It Sucks Because

• You have no easy way to manage what account links will open with (mailto, calendar, docs)
• You can’t (easily) have to inboxes open at the same time from different accounts
• All of your bookmarks, history, open tabs, plugins sync no matter what account you’re using
• Every account is subject to the same browser plugins permissions
• You are limited to a single private browsing window
• This method doesn’t work for all Google services

How to Make it Better

Chrome and Firefox have the ability to set up multiple user profiles. In Google Chrome go to the settings and click add a new user.

Once you do you’ll have new icon in the top left corner (at least in Chrome) with the icon for the new user. Click this drop down to select your new users and you’ll be prompted to sign into your Google account to start syncing your data. Each profile will be able to sync bookmarks, open tabs, search engines, passwords, and extensions individually so you don’t have to worry about opening your browser at home and seeing all your research tabs from work.
Using multiple profiles allows you to have multiple windows open each with their own Google profile signed in. Any mailto, calendar, or docs links will open in the browser window (and Google profile) of the last active window.
You now have the ability to also open multiple private browsing windows (one for each profile) for testing websites without cache, and logging in with additional credentials. Don’t want to test a new browser extension with your Google Apps domain admin user? Test it, and its security, on your personal account first without worrying about it stealing confidential information.

Why It’s Still Not Perfect

• No way to set a shortcut to control which profile opens initially (opens last used profile)
• No ability to selectively sync content between profiles*
• Multiple users are not supported on mobile browsers
• Switching users/windows may get confusing if you have a lot open

I have been using this method of managing my browsing habits and Google accounts for about a year now and I would never go back to the old multi sign on method. Got any tips for Google account management and browser syncing? Please leave them in the comments.

*I am able to sync selective content by using 3rd party services for my passwords and bookmarks. I use LastPass and Diigo under a single account and just install the extensions in each browser profile.

Computers and Mobile

1. First of all, I really really hope that the Apple mania that has been going on for the past few years will finally die off. I don’t think it will though only because Microsoft seems to have shot themselves in the foot with Windows 8 being nothing that consumers were asking for.

2. Speaking of Windows 8. This year Windows RT will finally become a viable tablet solution. It will only happen though because Microsoft will throw billions of dollars at developers to write software, manufacturers to make hardware, and advertising. There will be no real compelling reason to buy Windows RT over another tablet because Microsoft still won’t figure out how to make a compelling ecosystem. They also will come out with a new version of the tablet OS that will run on smaller screen devices which will allow hardware to drop to the sub $500 range. Of course, the smaller tablets won’t do anything that you really want because Microsoft will artificially limit their capabilities so you’ll buy a more expensive tablet.

3. Smartphone hardware will start to level out this year and the spec race will turn into an ecosystem/software capabilities race. 3rd party manufacturers (HTC especially) will realize their limitations of not being a 1st party manufacturer. Apple, Google, Amazon, and Microsoft will all have their own hardware that can and will do things 3rd parties fail at. Because 3rd parties won’t have the benefit of making money from a robust ecosystem, they will either die or be absorbed into the main players.

4. Google will continue merging Android and Chrome OS but their focus this year will be on making hardware. Making and selling their own phone, tablet, media streamer, Google TV, DVR, router, Android at home, Google glass, and laptop will be too enticing for them. It will also help them sell more ads and know what your are doing 24/7.

5. Google glass is going to be a huge nerd success while the general public will just think WTF. But then, another company (not Apple or Microsoft) will come out with a less obtrusive wearable computer (probably a watch or clothing) and everyone will think it’s amazing! Apple’s and Microsoft’s wearable computers won’t come out till 2014-2015.

Software and Web

1. Startups will fail left and right. It will become a crashing reality for everyone trying to make it as a startup. There will be very few that are purchased by big name companies and the rest will fail. This will cause a slow down in web innovation as fewer people are willing to take a risk and lose everything.

2. Ecosystems will become more segregated and users will have to choose their alliance. Companies are finally realizing what Apple knew years ago. Lock-in not only generates sustainable money, but it also makes it hard for users to leave. Microsoft, Amazon, and Google will continue to try to lock users into an ecosystem that is not only complete (music, movies, TV, OS) but also doesn’t work well with others.

3. Facebook will also expand their ecosystem but their efforts to make money through Facebook specific promotions (gifts, perks, etc.) will ultimately drive users away from the service. Not that they will care if a million users leave the service, but there will be some out cry for people to stop using it.

