Sunday, December 23, 2007

kEnny's E-Tool Fourvarites!!

These are my mobile phone essentials, compiled over the last year and some, since outgrowing my Motorola RAZR V3. They are somewhat tailored for use on my Sony Ericsson K790a Cybershot Cameraphone. Yes, I called it a Cameraphone with a capital C. My rule is that if it has more than 2 mega pixels and a REAL flash, it gets a capital C. Get one for yourself and you'll see why. There are a few available now with 5MP sensors as well.

Daily Use Tools: These are the programs and websites I use every day, to keep in touch and up to date.
  • 4INFO: While it is a very capable source of information for mobile browsers and SMS related queries, I primarily use 4INFO to give me my morning weather forecast on the weekdays. The infospace supplied services for AT&T Wireless still suck for regularly scheduled alerts.
  • Twitter/Remember The Milk: I don't use Twitter other than to connect to Remember the Milk, for which I am contually finding more uses. I just recently added lists for Movies and TV shows to see, gifts to get for people, and music to take another listen to. When I happen to catch a movie, I can type in the names of the previews to add to the list. When I'm listening to the radio in the car, I use Jott to tell RTM who I need to listen to again (because I try to make a concious effort not to take my eyes off the road). When my kids start asking about all the neato cool stuff they have got to get, as told to them by various children's television networks, I can keep track of those as well. RTM has a very easy to navigate mobile site, which really shows off how flexible their service is. As a side note, Remember The Milk just got whole lot better by using a Firefox add-in to integrate closely with your Gmail Inbox. Very sharp!!!
  • Jott: I have to check in at Jott's website every week or so for new Jott Links. My favorite new one is called Trapster. Sure, Trapster has their own software that runs on your GPS enabled mobile device (mine is not yet), but if you just want to do your part and look out for your fellow drivers, you can use Jott to send the exact location and type of service spotted to Trapster's database, in a safe manner!
  • GrandCentral: Since starting my E-Tool monologue, GrandCentral has graduated to the only voicemail service used for my cell phone. After re-enabling the internet access for the phone, and realizing that calling AT&T's voicemail counts against your anytime minutes (during the daytime of weekdays), I realized that I could keep a few more rollover minutes by using my unlimited Media Net access to check my voice mail visual-style from GrandCentral's mobile site. It took a little digging, but I found the generic GSM commands to send from my phone to change from ATTWS voicemail to GrandCentral. *** Know what makes this cool now? I can give my GrandCentral number to anyone, and it will either screen the call or forward it to my cell phone (or any number of other phones I specify), based on my preference. When I can't answer my cell phone, same thing! The links to the voicemail messages are sent to my Gmail inbox, just like my Vonage voicemails, and both services send SMS alerts to my phone.
  • Weather Underground: This is the sexiest website for weather, hands down! Not only does it give you an amazing amount of information (lots of great Google Maps mashups), but it has advertising for meeting single people in your local weather area too!! I use their RSS feed to get detailed weather predictions each day.
  • Google's mobile services: Where do I start? Headlines via RSS, Gmail and Google Maps from Java applications, and browser bookmarks for local movies. Of special note is Google Maps. They added the ability to triangulate your location based on cell tower data, allowing remarkable fun watching the map move when you aren't driving. It is also handy for looking up directions. The directions can start out from your approximate location. You can also get loads of information via SMS queries.
  • Blogger gets special mention apart from the rest of Google, as my phone has software made specially for it. Blogger can be configured to send SMS, MMS, and other picture messages from my phone (directly after taking the picture, even) directly to the Blogger blog of your choice. Since I only use Blogger, there's no problem.
  • Fandango: While I have been hesitant to use Fandango previously, due to Regal Cinemas as Comcast relations, I have to admint that they have a pretty good mobile portal. They have the only movie listings I have found where you can view show times for future dates. You can even purchase tickets from your mobile.
  • Yahoo! Go: This is one I've been following for some time, but still isn't available for the firmware version on my phone. I had a chance to try it out on a Samsung Blackjack, where it worked really well. Yahoo! Go packs in all kinds of Yahoo! content in an easy to navigate package. If you are a Yahoo! user, this should be at the top of your list.
That does it for now. You can expect part five when I come up with a clever way to phrase the title. :^)

Blogged with Flock

Tricked out with Flock and keyboard shortcuts...

The last thing I didn't like about Flock has a work-around:



The "Share this link via email" button hasn't worked the way I would like it to, because it uses your system's default email client to send an email, and I hadn't figured out how to make Windows use a website as an email client. I found out that Google Talk has such an option, which will make this button open a new tab to compose a message in Gmail. I have also read that Flock will address this disparity in the near future.

I just thought I'd spread some more Flock lovin' around. :^)

Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000
I have also been sending a little more time on my desktop system. You know the one with the ergonomic keyboard? Last night I Googlefied (I'm sure that's a word!!) the software for it to use the shortcut keys to open new tabs for various google products in my favorite browser. Here they are from Left to Right:

  1. Web/Home: iGoogle
  2. Search: New Gmail Message
  3. Mail: Gmail Inbox
  4. Favorite 1: Google Calendar
  5. Favorite 2: Google Docs
  6. Favorite 3: Picasa Web Albums (more Google)
  7. Favorite 4: Google Maps
  8. Favorite 5: Object Edit
I really like this setup. I'll save the Object Edit explanation for another post. For now I'll just say that if you have never heard of Stardock or Object Desktop, you need to check them out NOW!!!!

