Martin Stut about Applied Information Technology

Diaspora, a Social Network that Respects Your Privacy

Martin Stut — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 05:00:33 +0000

Many people want some kind of social networking, but don’t like the (non-)privacy style of Facebook.

There is an alternative being developed: Diaspora. I have heard of it, but when a friend told me his Diaspora address, I had a hard time getting started, so I’ll try to share some useful links:

Tutorial and introduction: http://differentcomputers.com/diaspora-user-tutorial
Step-by-step tutorial for getting started: http://diasporial.com/tutorials

If you want to join, you’ll either need an invitation or a pod (roughly equivalent to a server) that’ll accept users without invitation. One of those is diasp.org.

They say, it’s not yet ready for the masses. I can confirm this, because there are still a lot of server errors.

Filed under: test Tagged: diaspora, privacy, social network, web

Screenshot App for Android

Martin Stut — Sat, 12 Nov 2011 05:00:47 +0000

Because I wanted to document a few things about Android apps, I was looking for an app to take screenshots. Unfortunately, a search in the market revealed, that the few screenshot apps that exist, all require you to root you phone. I’m not planning to do this on my HTC Desire, because it would void the warranty and might even render the device useless.

Filed under: general Tagged: android, root, screenshot

Project Planning for Android with Projektplan Free

Martin Stut — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 05:00:09 +0000

A few days ago, I had to plan a real world project (arranging a new bank account for a small local church). The number of steps (16 tasks, 24 links) is high enough, that a dependency aware tool is helpful. So I searched the Android Market for a project management app that could handle dependencies and display them in a Gantt-diagram.

I ended up trying Projektplan Free (home page: http://www.thorstensapps.de, German language only). It took a while until I understood the modal user interface, but then it became really useable, so I could enter the tasks and dependencies as fast as I could plan them. By carefully adjusting the times needed (taking “banks are closed during nights and weekends” into account), I even got a rough estimate of the duration of the project.

Projektplan Free is missing some features that may be important to business users: resources and calendars. The display screens are there, but I found no way to add data.

It displays ads, but only on the list of all projects, not on the gantt-list of tasks within a project. That’s a place where I can tolerate them.

Summary: Projektplan Free is good for visualizing dependencies in small projects, but not good enough for professional use. Pros need Desktop tools like GanttProject or OpenProj – or web tools like Gantter.

Filed under: test Tagged: android, app, planning, project, Projektplan

Upgrading Ubuntu from 11.04 to 11.10 – You Can Keep the Gnome Desktop

Martin Stut — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 16:37:00 +0000

Besides my Debian Linux Desktop at home, I’m operating an encrypted portable Ubuntu Linux on an 8 GB USB stick. When Ubuntu 11.10 came out, I ran the usual upgrade on it.

The process downloaded more than 900 MB (23 minutes on a 6000 kbps home DSL line), the upgrade took almost three hours (cheap USB sticks are slow when being written to), but there were no flaws in the process. The system was even perfectly bootable after the upgrade – a lot better than a year or so ago, when some change in /etc/fstab broke the encrypted root mount.

But when I started logging in, I was disappointed to have lost my Gnome Desktop. Just before I started to (grudgingly) accept the loss, I got the idea of searching the Ubuntu Software Center for packages containing “gnome” in their name. The first (most relevant) match was “gnome”, the desktop environment. I installed that (took more than ten minutes, but it’s a big piece of software and USB sticks are slow when being written to) and after the reboot, there was a gear wheel next to the password field. Clicking on that gear wheel opened a menu with half a dozen choices, including “Gnome without effects”. I chose that and got the Gnome desktop.

Filed under: howto Tagged: desktop, gnome, linux, ubuntu, upgrade

Testing USB Sticks

Martin Stut — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 10:07:11 +0000

From a local IT shop (LWM Marburg) I got some old USB sticks. Before using them for important data, I wanted to make sure, they really store the data written to them. So I set out and looked for testing software, preferably running on Linux. It’s surprisingly hard to find.

The classic piece of testing software seems to be h2testw, for Windows, created by the German publishing house Heise. It expects a formatted stick. Testing is done by writing as many huge files (1 GB each) as will fit and then read them to check whether they contain the data that was written. This won’t test every corner, but it will detect fakes (having less capacity than advertised) and it will run without administrator rights.

Filed under: howto, test Tagged: test, usb, windows

Simplenote Apps on Android

Martin Stut — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 16:03:48 +0000

On http://web.appstorm.net/how-to/simplenote-the-power-of-plain-text/ I read about simplenote. The description looked interesting enough to make me check how it compares to catch.com, my current favorite, so I signed up for a free account on simplenoteapp.com. Their product seems to run on https://simple-note.appspot.com/ .

