The Firehouse

Last week I had to go to Romania for a meeting with a team of coders, landing at Cluj-Napoca on Tuesday. Scheduled to return on Wednesday, I duly turned up at the airport by 08:00, joining the long line leading to the security checkpoint. Wait. A long line? We’re talking about an airport with a single runway, one transfer bus (you could actually walk the 50 yards to the plane, but hey, if they have it they might aswell put it to some use!), about a dozen flights a day, all of them small turboprops with a capacity for around 60 people – which usually fly half empty.

So, what was the reason for the holdup? An overzealous security guard, who stared at each bag on the x-ray monitor while squinting his eyes as if it would bring more detail to the picture. After the long radioactive scrutiny, he would open the bags, shout a few things to their owners, and sometimes pull things out of them. Dangerous stuff such as sticks of SEMTEX I though.

When my turn arrived, some forty minutes later, I was rather curious apart from annoyed at what was captivating this guard. I should have guessed. Romania must have a healthy black market for….spray deodorants. My tiny Nivea sample spray tin was also taken, with a bad boy stare from the guard.

According to international safety regulations, flammable sprays are not allowed on board aircraft (albeit agencies such as the TSA allow toiletries in small quantities), just as dangerous chemicals, explosives, live ammunition, and a whole bunch of other nasty stuff. This guy had the right to take away my little piece of odour-fighting equipment – but was it really necessary to do so? I had almost calmed down, fearing I would miss my connection at Vienna, when I noticed the also tiny duty-free shop, which looked recently refurbished. On a closer look, they were selling…yep, you guessed it – a truckload of flammable products, from large hair sprays ten times larger than my former deodorant, to cologne with a high alcohol content. I could have just bought one and carried on with my world domination plans just as well, but all I wanted was to get to Vienna.

This got me thinking about the recent hubbub about exploding Dell laptops, basically when their batteries vented with flame and smoke, as it is technically defined. Laptop batteries are made of lithium-cobalt, or more recently, lithium-manganese oxide. This type of chemistry is very efficient at holding charge, and making it available at high rates, without damage or aging to the battery. The drawback is that they are very dangerous. A lithium battery can explode violently, sending chemicals and debris out at high speed and causing a lot of damage. They can also vent with flame and smoke, as seen in Dell’s promotional footage. For a great explanation of battery technologies, visit the Battery University.

The TSA officially allows laptops and their batteries in both checked and cabin luggage, so do we have to worry? If you ever find yourself sitting next to a burning laptop on a flight, take this comforting thought with you: there is nothing on the plane that can put out a lithium chemical fire.

Happy flying!

Today I received an email with some technical specs I was supposed to review, but the document came in OpenOffice Write format (.odt), and since on my MacBook I only had Office installed, there was no way to open it.

Checking the OpenOffice.org site, it appeared a version was available for OS X, but in the traditional open source way, I was met with thinks like:

“en-US builds for Intel based Macs will be listed here as soon as they passed QA. In the meantime please” (The phrase really ends like this, I am quoting vervatim!)

…please…what? What am I supposed to do in the meantime? Ask the guy who sent me the document to re-send it in Word format? Oh, wait, here is the solution:

“The builds use X11 and are meant for the user who doesn’t care that much about look but functionality and cross plattform integration and usability. Other prospects are the Darwin community and the Unix-savvy MacOS X user community and forming a platform for us to build the Quartz and Aqua tracks for the traditional Mac user.”

I thought Intel Macs had only been around for a few months, so how can there be a tradition? Last, but not least, the list of mirrors for the english version were empty. No problem for German or French users, so congrats to you, lucky people! The fact it was empty explained the “in the meantime” statement.

What is this rant all about? The discussion I had the other day with a diehard opensource defender – the type that scream “Linux will conquer the desktop next year, really, this time” any chance they get. I think it is really great that people are willing to donate their time to contribute to opensource projects, some as large as Linux or OpenOffice, but they have to think in terms of reality, not utopia. To think Linux will take over Windows on the desktop, or that OpenOffice will replace Office, at least in the short or medium term, is wishful thinking.