Blogged with Flock

kEnny's Favorite E-Tools- thReevisited!!

I've got a couple more Flock-specific add-ins to write about.

The first I'm using as this very moment. It is called Flock Blog Plus, and it is really slick. It integrates a whole bunch of extra features to Flock's already-more-than-handy blog editor. The features I am appreciating most right now are the lower-pane editor window and the extra link functions.

The second is called geoFlock. I like playing with maps from time to time, on both a computer and on my phone, so this is a nice tool to add to the arsenal. Maybe for the next caving trip I take?

Next visitation: More fun on your phone!

Sunday, November 11, 2007

kEnny's Favorite E-Tools... Part Deux!!

For this post, we'll focus on my favorite Firefox extensions, and which ones you can use with Flock. Extensions make Firefox fun! I use a variety of extensions, depending on the computer I am using. Here they are in no particular order:
  • Adsense Notifier: It's really funny that I use this extension, as I don't seem to give any of the advertisers on this blog much in the way of business. It gives you a quick, unobtrusive look at how much Google is going to pay you for all your hard work. I don't know if it works on Flock. I haven't had any reason to try it yet. :^(
  • del.ico.us Bookmarks: I got turned on to del.ico.us through using Flock. After running my favorites in the same manner for quite some time, I was looking for a new way to work them. While I don't use it over built-in favorites, I also don't leave it out.
  • Download Manager Tweak: This one adds extra options to Firefox's Download Manager.
  • Download Sort: I used to be a great fan of this extension, but numerous security updates have hobbled it to the point of being nearly useless. Being a big collector of skins for various forms of software (Winamp, WindowBlinds, etc.), this tool was indispensable for filtering different file types into separate folders.
  • Gmail Manager: I used to use Gmail Notifier, but the added functionality of inbox previews, and support for multiple Gmail accounts made me switch. Unfortunately, the mail count functionality doesn't work in Flock! I hope one or the other gets fixed soon.
  • GMarks: This one takes Google Bookmarks and makes it part of your built-in bookmarks as well. If I'm ever out of contact with one of my own computers, I can still get to my regularly visited sites this way, and synchronize my bookmarks across multiple computers.
  • Google Calendar Notifier: This is the next most convenient item to your cell phone with text messaging for keeping up with appointments on your Google Calendar(s). It provides you with quick mouse-over access to upcoming events, and provides pop up alerts as well. You can color code each calendar to make them easy to tell apart.
  • Google Send to Phone: This isn't real complicated, but can be incredibly handy. High lite any text on a web page, then with just a couple more clicks you can send it to your cell phone via SMS.
  • ForecastFox: Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, I've been a fan of the weather for many years. And you never know if the forecast is really going to be right of not. ForecastFox gives you upcoming forecasts as well as radar data, so you have quick access to local weather information from Accuweather.
  • FoxyTunes: Foxy Tunes brings the fun to web browsing, after all that productive crap I already mentioned. FoxyTunes acts as an unobtrusive remote control for your favorite media player.
Do you have any favorites firefox extensions not listed here? Tell me what you like and how you use it. If I like it, I'll add it to the list!

Blogged with Flock

Thursday, October 18, 2007

kEnny's Favorite E-Tools!

Let me preface this entry with the notice that one of the tools listed here, of which I am undoubtedly a fan of - and could even be considered an evangelist for, rather failed me the other day. I was well into the task of typing the original version of this post, when Flock choked and lost all but the title. Oops!!

I have been on a quest for a number of years to become more elegantly (but not intrusively so) organized on a number of levels. In this time of ever-increasing availability of information I have found quite the smörgåsbord of options for keeping one's life in order. My particular quandary lies in the fact that there are times when I spend copious amounts of time using a computers, lots of computers, and others when I am glad to stay away for a nice long time.

I have enjoyed the usage of Microsoft Outlook at work in keeping me aware of and (as much as it is able to) on time for appointments. Before the days of cell phones that could synchronize their calendars with PIMs, I found a way to keep myself current while away from my own PC: using VBA to forward Outlook's pop-up notifications to my cell phone. I can't tell you how many meetings this kept me from missing. It made me aware that there are always alternative means to keep on schedule, and that I could increase the productivity of others by promoting that awareness.

At work, I use Outlook to keep track of multiple projects, remind me of mundane tasks, tell me where and when my meetings are, and keep the unimportant stuff from getting in the way of my work. While Outlook is a very capable application for work, have untethered myself from it for personal organization, as it requires me to be attached to a single computer. At home I have 3 different PCs I use, so it just doesn't do the job. Browser based email and calendaring, coupled with easy integration of newer "smart phones", give me the continuity I ask for without keeping me tied to a computer screen. The purpose of this post is to increase the awareness of many of the handy tools I have found, and maybe some of their lesser known features as well.


