A Tale of Two Dealerships

I'm starting to look at replacing my 2010 Nissan Cube.  Don't laugh unless you've driven one.  It's a ton of fun.  However, at this point it's also eight years old and over 150,000 miles, so it's time to start looking.

I started at Dealership 'A' which I'm not going to name for reasons that will soon become apparent.  I walked in and the receptionist (between bites of something) asked what brought me in.  After saying I was interested in a new car she found a salesman for me.  It turned out that this really wasn't that helpful as I knew as much about their cars as he did.

I said I was interested in a particular model.  There was a stare, and then 'well, have you considered this other car?'  Since the model I'd mentioned was a hybrid and the other car wasn't the answer was 'no, I had not'.  'Well, I think that would work for you.'  This, without having asked me what I was actually interested in.

It turns out there was a reason he didn't ask and that was because he didn't know anything about the model he was pushing.  'It's new and we just received some'.  Okay, but unless the company just dropped some off an hour previously without having let anyone know they existed shouldn't a salesperson have done a little research?

Anyway, out for a test drive.  It was just about the shortest test drive you could have that actually left the lot.  Here's the entire conversation:

'Does this have Apple Carplay?'

'I don't know; let me check.' (poking at radio).  'Yes, it looks like it does'.  (pause). 'So, what do you think?'

'It seems pretty nice.'

'So, what do you think?'

'It seems to be pretty responsive.'

'So, what do you think?'

You get the idea.

At dealership 'B' the salesman asked 'What are you looking for?'  I listed a few specifics.  'Well, here are some models that have what you're looking for.'  After reviewing the specs a bit, we decided on the one I'd test drive.

It took a little while for him to return with the key.  He explained that he had to put gas in it because it had only been driven off the carrier (it had 2 miles on it when I got in) and he'd run it through the wash because the last storm had made it look terrible.  He then handed me the key and said 'Tell me what you think when you get back'.

When I did get back I asked a few questions (and got reasonable answers) and then was offered the possibility of taking the car home for the night.

 

Guess which dealership might get my business?

Save Your Device Passcodes!

My iPad Mini has a passcode set on it.  This is always a good idea, even if it doesn't leave the house very often.  You probably don't enter your password every time you read your email for instance.  A quick scan of the emails will show where you shop, where you bank, etc.  Follow that up with a quick 'forgot password' on the site and it's instant access if someone has your device.

So, passcodes are a good thing.  In my case, my iPad Mini also is connected to my work email system which not only requires a passcode but also requires changing it every 120 days.  That's not too bad; I have a system for my passcodes.  Except...

A few weeks ago my passcode expired at about 11 pm.  And I changed it to, something.  I know at the time it made sense and it would be easy to remember.  Unfortunately, it wasn't and several days later I realized I had absolutely no idea what it was.  And that is a problem.

You see, there (by design) is no way to recover a forgotten passcode.  Even if you can still unlock your iDevice with a fingerprint you can't change the passcode without entering the current one.  And eventually your device is going to require that passcode.  Even if you don't set it to force a passcode every 'x' days it will require it after a power up or upgrade.  You will be locked out.  And when you are locked out there is only one solution; wipe it and reload from a backup.

Luckily for me I could still unlock my iPad mini so I quickly hooked it up to my MacBook and did a backup (I normally back up only to iCloud).  Then, I powered off the Mini and turned it on holding the home button down.  This started it in recovery mode.  I attached it back to my MacBook and recovered from backup.  This reloads the data and most settings and steps you through the normal process for a new device (including setting a new passcode).  It will still have to download the actual apps.  The whole process took about an hour or so, but at least I didn't lose anything.

So the lessons are:

1) Back up your device regularly.

2) Put that passcode in your password manager because lots of weird things make sense in the middle of the night.

On TextExpander 6

Updated: 4/17/16 - See end of post

This week brought us news about one of my highly recommended apps for OS X (and iOS) when TextExpander 6 came out.  This release seems mostly like one that is trying to position itself for the future;  the big change isn't new functionality per se but a switch from using Dropbox or iCloud for syncing to using their own service and allowing snippets to be shared between users.

