Speaking of leaving Wordpress, it looks like the blogging platform is under a major attack. Wordpress has long been known for its security holes. Not that they're necessarily any worse than similar platforms, but the fact that Wordpress is both so prevalent and so insecure makes it an obvious target.
I was always pretty good about keeping my Wordpress installations updated with the latest security patches, which is part of what made it such a bear to manage. Glad I don't have to mess with that anymore.
So, yet again, I'm trying something new. Isn't that what life's all about?
First off, you may notice the site looks a bit different. Not radically, but enough that you might get a little weirded out if you come here a lot. Is this still The Adventures of Systems Boy? What's with this weird header nonsense? Who the Hell is Mike Barron?
Then, upon further investigation, you might notice that the URL has redirected to malcontentcomics.com. Huh... That can't be right. I'm sure it used to be systemsboy.com.
Rest assured, you've not gone mad. Here's what's going on.
If you come here a lot you probably also know that I haven't been posting much lately. This is due in large part to the fact that writing about systems has begun to increasingly take a backseat to my artisticendeavors, most particularly the making of comics. I've had a comic site for a while now, and after lots of thinking and hand wringing I decided that it was time to unify all my online projects into a single site. Since comics are my primary focus these days I've decided to go with my comic identity for the top level domain: Malcontent Comics.
I must admit, though, that this entire changeover was, in fact, prompted by a distinctly systems-oriented problem, as well as an interest in trying a new approach to hosting this site. First, the problem.
THE PROBLEM
I've posted before about my trials and tribulations with web hosting. I've used Blogger, Web Hosting Buzz, Media Temple and most recently 1&1 to host this site, and each has had its good and bad points. But after spending the past few years self-hosting, during which I've added numerous Wordpress sites to my stable of online homes, I'm getting sick of it.
About a year ago, I switched to 1&1 for hosting these sites. I'm using a VPS plan, paying $30 bucks a month, and I'm still having problems. Everything was fine for a while, but gradually I started having problems with SQL. Suddenly all my categories will disappear on the site, and when that happens I have to SSH in and reboot the VPS because SQL is so locked up I can't even run Plesk.
Honestly, I haven't really tried very hard to solve this problem. I did Google it, and mostly what I read seemed to suggest that 1&1 Support would have one of two responses: either they would tell me, "You have root, it's your problem, you're on your own;" or, "you need to upgrade your plan." Now I have not contacted 1&1, nor do I intend to, so I don't know what they'd actually tell me, though I do get the impression, from my years of experience as a webhost client, that you just won't get anything decent under $50 a month (which is what we pay for Mediatemple's VPS at work, which works pretty well). But I've just been doing this too long, I have to do it at work, and it's not really fun anymore. I'm done. This is no longer how I want to spend my free time, nor my money.
Yes, there was certainly a time when this would have been an intriguing challenge for me to tackle. But not anymore. I'm paying someone decent money to host and run my server, I do nothing that should place undue strain on that server, and yet it doesn't work reliably. Frankly, if someone were paying me to run some computers for them (oh, wait, someone does, every day) and they didn't work, I'd be fired.
THE INTEREST
At the same time all this has been stewing, I've been increasingly aware of and interested in a site hosting company called Squarespace. Squarespace hosts everything for you and you build your site with their online tools. It's a lot like Blogger.com or Wordpress.com, but much more sophisticated — with features like custom CSS and Code Injection — and with a terrific graphical authoring environment. Squarespace recently updated their platform to version 6 with much fanfare, and after reading about it for the bajillionth time I finally decided to take the free two week trial and kick the tires. While testing out Squarespace I tried two other similar services: Mediatemple's Virb and the well-known Weebly.
All these services are actually quite nice and their performance is surprisingly brisk and consistent. But Squarespace's ability to import — and export, should the need arise — all my Wordpress site data really carried the day. I also like the design tools best in Squarespace. They just do more of what I want, from the amazing and gargantuan selection of fonts to very flexible templates that let me brand my site and all its sections in ways the others don't. And last but by no means least, Squarespace's gallery functionality was my favorite, and this is a key component of my comic sites.
The more I played, the more I liked what I saw, and the more I started to think that Squarespace could probably do the job for me and my many sites. But more than that, Squarespace allows me to never have to worry about managing the server side of things again. This means that not only will I never have to SSH into my VPN and reboot because of a SQL lockup, but I'l never have to update — and possibly break — another Wordpress install (I have three I maintain regularly); I'll never have to update — and possibly break — all the plugins for each of these Wordpress installs.
And the icing on the cake? What will eliminating this huge time sink cost me in terms of dollars? Sixteen bucks a month. Not thirty. Sixteen. Or, to put it into perspective, slightly more than half what I've been paying. Less work, as good or better performance, ostensibly better reliability and terrific design tools, all for less money? That, my friends, is what I like to call a no-brainer.