Web Browsers- There are a few big ones to choose from, and a lot of others that leverage their technology. While Internet Explorer is a necessary evil at work, it has no compelling features that make me want to recommend it. Here are my favorites:
  • Opera: Very flexible and standards compliant. Available across multiple platforms, including mobile devices. Want to know what I like it best for? Setting the default magnification allows me to browse the web easilly on the 61" TV from across the room without ever having to fiddle with the settings again. Unlike any other web browser I have tried, Opera alters the size of images and plug-ins like Flash movies to scale the whole page (not just the text) for easy viewing. It seems to have some problems with some sites using Ajax features, but I've read that can be as much the website's fault as Opera's. Opera also includes voice support, by allowing you to control it vocally, and it can read content back to you.
  • Firefox: My favorite all purpose browser. Firefox's strength is in it's ability to add functions thought up by smart people not associated directly with the browser's development. I'll touch on some of my favorite ones shortly.
  • Flock: Based on Firefox's Gecko rendering engine, Flock is a wonder to behold. Coined as "The Social Web Browser", Flock has gone and integrated support for many of the more popular hot spots on the web, making quick work of uploading photos & videos, blogging, bookmarking, and keeping up with your friends who are doing the same. I try to use it for all my blog posts, because the off line capabilities combined with powerful online integration make it a very pleasurable experience. Like Firefox, Flock can be enhanced with extensions, and in fact many of the extensions written for the former can be used by the latter.
Websites & Online Services- In trying to make my own and other information available from my phone (via SMS-only right now) and from any computer I end up being attached to, I have assembled a bushel of helpers. I should stress that because most of these services offer some level of SMS functionality, it really doesn't matter what kind of mobile phone you have (even if you end up putting your phone through the laundry and have to use a substitute for a while). Here they are:
  • Google: Talk about overload. It seems like I am always curious what Google is up to next. When they buy a company or enhance any service, I am all over it. They have extensive resources available on the web of course, but many of them bridge across to mobile use as well. I use GMail and Google Calendar to keep my personal life in order. While my cell phone's calendar gets synchronized with my work calendar, Google's Calendar sends me SMS messages to remind me where I need to be. I can add new events and invite people by sending an SMS message to GVENT. Google's recent purchase of GrandCentral caused me to sign up for that service as well. It is a universal voice telephone routing/messaging service that has so many possibilities I can't begin to tell you what they do in this post. Everything I get from Google is free of charge. I'm sure I'll end up paying for it in some other way.
  • Yahoo!: I'll admit that I'm more attached to Google than Yahoo!, but Yahoo! has some very compelling competition to most things I use from Google. Something I've been wanting to try out from Yahoo! was their latest version of Yahoo! Go for mobile phones. It wraps up all their best mobile accessible content and squeezes it into an easy-to-use interface.
  • AOL Instant Messenger: Don't get me wrong, I'm not really into instant messaging too much after it got me married (and it was AIM that did it, too). But after I got my first "nice" phone and was looking for ways to exercise it, I went looking for an IMAP email service that offered Push service. For a brief explanation, most email software needs to be running for you to find out that you have unread messages (the client PULLs the messages from the server), where Push services notify the client first (and in this case the client was my phone). AIM's email service is the only one I have found in the US offering free Push email service that didn't require extra software to be running on your PC or phone. Using AIM, I had working Visual Voicemail while it was just a cool idea at Apple.
  • Vonage: I can't say they have distinctive service any more, and I can't say they are the best price in town, but they are the ones with the most reputation to protect. They give us reliable phone service with LOTS of features for a very low price. I get SMS alerts when someone leaves a message, and the messages are emailed to any email inbox I desire. Thanks for offering an alternative to Qwest!
  • 4INFO: I found 4INFO after being disappointed by Cingular/AT&T's unreliable SMS alerts lack of punctuality (I think their "service" is contracted through Infospace, remember them?). After dropping the unlimited internet plan from my phone in favor of unlimited family messaging, I stopped my morning weather RSS feeds on my phone, and changed to morning weather SMS messages. I stuck with 4INFO because I can put up with the unobtrusive advertising at the bottom of the message, and because they send the information when I ask them to.
  • Windows Live Alerts: This one I'm a little on the fence about, but I joined on the off chance that it would pay off. They supposedly offer local traffic updates, no matter how local you want to get, but I haven't gotten anything yet. Microsoft gets traffic data from both NAVTEQ and Inrix, so I figure if there's gonna be anything to report in Olympia, WA, it should be available there.
  • Twitter: If I were a social butterfly, I'm sure I would be using this constantly. Twitter allows other you and your friends to keep track of the other's life via short messages that can either be entered via the internet or SMS. I think it would be fun for a large group of people to tour a park or zoo together. I only use it so far to access my To-Do List, brought to you by my next featured service:
  • Remember The Milk: This service is my non-Outlook task reminder for things that don't go on the Google Calendar very well. RTM can be used for scheduling as well, but I like that I can use fairly plain English to set a reminder via SMS, quickly and easily. The first tab on my iGoogle home page contains an RTM widget now, which complements my Google Calendar widget quite nicely.
  • Jott: This is one I just read about while looking for tips on advanced usages of RTM, and instantly had to join. There is a service that Vonage provides for an extra fee per message, or you can spend a little extra for multiple messages prepaid: Transcribed Voice mail. Jott doesn't quite do that to follow the same function as Vonage. You call Jott (toll free number is 1-866-JOTT-123) tell the machine who the message is for, and speak the message you want delivered, then Jott sends an email to the recipient with the transcribed message. The person(s) being addressed has to be in your Jott phone book for it to work.
While I really wanted to go into more detail about Firefox extensions and how I have all of these toys arranged to keep me happy, I think I'll have to make this a multi-part entry instead.