I expect to be beaten to death by the diehard Linux fans, but there is no way my mother would know how to “vi your X86 configuration file to change the video adapter so that it works”. Until Linux or OpenOffice offer similar experiences than Windows or Office, there will stay in niche or very specific target groups. Companies are migrating to these operating systems and office suites, yes, but they usually have the resources to implement the transition, both from technical and training standpoints.

So, good luck with the project, I honestly wish it every success, and I am sorry that I am not a competent UNIX programmer so I can contribute. But from a user’s perspective, it has some way to go.

It was frustrating to see the TechCrunch Wiki continuously locked out by people signing up to Mike Arrington’s TechCrunch party #7, so it seems that in the 20 minutes I managed to be offline, it has been locked completely, and people have turned to RSVPing on the blog’s comments. I trust this proves a Wiki is not the best method to sort an RSVP list – RSVPr.com anyone?

I hope my entry on the blog, #115, makes it to the final list! Looking back at past events, it will be a blast. Oh, and that guy that kept locking the Wiki for 15 minutes, then again, and again, and again….I have your IP… (just kidding!)

This time around the party will be at August Capital in Menlo Park – plenty of space to schmooze and talk about or projects.

It’s coming back, but this time, it’s a 2.0 bubble. We will not likely see hundreds of millions of dollars burning in botomless pits, as VCs are being more rational about their release of funds, but no doubt a good many companies jumping on the bandwagon will not survive.

Take social networks – there are a myriad of them appearing, each an even more boring copy of the preceeding one (whoa, preceeding has two e’s, let’s grab the 2.0 domain quick!). It looks like anything with two vowels in line can be The Next Big Thing. Andrew Wooldridge has created a very handy Web Two Point Oh! name and product generator for your shiny new company – endless fun. Want a 2.0 bullshit generator? Go here. The tools are available, the VCs are waiting with the cash, what are we all waiting for?

I read a few weeks ago an article that defined this bubble as more controlled, in the sense that investments are made after the business model is somewhat proven, so the old “lets get 100.000 users and figure out how to make money later” is definitely out. Here is a great list of 11 suggestions to survive the 2.0 bubble – sobering read.

My opinion is that bubbles are necessary evolutionary process, they sort out the weed from the golden nuggets. The 3.0 bubble will be way bigger than this one – why? Because the 2.0 bubble will be more of a pop, with dozens of $10 million investments going down the drain, thus VCs will say “hey, the last bubble wasn’t that bad, we can risk more money this time”. History has proven that history always repeats itself.

When I started this blog, I talked a bit about the story behind the tech.am domain, and all this time I have been searching for one that fits better.

Armenia holds the .am TLD, and there are a few registrars, such as godaddy.com (what an awful name…), that provide services for AMNIC.

Thus, starting today, please point your browsers and RSS feeds to tech.am. I will be redirecting this domain to the new site, but I am unsure how to redirect RSS and Atom feeds, so for now you’ll have to update them manually. Maybe this will make a nice howto when I find out!

Today I decided to attempt a second round at configuring the router FON sent me a few days ago, since my first out-of-the-box experience hadn’t been that good. Emails to tech support unanswered, which seems to be an endemic problem, as can be seen on FON’s forums, I finally gave up.

After plugging in the WRT54GS router as briefly described in the brief manual supplied with it (a third of one side of an A4 sheet of paper), I connect to the FON_HotSpot SSID detected by the MacBook. Fire up Firefox, and I’m promptly greeted with a welcome page that states the router could not configure itself, and thus has no connection to the Internet. It shows a few scenarios that one can check for problems, also suggesting one should consult again the third-of-a-page-handbook, and, failing all this, to try manual configuration of the router.

