Bouncing Between Various Quanta of Activity

August 20, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

It has been an amazingly hectic week. And today has epitomized the chaos that I’ve felt. This week has seen a lot:

We got back from vacation (which was really just a long weekend). But we have been struggling to re-integrate into our normal routines.
The man who enticed me to leave my previous job has left our company. I am quite disappointed. But God has already quieted my heart. And He is teaching me how I can transform a disappointment into a blessing – and a ministry.
I’ve decided to step back into the management pool. So I’ve submitted my name for consideration by the company’s leadership team. I have been heart warmed to learn that my application was not summarily dismissed! 😉
Our dishwasher decided to develop a weak bladder: when we turned it on, it leaked everywhere. At eight years, it was time to buy a new unit. So we went and bought an updated dishwasher (Bosch) with a stainless steel finish. Our black appliances are starting to look a little dated.
After getting a new dishwasher, we also realized that it was time to update the refrigerator. While we liked the looks of a matching Bosch unit, we decided upon a Samsung stainless steel unit because it had better reviews on Consumer Reports. It also had some features that my wife really wanted. So Samsung got the nod.
We cleaned out the garage to get things ready for appliance delivery. Actually, we’ve re-arranged some stuff while sorting some other stuff into the trash. We now have room for the old refrigerator in the garage. I am voting for a beer and wine fridge; Cindy is considering my suggestion!

With these things as a back drop, today has been chaotic and wonderful.

We’ve worked to get the old fridge ready for replacement. We still have to move the final stuff into coolers. But we will be ready for the arrival of the new refrigerator.
I’ve updated my resume so that I can get it submitted to the leadership team. I’m really hoping that they have the same opinion of my capabilities that I have.
We’ve gotten all the dishes done. Normally, this is simple. But it’s been years since I washed a lot of dishes by hand. We did mostof them earlier in the week. But we now have to keep up with them throughout the day.
My son left a boatload of laundry for us to do for him. Apparently, he’s been stacking the clothes in his room waiting for someone to do them. Gosh, are all nineteen-year old men this naive? And are all middle-aged parents this accommodating?
After many hours of sorting and shuffling leftover laundry, we’ve finally gotten around to doing the week’s laundry. Phew. I never thought I’d make it to this point today!

With a lot of tasks finally moving through the pipeline, I’ve finally gotten a chance to address a couple of tech challenges.

I’ve copied all of the photos from Meredith’s wedding onto our media server.
I’ve updated Cindy’s phone so that she can access the media server from where she travels. The latest firmware build for the storage server is quite good. Western Digital provides a redirect service so that I can get to my photos (and music and movies) from the public Internet. This is very cool. But it reminds me that security is an everyday consideration these days.
I’ve updated my router firmware to enable uPNP sharing. This will certainly help our mobile experience. But I am a little leery about this change. I’ll have to research a little more to see if I’ve opened myself up to exploitation.
I’ve flashed my phone with the latest CyanogenMod firmware.

I think I’m finally able to breathe a little sigh of relief – but not for long. Once the refrigerator is delivered, Cindy and I will have a lot of work to do. But now that most of the prep work is done, this part should be fun. But I do think that pizza will be in order!

-Roo

I've Upped the Ante – My Increasing Android Investment

August 6, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

Android has been my smartphone OS for almost a year. And it has served me quite well. But it has its limitations on a smartphone. The limitations are many. And some of them are even noteworthy. But my biggest challenge with my smartphone is that it is a wholly inadequate platform for writing notes and blogging.

Why is that? That’s easy. Since voice recognition and voice transcription are still in their infancy, it is very hard to work with text documentation. First, the soft keyboard is difficult – especially for someone with big hands. And even with my Droid 2, the keyboard is just not suited for touch typing. So while I can surf the web and I can take photos, I can’t use a smartphone to really spend any time blogging and/or recording my thoughts. But that is not a fault with Android. It is just an example of needing the right tool for the job. Yes, I stumbled my way through some updates. But it was always cumbersome.

But that changed this afternoon. As a part of my fiftieth birthday celebration, I am now the proud owner of an Android tablet. My wife and I picked up a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 today. And I really love the device – and the Honeycomb platform. The list of my likes is rather large. And even though I am tremendously happy thus far, there are a few things that are quite annoying about the platform.

