Tablets: Flash, Storage and More

I have an iPad Classic, but I'm not an Apple purist. I am practical. If the iPad 3 doesn't deliver then I'm switching to a smarter tablet like the Android Transformer.

Why? Several reasons: flexible storage, camera quality, Apple's exorbitant charges to developers and booksellers and other Apple Big Brother rules, and Flash.

A disappointing iPad 2 once again had no capability for memory expansion. Many of the latest androids let you add external drives or other storage devices. Some have built-in card readers and USB support.

iPad 2 added cameras front and back. Yea! Both cameras have very low picture quality. Boo! While you want to keep the front camera pixels low for bandwidth, you want a higher quality rear-facing camera for better pictures. Next generation Androids typically have 5 MP or better for the rear camera.

Apple is really putting the screws to developers and ebook sellers like Amazon and Barnes and Nobles. This lunacy is passed on to the iPad owners. Often you'll see apps and ebooks cheaper on Android and higher on the IPad. One recent magazine I was looking to purchase was $3.99 on Android and $6.99 on iPad.

Don't want to surf the most popular sites and your favorite products and retailers on the web? Then iPad is probably OK for you. The problem here is the lack of Flash support on the iPad thanks to their tiff with Adobe. Yes, HTML5 offers site developers opportunities to redo everything they already did in Flash, but there still aren't that many takers. It's too expensive for them to do it. iPad users lose again.

One third-party Web browser that allows iPad users to surf Flash sites, play Flash games, enter Flash-enabled contests, and do other Flashy things is iSwifter. This is an essential app in any iPad user's kit. It works by feeding your site to their Flash cloud server to process and return to you. Sometimes their servers get overloaded or become unavailable and so does the site you are trying to access. It's still the best alternative on the iPad.

So while iPad was the first to successfully make the tablet market viable, they have a lot of catching up to do with Android. Quite frankly, they've moved so far away from their grass-roots user-centered business model and closer to the classic Microsoft-style profit above all else business model to pull it off.

If iPad 3 doesn't deliver, I'll get a superior product like the Asus Transformer, and keep the iPad classic around for the occasional app that's only available for them.

Tablet Printing Tip

Tablets and smartphones are great ways to surf the web, read email, and get social. But sometimes in the wealth of viewable information you just need to simply print.

Printing should be easy, but until smartphone and tablet makers improve the process, you can follow this process to make it happen.

First download a printing app. One excellent print app for Android and iOS is Print n Share. Next, start the Print app and then open the app you want to print from like your browser or photo album.

Tap the print button when you find what you want to print. For example, in the iPad Safari browser you tap a rectangular box with an arrow pointing to the right at the top of the tool bar. Then tap Print.

The Printer Options window pops up. If the Printer selection says Print via Print n Share then tap the Print button. If it doesn't then you'll have to go back and open Print n Share and come back to your browser to try again.

When the "ready to print" window pops up, tap the View button. If your printer shows up in the next Print window, tap Print. Hopefully, you will get a Now Printing window and hear your printer printing.

That's all there is to it! If anyone finds a shorter process please let me know.

Have a fun day!

Choosing a Tablet

Are all tablets equal? The media blitz tells you they're not, and they are right.

So what should you look for when choosing a tablet? First you have to pick your operating system. The key players are iOS on iPad and a variety of Android OS tablets. Blackberry has been trying to break into the tablet battle as well, but they don't have enough of the market share to be considered seriously.

If you want the largest variety of applications (apps) for your tablet, iPad and Android are good choices. The problem that has surfaced for Android, however, is that not all of these tablets have the full Android app Market collection available. Two Androids that come out on top in this arena are the Galaxy Tab and the Asus Transformer.

If an app linked to your favorite retailer, restaurant, media outlet, or hobby is important to you, then you may want to go with the iPad. An iPad app is usually the first these companies launch. It may also be the only one they develop.

That's it for now. We'll address Flash in the next blog entry. Have a fun day!

The Find

Here is the old silver trailer we finally found. It is a 1959 Avion R-23 travel trailer! So, we have a new project (like we need another one!) We are just thrilled.

We spotted this one in Bryson, Texas. Although it is livable right now, you have to be hooked up to electric power. All the batteries, propane and associated wiring and lines were removed before we purchased it. We'd like to put all this back in and add solar power so we can use it anywhere and in case of power outages. 

We haven't decided if we want to restore it to factory original, or just to a 1950s or early 1960s style. In any case, it makes a great little guest room right now. We found the pink flamingo at a local resale shop, so we are ready to go!

Silver Fever

Some people have gold fever and will follow the gold trail anywhere it leads them. Others have caught silver fever - a love for classic silver aircraft-style aluminum trailers like Airstream and Avion.

We caught the fever several years ago and always stop to look at or take pictures of these time capsules.

