MerGeek

iPad Back-ups are driving me Insane!

mergryphon — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 22:33:32 +0000

Does your iPad sometimes go, literally, overnight and still not be finished backing up in the morning? Join the growing numbers of people getting frustrated at iTunes’ backup functionality.

There are quite a few message threads on the Apple support forums discussing this topic, some with 30-40K readers. Few of the suggestions work for everyone, or in some cases anyone. But they are worth trying:

Make sure you are using the cable that came with the iPad, not any iPhone or iPod cable.
Make sure the USB port you are using is USB 2.0 and not 1.1.
Disable anti-virus software during backup
Some extreme user suggest iTunes is validating applications as it backs up their files, disconnect from the internet during backup.

Do these suggestions have an impact? Yes, but they are far from the entire story.

: Image via CrunchBase

The issue seems to be in the way iTunes backs up the information. For each file — text information, photograph, or graphic file that is part of an application — iTunes writes 2 files to your hard drive: one MDDATA file containing the actual data and one MDINFO file containing the identifier for the application the data belongs to and where it belongs in your iPad’s file structure. When you add this information to the sheer number of files requiring backup, and the speed at which it can transfer data over USB, it is possible to see that this problem will only worsen with the number of apps available, accessing data to be stored. Especially when iOS 4.0 will allow users more applications in folders.

Users can watch this data accumulate during a backup by opening the backup folder being used, on a windows system this is:

C:\Users\<YOURUSERNAME>\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup\<a40DigitHexNumberProbablyIdentifyingyourDevice>

Peter.Vdhamer has an excellent article on his blog, linking some excellent software that can be used to monitor the files as iTunes is creating them, and seeing what applications are your ‘speed hogs’. He notes that:

“The backup iPad function in iTunes backs up only in the order of 1 file/second. This is no problem for large files (which actually take longer), but particularly applies to very small files. Some applications have hundreds or even thousands of such small files. One application consisted of 80 MBytes made up of 6000 small files. It thus took 1-2 hours to backup those 6000 files.”

And while I would think these backups would be incramental, changing only information that has changed and backing up things I’ve added or used since the last backup, the one I am currently watching seems to defy that logic. I backed up at around midnight last night. I started a new backup about 4:30 EDT this afternoon, and it is still not 2/3 completed at 6:00pm.

I’ve watched it for 30 minutes (by looking at the identifier on the MDINFO files as they are created) back up photo’s from the apple photo application, 2 files each, and THEN backup THUMBNAILs of all the photos, again with 2

files each. I have not synced, saved, or added any photos to the iPad in several days.

Image via CrunchBase

I’m watching it for almost 45 minutes backing up every article and photo from the wonderful Pulse reader by name, again at 2 files for each article and picture. I have not launched Pulse in several days. I’ve mostly been using

Flipboard and Reeder this week.

There were 4 minutes or so, each, spent on backing up images and information from WeRule by ngmoco and Angry Birds, but I played both of those games at lunch, and one downloaded new content, so that is not unexpected.

Oh look, PULSE is still backing up images!

bplist00TPathWVersionXGreylistVDomain_Documents/ImageCache/Engadget/http: www.engadget.com 2009 11 13 npd-wii-reclaims-lead-in-us-sales-but-console-gaming-market-sh S3.0_*AppDomain-com.AlphonsoLabs.PulseNewsReader’.

There are now 10,330 files in that backup directory, amounting to only 990 megabytes. Not even a gigabyte! And all this time backing up a 64 gig iPad with more than 43 gigabytes of free space.

Apple seriously needs to:

Investigate the logic of what is backed up, and when it should be backed up.
Find a more efficient file storage method for backup, one large archive as opposed to double individual files for every item?
Allow users options for backups, backup settings only, back up app data,
make it easy to tell the difference between my iPad USB cable and my iPhone USB cable if you are going to insist they make a difference. (And they do.)

