iChoose 2.0

We asked iChoose if it wanted to update itself. It did. We asked iChoose if it wanted to go all 2.0, and, guess what? It did!

Ladies and Gentlemen, we give you iChoose 2.0. Coming to the iPhone App Store real soon.

iChoose will always remain free. We will not (as so many others have) suddenly start charging for our free apps in some vain, crass and stupid attempt to gain popularity. You will, however, be given the opportunity to make a donation towards the future development and evolution of iChoose, should you so desire.

"The Swiss Army Knife of choice"
(source: the UK App Store iChoose reviews)




What's new?

* iChoose Settings (in the iPhone Settings App)
+ Turn animations on/off when making decisions (the initial 'flip' from the '?' button is retained)
+ Individual settings for certain decision makers (choices)

* iChoose interface
+ New 'improved' look
+ Added a 'Hold' button to let you hold your choice until you've finished with it
+ 'Additional' button for some decision makers - e.g. 'Roll All Dice' for Dice ROLL (see below)

* Coin Toss
+ Added 'Real Coin' graphics option (A £2 GBP coin to be precise)

* Dice Roll
+ Choose to have 1-6 dice on screen
+ Roll each dice individually, or roll all dice at the same time
+ On-screen 'total' of dice values, e.g '= 7'
+ 'Hold' dice rolls

* New (More ...) decision makers (choices)
+ 'Let iChoose Choose' - iChoose will take you to a random decision maker/choice
+ Rock/Paper/Scissors
+ Loves Me/Loves Me Not
+ Red/Black
+ Boy/Girl
+ Quit/Stay
+ iPhone/iPod touch
+ Mac/PC
+ Weather (rain, sun, snow etc)
+ Random Number (range of numbers defined by you in the settings - defaults to between 1 and 100)

Record UK summer weather

I don't know what everyone was complaining about - the summer in the UK has reached record temperatures. The BBC said so, and they are never wrong...

Proof here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7585641.stm

It must be specially arranged for the queen.

One of my favourite blogs

I thought I would share one of my favourite blogs.

It's called The Big Picture on boston.com.

If you have the time then go through the months and you will be in awe at some of these wonderful photographs.

F1 Painting

Ok - so this has been posted elsewhere but I enjoyed it so much I could not help but link to this video myself.

We love F1, and we love clever stuff and clever people. This is clever!

Learn how to draw at 5min.com

.

A1 Customer Service

One of my iPhones developed a strange screen issue yesterday - the screen when WHITE with no ability to do anything. I tried resetting and updating the firmware but all to no avail....

I popped into the Apple Southampton store today and showed them. They simply apologised and instantly gave me a replacement. No fuss, no hassle, no sending off somewhere and being phone-less for a couple of weeks - simple.

That's what I like and wish many others would emulate.

Go GB

We're loving the Olympics this time round - we must whilst we are doing so well....

For those that love it too, then take a look at this! 

Olympics in Lego

Superb!

BPWEB

Bloody good people they are over at BPWEB. Very helpful.

Having thought that I'd managed to locally configure Rubygems and Rails 2 on a shared account with them, I discovered that it was in fact there support team that had done so.

Needing to do the same thing for another client this morning, I hopelessly spent the best part of 3 hours trying to do what I thought I'd done before before failing and submitting a support ticket. The result, a few minutes later: Sam has (as he did before) upgraded the server with Rubygems 1.2.0 and Rails 2.1.0.

Brilliant.

BPWEB hosting (recommended)

PS. Spoke a little too soon. Issues with other Rails apps on the same server have arisen, although BPWEB are working hard right now to fix them.

PPS. Pete, if you are reading... sorry, we were responsible (indirectly) for impatex.com being broken today. Not really our fault, but it was our request that broke things. Oops.

Be honest now...

... who had heard of Rebecca Adlington before? Come on, hands up. Not many I'll wager.

Two GOLD medals. One World Record. In Swimming? She's British, right? Wow. The first time in 100 years that a British swimmer has won two golds in an Olympics. The first time in nearly 50 years that a British woman has won a swimming gold at all.

Let's face it, nobody saw this coming, did they?. We knew we would do well in the Rowing, Sailing and the Cycling, but the Swimming?

I was going to try and write a nice article, but there's little point when this article from Claire Stocks at the BBC is so perfect.

These Games have been amazing. We've even got a medal in the Gymnastics (from a man)! Whatever next? Maybe the England football team can learn a thing or two about competing - no, forget that, forget the football, we won't be winning a World Cup anytime soon.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/olympics/2008/08/from_miss_nobody_to_greatest_b.html

Well done Becky, you should be getting enough recognition and money from now on to buy all the shoes you ever desire.

Bolt like a bat out of hell

9.69 seconds. That's, nine point six nine seconds! With no tailwind. That was awesome!

Usain Bolt - so damned good that he only has to run for 90 metres

This is the Olympics, competing against the best athletes in the world and 10 metres before the finish line, Bolt is slowing, looking around with his arms stretched wide in celebration. Now, that is what I call class!

"It’s been recorded that he takes only 41 steps to run 100m. Try it. Go outside and try running 41 steps flat out and see how far you get. Some of us won't make it past the letter box."

- Paul Lewis, The New Zealand Herald

Just think, maybe he'll decide to run for the full 100m next time. How quick can he go? A low 9.6, anyone? A high 9.5?

He'd just better be clean. The signs look good. As far as I am aware he has been tested several times before and during the Olympics, and I assume that a World Record beater is now tested after the event as a matter of fact? That may be no guarantee, but I hope he is just as he seems - a freak of nature and a man who is, quite simply, taking the piss out of the opposition.

I have read a couple of reports having a dig at Bolt for his actions, but they deserve no recognition. When you're that far in front, with that much in hand, you have every right to have some fun!

The 200 metres beckon and Michael Johnson's World Record of 19.32 has got to be under serious threat. Of course that assumes Bolt doesn't decide to slow down after 150m and start waving to the crowd.

Or, perhaps Bolt could take a quick break mid-race and pop-in to McDonalds for some of his favoured Chicken Nuggets? There has to be some big sponsorship coming his way from the Big Ron, surely it's too good an opportunity for the food-chain giant to miss... "Usain Bolt, fastest man in the world. Powered by McDonalds." Then again, maybe he could run in a Ronald McDonald clown suit?

I think he can do a mid/high 19.2. We'll find out on Wednesday.

PS. I lost my money on Asafa Powell because the odds on Bolt were so ridiculously short. Wonder why that was?

iChoose #17

iChoose is currently the 17th most popular free app in the iTunes App Store (UK).

An update will be released shortly that will add a few new features and settings, to allow you to control certain aspects of iChoose - such as whether you want animations or not, and and what speed they run. Look out for the iChoose version 1.2 update real soon.