Notes by Filos

A Personal Update

Thu, 28 Jun 2012 01:59:00 -0700

Today I would like to give you a quick update about…me :-)

People familiar with my activities and who have been in touch with me for a while now, know me mostly as a “startupper”, in particular involved with Twimbow, the company I co-founded, or Abbeynet, the company from which Twimbow was spun off and that I served for the past 12 years.

Today I would like to share with you an important news related to my new adventure: starting July 2nd (next monday), I am joining Research In Motion in the Developer Relations team as BlackBerry Developer Evangelist for the italian market.

To be honest, this is a news for me, too, quite unexpected, everything happened very quickly. There are a couple of reasons behind this choice, first and foremost the great challenges RIM has been facing in the past months and the incredible effort they are putting to change the skin of the company completely before the launch of their new smartphone based on BlackBerry 10 OS.

For this reason, I am very proud to have been chosen for this important role. RIM is creating an outstanding Developer Relations team around the world, headed by VP Alec Saunders, dedicated to help developers bring their great apps to the new upcoming operating system.

BlackBerry 10 is gonna be an incredible revolution for the smartphone market, a truly open platform, capable of running Android apps natively and also the platform that is easiest in terms of porting and developing mobile apps. Moreover, it’s the only truly multi-tasking mobile OS, open to possibilities that could have been never imagined before, with outstanding performances.

Looking forward to next Monday, ready to do my best for the success of RIM.

For any question, just drop me a line ;-)

On The Moscow Metro

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 23:48:15 -0700

instagram:

@tovsla

@bogd

@archziebaldovna

@xaniboo

@yukka_ko

Want to see more? Browse the tag #moscowmetro.

The world’s second most heavily used subway system features beautifully designed stations with ornate, classically influenced architecture. Opened in 1935, the Moscow Metro sees nearly 7 million passengers pass through its 185 stations each day.

Chrome or Safari?

Tue, 19 Jun 2012 23:47:13 -0700

I had been using Safari 5.2 for a while now and switched back to Chrome the other day. You know what? I miss Safari. I have the feeling that it’s faster overall. The big downside is the lack of favicons. When will Apple finally add this little feature to their browser?

What do you think? Safari 5.2 or Chrome?

Are you more connected with a BlackBerry? The graphs start going...

Mon, 07 May 2012 08:38:19 -0700

Are you more connected with a BlackBerry? The graphs start going up EXACTLY the day I started using a BB again after some time on an iPhone. What do you think? ;-)

Safari 5.2 beta and iMessage for Lion updated (March 20th)

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 06:26:07 -0700

On March 20 both Safari 5.2 beta and iMessage for Lion have been updated on March 20th. You can get the former from the Apple Developers website and the latter from this link. For Safari 5.2, this is the second update (release on Feb 16th and first update on March 5th).

Can’t see any evident change in iMessage, while Safari looks even faster now. Unfortunately the popular plugin Glims doesn’t work anymore so… forget favicons in tabs (something I like a lot). Moreover I still can’t use the reading list, is it just me?

Ultimake | SmartSync - Sync your iPhone contacts with Facebook

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 11:13:15 -0700

Ultimake | SmartSync - Sync your iPhone contacts with Facebook:

If you have an iPhone and haven’t downloaded this app yet, do it now. It keeps your Address Book in sync with your Facebook contacts, so that avatars and contact info are always up-to-date.

I find it very useful, you?

Gmail is Gmail. Period.

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 14:58:22 -0700

Maybe it’s me, but when it comes to manage my email, the web Gmail interface is nothing but the best option.

I have all my accounts forwarded to my Gmail account because of its powerful filters and anytime I try to use native clients on my Mac, I always end up going back to the web interface.

Why? It’s simply the best option, in particular when you need to make searches. No Postbox or Sparrow can beat it.

What do you think?

Sport and Fitness

Thu, 15 Mar 2012 04:01:34 -0700

Sport and Fitness:

Missed this suite lately, I have to say it is very cool and San Francisco - based. Definitely a way to motivate people to workout often and trying to perform even better.

What is WebRTC? : BlogGeek.me

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 05:43:28 -0800

What is WebRTC? : BlogGeek.me:

Very interesting post about WebRTC, the new stack that will shape the future between WWW and realtime communications.

SaveTheMom

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 03:21:33 -0800

SaveTheMom:

My favorite service today. Great idea, great team, very useful service for any family. Get it now :-)

iOS 5.1 rocks

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 02:14:17 -0800

iOS 5.1 just made my iPhone 4 better. No random lags, better scrolling, overall it seems a major breath of fresh air. It’s pretty clear that many bugs have been fixed. Good job Apple.

Unfortunately, iTunes Match and Music in the cloud is not available in Italy yet. Does anyone know a release date?

Safari and Favicons

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 05:11:20 -0800

I understand that Mac and Apple mean minimalism, but I really hoped to finally have the ability to see favicons on tabs in Safari 5.2. As mentioned in another post, that’s something I am really missing, despite the Glims plugin solves the problem (but not a native solution).

I have a question for you: is it just me? Don’t favicons help you move from one tab to another much faster? What am I missing here?

Curious to know your thoughts on this.

This is the average amount of business cards you collect in two...

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 13:36:32 -0800

This is the average amount of business cards you collect in two weeks in San Francisco. I look forward to a time when everyone will exchange digital business cards only.

Many people still love paper ones. Not me. You?

Big tabs? What about favicons?

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 08:11:19 -0800

Big tabs? What about favicons?:

To me, the following is a little problem compared to the lack of favicon in Safari. I hoped Safari 5.2 could have been the first version to finally support favicons on tabs. Favicons help you distinguish tabs at a glance. Reason why I had, again, installed Glims.

What do you think? Btw, I switched to Safari 5.2 from Chrome.

parislemon:

John Gruber filed the following Safari “bug” report:

Summary: In previous versions of Safari, there was a relatively narrow maximum width for tabs. This max width would come into play in windows with few tabs (1, 2, maybe 3). In Safari 5.2, tabs consume the full width of the window, even if there are only one or two tabs. I find that this is aesthetically unpleasing, and would like to see the old tab bar return.

I agree completely. The new Safari (5.2, still in beta) is very, very good. By far the best version of Safari yet — to the point where, yes, I’m actually using it instead of Chrome. But the tabs are ridiculous.

The same problem exists in Safari for the iPad.

Safari 5.2 now has an “omnibox” — a URL box from which you can search the web as well. Now they need to borrow the pinned tabs idea too.

Update: David Chartier disagrees. I think his touch argument is certainly a fair point, but I’d still make the tabs smaller — touchable-width. Gruber follows up with one potential compromise.