Complicated is bad, Simple is good

The nook needs a touchup

I had a particularly bad user experience with my nook eReader. Where to begin…

I like the idea of having my library digitally available with notes and highlights in a searchable format that is highly available. eReaders are not there yet, at least not the nook touch. The technology isn’t mindblowing, and the most interesting thing about the device is the display technology. I expect to be able to do a few things well.

Purchase books
Read books
Markup text with highlights and notes

I like going to a bookstore and browsing the titles. The limited space and availability of the physical shelf means the most popular books will be there. There are many books in a small space. You can pick it up and get a feel for it. Having browsed some pages and decided to make a purchase, I turn to my eReader for the purchase and to read the book. And this was my experience yesterday.

Strike 1: I was frustrated when searching for the book returned the wrong results. Similar titles and authors were returned, but not the book I was looking for. Do I need to type the full title? Did I make a mispelling? Click click click tap tap tap. Argh. A search by ISBN yields the book in question. Terriffic

Strike 2: I click the prominently displayed “Buy It” button.

Unable To Purchase

We are unable to process your order. Please verify your payment information is correct or check out Wi-Fi connectivity and try again later.

You can’t tell if the problem is with WIFI or my account information? You are the device…could you submit the request? Did you receive a response that indicated failure?

Strike 3: Oh, my credit card must be expired. Terriffic, I will update it. Tap tap tap…um, that isn’t the expiration date I entered. Tap tap tap….I know I entered it in correctly this time….what gives? Search the internet and learn that you really should use the website to update your billing information. Great, but why set me up for failure…don’t give me the option to screw up my settings.

Strike 4: Still getting the same error message. Huh, time to call tech support, proceed through the basic steps that I already tried (cycling the power, reentering billing information from the website). Next step…”Do you mind resetting your device sir?”. Um, of course I do. Won’t that reset my bookmarks? Aren’t you going to inform me of that instead getting consent from an uninformed person who of course is going to be upset when my settings are all gone and my problem hasn’t been fixed. I bought this device to use it. Its a personal digital library meant to store craploads of books and notes and highlights and bookmarks. Should we reset my device because you don’t seem to have a handle on the issue and would rather that it go away then figure out what is wrong? Should I lose my data because its a nice shortcut to try for you? What are you thinking?

Strike 5: I spend more time on the problem, purchase another book to determine that there is no billing issue, get support to remove the book and the charge, and inquire about how someone with my needs should operate a nook. How can I tell if the digital copy is available on my device? I get an answer that doesn’t fit my needs: “go to the website”. My eReader doesn’t have a web browser. I don’t want to have to whip out a 2nd piece of technology to see if I can use the first piece of technology. I figure that if there is no preview button and no download size then theres no eBook available. A simple message on the screen in place of the purchase button would do.

There are so many design issues and B&N must be aware of. Why did they let them out the door? Why havn’t they addressed them in the first update? Most of this was rookie design issues and not even bugs.

Should I invest in a digital library for this device? Would I do better to switch to a Kindle? Maybe the best thing is paper for now…

Pondering the Economic Vortex

Unbelievably, I didn’t realize that today was a day off until I rolled into the office. With the day free it gave me some time to take a look at the xkcd poster that is newly hanging on the wall.

At the dollar level it shows the relative cost of goods and services for different kinds of technology, pets, and food. There is a side-by-side comparison between average worker hourly compensation and average CEO wages.

The thousands level perspective contains bigger ticket items like cars and vacations as well as the cost of bigger personal projects such as college and raising children. Household income and investments are relevant here.

The millions turns more political. It contains campaign fundraising for individuals. it outlines the Net Worth of famous politicians, artists, and common rich folk.

The billions gets into the super rich classes of wealthy such as the Waltons and the Tech leaders like Eric Schmidt and Bill Gates, and also investors like Warren Buffet. This area is the largest and breaks down where the money is…and is aptly named the economic vortex. Corporate revenues, federal spending, household income, US GDP, huge projects, wars…its all here. Smack in the middle is the breakdown of people as income earners into classes: the bottom 50%, the Upper middle incomes, the Upper incomes, the high incomes, and the 1%. The amount of tax on each class that feeds into the federal and state budget is set apart. The effect on each classes “money pit” of hypothetical redistributions aimed at raising every family’s income to various levels of wealth…showing just how much money the most wealthy have left over.

The trillions level provides a view of countries on a global level and across time. It has the US contribution to global GDP over time. The interesting items here are the size of the derivatives market and value of resources that exist on the planet.

I do love infographics. There’s a lot to explore, plenty of information to overload my brain with.

The poster image is available here: http://xkcd.com/980/huge/

Challenge Accepted

//Given a list of numbers and a target number X, find the pairs of numbers in the list that add to yield X

//FIRST ATTEMPT: "THE LOOP"

public class Pair
 {
    int First{get;set;}
    int Second{get;set;}

    public Equals(Pair x, Pair y)
    {
        if(x.First == y.First && x.Second == y.Second || x.Second == y.Second && x.Second == y.First) return true;
        else {return false;}
    }
 }
 
 public class Calculate
 {
 
     public List<Pair> FindPairs(List<int> list, int target)
     {

         List<Pair> found = new List<Pair>();
         
         for(int i=0;i<list.Count;i++)
         {
             int current = list[i];
             for(int j=i+1;j<list.Count;j++)
             {
                 if(list[j] == list[i] - target)
                 {
                    Pair newItem = new Pair(){ First = current, Second = list[j] };
                    bool exists = false;
                    foreach(var item in found)
                    {

                        if(item.Equals(newItem))
                        {
                        exists = true;
                        }
                        }
                        if(!exists)
                        {
                            found.Add(newItem);
                        }
                    }
                 }
             }
         }
         
         return found;
     }
 }

//SECOND ATTEMPT: LOOK IN THE DICTIONARY AND TAKE THE HINT
//Inspired by: http://www.kirupa.com/forum/showthread.php?237560-Find-Two-Numbers-in-an-Array-that-Sum-to-a-Particular-Value

public class Pair
{
    int First{get;set;}
    int Second{get;set;}

    public Equals(Pair x, Pair y)
    {
    if(x.First == y.First && x.Second == y.Second || x.Second == y.Second && x.Second == y.First) return true;
    else {return false;}
    }
}

public class Calculate
{

    public List<Pair> FindPairs(List<int> list, int target)
    {
        List<Pair> found = new List<Pair>();
        Dictionary<int,int> find = new Dictionary<in,int>();

        for(int i=0;i<list.Count;i++)
        {
            if(find.Key(list[i])
            {
                Pair newItem = new Pair(){ 
                    First = list[i], 
                    Second = find.Value(list[i]) 
                };
                bool exists = false;
                foreach(item in found)
                {
                    if(item.Equals(newItem))
                    {
                        exists = true;
                    }
                }
                
                if(!exists)
                {
                    found.Add(newItem);
                }
            }
            else
            {
                find.Add(target - list[i], list[i]);
            }
        }
        
        return found;
    }
}

Broccoli Salad

Ingredients

2 heads fresh broccoli
1 red onion
1/2 pound bacon
3/4 cup raisins
3/4 cup sliced almonds
1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

Directions

Place bacon in a deep skillet and cook over medium high heat until evenly brown. Cool and crumble.
Cut the broccoli into bite-size pieces and cut the onion into thin bite-size slices. Combine with the bacon, raisins, your favorite nuts and mix well.
To prepare the dressing, mix the mayonnaise, sugar and vinegar together until smooth. Stir into the salad, let chill and serve.

Source: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/fresh-broccoli-salad/