4. A new company will offer a non-tablet data only (LTE) mobile device with no voice calling. No carrier will allow it on their network because they won’t make money off of it and the new company will go under. Then in 2014 Apple will have an LTE iPod touch and everyone will say “Why didn’t anyone do this before?”

Video Games

1. Indie consoles everywhere! The Kickstarter fad is going to generate a lot of small consoles that will plug into your TV that will use your phone as a controller (via Bluetooth) and they will all kinda suck. They will all run Android or Linux and none of them will have compatible app stores. They will be super cheap (~$100) but won’t catch on because there will be so many terrible knock-offs that no single console can be the winner.

2. Steambox will be the best new console! Although Steam Valve isn’t really new to the video game world, their console will be a huge hit. It will be announced at E3 and be available by Christmas. It also will cost less than a PS4 and probably the same as a Xbox 720. It will run Linux customized Ubuntu, have a limited number of games available, and have a vibrant hacking community. Ultimately the console will be better for Linux than it will be for Valve.

3. PS4 and Xbox 720 will both come out this year. Am I the only one who is over big name consoles? Until the consoles have portability or virtual reality I think I’ll stick to casual gaming on my phone and computer.

Other

1. It’s no secret that movie theaters are struggling to keep attendance. This year I suspect they will start to get creative and try to offer things that people can’t get at home. Two years ago it was 3D, this past year it was IMAX and 48 fps, in the 1920s-1930s it was widescreen video. Next year I suspect they will have some new gimmick that won’t enhance the viewing experience. Arguably not everything movie theaters come up with is a gimmick, but I have a feeling whatever they come up with next will be.

2. Likewise there will be more of a push to bring theater release movies to people’s homes. They will be outlandishly expensive but at least it will be something possible. In the next 5-10 years this will cause most movie theaters to go the way of the video arcade.

3. Self-driving cars will be a consumer reality. For the states that have approved laws, car manufacturers (not just Google) will begin testing self-driving cars. The won’t be available to the public until 2014 but if you live in one of the few states that allow it you may see them on the road.

4. The maker revolution will continue to grow. People making their own stuff and figuring out how things work has been driving a lot of innovation and next year it will only grow stronger as 3D printers become more accessible and information sharing grows. I suspect there will be a ~$250 3D printer that comes out and any company that encourages hardware modifications will be a consumer success even if most people don’t make any modifications at all.

5. Someone will succeed where Boxee failed this year with an unlimited DVR. I have a feeling it will be Amazon. They will offer a set top box that is capable of watching live TV and they also will make “recordings” available through prime instant video for prime subscribers. They will be competing mostly with Hulu but they will make the STB so cheap that it will actually catch on.

The Externals

The Google Mini isn’t super special outside from the fact that it’s a 1U server with a big blue sticker on top and the rest of the outside painted blue. There are also a lot of security bits that prevent normal users from opening them up.

The sticker prevents you from opening the lid so we’ll need to peal that back if we want to see what’s inside.

Here’s one of the security screws

And here’s the master key we’ll use to get inside.

The Internals

Once we get past that we can open up the lid by sliding it back and revealing the insides.

Let’s start by looking at the main components. The CPU heatsink is under the plastic shroud with just a single fan cooling off the entire server. The heatsink below the CPU is for the north bridge which handles communication from the CPU to the RAM. The black heatsink on the top right is for the PCIe controller.

The ports on the server are pretty standard for any desktop/server. An added benefit being this comes with dual network interface cards (NIC) which can allow for more advanced system management.

The server comes with 2GB of DDR2 RAM which you can easily see here.

The server has 1 PCIe 16x slot and 5 PCI slots. Not that you could use them in a 1U case though.

It also has 4 SATA controllers, 1 IDE hard drive controller, and a floppy controller. There is also an IPMI slot which is used for out of band management (OOBM). The slot is missing the OOB network card. You can also see two headers for optional case-mounted USB and some jumpers labelled JWD which stand for Jumper Watch Dog. These jumpers allow the machine to automatically reboot if a software hang is detected.

You can also see the Intel ICH6R south bridge for communication handling to the accessories. The chip near the top right of the picture contains the BIOS and the two pads on the bottom right of the south bridge allow for clearing the CMOS settings when jumped.

On the other side of the case are some more jumpers. These are labeled JPWAKE1 and JPUSB1. Both of these pins allow the server to be woken either by USB or PS2 keyboard/mouse input.

