Trader Eyal

Did a bit of geekery work this morning. My wife got the HTC Legendplus this cool accessoryover the weekend and joined the Android family, she totally digs it. I also noticed that since I got my device the Android Market has grown significantly and now has a ton of cool new apps.

Anyways, playing with the Legend prompted me to finally take care of the nagging message I’ve been getting on my Nexus that told me there’s a system update for my device. I haven’t updated my phone in a while. I was running the first Froyo build (FRF50) that I installed just as it came out but since then there’ve been a few more updates, more official ones. I’m not sure why I got the OTA (over the air) notification for the update as I rooted the device and I’m running a custom recovery (RA) and I read it wasn’t supposed to go out to such devices. Also when I clicked the OTA message there was nothing to install.. but it kept coming back. So I got the FRF91 full update zip plus the root zip and flashed them both (skipping FRF83, FRF85B as I already had Froyo radio from the FRF50). All was done via the nice RA recovery just booting in bootloader, scrolling to the zip file, clicking on it and waiting. Oh yes, I did do a full Nandroid backup beforehand just in case.
Everything installed fine, the first boot after flashing a new ROM takes a while, a few minutes instead of 30 seconds, and those minutes look pretty long :-) but as long as you’re not flashing a new radio component the risk of bricking the device is very low, so I’m told (do at your own risk blah blah). The first few minutes after everything booted up things looked slow and I was starting to get worried. I know it takes a while for it to settle in, I didn’t do a wipe or anything just installed on top, so all my apps and data are still there and I’m guessing it re-populates and checks some db’s with this stuff, but still slowing down is not nice. It took another reboot and everything is now even snappier than before the update. Good update from Google as I always.

Back to the HTC Legend, since it’s a HTC device rather than a Google one it had the HTC Sense on it, I was really impressed with it. Lots of small improvements and UI polishing over the stock Android that my Nexus is running. It has more eye candy, kindda like iPhone type of usability tweaks for the Android. I would not hesitate to get a HTC with Sense, such as the HTC Desire, as my next phone in the future. In fact I liked the HTC keyboard so much that I looked it up online and apparently I’m not the only one liking it as some good folks in the community extracted the APK’s and made them available for other Android users. I already had a couple of different keyboards installed so I’ve got the Sense one as well now which will probably see the most use. I could get the full Sense UI installed on the Nexus as I saw it’s available and was done but I think I’ll just pick and choose the components I like instead of changing the whole thing. Might be too much bloat getting the full UI.

Tags: accessory, android, Android Apps, app, backup, FRF91, froyo, froyo legend, google, Google Phone, HTC Desire, HTC Legend, htc legend froyo, htc legend froyo update, HTC Sense, iphone, legend froyo, Legend froyo update, nexus, Nexus One, OTA, ra recovery, Update, Upgrade

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So Apple is giving away this Incase snap case for Iphone 4 for free which got me thinking about changing my phone case.

I’ve never had a rigid or a silicone case but I’m open to trying it. Either something like that snapcase or maybe this case might be even better, as it looks extremely well made.

I really like the original case that came with the Google phone but it’s starting to wear out, it’s made of neoprene, so it ain’t gonna last long. And I can’t find a reputable seller anywhere who sells the original thing. Plenty on eBay sell similar cases, quite cheap (no $29.99 prices ;-) ) but even with the cute Android logo on them it’s pretty obvious they’re not genuine.

Tags: android, antenna issue, apple, free case, google, hard case, incase, Incase Designs, Incase Snap Case, INCASE SNAP CASE IPHONE 4, INCASE SNAP CASE IPHONE 4 - CLEAR-ZML, iphone, iphone 4, iPhone4, neoprene, nexus, phone, SnapCase, undefined

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As we all know, there’s a severe crisis in Gaza. Humanitarian aid is sorely needed for Gazans living in unspeakable conditions under Israel’s cruel blockade. New images are starting to come out from that area, which British journalist Lauren Boot, Blair’s sister-in-law compared to a WWII concentration camp and a crisis on the scale of Darfur.

Warning! The images I’ve linked to below are difficult to stomach. Mainstream media will not show them.

Image 1 – Gaza Humanitarian Crisis
Image 2 – Hunger in Gaza
Image 3 – Shortages in all types of goods in Gaza
Image 4 – Palestinians kids hardships
Image 5 – Lauren Boot braving life in Gaza

via Tom. More disturbing images from Gaza with explanations are available at Tom’s site.

Tags: blair, concentration camp, disturbing images, gaza, Gazans, humanitarian aid, humanitarian crisis, hunger, Image, israel, life, mainstream media, Middle East, new images, Palestinian Territory, palestinians

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Big Mike who has had very extensive experience with NinjaTrader came to the same conclusion I have: the myriad of problems and hassles surrounding NinjaTrader – all versions: 6.5 beta and 7 alpha – are just not worth the effort and investment of time. Check out his blog post: Big Mike’s Trading Blog: Tired of NinjaTrader?. There are several good reads in his forum about alternatives for anyone trading with a DOM.

One good solution I haven’t seen mentioned is a combination of InteractiveBrokers and ZeroLineTrader. I like this combo for a number of reasons:

1. IB’s TWS is rock solid, excellent stability and the broker itself is one of the more reliable ones (most of the time).

2. IB’s commissions are very reasonable, at $2 they might not be the cheapest around but not that far off for a small retail trader either. For a nice comparison of commissions see HPT’s post here.

3. IB’s universal account means I don’t need to split my account, I can trade stocks and futures in the same place. Including most futures contracts around the world.

4. ZeroLine Trader platform itself has been rock solid with a lot of very nice options for a very reasonable price. There are other alternatives like the cheaper BracketTrader but it’s bare bones, and ButtonTrader which is too complicated and expensive to my taste.

Anyways, this topic of IB TWS+DOM (ZLT or others) probably merits a proper separate post of its own. But the main point is that there are many alternatives and options available that one should spend some time to find what works for them, which is a better approach then trying to force their trading on something that doesn’t work too well.

Tags: Brokers, buttontrader, commissions, comparison, DOM, futures, hpt, interactivebrokers, ninjatrader, NT, platform, Stocks, trading, trading platform, TWS, X-Trader, XTrader, Zeroline trader, Zerolinetrader, zlt

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Looks like the almighty Goldman Sachs had an iffy bet on volatility this summer.

“Primarily in response to our client needs, our equity derivatives business was short volatility entering the second quarter and posted poor results,” Chief Financial Officer David Viniar said on a conference call with reporters today. The firm didn’t break out the size of the loss or the overall results from the equity derivatives group responsible for the business.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-07-20/goldman-sachs-lost-money-betting-volatility-would-drop-in-second-quarter.html

It’s certainly been one of the more interesting summers that I recall. Usually I would get almost no candidates in June-Aug but at the moment I can’t even tell it’s summer based on the action.

Anyways, back to GS, I wouldn’t be too worried for them ;-) whatever they dropped in their derivatives they’re making hand over fist with their evil high frequency trading algos.

Tags: bet, Chief Financial Officer David Viniar, derivatives, Equity derivative, Goldman, Goldman Sachs, high frequency, size, summer, summer trading, trading loss, volatility

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Now that I have your attention, here’s why you probably should be extra careful when someone offers you free frequent flyer miles to go along with their product or service.

The basic idea is that often people focus on near term concrete goals (such as frequent flyer miles), and while trying to maximize these immediate and clear goals they forget or discount the real reason for their actions — which in your case is maximizing their financial outcome.

Dan Ariely » Blog Archive Behavioral finance lesson – frequent flyer points? «.

I make sure to read as much material Dan Ariely publishes as I can lay my hands on. I’ve read his first book Predictably Irrationaland am looking forward to reading his second: The Upside of Irrationality.

Tags: Behavioral, behavioral finance, Dan Ariely, financial outcome, free, free frequent flyer miles, frequent flyer miles, frequent flyer points, Irrational, irrationality

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If sometimes you think life is tough, hard going, or unfair remember this girl Jessica Cox.

Tags: airplane, armless, cox, difficult, flying, Hands, Jessica Cox, life, look ma no hands, motivational, pilot

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