Some of us love fanfiction. Again, some of us don’t — so if you happen to be one of those, you probably won’t find this post of any interest to you. On the other hand, if you are interested — read on.

Today, will all these fancy ebook reading devices it’s really hard to [...]]]>

Some of us love fanfiction. Again, some of us don’t — so if you happen to be one of those, you probably won’t find this post of any interest to you. On the other hand, if you are interested — read on.

Today, will all these fancy ebook reading devices it’s really hard to keep yourself sticked to your monitor and reading from the websites such as fictionpress.com, fanfiction.net and so on. I felt that it is rather annoying too, so that’s why I’ve developed a fanficdownloader — a library, which helps to download fanfiction stories from multiple websites (list includes fictionpress.com, fanfiction.net, fanfictionauthors.net and others). Well, it was cool and all that stuff, but people didn’t like it (which is by no means surprising as end-users tend to like GUI applications rather than Python libraries with a clumsy CLI interface). So I went a step further…

… and developed fanfictionloader. Shortly, this is a web service, which does two things:

1. Allows to download stories from all these different websites and convert them to industry-standard ePub or good old HTML using a very simple web interface
2. Stores these stories for you (and you only) so you can always download them later.

So, if you want to read stories, say, in Stanza (which, surprisingly, supports ePub and supports it really well), your actions are pretty simple:

1. Go to fanfictionloader and paste a URL of the first chapter of the story (only multi-chapter stories are supported at the moment). Before you get to the application, you must need to log in using your Google account (why you need it — you’ll understand later on).
2. Click “Download” (you may need to provide your login and password for the website you’re downloading from).
3. After link appears, don’t click on it but rather click on Previously downloaded fanfics link and make sure, that your story has appeared in the list. This list contains stories which were downloaded by you — and only by you.
4. Go to your Stanza iPhone app, and add a new Source (like it is described in Stanza FAQ — for example, in bookworm section) with URL fanfictionloader.appspot.com
5. Go to your newly added sources, login (again) with your Google account and click on the Previously downloaded fanfics. All your books are here. Download them.

Beauty of this approach is that you can download stories while you’re at your computer — and add them to Stanza later on, when you actually need them. Anyway, if you feel that something doesn’t work in the way it should — just ping me a mail/comment/tweet, I’ll be right here.

I found a backup of [...]]]> I’ll make a long story short today — I did a “new iPhone”-style firmware update, i.e. without restoring everything from the backup. iPhone started to work like a dream on 3.1.2. But I’ve lost few things which I didn’t want to lose — in particular, my SMS messages. 

This email has been sent to you by Griffin Technology to help facilitate testing and/or replacement of merchandise.

Generally we handle returns for our international customers a [...]]]> I can’t really comment on it – so I will just cite the text of the original email. I’ve never, ever, ever seen anything like that before.

This email has been sent to you by Griffin Technology to help facilitate testing and/or replacement of merchandise.

Generally we handle returns for our international customers a little differently than for our domestic customers. We assure you that this is our preferred method for handling your return as it will help save you money (shipping costs) and the hassle of having to send the product back to us. It also has the added benefit of helping us to ensure that your unit is truly non-functional.

First, destroy your defective product. Yes, really destroy it. A hammer works well for destroying most products however feel free to use whatever tool you are most comfortable with. This can be a great opportunity for you to express yourself creatively and take out some frustrations at the same time. Also, you may want to use eye protection and protect yourself from any flying debris that may result from this process.

Second, document the destruction. We recommend taking a digital picture of the destroyed unit while it is laying on a printed copy of this email so that the RMA number and other information are visible. Also, take a digital picture (or scan a copy) of your receipt.

Third, send us the pictures. Just reply to this email and attach the digital pictures of the destroyed product on the printed email and the receipt along with any other pictures that we might enjoy, such as you holding the destroyed product or the town where you live. Of course including the extra pictures is optional but feel free to include them if you want to.

Once we receive the email and verify the photos we will send a replacement to the address that you have provided us below. In order to ensure that we receive your email, please limit the size of the email to around 3MB. If we have not received a response from you within 30 days from the when this email was sent, your request for a replacement will automatically be removed from our system. So please respond as soon as possible.

Processing may take up to 2 weeks once the photos are received.

Thank you,

Griffin Technical Support
support@griffintechnology.com

Indeed, I’ve sent them the photographs of (thoroughly) destroyed cable and received confirmation, that the new one will be despatched soon. I don’t know, how long will it last, but the approach to returns I’ve seen from Griffin – is truly admirable!

[...]]]> In my opinion, pictures are pretty much self-explaining. To be brutally honest, software isn’t 100% ready for your average user — it took me a while before I figured, how can I install a dictionary; also, widely-advertised on RipDev’s website i2Librarian is … well, let’s say it’s even less ready than i2reader itself.

On the other hand, once you’ve set everything up — it just works as designed with no problems whatsoever. To lookup a translation just tap-and-hold the word; you can turn pages by sliding them (or tapping left and right sides of the screen, which can be customised in app’s preferences) — that’s pretty much all you need to know about i2reader.

Ah yes, and English translation sucks :) I know, these guys are Russian, but after making a brilliant software surely they could spend a little time to find someone who can make a decent translation, couldn’t they?

Independent developers who [...]]]> What if you’re away from any wifi or desk phone with a fancy “All World Unlimited” price plan (i.e. your work phone), and you still need to make that long international call urgently? Apple says there’s nothing you can do about it and you must use your provider’s international tarif.

Independent developers who don’t bother putting their app to AppStore disagree. 3G is just another source of the Internet, and if Steve, O2, AT&T & co doesn’t want youto use it the way you like – worse for them. Because tiny app Siphone (apparently, SIP + telephone) works nicely via your 3G connection, and all you need is a SIP account with some money on it (I use voipcheap.com for that backup purpose – they’re crap, but none of them is any better). This morning I had a call with my wife (who’s meeting with some of her clients in Moscow) and chatted for 15 minutes; guess how much should I pay if I use O2′s international tarif?

Anyway, Siphone is a little gem and if you have your iPhone jailbroken, you have absolutely no reasons not to install it. Do it. Now.

Roman Kirillov
http://sigizmund.com

Sent from my iPhone