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Month: July 2013
Music from our Tube: Kellylee Evans covers “Alors on Danse”
Stromae‘s original hit “Alors on Danse” in English, in an acoustic version by Canadian jazz and soul vocalist Kellylee Evans:
(as heard on Radio Nova)
As found on Our Tube; Penguin Cafe Orchestra, Cutting Branches For A Temporary Shelter
Just heard this on KCRW and I’d want to edit this so it can be played in one beautiful, soothing continuous loop;
“Cutting Branches For A Temporary Shelter” by the Penguin Cafe Orchestra, whom I saw play at the Ghent Festivities back in the early nineties.
Sammy’s dead, long live Sammy!
I was pretty happy with my Samsung Galaxy S II, especially after the non-trivial Jelly Bean upgrade some time ago. Because of that and as I wanted to wait until I had 3 vouchers from my employer (which covers the bulk of the cost of a high-end device), I decided to hang on to my S II for one more year.
But then (about a week after the guarantee period ended) it died on me. Black screen, no sound what so ever. I tried charging it (the battery was running low a couple of hours before), but the thing remained dark. I tried replacing the battery with a known good one, but still nothing but silence. I banged it against the counter of the shop where I bought it and threw it up in the air while yelling slightly frantically;
‘ELLO SAMMY!!!!!
Testing! Testing! Testing! Testing! This is your nine o’clock alarm call!
…
THIS IS AN EX-SMARTPHONE!
But the shop-guy just said my Sammy was stunned and that it was out of guarantee anyway.
So I needed an alternative. I started out using my wife’s ancient Sony Ericsson w810 (which I used before her) but that didn’t work for me. I then convinced a colleague (thanks Gregory) to lend me the HTC Radar from his collection of test-devices, but the Windows Phone experience was pretty similar to the one I had over a year ago. In the mean time I tried to find me a smuggler who could buy me a ZTE Open with Firefox OS in Spain (thanks Tamara, thanks Pieter & Tine) but Telefonica (Movistar) support couldn’t confirm it wasn’t sim-locked so I cancelled the order.
And then i saw colleague after colleague (Benoit & evil twin Jean-Paul) surrender to the sweetness of what is considered the current hotshot smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy S 4. And after someone (Gregory, great chap!) gave me his voucher (on condition he would get mine next year), I caved and ran down to buy me that beautiful telephone. So (again) no Firefox OS phone for me just yet, I have me a new PRISM-device to tame.
Why I love the mobile web
This is why I’m a big fan of good mobile websites; the normal BBC Sport Formula 1 page loads in 6 seconds, where the mobile version loads in a mere 2 seconds (when over cable, DSL and 3G are off course slower). Same content, less clutter and based on progressive enhancement for ultimate responsiveness (from low-end phone on a mobile data network to a tablet on WiFi). Guess which site I use on all my devices (smartphone, netbook, the family tablet and my work laptop)?
The details, for both document complete and fully loaded (between round brackets) as seen from the Brussels webpagetest.org node using IE9 and the cable-bandwidth profile;
 |  | |
| load time | 6.011s (7.371s) | 2.057s (3.243s) |
| download size | 988 KB (1015 KB) | 184 KB (657 KB) |
| requests | 134 (141) | 32 (65) |
| test report | webpagetest.org result | webpagetest.org result |
Notice the big difference between document loaded and fully loaded on mobile; that’s where the progressive enhancement kicks in. If you visit the same mobile site with a small screen-size device or without JavaScript, page load time drops to 1.467s for just 76 KB.
An even more extreme example; the desktop news-site for the VRT (the non-commercial broadcaster here in the northern part of Belgium) loads in 10,598s (11,482s) for a whopping 4.337 KB (4.406 KB) (on cable, it gets way worse when on DSL-bandwidth!) while their (one site fits all) mobile site only needs 0,869s (1.475s) for 116KB (120KB). Guess which site I use?
The conclusion is simple; don’t assume that just adding some mediaqueries will make your dog-slow site truly mobile-ready. It’s 2013 and websites should be lean and mean, but most of them still remain way too fat for our smartphones.
As found on the web (July 8th)
| | frank shared Care to share; testing Simple Share Buttons Adder. |
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| | frank shared So who’ll bring me my Spanish Firefox OS phone for €69?. |
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| | frank shared Music from my green garden; Laura Mvula. |
Music from my green garden; Laura Mvula
I should be in Brussels, but I’m at home, working from the peace & quiet of the improvised office in my green garden, whilst listening to Laura Mvula:
No if only I didn’t have that meeting in the afternoon …