Summary
- Name: Zinio
- Developer: Zinio LLC
- Current Version: 1.2
- Language: English
- Category: News
- Price: Free (+ Magazines subscriptions)
- iTunes App Link: Zinio
Review
Let’s face it, Apple’s iPad is the content delivery savior for traditional media companies: be it newspapers, magazines, or books. While Apple’s iBooks app is an excellent reader and store for books, it doesn’t offer other printed materials such as magazines or papers.
Zinio for the iPad is another tool from the successful Zinio platform. The app lets you read your magazines in the comfort of your hand with one of the biggest selection of magazines online. It allows you to buy subscriptions or individual issues of hundreds of US and International magazines so you can brows through them on your iPad (or iPhone, PC, Mac, etc.)
The app allows you to brows quickly through your magazines exactly as they were published. Yet all text is clear and readable in its original formatting or using the text button that displays only the text itself in an iBooks like manner. It also allows you to email any article in its text format, a great feature in my opinion.
Even though the app has its own quirks (slowness, crashes, etc.) yet it is still the only real solution for magazine publishers to deliver their content to readers and subscribers on Apple’s iPad. I like the idea of reading my magazines on different platforms and this is where Zinio shines.
Pros
- Large selection of magazine subscriptions
- Horizontal mode allows the view of 2 pages of an issue
- Automated delivery over Wi-Fi
- Text reading mode and email features
- Simple interface
Cons
- Magazines’ prices are high (digital v. print)
- Very limited options and tools (bookmarks, text selection in magazine view)
- iPad store offers fewer titles than other platforms
- Performance issues
Verdict
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Gallery
Summary
- Name: Air Sharing HD
- Developer: Avatron Software
- Current Version: 1.0.2
- Language: English
- Category: Utilities
- Price: $9.99
- iTunes App Link: Air Sharing HD
Review
One of the first things I struggled with since I’ve got my iPad was how to “store” files and access them. Apple decided not to bundle a built in file browser or give the user access to internal storage other than what each individual apps offers. Air Sharing HD bridges that gap by allowing you to create a mountable hard drive on your network so you can mount your iPad on a PC, Mac, or Linux and use it as network drive; thus allowing normal file operations on your iPad such as: copy, move, delete and edit files.
I tried mounting my iPad using Air Sharing HD on a Windows 7 PC & on an iMac (OS X 10.5.8). It was a very easy one time process to create the network hard drive on both. Air Sharing HD does this by creating its own server through Wi-Fi and giving you an address on your local network. The result is great: I can copy my files to the iPad and access them on the go. The app offers a long list of feature, some I didn’t even try such as printing, which will defiantly accommodate the needs of any fellow geek!
My main use of this app is to store huge amounts of files and documents on iPad for later use that I can’t sync with iTunes, this includes: Microsoft Word & Excel documents, PowerPoint presentations, PDF files, etc. The app does offer you the ability to open files from within and it has a robust and powerful file viewer which I read PDF’s from on daily basis. It also allows you to email or share any file and to perform many other actions on it.
I’ve purchased Air Sharing HD after trying many similar apps, other apps always fall short in terms of features, performance, or usage. The built in tools are so many to detail in this quick review but here is a quick list (from the developer):
- Create a wireless hard disk
- View documents
- Many file formats supported
- Email documents
- Connect to your computer
- Mount remote file servers
- View and download email attachments
- Perform advanced file operations
- Print documents
- Share files with other users
Pros
- Many features and tools that accommodates a wide range of needs
- Simple interface
- Responsive and robust operations
- Rock solid file viewer and browser
- Simple connection to other computers
- Different views of documents just like any computer (lists, icons, etc.)
Cons
- Pricey
- Lacks the ability to access computer file systems on the network
- Slow connection to the mounted drive
Verdict
| Features | |
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Gallery
Apple iPad
After much anticipation I finally got my iPad from Apple, and what a day it is…
The device is a pleasure to hold, even though heavier than what I expected, and is stunningly elegant. The screen is so crisp and clear and is easy on the eye. Here are some quick notes after using it for a couple of hours:
- Browsing is a whole new experience in the iPad! The best browsing experience I had so far in any other device, even though Flash support is missing.
- emails are a joy to read and to reply to
- Reading, reading, reading! This device, without any doubt, will change the traditional media industry: newspapers and magazines specifically. This is the main reason I waited so long for the iPad, to read books, papers, and magazines. I can’t start to describe how wonderful books look on the iPad, you have to experience it yourself to understand.
- iBooks from Apple is an excellent bookstore. It needs time though to grow the number of titles it offers.
