A Drobo is a robot-like hard drive enclosure made by Data Robotics. It’s robot-like because once it’s connected to your pc, you can add hard drives, of any size and make, and it will magically recognize the additional space almost on the fly.

Since reading up on the clever little device I have officially added it to my list of things to buy when I build out my dream MAC.

For a nice intro to drobo, check out Cali Lewis’ video on the drobo website.

Post from: Udder Talk

Drobo what?

Ok ok, I know it’s only two days into the week, but the news must go on.

Google Chrome
It’s been about a week since google unveiled it’s new browser geared towards web applications. Among other things, it promises to be faster, more crash resistant, and user friendly than the suite of browsers it will compete with. If you haven’t checked it out, get some chrome over here

For a few quick updates and browser tricks check out lifehacker

More updates to come…

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Week in review

After waiting for just over two weeks from the July 11 release date, I finally managed to get my mitts on the iPhone 3g. I must say, it was certainly worth the wait but of course there is no such thing as a path that is paved in gold and the iPhone 3g is by no means the end all to Mobile Phones/Smartphones. Follow me now for my first impressions and a few tips that may help out fellow iPhone/3g users.

The original iPhone was a device that was far ahead of it’s time. Apple set out to achieve the impossible with that device. They were in essence reinventing the wheel and the way that we looked at smartphones from here on it. Apple quickly snapped up market share in the crowded smart phone market, and in almost no time at all they were sitting pretty with the 2nd best smartphone on the market, next to RIM’s Blackberry. Since that initial release we have seen countless competitors step up in an attempt to dethrone the new heavyweight champion, not to mention the direct knock offs and clones of the iphone. Even still, none of this seems to waiver the champ. The iphone is still the hot device to have and hold. Now with the advent of the iPhone 3g, the world stood on it’s heels once again.

The Good

3g speed is everything that you may have heard about. It is fast, and cruising around on the internet is definitely fun when combined with both Safari, and the iphone’s accelerometer. The phone now sports a smooth, more rounded corner, look than the original iphone. The added GPS functionality is also a plus as I was moving from a blackberry 8800, which already had GPS functionality built in, and did not want to take steps back in this department. The App store provides many new downloadable applications that add even further to the iphone’s already full repertoire. Email has been stepped up in this model of the iphone adding the ability to sync with Microsoft Exchange servers and offering full push email support.

The Bad

Although the 3g speed is fun and blazingly fast, it is not found everywhere. Even though I live in the heart of San Francisco, I have found that I lose 3g and downgrade to Edge at almost regular intervals. Also, that 3g speed comes at the price of a severely depleted battery life. Speaking of battery life, the iphone 3g suffers all around from a less than adequate battery life. I say this as a former blackberry user who could go with out a phone charge for 2 - 3 days at a time. I now find that I must charge my iphone after an 8 hour long work day, and I haven’t even begun to make use of it’s ipod functionality yet!

The Ugly

The phone may only be synced with one exchange account. For some this may be a non - issue, for others it may be a deal breaker altogether, only you can judge. For me, it’s not so bad as I mainly make use of imap accounts. This brings me to another issue that some users have encountered, you can only sync your calendar and contacts with either Exchange or your personal accounts, not both. Again, for some this may be huge, for me, not so much. There is, of course, the lack of cut/paste support which many iphone users have been begging for since the first coming of the device. Apple has had leaks and rumors of this support coming in a firmware soon, but nothing solid. Lastly, there is still the lack of MMS support, so if you have to send pics taken with your camera via a text message, you might as well fugedaboutit.

Final Words

I must say that overall I am in love with this new device. Apple has seriously out done themselves with these smartphones, and although the naysayers may line up for years to come, I for one will be there to salute good craftmanship and the perfect blend of form and functionality. The UI is extremely user friendly and fun to use.

If you find that you are running into issues with the battery life then you can try a few different tips and tricks to increase your battery life. If that is not enough, then I highly reccommend picking up an external backup battery. They can be found both on ebay, or direct from a few promising manufacturers.

ebay: iphone backup batteries

Richard Solo Backup Battery

IphoneCK backup Battery

Kensington backup battery

or you can wait for the: Mophie backup battery for iphone 3g

If you’re looking for a good case to protect your new toy iphone, then I highly reccommend checking out casemate - They make quality cases that still have a clean look.

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Look, it’s an iPhone 3g Mommy…

Codeigniter is great framework in and of itself, but it does not come with a built in auth library. Therefore there are many parties who have stepped in to fill this void. I won’t go into details about these libraries, but know that they are all a great choice when it comes time to secure your application. However, the authentication library that I have chosen to use is called CL Auth.

CL Auth is a great authentication library that comes with some pretty useful functions. It was written by Jason Ashdown (Flash UK over at the CI Forums) and inspired by the FreakAuth Light Authentication Library.

Here is a quick feature list:

* Remember Me (inspired by phpBB3)
* Forgotten Password
* DB Sessions
* Better Captcha
* URI Auth management (see below)
* Email Verification
* Login using Username OR Email address
* Password encryption with MD5 MCrypt
* Extendable user profile
* Optimised for performance

CL Auth does not come with an Admin Panel

CL Auth is compatible with CodeIgniter 1.6.3 (verified)

The system takes a new spin on authentication by using a uri management system for handling users and groups.

I decided to drum up an integration of this authentication library with the Vanilla Forum Engine. Vanilla is another, clean, modular, and state of the art forum engine that takes a different approach to managing a forum.

Check out the integration wiki here.

Now it’s back to coding.

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Codeigniter with a Vanilla twist

In my recent travels through out SF I have run into my fair share of interesting things. Not too long ago I attended the Bay to Breakers race event. Now this starts off as a race across San Francisco/Charity Event but what it becomes is definitely something else. People dress up in strange outfits and walk to other end of the bay. This would all be well and good if it were Halloween, but here we are in the dead of May and the sun is high in the sky. Yeah Gotta Love SF.

Let us not forget the rambling and more than occassional homeless person. Now I’d like to consider myself a human advocate. I haven’t organized my militia at this point, nor do I plan to in the foreseeable future, but that said, sometimes the rambling homeless person can drive me nuts. For instance, yesterday, I had one come up to my girlfriend and I and start rambling about relations. All well and good, IF IT MADE ANY SENSE! Gotta love SF.

Lastly, I keep reading about the next Bill Gates/Super Start Up founder. One guy I recently read about in the SF magazine is the founder of a company called BlueLithium. He sold the company about a year back to Yahoo for approximately 300 million! Gotta love SF.

And on that note, I have to go to work… it will be cold but I will press on.

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Gotta Love San Francisco