fedora released the latest version of their Linux distribution, version 18, codenamed "Spherical Cow", a reference to an engineering joke, the main new feature of which is a redesigned installer (still called...
Linux Mint is Ubuntu. Get over it!
Earlier today I was browsing the latest edition of Linux User & Developer, a British Linux magazine with a more in-depth analytical focus than Linux Format, which concentrates on reviews, tutorials and interviews with...
Google versus Samsung Android
Battle of the Androids: Google Android vs. Samsung Android Yesterday I took delivery of a Samsung Galaxy Nexus, which was the previous incarnation of the “official” Google phone line (it’s now been replaced by...
Windows 8: some first impressions
Yesterday I took the plunge and installed Windows 8 on my laptop. I had hesitated to do this, because of various reports such as that the Desktop (that is, the running of the normal...
The importance of staying connected
Over the years that the Internet has existed as a mass medium (which is more or less my adult life — I first got online at university in 1995, before Google and just as...
Yahoo and T-Mobile preserve an ancient tradition: inaccessible Captchas
This post is cross-posted to Same Difference, and you can comment there or here. Captchas are a method websites use to tell whether a visitor is a person or a computer. This is typically...
Upgrading your Galaxy S: there’s no easy way
I spent the past two days upgrading my Android phone, a Samsung Galaxy S (model i9000) to the new version of Android. There have actually been several new versions since the last one Samsung...
Windows 8: tablet as desktop coming to a desk near you
I’ve been noticing various articles about the impending Windows 8 release on OSNews appear recently, and it doesn’t look good. I’ve been using Linux a lot since about 2002, and one of the worst...
Review: Acer Aspire 5733Z
Last Saturday I bought a new laptop, a purchase made necessary by the fact that my old laptop had given up the ghost after just over four years. I had been using that for...
BADD 2012: mobile accessibility
Being Accessible Doesn’t Just Mean Ramps – Blogging Against Disablism Day » Dannilion.com Danni Brennand posted the above article this morning, regarding how accessibility is often taken to mean providing wheelchair ramps, rather than...