Along the rear of the case are also the two network controllers for the Broadcom network cards. This picture also shows us that the motherboard is manufactured by Supero and the model is a P8SCT. A quick Google search turned up the user manual which proved to be very helpful when identifying some of the chips and jumpers.

The power supply is standard but to be thorough I might as well take a picture of that too.

When taking out the hard drive there are 4 screws on the bottom of the case that hold the damper screws to the hard drive. Luckily they’re labeled so it makes finding them easy.

Once you take out the screws the hard drive slides out. There is also a little air dam that keeps air flowing over the hard drive on it’s way to cool the CPU.

Just to be overly thorough of the motherboard, here’s a component layout from the user manual.

I hope you enjoyed the teardown. Just for comparison, AnandTech their own teardown in 2005. The internals on that Google Mini looked quite a bit different.

First of all, the Samsung is not that cheap, $500 is the price of a low end notebook and a high end netbook. It is also right in the sweet spot for tablets and about 1/2 the price of any notebook I’d consider good. So does a $500 web browser live up to it’s expectations? No. Here’s a quick breakdown.

Good:

• Portability – Small and light, but not as small or light as a netbook or tablet.
• User management – There is nothing to manage here, that’s a good thing.
• OS management/updates – Automatic, until there are problems. Trust me, someday, there will be problems.
• Boot/resume time – Good, but only on par with a SSD equipped netbook and less than a tablet.
• Keyboard spacing – Better spacing than a netbook and no need to muck around with onscreen keys. Oh and Dvorak support was a good surprise.

Bad:

• Build quality – Worse than low end netbooks I have used.
• Touchpad – Multitouch scrolling wasn’t as bad as the CR-48, but clicking was a nightmare.
• Missing keys (home, end, f*, delete, super) – With such a terrible touchpad I turned to the keyboard to make up for shortcomings, too bad a lot of the hotkeys I rely on for writing were absent
• missing tools (citrix/rdp, screenshots, storage) – It came down to the fact that I could not do my job with this computer, and that’s a deal breaker.
• Price – As stated above, when the price is around the same as a low end notebook running Windows, something is wrong.
• Display auto brightness – I had multiple occasions when the screen ignored all brightness level I set and did its own thing. Very rough on the eyes.
• Video out/adapter – No extended monitor means, why put video out on the thing at all?

As you can probably see, I wasn’t a fan. I used the Chromebook for 2 solid days before I gave up and went back to my HP 2560p which costs twice as much but does 1,000,000 more things (even run Chrome OS). Battery life on the Chromebook was about the same as my notebook and so was resume/sleep times which are typically two of the selling points of the Chromebook.
Because the Chromebook is not a serious work notebook, if someone asked me what they should get for casual internet browsing and games for ~$500, I’d recommend a TouchPad. If they said they needed a real keyboard, I’d tell them to get the bluetooth keyboard and touchstone. If they still didn’t want that, I’d recommend a netbook.
The Chromebook only makes sense for businesses doing the monthly rental, and if they have a Citrix environment set up so users could get real work done. As my companies Citrix XenDesktop engineer, I look forward to that day, but for my family and friends, never.

Ease of use; Winner: 2-way tie
This one we can call a tie between iOS 4 and webOS because both interfaces are just as easy to launch and run apps and both have little things that you need to get used to. Double tapping the home screen to switch apps isn’t super intuitive and neither is forward/back gestures in webOS. In either case, Android is the loser.

Openness; Winner: webOS
Obviously iOS loses here, Android is open source for its core OS and allows installing apps from outside of the marketplace but so does webOS. Where webOS takes the cake is the fact that there is no rooting of your phone to get access to parts that are supposed to be locked down. How to root the phone is FREAKING IN THE DOCUMENTATION!!! It doesn’t get any more open then that. And lets not forget the open nature of the platform to allow apps to be written in HTML, CSS, Javascript, or C/C++ if you want. Due to this wide open nature, amazing things like Preware has been made available to tweak every last “kernel” of your phone.
Google also loses by making their “default” apps (Gmail, Maps, etc.) completely closed source and even takes down anyone who tries to share them. Palm on the other hand has written every built in app according to the standards they hold their developers to and made the apps all open source so you could see exactly how they built the app. Android and webOS are both fairly open, but webOS is more open and is the winner here.

