Times Table Football – iPhone / Android App

Check out my new app:

Learn Times Tables while you play sport !

A fun way to learn your times tables – combine playing football with learning!

www.timestablefootball.com

Available on iPhone/iPad/iTouch

Available on Android

iOS5 and iCloud in my world

I jumped back into blogging with my previous iTunes Match post after a long blogging drought. Thought it would be prudent to share some experiences of using iOS5 and iCloud on the various devices in my family world.

Some background, I have a Macbook an iPhone and an Apple TV all upgraded to latest versions.  The rest of the family have various iPhones, iPods etc and they share the iTunes library and purchases on my iTunes account / Apple ID.

iTunes Account / Apple ID

So the first challenge was how to setup my iCloud account.  I had a previous Apple ID which was my long standing hotmail email account.  This is the Apple ID I have used for all my iTunes store purchases.  I used the ID to activate the iCloud.  This gave me access to all the iCloud features except for email.  I decided that I wanted everything in one nice shiny Apple pot so added a new me.com email account to my Apple ID.  Note if you are a new user with no previous Apple ID, then just create a new Apple ID with a me.com account and happy days.

So, now I have an Apple ID and a linked me.com email account.  What I did not realise originally is I can now login to anywhere on Apple using my original hotmail or new me.com email accounts.  I have seen lots of forum post regarding requests for the ability to merge these accounts … but as you can log in with either and get all features, not sure why this is required.

Setting up the Macbook, Apple TV and iPhone was simple using the iCloud and my Apple ID:

Now the curious maybe wondering about my hotmail email?  Well I made the simple decision to now use my me.com account from now on, I used to love Microsoft, it is now Apple all the way!  Now I don’t want to go and change my hotmail account everywhere I have used it so thankfully in hotmail you can configure it to forward your emails to another account – simples.

So now mail, contacts, calendar, reminders, bookmarks, notes, photo stream and device backups synced between Macbook and iPhone using the iCloud, the only difficult bit was migrating my mail, contacts and calendar entries from hotmail to me.com (that is a whole other story).  Note: because of all the settings, you can switch on/off any options and continue to use previous providers where required … I was just after a clean break and the complete integrated Apple experience with all devices.  One other gotcha was that Apple have got higher requirement for password strength now so some features of the iCloud did not work until I had changed my Apple ID password to include capital letters etc.

Now iTunes Match is here see previous post the iTunes Music library is also now synced into the cloud and shared with my personal devices.

Family Sharing

Ok, what about other family members that also share the family iTunes purchases. Each member has created a new Apple ID/iCloud account with a new me.com email address.  They have configured which bits they want to sync with the iCloud, most are continuing to use their hotmail accounts for email / calendar etc, which continues to work without problems.

Now the clever bit, on their devices they can configure a different store account for purchases.  They just add my original Apple ID account here and they get all the benefits of the iCloud but still access all the family purchases from the iTunes store, e.g. Apps and Music.

For some more info, see Apple IDs and iCloud.

Now, I am using iTunes Match to share my music between my Macbook, iPhone and Apple TV which is great, but not ideal for sharing with other family members.  So the rest of the family continue to sync their chosen playlists with the iTunes library.   This can now be done without the need to plug the white cable in, by enabling the Sync over WiFi option:

Home Sharing

For a slight variation on the sharing of music between family members devices, if they have their own PC/Mac, iTunes Home Sharing can be setup so their iTunes instances get access to the master iTunes library on my Macbook.  They can then managed their own iTunes library and copy any music from the master that they require.  Their devices can now be synced with their own PC/Mac.  This has the advantage that they can manage their own iTunes music library instance without the risk of messing mine up, but still access all the shared purchases.  They can also add their own music of dubious taste to their own libraries without cluttering mine – perfect.

Calendar Sharing

Finally, a great feature is calendar subscriptions.  For both my me.com calendar and the wife’s hotmail calendar there are options to share the calendar.  This produces a web link that devices can add as a subscribed calendar.

