My experience with Qik has been hit-or-miss, but generally it’s been a positive one, which is why I continued to use the service in the first place.  However, the events of the past hour or so have made me reconsider that position, especially now that I have a netbook I could use instead with my Justin.tv account.  Let me additionally point out the fact that the previous version of the Qik client I had on my phone worked perfectly.  It was familiar, it functioned as advertised, and I didn’t have any complaints with the way it worked on my phone.

Anyway, I generally consider it a polite gesture when a service decides to let me know that there’s something on my end I need to do to continue my use of the service.  I think that makes things feel a little more personal when you let the customer know that the latest and greatest is out and that there’s a tangible benefit to upgrading.  Qik, on the other hand, sent me this rather sparse e-mail this evening with the air of making it sound like something was broken.  Alright, stuff breaks, and I can understand that, but the unclear meaning of this e-mail was my first clue that I shouldn’t have bothered.

Given that it’s Labor Day, I’m taking a break from some of my schoolwork for the moment, and updating Qik shouldn’t take more than a few seconds, I decided to oblige the e-mail’s request and update.  That was my mistake.  Oops.

In contrast to my previous experiences with Qik, this “update” seems more like a leap backward than it does a step forward.  If you’ll take a look at the picture I’ve included, there are two things I would like you to notice.  First, if you’ll examine the screen on my phone for a moment, you’ll notice that my Treo Pro appears to be capturing the episode of House I was watching as well as it possibly can…but that it’s doing so with the user interface rotated clockwise.  Unfortunately, something between the client and the website isn’t properly functioning, because, while I should be seeing Hugh Laurie’s face on my 22” LCD, instead I’m seeing severe artifacting and the vague suggestion that it might be the fifth season of Fox’s hit show I’m watching.  I’ve tested this multiple times (on both a cellular 3G connection and Wi-Fi), and I get the same results all the way around each time.  And, while I’m not going to point fingers, I think I know where the problem is because there are plenty of people still broadcasting as you read this.

There’s a huge difference between releasing a test version of your software with the expectation that these bugs are present and that they will be reported and sending e-mails trumpeting end-user updates to your legion of users, updates that should be devoid of functionality quirks like this.  What am I supposed to do with Qik now that I can’t actually use it for the one function it’s designed to perform?  I’m currently slogging back trying to find the CAB for the previous version of the client, the one that actually works, in hopes of moving forward and fixing this mess, but I’m not entirely concerned given that it’s not something I use on a daily basis anyway.

All the same, let this be a lesson to the rest of you, one that you can probably apply regardless of the industry you’re in and regardless of whether you’re technically inclined or not.  If you’re going to ask that your users (or customers, or whatever term you use for the people you deal with in your line of work) should take action in some form or another, make sure that they don’t get screwed for obliging you.  Do your homework, run your test cases, follow through on your research and quality assurance; in other words, make sure that you’re not asking people to make the jump from a Ferrari to a station wagon.

Edit (9/9/2009): Apparently Qik is now aware of the issue and suggests that users experiencing issues like this backpedal to an alternate version of the software that wasn’t designed for the phone.  Great job, guys!

Lady Ada

It’s not well-known, but today is a day that most geek calendars include.  Today is Lady Ada Day, named after Ada Lovelace, recorded in history books as the first person to write a computer program.

There’s a giant roster of people who are supposed to be posting about a female figure in the tech industry today whom they admire as a “Modern Ada.”  Considering the long time it’s been since I managed to put in some posting time on here, I figured I would take this challenge up.

Me?  Well, I never was one for following memes (which I consider this to be), and I can’t think of a woman in the tech world I really admire.  Well, that, and I’m not one to play favorites.

Sure, I could talk about some of my fellow university students and the impressive work they’ve completed, but that would get boring to everyone who has no idea what school I attend.  (And I appreciate my privacy in that matter, thanks. )  And, to be honest, that would probably be creepy for anyone to read, most of all them.

I could always cheat and pull some random tech employee’s name out of a hat, but that wouldn’t work either.  Not only could I not name-drop any reasonably-well-known females in the tech industry, but there will probably be countless other blog posts drooling about how attractive/intelligent/rich/attractive said woman is, which makes picking anybody of note instantly a poor choice.

However, I think I have a solution.  Rather than write one more post about whatever useless tech journalist/CEO/evangelista the rest of the blogosphere is, what about taking a second to thank all of the female bloggers I know for doing their thing?  After all, in a loose definition, they’re pretty in-tune with technology themselves (even if their blogs let on otherwise).  Right?

