The Cloud Wars

A couple of years ago I reviewed some online backup solutions. The main contenders were Dropbox, iDisk and DriveHQ. Fast forward two years and Google Drive, Apple iCloud, Microsoft Skydrive, Box and Dropbox are battling to provide your online storage.

I have used all 5 services (free accounts) and have detailed the unique features, pricing and sharing capabilities of each here in helping you decide which product would be best for you. In most cases a combination of two or more services is the best option.

Google Drive

This year Google launched their long awaited cloud storage service, Drive. Their online office suite Google Docs is now part of Google Drive and with desktop clients available for Windows, Mac and Linux (soon) it has become a serious player in the cloud storage game. An Android app is also available with an iOS app coming soon.

Google Drive offers users 5GB of online space for free. Currently it is priced at $2.49/month for 25GB, $4.99/month for 100GB … and all the way up to 16TB for $799.99/month. I wonder how many accounts have 16TB :O

Sharing documents and folders is easy with Drive. Simply select the document and click the share button to allow access to another with an email address. You can even see changes as they happen if two or more people are working on the same document. Collaborators can add comments and there is version tracking so you can go back up to 30 days if you need to see a prior revision.

I rate Google Drive as a solid and flexible solution for cloud storage and online document editing. It is not limited to traditional document file types and provides real time changes to be seen by people working on the same document.

Microsoft Skydrive

Skydrive has been around since 2007 (known then as Windows Live Folders). In 2011 it was overhauled to be HTML5 compatible and now allows users to create word, powerpoint and excel documents from within a browser. It can also be synchronized with the 2010 Office software, allowing users to change a document at the same time.

Skydrive offers users 7GB of online space for free. If you had an account prior to April 20th 2012 you were offered a free upgrade to 25GB. If 5GB is not enough the pricing as it stands now for Skydrive is 20GB for $10/year, 50GB for $25/year and 100GB for $50/year.

There is currently an iOS and a Windows Phone app but no official Android app. Desktop programs are available for Windows and Mac operating systems. Sharing is can be done from the web browser and across social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Apple iCloud

iCloud consists of a few more features than file syncing. In addition, you will have access to Photo Stream, iTunes in the Cloud, Calendar, Contacts and Email and Find My iPhone/Friends.

This article will mainly focus on the file sharing side – Documents in the Cloud. Once you have Pages, Numbers or Keynote on your iOS 5.0 device or Mac you will be able to save your iWork, MS Office, and PDF documents to iCloud. As far as I know these are the only types of documents that can be saved to iCloud and this I feel puts Documents in the Cloud at a massive disadvantage compared to the competition. Sharing is limited to sending via email.

Every account comes with 5GB worth of storage for free. If you need more online storage from Apple it will cost (at time of writing) $20/year for 10GB, $40/year for 20GB and $100/year for 50GB. It is a lot pricier than the rest however the extra storage may be useful for backing up an entire mobile device or for storing photos in Photo Stream.

iCloud desktop programs are available for OS X 10.7 + and Windows Vista +. Personally I don’t like the fact Apple has now forced users to upgrade from Snow Leopard if they want to use iCloud on their Mac desktop.

Box

Box is another solution, which behaves much like DropBox. I signed up for Box a while back when I came across an article saying they were giving away 50GB free storage if you downloaded their app for iOS. Their free account now will provide you with 5GB of online storage.

One thing you cannot do with a free account is download multiple files. This was enough for me to stop using Box. Looking past that, Box can integrate with Microsoft 2010’s Office Suite, Google Apps, and a few other CRM software packages out there. It also has an app for Android and iOS and programs for Windows and Mac (Premium account required).

A lot of Box’s functionality is reserved for premium accounts. Currently a premium account costs $15/user/month and that will get you 1000GB of web storage and access to those documents offline on a computer.

Dropbox

Last but not least I am going to mention Dropbox again. Like two years ago I thought the way Dropbox seamlessly integrates with any computer or mobile device is perfect. Sharing a document or folder could not be easier and now you can even right click a file and get a public link to share it with another person.

I find being able to share files via Dropbox the easiest way to get them from my mobile to a computer and vice versa. The free account will give you 2GB of storage but referring friends and allowing automatic camera uploads can increase this up to 16GB. Paid accounts can get you 50GB for $9.99/month and 100GB for $19.99/month with referrals getting you 1GB per referral (500mb for free account).

