Under a Gibbous Moon

I’ve written about this topic before and it just won’t go away. To a certain extent I can forgive random forum members and poorly trained sales associates but I cannot forgive a blogger for a major tech site. Jason Perlow from ZDNet  writes:

Why is it awful? Well, let’s start with the basics. In Android, as you start an application, its services will continue to run in the background when you start more apps.

Provided that an application is well-written, only a stub of that app continues to run, such as GMail’s message poller or perhaps a Twitter client’s notifier service.

But plenty of apps still commit a significant amount of resources to memory even when you stop using them or start a new process.

Which they really shouldn’t.

If these are left unchecked, your Android device’s performance and stability goes straight to hell.

Of course this is flat out ignorant, as Dianne Hackborn, a Google software engineer explains:

The fact that you can see an application’s process “running” does not mean the application is running or doing anything. It may simply be there because Android needed it at some point, and has decided that it would be best to keep it around in case it needs it again. Likewise, you may leave an application for a little bit and return to it from where you left off, and during that time Android may have needed to get rid of the process for other things.

…

Of course, there is a limited amount of memory, and to accommodate this Android must decide when to get rid of processes that are not needed. This leads to Android’s process lifecycle, the rules it uses to decide how important each process is and thus the next one that should be dropped. These rules are based on both how important a process is for the user’s current experience, as well as how long it has been since the process was last needed by the user.

The only evidence Mr. Perlow presents is that the existence of this myth is proof of its truth.

What’s the common fix to this issue? Well, an entire cottage industry of developers have written various task killer/task managment and memory optimization utilities for Android, which can be used with a single click of a button to wipe apps and services out of memory.

Of course there are a lot of popular apps written to kill task on Android but that is because people are constantly (and erroneously) being told that they need them. I remember that when my parents bought their phones that the store rep installed task managers on both phones. When I saw them later I explained to them why it was not necessary and it was just eating up resources for nothing. I uninstalled both apps but later, when they had gone back to the store for something, a rep again installed the app on their phone insisting that it was necessary.

Unfortunately, it is very difficult to fix stupid but such ignorance is unacceptable in people who get paid to write about technology. Readers who are looking to ZDNet looking for information are going to be sorely misled by this article and this myth will be continued by people armed by the authority that the ZDNet logo imparts.

The summary for the article states that, “When it comes to task managment, the developers at Google think they know better than the end-users that are actually using their products.” In actuality, Google designed an OS that does not require end users to have to worry about task management and yet you bitch about it. Try educating yourself about your topic before trying to actually write about it.

My favorite thing about the iPhone aftermarket is the number of gadgets available to add functionality that Steve Jobs says that you don’t need.

This attaches to your iPhone to let you have a flip out physical keyboard.

It’s a rather clever device. I do like the tag line: Take that Blackberry! Because you know, if you bought a Blackberry wouldn’t be spending and extra fifty bucks for your keyboard. So take that!

Looks like some psychologists have studied social media such as facebook and have determined a correlation between pages and clinical narcissism. No shit. Facebook whoring has been there for a while. I’ve seen people with well over 1,000 friends. I doubt they even have that many acquaintances.

I can honestly say, I don’t like Facebook. I don’t even remember the last time I checked it.

At one point, it was useful. It allowed people to easily stay in contact with friends who lived in disparate parts of the country or even the world. At some point though, that changed. Facebook changed into VagueAcquaintanceBook. I see people who have several hundred “friends” even though they are actually the ex-brother-in-law of the sister whose cousin they met at a party one time.

FaceBook also changed into SpamBook. I got really tired of being asked to help someone find the Pearl of Wisdom so that they could could get and extra 100 fun bucks so they could buy the armor they needed to slay the dragon so they could steal his hoard and use the proceeds to adopt a panda. Fine, you like the game but don’t drag me into it.

So until FaceBook actually turns back into Facebook, I’m going to continue not use it.

I recently replaced my old laptop with one made by ASUS. One of the nice things about ASUS laptops is that they have a free, two year accidental damage warranty (ADW). After I brought it home I downloaded the forms, filled them out, and mailed them in so that I could take advantage of this.

I recently received and email from ASUS stating that my laptop does not qualify for that ADW because it was purchased from a retailer (Best Buy) that offers their own warranty service. Specifically:

Deny Reason: Bought from Best Buy – Retailer does not participate in ADW

It’s good to know that Best Buy’s terms of sale with ASUS preclude them from giving you their free warranty so that Best Buy can sell you theirs.