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The enemy’s gate is down…. thoughts on the Enders Game movie

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I said in a Facebook status update that I love the book Ender’s Game. I do. I read it every year.  It is one of my all-time favorite reads.  In both print and even more in the unabridged audiobook. To me Stephan Rudnicki will always be the voice of Ender, and Gabrielle de Cuir the voice of Valentine.  

But I had mixed feelings about going to see this film for two reasons:

1)  I hate giving more money to the author Orson Scott Card, who has proven himself to be one hell of a bigot in recent years.   His anti-gay rants bother me.  Big time.    But I am not going to allow that to not let me enjoy a dramatization of one of my all-time favorite books, which have NOTHING to do with his close-minded bigotry.  His being a bigot does not take away from Ender’s Game being the award winning novel that it is.   

2) I was incredibly leery of the film from the first previews.   All the kids were teenagers. Enders Game is a story of children.  Ender is 6 when he goes to Battle School, 10 when he graduates, 12 when he, ahem… finishes Command School. In this film all the actors are teenagers in the 12-15 year ago;  the girls look to be more like 15-17.  And the launch group seems to be half-girls.    

But I told myself to “forget the book.” This is a movie, it is a loose adaptation of the book. Enjoy it for what it is. The teachers are still the enemy, and the enemy’s gate is down.  Yeah, ok.   So I said that 10 or 20 times, and went to the theater.

I managed, for the most time to keep my “why isn’t this here? why did they do that with that character? etc…” out of my view.    i absolutely loved being immersed into the world of Ender’s Game, and thought some of it was really good.

I think Asa Butterfield did a great job as Ender.   Same with Harrison Ford and Ben Kingsley.  I loved seeing Mazer sitting in Ender’s room, in that prostrate position.   Just like in a drawing of it from the graphic novelization.  I was sold.   I could live Viola Davis cast as  Major Anderson, I guess the major could be a woman. It worked.   

I have ONE casting issue that I could not get away from the book with.  Ender was a stinking foot taller than Bonzo Madrid?  Why on earth would Bonzo even be intimidating, other than that he was a bit muscular?   I wanted — No —  I needed Bonzo to be a foot taller, and intimidating.  

But I tried to think, If I did not know this story, would I walk away understanding it, or persuaded by it?  For example,  they move very quickly, it seems as if the whole story takes place in maybe a year.     Ok, I guess… but did Ender do anything in that short time which would make him stand out as the one last great hope for humanity?  I don’t know.  It seemed forced.    WHY was Ender better than Alai? Or Bean, or Petra?  Or any of them?     

And I started to cringe when Ender was holding Petra’s hand.   I thought, NO!   Don’t go there!   There is no kissing in battle school!!!   Luckily, that didn’t happen.  But it was almost there.  And if they did, I would probably have burst out swearing in Battle school slang.  

My son asked me when it was over – “what was that with Valentine and the dream?”    I don’t think they pulled off the ending very well.  I got it;  but I heard several people walking out kind of shaking their heads, “this is it?”   “What happened there?”     

I think the film-makers could have kept the film basically the same length and managed to spread out the story a bit.  They could have made a transition with something like “two years later” or something like that.  And still used the same actors.  They were teenagers anyways.   It might have made for a more compelling story on its own.  

Did I enjoy it?  Yes,   was I disappointed?   Not as much as I expected to be. Indeed, I’ll probably get the Blu-ray.    In many ways my criticism of the film is a lot like my criticism of the first JJ Abrams Trek (No, Not about the alternate universe, don’t go there!) in terms of plot holes and plot devices that did not quite work for me (i.e., take a disgraced cadet and make him first officer of the flagship, yeah, that makes sense!).     If I were to grade the film, I’d give it a low B.   Still a good paper, but not quite where it could be.    

First Reactions to OS X Mountain Lion

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Yeah, I am a geek, and the first thing I did this morning was go into the App Store to see if Mountain Lion, the latest version of Mac OS X (10.8) was out.  It was, and I clicked purchase.   $20 later and the 4.34 GB file began downloading.   An hour later (it took longer to download the file than to install it) I was roaring like a Mountain Lion (or do they chuff and not roar? ) Anyways, I digress.  

