syncopation

Spotify – yes? no?

I am sick of waiting for open beta of Spotify and took my chance at spotifyinvite.se. I have heard so much good things about Spotify but have yet to try it. Spotifyinvite.se, would you please grant me the precious access to the little green app?

I’ll be back should I get my invite and let you all know about it… or you are thinking SCAM, RUN JANICE, RUN!

Hopefully that’s not the case.

Stay tune.

The most humourous iPhone app

I love this app’s description:

Ever forgot you girlfriend’s birthday? Problem solved. What about an anniversary? Does she simply get upset because you don’t talk to her enough?

With the humorous Girlfriend iPhone app (and possibly the answer to life, even at $0.99), all of these problems are solved. Here is a user testimonial to prove our point:

“My first three wives divorced me because I always forgot anniversaries. I am pretty sure my forth marriage will work thanks to the Girlfriend app?” Mark, 22

This application allows you to set up automated text messages or emails to be sent to your significant other based on your specified criteria such as “Relationship Seriousness” and how often you would like to (or are expected to) communicate. Messages will be sent based on your criteria (every two hours to once a month) and will be randomly generated and sent based on your relationship seriousness level. Messages will possibly be humorous but never vulgar. Out database contains thousands of messages, enabling messages to constantly be fresh and original and signed with your name. Our system enables your significant other to respond to the message and the response will be sent to your email address.

In addition, we have an “Advanced Settings” feature, which enables you to enter relationship and personal information such as anniversary dates, birthdays, and even eye color. This way, you will never miss another date and your messages will be very specific. Example texts are shown below:

“I just drove by a brown barn and it reminded me of your eyes.”

“Did you know we started dating 37 days and 8 hours ago?”

There is a history feature as well, which lets you see what messages have been sent to your significant other and when so you are not thrown off guard if they come up in casual conversation.

In conclusion, forget male enhancement and steroids, all you really need is the Girlfriend iPhone app and your relationship health and sexual activity will increase significantly!

I wonder if the app creator is a female or male… I am this close to trying it – only if I have an iPhone!!!

Girlfriend App

So Close!

My dream’s come (true)

Some shocking news about wireless electricity

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers said Thursday they have developed a wireless energy transfer technology that could ensure wireless devices are always charged up and ready to go.

The team at MIT, one of the top US academic “laboratories” for new inventions, has roadtested the fledgling technology and shown that it can power a 60 watt bulb from a power source two meters away.

That’s more than enough juice to supply an average laptop, said Marin Soljacic, a professor of physics at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who has been working on this project for several years.

The researchers, having proved that the technology dubbed “WiTricity” does work, plan to refine it to make it more efficient, although the range over which wireless power can be delivered probably won’t extend beyond a room or a factory floor.

Well, techno-wise, my dream is really not having to worry about power supply of my mobile, iPod and laptop and that they could be charged anywhere anytime with no strings attached.

Now, although the researchers does not believe that it could be extended beyond a factory floor now, who knows how far they’d achieve in another 10 years?  I doubt anyone would have thought that you could charge your laptop wirelessly 10 years ago.

I will continue to cross my fingers for WiTricity to become as sophisticated as Wifi nowadays :-)

Mac Recipe: Make Acutal Phone Calls via Quicksilver!

Call your friends via Quicksilver!, originally uploaded by Straußer.

I don’t know what brough me to this impromptu exploration of Quicksilver. I am pretty sure many people out there would know about this trick, but I have never read it anywhere else. (Maybe I have but then I forgot.) So I figure I could share it to all of you!

Ingredients needed:

1. First, make sure you have get all the ingredients listed above.
2. Then, make sure your Quicksilver has Phone module & Bluetooth module installed. If unsure, check preference > Plug-in > All Plug-in. Make sure the two boxes of Phone module & Bluetooth module are checked.
3. Turn on the bluetooth connection of your mobile phone!
4. Trigger your quicksilver (e.g. mine is double-option)
5. Type a contact’s name that you have got an actual phone number in the address book.
6. Press than right arrow on the keyboard – and QS should let you browse the contact details of that contact.
7. After you chose the number of that contact you want to dial, click tab.
8. Scroll until you’ve select Dial with in the middle box as illustrated above.
9. QS should prompt you with the third box – choose Bluetooth and click return!
10. Oh your phone is dialing now!!!