So, with that said, I’m going to suggest you spend the rest of your Lady Ada day appreciating not just female software developers and company CEOs, but female bloggers too.  And you can start with those I have in my sidebar.  That’s right, tonight looks like a great night for you to check out Keri’s Curious Cloud, daigakudeki, Geekin’Out, Rachelskirts, Snubs’personal blog, Splendid Mishap, and maybe even mosey over to Brooke’s or Gretchen’s blogs if there’s time left.

(There are more, of course, but seeing as even I have not talked with everyone in the universe yet, it’ll have to do.  Also, I should probably do some housecleaning, because there are a few stale links in my sidebar.)

But while I’m either pleased with or indifferent to the aforementioned items, there’s one thing tarnishing the number for me.  And (to what I assume is Justin’s eternal glee), of all things, it’s a Microsoft product.

If you’re waiting on me to rant about Windows Mobile 6.5 and my Treo Pro, you would be half-right.  Literally.  Just one-half away from the appropriate version of Windows.  (Well, and a gigantic platform jump over, but who’s counting other than me?)  If you thought I willingly put myself into a position beta-testing the Next Big Thing™ to come out of Washington (other than the Mariners), you’d be right.  Seven points to you.

You might ask why I did it.  Back in October, I posted about how I have no problem whatsoever using in-development software.  (In fact, I’m writing this post using one of the latest nightly builds of Firefox, but I digress…)  Of course, that was before I willingly installed this pile of dung, and in the future I’m going to be putting more consideration into that policy.

Before you ask, it’s not the computer’s fault.  I’ve lived on Pentium 4s for the past several years, and finally decided in December to build a new Core 2 Quad desktop for school.  Of course, what would be better than loading up the test build of the operating system that it will most likely be seeing for most of its useful life, right?  That’s what I thought…

I’ve been using dealing with Windows 7 for about a month, and while I’ve taken to some of the “new” features, on the whole, I still feel like the experience is missing something.  A big something.

Performance-wise, everything seems to run at a very pleasing rate.  Even in beta, the operating system is quick to respond, and I’ve gotten used to some of the “enhancements” (read: mind-numbing changes for the worse) Microsoft made.  Things I’d also installed out of humor, like my old TV tuner, installed without any trouble.  Granted, the workflow in things like the Control Panel could be improved, but I’m going to let that one slide because it’s not the worst thing I’ve seen.

My biggest gripe is that Windows somehow seems to have lost control of user processes.  The same build of Thunderbird, for example, works fine on other operating systems (like my Windows XP-based laptop), but hangs in 7 to the point where it cannot be killed using the Windows Task Manager or even the appropriate command-line commands, and ultimately requires me to restart the machine from the front panel.  (As I write this, there is an unresponsive Thunderbird window where my desktop normally goes.)  This is on top of very annoying bugs I’ve already managed to encounter on more than one occasion.  I’ve also tried several applications that hang immediately, such as the NX remote desktop client, and plenty of applications you would expect to work (like Picasa) blow up without administrative permissions.

My next complaint is with data transfers.  For some reason, I have issues transferring files to and from removable media, though network transfers are fine, as is the removable media when used in conjunction with my laptop.  According to other people running the beta, they haven’t had any such problems, so this might be something I need to look into at a personal level, but it gets annoying that I need to transfer everything over in small chunks.

Win7′s inability to sync properly at all with my Treo is another showstopper, as far as I’m concerned.  And I would complain about power management, but I can’t say I’ve noticed any issues – my computer is kept on all the time, except when it’s being rebooted to ward off evil spirits and afflicted processes.

I’ll keep my hopes up (slightly – I wouldn’t want them dashed, as this is a Microsoft product we’re talking about) that the problems I’ve found get fixed before release.  I don’t know if I would be placing monetary bets on all of these issues being resolved before the final release, however.

What are your thoughts about the beta?

Today marks the day the Unix epoch time (the number of seconds since January 1, 1970, 12:00:00 AM UTC) reads 1,234,567,890. This event will occur at 11:31:30 PM UTC (which is when this post is scheduled to appear ).

Why might this matter?  The Unix epoch is used more than you think, including time management on that cushy MacBook you’re probably reading this post on.  That, and it makes for a more interesting clock than your standard 12/24-hour watch.  (This includes binary clocks.  Swatch Internet Time might still have it beat, though, simply for being obscure and having an at sign as a designator.)