Come back for Part II!!!

Blogged with Flock

Tuesday, July 03, 2007

This is a test...

...of the Flock blog posting system. This is only a test. If this were a real blog post, this message would be accompanied by emergency reading instructions. There may also be a picture to make the reading more interesting for folks less inclined to read.

This message has been posted as part of the process I am following to see if version 0.9 of Flock will be worth my messing with. So far it is going well. I may do more with it than simply go back to using Firefox!

Blogged with Flock

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Much ado about Blah-Blah Blah

I'm sitting here with some time on my hands, so I thought I'd get some typing practice on my lovely ergonomic keyboard, which I have just recently rediscovered at my (gasp!) desk. This won't quite be a freewrite session so much as some of my thoughts of late, and what I would like to do about them. Meanwhile I'll be digesting my tasty turkey salad sandwich.

If I don't think about it, I'm a decent touch typist. I can go on for quite a stretch when I don't think about it. Too bad I am at the moment.


I've always enjoyed watching movies in theaters, so much that even though I have an entirely adequate home theater, I still have a hard time staying away from the local cinema. One of the things I'm preparing to tell you about has to do with my desire to go visit the movie theater. I'm not doing it so much to share my unending combination of lazy bastard and geek, but because I think I should document it somewhere so that when you see it later, you'll know I had the idea first.

My job allows me quite a bit of flexibility, and sometimes I choose to take longer lunch breaks than I might under normal circumstances. I used to comb through the movie listings from Google and Yahoo! to find the best movie to watch at the best time, at the best theater. In rather short order, that became too much like work (hey, does that make you wonder what I do? It sure makes me wonder). I decided it would be better to let someone else take care of this heavy lifting for me. Since one of my children is just beginning to read, I didn't feel comfortable giving this responsibility to them yet. I decided to see if I could get my trusty copy of Microsoft Office to do it for me.

My goal was to assemble a list of movies to wach at lunch, sorted by the approximate time of my return to work. I had used Excel in my search for a new HDTV before by using it to grab prices from one of the popular price-search websites, so I was somewhat familiar with using web queries, and manipulating the data from those queries. I started by looking at the data presented by a number of websites. I have still only found one that consistently differentiates AM times from PM times: Yahoo! was the one, so I set out to customize a query for each area theater to download the movies and showtimes on their own worksheet. This seemed to be working well, so I set out to start manipulating the data to assemble the return-drive offset times.

About halfway through this process I began realizing that Yahoo! was Screwing! With! Me! They were throwing ads and switching up the order of the theaters, so that I was not always getting the showtimes for the theaters I thought I was. I figured I would sort that out later as I was starting to work out a good system for converting a long string containing multiple times into multiple time entries with the correct 24hr time format (so I didn't try to watch an 11pm show at 11am). Next I put together another worksheet which would display all of the results. I decided at this point that it might be handy to filter for just a single movie. Yahoo! also had me covered because they could give me a list of just movies, guaranteed to have the same name as the lists of movies at each theaters. Now I had two sort methods to figure out, and a recurring problem with my movie theaters not staying in the same spot.

I decided to rework the whole thing. If yahoo wasn't going to give me consistent results, I had to make a smarter spreadsheet. Instead of grabbing the same webpage 10 times to get one small table I would download it once, then parse each line to sort each theater's shows into their own worksheet, where my previous technique of pulling out the showtimes could be reused.

This gave me an idea for another "feature". There were some theaters I really didn't care to waste my time on, so I grafted in some more creative math to ignore the ones I didn't have an alias or commute time for (duh, because I wasn't going to go there) once the data got copied to the report worksheet. This way it could all be processed the same way, and would be simply hidden from view in the end, maybe not the most efficient for processing, but much simpler for me to design with Excel. I also threw in an option for a second "base" location, with a second set of drive-times. Now I could find out when I might get back to work OR home after seeing a movie. Nice!

Is the current form we have a fairly large spreadsheet, that can retrieve the first 20 showings of up to 20 movies each at up to 10 theaters closest to (up to) two locations. It sorts ALL of this data by proximity (represented by the number of minutes you think it takes for you to drive between your "base" and each theater) added to the calculated ending time (start time plus end time plus 15 minutes for commercials and previews). Alternatively it can show you a single movie's showtimes, in case you already happen to know what you want to watch, but don't know where to watch it. Two to four clicks is all it takes.

I'm rather proud of it, but I recently decided it wasn't enough. There seems to be a boom in web creativity as more content owners make it easier to play with their information, or to add your own to theirs (Hi, Google). I would love to have something like this on the web to look at from anywhere, but nobody seems to have done it yet. I guess it's gonna be me for now. Man, are you gonna be sorry for not doing all this hard work for me.

I've got another thing I really want this to do. I want it to pick a showing, then add it to my calendar! Why? This started out as an exercise in not missing important things at work. If I can put it on my calendar, it would be eaiser to see where there might be any conflicts with other items on my schedule. Right now I use two calendars: Outlook/Exchange for work, and Google for not-work. I sync my phone with Outlook, and get alerts from Google Calendar via SMS. To begin with I'm going for Outlook "integration" to leverage the work I have already done, and my relative ease with using VBA. The kicker is that I would like to integrate on the Outlook side so that I can preview the movie schedule right next to my current calendar, select the item, and slurp it into my own calendar. I haven't come close to playing on this level before with Outlook. The less elegant method (in my mind, anyway) would be to use Excel to grab the calendar from Outlook and do the picking from Excel, then send it back over to Outlook. It may end up being easier to implement, though.

Once I have the kinks worked out, and a clearer vision of how it works, my goal is to make my own gadget for Google Desktop/Home-Page/Etc. that would look at your location, ask what movie theaters you do or don't like, automatically calculate drive times and store that info for future use, show you the movies coming up (maybe for the next few days) and send the appointment to the mail/calendar app of your choice after you pick the movie.

That would rock.

I think I've exercised the finger enough now. More "free writing" later!

Blogged with Flock

Saturday, June 16, 2007

Time to Try New Tools

This entry is again dedicated to the topic of alternative means of working with my blog. I just recently installed Flock, which is a web-community oriented browser based on Firefox that includes built-in support for posting to various blog, batch uploading pictures to your the web, sharing bookmarks, and other forms of on-line collaboration. -I just ran the spell checker and noticed that it didn't recognize the word "blog". How funny!

I've had a bit of a revelation of late. In working to understand all of the features of my new mobile phone, a Sony Ericsson K790a, I have been playing with both this blog and my new mobile blog quite a bit more. I've noticed that there are a lot more resources on the web for earning money by making your own words and pictures available for publishing. I had run across similar ideas in the past, particularly from my father, and had not been very impressed.

My dad is staring down the barrel of retirement, and wondering what he can do to ensure (maybe even grow?) his income once his career as a city employee is over. He has been looking to the Internet for inspiration and ran across a business & advertising scheme called Affiliated Websites. I use the word scheme because I think the purveyors of these prebuilt websites are taking advantage of the common netizen by stealing their money for services that aren't that hard to perform for yourself. For a 3-figure annual fee they set up a domain (which they own), let you choose from a number of content templates to fill in the blanks (including your testimonial as to how effectively it makes money for you), then they sell ads and prominently link to specific businesses selling products related to the main topic of the website (those are the affiliates).

I was initially quite shocked when Dad introduced me to this idea. I wasn't very impressed with the so-called content of these websites. There was a lot of fluff, and not much meat. My impression was that these sites were just search engine traps optimized for funneling eyeballs toward on line vendors, rather than providing any real information about the topic highlighted by the site. I explained my objections to him and tried my best not to sound like a jealous snob. Was I doing anything to try to make money using the Internet? Somewhat, and in a rather lame & half-hearted way. Did I have any better idea? Not really. My only strong objections were that there wasn't much this affiliated business plan did that you couldn't do yourself for a handful of dollars, and that there was nothing to keep people coming back for more after they tripped across the site and made (or didn't make) a purchase at the featured store.

My dad is a great guy, and took my criticism of this plan very well. He still plans to set up a website to attract folks with interests similar to his own, primarily motor homes. He took an HTML course at the local college and is now much better equipped to not only help himself, but he can sell his services to other people wanting to set up a website.

I'm going to try to turn the increased opportunities to be published to my advantage by writing more often, and taking more pictures that can be applied to more than just my own personal use. I'm looking forward to being able to use new tools and features included in products like Flock to make this easier than ever before. I'll be using this forum to let you know how it goes.

Blogged with Flock

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Back to my New Toy: Portability of Information

