New Chevy Bolt EUV

We newly acquired a Chevy Bolt EUV. It seems to present a very nice driving experience. One minor thing that I think the designers overlooked. When using Apple play, the fonts in the iPhone support a wide range of Unicode (as demonstrated by my phone's name in the first image). Apple play in the car's display unit also supports a similar range Unicode (second image). However, the screen of the drivers dash does not support the same set of characters (third image). It is quite common for fonts to replace the characters they don't contain with boxes. I encountered this issue with US based automobile manufacturers' media console displays in Nigeria when people were playing songs with titles in arabic script.

Two other user experience issues:

  1. My wife raises the seat and it didn't automatically lower when I get in. Every time I get in with her seat height I knock my head and it kills my neck out.
  2. When I am in the front passenger seat and the car is off, and the driver is out of the car, I can not turn on the air conditioning.

Pulling text messages off of iPhones

I had an interesting situation where I wanted to pull off some text messages from my iPhone. I started Googling around and found a few solutions for jailbroken iPhones. But being a good citizen I have not jail broken my iPhone. I did find a solution. It might be the only one… but none the less I found one.

DiskAid

DiskAid is a really nifty little program which grants access to the files and file structure on iPhones, iPod touch and iPads. Additionally, if one has a student email address they can get a free (gratis) educational license.

From a forensics perspective, the iPhone is full of data. The DiskAid guys also had a note on how to disable geo-logging.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9x_KzBMMfjk

Making your WordPress site iPhone friendly

What are the crucial questions to ask when I think: “I want to make my site mobile friendly.”

How do I do it?

What tools do I use?

Useful links:
http://speckyboy.com/2008/06/29/7-amazing-plugins-to-view-your-wordpress-blog-on-any-mobile-device-iphone-pda/
http://freepressblog.org/2007/09/25/wordpress-mobile-admin-ui-for-iphone/

WordPress Mobile Pack

http://mobiforge.com/running/story/the-dotmobi-wordpress-mobile-pack
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-mobile-pack/

WordPress Mobile Edition
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-mobile-edition/

A mobile/phone/PDA friendly interface for your blog with progressive enhancement for advanced mobile browsers. You can see it in action by visiting this site in a mobile browser.

I have tried this on this thejourneyler.org. The plugin only works with Carrington Mobile theme 1.0.2. However, the Carrington mobile theme is currently at version 1.1, which is not compatible with this plugin (as far as I can tell). CMT 1.0.2 is not compatible with PostTabs, a plugin I use extensively to display multiple layers of content on a single page.

A nice feature of this plugin is that the user of an iPod Touch can “opt out” of the CMT. And once they have opted out they can “opt in” again with a link on the bottom of the post or page.

WordPress Mobile Admin
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wordpress-mobile-admin/

It uses Wapple’s advanced web services to produce perfect markup whilst at the same time maintaining the familiar look and feel of WordPress. You can write and edit posts, moderate and reply to comments as well as updating and managing pages.

I have also tried this. It is not compatible with Block-Spam-By-Math. That is not in and of itself a deal breaker. But to use this I would have to find a bot blocking plugin that does work with WordPress Mobile Admin. This plugin is great for managing the commenting process or adding new text content. There is a lack of support for controlling WP settings through the mobile interface.

iPhone Control Panel
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/iphone-control-panel/
The iPhone Control Panel Plugin allows you to easily configure how iPhones and iPod touches “see” your site. It gives you the ability to add custom css, a home screen bookmark icon, change the viewport, or even redirect iPhones and iPod touches to a different url.

WordPress PDA & iPhone
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-pda/

This plugin helps the users to view your blog in a pda and iPhone browser. iPhone is still in beta testing state. Soon more updates will follow.

http://www.bravenewcode.com/wptouch/

iWPhone WordPress Plugin and Theme
http://iwphone.contentrobot.com/

Wapple Architect Mobile Plugin for WordPress

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wapple-architect/

Wapple Architect Mobile Plugin for WordPress is a plugin that allows you to mobilize your blog in minutes.
Every single mobile device is detected and all aspects of your blog are tailored to the visiting handset. Sites aren’t dumbed down to the lowest common denominator but instead use the features and functionality that advanced phones offer.
Devices are detected by using Wapple’s advanced web services instead of relying on inferior 3rd party tools. If you view your blog with a brand new, never before seen handset, it’ll still work perfectly!
Any theme you’ve installed and have styled for web will be carried across to mobile giving you a consistent look and feel for each and every one of your visitors.

iPhone / Mobile Admin
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/mobileadmin/screenshots/

Mobile Admin adapts the WordPress admin UI to be more friendly to mobile devices, specifically phones.
The iPhone / iPod Touch browser was the first target, but most other mobile browsers are supported at a basic level, and plugins can be used to customize for specific browsers where desired.
A plugin for the iPhone/iPod Touch devices is included, as well as a more basic plugin for Windows Mobile browsers. (Consider the latter a “beta”, but it’s mostly intended to be another sample for how to write a plugin.)