Nevertheless, I think I may wait on posting a full review of the platform. After all, an entirely new computing domain should warrant a few days use before I pontificate on the subject. For now, I’ll settle for an overview. One sentence summary: the Android tablet environment fills a needed gap in my computing spectrum.

Where is that gap? It’s the space where I need media and mobility. It’s where I still need some real computing – but I can’t carry a big laptop. It is a place where I can stuff tablet and keyboard into a back pack or a bike pannier – and still be confident that I can do a complete job. Bottom line: This is my new mobility space.

And I want that space to be open – not constrained. I want to connect to wireless networks with ease. And I want to use the device to access my other devices while I am away from them. And I want to install the things that I want to install – not just what someone else thinks that I need. I don’t want someone else’s handcuffs. And if I am handcuffed, I’ll pick the lock to free my hands.

Innovation is about taking existing pieces and building a whole new thing. So my new tablet is the melding of technologies that I have used before into a package that is compelling. At the same time, I want to have access to the computer. Think of it this way. I want a car. But I hate the fact that some dealer has me over a barrel because he has the only computer that can read the sensors and program the electronics. Some folks may be satisfied with that situation. I am not. Consequently, I have an Android tablet.

-Roo

I’ve Upped the Ante – My Increasing Android Investment

August 6, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

-Roo

Welcome Back My Friends…

July 30, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

…to the show that never ends.
Last weekend was exciting – and frustrating. Seven days ago, I decided that I needed to switch to a different ROM on my phone. I loved Liberty GB. But about a month ago, it lost all of its momentum. Daily builds had dried up. And there was no sustainable roadmap for future development.
But the CyanogenMod distribution was thriving. Nightly builds were flourishing. And this ROM was even pushing boundaries by adopting cutting edge features from many sources – including the carriers. CM7 was headed towards Android 2.3.5 (which was delivered this past week). And CM& has included the T-Mobile Theme Chooser. This mod was smoking.
So last weekend, I took the plunge…
…and landed in a dry lake bed.
I really didn’t want to wipe my phone to bare metal. I had read quite a bit that seemed to indicate that I would need to wipe the cache, data and even system files on my phone. Since I had never wiped the system files and used SBF to rebuild my base system, I was nervous. Then I read a whole lot of posts that said that if I was on a Gingerbread build (of Liberty), I could just wipe cache and data and then install. So that’s what I did. And that’s when I landed in the dry lake bed.
The result of this approach was a fully bricked phone. In fact, I’ve never torched a system quite as successfully as I had torched my phone. There was absolutely nothing left on my phone. So I had to learn about SBF and then do it for myself. Fortunately, the process is simple. All you have to do is get the right software on your desktop, connect your phone via USB and then use the bootloader to re-deploy the basic image (that originally came from your carrier).
Once I flashed the phone, I was tempted to just stay put. That temptation lasted thirty minutes before I flashed the base CyanogenMod system.
And what a wonderful change this has been.
I love this ROM. It is fast. It is stable. Most importantly, it is actively developed. In the past seven days, I’ve loaded six nightly builds. The only reason that there weren’t seven nightlies is because one of the nightlies included a whole new Android build (i.e., 2.3.5). So there was no new build on July 26. I guess it took an extra day to put together such a big change.
It is even more exciting to see that CM7 is the productof a lot of code branches assembled together. I am so impressed with the T-Mobile theme chooser.

Is it the best such tool? Probably not. But it was developed within a massive company. Nevertheless, it was released as open source. So the CM folks pulled it into their ROM distribution. This is one of the greatest things about open source development. You are able to pick and choose the things you want to assemble together. I suspect that this theme chooser will now find its way into almost every Android distribution.
Vive le difference.
-Roo

Using Android to Remotely Control Media Playback

July 26, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

It’s interesting to see how mobile devices can be used for the oddest little tasks. My Android phone can do a lot. It can run all sorts of network apps. And the latest app I’ve picked up is a remote control tool for the VideoLAN VLC media player.
When you think about it, there isn’t a lot of “never been done before” tools in this kind of application. But the folks at VideoLAN have really assembled an innovative package.
An http server is installed on the machine that you want to control. The server accepts incoming web connections and processes these requests as control strings to manage the operation of a VLC media player on the target computer. The server provides content listing and content playback controls via http packets.
A TCP/IP control program on your phone communicates with the web server on your computer. The mobile control program has a nice little GUI that displays the content and allows you to manage the server.

