JaypeeOnline

Skimmer: Lifestream Desktop App

Jaypee — Fri, 08 May 2009 01:19:33 +0000

While browsing the web and looking for cool stuff and apps, I came across this lifestreaming desktop app called Skimmer.

Skimmer℠ is an Adobe® AIR™ desktop application designed to streamline, beautify, and enhance the experience of participating in your most frequently used social networking activities. It improves upon your day-to-day interaction with multiple social networks, removing distractions and providing a rich experience that is particularly suited to multimedia content.

What Skimmer is trying to do is create an integrated social web experience for the user and enable the user to interact with multiple social networking sites from one application or interface. Right now, Skimmer provides access to Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Blogger.

Screenshots:

Feed Mode (Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, Blogger)

Flickr Mode

Flickr Sets

Flickr Slideshow

YouTube Mode

YouTube Videos

YouTube Fullscreen Video

Twitter Options

Skimmer notifies the user of updates via a pop-up window on the lower right corner of the screen like the one seen in the screenshot below:

The Skimmer stream has 3 modes - Feed mode, Flickr mode and YouTube mode which can be viewed in 3 different layouts.

The Feed mode displays all updates from different accounts grouped together or sorted according to the account it belongs to, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Blogger. You can view update options by clicking on the + sign found on the right side (the + sign shows up when you hover your mouse on the right portion of the tweet). Updates are color coded and each account is assigned a different color - Facebook - dark blue; Twitter - light blue; Flickr - pink; YouTube - red and Blogger - orange.

Although Skimmer has Twitter, Facebook and Blogger capabilities, its features are obviously more geared towards Flickr and YouTube with its different viewer modes and other extra features. On Flickr mode, you can click on a photo from your Flickr set or one of your contact’s Flickr sets and it will display a larger version of the image and from there, you’ll be able to see the photo’s title, date uploaded, tags and number of comments. You also have the option to post a comment, view a larger version of the image or watch the whole set in a slideshow presentation. On YouTube mode, its basically the same as Flickr mode where it will let you watch videos on fullscreen. I wasn’t able to try out all the features for YouTube mode because I couldn’t login to my YouTube account via Skimmer. Its giving me an authentication error. Btw, you can also upload photos to Flickr and videos to YouTube via Skimmer’s built-in media uploader found on the lower left corner. (See screenshots below)

If you want to use Twitter, you can access and view your friend’s tweets from the Feed mode. From there, you’ll have the option to visit the persons profile, reply, send a direct message or retweet. (See Twitter Options screenshot)

Facebook features are quite limited. Skimmer updates you when your friend change their status, upload photos or when they get tagged in a photo. If you click on an added photo update, you’ll see the photo that was uploaded, name of the album and the option to view the photo on Facebook via your web browser.

Skimmer’s UI (user interface) is absolutely gorgeous. The only problem with Skimmer is that its a bit of a resource hog and eats up more memory than TweetDeck. Since Skimmer is an Adobe AIR application, it means you can install it on either a Mac, PC or Ubuntu/Linux powered computer. I installed it on both my Windows and Ubuntu partitions and they both run smoothly although its a bit sluggish at times and I’ve encountered a few minor bugs like there are occasions when Twitter updates don’t show up. These are minor bugs that you can bear with and ignore as Skimmer is still in beta.

Overall, Skimmer is a cool app that has a gorgeous user interface. Unfortunately, its a resource hog and I’d only recommend it if you’re more into Flickr and YouTube but at the same time would like to have access to Twitter and/or Facebook. If you’re like me and you’re more active on Twitter and Facebook, then you’re better off with TweetDeck.

NOTE: If you’re concerned with your online privacy and personal data, make sure you read Skimmer’s Privacy Policy before you download and install it on your computer.

Based on the screenshots and the stuff I shared with you, what do you guys think of Skimmer? Would you be interested in using it? For those of you who have tried it or are currently using it, whats your experience with Skimmer? Did you like it or did you uninstall it right away? What other options/features would you like to be added to Skimmer? Please share your thoughts via the comment section. Thank you!

Copyright © 2009 JaypeeOnline.net. This feed is for personal non-commercial use only. If you are not reading this material in your news aggregator, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact me so I can take legal action immediately.

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Ben Southall Wins Best Job In The World

Jaypee — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:25:20 +0000

If you remember earlier this year, the state of Queensland, Australia announced that they are looking for candidates to apply for the job as the caretaker of the Great Barrier Reef islands. Dubbed as the “Best Job in the World“, the person chosen to be the “island caretaker” was required to do the following: lazing in the sun, snorkelling, feeding the fish, cleaning the pool and post weekly entries and photo/video updates on a blog. For compensation, the “island caretaker” will be receiving $150,000 Australian dollars (US $105,000) for the 6-month tenure.

