Is the iPad more like a Mac, or an iPhone?-UPDATED

I'm sure the question has already been asked. I am here to answer it. I'm correlating all the ways the iPad is like a Mac, and all the ways it is like an iPhone.

Aspects shared by the iPad and Mac:

• When purchased, you are given the option to recycle your own computer
• Runs iWork full-fledged
• Can be mailed in for repair (MacBooks are the only Macs that can be mailed in)
• LED Display
• Has file syncing/sharing/downloading capabilities
• Has 802.11n WiFi

Aspects shared by the iPad and iPhone:

• An App Store
• The UI (The iPad UI is a bit more rich, and user-friendly)
• Is synced to a computer
• No user-accessible file system
• Two-year AppleCare extended warranty (suggested by MacFusionGirl, thanks!)

I'll let you guys decide. Let me know in the comments what you think.

iChat vs Adium - Fight!

For about two years now, there are always heated debates in the Chat sector of the Mac, debating if iChat or Adium is the best Mac Chatting client. I've used both Adium and iChat for an extensive amount of time, and I personally prefer iChat since it has a simplistic UI and I don't use the platforms it doesn't support anyways, so I don't have a problem with that. So, I've decided to make a few rounds of head to head competition on the major aspects of what is expected of a chat client. Then, at the end, I'll post comments from people who I've asked the preference of client.

Round 1 - Platform Support

iChat and Adium both support multiple chatting platforms, such as AIM, Jabber, MobileMe, and usually work fine. However, Adium supports almost 4 times more of what iChat supports, and it also works fine. What Adium supports that iChat doesn't:

• Yahoo! Messenger
• MySpace IM
• Facebook
• QQ
• LiveJournal
• ICQ
• Novell GroupWise
• MSN Messenger

Adium definitely is the winner in Round 1. iChat doesn't have a wide selection of different chat support, it only supports the basics.

Round 2 - User Interface

Now, here is where things get kind of tough. Adium has an OK basic UI, however you can fully customize it to whatever fits you. iChat has an amazing basic nice and bland UI, however you can't change the font, UI, or colors unless you use a 3rd party application, such as chax. However, the latest version of Chax is no longer an add-on, its an actual app. But it looks exactly like iChat and you can fully edit it. So who wins this one? Its really a tie because Adium's base UI is weaker than iChat's, but you can edit the UI completely and make it just like you want it. You can change fonts and order of how iChat's buddy list is sent by using Chax, but you can't change the actual UI like it's colors. You can change the format which is included in the actual iChat(meaning you can change format w/o Chax), to Bubbles, Boxes, or Compact. Round 2 is a tie between iChat and Adium.

Round 3 - What you think

I asked a few people of what they thought of iChat and what they thought of Adium and also asked them what the better client was. Here's what they Said:

TrueSongmedia answered Adium is better: "because it 1) is more stable ... 2) supports more protocols ... 3) looks better ... 4) can log/organize chats". He also went on to add "iChat is okay, but Apple should get a clue and use the libpurple library for IM instead of writing their own crappy one".

Jeff answered Adium because it had multiple platform support.

So, it looks like the majority of people prefer Adium because of the reasons I've stated in the blog post. It would be nice to see Apple make iChat more customizable, but seeing how pretty much every other Apple-made Application is nice and basic, I don't see that happening in the near future. But since I do LOVE the simplistic interface on iChat, I'll keep to iChat.

If you'd like to follow me on Twitter, I'm @Knunez.

Google Dashboard Overview

At the risk of making an assumption, I'm going to say that the majority of us reading this blog use quite a number of Google services. The question is, do you know just how many Google services you have signed up for over the years?

Well, Google has finally made it easy for you to keep track of all of your Google services, with Google Dashboard. If you go to www.google.com/dashboard you will see a list of the Google services that you are signed up for. From there, you can manage any accounts you may have; modify the information that is shared on a Google search from those accounts; and edit the personal information that is tied to said account(s).

This is a quick way to get a glimpse at some of the statistics of your Google accounts as well as an easy way to manage everything all at once. I hope you find it helpful.

Exposé For iPhone?

Exposé is one of the most productive and useful feature in Mac OS X. Have you ever thought of it on an iPhone or iPod Touch? Ocean Observations has an idea, an Exposé feature for the iPhone and iPod Touch by using the home button’s double tap features. Tap the home button, and up to 9 pages of homescreen are shown in a grid. Tapping any of the displayed pages will jump you directly to that page, allowing you to skip from page 1 to page 8 without swiping 7 times. Interesting idea, but would Apple include this or would it be a “jailbroken iPhone charm”? I can see myself using this, because it could also mean running apps in the background. Here below is a demo of the “iPhone Springboard Exposé”

Google Releases Push E-mail For The iPhone

Today, Google released the ability to receive push e-mail notifications to the iPhone. For those of you who may be unaware, push notification is the ability to be notified of an email instantly. Up to this point, the iPhone could only retrieve mail from the Google servers every 15 minutes. 

Before I go on any further, I would like to point a few things out. First things first, this service is in beta, and the service was launched today. That being said, my personally experience with the service is unreliable at this point. My iPhone has had problems connecting to the mail server, as well as moving messages to the trash.

 If you would still wish to set up Push notification for the iPhone, it is STRONGLY advised that you back up your data before you begin, as you are setting up a new service and could lose all of your contacts and calendar events.

 Please also note that this only works with software version 3.0 and above

 To set up Google Sync for the iPhone

1. Go to "Settings" on the iPhone Home Screen

2. In "Settings", select "Mail, Contacts, Calendars"

3. Tap the "Add Account" option

4. Select "Microsoft Exchange" as your new mail account

5. In the email field, enter your full Gmail address (youremailaddress@gmail.com)

6. Leave the "Domain" field blank

7. Enter your full Gmail address as the username (youremailaddress@gmail.com)

8. Enter your Gmail password in the password field

9. Tap "next" at the top of the screen.

10. If the "Unable to Verify Certificate" box appears, tap "accept"

11. In the server field enter: m.google.com

12. Tap "next" 

13. Select the services you wish to push to your phone.

 That's it! 

As I stated earlier, this is new and is a beta, so user experience may vary. If you wouldn't mind, come back to this post and share your experience with Google sync.