I currently use all these services except Box and iCloud. I think for a business Box would be a good solution, however since there is no standalone desktop program and there are limitations on multiple file downloads for free accounts I have steered clear.

Out of all the services mentioned I think Dropbox is still the best despite not having as much free storage as Drive or Skydrive. By inviting a few friends you both can receive boosts to the data storage and I find their file synchronization flawless across all devices and computers I have used it on. I would use this in combination with Google Drive for times when collaboration on a document is needed.

Quickly trim videos using QuickTime

As far as media players go I have never rated QuickTime at all. It only supports a handful of file types and it’s not as fast to open like similar programs such as VLC and MPlayerX. In fact, if iTunes didn’t require it, then QuickTime would have no business at all being installed on my computer.

Fortunately it was, and it helped me out when I needed to extract a certain part of a video file for a client. I have outlined the process for doing this below and it really could not have been simpler -

The hardest part of the process would be having QuickTime open the file. Especially if it was in mkv or avi format. If the file isn’t compatible you will need to use a program like Handbrake to convert the file to MP4.

Once QuickTime is playing the file you can click on Edit, then Trim.. to start the trimming process.

Step 1: Click on Edit, then Trim

This lets you drag the yellow lines and select what part of the video you want to extract and save separately. When you’re happy with the selection click the Trim button in the lower right. It’s worth noting that this method QuickTime uses isn’t very precise. It can sometimes be difficult to get the exact part at start or stop. This problem can be overcome by trimming the finished product again or by using some AppleScript.

Step 2: Find part to extract, then click Trim

Next click File and then Export for Web. This option allows you to save a few versions of the file for different qualities and size. It is useful if you want to email a smalled sized video but upload a higher quality video to YouTube.

Step 3: Click File, then Export for Web...

Give the Trimmed version a name and click Export to have the video saved in the Where: location.

Step 4: Give the trimmed version a file name

And we’re done. If you’re in need of a way to extract part of a video and don’t want to use any other 3rd party software then QuickTime might be the tool for you. If you’re considering using it to play video file I’d recommend giving VLC (windows/mac/linux) or MPlayerX (os x) a shot instead.

OSX 10.7 – All My Files … are killing my computer

One of the new features in OS X Lion is “All My Files” which shows you a list of your most recently opened files in Finder. I didn’t really see the point but kept it there in Finder as it didn’t seem to hurt. That was until updating to 10.7.2…

Post update my computer would slow down to a crawl and Finder would crash frequently. After changing what is shown in Finder on startup from “All my Files” to my Home folder (or I guess any other folder) everything has returned to normal. To do this open Finder (if possible) and click Finder -> Preferences. In the General tab locate “New Finder windows show:” and change to another folder.

Change the "New Finder windows show:"

I hope this helps anyone with the same problem.

Releasing the Handbrake

Finding the right tool for a job is often easier said then done. Especially if the tool is a quality software program. My recent dilemma was finding a good video convertor to transform movies and videos from AVI format to a more Apple friendly format such as MP4. Yes, Apple are bastards when it comes to format restrictions (among other things) on their devices. Usually a Google search is enough to find what you’re looking for, but in my case it only produced results of commercial software with poor reviews. The next trick is to search forums (Neowin and Whirlpool are two of the best) to see what other people are using. Bingo.

Handbrake is an open source, free utility for converting a variety of popular video formats into MP4 or MKV. It is available for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux and is relatively straight forward and easy to use. Select a file to convert, select a preset for the device you will be using it on, click start and wait for it to finish.

Converting video to MP4 or MKV using Handbrake

As of the current version (0.9.4) there is no iPad preset. However, Handbrake has a great community and a thread search produced this guide containing specific settings to use when converting for the iPad.

Next time you would like to transfer movies/videos in an unsupported video format to an iDevice, or just want your vids in MP4 or MKV format, look no further than Handbrake. It does the job, and it does it well.

My Tech on iPad

Is the iPad’s 15 minutes of fame almost up? In the last few weeks the only gadget on everyone’s mind has been the iPhone 4. Nonetheless the iPad isn’t that bad…but it’s missing so much that could have really made it a lot better. No doubt all part of Apple’s game plan for future generations.