The Best Job in the World campaign attracted over 34,000 applicants from over 200 countries. After a preliminary round of the selection process, the initial number of candidates was cut down to 50, then a group of 16 finalists coming from 15 different countries were chosen. Yesterday, the winner was announced and the person chosen to be the “island caretaker” was British adventurer Ben Southall.

Here’s a video of the press conference and announcement of the Best Job in the World winner.

What a lucky guy! Imagine, being paid to go to the beach, go snorkelling and blog. I’m sure most of us dream about having a job like this, right? Although the job only lasts 6 months, its still the best job in the world especially for a blogger. For sure Ben will be having the time of his life. Congratulations Ben and looking forward to reading your blog entries. Have fun mate!

How about you guys? Ever dreamed about having a job like this? If not, what would be the best job in the world for you? Do you think Ben will get bored with his job after a few weeks? Please share your thoughts.

[image and video taken from the Daily Telegraph]

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WP Plugin Review: Google Syntax Highlighter

Jaypee — Wed, 06 May 2009 05:52:28 +0000

In my last blog update post, I listed the new WordPress plugins that I installed here on JaypeeOnline. I also mentioned that I would do a review of those plugins so you guys would have an idea on how they work and how I use them here.

Today, I’ll be sharing with you the Google Syntax Highlighter WordPress plugin created by Peter Ryan. It integrates the Google Syntax Highlighter by Alex Gorbatchev to any WordPress-powered blog. This is the plugin I use to display codes which you might have noticed in my recent articles like HowTo: Allow Google Reader Access To Hotlink-Protected Images and HowTo: Widgetize a WordPress Theme.

Features:

100% client side, no server dependency
Multiple languages support
Wide browser support
Very lightweight

Languages Supported:

C++ (cpp, c, c++)
C# (c#, c-sharp, csharp)
CSS (css)
Delphi (delphi, pascal)
Java (java)
Java Script (js, jscript, javascript)
PHP (php)
Python (py, python)
Ruby (rb, ruby, rails, ror)
Sql (sql)
VB (vb, vb.net)
XML/HTML (xml, html, xhtml, xslt)

Screenshots:

.htaccess file

WordPress theme sidebar

Previously, when I wanted to display a piece of code within my post I would have to copy and paste the code into a text editor, take a screenshot, edit it and insert the image into my post. It was a tedious and very time consuming task.

WordPress has a built-in tag called “code” that lets you display and specify a certain line of text as code. So why am I not using it? The problem with this is that it doesn’t recognize HTML tags and in order for it to work you’ll have to use character entities or extended characters. One alternative is to use the “pre” tag which is the one used by the Google Syntax Highlighter plugin. The “pre” tag like the “code” tag displays the tagged text as monospaced type but the difference between the two is that the “pre” tag exactly reproduces everything inside the “pre” tags.

What makes Google Syntax Highlighter cool is that it displays the code the way advanced text editors do. The parameters are color coded and there are line numbers that makes it easy to find a specific line of code. Aside from that, the Google Syntax Highlighter plugin also gives the user an option to see the code in plain text and to copy the code into the computer’s clipboard. This plugin lets you implement the “pre” tag and display the code in style easily without having to worry about messing with the WordPress stylesheet.

So how do you use the Google Syntax Highlighter plugin? All you need to do is download, install and activate the plugin and make sure you read the Usage Directions. Then you can start using it. Just specify the code snippet in your blog post/page and you’re good to go.

Here’s a sample of how I was able to display the code for screenshot #2 or the code for the WordPress theme sidebar.

Copy the piece of code that you want to display and paste it between the line highlighted in red. Replace the value of “class” to the specific language that the code is written in. In the example, I put php because I needed to display a piece of php code.

The Google Syntax Highlighter WordPress plugin is very easy to install and doesn’t use much resources. Its very useful if you want to display codes within your post.

Check out the Google Syntax Highlighter WordPress plugin.

What do you think of the Google Syntax Highlighter WordPress plugin? Are you already using it or have tried it before on your blog? Do you know of other WordPress plugins that have the same functionality? Please share your thoughts. Thanks for your time!