Technorati Tags: iPad, Apple, iTunes

Basic Economic Stimulation

mergryphon — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 22:46:31 +0000

Alright, lets be honest. For most of us, the science of Economics is about as stimulating as a lecture on physics. But as Rachel Maddow noted in her MSNBC show this week; on a scale between Rocket Science and ‘Doh!’ the concept of economic stimulus is way over on the “Doh!’ side. I think I understand it and I am not too ashamed to admit that I took remedial math courses in high school and barely passed the single math class my fine arts college required.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wem1XQT3JqI

President Obama agrees passionately in a speech he gave earlier this week to Democrats in Virginia. While he does not go into great details he asks “What part of Stimulus do you not understand?”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJDwbfbpRnQ

This video is the first half of the speech, the second can be found here.

Supply and Demand

At the very heart of the matter is the concept of supply and demand. Someone makes products, and in order to remain in business and buy other things, he needs his product to be purchased by someone.

With unemployment rising, the average citizen still reeling from last year’s gas prices and truly in fear for their personal financial future; they are not buying. Like a butterfly dying in the forest, this ripple becomes a tidal wave in its far reaching effects on the economy of the country and the world. In every state, in every town, business are closing and more jobs are being lost simply because no one is buying their products or services.

We’ve lived in an amazing world for the last several decades; one where technology was king and the products were in such high demand that we happily put ourselves into individual debt and remortgaged our properties to keep up. We can’t do that anymore. The zeitgeist has changed, and we, along with our government need to be ready to change with it.

Perhaps Steve Ballmer, Microsoft Chief Executive, said it best to democrats in Virginia this week:

The bubble has burst. We can no longer rely on consumption by refinancing our homes or inexpensive money to fuel economic growth…

He goes on to suggest that what we are looking at is an economic reset, something that has happened at times in the past. We are going to have to change how we do things, and make sure that how we spend reflects the real value of the assets.

Return on Investment

If demand is what we need to stimulate, then we need to look at what government programs are the best places to invest so that we get the largest return on each dollar invested. This too is not Rocket Science, there have been studies done, there are facts and figures that show us exactly where we get the most bang for our buck.

Mark Zandi and Moody’s Economy where sourced in the Rachel Maddow clip above and in numerous other articles and news pieces discussing the economic stimulus package. What he has to say in his report is pretty clear:

Increased government spending provides a large economic bang for the buck and thus significantly boosts the economy. [...] The most effective proposals included in the House stimulus plan are extending unemployment insurance benefits, expanding the food stamp program, and increasing aid to state and local governments. Increasing infrastructure spending will also greatly boost the economy, particularly as the current downturn is expected to last for an extended period. [...]
Tax cuts generally provide less of an economic boost, particularly if they are temporary; on the other hand they can be implemented quickly.

The charts are even clearer. After seeing the information below, would you chose a bill full of tax cuts that returns little more than the original dollar for each dollar invested in them? One with cuts in corporate tax rates that actually return 70% less than what you put into them?

Seriously, would you not fill that bill entirely with food stamps, extending unemployment benefits, aid to state governments and increased infrastructure spending? Maybe a little tax rebating on the side to get some money into middle and lower class spending hands?

Why aren’t they doing that? Why are they standing on the senate floor calling for tax cuts for individuals and corporations? Why are they railing that there is too much ‘spending’?

Pork Games as Usual

Rather than work towards a stimulus package that emphasizes items that will actually stimulate the economy our elected representatives are playing games with votes and are obviously more interested in party and personal political power than actually aiding their constituents and their country.

Liberal economist Paul Krugman noted in an OpEd piece in The New York Times:

A not-so-funny thing happened on the way to economic recovery. Over the last two weeks, what should have been a deadly serious debate about how to save an economy in desperate straits turned, instead, into hackneyed political theater, with Republicans spouting all the old clichs about wasteful government spending and the wonders of tax cuts.

The picture he paints of our current economic crisis is eye-opening and frankly disturbing. The emphasis he places on the ‘need for speed’ in order to spare us the worst is scary.

We need our representatives to leave their games at the Capital Hill Security checkpoints and get down to business. We don’t have time for their games. They can get back to them later. What we need now is a bill that emphasizes spending and invests in things that have the highest possible return on our tax dollars and create the largest numbers of jobs for Americans. If they also happen to improve our failing infrastructure, that years of tax cuts and reduced spending have rendered pot-hole filled, incapable of holding back floods or providing electricity during a simple winter storm, so much the better.

Now is the time. They represent us, let them know to stop it. There is a place on USA.gov where you can get contact information for the President, for every member of the House and Senate. Send them mail now. Tell them the time for political games is over, and put up or we can shut them up with our lack of votes for them in the future.

