No Zytrons In Range

As a sequel to “Zune - Wha!?“, Here’s another gem from the Zune team:

Error when connecting/disconnecting USB headset

Two bugs for this post:

1) I was watching a movie on Zune (MP4 format, if that matters) when I plugged in my USB headset to make a Skype call. Despite my computer’s default audio being re-routed to the USB headset, Zune continued to play over the speakers. Every other application on my computer will change its audio output to the headset except Zune, so this is extremely annoying.

Workaround: Quit Zune, restart it, then play the same movie and skip to the same point at which you plugged in the headset.

2) After doing the workaround above, I finished my Skype call and then unplugged my USB headset. Zune then stopped my movie playback with the error “To listen, connect speakers or headphones to your computer.” Two points here:
a) This error message is insultingly moronic. No shit, you need headphones or speakers to hear things? I’m so glad I have Zune to tell me these things! (Must have been written by the same guy who wrote this error message: http://blakeyrat.com/2008/05/10/zune-wha/ )
b) It also was a blatant lie; there *are* speakers hooked up to my computer. Zune was just too stupid to switch audio output to them, like every other application I’ve used ever does.

So if you plug in, or unplug, a USB headset while watching a movie on Zune, you have to restart Zune.

Can someone on the Zune team please look up the phrase “plug and play” in the dictionary? There’s no excuse for this shoddy coding in the year 2008, I think pretty much everyone is aware of the existence of USB sound devices by this point, right?

Thanks.

PS, despite my griping about bugs, I really do like the new features in the new version– now that Zune buffers MP4 files read from network disks, I have absolutely no reason left to use iTunes. And that’s nice, considering how bloated and ugly iTunes is.

Whenever I go shopping, I always encounter the item with the gloop on it. Maybe you’re reaching into a freezer shelf and get frozen ice cream gloop, or you’re grabbing a can from a shelf and get exploded sauerkraut all over your hands.

What can you do? Well, you can’t blame the store, after all they stock thousands of items every day. And you can’t blame the truck driver, it’s not like he wants the products in the back of his truck to explode and get gloop all over. Some grocery stores actually have paper towels in some aisles to wipe gloop off, but those seem to be few and far-between. But as I was grocery shopping today, I came up with the perfect solution to this problem.

Inspired by the self-cleaning public toilets Seattle has placed in their public parks, and the moisture systems supermarkets already have installed for their produce, I propose the Supermarket Shampoo. Simply install car-wash style water nozzles and powerful fans on the top and bottom of every supermarket aisle.

When 2:00 AM rolls around, the nozzles let loose, blasting every single aisle with powerful water mixed with a special Supermarket Shampoo mixture and washing the gloop off everything in sight. Once the shelves are clean, you simply turn on the fans and dry out the store so everything is sparkling clean for the next day.

Best idea ever.

This is all I ever see when I try to use Google Docs Offline while actually offline. Brilliant work there, Google. (It seems to work fine while I’m actually online, if that’s any consolation.)

An email I was recently required to send a complaint to New Line Cinema (movies@newline.com; their email address is hard to find, but that one seems most relevant) after suffering an embarrassing and annoying experience with their broken copy protection.

Hello,

I recently rented the DVD of the movie “Shoot ‘Em Up” from Blockbuster Online. I was originally planning to view this movie on my laptop, since I have a long train commute to work, but I found I wasn’t able to. The disk didn’t seem to read or work correctly in either VLC or Windows Media Player. Once I got home from work, I instead tried to view it on my Dell desktop computer, but I had the same issues as on my laptop. So I attempted to play the DVD on my Macintosh G5 computer, only to find that it wouldn’t play on that computer either.

I tried:
1) A HP laptop computer, using both VLC and Windows Media Player
2) A Dell desktop computer, using both VLC and Windows Media Player
3) A Macintosh G5 desktop computer, using both DVD Player.app and VLC
4) An Xbox 360 game console

The Xbox is the only device in my entire household that seemed able to play the DVD, and I was finally able to watch the movie using it.

The DVD is not scratched or damaged, so I can only assume that the problem is caused by some copy protection you placed on the disk. I understand the need to protect creative works from piracy and copyright infringement, and as a software developer I often face the same types of issues that a movie studio does.

However, I would never create a product that simply does not work on my client’s/user’s computer to meet this need of copy protection. This DVD is, in a word, defective. All of the above devices have the standard DVD logo on them, and are perfectly capable of playing every other DVD I’ve come across.

Since I rented this DVD and did not purchase it, it would be out of place for me to demand any compensation for the time and effort it took to determine why this DVD was not playing on my various computers. I do hope that you take a step back and realize that one of the primary reasons people pirate movies such as Shoot ‘Em Up is the increasingly strict copy protection that refuses to allow them to play the movie the way they want it played. I’ve never downloaded a movie over bittorrent before, but I sure was tempted when I wasn’t able to play this one after three attempts—I can guarantee the bittorrent download would have played on my laptop the first try!

Thank you for your attention,

- James Schend

I’m not usually one of those foaming-at-the-mouth “DRM and copy protection is evil!” type of person, but making and selling a product that simply does not work in the name of copy protection is way over the line. Way over the New Line (ha ha, get it?)

I just auto-updated my Zune software to version 2.5, and when it started up I was greeted by the following dialog box.

For the image deprived, the dialog reads:

You recently enabled graphics and video enhancement. Is the screen displayed correctly? Yes/No

Ugh! Where to even start!?

1. No I didn’t. I didn’t “enable” anything, much less “graphics and video enhancement.” I don’t even know what that is, or how to enable it, or why I would want to enable it. Above all, this dialog lies to me.
2. Are you seriously asking me if the screen is displayed correctly, in a dialog box!? “I’m sending you email to ask you if your email is working.” Of course the goddamned screen is displaying correctly, idiots.
3. Wait a second, do they literally mean the screen!? Are they seriously saying that something Zune’s installer (or it’s “graphics and video enhancement”) might do to my computer could actually fuck around with my video card? That’s certainly the implication, isn’t it? Of course, what they actually mean is “window,” not “screen.” At least, I hope to God they do.
4. And lastly, but perhaps most importantly… if the window was displaying incorrectly, how would I know? Zune has a very customized UI that doesn’t lend itself to instantaneous judgments of “correct” vs. “incorrect.” (See the screenshot at the top of this post.) The dialog doesn’t present a screenshot describing what it’s supposed to look like. How could any end-user, actually answer this dialog?

I hit “yes.” It seems to be working ok. I’m mildly curious to know what would have happened if I hit “no” or the close box. (I like to imagine it would shuffle the window around a bit and then ask me if it’s displayed correctly now… kind of like those “can you hear me now?” commercials.)

Congratulations, Zune developers. You’ve earned this:

P.S. I really do like Autoplaylists. And thank you from the bottom of my heart for fixing MP4 playback from a networked drive!