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Intel MID: Concept Mobile Internet Device

Jaypee — Wed, 06 May 2009 03:48:03 +0000

I love gadgets and everytime I see a new piece of technology or new electronic gadget, I can’t help but get excited. While browsing the web the other day, I came across a concept mobile internet device called the Intel MID designed by Jan Rytir. This sexy piece of gadgetry is a mobile internet device that’s specially designed for internet browsing anywhere.

Based on the design, the Intel MID mobile internet device has the following features: 180×80x20mm dimension, full QWERTY keyboard, OLED touchscreen, trackball, 2 USB slots, microphone and audio input, SD card reader, stereo speakers, docking connector and something unique to this device, 7 completely configurable action buttons.

Additional Images:

Although the Intel MID is a thing of beauty and a totally different device on its own, I can’t help but see the similarity with the Sony Xperia X1. I’m talking about the curved design of the QWERTY keyboard. Based on the design and physical features/specifications, IMO the Intel MID is way better than the iPhone 4G concept. But then again, both of these gadgets are only concept.

So what do you guys think about the sexy Intel MID concept mobile internet device? What other features/specs would you want to see added to it? If this Intel MID concept would be picked up by one of the big companies like maybe HTC and made into a real product, would you get one? If I could afford it, I definitely would!

[via Yanko Design]

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April Top Commentators

Jaypee — Tue, 05 May 2009 04:15:42 +0000

Time once again to recognize and appreciate the efforts of the top commentators, this time for the month of April. I haven’t forgotten about the Top Commentator of the Month award, its just that I was quite busy during the weekend and had some stuff that I needed to attend to. The top commentator for the month of April is not a stranger to this blog or to other regular readers of this blog because he was the top commentator for February and he’s also one of the guest bloggers here on JaypeeOnline. Some of you might already have an idea who I’m talking about.

The top commentator for the month of April:

jan - 27 comments

Before publishing this post, I informed jan that he was the top commentator for April and since he already won this a couple months back, he wanted to share the prize with the next person who had the most comments which is jhay. So jan will be receiving $15 via PayPal and jhay will get the WordPress schwag (pencil, pin, stickers, temporary tattoo) and a WordCamp Las Vegas t-shirt.

Here are the rest of the top commentators for the month of April:

jhay - 20 comments

trench - 11 comments

Gem - 10 comments

elmot - 10 comments

loy - 6 comments

sylv3rblade - 6 comments

joie - 5 comments

K - 5 comments

Raju - 4 comments

Thanks to the rest of the top commentators for participating and joining the discussion here at JaypeeOnline. I’d also like to thank the rest of the readers and other commentators not included in the list for taking the time to drop by, participate and share their thoughts and ideas here on JaypeeOnline. I appreciate and value all your ideas, questions and comments that you share.

Regarding this contest/award, I regret to inform you guys that I won’t have it for the month of May. I’ll make it up to you guys with a birthday bash slash contest that I’m planning to hold on July which hopefully will have better prizes than the Christmas Giveaway. If you’d like to sponsore a prize, feel free to contact me.

Thank you everyone for your time and have a nice day!

[image source: Lamont Cranston]

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Weekend Roundup #46

Jaypee — Mon, 04 May 2009 06:43:36 +0000

How’s everyone doin? Hope you guys had a good weekend. I’m sure most of you did, especially the Filipinos and boxing fans who watched the Pacquiao vs. Hatton match. It was quite a busy weekend for me with several church activities and of course having to watch Manny Pacquiao’s fight. Then spent the whole day Sunday for family time thats why this edition of the Weekend Round is a bit delayed. Hope you guys like and learn something from these links I’ve gathered all over the web. Enjoy!

Blogging

Technology

Gadgets

Pinoy Blogs

JaypeeOnline Weekly Recap

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions or want your article or find an interesting story that you want to be featured in the next Weekend Roundup, feel free to leave a comment or send me a message via the contact page.

Thank you for your time and hope you guys have a great week!

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Free 25 Google Profile Business Cards

Jaypee — Fri, 01 May 2009 16:59:22 +0000

Found out earlier from my friend AJ that iPrint is giving away 25 Google profile business cards for free.

Tell your friends and coworkers how to find your profile
We are giving away 10,000 sets of 25 Google profile business cards totally free. Have a little fun and show off your profile.

I’ve already placed my order and I’ll be receiving it in 10-12 days. Btw here’s how my Google profile business card looks like:

All you need is a Google profile and a US mailing address. In case you’re not from the US or don’t have a US mailing address, you can ask a relative or friend who lives in the US if you can use their mailing/shipping address and accept the package for you. If you don’t have a Google profile, you can create one. If you already have one, just login to your Google account and click on My Account and click on the link that says Order profile business cards. See screenshot below:

Make sure that your profile is set to public, if not you won’t see the order link.