The downside to all of this, of course, is that I lose a certain amount of flexibility. To be sure, Squarespace and its ilk have far more limitations that the wide open spaces of a 1&1 VPS plan. But the limitations just happen to be in areas that don't really concern me all that much these days. And what I lose in flexibility I believe will easily be made up in productivity. That is to say, all the time I spent maintaining that damn VPS and those Wordpress installs will now go towards writing and drawing more. And after all, that's what I'm really here to do.
Especially now that the flow of Systemsboy posts has pretty permanently slowed to a trickle, it seems even sillier and more pointless to self-host to the extent I've been doing, and the systemsboy.com domain no longer seems particularly relavent or necessary. There's just no reason to suffer for it anymore.
ANOTHER CHANGE
Commensurate with the change of hosts, and the general unification of my online presence is another kinda big change to the way TASB works: I am no longer anonymous. Maintaining my secret identity, now that I no longer blog about specific work issues, is no longer particularly important to me. And I really like the idea of having everything under one, big umbrella site that represents me as a person, rather than a set of fragmented brand identities.
So, hi. I'm Mike Barron nice to meet you.
SAME OLD SYSTEMSBOY
Despite all these changes, though, The Adventures of Systemsboy! should be much the same as ever. You can continue to expect very occasional and oft-cheeky posts that contain my personal observations on a variety of my favorite technology-oriented topics with a focus on the Mac and iOS platforms. But no punditry. I'm terrible at punditry.
I have an unbridled obsession with finding the perfect Mail client app. This is a bad obsession to have, because the perfect Mail client just doesn't exist. And it doesn't look like it will for a long, long time; no one wants to make it.
Nevertheless, every now and then some foolhardy startup comes along and takes a stab. The most recent entry in the realm of the Mail client is called Mailbox.
The Queue
I don't want to spend much time talking about Mailbox's much discussed queueing system for new users. While you can download Mailbox now, today, for free, the app requires that you reserve a spot in line. And it's a long line. I reserved my spot weeks ago and am only now trying the app for the first time. Mailbox says it's adding users gradually to ease the load on its servers. Maybe that's true — they're certainly having some problems right now — or maybe there's some clever marketing going on — or maybe a little of both — but suffice to say, you should be prepared to wait a while before you'll actually get to use the app.
Also, while we're on the topic of the limitations of this new app, be aware that Mailbox currently only works with Gmail, and it's only made for iPhone.
Inbox Zero
The ultimate goal of Mailbox is getting your Inbox down to zero. I suppose if this is really important to you, then the app might be worth waiting for. But if it's really that important to you, you've probably already done it. It's not that hard. If you really want to get your Inbox down to zero, simply select all your messages in Gmail's browser client and hit the Archive button. If there are messages that require a response, respond to them.
I'm also not sure I really see the point. The zero-mail Inbox just isn't that big a deal to me. Having zero mail in my Inbox doesn't actually mean I've gotten anything done, it just means I'm not looking at it right now. While this does have its benefits, I'm not sure it's worth disrupting my particular workflow by adding a unique and additional mail client that exists solely on my phone.
Swipes and Snoozes
In Mailbox you file messages away, either to Gmail's archive, or to a sort of "Remind Me Later" area (which exists in Gmail as a group of Mailbox-specific labels), via the use of swipe gestures: swipe right to archive, swipe left to "Snooze" a message for later.
I must say, I do love the gestures. They're fun, beautiful and easy to get the hang of. And I love the ability to file things away for later. But that's really all Mailbox offers. Frankly, archiving a large number of messages can already be done easier and faster using Gmail in the browser — just batch select and hit Archive. And individual Gmail messages can already be archived with a swipe in Apple's iOS Mail client.
So we're left with snoozing messages as the primary useful feature of yet another email client app that now exists only on my iPhone. This means that every time I want to use this feature I have to get out my iPhone and launch a separate app. Wouldn't it just be easier to leave that handful of messages that you want to be reminded of in your Inbox? Or, if you need time-delimeted reminders, use iOS's Reminders app, or Calendar?
To Do Lists
Mailbox rests on the presumption that people use email as a sort of to do list. And that's true. But Mailbox overlooks the rather crucial fact that people use mail for other things as well. One unintended use of email is as a file transfer application. I see people try to send large files via email all the time. And some mail apps have even tried tackling this problem using services like Dropbox, but Mailbox doesn't. And, of course, email's primary function is reading and writing email messages, but Mailbox's mail composing window is fairly paltry and unappealing, offering little in the way of innovation. Mailbox is essentially a novel mail filing app, not well suited to writing or any of the myriad other ways we use email beyond its original intents.