In case you were interested, here are some other cool facts:

• A 32-bit computer will run into an issue (aptly dubbed the Year 2038 bug) when the epoch value becomes too big to store with 32-bits on January 19, 2038 at 3:14:08 AM UTC.  (Personally, I think it’s a shame that it’s only seven seconds from ending at 3.1415…but that’s just me.)
• Assuming your 32-bit computer makes it past the Year 2038 bug (not that hard to imagine from a software standpoint), the epoch time will reach 3,141,592,654 (approximately the first ten digits of pi) on July 21, 2069 at 12:37:34 AM UTC.  There will be pie to celebrate. (Since this value is larger than can be stored with 32-bits (2,147,483,647 is the maximum), a broken 32-bit computer will read June 14, 1933, 6:09:18 PM UTC.)
• Similarly, the time will read as the first ten digits of the mathematical constant e (2,718,281,828) on February 20, 2056 at 2:17:08 PM.  (Again, since this time flies right past the Year 2038 bug, a broken 32-bit system will interpret the time as January 15, 1920, 7:48:52 AM UTC.)
• Unix time reached a count of 1,000,000,000 (one billion) seconds since the epoch on September 9, 2001 at 1:46:00 AM UTC.
• According to the specification for Unix time, certain values can be ambiguous or point to times that never existed because of the lazy way each day is expected to be 86,400 seconds.  This miracle is brought to you by leap seconds and lazy developers (both known as order and chaos, respectively).
• This bullet exists for the sole reason of increasing the number of words.  Either that, or it’s just a ploy for me to poke fun at why I’m making a list in the first place.

Oh, and in case you didn’t notice, today is Friday, February 13, which makes for a truly “epoch” win. Except in those areas on east of UTC, where they’re already celebrating Valentine’s Day.  Geek love conquers all?

One of the first projects to get an upgrade is Rolling Paper, the nearly pointless little wallpaper-cycling utility I wrote eons ago to randomly swap wallpapers in a given time period, almost turning your Windows desktop into a picture frame.  (Hint:  If you’re looking to do that without any of the desktop icons in the way, you might want to check out HideIcons while you’re at it.)

While Rolling Paper hasn’t picked up any new features (I know, I need to fix that little one-folder problem…), it has picked up an important bugfix.  A bug that resulted from my stupidity and a bit of zealous copy-pasting with some of the settings code that made it impossible to use the software more than once or twice without manually rewriting the configuration every time you used it.  If you happen to be using it, you might want the update, available now on the Rolling Paper project page.

I myself have taken advantage of this situation, adding the latest builds of Firefox, Thunderbird, Witty, and other products (some well-known, some off the beaten path) to my arsenal.  And I haven’t done this out of hopes that there won’t be problems, or simply because the new versions are “expected to fix outstanding bugs” (that’s a fringe benefit, people), but more so because the latest builds are increasingly and surprisingly mature and well-tested.  (And besides that, who could resist getting all of those new features ahead of the curve? )

At one point, the words “alpha”, “beta”, “testing”, and “development” (stop me anytime) scared people away from software and service simply because the connotation those words carried was one of buggy, incomplete, untested software.  While to some people, the meaning of these words has not changed (and I can think of “a few good reasons”™), these words are being turned into extraneous, meaningless descriptors of the applications everyone uses and loves, tacked into the name much in the same way Web 2.0 “dictates” misspelled words and dropped vowels.  (Flickr anyone?)

As Justin Cox so eagerly pointed out at the end of August, G-Mail has been in beta since it was announced, and Google doesn’t seem ready to remove the label just yet, either.  My point here is that even though the concept and implementation of G-Mail is littered with reminders of its perpetual development, it is still one of the most popular web-mail platforms available today in direct contradiction to the connotations of the “beta” label.

Google is not the only company riding the “always-in-development” bandwagon, either, but they’re definitely one of the most notable, given that they’ve taken beta software to an extreme.  According to this article, almost half of the projects they have their finger in are in some non-finalized state.

While many popular applications apply the “always-updating, always-improving” philosophy, it would be great to one day leave the computer running every night, and come back to find that my operating system has updated itself and made the experience better than it was the day before, with new features and bug fixes provided in a sort of seamless transition.  Unfortunately, I don’t think this is going to happen anytime soon because it doesn’t work too well with either of Microsoft or Apple’s business models, and I don’t see them changing their behavior anytime this decade.