The PC-based server can either send the content to a display attached to your system or the server can stream the ontent to your phone. And I was incredibly surprised at the picture quality when it was streamed to the phone. I wish I could share a picture with you, but ShootMe didn’t get any good screen captures of the Android-based VLC player. I’ll have to try and get these at a later time. But trust me when I say that the streaming quality is good.
So what did this experiment prove?
First, the open nature of the platform breeds this kind of innovative tinkering. People can fiddle and tweak things as much as they like. And you don’t have to go through the app police to get a permit in order to test, to distribute and to operate apps.
Second, the size of the Android developer community is huge. The sheer enormity of the developer base is leading to some very cool innovations.
Finally, it’s great to have lots of choices. But it can get crowded in any given application category. There needs to be a good method for recommendations and curation. The Amazon philosophy of 4/5 star customer ratings is an excellent way to weed through enormous piles of similarly featured tools.
Is this tool cool? It most certainly is cool. Is it an essential tool for home media center management? It most assuredly is not essential. But sometimes cool is enough – at least for tonight.

-Roo

Naming Your Phone Ain’t Easy

July 16, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

This week has been hectic at work and hectic at home. When there weren’t too many things to be done, there were hugely important little things that needed to be addressed.

This ain’t either one of those! 🙂

Like a lot of other geeks and music freaks, I’ve been fiddling with Spotify. I’ll post a full review of Spotify sometime this weekend – along with a more complete review of Google+. But I saw some things when I installed Spotify that made me address a long-standing challenge I have with Android. Specifically, Spotify allows you to sync your music to your mobile devices based upon the host names that your mobile devices present to your WiFi infrastructure. But Android doesn’t provide useful names for your phone.

In fact, the name that most Android phones provide is positively hideous. It usually takes the form of Android + <hexadecimal character string>. And when you have three or more Android phones connecting to your WiFi router, this kind of naming is impossible to manage. Like most folks, I prefer seeing a name that is customer-selected.

So I began the great Google quest. I found out where the odd name comes from. I also found a means of changing that name via a command shell and rot privileges. I even found an app that will change the name – but it is only effective until the next reboot of the phone. Finally, I realized that I could change the name on my home network by updating the DHCP tables on the router itself.

So I can affect the change that I desire (see above). But it sure would be nice if Google (and the Android community) would update the core OS to allow for customer-selected host names. That way, the platform will be even more manageable for the average user.

-Roo

Naming Your Phone Ain't Easy

July 16, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

This week has been hectic at work and hectic at home. When there weren’t too many things to be done, there were hugely important little things that needed to be addressed.
This ain’t either one of those! 🙂
Like a lot of other geeks and music freaks, I’ve been fiddling with Spotify. I’ll post a full review of Spotify sometime this weekend – along with a more complete review of Google+. But I saw some things when I installed Spotify that made me address a long-standing challenge I have with Android. Specifically, Spotify allows you to sync your music to your mobile devices based upon the host names that your mobile devices present to your WiFi infrastructure. But Android doesn’t provide useful names for your phone.
In fact, the name that most Android phones provide is positively hideous. It usually takes the form of Android + <hexadecimal character string>. And when you have three or more Android phones connecting to your WiFi router, this kind of naming is impossible to manage. Like most folks, I prefer seeing a name that is customer-selected.
So I began the great Google quest. I found out where the odd name comes from. I also found a means of changing that name via a command shell and rot privileges. I even found an app that will change the name – but it is only effective until the next reboot of the phone. Finally, I realized that I could change the name on my home network by updating the DHCP tables on the router itself.
So I can affect the change that I desire (see above). But it sure would be nice if Google (and the Android community) would update the core OS to allow for customer-selected host names. That way, the platform will be even more manageable for the average user.