When the iPad was released earlier this year I was in no rush to buy. No front or back camera, low RAM and no flash support, and this product was meant to “revolutionise” mobile computing :S. A couple of associates had imported from the US, so we were able to have a peek before it was officially released here in Australia. First thing I noticed was how easily the screen smudges. The good news is that when the screen is on you can hardly notice the greasy marks. My first impression was this is just an iPhone on steroids. Many others obviously disagreed as they were prepared to wait in queues hours long to be first to get one. Since then there has been very limited stock, especially of the 3G version.

Fast forward a couple of months and iPads have been trickling in here in Oz. I received one as a gift recently and after using it for a while I must say my opinion has changed. This thing actually has a lot of potential! I can tell because after loading up some frequently used apps, bookmarking my favourite sites and setting up my email accounts I’ve hardly used my laptop since.

I doubt I would ever read a physical book again thanks to iBooks. Save any PDF document from Safari and it’s there in iBooks ready for offline reading. Perfect for a plane or train trip. There is a variety of books in the app store, but also check out the Kindle app for an even larger selection of titles (and generally cheaper) from Amazon.com.

The iPad's screen is amazing for reading digital books

Unfortunately compared to the large amount of iPhone apps in the App Store, only a small percentage of them are iPad optimised. I’m hoping this is because the iPad is fairly new and developers are still hard at work porting their mobile apps. All iPhone/iTouch apps can run on the iPad, however most I’ve tried look horrible magnified 2x. There are exceptions such as Bejeweled, Trees of Doom and Fruit Ninja (which also has a HD version). Here is a list of iPad apps which I have installed and use often:

Team Viewer HD – Easily gain secure access to your own or a friends PC for remote help; this is the best remote desktop client app I have ever used. Free for personal use and works great with Windows and OSX.

Bloomberg – Excellent finance and share watcher. Looks amazing on the iPad plus it’s free. Watching your stocks drop in high res sort of makes up for the loss….well almost.

Dropbox – I’ve discussed Dropbox previously and it’s only natural an iPad version exists. One of the best free cloud storage solutions.

IMDB – Read up on and rate movies and television series’ using the Internet Movie Database App.

WordPress – Fantastic free app for admins whose sites use WordPress. Easily connect to write new posts or edit existing ones.

Feeddler RSS – Awesome free RSS reader that syncs with Google Reader.

Evernote – Synchronises notes across multiple platforms. I’ve stopped using the built in notes as Evernote is all that plus more.

Jumbo Calculator – Why Apple thought the iPad didn’t need a calculator I don’t know. It could be useful. Jumbo is free anyway so if you need a big ass calculator check it out.

Surprisingly a Facebook for iPad app does not exist. If you don’t want to use the iPhone version check out touch.facebook.com. This site is presented very nicely on the iPad but there is no FB Chat.

If you come across any iPad games or applications you would like to recommend please use the comment section below.

Currently running on special version of iOS 3, the iPad doesn’t yet support multitasking (unless you jailbreak). This is set to change later in the year when a new software version is released. It is definitely much needed! Some other minor OS improvements I believe would make the iPad better include being able to attach more than one file to an email and having way to connect to a printer from the Email and Safari apps.

Doodle Jump & Froggy Jump

When it comes to game addiction I’m pretty much the worst of the worst….and then I found these jump games for iPhone. Aiyaiyai. The concept is simple – tilt the phone to move the character and bounce on the platforms to get as high (pun intended) as possible. Having a few mates that are always trying to beat your score is also incentive enough to keep playing.

Doodle Jump has been around for a long time. Really I have no excuse for not buying this game sooner, as its always in the top 25 best paid games of all time. Doodle Jump starts off easy enough. There are lots of platforms and the occasional monster may pop up to try and kill your little…I don’t know what the hell you play as…alien? Tapping the screen makes our alien fire bullets out of its…nose? Mouth? This alien is odd indeed. Anyway the bullets can kill the monsters or you can jump on their head to kill them too. As you progress you will come across more challenges like exploding platforms, black holes in the background and platforms that you have to position before you can jump on them.

Doodle Jump. What exactly is this thing?

High scores in Doodle Jump are submitted via the Facebook in app login. I don’t mind this but prefer services like OpenFeint that don’t require a Facebook account.

