-
Samsung Instinct - Nice try, but...
Last week, Sprint announced the Samsung Instinct. It is a nice try to compete with the iPhone, but it just isn't an iPhone. It runs on a great network (Sprint has an excellent data network), but Samsung and Sprint aren't known for their cutting edge user interfaces. In addition, the iPhone has iTunes which is an easy to use application and actually works on the Mac; will the Instinct ever have Mac software? Unlikely as Sprint's commitment to the Mac is mediocre at best. Granted it does have EVDO and some other cool features, but it doesn't have the buzz of the iPhone and won't have the third party applications that the iPhone will have in a few short months.
-
Caught with his pants down
I had a user send me email the other day indicating that his copy of ReceiptWallet was already registered and he couldn't enter his newly purchased registration code. He sent me a screenshot of the about box which shows the registration code and I ran the code through my database to discover a) it was never issued and b) it is in the wrong format to be a valid code. Hmmm. When I was at Macworld, I spoke to an engineer at eSellerate who indicated that their serial number library was updated to be more secure as there have been some cracks out there of it; I still use the library as some of my users purchased way back when I used eSellerate to process my sales. So, it would appear that there is a cracked serial number for DocumentWallet (and now ReceiptWallet) floating out there.
-
Tech support via Screen Sharing
One of the features that I really like about Leopard is iChat's ability to do Screen Sharing. There have been different implementations of screen sharing including Apple Remote Desktop and VNC, but none is as easy to use through home routers as this. In the last week, I helped my dad with email (he just upgraded to Leopard) and helped a ReceiptWallet user with an issue. Sometimes it is much faster and easier for me to poke around than to talk on the phone or exchange email. While there are some problems with the feature dealing with different screen resolutions, for most people it works quite well. This feature, alone, is a reason to get anyone that you support to upgrade to Leopard; if you've ever spent hours on the phone trying to talk someone through a problem, then this is for you!
-
Excellent Crash Reports
I find that a majority of the crash reports that come in for ReceiptWallet have the following for the description: