Getting Tech to Do What You Want

Getting Tech to Do What You Want

We repeatedly get great hardware these days. It can do all sorts of useful things. But the associated software is awful. I have complained about most these issues before, but it's interesting to collect them.

For phone issues, I can only address Android. And I can't say anything about Android Auto - it was too unreliable when I tried it.

First a hardware issue. On laptop computers, why can't I get a touchpad on the right side (or left). Why does the horrible compromise of in the middle completely dominate the market?

Back to software.

Time Zone

When I'm traveling, I need my clock to show me what time zone I'm in. I don't know the time if I don't know the time zone. But do phone clocks display the time zone? No. My solution - Ravitz Software Clock Widget. This is my software, free, for Android only.

No solution for iPhone based on my limited experience with an iPhone 12.

Linux desktop - just format the time display to include the time zone.

Poor Control of USB Music

I like to use a USB drive in my car to play music. I can fit a huge library of music on one drive with no need to deal with radio, satellite radio, disks. The user interface is typically awful since they are pushing satellite radio and car touch screens are difficult to use, but I can live with that. But. When I want the songs played in random order - select "Random". But that selects the next song by selecting at random from the songs on the list. That is not the same as playing the songs in random order. By the the time you are halfway through the list, there is a 50% chance that the next song will have already been played.

The software people could select at random from the songs that have not yet been played. Or there is a simple algorithm to randomly order the list. But the programmers have never used the software so they don't know that there is an issue (speculation). And anyone higher in the chain of command at the manufacturer is selling cars, not software, and knows that the music software cannot rise to the level of preventing you from buying the car. The solution is a long and winding road. Here goes.

Set up your phone to automatically connect to the car. A USB cable connects music and power, but this is a pain. A Bluetooth music connection and cordless charger/phone mount is better. Now you can play music from your phone (and take phone calls) via the car sound system.

But what if you are using Maps on your phone. Now the navigation instructions come through your car sound system, at a MUCH higher volume than the music (in my car). Maps has an option to not send its voice through Bluetooth. But it often doesn't implement this immediately after starting a route. So the first instruction is played very loudly through the car sound system. But Android has the ability to let the sound output of one app go to a specific output device. Look for "separate app sound". Set up Maps to output to the phone (instead of Bluetooth). Now music goes to the car sound system, Maps always goes to the phone speaker. But Maps doesn't silence phone music while talking. So, set up Maps to not talk via Bluetooth AND set up Maps to always output to the phone. Now Maps interrupts the music, so no conflict. It works pretty well.

Phone Gestures

I dislike phone gestures. They are invisible so you must work to find the gesture to function association. And they wear on my fingertips, making my fingertips annoyingly touch sensitive. Fortunately Google kept the navigation bar as an option when they switched to gesture navigation. Settings - Display - Navigation bar.

Many apps let you turn off gestures. But it can take some effort to set up.

Digital Assistants

I hate digital assistants (starting with Microsoft's Clippy). By not configuring the Android assistant or Bixby (Samsung), I thought I had suppressed it, until the home button popped it up. Search the Android settings for device assistance app, digital assistant app, or try Settings - Apps - Default apps - Digital assistant app and set it to none.

Names

When I'm looking in a list of names, I want distinctive names - that would be last names. And I often need to look for myself - my name, not "me". Android FairEmail gets this right. Desktop Gmail does not and has no configuration to fix it. I haven't used Android Gmail in a long time and don't remember its usage.

Always On Screen

On my Samsung S23 the always on screen is too dim in low light. There is an adjustment, but that removes the automatic aspect of it and it still doesn't get bright enough. This appears to be a case of save the battery at the expense of useful function. Why not let me make that choice?

And the next alarm is not displayed. When using the phone as an alarm clock, the next alarm is important.

Both of these issues were handled well on my Pixel 4A. Samsung was a leader in always on displays. Now they are way behind.

Phone Call Volume

Sometimes the phone is too loud. On every mobile phone that I have owned. You can adjust the volume, but not low enough. Why is this a hard thing to handle?

Mice

Mice have been around for decades. I often want to move the mouse only horizontally or vertically. Why is there no software that recognizes motion in only one direction. I often want to move the mouse a very small distance, but the scaling factor that controls mouse ticks to cursor motion can't be easily changed. Why not?

This could be done in the operating system software. Dedicate two buttons for horizontal and vertical control. The buttons would rotate the scale between 0, 1, 1/10 times the nominal scaling factor.

A Good Use for Artificial Intelligence

Why not use AI for automatic expansion of acronyms. Imagine how much time it would save, when reading a news article, to not have to look up and scan a hundred possible expansions of an acronym to find the one that the article is referring to.

Meanwhile

A headline from Android Police - "Android is changing its brand identity once again". They are capitalizing the A and changing the font. Are they taking a cue from politics? Distract people from the problems that they do not address. But it would be so easy to fix most of these issues. I don't understand.