Froggy Jump seems to have more features than Doodle Jump and at the bargain price of free it is definitely great value! Reaching certain height milestones in Froggy Jump unlocks different themes. So far I have only unlocked 3 themes but one (Inferno) has the benefit of having ledges that normally drop or disintegrate hang around for a few more jumps. There are also items you collect on your way to the top in the form of special word letters and coins. Collect all the letters of the special word or 1000 coins and you’re rewarded with a diamond. Gather enough diamonds and you can purchase even more customized items/upgrades for your frog. Alternatively you can buy diamonds via an in-app purchase.

Skeleton Froggy is unlocked after reaching 52k

In contrast with Doodle Jump your frog doesn’t have a weapon to fire at enemies. Instead, a tap of the screen will trigger use of a held rocket that blasts your frog into the air; a technique that when timed right will prevent him from certain death. I prefer this “lifeline” to the shooting perk offered in Doodle Jump. Froggy Jump utilizes the awesomeness of OpenFeint. This will allow you to share your high scores with your friends, unlock achievements, and connect via Facebook and Twitter to post updates.

Both these games are highly enjoyable and addictive. If there is anything I don’t like about them it’s that they can drain your battery way too quick!

Online Backup Solutions

Some people have a fear of spiders. Others heights. Up until a few years ago you could be excused for having a fear of losing all your important files. Sure, you can transfer them to a USB drive every so often and hope that drive doesn’t fail, but who has time for that? Well fear not. We live in an age where cloud computing is taking off and although I can’t help with arachnophobia or acrophobia, by using some online backup services, it might take the edge off any file loss related phobia you may have.

For the last year or two I have been using a service called Dropbox to automatically backup files and have them accessible on any computer or mobile device. Overall I’ve found it works perfectly. After installing the software simply drag and drop the file or folder you wish to backup into the special Dropbox folder. And that’s it; Dropbox handles the rest.

Dropbox syncs all files and folders in it's special folder

Whenever you change, add or delete a file in Dropbox the changes (not necessarily the whole file) are automatically sent and updated on the server. I no longer find a need to email myself attachments or put files on USB storage as the Dropbox client can be installed on Windows, OSX, Linux and even a mobile client such as the iPhone.

Security wise Dropbox is very good. They encrypt all data before sending and it’s stored on their server using AES-256 encryption. They also have big men with guns and lasers securing the perimeter of the data server, you know…just in case.
Currently (and for as long as I’ve been using it) Dropbox has been offering 2GB of storage for free. They also offer larger allowances for a fee per month.

So what alternatives are out there? I think the main contender is Apple’s iDisk. As part of their MobileMe suite of cloud computing software iDisk allows for up to 20GB of online disk storage and a nice browser interface to access the files remotely. Like Dropbox there is an app for iPhones and iPads to allow mobile users access these files as well as desktop integration. At the time of writing Apple are charging $99 a year for the MobileMe service.

The other which I have been testing out for a client is DriveHQ. What I like about this one is you can select individual files and folders to backup without moving or copying them to a designated folder. You can also specify your own passkey to further encrypt your files when they are backed up online. Unfortunately the desktop software is Windows only, however there is a web interface to access the files from a web browser. DriveHQ has a free account with 1GB of storage, or plans with pay per month or year if more storage is required.

All three previously mentioned solutions provide a way to share or make public some or all of your files. This can be helpful if you need a group of people working on the same files.

Cloud computing has become increasingly popular over the last couple of years and now more services, like Office 2010, are integrating these features to provide users with a secure and easy way to store and share documents and files.

Closing apps in iOS 4 to save battery

Like most tech geeks out there I was keen to update to iOS 4 on my 3GS as soon as it came out. The two negative things I noticed were 1. My contacts and calendars had all gone and 2. My battery was only lasting half a day (usually I get about a day). The first turned out to be a problem with gmail synced contacts and calendars. A reset of the exchange account seemed to help as contacts were coming back in blocks of 50 and calendars had returned. After an hour or so everything was back to normal here.

It took me a day or two to realise that the battery was draining at a much faster rate since the update. I put this down to multitasking but it never occurred to me that you could kill open apps. It was only once I found this article on how to do it and closing the open apps did my battery go back to lasting the day. I hope this helps others like me that didn’t find it obvious.

Pressing on an open app for a few seconds in the multitasking bar brings up the close app icon.