- Kindle, Amazon.com digital book library, also works great on iPad. All my books were available on my iPad the minute I synced my account.
- Magazines, PDF’s, word documents, etc. all look superb!
- Arabic is supported in all apps I tried (reading but not writing yet), this includes: emails, PDF’s, docs, and websites
- Wireless connection is good, didn’t have any problem as of yet, even though many users report having some problems
Verdict
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Much to come later but that’s it for now. I will leave you with some screen shots I took from the iPad:
Back in 2006, I gave a class for young bankers on the basics of Information Technology. The course was an introductory one and the aim was to give the trainees a brief overview of the IT world and its history.
Someone reminded me of these documents and asked me to publish them online, so here they are! Enjoy the reading and tell me what you think. (the docs are in Arabic). You can directly download to your computer in PDF format: 1. IT Basics Documentation / 2. IT Basics Presentation.
قمت في العام 2006 بإعطاء دورة تدريبية عن تقنية المعلومات لموظفي البنوك الجدد في أحد البرامج التدريبية. الهدف من المحتوى كان إعطاء الموظف فكرة عامة وممتعة عن أساسيات تقنية المعلومات وتاريخها.
ذكرتني إحداهن بهذه الدورة والمحتوى الذي قدمته، وطلبت نشره ليستفيد منه الناس على الإنترنت. استجابة لهذا الطلب أنشر هذه الوثائق لعلها تفيد أيا كان. يمكنكم تحميل الملفات بنسق أدوبي أكروبات مباشرة إلى أجهزتكم: 1. أساسيات تقنية المعلومات (مذكرة) | 2. أساسيات تقنية المعلومات (عرض تقديمي) .
Download Presentation
Download Document
Twitter
After trying many plug-ins for WordPress to publish my site’s posts on both Twitter & Facebook, I came to a simple conclusion: 3rd party plug-ins are useless! The best way to go is using plug-ins that truly integrate with WordPress. The ones I used were: Wordbook (integrates with Facebook) and WordTwit (integrates with twitter). The result is satysfying and practical: both plugins submit new posts directly to Twitter & Facebook.
Now, the only problem I encountered was with Wordbook: It requires PHP5. By default, my host (1and1) uses PHP4, you have to choose PHP5 when you create a new MySql database. To overcome this problem, I used a very simple solution that I found on 1and1 FAQ site (Link to original page):
By default Apache uses PHP 4 for .php extension. If you don’t want to rename all your
scripts to .php5 you can do the following:
Create a .htaccess file and place the following line AddType x-mapp-php5 .php in it.
Now I enjoy true integration with my 2 favorite social sites 
Gravatar
Managing multiple profile on tones of websites, forums, blogs, social services, etc. is becoming more and more difficult as your digital self grows on the web!
One service that might help you cope is Gravatar (Globally Recognized Avatar). This service helps you publish your avatar (symbol, image, or icon that represents you) on almost any forum, blog comment or post, etc.
By signing up with Gravatar you’ll be able to upload your avatar (or multiple avatars) to it and associate one or multiple emails to it. Thus, whenever you post a comment on a blog or interact with any website, your avatar (or Gravatar in this case) will appear automatically without you having to create a profile! Magic isn’t it!!
The service explains:
Your Gravatar is an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things like comment or post on a blog. Avatars help identify your posts on blogs and web forums, so why not on any site?
if you looked into the comments left on some posts in here you’ll appreciate the power of Gravatar:
Gravatar Example
Finally, here are some links to understand the service more:
Web 2.0
Trying to connect all my online activities and social connections into one place, my personal website, proved to be a challenge. Yet WordPress in addition to various plug-ins made it happen: at last I can rest assured my scattered info all over the inter webs are happily residing in one place!
This little experiment allowed me to connect: Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, digg, etc.
Whenever I post something in here it gets published in twitter (as a tweet) and Facebook (as a ststus). When I update my profile on Facebook or update my status on Twitter, my website gets the info! Flickr images are integrated into my site!! And on top of it all, RSS feeds are generated for me!!!
One last thing, I have to applaud WordPress.org for their excellent iPhone app! Now I can update my site comfortably and in a meaningful way from my iPhone. Web 2.0 is a dream come true…
Note taking was not a priority for my iPad but a lot of developers are publishing such apps to iTunes App Store. 
I was looking for an iPad App that replaces Google Reader’s dull interface. There are many RSS feed readers on Apple’s App Store but The Early Edition ($4.99) stands out in such an elegant way. The app aggregates your feeds from all over the web and then presents them in newspaper like interface, with page flips!