There are certainly bigger travel trailers with room elements that slide out and have ample space for big screen TVs, couches and all the extras. But they don't capture the imagination or the fascination like the silver classics that turn adults into children with the wonder and visions of far away lands.

In the 1960s and early 1970s you were just as likely to see Avions and Airstreams in Holland, Mexico, Africa and Egypt as you would on the road to Yellowstone Park. The travel clubs kept the roads (and railways and ships) hot with adventures for owners of these silver beauties.

After years of searching Airstream dealers (with new trailers that cost $40,000 and up), eBay, Craigslist and other long-distance leads that were still too pricy for us or too far away, we finally stumbled across one about five miles from home. With only $500 and a challenging escapade to get the title and license transferred to us, our 1959 Avion R-23 was ready to come home with us.

Duck Becomes a Swan

Just like the fairy tale, "Duckie" may actually be a swan. She's about three weeks old now, slightly bigger than an adult duck and still has her down and a few pen feathers.

She has a fuzzy toy duck and a toy sheep she likes playing with, and she pecks at the duck when it makes duck noises. She may be cleaning the duck. Her favorite pillow is a fuzzy toy dog.

We think Duckie is a tundra swan. Her bill, coloring, size and calls fit the profile. However, we are keeping an open mind until someone who really knows geese and swans can tell us what we have.

We've been calling our gosling Duckie after Dr. Drake on the NCIS TV series. However, we are thinking about changing it to something like Sinbad and maybe keep Duckie as her nickname. (What do you think?)

Duckie took her first swim a few days ago to my surprise. I took her out for a walk and filled up a shallow litter box for her to bathe in. But when I sat her in it she totally freaked out and promptly jumped out of the box.

The next day, we went for a walk and passed the litter box I had emptied the water out of, but she pecked at it like she wanted me to fill it. While I was pouring water into the pan, she jumped into a nearby water tub from which the dogs had been drinking.

She flipped water on herself and swam around while yaking up a storm. Then she dove under the water and swam around and around, kicking with her flipper feet.

Duckie is getting a bit better at catching her own grasshoppers, but she prefers just pecking in the dirt and snacking on tender greens. She also loves the occasional romaine lettuce leaf.

Since we are going through a lot of newspaper and Timothy Hay, we are checking into a diaper harness. Diaper a goose? It does sound a bit daft, but some people say it really works and makes ducks and geese ideal indoor pets. The Goose's Mother carries harnesses and diaper holders at http://www.thegoosesmother.com/id47.html

So, it appears I was a bit hasty when I said that ducks are not good house pets. At least to a degree. You don't want to just grab a wild duckling or gosling away from it's mother. I don't believe you can actually house break them like a dog. They also won't use a litter box like a cat (although we have a goat that did). The diaper harness is a great solution, but it does take a bit more attention than changing a litter box.

A pet of any kind is a commitment. Ducks and geese may live up to 40 years and that is a big commitment. On the plus side, ducks and geese are supposedly allergy free and don't get diseases common in other pets.

Duck Duck Goose

Did you know that toes look like fat juicy grub worms, and fingers look like tasty grasshoppers? Well, they do if you're a baby goose!

Beth brought us an orphaned gosling that she found in Fort Worth this week. First, she made sure that it wasn't just separated from it's mother before bringing it in. The gosling had a small abscess at the beak root, but the vet said that since it wasn't affecting her eating habits or activity to just leave it alone and it will take care of itself.

We are feeding Goosie a diet of 50/50 birdseed and grit, grass, grasshoppers, and crickets. She gets really excited when we bring in the grasshoppers! However, it sure is hard catching the little buggers. Maybe a butterfly net would help?

We keep calling her a "she", but we really don't know for sure. How do you determine sex in a gosling? I don't guess it really matters at this point anyway. We'll just keep her well fed and happy.

A veterinary technician told us that Goosie (formerly called Duckie) was a goose instead of a duck. She said that you can tell because the bill and feet are different. The tech has raised a lot of ducks, so she was a great person to ask.

A baby goose is a lot like a puppy. Both require a lot of attention, they yelp (or quack) a lot at when they can't see you, and neither come house broken! Small dogs or cats make good house pets. Ducks and geese? Not so much.

A lot of people pick one up for a pet after seeing a movie with baby chicks or ducks in it. Easter is a holiday that sells truckloads of bunnies, chicks, and ducklings. Hamsters are the big thing this season with the new G4 movie and its fuzzy little talking spies.

Goosie was probably someone's pet, since she is so people friendly. She may have either escaped, or someone got tired of her and just let her go. Domesticated animals don't make the transition to the wild that easily and many don't survive. That's true for dogs, cats and other pets, too. It's always better to find another people home for a pet or to take it to an animal rescue group that will know what to do.

Little Goosie is happy and healthy now. She has a little cardboard scratching pad she likes to sleep on when she's not sleeping on the grass we bring in for her. Now all I have to do is find those grasshoppers that got under the bed!