Address Book and iCal Google Sync

This tutorial is intended to follow on from yesterday’s post on setting up a Google account to synchronise contacts and calendars automatically. It assumes you have contacts and/or calendars set up on a Gmail account.

It’s time now to set Address Book to automatically sync with this account. Open Address Book and click Address Book -> Preferences. Click the “Accounts” tab and check “Synchronize with Google”. Click configure and put in your Gmail address and password. Your online contacts will now be downloaded into your Address Book.

Setup a Google Account within Address Book

Configuring the calendar will be a similar process. Open iCal then go to iCal -> Preferences. Under the Accounts tab click “+” in the bottom left to set up a new account. Leave Account type as Automatic and put in your Gmail address and password. Your online calendar will now be downloaded into iCal.

Setup your Google calendar in iCal

If you have multiple calendars in your Google account you can select which ones to sync by going to the Delgation section of the account. Put a check next to the additional calendars you wish to synchronise.

Click Delagation to add multiple calendars

You should now successfully be synchronising with your Google account

iPhone Wireless Sync Contacts and Calendar

OK I won’t deny it, I’m lazy. I’m very lazy. Hell it’s been over a month since my last update. In fairness this is partly because nothing has impressed me enough that I wanted to write about. That is until a couple of weeks ago when I decided I couldn’t be bothered regularly plugging my iPhone into the computer anymore to manually sync contacts and calendar. Lazy, I know.

And so I decided to research ways of wirelessly syncing my phone contacts and calendar with my computer and possibly have them backed up online somewhere just in case. My search led me to MobileMe, Apple’s cloud service which for a fee per year the service would be provided, and Google’s mobile sync. Not being a fan of paying for something which I can can get for free I went with the Google option. And here we are.

To start one needs a Gmail account. If you already have one that’s great, otherwise head to Gmail and create one. With 7GB+ of storage and a nice user interface you’ll be wondering why you didn’t do it sooner.

In Gmail there is a link on the left hand side called “Contacts”. Click it. Now to import your existing contacts from your computer to Gmail. If you use Address Book for Mac click File->Export->Address Book Archive and save a file which will contain your contact data. Alternatively if you use Outlook or Outlook Express you can export in a similar way but choose to export as a CSV file so Gmail can read it. Back in the Contacts section of Gmail there is an “Import” link. Click it and upload the file you just created with your existing contacts. Hopefully you will see all your contacts appear in the All Contacts list.

As a side note – although Gmail can put contacts into groups, when you sync with an iPhone it can’t (as yet) mimic the groups.

On to Calendars. If you don’t want to sync any calendars you can skip this section.
There is a link to Calendar in the Top left corner of Gmail. Or you can access it from this link: https://www.google.com/calendar/

If you have an existing Calendar(s) in iCal or Outlook now is the time to export them to a file. Gmail can read iCal and CSV format. Like contacts use File->Export to make the file, or files if you use multiple calendars.

Under the My Calendars section of Google Calendar click Settings and then Import Calendar. Select the Calendar CSV or iCal file you created and marvel as the data gets copied into Google Calendar.

With contacts and calendars now stored in your Gmail account you are almost ready to (not so) magically wirelessly sync them with your iPhone….or Blackberry or Nokia or Windows phone. This is the link that will show you how to set up them up; although I am only going to be focusing on the iPhone version.

This page here will show you how to set up the iPhone Exchange account: Google Sync iPhone

As of the latest iPhone Software version only one Exchange account is allowed per device. This will change when software version 4.0 is released (apparently)

Right so now with the Google Exchange up and running, contacts, calendar and mail will now be synced to your iPhone. Every time you add, edit or remove a contact or event the change will be sent automatically to your Gmail account provided you have an internet connection available (3G or Wifi).

One problem I came across was not being able to sync multiple calendars. The solution is to open up Safari on the iPhone and go to http://m.google.com/sync
After signing in you can select the other calendars you wish to sync. This sort of thing is handy if you have separate calendars for work and home and you can also add predefined calendars from Google such as Australian Public Holidays.

This concludes the tutorial on wirelessly syncing with an iPhone. I will be preparing another post on automatic contact and calendar syncing using Address Book, iCal and Gmail shortly so check back in a couple of days….or months. I just remembered how lazy I am.