First reactions.   The core of OS X Lion is intact.  This is less a major overhaul of the OS than it is a series of welcome enhancements.    OS X is taking a huge step towards total integration with Apple’s iOS operating system found on iPads and iPhones.  And as an owner of both an iPad and an iPhone, this is a very good thing.   The first thing I saw was icons in the dock for Reminders, Messages, and Notes.  Identical to their iOS 5.0/6.0 applications, thanks to iCloud, these applications now sync content seemlessly between the iPhone/iPad and Mac.  I created a note on the Mac, had the iPad open, five seconds later it showed up there. I edited it on the iPad, and the changes were practically instantaneous on the Mac.  

I have been running the beta of Messages since this spring, so that was not exciting, but for communicating with others in the Apple ecosystem, Messages is awesome.   Send texts from your computer.    Alas, it only works for users on iOS 5 or higher.   All you Android folks – sorry, I can’t message you through my Mac.  

Next up, Safari 6.  I have also been running the beta of this for the past month, but with ML, it now has an iCloud tab.   I can instantly see the browser windows open on my iPad and iPhone, and switch to any page.    There is now a unified address bar (like in Chrome) so searches and addresses are in the same place.  A few other features, but the biggest thing is Safari just felt fast.

Then we come to Airplay.    Yes, in the place of the display icon on the menu bar is now the iOS Airplay icon.   If you have an Apple TV, this is cool.   Click on it, and you can mirror your Mac’s screen to an Apple TV.  Works great.   It automatically scaled my display to a 16×9 screen with small black bars (but still looked good) and played instantly on my Apple tv.  I loaded a 1080p video from You Tube in Safari, went full screen, and it played flawlessly on the Apple TV.    Now I can use Amazon Prime Video on my Apple TV, just need the assistance of my Mac.   Very nice.

Twitter is now integrated into the OS;  I can tweet from pretty much anywhere (and soon will be able to do the same with Facebook, but that is still under development).   This brings me to the notification bar.  Just like in iOS, Mail, Twitter, and other apps can place notifications of events in a dropdown box on the right side of the screen.  Works well.   Will definitely put Growl out of business.   Would like to see a bit more volume when a notification comes in, and I have not yet found the Do Not Disturb button.  

There are updates to iWork, iPhoto, iMovie, and Aperture.  Now, in iWork apps (say Pages) and Preview you can rename a file from the title bar, move it to iCloud, Duplicate it, etc.  All from the title bar!   From within Pages or Numbers or Preview, click OPEN from the file menu, and you can choose between files stored in iCloud and files stored on your mac.  Also very cool.   Finally, iCloud is getting it.   Not quite Dropbox, but a huge improvement.     From within iPhoto you can now share to Photostream, to Twitter, and to Messages.   Got a photo you want to text to an iOS user, easy as pie.   Have a photo in iPhoto you want to tweet – just as simple.   

Mail and Finder now have easy access to the Photo Browser.   You can attach any photo from your iPhoto Library into an email – or search directly for a photo from Finder.   No need to open iPhoto.   There is now a MEDIA section in Finder for Photos, Music, and Movies.    Yet, all drawing on the power of the iPhoto and iTunes libraries.  

What have I missed?  Oh yeah, Voice Dictation.    Double click the function key and a Siri-like sound and microphone appears on the screen.  Talk to your mac and it will listen.  Same technology, works as well as on the iPhone and iPad.    I like it a lot.   When done either click the mouse on Done (my initial reaction was to touch it on the screen – but this is NOT an iPad!  DOH!), or click FN again.   Works great.   Now I can talk to my computer whenever I want – and while you already know I am crazy, I’ll at least be accomplishing something.   

I am sure I have missed something, but its only been 2 hours since I installed the operating system.   Is Mountain Lion a game changer?  Is it a whole new OS?  Absolutely not.   It is a series of enhancements to a solid operating system designed to make it easier to use, and to make it more relevant to the way we compute.   If you live in Apple’s walled garden, and have a mac, iPhone, and iPad, then Mountain Lion is well worth it.  I absolutely love the total integration among my devices – and how seemless that process is.   Worth $20?  Absolutely.   