After about an hour of changing IP addresses of the WAN and LAN interfaces (and where is the WiFi interface? or is it linked to the LAN or WAN?), I have finally given up again. I’m not a networking überguru, but I know a bit about routing and setting up IP interfaces, and this thing just managed to get on my nerves. You cannot find a clear manual with diagrams of network connectivity, setups and scenarios, a description of the theory of operation of the hotspot, and as it has been shown, sending emails to FON support is usually futile. The forums are more helpful, but not because there is a healthy bunch of FON staff there, but because a number of talented and skilled individuals have taken upon themselves the task of helping others through the ordeal.

I’m sure that a lot, if not most, users that plug in the FON router can simply connect to it, register and start surfing, but in cases like mine, where I simply have a DSL router to which I plug in the FON router and it’s supposed to work – but doesn’t – a blank void is all there is left to stare at.

Maybe a last attempt will be to flash the new release of the firmware, once they have fixed the problems in v.0.6.6…

Bottom line is that FON cannot expect to create a WiFi planet with people roaming for free on the 1 million routers they are going to distribute, once they get their logistics right, based on complex hardware that requires from either skilled operators, or very good tech support and clear setup and troubleshooting guides. A couple of days ago, someone posted on the forum that FON was a beta company. How can a company class itself in beta? It can have a service in beta, but the company must be running, if not totally smooth, at least with agility and responsiveness, fixing its problems quickly and providing first-class customer service.

Why? Because demand either totally exceeds supply, or the other way around. And the fares stay the same. A few days ago, I found myself on a hunt to get a cab that would take me to the bus station so I could get the last ride home that night – and ended up walking half the distance while watching taken cabs go past all the time. When I finally managed to find a free one, I had to convince the driver I’d give him a handsome tip if he would cut off the bus that had already left the station.

What is my proposal? To link all the meters to a central database which tracks in use versus free cabs at any one time in a particular area or city, and adjusts the price of the minimum fare accordingly. This minimum fare could then be shown to potential clients on the LCD display most modern cabs now sport on their roofs. This would have a few effects:

1. It would make cabbies happier. They hate taking people two or three streets for the minimum fare, which then causes them to have to drive around again for a while to find a new costumer.

2. It would make people who really need to take a cab (like I did) happier, as they would be more likely to find one when they most needed it.

3. It would give tons of free publicity to the first city to implement this!

I bet some of the people riding the dozens of cabs I saw that evening would have been willing to pay a minimum fare of $5 instead of $1.50. Today, there were tons of free cabs at the stop, so the fare would be cheaper, and more people would feel compelled to take one.

The twist that makes this work is that the fare you pay doesn’t represent the same distance or waiting time regardless of the actual price, but it is proportional. So, a $6 minimum fare would get you four times as far as a $1.5 minimum fare. The travel cost is the same, but the value of it changes – that is, the distance people feel is worth walking to save the cost of the cab.

People use USB WiFi adapters for a number of reasons, maybe their laptop doesn’t have built-in WiFi, or like me, there are no cards yet available that fit the tiny pseudo-PCMCIA slot of the MacBook Pro. Yes, I know the MBP has built-in WiFi, but my personal interest and professional activity involve using WiFi in alternative ways, so I need to test antennas, adapters, software and so on.

A few weeks ago, I bought a D-Link DWL-G122, the thought being that since it could be connected to a long USB extension cable, there wouldn’t be any of the RF losses associated to coaxial cables – and so I could go wardriving with a potentially better setup than the usual PCMCIA card with a pigtail and coax running to a roof-mount antenna. And I was wrong. The results were appaling – even the Vaio’s internal IPW2200 card was much better, detecting over twice as many access points as with the D-Link.

How could this be? Logically, having the antenna attached directly to the RF port of the WiFi adapter should reduce loss considerably – but it wasn’t the case. To be sure, I went shopping again, and this time bought a Conceptronic C54RU. One would think that the D-Link, costing around 39€, would have better performance, since the Conceptronic only cost me 25€ – there just had to be something there to justify the price difference. To my surprise, performance was almost identical. This prompted me to pry open the two adapters, and this is what I found:

No, I didn’t just photoshop a clone of the first PCB. It is the same PCB for both adapters – which means that some OEM/ODM company is manufacturing these devices, and selling them in customized plastics to whoever wants them. Paying attention to quality? Probably not their very first priority.

