I Love Layers

Thanks for your immediate response to my layers info request. I read this month’s lesson with great interest and enthusiasm. Will now digest it slowly and do the home work assignment. It’s been a great series of articles.

—Don Bruno

iPhone

I know this is a review of the iPhone, but since Apple has made this available on only AT&T I would think that you would provide some insights on that company’s support and service. I lament that Apple made this a one-carrier phone (at least in the US). I am on Verizon and will not leave them. They have treated me right over many years, and I am a loyal customer. I am also a loyal Apple customer, but it ain’t sufficient to lure me away from Verizon!

—Michael Moon

• • •

I can add a few thoughts to the mix.

First, I was an AT&T (Cingular) subscriber before buying my iPhone. Wife and I carried BlackBerry 8700c phones for over a year. We have no service complaints about AT&T. Your mileage may vary.

Second, we moved to AT&T from Sprint because Sprint angered me substantially when I was trying to get a phone upgrade, really wanted something that was a combination PDA/phone without having Windows Mobile (so it would talk to my Macs), and got nothing but a run-around for over a month. Sprint’s network was great, and my Sanyo phone had the best radio of any mobile phone I’d owned since I gave up my 3-watt bag phone. Sprint customer service, however, sucked. (Perhaps others have better experience with Sprint’s business services.)

Third, Wife was sold when she learned our data plans would cost about $60/month less (total) than with the BlackBerrys! While I thought highly of my BlackBerry, it wasn’t quite what I was looking for. It was good for e-mail, but less satisfactory as a PDA. The iPhone is closer to my ideal convergent device, but even it isn’t quite there yet. Part of that has to do with the network—we just need more bandwidth for the kind of service I want. I think we’ll get there before I retire/die/whatever, but it’s still a few years out.

I activated our iPhones in about five minutes each. The process shut down our BlackBerrys (good thing, saved money) and adjusted our rate plan accordingly. It was simple, straightforward, and I have no complaints. Our service with AT&T is perfectly acceptable, and service at the company stores is great, provided they aren’t overloaded. (Don’t get me started on the contract stores!)

—Dave Thompson

Crossword Forge

Thanks for the review. I should point out that the review is somewhat misleading in that it suggests that Crossword Forge only allows 1 intersection per word. That isn’t true, in fact in your example screenshot 1 word has 4 intersections, 2 words have 3 intersections, and 6 words have 2 intersections (only 4 of the 13 words intersect only once).

A truer statement would be that the puzzles are free-form and random and do not enforce intersection or symmetry rules.

—Cortis Clark, President of Sol Robots (makers of Crossword Forge)

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