Simplifying Email
While Mailbox goes some distance to simplifying mail management on one hand — and it does so in some novel and even enjoyable ways — overall it complicates the whole process by adding an additional layer to the management of mail while offering very little else in return. If Mailbox existed in a vacuum, if it were your only Mail client, it might be acceptable. But it's not. And it can't be, at least not in its current, rather limited form. If you use Mailbox, you'll still need to go to more full-featured clients for richer composing and mail management features. And those clients will now be populated with Mailbox's folders, yet be completely unaware of Mailbox's behaviors.
Mailbox is another outlier in a world where what we really need is better integration. That's been my quest: an email client to rule them all. One email application that does everything — writing, reading, file transfers, to do lists, and everything else including saving my ass — perfectly across all platforms. Mailbox is not that app.
For some time now I've been syncing my iOS calendars with Google Calendar using the CalDAV protocol. And of course my email of choice has been Gmail for the better part of a decade, and this has synced seamlessly using the magic of IMAP. Up until recently, though, there was no good way for me to sync my Google contacts.
Instead of using a server-side protocol like CardDAV (similar to CalDAV for calendar syncing) to sync my Google Contacts with my devices, I was using Apple's Contacts app to sync to Google Contacts on my Mac, then syncing this to my iOS devices. This was indescribably clunky and prone to all sorts of collisions and failures, and it required syncing contacts to my iOS devices using iTunes. I've been looking for a better way for some time. And yesterday I found it.
Google now supports CardDAV. This means that, in the same way I sync my calendars, and similar to how I sync my mail, I can now seamlessly sync my iOS Contacts with my Google Contacts.
Setting this up is very easy. The only oddity is that it's not yet part of the standard Google account setup. It must be set up as a separate account. I'll also mention that if you were syncing your contacts via iTunes, once this is set up and working well, you can turn off iTunes syncing of contacts.
Here are Google's instructions on the matter. They are about as clear as can be, so I'll just leave it at that.
I've only been using this for a day, so I can't speak to it's long term reliability. But in testing, CardDAV for Google contacts worked brilliantly for me. I was able to add a contact to my Google Contacts via a web browser and have it show up on my iPhone almost immediately. I could then edit or add a contact on my iPhone and watch the changes occur in Google in my Mac's browser nearly instantly.
For me, this is a pretty big deal. I'm now able to have all my mail, calendar and contacts centrally located on Google's servers and sync those things to all my devices. It's pretty special.
UPDATE: This has worked seamlessly for me from day one. But lots of folks have been having problems. The main complaint seems to be that contacts only partially import to iOS. One reader seems to have found a possible — if somewhat annoying — solution. Jump to Lyallp's comments for the full explanation. The nutshell version is that iOS gets stuck on certain contacts that it deems malformed in some way. The solution is to export your contacts in small chunks and import these chunks into iOS to find the culprit. It's kind of like Battleship for Contacts. Fun times!
Lyallp also notes that control characters (^) were present in parts of his VCF file. So you might search for these and possibly other problem characters as well.
Anyway, thanks, Lyallp, for the info. Much appreciated.
First off, let me just say, people need to chill the fuck out and quit all the bitching. Yes, I grasp the irony of bitching about people bitching. But the fact is that, before the iPhone all cell phones were total pieces of shit, and no one ever complained about it. Now Apple releases a new and better iPhone every year and all people do is complain about it. It reminds me of Louis CK's brilliant Everything's Amazing and No One's Happy bit.
Second, and along similar lines, I want to take a moment to respond to a ridiculous attempt at tech punditry by the New York Times' Joe Nocera. Let me be clear from the outset: I am not a tech pundit. I make no claim to be able to write competently about business, tech or otherwise. When all's said and done, I'm a technician. But I've been following Apple and using and supporting their products for over a decade now. And I have a brain and a perspective, and these things lead me to call bullshit on Nocera's article.
Nocera is basically arguing that, now that Apple is big and Steve Jobs is gone, the company will never be innovative again. And his Exhibit A is the iPhone 5 and the new Maps application. Let's go through his article bit by bit and see where things fall apart.
Nocera starts off by invoking the Ghost of Steve Jobs:
As Apple’s chief executive, Jobs was a perfectionist. He had no tolerance for corner-cutting or mediocre products.
This is certainly true. But Jobs also knew when to ship. And he knew that shipping great products was as important as making them. And Jobs understood that 1.0 releases would be feature incomplete and imperfect. And that that was okay. Take any new Apple release from the last decade — like, I don't know, the first iPhone — and you'll see what I mean. I'd argue that Maps is not mediocre, it's just new.
Nocera then writes:
The three devices that made Apple the most valuable company in America — the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad — were all genuine innovations that forced every other technology company to play catch-up.
This is certainly true. But suggesting that this level of innovation is possible on a yearly basis is folly. These are once-in-a-decade releases. Most innovation comes not in leaps and bounds, but rather in baby steps. Take Mac OS X, the iPod or even iOS as examples of consistent, year over year evolutions. This is how it works.
Nocera complains a bit more about Apple's recent lack of innovation, and then goes on to criticize the new Maps application:
In rolling out a new operating system for the iPhone 5, Apple replaced Google’s map application — the mapping gold standard — with its own, vastly inferior, application, which has infuriated its customers. With maps now such a critical feature of smartphones, it seems to be an inexplicable mistake.
But what Nocera fails to grasp is that it's not a mistake at all. Maps is an example of the very innovation that Nocera claims Apple now fails to attempt. Let's face it, the old Maps app hadn't been significantly updated since iOS 1. And with relations between Apple and Google strained, getting Google to improve the product was, I'd guess, an increasingly daunting task. Apple's belief was that they could do it themselves and do it better. The new Maps is the first iteration of that gamble.
Nocera then goes on to write about how this never would have happened without Jobs, and then:
Apple’s current executive team is no doubt trying to maintain the same demanding, innovative culture, but it’s just not the same without the man himself [Jobs] looking over everybody’s shoulder. If the map glitch tells us anything, it is that.
No, the Maps "glitch" is exactly the kind of innovative nudge Jobs would've done. It is, in fact, precisely how Apple has innovated over the past decade: by destroying the old and rebuilding it. The current team, to my eye, seems to be behaving perfectly in the Jobsian style, even if they may not be able to sell it as well.
Next, Nocera begins to contradict his very own argument:
When Jobs returned to the company in 1997, after 12 years in exile, Apple was in deep trouble. It could afford to take big risks and, indeed, to search for a new business model, because it had nothing to lose.
So wait, you're saying that Apple has just replaced the "mapping gold standard" on its flagship products with what it believes will one day be a better solution, thus pissing off lots of people, taking huge amounts of criticism and possibly hurting the brand, at least in the short run, but that they're no longer willing to take big risks? Whatever their motivation, and despite what you may think of the app, replacing Maps with their own, non-Google version is a hugely ballsy move and shows that that's just not true.
Nocera then goes on to make the inevitable Microsoft comparison, followed by some erroneous assumptions:
Once an ally, Google is now a rival, and the thought of allowing Google to promote its maps on Apple’s platform had become anathema. More to the point, Apple wants to force its customers to use its own products, even when they are not as good as those from rivals.
This is just wrong. From what I understand, Apple's license with Google had simply expired and they needed to decide if they would extend that license or go a new way. Apple has allowed a Google-branded YouTube application onto iOS, as well as Google's Chrome browser. And it's my understanding that a Google-branded mapping solution is in the works. If it's not, you can only blame Google for this. If it is, I have little doubt that it will soon be available in the App Store along with all the other Google products. This isn't Apple being anti-competitive, it's Apple being competitive. Apple thinks they can win here, not by forcing people to use its own products, but rather by making better ones.
Whether Maps is a good app or not is arguable. It has features not found in Google's maps app, but lacks some of that app's functionality as well. I've used it and I think it's good for a version 1 product. I certainly think the turn-by-turn navigation is very well implemented. And for most daily uses I think I'll be able to get by just as well with this new Maps, though, being in New York City, I will dearly miss street view in certain instances. Innovation always incurs tradeoffs, though. We technicians are well aware of this.
But Maps is not an indication of Apple being in decline or failing to innovate. If anything, it's just the opposite. This seems to be the same old Apple, making year-over-year improvements and taking the occasional risk that a change that pisses people off today may just be the thing everyone wants in a year or two. They're not always right about this, but they keep trying, and Maps and the iPhone 5 are the proof — not the refutation — of this.
Addendum:
One other thing has occurred to me while reading more about Apple's difficulties with the Maps launch. I keep reading that Google has had turn-by-turn directions in the Android version of its Maps app for some time now. But we've never seen this feature in iOS. This seems a strong indication to me that Google was not in any huge hurry to update its iOS Maps offering. Turn-by-turn is a feature — admittedly, perhaps the only one right now — where the new Apple Maps is actually better than the Google-made Maps. And its an important feature to a very large chunk of potential iPhone buyers. But more importantly, the addition of turn-by-turn is evidence that Apple wanted to make the Maps product better but was not getting any help from Google.
The fact is, none of us — not Joe Nocera, and certainly not me — knows what really went on behind the scenes to make this Maps deal go down. It's clearly been in the works for some time and there have likely been numerous factors at work. But I do believe that at least part of the decision was based on Apple making a better product for its customers.