So for example, I have a personal calendar called home that I have shared with the wife.  The wife has shared her hotmail calendar that I have subscribed to.  It really is great trying to organise a busy family life when you can instantly see what is going on.  You can also subscribe to any other public sports team or event calendars that are available just search google for a relevant iCalendar or ICS, click on the link and subscribe.

iTunes Match Impressions

iTunes Match arrived in UK, and overall it really is very good!!!

I enabled it in iTunes (paying the 20 odd pound) and it did it’s stuff for a few hours.  I have approx 3000 songs so the 25000 sony limit set by Apple was not an issue for me.  Of the 3000 songs about half were already purchased from iTunes so it cleverly just links to the Apple iTunes copy in the iCloud.  Of the rest which were rip’s from my own CD’s, iTunes matched most of them with the equivalent high quality iTunes version (more about that later).  Where they were not matched (not many) the track was uploaded to the cloud.

Ok so my music collection is now backed up to the cloud, so what does that give me:

• A backup obviously
• Now available to any iOS 5 device, other laptop/mac iTunes or even AppleTV
• iOS 5 devices can now see all music/playlists in the iCloud not just the ones you used to sync with iTunes.  They can be downloaded straight to the device anytime.
• AppleTV using new Music menu can play music straight from the iCloud – it cleverly buffers the songs so no waiting even on my 3meg broadband connection.
• For all matched songs I can now download the iTunes 256kbps version if I want.

The Bad, well not much so far:

• After switching it on my iPhone, there was a nervous moment as all my playlists disappeared, they did come back but with one notable exception.  The purchased list no longer appears.
• If I change the Album cover art on some songs, it gets replaced by iTunes Match next time I do a sync.
• I had a few songs that were stuck waiting sync on the first pass, but this was rectifed later by going to iTunes Store menu and selecting ‘Update iTunes Match’ – much quicker second time.

A little tip, for all the songs that were matched.  If you want to get the iTunes version in your iTunes collection instead of a poorer quality local version, then unfortunately there is no update all button.  You can however use a iTunes smart playlist.  Create a new smart playlist with the following criteria:

• iCloud Status is Matched
• Kind is not Matched AAC Audio File

This will create a new playlist of all the songs in your library which were just matched to an equivalent iTunes version.  Selecting songs and option delete will prompt you, do you want to delete, make sure you DONT select delete the iCloud version.

The song will now be replaced with a download link to the iTunes version.  You can do this for as big a selection as you feel confident with or have time enough for the download.

 

One last point, I think my experience was so trouble free, because my iTunes library was already in a very neat and tidy state before I started.  I receomend spending a little time making sure your library is in order, songs are correctly named with meta data and relevant album cover art etc. before starting.  Obviously make sure you have a backup as well first. 

If you happen to have any songs in your library that came from dubious sources (not that anyone has or should) and you don’t want to share with Apple, then you might want to remove from your library before running iTunes match.

Replacing iPod Hard Drive

Replaced the hard drive on my ageing iPod 20GB, because it was corrupt and would not sync with iTunes any more.

Bought replacement Toshiba disk drive (MK2004GAL) for £15 off eBay, and followed instructions here:

http://joshhighland.com/blog/2005/12/24/replacing-the-hardrive-of-an-ipod/

Very easy!

Note: iPod updater is no longer required, just plug into iTunes and it will automatically restore the software.

Windsurfing at Newton Bay (Porthcawl, South Wales)

Finally got the new North Ice 2010 rig out for a great blast at Newton Bay.

Rigged the 5.7 with my Starboard Kombat 97l, as it did not feel that windy on the beach.  First time I have sailed Newton so should have taken the locals advice and gone smaller.  There is a wind shadow for the first 100 yards and then it kicks in.  5.0 would have been better but cranked some more downhaul and outhaul on the 5.7 and could just about hold on in the 35mph + gusts.  Thoroughly pleased with the North gear it feels so much more controllable than the Tushingham Storms I am used to.  When catching the waves back in it is fantastic, it just goes light in you hands when you need it as you carve back in.