-Roo

Making Your Phone YOUR Phone

June 19, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

After waiting a very long time for Verizon to release a Gingerbread ROM for my Droid 2 phone, I started hearing that this might not happen until the third or fourth quarter of the year – if ever. I appreciate Verizon’s position. They want to ensure that their new Android devices (with Gingerbread or Honeycomb) have the best features. And if previously existing phones get updates, then there is less “incentive” for customers to upgrade to the “new” phones.
I understand the sentiment inherent in Verizon’s approach (and their public statements). But as a tech savvy customer, I really despise being treated like a rebel. I bought an Android phone so that I could customize my own wireless experience. I bought an Android phone to have access to the broadest range of applications. I didn’t buy this phone to ensure the hegemony of Verizon.
Consequently, I chose to root my phone. Then I chose to upgrade my phone to a custom ROM (i.e., Liberty). And I was supremely excited when Google released Gingerbread (and the SDK) late last year. But I have waited to take the plunge and install a Gingerbread-based ROM. First, Gingerbread ROMs were very immature. Second, I really wanted to have a ROM based upon the vendor builds. A few months ago, I got excited that there was a leak of Verizon’s D2 Gingerbread build. But that leak has not been followed by a general release. So I waited.
Since the leak earlier this year, there has been a lot of growth. There are numerous Gingerbread builds for the D2. And the folks on the Liberty team have been working on their new build. As of this week, Liberty Gingerbread (a.k.a., LGB) is now at v0.8. With this latest release, stability has increased. And performance is always improving.
So after a lot of hesitancy (and a wedding or two), I’ve finally decided to tae the plunge. I am now running on LGB v0.8. So what did it take to get from Liberty 2.0.1 to the latest build? Here was what I did:

As a first step, I needed to deploy a Gingerbread build so that I could be on the new Linux kernel. I followed the recommendation found here and grabbed the ‘monster leak’ file. With a great deal of hesitancy, I flashed the revised kernel (wiping the system and cache) – and crossed my fingers. The result was a very vanilla build. But I was now on the right kernel.
Once I had the right base, I then re-downloaded the ‘donate’ version of the Liberty Toolbox. From within this tool, I was able to download and flash the new bits for Liberty 0.8.
My first thoughts about the new build were “wow” and “this thing sucks major power.” So I decided to get to work. The first order of business was to get all of my apps installed onto the new system. I could have used Titanium Backup. It is an awesome tool. But I chose to see how the base Android Market app would do on a Gingerbread ROM. For the most part, I was satisfied that my apps were recovered. But a few key apps didn’t get restored. I’m still researching why this was the case. But I now have all of my apps restored.
On Liberty 2.0.1, I used Advanced Task Killer to keep my system clean. But since I am now on a new kernel, I want to ensure that I test the base memory management capabilities of Gingerbread. Therefore, I uninstalled ATK. It may find it’s way back onto the phone at some point. But for now, I’m living with the base OS task management.
Since I was already seeing some battery issues, I decided that I would enable Juice Defender. I had purchased Juice Defender Ultimate. But was disappointed to learn that the Ultimate version didn’t work on Gingerbread. But the basic program did work fine. So I now have a good battery management tool that is helping to deal with battery management.
The overall look and feel of the new LGB ROM is great. But if I was going to rock a new ROM, I really wanted to make it look fantastic. So I downloaded a new theme (GingerComb Juiced). I also paid for the Beautiful Widgets pack. I really love the widgets in this package. So I now have a “killer look” to my fresh new system.
I rounded out the effort by switching to LauncherPro Plus. The New Liberty Launcher is good. But I have grown so accustomed to LauncherPro that I decided to replace the default launcher.

So what is the result of all of these changes? First, my phone looks great.

Second, my phone appears to be operating well with reasonable task, memory and battery management. But time will tell on this front. Finally, I have stuck my finger in Lord Farquaad’s eye (i.e., Verizon). This phone is mine. Yes, I respect Verizon’s right to deny me support. But they can never take my freedom!
-Roo

Platform Pivot Possibilities

June 11, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

Anyone who has read my musings before already knows that I have loved technology for a very long time. You are also aware that I’ve used many different forms and flavors of technology. The list of operating systems is quite long. On the server side, I’ve used: Univac Exec 8, IBM MVS, IBM VM/ESA, IBM MVS/ESA, IBM z/OS, SunOS, Solaris, Irix, DG-UX, HP-UX, IBM AIX, Windows NT, Win2K(x), Linux and a host of other platforms. On the desktop, I’ve used: CPM, UCSD Pascal, HDOS, MS-DOS, PC-DOS, Windows (many flavors), MacOS (many flavors), Xenix, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, Linux (many flavors) and a plethora of experimental OSes.
As you look at this list, you have to be thinking a few things:

Roo is really old,
Roo is fickle,
Roo has been through a lot of tech transitions, and
Roo is really, really old

So why would I recite this list? Am I building a new resume? [No, I’m not.] Am I a preening, arrogant technology elitist? [Yes, I am. But that’s not the reason I recorded the list.] I wrote the list because I’m becoming convinced that it is time for yet another technology pivot.
There are some big trends that are becoming absolutely obvious:

Computing technology is for everyone. So it must necessarily be simple and bullet-proof. Over the past three years, I have deployed more “appliance” devices at home than I have deployed computers. Yes the appliances are computers. But for the average consumer, they are plug and play functionality. This includes: set top boxes, wireless routers, wireless extenders, wireless printers, wireless cameras, wireless phones, wireless monitoring systems, etc.
Everything is becoming mobile. Computers are getting smaller. They are embedded in everything (including my heart). And they are increasingly becoming disconnected from fixed structures (like an office or a home).
We are finally starting to see new user interfaces. Just as the keyboard was displaced by the mouse, the mouse is now being displaced by human touch. Haven’t we had pen computing for almost a decade? Yes, we have. But the iPhone made touch computing ubiquitous. More importantly, touch is not the only new user interface. Speech recognition is becoming ubiquitous as well. I can now talk to my phone and place calls (or write emails). I can now talk to my car (or its GPS) and get driving directions. With speech and touch replacing the hands and fingers that were tethered to a swivel chair, we are accelerating the move towards mobility.
Retail purchasing and provisioning are finally reducing the need to go to the store. It is very possible to sit in your chair at home and order anything for delivery right to your door. I won’t go into the moral impacts of promoting such sedentary lives. But I do think that this change is transforming the way that we live – and the computer systems that we utilize.

These trends (and a few other minor trends) are allowing new competitors to jump into prominent positions. And these changes are putting strains on older competitors.
The big boys do see these trends. Microsoft recognizes these changes. And I think that they are trying to compete in these spaces. But their corporate identity (based on sales pros getting commissions) is becoming outdated. Their corporate ethos allowed them to miss the entire music resurgence that Apple inspired. Sure, Microsoft is now in that business. But not before Apple seized the entire market. The Zune is cool. And the Zune market is feature-complete. But the battle was lost because Microsoft was trying to protect their existing channel model.
The Microsoft phone strategy has been equally anemic. They did indeed recognize the mobility trend. But Windows Mobile was incomplete and clunky. Can WP7 and its successors thrive? Uh, using the number ‘7’ in your name won’t repeat the Windows 7 success. Did Microsoft have a chance? Yes. Can they seize market from both Google and Apple? Sure, but they are taking table scraps from their competitors. And their corporate heritage is holding them back. Android has succeeded because it is repeating Microsoft’s PC success: Google has built an open platform.
Microsoft isn’t the only company at a crossroads. Apple is also at a crossroads. Their model of retail purchase via iTunes and delivery to a desktop device is now under assault. The iTunes infrastructure has always used the desktop as the hub of your music experience. But staying with that model would be like staying with high-end audio equipment. Sure, some audiophiles still have a stylus and all of their other component gear. But component audio was replaced by compact discs and then by PC audio.
The new model is to buy the rights to the music and to store the music remotely. This allows you to access your content anytime and anywhere. You don’t have to be at your desktop. You don’t have to stream from that same desktop. And you don’t have to sync with that desktop. You store your licensed content in the “cloud” and then stream it to wherever you want to play it. For me, this meant that I could stream some cool music to Meredith’s outdoor wedding site while we decorated that site. It also means that I can have my entire library available while I’m at work or in the car or on my bike.
And as of this morning, I’ve now switched all of my podcast content from my desktop (and iTunes) to my mobile device. I’m playing with both Doggcatcher and Google Listen. I haven’t chosen my final podcast catcher, but the choice to push content to my mobile device is now made.
That’s a horribly long setup to the real point of this article: I have finally broken the musical cord that tied me to my desktop computer. And last year, I severed the cord related to web content browsing. For me, this mobility push has been thanks to Google and Android. For others, they are thanking Apple and iOS. But the trend is obvious: cloud-based music is yet another desktop tether that can be severed. And with cloud-based services like file storage (via Google Docs, or Dropbox or any number of other tools), I can snip yet another tether.
Think of a bundle of helium-filled balloons. I’m slowly snipping the strings that hold them down. And I think I may soon be cutting the last of the ties that hold me to my desktop computer. Once I can effectively type on a mobile device, I may be able to come out of the cave where my desktop computer is connected.
The final straw will be whenever I purchase a tablet. And when that happens, I will be free of both Microsoft and Apple. I may end up being dependent upon new vendors (like Google or Amazon). But it is just about time to change things up in my computing ecosystem. I can’t wait for yet another technology transition.
-Roo