Battery Life; Winner: Bogus Category
WTF is this doing here?!? This has everything to do with hardware and almost nothing to do with software. In any case, I think we can agree that Android loses this category with almost zero battery conserving settings and complaints on almost every Android device. This is a bogus comparison when trying to compare mobile operating systems. If this were a debate between the iPhone 4, Evo 4G, and Palm Pre Plus this would be a perfectly valid comparison.

Multitasking; Winner: webOS
This is a no brainer. WebOS does multitasking better than any other mobile OS available period. Android is the only other one that even can run apps in the background but there is a reason that a task killer is the first thing every Android phone needs. And lets not even get into the difference between running apps and using approved services and fast app switching.

Software Keyboard; Winner: 2-way tie
iOS has evolved into the best software keyboard and Android actually gives you options for keyboards, I would call this a tie because if you want to use swype on Android, you can. A software keyboard is only good if you are used to its idiosyncrasies and can use it. Personally, I rarely have to get used to a hardware keyboard, but webOS doesn’t even have a proper soft keyboard option.

System-Wide Search; Winner: 3-way tie
They all have it, they all work about the same with the same oddities and features. It is a tie. But just for the record, Android and webOS did it first.

Notification System; Winner: webOS
Once again iOS is the clear loser here, and while I liked the idea of Android’s curtain at first it just plain sucks after using it for a few months. I can’t clear a single notification without clearing all of the notifications and I can’t have extended controls in a notification. I know it is possible, but in all the apps I have installed, I have never seen actual controls inside the notification, just an icon that always stays there and opens the app when pressed.

Voice-to-text; Winner: Android
This works really well 80% of the time in Android and is the clear winner without a doubt. The bad thing is, I only use it 5% of the time I am inputting any text. So it is great 4% of the time I input text but really wouldn’t be a missed function and I still would prefer a proper physical keyboard.

Syncing; Winner: 2-way tie
Who the hell wants to plug their phone into their computer anyway? iOS loses here because you need iTunes for updates and setup. Android is great as long as you use Gmail and have a Google account. WebOS creates an account for you and stores all of your settings AND apps installed. So with webOS, if you break/lose your phone, you can log in with your Palm account and not only do all your settings from every service (sans Facebook) come back, but the apps you had installed come too.

Non-Google Syncing; Winner: webOS
Ever heard of Synergy? You probably haven’t, but it wins. Gmail, Facebook, Yahoo, LinkedIn, and Exchange are all there, out of the box. There is not contest here.

Tethering; Winner: webOS
iOS is just now putting this feature in but because it has the typical Apple restrictions, (no teather in to the iPad, really?) and Android still costs money on any carrier that will allow it, webOS wins because it is available on the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus and is completely free on Verizon. Yes I know if you root your Android phone you can do it for free, guess what, you can do the same thing in iOS and webOS so no one cares. Heck, Windows Mobile 6.1 had this feature and it worked great and was always free, doesn’t mean WM is any good.

Release/Update Consistancy; Winner: Bogus Category
HUH?!? really? What does this have to do with how good a mobile OS is? because you know you will get an update every year? Is Windows better because you get patches every first Tuesday of the month? Or the fact that a new and improved Windows will come out every 3-5 years? NO it makes it worse. This shouldn’t even be on this list.

Customizable; Winner: 2-way tie
If we are talking about user customizations, Android wins hands down. Widgets are great, icons can be placed almost anywhere, and you can set anything you want as a background image. But if we want to talk about the underlying OS, that is a win for webOS. Just go look up Preware and kernel patches and then come back and see why I picked this as a tie for Android and webOS. Oh and I agree, webOS needs to allow more home/lock screen customizations. Widgets sure would be nice but not at the cost of slowing my phone down like it does in Android.

Apps; Winner: 2-way tie
WebOS cannot complete here. Both Android and iOS have >50,000 apps and at that point it just doesn’t matter. There will probably be an app for just about everything. I would actually call this one a slight win for Android just because you can still install apps outside of the marketplace and the web store they have announced should be a huge success. Oh ya, and that whole Apple approval process is a joke.

Web Browsing; Winner: 3-way tie
They are all based on webKit so what does it matter. Some will scroll faster than others and some have better resolutions, but that all depends on the phone and doesn’t matter for rendering. Android and webOS may have slight wins over iOS because they have embraced Adobe flash but once again, that is a phone specific thing because the device has to be up-to-snuff for playing flash content. A three way tie.

Gaming; Winner: 2-way tie
Android doesn’t even have a language that enables the rich games that iOS and webOS allow. And besides the quantity, webOS has every bit of the quality as iOS so it is a tie.

