One Finite Planet

One Finite Planet

Opinion and Review: The Samsung Note Edge.

Date Published:

I moved from a Samsung Note 3, to a Samsung Note Edge (note 4 variant). The move was not because I chose to make the move, but because I received the note edge as a gift. A key advocate of my receiving the note edge as a gift was set to inherit the Note 3 as their phone 🙂

All this means is that I am not really invested in the decision to move to the Note Edge, as it was not my decision. So I can present a more detached review.  From one generation of device to the next there usually seems insufficiencet incentive for me to update and with most electronics I tend to wait more than one generation to update. At least moving to the Note Edge rather than the Note 4 means I will more clearly see the difference from the previous Note 3.

The secondary display.

Starting from around the Samsung S4, Samsung arrived at the concept of having a secondary display with their phones. The idea is somewhat similar to deciding that for simply checking the time and many of the uses of a phone, particularly the more traditional uses phone usage, a simpler smaller display like that of older phones is actually ideal. Then for browsing, photos, games, detailed contact information, social networking and other ‘tablet like usage’, the bigger and more detailed the display the better. So a larger ‘primary’ display for more detailed work and simpler smaller ‘secondary’ display for sporadic quick interaction. The first implementations came by way of a window in a display case framing a small area of the main display. In that implementation, when the case is closed, the smaller secondary display is still available and when the case is opened, the larger primary display is revealed. With the note edge, for the first time, both primary and secondary display are available simultaneously. Now this is a breakthrough, but the software simply does not make all the usage of this that is possible. Examples of usage include the camera where the controls for the camera are on the secondary display and the viewfinder is the main display. But some of the best uses can be when the device is actually being used for two tasks which can each have their own display. Like using the main display while the secondary display is controlling music. Or where the secondary display manages an incoming phone call avoiding interrupting the primary display.

The Unique feature, simultaneous secondary display.

The secondary display, which I first experienced with the Note 3 through the ‘S-View’ cover, is certainly a useful feature. You can even buy ‘s-view’ covers now for iPhones as well a quite a range of Samsung phones. Samsung has also developed an LED wallet cover for the regular Note 4. Both the LED cover and the Edge avoid the trap of S-View wallet covers which require a window in the wallet cover. The window prevents using the wallet to hold cards! This means the Edge is not the only phone where you can have the secondary display and have a wallet that holds cards, but the LED cover is a very limited display and the user cannot touch and interact with this display. The Note edge IS the only device so far where both displays are available at once.

If there is any interest I will post a part 2 to this review covering more on the Note Edge.

Table of Contents

Categories

RCS – The SMS successor and blue bubbles vs green culture war.

The world and usage of SMS has moved on since the introduction in 1992, and the system lacks many features now seen as essential including, even the ability to see if a message has been received.

Apple has its own proprietary “iMessage” SMS/MMS successor for communication between iPhones within the Apple walled garden and the bubble wars, Facebook has its own messages system and has “What’s App”, but is there room for a true SMS successor that is not a walled garden fully controlled by one technology company to create division into “tribes”, and instead is able to connect all devices just like the original SMS system?

RCS is simple to enable and is the best messaging solution for Samsung and other Android phones and to end culture wars and walled gardens.

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A different perspective: Humans maybe the greatest threat to life on Earth but also the only hope.

The title ‘one finite planet’ can be mistaken to be yet another proclamation of how we live on this amazing planet which could even be unique, and we humans are foolishly placing it all at risk. Boring.

No. Instead, the perspective is we are living on a planet that is naturally hostile to humans, where nature dictates only a limited total amount of life, can only exist for a limited time, and that time is almost at an end. When seen from this perspective, even the environment mission changes from just not interfering, to the more complex task of tackling the challenge of overcoming nature, while yes, quite importantly, not bringing life to an early end in the process.

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Surprise, Shortest day ever recorded: Not just the solstice, but climate change?

This page is more under the heading of ‘fun facts’.

The first ‘fun fact’ is that while everyone knows how the length of daytime and nigh time vary throughout the year, it may come as a surprise to realise the length of the entire day, also varies. Partly because, second fun fact, the a day is a longer than one rotation of the Earth, which lead to the third fun fact: we just had the shortest total day ever recorded.

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WordPress.com to the Next Level: Plugins, Elementor, CoBlocks?

Something completely different. A discussion on how this site is hosted: on wordpress.com.

Anyone who has started a “blog” or other site on wordpress.com, may get to wonder, what are the options for upgrading the website? What is the value of the free, personal or premium plans and beyond? What real world benefits are there, and, alternatively, what would you lose and/or gain from moving away from wordpress.com. This is a page discussing being in that situation. If you are not considering having a website, it may be of little interest.

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Images, Making Animated GIFs & Solving colour problems.

This is part of series of pages I will be adding on things I have learnt as part of building this website, and I will soon try and enable following by topic (when I get this page working), so people can separately select notification on building websites and/or population or other issues, without being notified of things outside their interest. Standby for that update.

Meanwhile this page provides general help on making an animated GIF for a series of images, specific help on a challenge with animated GIFs, and a list of sites with free images as a resource for those building images.

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Hydrogen Future of Fool’s Gold & Scams: “Where does the hydrogen come from?”

The race to stop CO2, has led to many ‘scams’ projects involving hydrogen, but it is not always clear who is being scammed: the public, or the proponents of hydrogen projects. What is the attraction behind the obsession with hydrogen? This is a look at the motives, the myths and the facts around hydrogen projects.

Spoiler: There are some valid roles for hydrogen, but hydrogen has no remaining role as an energy source, and even any potential role as an energy carrier is highly questionable.

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