I ended up comparing a bunch of Simplenote clients for Android with catch.com. Because I don’t have permanent network connectivity (e.g. not in speeding trains in rural areas or inside concrete buildings), I put emphasis on clients capable of offline operation with occasional synchronization.

AndroNoter: lean and mean, nice widget, but no tagging support
JadeNote: tagging available, but no widget.
All other clients have ads, which I just can’t stand in an app that’s the core of my self-organization.

No client comes even close to catch.com, so I’ll stick with that.

Filed under: organization, test Tagged: android, app, note

Android App to Rearrange Ideas into Text

Martin Stut — Sat, 25 Jun 2011 15:04:47 +0000

After having decided to more regularly publish blog posts, I started looking for a method of collecting ideas and editing drafts on my Android smartphone.

Standard text editors won’t do it for me, because rearranging portions of the text (sentences, paragraphs) feels so clumsy and error prone. I consider it very hard to precisely select a certain range of text on Android. I’m still on 2.2 (“Froyo”), because HTC didn’t yet publish the update to 2.3 for my HTC Desire, bought in late June of 2010.

So I’m looking for an Android app that can manage a bunch of text fragments (thoughts, “items”), rearrange them in a manually selected order and then somehow move that sequence of words into a draft post on wordpress.com.

First Round

I searched the Android Market for a number of words (mind map, subnotes, note tree, subtasks etc.) and found quite a number of candidates. I did include ToDo managers, because they also tend to cater for ordering ideas.

Trying them briefly resulted in these findings, in the order of test:

Thinking Space (the mind map classic on Android): powerful arrangements. Needs some learning, but feels quite good then. Not quite ideal for quick notes. Export only as mind map file, so it requires a full PC to copy into a blog post. Admitted to second round.
JetNote: no recognisable drag/drop, deinstall
MindMapMemo: rearranging won’t readjust other nodes. Nice tool but not for quick arrangeable notes, deinstall
ListMaster: ads, to-do oriented, separate title and detail, multiple lists, drag and drop of notes within the list. Admitted to second round.
Extensive Notes: no manual sort. Deinstall.
Mobisle Notes: lists can be reordered, not items within a list. No export. Deinstall.
One Line Todo: ads are dangerously close to the input area. Todo only, Nice drag & drop of to-dos within one list, but every item (line) absolutely needs date & time. Deinstall.
Noodles Todo List: beautifully simple UI, but absolutely no way to export, except copy & paste item by item. Barely admitted to second round.
TaskList Todo List: to-do oriented. Slightly slow UI, not faster than Thinking space. Export into XML only. Deinstall
LiveList Checklist: great UI, very fast, good manual sort, but no export. Even the web site won’t show the task details.
PalmNote: no ads, user definable categories, manual sort order of notes available. Tries to emulate the feel of the note app of good old Palm OS. Export to SD manually, xml only. Admitted to second round.
GetItDone Task List: aims high, full GTD, but no export, can’t terminate program. Deinstall.
QuickTodo: clumsy, almost buggy UI, no readable export. Deinstall.

The apps that seemed worth a second look got into the

Second Round

All apps that made it though here have sub-items and manual sortability as pre-checked properties.

In this round I’m checking on

Visibility of details
Ease of entering new items (thoughts)
Ease of modifying existing items
Ease of rearranging thoughts
Ease of exporting thoughts to a WordPress draft post.

Thinking Space

The mind map classic on Android. As a mind map app, it enables powerful arrangements. Needs learning, but quite good then. Not quite ideal for quick notes. Export only as mind map file, so it requires a full PC to copy into a blog post.

Details are visible if the nodes are expanded, very flexible, very good.
Entering new items: focus (tap) on parent, tap + icon, type text, finish with enter. Parent remains focused. Nice easy.
Modifying existing items: double tap item, edit, enter. Nice easy.
Rearranging items: tap star icon to enable gesture input, mark item to be moved, swipe curve gesture. This also moves subitems. Cut & paste for changing levels also available. A bit complex but nice flexible.
Export to WordPress draft: for each item separately: double tap item, long tap text, copy. Does not copy subitems.
Alternatively through desktop Freemind and ODT export (would capture entire mind map).

Live List Checklist

Very fast UI, but separate title and description. No useable export, except copy & paste (which may be acceptable).

Visibility of details: title & first line only, requires long click to see full detail
Entering new items:
title only: tap on entry field, type, tap “+” icon.
Title with detail: long tap “+” icon, tap title field, type, tap detail field, type, tap save button. A bit complex.
Modifying existing items: long tap item, tap title or detail field, edit, tap save.
Rearrange items: Menu, sort/manual, then drag & drop.
Export to WordPress: for each item separately: long tap item, long tap title, copy, paste, long tap detail, copy, paste.