Sony Ericsson Cyber-shot K790 Camera Phone

I'm still working out the kinks in my new-found access to information, where my phone has the potential to become a mobile navigation aide, help me keep track of appointments and items on my "To Do" list, and generally make life easier. I would love the Sony Ericsson K800/K790 even if it didn't have the camera. Here are some of the things I found I can do anywhere, rather than being stuck in front of a computer:
  • Check my Vonage Voicemail: This one was tricky, but now works great. I love Vonage, but sometimes find their website a little frustrating. Their voicemail page is particularly slow to respond, so I went to some length to make it accessible from elsewhere some time ago. I set up a private Google Group for just Allison and myself, including virtual members like our cell phones' SMS addresses, to which our voicemail alerts are sent, with attached messages in .wav format. I had previously set the voicemail alerts to go to my Gmail account, which then passed them on to my cell, but I wanted Allison to have similar visibility and didn't want to keep cluttering my Gmail Inbox with these messages. The Google Group helps us both keep up to date with our home voicemail by letting us both know when somebody has cared enough to leave a message. I was getting the individual alerts sent to my phone, Allison to her Gmail Inbox, and I would also get a daily summary in my Gmail Inbox. Now that this Google Group contains lots of messages, all with the same information, it in turn has gotten hard to navigate and retrieve messages. This is where my K790 comes in. It supports IMAP "Push" email which, unlike SMS, supports attachments. After months of searching, I finally found a free IMAP mail service that supports this "Push" service. It's from our good old friends at AOL! Their AIM.com email service just happens to do what I need. I managed to dig up my account information (I had put it away after it got me married) and set up the email account. Configuring the phone was fairly easy as well. Sony Ericsson provided the setup for AOL email to my phone via SMS, which I then changed to reflect the AIM.com domain. Now, I get immediate notification that a message was left, I can download it to the phone to listen to, and then delete the message when I'm done with it.
  • Check News headlines and weather forecasts: The K800/790 has a built in RSS reader, which allows each feed to be individually customized.
  • Find lower-priced gas: I've found a number of services offering mobile access to prices at local gas stations. In 5 clicks (browser-down-down-down-select) I can see a list of the lowest gas prices in my area. This service is one linked to by Cingular, but if you want my all around favorite check out www.gasbuddy.com. They support mobile web browsers as well as SMS services. They also allow you to submit updated prices.
  • For you Outlook users, there is software available called MobyToday, which taps your phone's PIM attributes (appointments and To Do list) and puts them together on screen like Outlook Today does as well as any Windows Mobile device. It's really handy to see these items on your standby screen if you are the type wanting that information in your face. I discovered I didn't really need it at about the same time I discovered I couldn't get my theme's background to show up as the MobyToday background. Oh well. Reminders are really enough for me.
  • Navigation: This is still a work in progress. I've found a few navigation apps that can use a bluetooth connected GPS to show location information. You can find an appropriate GPS for less than $60. My idea is that I can leave the GPS in the car charging until I get in, dock the phone in it's dash holder, which would also charge it, and start the navigation app. Conceivably these devices could also be used as a two-piece bike computer as well. I've got an OLD Garmin GPSII on my bike now, which it is not ideally suited for, as it takes so long to acquire the satellites.
One other feature to note on this phone -and to look for on other phones-, is Bluetooth 2.0. Don't get a phone without it. In this day when hands-free features are becoming not only prevalent, but required by law, being able to maintain simultaneous connections is really handy. My Moto RAZR had decent bluetooth support, but I had to turn off (or tell the phone to disconnect) my headset if I wanted to wirelessly sync calendar/contacts, which then turned into a pain if someone called because it could only maintain one connection at a time, and I still don't like the idea of holding a cell phone up to the side of my head. With Bluetooth 2.0, I can keep the headset connected all the time, no matter what other bluetooth devices may be clamoring for attention.

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Soapbox Time!

This one is near and dear to me, and has been for some time. Distracted driving has become more and more of an issue as the number of guests, gadgets, or food items increase in cars these days.

I have a long history of gadget admiration and consider myself to have been a bit of a road warrior in the past (how's Pascagoula, MS to Portland, OR solo in 52 hours?). After acquiring a wife, house, and two small children, the gadgets and road trips are much fewer and far between. I used to have a small, but delightfully overpowered Chevy Corsica that was near to invisible on the road. It was fully outfitted with counter-intelligence equipment for optimal "safe driving", which meant I had a good idea of where I could get away with speeding and where I couldn't. Here's what I had tucked away in there:
  • CB radio: After throwing a rod (thanks Jiffy Lube) and getting stuck between Charlottesville, VA and the Blueridge Parkway with two guests, I didn't want to be without some form of emergency communication, should the need arise. The first thing I bought after getting the engine replaced for $95 (thanks Chrysler warranty) was to purchase an under-dash Citizen's Band Radio. The first one I had was a little large for the space available in my car, and was quickly replaced by a Cobra everything-in-the-handset unit once I read about my next "safe driving" aide. I purchased a cell phone mounting kit (for cell phones that had separate handsets, remember?) to keep it beside the center console, where I could hear it clearly and grab it quickly if I had anything to say (which didn't happen often). After getting a free paint job (thanks for the peeling paint, Chevy) I changed from a trunk lid mounted antenna, to an adhesive glass mount antenna on the upper right portion of the rear window. I had read up on how antenna placement can affect the directionality of your reception, so I compromised between ease of installation
    and center placement, with the antenna for the next gadget already being present on the left side of the same window.
  • Mobile Police Band Scanning Radio: This was one was the most fun I've ever gotten from a "driving aide". It was my main reason for replacing my first CB radio, as there was no other adequate place to install it than under the dashboard, above my left knee. This was a revolutionary idea in police detection at the time. I had been living in and out of Virginia, where RADAR detectors are illegal, but wanted some fair way to detect the fuzz residing outside my naval. The Uniden Beartracker BCT-2 didn't have more than a two-digit display, but the trick it had was listening for mobile repeaters installed in the vehicles of state and local law enforcement. They have about a 3-mile range to make sure the officer's hip radios work properly. If somebody keyed their microphone on any of those systems and my BearTracker picked it up (with wild beeping and a bright flashing red light), then I knew I was close to old Smokey. I had to look around to finally find a store that had one, and it was at a Truck Stop, no less. A few years later, I replaced it with a BCT-7, which added a real scanner diplay, more monitoring bands (including CB), and fit in the same bracket. Not having seen any active use in a number of years, I recently loaned my BCT-7 to a friend who was in training to become a police officer. I like to think I helped, as he has since graduated from the academy he later attended.
  • RADAR detector: I went through two of these too! Both from Uniden. Having been a fan of the Valentine One detectors since their inception, but not wanting to fork over the cash for one (thanks for never dropping the price, Mike!) I found a fairly capable Uniden 4-band detector (how many do they do now? this was back in 1993!) for my car. Having read and re-read any dectector comparison I could get my hands on, I was looking for optimal placement, that would not be too obvious to the casual onlooker as I was all about stealth, and keeping passers-by passing by. My decision was to cut the clutter of detector and power cord that would be found by attaching the detector to the base of the windshield, and put it just below the window tinting, on the right of the rearview mirror. I powered it by tapping the power to the map lights in the mirror, keeping the cord short, and minimizing the visual impact of the detector. Instead of suction cups, I used adhesive lock strips to anchor the mounting bracket of the detector to the windshield. I replaced this detector with a newer model later, featuring Voice Alert to verbally announce alerts.
  • Stereo system: Nothing fantastic. No extra amps or processors. Just a Pioneer KEH-P8200 with 12disc CD changer. Before you dismiss this little-known head unit, know that it was the most complicated car stereo I have ever seen. Literally, you could not perform many basic functions, like track/station seek without using the remote control. The state of the world when I bought this "car radio" was such that CDs had not fully displaced tapes, and I was still using tapes on a semi-regular basis. The P8200 had a great tape transport that could actually repeat songs, and had a number of features to make tapes sound their best, including Dolby C Noise Reduction. How was the radio? Amazing! In the early days of RDS, with spotty usage at best, Pioneer came up with something less flexible, but more complete: Attached via fixed umbilical cord was a small box containing the entire list of FCC licensed AM & FM radio station, their format, and approximate location. You could tell the stereo what state it was in, and it could scan the bands to tell you what city you were close to. I could drive across the country listening to only the format of radio station I wanted.
  • My last road gadget was not affixed to the car, but was always ready in the center console. It was one of the early pocket-sized highway directories. I could enter the state, interstate highway number, direction, and mile-post to find the closest services or find out how far to specific businesses. It was quite invaluable when used in concert with AAA Trip-Tiks.
My whole point here it that I had a few simple devices, and a few more that were rather complex. Today I was reading some opinions about cell phones, GPS, and other distractions on the road, and which ones should be allowed. One particular opinion struck a chord with me. They said that any driver should wanting do anything else while driving should take driving test doing that same thing, be it eating food, reading a book, fiddling with the stereo, or anything else.