Ah well, I can dream*, can’t I?

*Dreaming is in beta, with an anticipated final release date of <undetermined>.

Is it just me, or does anyone really care that Safari (until late yesterday) couldn’t be installed on non-Apple hardware?  Is anyone shedding a tear that youngsters shouldn’t be looking up something with a search engine?

No offense, but I think the time of those lengthy legal documents is drawing to an end.  Users ignore them.  Companies (obviously) don’t even bother proofreading them anymore, and instead distribute them without even verifying that their demands and requirements are enforcable.

I myself have had some very interesting run-ins with EULAs over the past few months.  Not that I’m running to alert Slashdot, The Register, The Onion, or any other news source that might care to listen to me (even if they don’t take it seriously), but there’s something going on when companies shrink the viewable area of the agreement to such insignificant lengths that it’s almost a waste of space to even have it there in the first place.

Users click through any agreement displays without reading.  It’s been proven time and time again.  It’s one way malware installs itself without violating laws, it’s one way software companies can get you to bite off more than you originally wanted, and, believe it or not, it’s one way end users are made a joke out of.  Yes, I said joke.  There’s definitely something to be said about a company who can embed a paragraph on getting paid to read the EULA into one of their agreements, and then sit back and wait four months for someone to come across that, all with countless people installing the software and missing their chance at payment in the meantime.

If people aren’t even going to bother to read what they’re agreeing to, perhaps it’s time to dumb it down into a few bullet points.  Heck, make the bullets checkboxes, and you can make sure the user reads each and every one of those (perhaps require one of them to be *unchecked* in the way they’re worded to prevent the same type of clickthrough that occurs now from occuring in the future).  By making the users actually sift through and read everything you’re requiring of them, it will make them understand more of what’s going on.

If you’re a developer, jump outside the box.  Don’t write pages and pages of nonsense nobody (including yourself) ever reads again.  Your users certainly aren’t reading it.  So why not encourage them to, and demonstrate that being careful and paying attention are beneficial?

What really needs to be done here is a rebirth/redefinition, so to speak, of “open source” in general.  There’s more to it than just functions or methods or subroutines, but it seems that those are the only components that seem to have gotten through to the general public; in realistic terms, open source is simply the free flow of relevant and universally useful information, distributed so that others can gain from it and/or improve upon/with it.

Take a leaf from 2600, Volume 24-4 (which, admittedly, I just picked up).  In the letters section, “theforensicsguy” mentions that unlike most school districts, the one he’s employed for is more open than your typical school IT crew.  This openness is a broad, but relevant, example of what should be happening; when you are open, accepting, and willing to let others pick up tips, tricks, and knowledge in general, they in turn will give you back what you might be seeking (“theforensicsguy” claims that his students report some of the security holes they find to him).

A similar approach could almost certainly be applied in more than just that scenario:  Your favorite (unnamed) software company could open up and actually start accepting tips, tricks, bugfixes, and patches from their users, rather than simply claiming that problems with their product are nothing more than unintended features.  Imagine how much more sound a product could be if that multinational manufacturer took the considerations and rantings of users who found a design flaw in a new product and actually utilized what they gleaned from those considerations.  Even detrimental facts can be of benefit; for example, if a bank gets robbed, they can see what some of their security weakpoints are and improve them to maintain and improve the trust their clients impart in them.

You see, everything works better when everyone works together. By telling others what you know, you can not only improve what you know, but you also improve intelligence overall, and create a more sound and improved society.

People are also drawn to the improvements drawn by progress; for example, why is it that students flock to what would be considered “major” colleges? Is it simply because the school is big, or because of its size, also maintains a hotbed of new and innovative skills and enhancements that can benefit people.  And the best part is that some don’t even realize they’re being, for want of a better term, “improved” themselves.

I’m not one for fame in general, but people also tend to be remembered not for their secrets, but for the openness and knowledge they’ve spread, be it something like a detailed and impacting writing, a significant and upstarting speech, a breakthrough scientific discovery, an impressive new invention, or even plain old music.   Sure, you might make a few people in your hometown proud with that secret sauce recipe of yours…but wouldn’t it be put to better use if you shared it to the world?

So, I end this (short?) tirade by asking this:  What have you shared with the world today?