noisypoppy!

Apple sucks at shuffle.

I’m not talking about the device (ipod shuffle) .. I’m talking about the way they use shuffle.

Here are a few things that further illustrate my point:

in iTunes:

This has bugged me for fucking years .. 95% of the time I listen to my iTunes library on shuffle and anybody who knows me knows how obsessive compulsive I am about switching tracks all the time until I find one that’s just right.

So say I’m listening to iTunes on shuffle here’s what plays:

Song I -> Song A-> Song G -> Song T -> Song N -> Song F

and then when I get to Song F I decide “Hey, I feel like listening to Song I again” so I search for it and play it.  After that, guess what happens?  Yep that’s right:

Song I -> Song A-> Song G -> Song T -> Song N -> Song F -> angry poppy

Next thing that pisses me off ..

on my iPhone (probably applies to iPod also):

Say I’m listening to the iPod on shuffle again:

Song I -> Song A-> Song G -> Song T -> Song N -> Song F

and then I get up to Song G and decide “Hey, the album that Song G is on has another song I feel like listening to ..”, so naturally I hit “Album” which Song G is on and select the song I want to listen to ..

What happens?

Song G album starts to shuffle

Goddamnit!

Previous naughty dock

So basically I had a bit of a revolution on the computer front and decided to trash all my cracked/hacked apps and replace them with more happy karma inducing open source software.

So here’s what I’m switching:

• Safari -> Firefox 3.5rc2
• Apple Mail -> Thunderbird 3b2 (fed up with Apple Mail’s lousy IMAP)
• Photoshop CS3 -> Gimp
• BBEdit -> Smultron
• Logic Pro 8/Garageband 09 -> Ardour 2
• Parallels -> VirtualBox
• Toast -> Burn
• Microsoft Office 08 -> OpenOffice
• Transmit -> Cyberduck
• MSN Messenger -> Adium
• Quicktime Pro -> Miro // VLC
• Spotlight -> Quicksilver

Current happier dock ^_^

So I haven’t managed to find any free open-source apps to replace Reason and Reaktor but I’m trying to move away from my old sound they they’re going in the bin anyhow

I think for now I won’t replace any iLife apps including iTunes with Songbird because I’ve techincally paid for those apps and they work great.

Also Tweetie stays where it is until a sexier open source twitter app comes along.

I should also mention that after trashing the commercial apps and replacing with open source apps I’ve now an extra 15GB free ^_^

I’ll post again in about a week or two and see what I’ve caved on.

Original link here

This is an excerpt from my last french exam.

TRANSLATION:
Q: Does the Hotel Plaza have less rooms than the Hotel de la Gare?
A: No, the Hotel de la Gare has more rooms than the Hotel Plaza.

<Saku Saku!> why don’t you linux up your mb?

<spawn57> it;s for my mom

<Saku Saku!> *cough*

<spawn57> what?

<Saku Saku!> nothin

<Saku Saku!> I avoided a joke

<spawn57> oh oki

<spawn57> wonder how long you can hold it before you explode

<Saku Saku!> I’VE GOT SOMETHING FOR YOUR MUM

<Saku Saku!> sorry

<Saku Saku!> :$

<spawn57> you fucker..

So about the travel blog things, I’ve taken them off the front page and turned off the twitter notifications but I’ll still be doing my regular daily updates (er and sometimes 3 in one day when I forget and need to catch up) .. you’ll just need to go to the 「travel section」

Anyway ..

“Why do they call it an xbox 360?  Because when you see it you turn 360 degrees and walk away”

I know some of you might be bored by the travel entries, but I’m just trying to keep a personal log of it somewhere (3 years later)..

Anyway, to make up for that here are some pics:

*driving Kimberley to work*

<noisypoppy> Oh, my God, they found me, I don’t know how, but they found me.
<Kimberley> who?
*points to VW van*
<noisypoppy> who do you think?  THE LYBIANS!
<Kimberley> …

So last night Kimberley and I headed to the city to get some sushi up ins.  We headed to Takas and Kimberley ordered a large chicken katsu and I decided since she was getting a large I might as well get a large also because I was hungry so I settled on a large assorted sushi platter .. this is what came out ..

すしを食べましょう!