NB. I just realise the steps are soooo clumsy, I should do a screencast tomorrow – hold tight!

Play OGM nicely on Mac

I have got tons of Friends episode in .ogm files which unfortunately Quicktime player never supports it. As a result, I never get to watch them often because I hate using my PC since it always freezes itself.

Until I have found NicePlayer!

NicePlayer is an open source media player which can play many files that QT can’t play e.g. ogm with help from plugins such as XinePlayer. I understand that VLC also plays .ogm, however, what is nice about NicePlayer is that it will use QT’s code too. Therefore, NicePlayer remains small in size yet powerful in function which is really what I am after since my iBook has a 30 GB hard disk.

NicePlayer is currently in its Beta phase, but I found it quite steady and I had a great time with it.

If you want me to be really picky, I guess I could say that I prefer that it at least has some border… but that’s really just personal taste :P

2006 Apps round-up

Glenn Wolsey’s post on Apps that he’s bought this year has “inspired” me to write one of mine:

In the year 2006, I have bought the following applications:

1. David Wantanabe’s NewsFire: I of course was comparing it to NetNewsWire when I made the decision as they pretty much do the same job and are both great rss readers. I just look at the price, and NewsFire won by a narrow five bucks.
2. Code Sorcery Workshop’s Pukka: reason of purchase found here.
3. MacHeist Bundle which includes… another copy of NewsFire (which I gave to Samantha), Delicious Library, TextMate (I have wanted this app for a long time! However, my limited usage never allows me to justify the purchase… so its inclusion in the MH budle was really a great news to me.), Pangea Arcade, ShapeShifter, DevonThink Personal, FotoMagico, Disco and iClip 4

However, that’s not all the apps I’ve got in 2006. Thanks to Phill Ryu and other Mac gurus who have set up shareware give-away events such as My Dream App, Mac Heist and Mac App A Day. I have got another zillion apps that my iBook’s little hard disk is now too well-fed.

Continue reading…

Best Shortcut in Safari

I just* discovered a great use of shortcut in Safari which is best accompanied by the use of del.icio.us bookmarking applications such as Cocoalicious or Pukka. (Or any variation or del.icio.us and its peripheral applications)

Follow these steps and you can bookmark easily with just your keyboard:

Step 1: Get a del.icio.us account if you hadn’t already have one.

Step 2: Get a bookmarking tool such as Cocalicious or Pukka. (I have used Cocoalicious before, but now I use Pukka, they are both really good tools… it’s just I like Pukka’s icon and UI better. But the downside of Pukka is its lack of ability to browse the tags locally.)

Step 3: Put the bookmarklet for your bookmarking app on the Bookmark bar on Safari. (You can try this on Firefox or Flock, I don’t guarantee it’ll work though)

Continue reading…

Facelifting lil’ janicelo.com

If you visit here frequently enough, you should recognize some changes since last week…

First, to glorify the renaissance of this lil’ blog, I have changed the theme from Kyle Neath’s Hemingway to Unsleepable from openswitch. (Not that Hemingway is not a superb theme, it is just I got sick of things too quickly… this is my sickness :P)

Second, JaniceLo.com now comes with heaps of plugins – maybe not as crazy as many other blogs, but they have certainly costed me some time long to setup. Installed plugins included>

Third, as mentioned before, I have installed the sidebar widget. Then of course I would have equipped it with tones of useful widgets. However, in order to save you from boredom, I guess you could see for yourself in the sidebar…

Fourth, if you are a mybloglog user, scroll down to the bottom of the frontpage of this blog! You will see your avatar!

Hmmm… I guess that’s it for the moment, but my ultimate ambition really is to make my own theme, only that my coding stupidity and exquisite procrasitination skills won’t let me do so….

Unveiling JaniceLo.com

Thanks Tim – can’t wait to set up this new baby!

So the rumors are true, due to countless complaints to the length domain (stupidcomplexities.com) – I decide to choose a sweet and short one. It is a hope that no one will complain about this domain in any future and that I could keep this for and beyond my life time.

And yes, the domain stupidcomplexities.com will expire in January, but you will get JaniceLo.com before that. So be prepare to change your bookmark! But Feed subscribers who subscribed to my feed via feedburner can stay put :)

Stay tune!