Music Player; Winner: 2-way tie
Android’s built in music player is terrible, iOS’ is as good as any iPod’s (which doesn’t really say much), and webOS’ is just OK. The fact that webOS’ player is open source makes the player really stand out from the crowd when you install simple things like lyrics, and wikipedia searches straight from the player. I know there are better 3rd party players on all the platforms but that is not what we are comparing here. So it is a tie between stock iOS and stock webOS.

Free Turn-by-Turn Navigation; Winner: Android
This is a killer feature, but lets be honest, this will probably come to iOS and webOS simply because Google can sell more ads if it exists on all the platforms. For right now though, it is a win for Android.

Google Apps Integration; Winner: Android
This is like saying iOS has the best iTunes integration. OF COURSE ANDROID IS INTEGRATED WITH GOOGLE APPS. If Android did not have the best app for Gmail I think we would all be very worried. This is one of those arguments that fluffs Androids numbers IMO, but I will leave it in just for the sake of argument. Every mobile OS will integrate with their own offerings, the problem is, Apple and Palm don’t have email or web app offerings. This is more a win for Google and less of a win for Android.

Google Voice; Winner: 2-way tie
Yes this is a cool feature, I have it (and have had it since it was Grand Central) but I never use it because it is iffy and I don’t think the service is quite there yet. In any case, both Android and webOS have native apps for Google Voice and iOS is stuck using a web page. Android integrates deeper into the system, but all of the basic features/settings can be set on either platform so it is a tie.It has come to my attention that webOS no longer has a native GV dialer since some of the recent webOS API changes. I was unaware that a recent update broke this compatibility. In any case, it is somewhat of a bogus category seeing as accounts are still invite only and I am sure only 1-2% of people who have GV even use it for their daily calls.

So what is that total again? This time taking out the stupid frivolous comparisons.
iOS = 7
Android = 10
webOS = 13

Do I own a iPhone, Android phone, or Palm device? No. I have a 4 year old Windows Mobile device (HTC Vogue) running Android 2.1. I have use plenty of iPhones and have convinced quite a few people to buy webOS devices. I just needed to let the few people who read this site know webOS is the best mobile operating system currently available on the market. I just hope other technology sites can finally recognize how great webOS is, and maybe stop focusing on flaws with a phone that came out when the original iPhone was still big news.

First here is what you need:
A Google account. I know you were probably expecting more but that is it. If you are reading this site you already have a computer with a web browser so you are all set to go.

Let’s head over to Google Reader’s website to log in. Look familiar? It should because it is the same login that you use for your Gmail account. Once you are logged in you should see this sidebar. This side bar lets you view all your unread news articles or you can also share items with friends (requires a Gmail account) or put notes on things. Lets not forget this is Google so it tracks what you do. If you click on Trends you can see how many articles you have read, what categories you usually read, and how many items you have shared and starred. To be honest I don’t do much starring because I find it like a inferior bookmarking method and if I find something I like (and want to keep for later) I bookmark it with delicious and move on. You can also browse for stuff to find articles you probably will like and subscribe to them right there. If you want to share articles with fellow Google reader’s you can click the start sharing button and get right to it. Below that is where all your subscriptions show up. You can sort them into relevant folders and go through the articles you want to read in a jiffy.
Here is how mine looks. As you can see on the left I have everything collapsed so that I can just browse all my news by either clicking All items at the top or by each folder. On the right I also turned on collapsed view so that I can read more articles without having to scroll as far. If I find something I like I just click on the headline and the article expands. If I want to read it further or see it at the original site you can just click on the headline in blue. Once I am done with a folder I just click the “Mark all as read” button at the top and that whole folder gets marked and I move on to the next folder.
If you want to share an article you can either click on the share button, share with note, or if you want to share it with someone who doesn’t use Google Reader you can just email it to them right there. It drops a little spot down to write the email and send it all without leaving the reader. Pretty fancy if you ask me.
Last thing you will probably want to know is how to add sites when you are not at Google Reader. All you need to do is look for the RSS link. Usually it will have this icon. All you have to do is click on the logo and any modern browser will ask you what you want to do with the feed. You can simply say “add to Google Reader” and it will take you there with the feed already populated with the latest 10 items. Couldn’t be more simple. Give it a try and subscribe to my blog by clicking the RSS button at the top or click here.
Hope to see you sharing articles in Google Reader.