Which One Will I Choose?

May 30, 2011August 22, 2018 Lorin Olsen

Over the past several weeks, I’ve spent time and money on assessing a variety of streaming audio solutions. My assessment has considered many factors. But chief among those factors was the mobile experience. When I was at home, I used iTunes. It’s not that iTunes is necessarily the best. Indeed, I’ve used dozens of tools at home. As a general rule, I have always favored things that also provide for metadata management (e.g., MediaMonkey). But iTunes has always been the “gold standard” for both “look and feel” as well as for application compatibility. Everyone is “compatible” with iTunes because it IS the de facto market leader.
But that market may be shifting – at least for me. Over the past few weeks, I’ve assessed two different audio streaming tools: Amazon Cloud Player and Google Music. Both have their pros and cons. Google has much more storage available that is (currently) free of charge. Amazon has a pre-exisiting (and built-in) retail channel that allows for easy (and impulsive) music purchasing. Both have good web clients. And both have good Android clients.
But both suffer from one key problem: I can’t capture and record my listening data on Last.fm. Yes, I can scrobble data from the web client (if I use third-party scripts to do the job). But neither product has any native capability to scrobble from an Android device. There are music players that do scrobble from Android. If you use the Android Music player, you can use tools like ScrobbleDroid. And if you are a fan of Winamp, you can scrobble through the Last.fm Android app. But neither of these players can stream audio from my library. So I was stuck in a quandary. Should I store music on my phone and utilize a player that scrobbles? Or should I use a cloud-based music player and forego the ability to scrobble my music?
The only solution was to either code up my own solution – or use something that already does both. Since I still have another wedding in five weeks,I chose the latter approach. Based upon some searches in Google and Twitter, I decided that I would try out the Audiogalaxy product. Based upon its marketing, the product provides streaming audio (from your home and through their servers) and the product scrobbles via the Last.fm Android app. So I began yet another quest in search of a mythical chalice.
Audiogalaxy is relatively simple to install. The site provides the step-by-step instructions that will get you going. But the basic process is as follows:

Create a free account on the Audiogalaxy site.
Download and install the Audiogalaxy “helper” application.
Point the “helper” application at your music files.
Wait for the helper application to collect metadata and send it to the Audiogalaxy service.
Install the Android app on your phone.
Start listening to your music.

The process is relatively straightforward. And I had no technical issues with the setup. I can now listen to my music library from my phone. And as I listen, my listening habits are recorded at Last.fm.

Unfortunately, Audiogalaxy has the same privacy issues that are present in Amazon’s service and also present in Google’s service: all of your music is streamed through a third-party service. So the architecture of all of these products is an architecture of control, not anonymity.
As I’ve said before, this doesn’t pose a problem for me at this time. After all, my music is positively pedestrian. But what would happen if my musical tastes were more scandalous? Or what would happen if the government decided that rock music was not to be tolerated at all? Then where would I be? I would need to rethink my listening habits. Of course, if something that draconian ever happened, then I would rethink my need to scrobble at all! And for those kinds of over-the-top situations, I might need to assemble a BOB (bug out bag)! 😉
After this exercise, I now have a streaming solution that I can utilize. And I think I know what to look for when it comes to government snooping into my private life. And there is one more option that has to be noted: Apple has not put its offering on the table yet. Maybe that offering will be announced this week. If so, I suspect that my options will grow even broader.
Finally, I really ought to point you to a vey fine comparison of all of these options. David Ruddock (and the folks at AndroidPolice) put together a great comparison of music apps on the Android platform. Check it out for a comprehensive view of all of the Android options.
-Roo