I whole-heartedly agree. I think that anybody performing a task that could have a potential effect on anyone else should have some level of qualification for that task. If you are all alone in an empty parking lot, and can verify nobody else is present, then I say you can take that opportunity to play around. If not, then you had better be practicing your best "all business" driving. The latest benefits of technology can provide such great benefits, PLEASE make sure you are well versed in using them. Look for ways to minimize the requirements for your attention to leave the road, and keep your eyes open for the other folks not doing such a good job.

Thanks!!

Monday, May 21, 2007

kEnny's New Toy

My latest toy is finally almost fully operational. A few months ago I purchased a wireless phone on Ebay, which I had thought I thoroughly researched. I had read that the mechanism required to unlock this phone was rather complicated, and that it would cost a little more than most others. The combination of features offered by this phone seemed to be worth it to me. It’s the Sony Ericsson K790a.

I made the purchase from a Canadian seller who got the phone to me in good time. Being as it was locked to Rogers AT&T, I could not use it yet. When I set out to find the best place to get the phone unlocked, I seemed to be suddenly running across lots of places saying they could no longer unlock any of the Sony Ericsson db2020 phones (that’s the name for the encrypted locking technique or something associated with it). I made an inquiry to a business that had unlocked another phone for me before, and they said they could unlock it with no problem. Right there I was both happy and suspicious. Could they really do it, or did they possibly not know about the recent “Lockdown on unlocking?” It turned out to be the latter. They were able to unbrand (this removes the software limitations and new software installed for Rogers) the phone right away, but unlocking was a different matter entirely. I let them hang onto it for about a month and a half, so they could try new releases of whatever product they are using to unlock phones, with no success. When I asked for the phone back, it was returned promptly and I was refunded most of the money I paid. Half of it had been for the successful unbranding of the phone. I consider this to have been very generous, as I felt like I was taking advantage of their misunderstanding about their being able to unlock the phone in the first place.

Getting the phone unlocked was an interesting adventure. While there are many b&m stores inviting you to mail or carry your db2020 phone to them for unlocking, I could only find one that would perform remote unlocking of db2020 phones. They had all kinds of downloads available for connecting hidden USB devices, flashing, & unlocking phones. I followed their instructions to generate a file to email to them. My first attempt to send this file was thwarted by my choice of email service. I use Earthlink as my email address, but have it set to forward everything to Gmail, which is set to send messages with Earthlink as my return address. It’s great for dropping the spam, but not when the place you need to send a file to is expecting it from the domain you originally gave to them. I logged into Earthlink’s webmail interface to send the file and waited for about 8 hours for the return file to arrive. I was at work when I got it, and of course the unlocking software required access to the internet. My employer uses proxy servers to access the outside world’s internet, and of course the unlocking software did not have options for using proxies, so I drove to a local strip-mall where a number of businesses have free wi-fi. I sat there for almost an hour trying to get it to work. I finally figured out that I didn’t have all of the correct drivers installed, but by the time I got them running, my laptop had decided to turn off it’s wi-fi adapter. Doh!! I at lunch and tried it again. BINGO!!! I made a call, received an SMS message, and went back to work.