The next two photographs show a little explanation on the structure of the RF section of these adapters. Do not confuse the PCB antenna as a diversity arrangement, it is basically a center-fed dipole. The designer paid no attention to the large mass of grounding material right next to the large pads of the antenna, and the matching circuit could probably not do much to alleviate the poor design. Here is the actual stripline [click the image for a larger version]:

And the test connector:

Bottom line: if you are close to your access point, and don’t really care about the range and quality of the link, this may be the adapter for you. But, if your intention is to take these devices for a wardrive, well, don’t.

I got tired of the old theme for various reasons, but it mostly got on my nerves for its tendency to place content around in any random order. So, how do you like this one? Comments welcome.

Last night I was watching a DVD on my MacBook Pro, and remembered that I still kept a Motorola Bluetooth stereo headset from the time I was working at SouthWing and we designed such devices.

Bluetooth stereo headsets use a profile called Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP), which allows them to receive medium-quality audio at 16kHz from compatible devices. Most USB Bluetooth dongles sold recently have the profile in their drivers, and there are some mobile phones from Nokia, Samsung and Motorola that also feature this profile. The advantage is that you can listen to music wirelessly, and also control the player from the headset, as they feature the usual forward, back, play and pause controls.

Once I found the headset, I switched on Bluetooth on the Mac, and started the pairing process. The headset was recognised just fine, and pairing completed, but I noticed that it had been connected as a Handsfree device, with A2DP nowhere to be found. Since there doesn’t seem to be a method of connecting the headset permanently, so the audio is always routed from the Mac to it, the attempt was frustrated – I couldn’t even listen to the DVD in low-quality audio.

Why has Apple left out this profile, is it a blunder, or a calculated approach? As to this date, Apple doesn’t manufacture or resell any Bluetooth wireless headsets (only one can be found at their store, and it comes with a dongle for the iPod, so it doesn’t count). So, why would they have an interest in adding the A2DP profile, so that we could use any other headset? If they are in the process of designing their own, they might want to keep the profile away from Macs until they launch it.

Then again, if we give Apple a vote of confidence that they are not that insidious, it could be a blunder. And a big one. Windows has been able to work with A2DP headsets since late 2005, so they have had plenty of time to add the profile to their Bluetooth stack.

A few myths and facts about Bluetooth, versions and profiles for the curious:

1. Profiles are mostly independant of the Bluetooth version. It is perfectly possible to have A2DP in a V1.2 Bluetooth device, just the same as a V2.0 + EDR can have just two profiles and miss many of the usual ones – the mix is up to the manufacturer and driver supplier.

2. EDR stands for Enhanced Data Rate – this does not increase the range, just increases data throughput from around 700kbps to around 2.1kbps, by using a different modulation scheme. The Bluetooth protocol and profiles stay just the same – the advantage is that since data takes almost 1/3rd of the time to send compared to non-EDR devices, there is a considerable power consumption reduction.

3. “Device Y doesn’t support profile Z”. Again, this is up to the manufacturer, and it’s hard to add new profiles, specially in embedded devices. Some chipsets use masked ROM, which means that the Bluetooth stack, profiles and other settings are burned at the time the silicon is printed – so, no software updating on these. Masked ROM is considerably cheaper, although has an initial setup cost of $100.000, so it’s only good for high-volume production runs. The chips can drop $1 to $2 compared to the flash EEPROM counterparts.

As an example of a very poorly implemented Bluetooth solution we can find the Logitech MX5000 keyboard and mouse combo – it sucks. A lot. I am preparing a review that will try to investigate why it does the stupid things it does, such as repeating the first letter you type when it wakes up a dozen times, or why the mouse starts wondering around the screen as if it was possessed by a poltergeist.