Shortcomings?  I haven’t found any yet.  I don’t think they have improved the full-screen mode support for dual displays (but I have not connected this machine to a second display yet. 

 PS If you are going to take the plunge, remember to save the installer to a USB external drive before installing it – so you have a copy.  The installer disappears when the OS is installed.  And be smart and so a full backup before installing.   🙂

First Impressions of the “new” iPad

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What?  Another first impressions report of Apple’s latest gadget?   Yup.  I am an early adopter.   My wife would say that is a disease, a vice.   An expensive one at that, but better than spending my money in bars drinking. Anyway, I digress.    I have owned an iPad since the iPad 2 came out last March.   Before that, I spent the prior year in Apple-denial, refusing to buy an “over-sized” iPod touch.    While I liked the Samsung Galaxy Tab (the original 7” model), I was drawn to the iPad 2 — I found the size of the 7” screen too limiting to do real work on the tablet.  (See this blog post for my original reasons for switching to an iPad).   One year later, I remained firmly planted in the world of the iPad.

The iPad 2 is fast; it is elegant; everything works;  applications are slick, the user interface is easy.  With a 9.7” screen, I could read and annotate PDFs in almost full-size.   iPad 2 brought me into a paper-less world.    All of my classes are now prepped using tools that enable me to have my notes and class materials on the iPad.  I do not need to bring anything to class except the iPad.  I attend numerous long meetings, and take notes on it.   I use UPad to take notes, often using a stylus, so I can write in my own script.    I export notes to PDFs, which I can access on my MacBook Air.  With the almost ubiquitous presence of Dropbox services, I have access to over 40GB of materials.    The iPad 2 rocks.   It has never failed me.  

So, why the need for an iPad 3? (technically its the iPad (3rd generation), but I’ll stick with iPad 3 instead of the new iPad).    After following the tech blogs for the past year, the rumors of the next great iPad were that it would draw upon the success of the iPhone 4 and 4S, which feature a high density “retina” display, that makes the icons on the screen look as if they are painted on.    There was talk of a 4G/LTE iPad, a faster processor, a better camera.    Of those things, only one thing excited me: the retina display.   As an iPhone 4S user, I have absolutely loved the display on that device — even though it was considerably smaller than my prior Droid X phone.    The iPhone 4S’ retina display TRULY DOES LOOK like it was painted on.  That comparison is absolutely true.   The idea of a similar screen for the much larger iPad intrigued me.  

I spent a lot of time reading on the iPad: whether it is a book on the Kindle app, the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, The Daily, or one of a handful of magazines, or web pages, forums, and social media outlets, reading is the number one thing I do on the iPad.   Yes, I use it to take notes; yes I use it for meetings, for lectures.    But even when I am “creating” rather than “consuming” the iPad is being used to read.   What I don’t do is play a lot of immersive 3D games.    For me, gaming is Easy Sudoku, Bejeweled, or Video Poker. So, the enhanced graphics capabilities were less important.  But text that was more than High Definition, that equalled print in a book or magazine (and exceeded print in a newspaper)… that drew me in.

I successfully put my iPad 2 up for sale, and pre-ordered an iPad 3.  It arrived late yesterday afternoon.    When I unboxed it, I was struck by the fact that the box looked identical to the iPad 2.   Indeed, if it were not for the model number, you would not necessarily know you were getting an iPad 3.  The iPad looks identical to the prior generation.   I weighs slightly more (.09 pounds), but I have not been able to distinguish the weight difference.  It is a tad thicker, but again, side by side, we are talking minor changes.   It came pre-loaded with Apple’s latest iOS 5.1 software, and the setup was identical to the iPad 2.   Turn it on, find a wi-fi network, log-in with an Apple ID,  connect to iTunes (or iCloud), and either setup a new iPad or restore from a backup.  I chose to use iTunes to restore from the last backup of my iPad 2 (I could have used iCloud, but knew iTunes would be quicker).   Four minutes later I was up and running, and 30 minutes later, all 94 of the apps I had on my iPad had transferred.   

