Sparrow is a Mac only desktop email client specifically for GMail. They way they describe it on their website  is this way:
Sparrow is a minimalist mail application for Mac. It was designed to keep things simple and efficient. No fancy stuff here… just your mail and nothing else.
I decided to take it for a spin; I’m not a huge fan of Apple Mail (or most desktop clients), but Sparrow seemed different since it’s specifically for GMail.
The other day I installed Sparrow, a GMail desktop client for Mac (review on that soon). Without thinking anything of it, I put in my username and password. When it told me I had the wrong username and password, even though I did not, I started to get a little worried (turns out it’s because I didn’t have IMAP enabled in GMail). You see, I was willing to give this brand new software a try without knowing anything about the developers or the software, except that it looked cool, and I willingly gave the username and password to my primary email account of the last 6 years. That got me thinking about how many of us just trust 3rd party applications.
A couple of weeks ago Facebook announced the latest service in their social networking scheme, Places. It allows you to ‘check-in’ using your iPhone or the mobile web and post your location to your Facebook profile. You can also tag friends and see who is nearby. I asked my students- college freshmen- what they thought of Facebook Places and got some pretty good replies. Let’s take a look!
I woke up this morning to a very upsetting email that my favorite music service in the cloud, lala, is closing its doors on May 31st. Â As a member since the tail end of 2008 and an avid user of the service, I of course wish it weren’t so; but since Apple bought it earlier this year, it does raise some interesting questions.
A week or so ago, Gina Trapani wrote on her website about AppBrain, an Android app that inventories your apps, makes recommendations, and makes it easier to manage them. I installed it and played around with it, and have go to say, I’ve actually started using it more than the native Marketplace App. Read my review after the jump!
Over the last couple of days, a Facebook virus has been going around, cropping up in user’s notifications that someone has, “commented on a photo of you” or “posted a photo of you.” Upon clicking the link, however, you’re taken to a blank 3rd party app page that is automatically installed on your profile.
From what I’ve gathered so far, there are 2 types of links (but could be more). The link includes “beta-dislike” or “photo-comments” in the URL. Simply mousing over the link in the notification will show the URL in the bottom left corner of your browser. If you see either one of those, DON”T CLICK ON IT. Photo links on Facebook are in this format: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=<ID>&subj=<ID>&id=<ID>. There could also be more info after the ?, but no other slashes in the URL. If you see any other slashes, err on the side of caution.
Don’t fret. So far, I haven’t seen any password stealing, profile changing, or other malicious actions. However, I have read that some of the code found in the app may be storing information and sending it to a 3rd party website. This leads me to believe the writer of the app is probably storing the information to sell it to spammers. Here’s how you can fix it.
First, uninstall the application. Go to Applications->Edit Applications in the bottom left  of the chat bar. Make sure “Show: Recently Used” is selected in the drop down box in the top right on the Edit Applications page. Check those apps, look for an app called “Tagged?,” and uninstall it. If you don’t see “Tagged?,” check for other apps that you did not install and get rid of them. Next, it would be worthwhile to change your Facebook password for good measure.
Finally, report the link. In your Notifications, right click the link and copy it from  the notification in question. Go to this page, fill out the form, and submit.  If you have any more information on this little Facebook pandemic, make sure to leave them in the comments! I will post updates here as well (so if you’re reading this on Facebook, you might want to click through to my blog).
When I got my Droid, one of the first things I did was tap into Android’s vast app market  to check out apps and widgets (modules you can throw on one of your home screens for instant access to some app or information). I’ve had the device about a month now and there are a few apps that have proved themselves useful and/or awesome. Here is a list of my favorites. (more…)
These are the three sides of the project triangle- Good, Fast, and Cheap- and these three sides are things that every client wants. But, there are trade-offs to each one, and many people outside the development world don’t see that. The catch is you can only pick two.
WordPress is becoming an increasingly popular content management system on top of it’s popularity as a blogging system. More developers are choosing it as a solution to enable clients to update their own websites. And while WordPress out of the box is an excellent system, it could use a few tweaks to give most clients the freedom they need. Here are 7 plugins that will make your client’s job of managing their own website easier.
Over at Nettuts, they’ve posted an article titled, “Should You Attend University for Web Development”. Reading the article, I found it pretty interesting that a lot of people feel college isn’t necessary for web development and that their schools are behind the times when it comes to web development. I’m not going to defend my school and say it’s totally up-to-date, because it’s not. I do feel however, that that’s the nature of the beast when dealing with web development and computer science in general. As I wind down in the Masters program, set to graduate in May, I can tell you these two things after six year of college: the CS program should not be about the what but the how, and college is just as much a social thing as it is an academic thing.
First, let’s focus on the academics. Computing, no matter what your focus, is an ever changing field. It would be impossible for every school to stay on top of every technology is out there. I’m not being an apologist, I am speaking the truth. The idea should not be, “I’m learning C#,” or “I’m learning PHP.” It should be, “I’m learning how to program, using PHP.” I learned what Object Oriented Programming is and I can apply that to any language. I’ve learned the semantics of an imperative and a declarative language. I learned algorithms, and should be able to implement them as long as I know how certain language behaves, and I’ve learned how to teach myself that. Heck, my school doesn’t even have a web development major, and I consider myself a damn good web developer.
Beyond that, you learn the social skills you should have whether your profession be computer scientist, web developer, engineer, etc. There is a huge focus in our program on team building and communication. Human interaction isn’t something Google can teach you (yet). In our Masters program (in Software Engineering) we learn about process, eliciting requirements, etc. While you can learn some of this stuff with experience, hearing about it in a classroom certainly expedites the process.
But college isn’t just about academics. I will attribute a good amount of my social skills, professionalism, and 90% of my connections to going to college. I got involved in extracurriculars, networked, and made some amazing friends that challenged my way of thinking and got me to try new things. Again, that isn’t something you’re going to find on Google.
College should not just be about teaching you X. It should teach you how to learn. You should get some leassons in being social. It should give you some experiences you can’t get anywhere else. Those who say, “I don’t need to go to college to be X,” aren’t looking at the big picture and will never be the best at what they do.
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