New iPhone release closer?

A number of recent news reports and press releases are pointing to a new iPhone (and most likely a 3G one) release in the very near future. Additionally these confirm the post on MacTalk just over a month ago. Another post was added today summarising this.
- both Vodaphone and Optus have announced they will be selling the iPhone in Australia (as well as several other countries). Interestingly Telstra has not said anything...
- 3G on/off settings have been found in the latest iPhone SDK. This is apparently to help with battery life
- iPhones (as of Saturday) are unavailable on the US or UK Apple stores. See this AppleInsider report.

I think this points to an iPhone release sooner rather than later (possibly even this week). Whether this means you will be able to get the new iPhone straight away is another matter as Apple sometimes announces products that will ship "in a couple of weeks". However, in the case of us here in Australia I think we will definitely be waiting until Sydney Apple Store is opened in mid June (mainly as this is a great marketing opportunity).

U2 3D

Back on Sunday 13th April we went to Sydney's IMAX to see U2 3D.  Being a big U2 fan (so yes this article will be biased!) I was excited to see this film, especially as this was billed as you getting the best seat in the house.  I also wanted to see how this compared to the actual Vertigo concert that we went to in Sydney in late 2006.  I was worried that it would be like all the concert films/DVDs I have seen which I find to be a bit lacking and nothing like going to the real concert.  I much prefer to listen to them than watch.  Well in this case I was not disappointed. You certainly get the best seat in the house as well as get to be up on stage with the band all within the one song.  The 3D effects are not cheesy or overused (certainly not like ones I have seen where you get the red and blue cardboard glasses).  In fact, you get used to the 3D really quickly and almost forget its there.

So was it like going to a real U2 concert? Well yes and no. On one hand the sound was great and you do feel like you were there.  Additionally for us since this was on opening weekend so we had to line up for 30 mins so we could get good seats, so that made it feed a bit like a real concert.  However, it was actually easier to go to than a concert as we did not have to line up for as long! For Zoo TV and Vertigo we lined up for 6 hours or so just to get good spots!  Also, I was not deaf at the end with ringing in my ears for several days afterwoods.  Not that there was any problem with the sound being too quiet! 

There was a problem with some idiots in front of us who kept getting up to get drinks or food (why I don't know as the film only went for 85 mins!) But the really funny reason why it felt most unlike a concert was it was a bit cold.  Normally you get really hot at a concert, but here since we were in an air conditioned theatre it actually felt cold at the end of the concert!  Lastly (and this is more from a fan perspective) I found the concert to be too short and I would have like to have seen the full setlist.  I really liked the Zoo Station / The Fly combination at both the Zoo TV and Vertigo tours and was really disappointed that Zoo Station was omitted.

So, even with a few faults I would highly recommend going to see U2 3D, even if you are not a U2 fan.  This is an excellent showcase of the 3D technology and I hope more bands and filmakers use this in the future.  We will be going again :)

Lastly if you are interested in more details of this, Wikipedia has an excellent write up of how they did the concert and the history behind it.

iPhone in Australia in June?

According to this post on the MacTalk Australia forums the iPhone will be released in Australia in late June (yes 2008!). Normally I would be somewhat skeptical of this, however, this has come from the Aussie Apple resellers.

Important points:
- late June release
- multiple carriers
- no contract lock in
- current resellers to sell iPhone

Interestingly the last 3 points are a change for Apple as these are not done anywhere else. I wonder if this will be extended to other regions or what other regions will be released at the same time.

The multiple carriers hints at a 3G iPhone as the current 2.5G iPhone needs EDGE which is only used by 1 carrier in Australia: Telstra. Also, this is around the time the 3G iPhone is rumored to be released. Additionally there is this AppleInsider report today on the 3G iPhone. Coincidence?

Using xmltv feeds with EyeTV

UPDATE: the Free*EPG service no longer provides an xmltv download. I have released a new version of the Applescript which downloads the EPG from OzTiVo.

In October last year I bought a Mac Mini to use as a media center. The software I am using is Elgato's EyeTV which does a great job of managing and recording TV shows. Initially I had setup schedules for each of the TV programs I was interested in, but this only works when shows are on at the same time every week (which the commercial networks are notorious at sticking to).

With the release of v3.0 in January one of the new features I was most interested in was "Smart Guides". This allows you to set your recordings based on search criteria (e.g find Top Gear or Doctor Who). This works well when you have a complete EPG. Now while 7, 9 and 10 transmit a 7 day guide, ABC1 & 2 only have one for the next 2 days and there nothing for SBS.

With the latest release of EyeTV (version 3.0.1) it allows xmltv files to be used as an EPG. First drag the downloaded xmltv file onto the EyeTV application. Now Go the the Channels in EyeTV and for each of the channels you want to use the xmltv file for the EPG set its EPG to xmltv.


In some cases if EyeTV cannot find the channel in the xmltv file it will ask you to select from a list of channels it has found in the file (this always seems to happen for SBS).


This works well, however, EyeTV needs to be restarted or the xmltv file dragged onto it for the EPG to be refreshed for a newly downloaded xmltv file.

I get my xmltv EPG from Free*EPG and to make my life simpler I have written the following Applescript which downloads the zipped file, unzips it and opens the xmltv file in EyeTV. The only user settings required is to enter your ClientID and Postcode into the two variables (they currently contain ????) and save the script.

To activate the script you can either set it to run via iCal or cron. For example I set iCal to run the script daily at 6:50.


The same script can be used to grab files from other services. I included a separate variable for the download link so this can be changed easily for other xmltv providers.

Edited 5th July 2008: updated locations of images

Edited 21st February 2009: included link to blog posting for the updated Applescript

RIP Arthur C. Clarke

It was a sad day for me on March 19th as my favourite author, Arthur C. Clarke, passed away aged 90. I had just finished reading one of his best books 'Rendezvous with Rama' the night before.

RIP Arthur, thanks for the inspiration and all the good reading :)

Website update

Haha 2 posts in one day!

As well as some of the REALbasic stuff I have been working on I have also been working on updates to the website. I discovered that Firefox and Safari now support rounded corners (one of the new items in CSS 3). So I replaced the javascript I was using (Ruzee Borders). If you are using IE or Opera the borders will be square.

Lastly I found a cool way to show pictures. It is a javascript called Lightbox. Currently I am only using this on the My Money Minder page to show screenshots, but I may move to using this on our pictures page...

My Money Minder 1.9.8 released

I have released another bugfix to My Money Minder. I had thought 1.9.7 was going to be the last release before 2.0, but a few bugs were found that needed fixing. For the full details of the changes and download links go to the My Money Minder pages