You better HURRY and get your free profile business cards quickly because Google only has 10,000 sets to give away and I’m sure these things are gonna go fast. I’ll share photos of my Google profile business cards when I get them. Its only 25 business cards but I can’t complain because its totally free and includes free shipping. Besides, the business cards look really cool. Thanks Google and iPrint!

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JaypeeOnline’s New Hive

Jaypee — Fri, 01 May 2009 16:15:19 +0000

I’m glad to inform you guys that JaypeeOnline is now back online as the DNS settings have fully propagated. I confirmed this by asking friends from different locations, mostly in the Philippines (Asia is the last place for DNS settings to propagate) to check if they can access the blog and they all reported that they could. I’m also glad that it didn’t take too long, it usually takes about 24-48 hours but in my case it only took more or less 12 hours for the DNS settings to fully propagate.

Initially I told you guys that I would be migrating to my new host on the 29th but because of some delays, I was able to do it yesterday, the 30th.

So how did the migration process go? That’s another thing I’m thankful for, the migration process went smooth. I’ll share with you the steps I took during the migration process. The first thing I did was to change my domain’s nameservers from MediaTemple’s to the new nameservers. Next was to backup all my files - WordPress themes and plugins, images and other local files including the WordPress database. After I got the login and FTP details to the new hosting account, I uploaded all the local files and WordPress themes/plugins. That part wasn’t complicated, it just took a while because I had lots of files so I just had to wait until it was done. Then I created a new MySQL database in the new hosting account. For me, importing the old WordPress database is the most important/crucial part of the migration process. The usual way to do it is via phpMyAdmin but if you have a large WordPress database like me, then you might have a hard time and encounter some errors. Fortunately for me, I was able to use a script that helped me with this process and it took me only a couple minutes to successfully import my old WordPress database into the new one. (For those who are interested, I’ll be publishing an article about how to use that script for importing large WordPress databases or MySQL dumps so watch out for it.) After uploading all the files I needed and successfully importing WordPress, I disabled all comments in the WordPress install on MT and put it into maintenance mode. I did this so I’ll know if the blog being accessed is the old one in MT or the one from the new host.

I’ve been talking about the migration process but I almost forgot to mention about my new hosting provider. My new home in the web is TechHive which is owned by my friend AJ Batac. Basically my new hosting account is a VPS or virtual private server and I share it with AJ who I also shared my MediaTemple account with. TechHive has existed since 2001 and hosts Mployd.com, PinoyLancer and PHPUGPH, the largest php developer community forum just to name a few. I’m paying the same amount I paid for MediaTemple and although the specs are lesser than what I had in MT, I didn’t mind moving because my priority is uptime and page load times. Besides, I have more than enough resources to work with in my new account.

I’ve checked most of the parts of this blog for errors and problems that may have been caused by the migration and didn’t find any problems. However, I haven’t checked each individual link, page and post so there might some errors or issues that I’m unaware of. If you encounter an issue or error with any part of the blog, I’d greatly appreciate it if you can please notify me via the comment section or via the contact page so I could fix it ASAP.

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Weekend Roundup #46

I’m Leaving The Temple

Jaypee — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 07:02:24 +0000

UPDATE: There was a slight delay with the acquisition of the new hosting account so I wasn’t able to do the migration yesterday, so I’m doing it right now. Btw, I’ve temporarily disabled comments on all posts and will enable it as soon as the DNS settings have been fully propagated. So if you wish to leave a comment, please wait until I’ve enabled it again. Thanks for your kind consideration!

I’m leaving the temple, MediaTemple that is. Tomorrow, April 29th, I’ll be moving JaypeeOnline to its new hosting provider and I just want to give you guys a heads up that the site may be inaccessible for 24-48 hours (time to propagate the DNS settings) depending on your location. I will let you know who my new hosting provider is and more details as soon as I make the move.

Anyways, you might be curious as to why I’m making the move and leaving MediaTemple. First of all, I’d like to say that my experience with MediaTemple was far better than what I had with DreamHost. MediaTemple’s services and customer support were way better. They had free phone support and a toll-free number that I can call here in the US, unlike DreamHost where you had to pay extra to get phone support. Their customer representatives or customer support were very friendly and helpful. I’m experiencing some issues not receiving trackbacks/pingbacks for my blog posts and I suspect that it’s got something to do with some settings on MediaTemple’s servers.

