Square Enix Games Are On Sale in the Apple App Store

Most Square Enix games in the Apple App Store for iOS devices including the iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch are on sale including Final Fantasy I, II, and III, Secret of Mana, and others:

End of year holidays campaign now running! Square Enix games at 25-67% off for 2 weeks only! Limited Period FINAL FANTASY III 25% off!

Browse their iOS games here.

Typing Practice with iPad screen keyboard

The one thing that I have not practiced much is using my iPad’s on-screen keyboard for typing. I don’t want to carry my laptop to the Poland SFRA conference. Already I have needed to correct a number of typos. However, it is already getting easier to type at a good pace without looking at the keyboard. If I practice this regularly, I should become proficient at using the onscreen keyboard on the iPad.

While I am typing, Miao is sleeping and I am watching Storm Chasers on Planet Green channel. Before the movie Twister came out in the 1990s, I thought that chasing tornados was a foolhardy but exciting endeavor. I have never seen a tornado in person, but I hope that if I do that I live to tell the tale.

Apple iOS 4.3.3, Fix to Location Data, Now Available

As I wrote about previously here and here, Apple iOS on iPhone and iPad keeps a cache of crowd-sourced location data on your mobile device as well as on the computer that you sync your mobile device with. Today, Apple released an updated version of iOS that allows you to remove this data. Connect your device to your computer, fire up iTunes, and check for updates to download iOS 4.3.3.

Look to the Future for Solutions Rather than the Past: Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. calls out iPad as a job-killer

Kelly Hodgkins reports on a story from MacDailyNews that Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr., who once thought iPads and ebook readers should be a guaranteed right of all American school children, is now attacking the iPad and lesser devices as the engines of American job destruction. He wrongly accuses the iPad and other easily portable computing devices as killing American publishing and bookselling jobs. This is an incredibly shortsighted way of seeing technological development and its effect on jobs and the economy. Furthermore, his way of thinking is anti-progress and anti-innovative. Instead of lamenting the shifts in the economy as a result of technological innovation, he should be part of the solution to figure out new economic models that supports jobs and economic growth rather than decrying the on-going shift to new economic models that support these new technologies. We cannot look backwards nostalgically if we intend to weather the current economic storms. However, we can look backwards for inspirations on how to handle shifts in jobs. We know from history that there have been massive displacements of workers as a result of new technology, and humanity by and large handled those shifts in innovative and creative ways. This is not to say that these shifts are always for the better, but the innovations that lead to their taking place were necessary and inevitable for various reasons. Demonizing technology is not going to solve our current job crisis. Doing away with the iPad (obviously, not something that will happen), will not magically resurrect the lethargic mega-bookseller Borders or the other nosediving brick and mortar booksellers. Looking into the past, there were not always book sellers as we knew them, and looking into the future, there will not always be book sellers as they were in the past. Businesses have to adapt to the market and the influence that new technologies have on the marketplace. Likewise, jobs will have to be changed and the education necessary for job holders will need to adapt to the new needs of the market. Rep. Jackson and other congressional leaders need to look to the future and employ their extrapolative imaginations rather than their nostalgic memories of a bygone era. Some businesses are already doing this while other businesses that refuse to adapt are going the way of dinosaurs. Some of these resistant businesses are taking longer than others to die out, but it is likely that new Tyrannosaurus and Brachiosaurus will arise on the marketplace savannas. Hopefully, political and business leaders will adopt a more inventive strategy to shape these future Goliaths.

Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. calls out iPad as a job-killer.

ComicGlass Comic Book CBR and ZIP Reader for iPad and iPhone

At dinner on Monday night, Amy Yau showed Y and me a slick comic book reader that she recommends called ComicGlass. I particularly like its built-in web browser and import functionality.

After my disaster with ComicZeal (read about my iPad meltdown here), I will try out this CBR reader when I get back to the States. It is available in the App Store.

Amy also recommended the Marvel comic book reading app, because it does offer some comics for free.

Notes from Taiwan, Dead iPad, Comic Zeal Freeze Led to Forced Restore Mode

I can safely say that I am beyond pissed about my iPad. I spent the better part of an international flight typing up my notes on TRON: Legacy for a review in the SFRA Review, and today, I used my iPad for browsing and comic reading before it froze. No worries, I thought. I powered it off, and attempted to reboot it. Unfortunately, the iPad went into restore mode, and I was greeted by the iTunes plug-in screen. I watched YouTube videos and read lots of posts, but I could not find anything that disputed what I feared: everything on my iPad was lost and I would have to restore iOS.

I wouldn’t be so mad about this situation if:

  • Typing on Apple’s Pages and formatting all of those italics didn’t take so long.
  • I didn’t have to restore all of the apps that I had bought and wanted to use from the App Store.
  • I wouldn’t lose the media that I purchased from the App Store on the iPad after my last backup (TRON: Legacy soundtrack and the novel Atmospheric Disturbances).
  • I didn’t want to show my in-laws pictures that I had saved on my iPad.
  • My bookmarks weren’t obliterated.
  • My comic books weren’t erased.
  • My videos weren’t de-rezzed.

Y and I brought our iPads on this trip thinking that it would reduce how much stuff we had to keep up with. Y’s iPad didn’t transfer all of her photos, and now mine has just deep-sixed itself.

Y’s father was kind enough to let me install iTunes on his Windows XP enabled Acer machine so that I could perform a restore. The iPad seems to be working now, but it is wiped clean besides the default Apple software. I will grab some apps that I have already bought, but I cannot restore all of the media when my computer is half-way around the world.

I’m not entirely sure who I should be mad regarding this technology failure. Certainly, I could have brought my computer with me, but that defeats the purpose of a general computing device like an iPad. Apple’s hardware and software let me down by letting what I perceive to be an app’s problem to take down the entire device’s operating system, apps, and data. Is ComicZeal really at fault here? I haven’t had a chance to investigate other folks’ experiences with that software.

This is my experience, and I wanted to get it off my chest before I attempt to rewrite my review from my notes. Be warned and be careful with your iPad.

Coincidentally, my iPad locked up while I was using ComicZeal. I wonder if other folks have had similar issues with that software or other apps that have brought down the whole system on an iPad running iOS 4.2.