Category: Uncategorized

Nokia rolls out software update for N9, bricks mine and others’

Nokia is rolling out its first update for the N9 and as I wrote about it the other week, it’s a pretty big update for those who received their N9s with the stock 1.0 software.

When I received my N9 from Nokia Indonesia, it already came with version 1.1 (20.2011.40_2_PR_005) which is newer than the one that was shipped with the initial batch of N9s. I saw a couple of units with v. 34 instead of the v. 40_2 that I got. The public update that was rolled out earlier today is designated 40_4 which brings four more new features over the 40_2. I listed the differences in the previous post.

Around 11 am GMT+7, a notice popped up on my N9 letting me know that there was an update for the phone, so I proceeded to back up my phone and was about to run the update when I decided to tweet about it and soon after was told by a friend not to run the update because her N9 had gone kaput after she ran it. Another friend also ran the update and is now holding a bricked N9.

The update came in at 11MB instead of the 218MB that was announced earlier. As it turns out, the larger size had been for the entire OS instead of the update. Having gone through Over-The-Air update smoothly for my iPhone, I placed my faith in Nokia, despite the warnings. Turns out I should have trusted her. Now my N9 is stuck in a boot loop and I won’t be able to use it until Nokia gets it fixed.

The comments in the Nokia Conversations blog swayed my decision to update because there had been very positive feedbacks for the updates but I overlooked the likelihood that they were updating from an older version of the OS than mine.

Now, I have to wait for my contacts at Nokia Indonesia to get back to me so I can have it restored to operational status.

[update]

A full restore from scratch apparently would get the phone working again but I may lose all photos, songs, videos, and apps I’ve stored in it. I’m heading to Nokia’s office to get it fixed.  

I’ve got photos and videos transferred to iPhoto, and some of the songs are from iTunes but I’ve downloaded a few dozen from Nokia Music. The apps and songs may need to be redownloaded. This would be a big meh.

Nokia rolls out software update for N9, bricks mine and others’

The History of English in 10 minutes

iPad controls up to 95% of tablet-based Internet traffic

Frederic Filloux:

according to hosting provider Pingdom, which monitors global traffic, the iPad controls 88% of the tablet-based internet traffic worldwide; in the US, it’s 95.5%. For a device that represent only 1.2% of the worldwide web usage (desktop + tablets), that’s not bad.

Those Android tablets are not seeing much online use then.
iPad controls up to 95% of tablet-based Internet traffic

Source: Flickr / m-s-y

They got the bastards in 3 minutes. Cops will never be this responsive in this country.

thedailywhat:

Caught On Camera of the Day: A 911 call from a woman watching live CCTV camera footage of her house being burgled is synced with video from the surveillance feed she was watching.

[reddit.]

tuaw:

The Insanely Great History of Apple. Sweet, infographic fun.

(via Pop Chart Lab)

Source: popchartlab.com

minimalmac:

zenhabits:

(via The Expert Enough Manifesto | Expert Enough)

Self reliance.

Source: expertenough.com

Georgia and Verdana typefaces extended

Thanks to a partnership between Font Bureau, Carter & Cone, and Monotype Imaging, Georgia and Verdana are now extended families, enabling much more versatile use on screen and paper.

/via @hellosigit

Georgia and Verdana typefaces extended

Major iOS security bugs fixed in latest update

Not only did the Levi’s update of iOS (I’m gonna call it that since it’s 5.0.1) bring you better battery life, adds multitasking gestures to the first iPads, resolves bugs with Documents in iCloud and improves voice recognition with Australian accents, it also closed the security bug that was publicly exposed by Charlie Miller a few days ago which cost him his Apple developer account.

Other fixes: iPad 2 passcode security lock bypass and removing DataCert as a trusted certificate provider.

Major iOS security bugs fixed in latest update

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Nokia’s in depth documentary on Lumia 800

chartier:

Yes, it’s the same kind of polished marketing fluff that Apple and a few other companies produce, but that’s the point. It’s polished, and they talk as passionately as engineers, executives, designers, and other nervous non-actors can about loving their work.

via GigaOM

While this is about the Lumia 800, a lot about the hardware could probably be said about the N9 which I really love, after all, the two phones share an identical design with slight tweaks in a few places.

I do hesitate a little about openly recommending the N9 given the limited availability of the applications as well as the unique approach to its use but I can say that I’m enjoying the different ways to use a mobile device. I love it when somebody comes along and offers a fresh take on common activities and the N9 is as fresh as it gets.

I’m genuinely excited about Nokia’s future having seen and now own the N9. This is a fresh start for the company struggling to maintain its position in the rapidly changing world of mobile phones.

Though I’m apprehensive about the deal with Microsoft, having used Windows Phone 7 for about a month earlier this year, I can say that it’s really not a bad piece of software from the consumer point of view. I like how it delivers a truly fresh approach to the user interface, focusing on text and panels rather than icons and heavy graphics. Microsoft’s approach to Metro takes away many of the fluff and shows just the important elements.

Having gone back to the familiar iOS interface, I miss the spartan look of Windows Phone but what can I say, iOS feels a lot like home. It’s what I’ve been used to since 2008 and it’s clearly much more polished and mature.

Today, I use both the N9 as well as an iPhone 3GS. Having owned an iPhone 4 for three months, I never had the intention to upgrade to the 4S. Despite the highly publicized and clearly impressive Siri, it doesn’t fully work outside of the United States and I’d rather wait until the next iteration. Without Siri, the camera is the remaining major upgrade from the 4 and I’m currently quite happy using the cameras on the 3GS as well as the N9.