Yes, they may not listen. But at least we will have done our part in the democratic process. And who knows, one small pebble can start an avalanche.

For more basic reading:

Must See: Dollhouse

mergryphon — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 21:14:06 +0000

Arm your DVRs, program your Tivo, or be sitting before your television at the ready at 9pm Eastern/8pm Central Friday evening, February 13th. Its an auspicious premier date for Joss Whedon’s return to television: Dollhouse, staring Eliza Dushku (previously seen as “Faith’ on Buffy: The Vampire Slayer) as Echo, a ‘tabula rasa‘ who can be transformed into whoever and whatever the customer needs her to be. These “Actives” have had their entire original personality’s removed so that they can completely take on the persona the client wishes, lover, negotiator, assassin, or whatever can be tamed from Joss’ wild imagination.

It also stars Tahmoh Penikett (familiar as Captain Karl ‘Helo’ Agathon on Battlestar Galactica) as FBI Agent Paul Ballard who is on a mission to stop the ‘Dollhouse’ and rescue Echo whose former identity he believes he knows.

As part of the wave of publicity for the show’s premier Joss gave an interview to The New York times in which he discusses the creation of the show, and the Fox network’s faith in the concept.
Fox on Demand has some interesting behind-the-scenes Jossverse videos that involve the show’s production and chats with the cast, etc.
In a TV Guide article Eliza calls the show “mind-blowing.”

Joss is a master of character interaction, development and dialog. We’ve seen it in Buffy, Firefly and Dr. Horrible’s Sing-along-Blog, it should be there again in Dollhouse. I missed all the hype for Firefly, and didn’t discover the show until long after it had been cancelled. I don’t plan on repeating that mistake with Dollhouse.

I want my ATV!

mergryphon — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 03:22:12 +0000

This week Lifehacker had an excellent article on the Boxee open source multi-platform media center and how to install it on an AppleTV.

While the excellent Boxee application can be installed on computers, installing it on the AppleTV makes for an easy solution to add the ability to view DRM-Free media. The AppleTV, at its low end can be cheaper than acquiring a seperate PC to act as your media center box. Out of the box it interfaces with iTunes and the Apple Store, and can access your existing iTunes library as well as purchase items to view directly from the TV. It also sports HDMI output to your television and optical audio jacks.

The process outlined on Lifehacker consisted of making a USB boot drive for the AppleTV that adds XBMC and Boxee directly into the menu system of the AppleTV itself, leaving its original operations intact. Once installed it can read media from its own drive (which you can place there now over the network), interact with Network Area Storage (NAS) or download or stream media from the Internet.

I have never so easily hacked or so cheaply hacked a media device. And I’ve done my fair share of computer and gaming console hacking. Simply follow the simple steps to make a USB stick a boot device, and plug it in, it does all the work. When you restart the AppleTV, all you need to do is update the Boxee, XMBC and Launcher software, and then launch Boxee.

You might want to make an account over at Boxee, to share information with other users and perhaps set up your own RSS feeds of shows to watch. With no extra configuration of feeds or settings Boxee offers immediate menu access to Hulu, Comedy Central, CNN, and a number of other network feeds of televsion, movies, movie trailers and video podcasts. Within a minute or two I was watching the Daily Show and South Park. This is a good way to quickly find broadcast episodes you might have missed, like the latest Heroes or Battlestar Galactica.

Now, the quality of the streaming video from the Internet can be a mixed bag as to quality of the video. I do not think I would want to try to watch something I could get in HD from another source this way, but for simple normal broadcast, especially something like South Park and the Daily Show it was fine. (Although it may be determined by the source stream, South Park from Comedy Central was fine, Futurama from Hulu was almost unwatchable.) The AppleTV is not a high end media computer, so I wasn’t expecting too much. But still, it offers the ability to ftp DIVX or other files onto the drive, at that retains the original resolution.

All-in-all, not a bad weekend experiment for something sitting around gathering dust.

Caution Zombie Hacks!

mergryphon — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 23:14:23 +0000

Someone in Texas successfully hacked the road-side traffic alert signs to warn oncoming motorists of zombie problems on the road ahead. Run!

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