Oh, and moving from a purchase to a subscription model.  An expensive subscription model.  Although there is a discounted one year upgrade option for current users, for new users or after that first year subscribing will cost you $48 if you pay for a year or $60 if you go by month.

This is a difficult market for developers; especially developers of productivity applications.  It's a bit of a niche market and one of the downsides of the App Store is that now everyone expects apps to be $.99.  Obviously that won't work for something complicated with a somewhat limited audience like TextExpander.  Moving to a subscription model must be tempting; the chance to get a steady stream of income would be a great help to any development company.

In this case, though, the problem is that the new features seem to be only of use to business users (and with the new sharing I really mean groups of business users).  And it is priced only for business users.

I use TextExpander at home, exclusively.  I cannot use it at work (we are Windows based and completely locked down; no external syncing app would ever be approved for security reasons).  And while I would pay that discounted rate they have for the first year (it comes to $24) there is no way I get enough value to pay twice that much every year.

A 'consumer pricing' tier that excluded the ability to share snippets with other users would be perfect for me.  But unless that happens I'll have to migrate my snippets to something else.  I'll be trying Keyboard Maestro first.  I already own it so there is no cost.  It doesn't handle text expansion quite as well but so far it seems to be good enough.

I hope the new approach wins them business customers and allows them to continue to develop TextExpander.  But I'm afraid they are going to leave the home user behind in the process.

UPDATE:

As I pretty much expected (and hoped) Smile Software realized pretty quickly that they had mis-priced the Life Hacker (i.e. home) package as well as the upgrade pricing.  The upgrade pricing is now $20/year forever.  Much better and I gladly signed up.

 

More Apple Watch Thoughts

This is not was I was planning to post this week, but I kept hearing about how the Apple Watch was a 'failure', 'not cool' and some tech writers were abandoning it.  I decided to put down my thoughts on it, since I've had one since last Father's Day.

First, I still wear it everyday.  I've forgotten to put it on once and two times it didn't get on the charger correctly and died during the day.  All three times I was irritated that it wasn't on my wrist.

What do I use it for?  Probably what Apple should have focused on when they released it:

1. Messages.  No it's not 'necessary', but it is very useful.  Especially in meetings it is much less obtrusive to check my wrist than dig out my phone.  It also makes it very easy to respond if a short message is appropriate.

2. Maps.  Yes, it does this well.  It is a little slow if you set it up on the watch but most things are a little slow on the watch, so...

3. Complications.  Specifically the temperature and next appointments. Yes, this is lazy.  Yes, this is convenient; especially the temperature since for some reason the 'Today' notification would rather give what the rest of the day might be like rather than let you try to figure out what coat you need RIGHT NOW.

4.Exercise.  The built in app is pretty good.  So is the app for MapMyRun.  Not for hard core fitness buffs but for the casual user it works very well.  I like the daily rings, too as well as the heart rate.

5. Notifications.  Sports scores, Credit card usage, etc.  It's very nice for that.

Other stuff?  I don't really use it as much as I'd hoped.  Apps can be very slow to open.  Some are hard to read.

I think Apple would have been better served if for version 1 they had just stuck with those few things.  Remember the original iPhone?  No app store, no thousands of apps.  It was brought out as a phone, a music player, an internet device.  The rest came later.

Anyway, if they really have sold 12 Million Apple Watches, I don't think I'd call that a failure.  As I tell everyone who asks this hasn't changed my life but I'm still glad I have one.

Random Thoughts about the Apple Keynote

New Watchbands

Okay, nice.  I guess.  I'd love to get a better feel for how well they are selling.  I love my watch and can't wait for the new OS.  Last week it didn't get charged for some reason and I went a day without.  Yeah, I know horrible.  But it was annoying.

Ipad Pro

Looks pretty nice.  Might be good for professional artists, medical folks.  Costs about the same as  my MacBook once you add the keyboard and pen.  And I have a full-fledged OS, not iOS.

Apple TV

Me want.  Now.

Look, this isn't going to dump the PS4 or Xbox in spite of what some people said.  But it has some really nice features for watching content and the games could be fun.

New iPhones

All we changed is everything.  A little.

I'll wait for the iPhone 7.  Or 7s, perhaps.