That night I spent a good bit of time getting to know the phone, the camera, and many of their various options. The Sony Ericsson website has lots of useful information, including a feature that will send an SMS message to you to automatically configure your phone for MMS, web access, and email. I used them all. Once I had everything working to my satisfaction, I (watch out!!!) changed my data plan from 200 SMS messages per month, to unlimited web/video & 200 messages (SMS/MMS/IM/Email) per month. Immediately, nothing worked. Coincidentally, my wife couldn’t send or receive MMS messages for the rest of the night either.

The next morning, I found I could send SMS messages out, even to email addresses. The return address was rejected when replying from email accounts, however. Using a specific combination of phone number and Cingular email extension, I was finally able to find an address that would get messages from my email account to the phone as well. I called Cingular with my now-specific complaint, and after spending almost an hour and a half explaining that the phone does the job fine, that they needed to fix the way they were handling (or not) messages for me after changing my data plan, I was left with two interesting things: The CSR I was speaking with didn’t really know what was going on as he told me I should not expect the addressing problem to be resolved, and that everything was going to start working okay again. Allison sent a message from her Gmail account, which I replied to, then she replied back and my phone saw it just fine. WOW!!

After some time getting to know how to navigate with the phone’s built in Netfront web browser, and playing with Opera Mobile, I still don’t know which one I like more, but I’m left to use Netfront more in general because the phone’s built in RSS reader opens links with it. I used to get an SMS message every morning to tell me what to expect for weather, but now I don’t have to waste messages on that, because the phone gets RSS feeds for weather and news headlines every day.

I’ll add updates later as I smooth out my day-to-day operations with this phone. For now, I’m gonna say that I love it, and am glad I waited for it.

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

HTPC-to-be #1

The parts are on the way. If you want to see what's on tap, you can go here, and click on the link for "My Home Theater" to see the HTPC components along with the rest of the home theater components.

The case will blend nicely with the rest of the home theater components' silver theme, and the PC can be tucked away inside the TV stand. I'm looking at auditioning MythTV for media feeding, DVD playback, and possibly handling TV recordings.

Thursday, January 18, 2007

HTPC Dreams

While looking for something to do, and worrying about all the holiday shows and movies that were piling up on our DVR, I decided to bring my desktop computer down to the living room and see what I could do about connecting it to our home theater. I swapped out the older video card (Geforce 6600LE) for a newer model, a Geforce 7600GS, in the hopes of playing a few games at the TV's full resolution via DVI. The motherboard has optical digital audio output and firewire built in, so I can send Dolby Digital Live to the audio receiver and capture the transport stream from the DVR for temporary storage.

With a little tweaking I was up and running, playing Half Life 2 @ 1920x1080, and getting really scared at how immersive the game could be. Wow! I really loved playing it at my desk, but it was nothing like this. I'm literally too scared to play for more than a half hour at a time.

I was able to find instructions and software to capture programs from the DVR and save, view, or burn them to DVD from the HTPC. This is pretty cool in a time when there are so many good shows in HD and our DVR has a relatively small hard disk. While playing shows on the DVR to record them on the PC, I was able to watch the un-aired episodes of Vanished in near-HD quality by pointing my browser to the show's M*Space page. By dropping the display resolution to 1280x720, and expanding the streaming video in the browser, it almost filled the screen.

One of my reasons for wanting a home theater PC is to more easily control our television. One of its weaknesses is that it has no discreet remote-control command to switch it the second HDMI/DVI input. All other inputs can either be selected by their own code, or by toggling through each one in succession. The other weakness is that it ignores anything you tell it to do while it is switching between inputs, which takes a few seconds (we'll call it 4) to do.

The "exciting" new bit about having the PC nearby is that have been able to experiment with the serial port on the TV's back panel. I managed to find a program that would allow me to send commands to the TV, by manually constructing the words required for the TV to pay attention. I was able to send commands to switch between a number of inputs. Just about every function available from the remote control can be duplicated through the RS-232 interface. My Pioneer receiver has serial control, too. I have found a few references to controlling Pioneer components, and that will be the next challenge.

I am starting to see the Infra-Red Light at the End of the Tunnel. My goal is to have a small "not-quite-a-PC" appliance sitting in the entertainment center that can be connected to most of the devices there, that would receive a specific set of commands from my remote for which it responds by changing the TV and receiver's inputs, and be the main interface to the entertainment center's UPS. Until I have that device, I can use the HTPC for the same job, and develop the device using the HTPC. An interesting possibility would be to put the "intelligent" bits into the wireless router (a Linksys WRT54G currently running DD-WRT software) and connect an Ethernet accessed serial controller of some sort to it.


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Heroes Alert!!!
On Monday night, January 22nd, during a commercial break on Deal or No Deal, there will be a sneak preview of a new and previously unknown Hero. I can't wait!
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