First impression?  The screen.   The icons have much more definition, they are clearer; they are brighter; the text descriptions for them are sharp.   Very similar to the iPhone 4S in that sense, but bigger.   But its when you go into an app that you see the real effect.  I immediately loaded the Kindle app.   After a quick log-in to my Amazon account, and download of a book, I was reading.   And I almost fell over.  I have never seen electronic text so crisp.  No pixelation at all.  More clear than on my MacBook Air’s screen, better than anything I have ever seen.   Heck, I am not sure I have seen printed text look as good.  Then I went to the New York Times — and was equally stunned.  The visually appealing interface the Times iPad app uses was magnified by the quality of the text.   It draws you in.   And the text of articles is of the same quality as the Kindle.   Next up, Safari.   I loaded Facebook.   Browser text had that same fine quality.   Ironically, Facebook’s graphics (their blue menu) looked a bit fuzzy in comparison.    Time and time again, I was blown away by the visual appearance of the word on screen.   Even iPhone-native apps looked better.  The iPad has always had a 2X zoom mode for iPhone apps, which always looked fuzzy and blurry on the iPad and iPad 2.   Now, the 2X display is much improved.  Its still not perfect, but its quite functional.  

I then took my iPad 2 and put the two devices side by side.   The iPad that I thought was the coolest thing since sliced bread for the past year suddenly looked pale and cheap in comparison.  Not because the iPad 2 was slow (indeed, the iPad 3 and 2 seem to be equally fast at loading applications; neither have any lag whatsoever), but because all of a sudden, the iPad 2 seemed to have developed a pixelized look.  I COULD SEE the pixels where I could never see them before.  It was like switching from a blue ray in 1080p HDTV to a standard definition television show.   I guess if you double the resolution of the iPad, and put more pixels per inch than any device before it, you are going to notice a difference.  And you do.     

The improvements in resolution – coupled by a quad-core graphics processor – mean even better video performance.   I use my iPad at the gym all the time, either viewing TV shows on Netflix or videos I have downloaded from iTunes.    The iPad 2 had great video; the iPad 3 takes it to another level.  Sharp images, smooth video, the difference is really significant.   Whether it is the higher than high definition resolution or the graphic processor is unclear to me, but wow – the results are stunning.

Any downsides?   Only that not all apps are “retina” ready, and third-party developers have to do some updating.    Sadly, UPad – the great note-taking app I referred to above – does not play well with the retina display.  In fact, it no longer functions.   And Note Taker HD, a close-second to UPad, which still manages to work, suddenly looks blurry in terms of the on-screen notes.   In addition, some programs that use their own fonts instead of the stock ones provided by Apple, also suffer from a “blurry” effect.   But I suspect in the next week or so, many applications will get the “retina” treatment, and will be updated.   And, I have little doubt that Apple will require retina-support for future apps.   

Is the retina display alone enough to merit upgrading to an iPad 3?   Absolutely.   NO doubt in my mind at all.   Sure, the iPad 3 has a quad-core graphics processor, and now sports a 5MP camera like what was in the iPhone 4 (but not 4S);  and it has 1 gb of ram as opposed to 512MP.    None of that matters to me.  The iPad 2 was fast – it did everything I asked it to.    I never used the camera on the iPad – perhaps because I thought you looked like a dork taking a photo with a 10” tablet.   I don’t have high expectations for the camera in the iPad 3, but that is not important to me.    

I can’t speak to the 4G/LTE broadband speeds, since I bought a Wi-Fi only iPad.  I already pay for a data plan on my iPhone, and because I spent 95% of my time in places where there is wi-fi readily available, I was not motivated by that (although all accounts from friends at satellieguys suggest that the 4G speeds are stunning).   

Is the iPad 3 worth it?   Without a doubt, yes.   No reservations at all, and no regrets.  Until yesterday, the iPad 2 was the best tablet available on the planet.   It has been beat – by the iPad 3.    The iPad 2 is still a great tablet, and can give people several years use.   Just don’t put it side by side next to a “new” iPad. Everyone wondered what the iPad killer would be – and Apple provided the answer.

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