ListMaster

Ads, to-do oriented, separate title and detail, multiple lists, drag and drop of notes within the list. Too slow, moved out within the second round.

Noodles Todo List

Beautifully simple, fast UI, title and details are in a common field (which I consider good) but absolutely no way to export, except copy & paste item by item (which may be acceptable).

Visibility of details: title plus first 35 characters of detail. Requires long click to see full detail.
Entering new items: tap empty field, type title, enter, type details, tap + icon. Nice easy.
Modifying existing items: long tap item, tap small text field, edit, tap refresh icon.
Rearrange items: direct drag & drop.
Export to WordPress: per item: long press item, long press text area, copy, paste

PalmNote

No ads, user definable categories, manual sort order of notes available. Export to SD manually, xml only. Interaction required to see details.

Visibility of details: title only, requires click to see details.
Entering new items: tap “new”, tap huge text field, type title, enter, type detail, tap “done”
Modifying existing items: tap item, tap large text area, edit, tap “done”
Rearranging items: direct drag & drop
Export to WordPress: tap item, long tap text area, copy. Or export to xml and fiddle around with the resulting file.

Final Decision

After having tried all these apps, my preference for collecting and arranging ideas on Android is Thinking Space, because the arranging possibilities are by far the best.

Unparalleled switchable visibility of details.

Entering and modifying items is a bit slow, but with a bit of learning it should be as fast as the thoughts are flowing.

Because Thinking Space is capable of storing the results in Freemind format on the SD chip, it is one of the few products that are capable of exporting all items in one single go, although that requires the help of a notebook/desktop PC running Freemind.

Filed under: test Tagged: android, arrange, export, mindmap, order, text

Catch.com for Documentation in the Cloud

Martin Stut — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 10:59:37 +0000

For almost a year now I’m using catch.com for taking quick notes. It’s available on the web (everything https by default) and as an Android app (slightly more functions than on the web; didn’t check other platforms).

It is geared towards being really quick when taking notes, jotting down that quickly fading thought. There is a widget for Android, reducing the effort to just one single click (get the focus on the text widget).

A note can be assigned multiple tags, useable for comfortable filtering, both on the web and on the Android app. The Android app can also assign a reminder (alarm) date/time to a note.

The Android app can reliably work offline and sync to the cloud later, when connectivity comes back.

In my view, catch.com is a great system for taking notes, if you can live with the privacy limitations of a cloud service.

Filed under: organization, test Tagged: android, catch, cloud, documentation, web

Drupal can mail You if an Update is Available

Martin Stut — Sat, 11 Jun 2011 06:17:46 +0000

A simple feature, but really useful if you run a Drupal website: in admin/reports/updates/settings you can enter a list of email addresses. Whenever the internal mechanism of Drupal learns about an available update for one on the components you run, you’ll get an email. This is better than subscribing to mailing list, because a mailing list would notify you about hundreds of extensions you don’t run.

Filed under: howto Tagged: drupal, maintenance, security, web

Comparing Functionality of Blogging Platforms

Martin Stut — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 14:13:00 +0000

With accounts at posterous.com, blogger.com and wordpress.com, I need to decide on a platform. One factor in deciding is the feature set of each platform, including the android client available. Here is the table of my test results:

Feature	Posterous	Blogger	WordPress
automatic posting to Twitter, other blogs, social networks	yes, many services	not possible	a few services (Twitter, Facebook, Yahoo Updates, Messenger Connect)
search engine positioning of your posts	poor	good	best
Creating a Draft on the Mobile	click the tiny “i” to mark the post as private. Later, when on the web, edit the post options (top right in a light gray, next to media) to make the post public.	click “Save as Draft”	set status as “Draft” before saving
Editing a Draft on the Mobile	not possible	straightforward	straightforward
Drafts when Editing on the Web	Save (don’t publish yet) and then click Cancel. When warned about unsaved content, accept to leave the page.	Click “Save”, not “Publish Post”.	While composing, set the status to “Draft”.
H1, H2 headings	Not offered in the online editor. You are able to enter these codes in raw HTML view. H1 becomes right adjusted – not looking nice.	Not offered in the online editor. You are able to enter these codes in raw HTML view. Looks good.	Offered in the online rich text editor. Looks good.
Tables	Not offered in the online editor. You are able to enter these codes in raw HTML view. Looks good.	Not offered in the online editor. You are able to enter these codes in raw HTML view. Looks good.	Not offered in the online editor. You are able to enter these codes in raw HTML view. Looks bad, because THs are silently removed.

Browsing the web for information, I stumbled across a blog post by novel writer Emlyn Chand: Which is better, WordPress or BlogSpot? See how they stack up here . The bottom line is: both have different strengths, it depends on your goal.

Filed under: test Tagged: blog, blogger, posterous, requirements, wordpress