I did my best but could not eat it all ^_^

watching FOTC in class

Things I did in todays French class:

• Configured a girls VPN on her iPhone so she could download a french translator to help with questions
• watched two french skits
• watched an episode of Flight of the Conchords (it was the Foux da fafa one)
• ate cheese
• ate quiche
• drank wine
• had a conversation in Russian with a girl in my class

Things I did not do in my French class:

• Learn french

Sounds like a cool class .. but when you’re paying $700 a unit it’s not so cool ¬_¬

Testosterone gels made by Solvay SA and Auxilium Pharmaceuticals Inc, used to boost sex drive in aging men, may inadvertently rub off on children with harmful effects that include enlarged genitalia, US regulators said.

Childrens secondhand exposure to the products also has been linked to increased libido and premature development of pubic hair, the Food and Drug Administration said today in a statement.

…sounds like it works!

I’ve owned a lot of mobile phones in my short history of using the things.  I’ve always disliked the idea that anyone can contact me at any given moment – and combined with my constant annoyance at people texting while walking, talking loud on their phones, walking away from their phone and letting it ring and generally loud obnoxious ringtones, I’ve always hated the things.

While everyone was carrying around a mobile phone pretty much from 1999 onwards, I had always carried around a little red book with my friends phone numbers and addresses which made for quite an inconvenience when I needed to make a phonecall and there wasn’t a phone around.

In 2000 & 2001 when I reached my senior years in high school I watched as all my friends obtained mobile phones and spent 99% of their time on the fucking things.

In 2003 when I moved back to Mackay I lived with my parents and they didn’t appreciate my friends calling at all hours so I finally bit the bullet and decided to buy a mobile phone.

Since I didn’t have a job at the time and wasn’t on any benefits from the Government I decided pre-paid was the way to go.  My first stop was eBay where I managed to find a Vodafone pre-paid starter kit for $10.

Now all I had to get was a phone ..

Introducing my first phone – Motorola’s P7389 in all it’s glory.

This phone did the job fine: it stored my contacts, made phone calls and (painfully) I could write text messages.

I held onto this phone for approx 3 months, until one day my sister’s boyfriend bought himself a fancy new colour screen phone (with FM radio!) and told me I could have his old phone for $20.

How could I resist such a generous offer?

 Introducing my Nokia 3310.

This phone pleased me no end when I got it.  Not only was I no longer carrying around a phone the size of a cinder block, I also had the ability to create and download my own (monotone) ringtones!

I spent many nights writing & creating ringtones for this little sucker from all my favourite songs.

That was until the night the phone decided it had had enough with life and suicided, leading to an ultra night of trouble. 

The night my phone died I was meant to pickup my girlfriend from work as I insisted to her earlier that day not to catch a cab, that I will pick her up.  I was sitting around playing games and irc’ing when I decided to check what time it was on my phone only to find out that it had locked up hours ago.  I rebooted and found out numerous missed calls and messages from my girlfriend.  She had been feeling sick at work and decided that she should probably finish early and go home.  So I raced into town to pick her up only to get pulled over by the police for speeding and while the cop was giving me a ticket I received a text message saying she couldn’t wait any longer and caught a cab home.

An unhappy & sick girlfriend and a speeding ticket later my phone kicked the bucket and left me once again in the pre-mobile phone era.

I needed a new phone and since I didn’t have enough money for a new one, I had to go for a contract.  

My girlfriend, becoming frustrated with her old Ericsson piece of junk, had gotten an upgrade to a fancy new colour screen phone a few days earlier.

I became a little jealous of this and had no option, so one night I headed to the Vodafone shop to try my hand at signing up for a contract.  It was a success ..

 My first contracted & colour screen phone - Sharp GX10i

I’m going to say now, this phone to date is my second favourite phone I have ever owned.

It’s interface was fast, text was simple, it handled java well, battery life was fantastic and I got to try my first camera phone with MMS.

Not to mention I now had a phone capable of an alarm which was handy considering I spent 96% of the time sleeping at my girlfriend’s house.  The alarm tone I chose drove her nuts and continues to drive her nuts when I hum it.

The main thing that shitted me about this phone was the network I was on which had ultra poor reception in the heavily armoured studio and out in the industrial areas where I worked at my second job, so I waited out my 12 month contract and idiotically I bought into the CDMA garbage that Telstra was spinning at the time.