It was a busy day at Newton with 30 sailors out – might go down as the ‘best ever’ session so far, still need to work out those carve gybes though as it is a hard workout water-starting all the time.

 

PS3 Watching / Streaming Video

There are a number of options for watching video on the PS3…

 

(1) Stream Video from Windows Media Player

This is a relatively simple option if using Windows 7, but only supports common Windows Media Player codecs.

 

(2) Stream Video from PS3 Media Server

http://ps3mediaserver.blogspot.com/

This free download for Windows / Linux / Mac is an excellent DLNA compliant Upnp Media Server for the PS3 that can stream all sorts of video formats.

 

(3) Attach an external USB disk to PS3

Another option is to copy video files to an external USB drive and attach it to the PS3.

First you need to format the drive as FAT32, because that is the only format the PS3 will recognise (FAT32 has a 4GB file size limit).  For large drives which can’t be formatted to FAT32 in Windows you will need to use a utility like ‘Fat32Formatter’ (make sure you run as administrator if on Windows Vista/7).

Next you will have to create the ‘standard’ PS3 folder structure for the PS3 to find the files:

North Ice 2010 Arrives

Just as the cold Northerly winds hit the UK, my new North Ice sails finally arrive.

I had to wait for a delivery from Austria, Nik Baker is the distributor in UK http://www.k66.org.uk/ , I ordered mine from Robin Hood Watersports http://www.roho.co.uk/ , who provided an excellent service.

I have not used them on the water yet, but rigged one up in the garden to try out the VTS (visual trim system), anything that takes the guesswork out of rigging has got to be welcome.  The following picture is the complete North Rig out of the box with Silver series boom and RDM mast plus Power XT RDM extension.  (Notice the colourful sheets underneath because I did not want to get the rig wet / dirty – sad I know!)

 

The ratchet handle on the Power XT RDM extension makes down hauling a breeze:

Now the VTS system, Just keep tensioning the downhaul until the sail becomes loose to the chosen mark (min for less wind or max for when its windier):

Setting the boom height, there is a guide to tell you the boom length for the height:

Now pick the clew position (min for less wind, or max for when its windier):

Finally, there is even a guide to position the harness lines:

Simples … can’t wait for warmer South Westerly’s to give them a try!

 

Read an early review here:

http://purewindsurfing.blogspot.com/2009/11/2010-northsails-ice-review.html

iTunes – Maximum of 5 devices

iTunes has a limit of 5 devices that can be registered per account.  The devices refer to the computers/laptops that you authorised to use your iTunes account through iTunes (as far as iknow there is no limit on the number of iPods/iTouches/iPhones that can be synced).  Computers can be de-authorised within iTunes to free up devices but what if you no longer have the computer … well you can remove all devices when you have reached the total of 5 using iTunes, full instructions in link below, you can then re-authorise computers as required:

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1420

Nokia 6730 – How to stop the message light flashing?

If you are switching from an older phone to a newer Nokia 6730 and using your existing SIM, there is a chance that the message icon will be flashing when you turn it on.

This could because of ‘lost’ SMS messages stored on the SIM.  Go to your Messages, then Options, then SIM Messages and delete the messages from there.

Windsurfing West Kirby Marine Lake

As I was in Manchester for the weekend I drove over to West Kirby Marine Lake to check it out.  This is a large salt water lake near Liverpool that is about 5ft deep.  It is great for flat water blasting and freestyle because of the protection of the sea wall.  See below for Google maps view:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=West+Kirby&sll=53.314608,-3.499897&sspn=0.005922,0.015514&gl=uk&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=West+Kirby,+Wirral,+Merseyside,+United+Kingdom&ll=53.367558,-3.186679&spn=0.01183,0.031028&t=h&z=15

 

Unfortunately when I arrived the wind had gone, typical after a weekend of 30mph plus winds!

Here are a few photos, will have to try it on a future trip: