Upgrading to Android 5

My Google Nexus 5 finally received the Android 5 update… well, the notification for it at least.

Eventually I decided to upgrade it.

Good stuff

Easy upgrade.

It seems pretty speedy on the Nexus 5.

Some good, useful functionality, like priority contacts (who it looks like can be set to ring when nobody else does — something I’ve used an app called Auto Ring for in the past, which still seems to work). Beware though, “Priority” apparently means low battery alerts are allowed to make sounds. Didn’t appreciate being woken up by that.

Better links from contacts to recent activity such as calls and texts.

Torch. Wasn’t there before.

Google Fit… it turns out this is compatible with Android 4. I hadn’t seen it, but it added itself with the upgrade. Quite neat, I’ve been tracking my steps.

Android 5 upgrade  Android Device Administrator

Bad stuff

The new look may take some getting used to. I don’t understand why they’ve got rid of most of the lines between things. The keyboard is now one big lump, with no distinguishing lines between the virtual keys.

Gmail now handles the stuff that used to go through the email app, such as Exchange ActiveSync. I find that a bit painful, as I liked to keep my work/Exchange email separate from my Gmail.

Worse, it now enforces Exchange’s device restrictions (did Android 4 do this? I don’t recall that it did). This includes scary things like the ability to wipe your device if you get your password wrong too many times. Given how apps sometimes go crazy polling the server when the password changes, I’m not sure I trust it with this power.

I ended up deleting the Exchange account from Gmail. It wasn’t easy — you can’t simply remove the account. It turned out the way to do it was via Settings / Security / Device Administrators. Turning that back off forces the accounts relying on it to be removed.

I might need to find a new Exchange app. Touchdown looks good — They do a good job of hiding much it costs (appears to be US$20 after a month’s trial), but it looks like a good Exchange app that limits security restrictions to itself, not the whole phone. CloudMagic also appears to work okay, but has a completely free option, as well a paid (US$4.99/month) option.

More as I explore the new version.

I’m really liking Google Fit. Sure, it doesn’t track very much information, but I gather the Nexus 5 has a pedometer built in, so it’s nice to be able to see some results from it.

Google Fit

Response times seem to be a little bit slower, going onto the home screen, but nothing worth worrying about (yet).

Pointless choices

This seems to be common on store finder applications on the web: After entering the postcode, you’re asked to enter the suburb as well.

coles

It makes zero difference what you choose, because the suburbs aren’t huge. The Store Locator shows you stores within at least 5 kilometres, but the suburbs are much smaller than that.

In fact it’s worse in the case of the Coles Catalogue, because it ends up giving you a catalogue which is clearly marked “Vic Metro” – which applies to the entirety of scores of postcodes.

Is there anywhere in the country that has suburbs big enough that it would matter? I haven’t found any.

Making people make this choice is pointless. It’s just another barrier to them getting to your information.

More help is available

From the “Do you understand why people hate you, Microsoft?” department:

D:\>net stop xyz
The service name is invalid.

More help is available by typing NET HELPMSG 2185.

D:\>net helpmsg 2185

The service name is invalid.

D:\>

Yes. Very bloody helpful.

I don’t expect miracles in the command line, but I do expect that if I’m told more help is available, that more help is actually available.

Chrome starts blocking web sites using HTTPS over SSL3

It would seem some organisations still haven’t got the message on SSL vulnerabilities, even one with a publicity-friendly name like Poodle.

For instance, Swinburne University of Technology, which is actually one of Australia’s better universities to learn computer science, has its student portal still trying to use SSL 3.

MySwinburne SSL error

My son was trying to figure out why he couldn’t connect with Chrome. Only by clicking for details do you get the slightly cryptic error: “ERR_SSL_FALLBACK_BEYOND_MINIMUM_VERSION”

It turns out Chrome has disabled fallback to SSL3. For now you can override it (though it’s easier for now just to use another browser), but soon it’ll be disabled completely. Site owners will need to make sure their servers support TLS instead.

They’ve also started giving a warning on SHA-1 certificates — no more green logo; it’s gone yellow, with a warning: “This site is using outdated security settings that may prevent future versions of Chrome from being able to safely access it.” Again, it’s up to site owners to resolve this, by updating their certificates.

Why can’t you resize Remote Desktop windows?

RDP optionsIf you can spontaneously change the resolution of Windows in a Virtual Machine, how come you can’t do it in a Remote Desktop session?

I’m forever opening up RDP sessions in the wrong resolution, because the RDP client seems to have a funny way of selectively remembering (or forgetting) the preference.

Sometimes if focussing entirely on the remote session, I’d like it to be full-sized. At other times I’d like it smaller so I can more easily jump between things.

Is there something complicated that stops RDP windows being resized after connection has been made? If it is possible in a VM, presumably it can’t be too hard in RDP?

It looks like in Windows 8 and later you can easily turn on “smart resizing”, and in earlier versions this can be configured in the .rdp file. But this scales the window at the original resolution, rather than changing resolution.

It’d be nice if proper resizing of the window was possible.

badges.del.icio.us malware

Interesting warning from Google when displaying some pages on this geekrant.org:

Malware warning

In response I’ve disabled the Socialize plug-in which was serving them. Hopefully that makes the warning go away — I’ll look for another way to display social media buttons.

myTax – pleasantly surprisingly pain-free

I’m sometimes wary of online services, especially those provided by government. (Heck, look at the Myki web site… it’s clunky and still looks like it was written last decade — which of course it was, and it’s never had more than a minor update.)

But having tried the Windows-based eTax for the first time last year (when the Australian Taxation Office pretty much forced everyone off the paper Tax Packs by not making them generally available), this year I tried out MyTax, which is the cut-down simplified web-based tax return system. It means I can avoid having to download and install eTax.

It has to be linked to a MyGov account, which is Big Brother’s logon system that includes (at your option) services provided by the ATO, Medicare, Centrelink and others.

MyGov

Signing up and submitting the tax return all seemed to go fairly smoothly, and the simplified design (it can’t handle more complex tax affairs) means the process of entering all the information is much quicker than using a Tax Pack or eTax.

A big criticism of eTax has been that it only works under Windows. Given MyTax is also cross-platform, I wonder how long it’ll be before it is enhanced and replaces eTax completely.

The only criticism I have with it is that once you’ve submitted, it says there’s only one chance to Save and/or Print what you’re submitting. That’s a bit weird. And it doesn’t actually allow you to Save, only to Print. I cheated and Saved by copy/pasting the HTML into Word, and saving that.

Summer 2014/2015 starts 

Saturday 18 October             Max 26    Partly cloudy.
Sunday 19 October     Min 17    Max 29    Afternoon cool change.
Monday 20 October     Min 12    Max 23    Mostly sunny.
Tuesday 21 October    Min 10    Max 28    Sunny.
Wednesday 22 October  Min 16    Max 31    Possible shower.
Thursday 23 October   Min 15    Max 20    Possible shower.
Friday 24 October     Min 13    Max 22    Cloudy.

iTunes free U2 album: How to make it appear

So you don’t want to splash out on a new iWatch or iPhone, but you do want that new U2 album that’s free on iTunes until 14th October?

The instructions (for Mac or PC itunes) say:

On your Mac or PC, open iTunes, then select the Albums tab. Select Songs of Innocence. Select a track to listen or click the iCloud icon to download.

What they don’t tell you is what to do if it’s not showing there. In my case, it wasn’t. It also wasn’t in Purchased, and although I could see it in the iTunes Store (and play previews), the iCloud icon wasn’t appearing.

Screen Shot 2014-09-10 at 10.58.33 am

The answer is you need to switch on the option to see iCloud purchases:

Preferences / Store / Show iTunes in the Cloud purchases

Then it should appear in the Albums tab.

With thanks to Sam Wilkinson on Twitter

Update 2014-09-16: For those who aren’t as keen on U2, Apple has now published an article on how to remove the album from your iTunes:

Remove iTunes gift album “Songs of Innocence” from your iTunes music library and purchases

Winter 2014 ends

I’ve tried to use the same technique to determine winter the same way I do summer; I decided back in June that winter started. And in August, it’s over.

Tuesday   19 August Max 15 Possible light shower.
Wednesday 20 August Min 7 Max 15 Cloudy.
Thursday  21 August Min 5 Max 18 Mostly sunny.
Friday    22 August Min 6 Max 19 Mostly sunny.
Saturday  23 August Min 7 Max 19 Mostly sunny.
Sunday    24 August Min 8 Max 18 Mostly sunny.
Monday    25 August Min 6 Max 18 Mostly sunny.

A couple of days later the forecast was extended out to

Tuesday   26 August  Min 8 Max 19 Partly cloudy.
Wednesday 27 August  Min 9 Max 21 Mostly sunny.

Airliner shootdowns ought to be technically impossible

Using missile to shoot down an airliner ought to be made impossible.  It may be a lack of imagination on my part, but I can’t think of a circumstance where a military force needs the ability to shoot down civilian aircraft.  There aren’t a lot of manufacturers of surface-to-air missile systems, regardless of their level of sophistication and range – shoulder launched or vehicle-mounted – so changing those designs to prevent civilian shootdowns ought not be a big deal. Admittedly there are many more means of bringing down aircraft beyond SAMs, but not a lot of them have the reach to bring down cruising airliners.

Civilian airliners have carried IFF transponders since World War II, so there’s the infrastructure in place already for the identification of non-military aircraft.  Furthermore, it’s a violation of Article 37 1.c of the Geneva Conventions to pretend you’re a civilian – that is, it’s a war crime with all the international condemnation that goes with that, so it’s reasonable to make weapons that refuse to down aircraft that identify themselves as civilian.

So, why is this still happening?