So why exactly am I leaving them? It’s not because of the technical difficulty I had recently experienced. Inspite of the good service and customer support, i encounter frequent uptime problems in this blog. Not that it’s a really bad problem or something like what I experienced with DreamHost. But I noticed that in the past couple of months, the instances of my blog being down due to server issues, getting a 505 Internal Server Error or sluggish page load times even for my WordPress Dashboard were becoming more frequent. I didn’t have any of these problems in the first few months I was with them.

It came to a point where I’ve decided that I need to find and try a different and more reliable hosting provider. I also didn’t want to wait until the situation got worse before I make the move.

That’s it folks. Just wanted to share that with you. Thank you for your time and I apologize for any inconvenience that will be caused by the downtime. Please give it a few hours for the DNS settings to properly propagate and everything will be back to normal.

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Samsung’s First Android Phone - The I7500

Jaypee — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 06:54:11 +0000

First it was a rumor, then all of a sudden it became official. Yesterday, Samsung officially launched the company’s first Android-powered mobile phone, the Samsung I7500.

Aside from its slim and slick design and the fact that the Samsung I7500 will be powered by Android, it also has some pretty impressive specs to offer like a 3.2-inch, 320 x 480 pixel AMOLED touchscreen, WiFi, GPS, a 5 megapixel camera with Power LED, 1,500mAh battery, 8GB of storage (plus MicroSD expansion for up to 32GB more), and a standard 3.5mm headset jack.

Specifications:

Android 1.5 OS
Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, dual-band UMTS/HSPA
528 MHz
3.2-inch HVGA capacitive OLED touchscreen display
5 megapixel camera with LED flash
Wi-Fi
Bluetooth
GPS
8GB internal flash memory
microSD slot
3.5 mm stereo jack
Metal case, 11.9 mm thick

Additional Photo:

Looks pretty impressive and could pose as a major threat to other popular smartpones not just because it uses Android but also because of its stylish design and built-in features/specifications. If the Samsung I7500 had a QWERTY keyboard, it would have made it even more impressive. Well who knows, maybe Samsung will come up with a newer version or another model that features a QWERTY keyboard. We’ll just have to wait and see.

The Samsung I7500 will be released in major European cities this coming June and no word yet whether it will also be released here in the US or North America. Estimated retail price for the Samsung I7500 is around €300 or nearly $400 US.

Samsung I7500 Official Press Release

Samsung launches I7500, The Company’s First Android-Powered Mobile Phone
Samsung sets its leading position in Android, the mobile industry’s emerging operating system

April 27, 2009, Seoul, Korea - Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., a leading mobile phone provider, today unveiled the I7500, its first Android-powered mobile phone. With a launch of I7500, Samsung became the first company among the global top three mobile phone manufacturers to unveil an Android-powered phone.

“Samsung is among the earliest members of the Open Handset Alliance and has been actively moving forward to introduce the most innovative Android mobile phone,” said JK Shin, Executive Vice President and Head of Mobile Communication Division in Samsung Electronics. “With Samsung’s accumulated technology leadership in mobile phone industry and our consistent strategy to support every existing operating system, I believe that Samsung provides the better choices and benefits to our consumers” he added.

The Samsung I7500 is a cutting-edge smartphone, featuring a 3.2” AMOLED full touch screen and 7.2Mbps HSDPA and WiFi connectivity, giving users access to Google™ Mobile services and full web browsing at blazing speeds.

The Samsung I7500 offers users access to the full suite of Google services, including Google Search™, Google Maps™, Gmail™, YouTube™, Google Calendar™, and Google Talk™. The integrated GPS receiver enables the comprehensive use of Google Maps features, such as My Location, Google Latitude, Street View, local search and detailed route description. Hundreds of other applications are available in Android Market. For example, the application Wikitude, a mobile travel guide, allows consumers to access details of unknown sights via location-based Wikipedia articles.

Based on Samsung’s proven product leadership, Samsung I7500 comes with latest multimedia features. The large and vivid 3.2“AMOLED display ensures the brilliant representation of multimedia content and enjoyable full touch mobile experience. Along with supporting a 5-megapixel camera and various multimedia codec formats, the I7500 also provides a long enough battery life (1500mAh) and generous memory capacity up to 40GB (Internal memory: 8GB, External memory: Up to 32GB) to enjoy all the applications and multimedia content. The phone also boasts its slim and compact design with mere 11.9mm thickness.

The Samsung I7500 will be available in major European countries from June, 2009.

[image source: Samsung Mobile]

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