Introducing my third phone – Kyocera Koi

I’m going to say this – this is absolutely the worst phone I have ever owned.

It was incredibly expensive, stupidly awkward and half of the features didn’t work.

Including (but not limited to) one of my most used option: alarm clock.

It was flakey as anything, it decided at random intervals that it would go off but never for the actual time I set it for.

Another annoying feature (though more CDMA’s fault), it didn’t have a SIM card so I was locked to this phone for the remainder of my contract (which thankfully was only another 12 months).

As soon as the contract ran out I headed down to the Telstra shop and got myself a new phone.

Introducing – Motorola RAZR V3

I, like most people, fell in love with this phone the second I laid eyes on it.  It was slim, remarkably sexy and it sync’d with iSync and Apple Address Book (a feature I’d never had in a phone before)

I decided to ignore the nay sayers who were all saying how flimsy and easily breakable it was, and got one. 

I found it was one of the sturdiest phones I had owned.  I’m not sure where all those rumours came from.

The alarm worked which is something I was relieved about.. still, good looks, sturdiness and a working alarm were not enough to make up for a piece of shit operating system.

This is by far one of the slowest interfaces I’ve ever used on a phone before.  Everything on it was extremely painful to do.  So much so, I grew to loathe people who texted me expecting a reply.

Once again, as soon as the contract ran out on this I raced out to grab a new phone ..

Introducing the JASJAM iMATE

Yes that’s right, a Mac user with a Windows Mobile device.

Let me explain this phone.  It’s one of those things that you show off to all your friends and make them jealous – but as soon as you get time alone with the device, you cry yourself to sleep wishing you hadn’t been such a moron and bought one.

Why? The alarm worked, but it was really fucking quiet and I slept through it most of the time.  Messaging was OK, I’m not a fan of slide out QWERTY on mobile phones and Windows Mobile 5 is more unstable than Windows ME.  I was constantly having to reboot this phone due to memory leaks and just random bollocks.

Not to mention USING A STYLUS TO DO EVERYTHING IS A PAIN IN THE ASS.

One thing I did like about this phone however, is it made me a lot of money when I decided to sell it prematurely.

Which lead me to keep most of the cash and buy my next phone on sale for $60 at my local post office ..

Introducing the Motorola L6

I dunno what the fuck is wrong with me .. not only did I hate the RAZR and it’s slow interface .. I’m not a big fan of candybar phones as I like the clamshell so buttons don’t get pressed and I don’t have to fuck around with pain in the ass lock/unlock shit.

This phone is pretty much the same as the V3 RAZR with additional pain in the ass features such as “Buttons getting pressed in your pocket” and “Calling your boss while you’re calling him a fuckstick resulting in you getting fired” (didn’t really happen, but that’s funny right?).

As soon as my iMate contract ran out, for some retarded reason I decided to try again with Motorola ..

Introducing Motorola V3i

Okay, before you go calling me a retard again .. my dad bought one of these and one for mum also.  I gave it a good test before I got one and because I loved the design so much and the interface issues had been addressed, I decided to go get one.

I was actually pretty happy with this phone and used it pleasantly for (most of) the life on it’s contract.  I eventually lost this phone on the train and decided I’d had enough with Telstra’s gouging, so I paid out what was left on my contract and jumped to the 3 network for a cheaper option.

Introducing LG KU990 “Viewty”

This phone .. I got a little excited about the iPhonishness (before the iPhone was released in Aus) and the 5.0MP camera.

Overall this phone was okay and I would probably use it again if my iPhone fell in a pit of acid.

The touch was actually pretty responsive and had an easy to use interface.  The alarm worked, and texting was a breeze.  The biggest issue I had was selecting phone contacts (for calls and texting), it wasn’t hard .. it was just awkward and took longer than it should have.

Sometimes this phone would just randomly drop out too .. not all the time but .. sometimes ..

As soon as my contract neared it’s end and Kim bought an iPhone I jumped over to Optus and grabbed myself a 16GB White iPhone.

Introducing the iPhone 3G

This phone is sex on a stick and I could not imagine buying another type of phone.

Enough said .. until my fantastic review that is ..