Michael Olivero
The official blog of Michael Olivero, Software Architect & Humble Entrepreneur

Cross Multiply Mental Calculation iPhone App

Friday, 27 April 2012 19:42 by Michael Olivero

Update 5/9/2012:

 

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Yusnier Viera, a former co-worker and current world record holder in calendar mental calculation, brought to my attention the concept of cross multiplying.  After learning the basics and practicing over time, I have been able to successfully multiply upto four digit by four digit computations in my head.  Since the exercise is stimulating and to a certain extent entertaining, I decided to build an iPhone application to easily practice.

Unlike paper and pencil, using an iPhone app allows for immediate feedback while entering the answer.  I've been learning how to develop iOS apps for both iPhone & iPad and I am on the verge of releasing this application.  Since I'm anxious to get it out to the world, I have defer creating the tutorial, the statistics page as well as game center integration, until future updates.

I decided to give the app a representative iconic person, so Einstein fit the bill.

 

Once loaded, you are presented with the home screen where you can link out to a video tutorial or simply start the app.

 

 

Once started, you can interactively create up to 4x4 multiplications to test your mental calculating abilities.  In a future update, I'll hook it up to game center and keep track of best times for each type as well as increase the scale up to 8x8.

 

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Categories:   iPhone / iPad
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iPad3 WiFi connection issues resolved

Thursday, 5 April 2012 21:51 by Michael Olivero

I believe I have a solid work around for the the wifi issue where disconnects occur. First it appears only to happen when connecting to wireless-n connections. Wireless-g doesn't seem to have any problems.  Note this is only for the repeated disconnects and has nothing to do with the low signal issue some have mentioned. For the record, I have a 32gb Verizon iPad.

The symptoms are as follows.  

Symptoms:

  • You connect fine and surf fine. Put the iPad to sleep or come back to it later after sleeping automatically and your wifi is not connected.
  • When tapping the previously connected wifi to reconnect you are usually asked to enter the password again.
  • When you connect the first time, it says failed to connect but re-tap the join button it connects.
  • If you turn off wifi and then turn it back on  it doesn't reconnect.
  • Once connected to the wifi, if you click on the right arrow to go to the details you will NOT see the "forget this wifi" button even though you are connected.
 
 

If you fall in any of those scenarios, this WILL solve your problem in the interim until Apple updates software. In short it seems as though the wifi is not stored or remembered.

 

Solution:

Configure wifi manually, explicitly typing your wifi's broadcast name, explicitly choose the security your wifi is using (wep, wpa, wpa2, etc. ) and then proceed to enter your password. Once connected if you go to the details of the connection you should see the "forget this wifi" button. If you do, you can now rest assured it will allways reconnect and  the above symptoms can no longer be reproduced.

4/12/2012 Addendum:

Not sure if this is related or not, however I have the "Ask to Join Networks" feature off in the wifi settings too. 

 

4/13/2012 Addendum:

Here I show how easily I can reproduce the automatic disconnects because the iPad doesn't remember the wifi connection.  My solution, and working now for weeks without a problem, has been to set it up manually.  Interestingly, after setting it up manually, I haven't had to set other networks manually as they connect and remember fine.  It's only the first one it seems or my home one.

5/2/2012 Addendum:

Updating the router firmware has resolved this issue in two separate situations (my home and a friends home).

Good luck!

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Categories:   iPhone / iPad | Mac
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