Great day for Spaceflight

The maiden flight of the SpaceV Falcon 9 successfully achieved orbit today. You can watch the really nice video with a camera that is on the rocket itself.

Wow!

UPDATED: Some great iPad ideas from a scientist

Molecules from my iPad

iPad Review for Scientists
[Via MacResearch]

Author: Charles Parnot

I would like to point out a recent review of the iPad, specifically geared towards scientists and researchers. The author of the review details his experience with the iPad in the context of his work as an academic, and lists a number of applications he has found useful in that context. Let us know what you think of the iPad in the context of your work.

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I’m going to have to check out Things, although there is some cost and it looks like it might work best with the Mac applications –which is $50. Papers is a nice app also. And again it works best with the Mac app, which is great. I have used Sente on my Macs for years –I left Endnote when it seemed to forget about the Mac. It looks like Sente for iPad is on its way also.

Now if we could get a really nice dedicated lab notebook for researchers.

UPDATE: The URL for the review has been changed. This one should now work.

I miss John Hodgman and Justin Long already

WWDC Flashback – John Hodgman impersonates Steve Jobs, makes fun of Microsoft
[Via Edible Apple]

Steve Jobs is no stranger to “mixing it up” and taking a few well-timed jabs at Microsoft, and no where is this more apparent than at WWDC. With Apple’s world wide developers conference just days away, here’s a look back at the opening of Steve Jobs’ keynote from WWDC 2007, starring the hilarious John Hodgman doing his best “PC as Steve Jobs” impersonation.

Best line? Well, anything referencing the brown Zune is always killer.

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Apple sure knows how to make a point in a very humorous way. I wish they would have a farewell bit from Hodgman and Long at this year’s WWDC.

Tropical storms and Hellholes in Guatemala

by horslips5

Giant Sinkhole in Guatemala
[Via Daring Fireball]

Incredible.

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Not only did the recent tropical kill many in Guatemala but this huge hole just opened up, apparently swallowing a 3 story building. Sixty meters wide and 100 meters deep, it is quite striking.

I wonder if the oil spill could be responsible </snark>

Since ruptured sewer main was responsible for a similar 100 meter deep hole opened up in 2007 that killed several people, it may very well be likely that a similar thing happened here.

Or maybe the Silver Surfer has arrived.

Seems like old times only with Apple vs Google

Tips and Tricks to Extending the HTC EVO 4G and Incredible’s Battery Lif
[Via Daring Fireball]

Sounds like fun.

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Like the early battles of the Mac OS and Windows, one system just let’s you do things without worrying and the other requires all sorts of workarounds to function. As Daring Fireball mentioned on another post – although with respect to Adobe, but the sentiment is the same – it is like having them “speaking English as a second language. You can see the logic behind the thinking, but the result is utterly weird and wrong to a native speaker.”

I guess we will fight the same battle between an OS that just let’s you do what you want but is not free versus one that is free but makes you jump through hopes to use. I do think, though, that battery life is a big hurdle in the mobile world. Apple appears to have found a ay around this in some novel ways with the iPad. I t will be interesting to see if this also holds true for the iPhone. And whether tablets from others based on Android can up their battery life.

Otherwise Apple will win this going away.