Mobile
Best Alarm Clock Ever
I got a G1 a while ago. I have found the Alarm to be pretty lacking in the sense you can’t change the default Snooze time out from 10mins to any thing else. This is way to long I will have fallen fast asleep by the time the next one goes off and the first one wont have done any thing.
Luckily Android is open-source and some one modified the pre-installed alarm to create Alarming!.
This new-and-improved alarm functionality allows for a “Captcha on Dismiss” this sounds kinda scary but really it is amazing! Often I will press the dismiss button instead of snooze and over sleep this makes it much harder by having to press random buttons on the screen to deactivate the alarm. See the image one their home page.
Mxit Attempt packaging
Mxit released their open platform a while ago as part of this platform they created an plug-in for libpurple the library that both Pidgin and Adium.
I am very pleased that the code is available as well as deb’s for my ubuntu machine. When running the deb it was presented with
MXit libPurple Plugin
MXit libPurple Plugin
(Converted from a rpm package by alien version 8.72.)
I was under the impression that debs were easier to create then rpm’s? Also why are they making rpm’s as their primary packaging and trying to convert to deb’s also I find it odd that they have had more downloads for the deb platform
- MXit Pidgin Plugin v1.1.1 – Fedora 8/Red Hat (.rpm) (92.3 KiB, 364 hits)
- MXit Pidgin Plugin v1.1.1 – Debian/Ubuntu (.deb) (91.1 KiB, 387 hits)
- MXit libPurple Plugin v1.1.1 – Source Code (.tgz) (64.6 KiB, 446 hits)
Then again why are all those users downloading the source code? Is it because they don’t provide a 64bit arch package? Is it because they are removing the mxit promotional image at startup?
Who knows but I don’t really like to see my debs being created by Alien where there is a perfectly great Launchpad ppa’s Mxit.
How To Stop SMS Spam
This only really relates to South Africa.
Background:
Each Text Message (sms) comes from either a Short Code or a Long code or an users mobile number.
- User mobile numbers: currently 10digits long. Starting with (+27|0)(78).
- Short codes are 5digits long and start with 3 or 4. No international code since they are only valid in the current country.
- Long Codes are 10+digits with the international dialing code +27
First step when receiving unsolicited bulk messaging, is to try contact the party that it is being sent on behalf of. If you have an X account and are receiving messaging or you should simply be able to reply to the sms (either the short-code or long code) with stop | un-subscribe | remove, generally most systems should accept the stop.
Should this not work, visit Smscode but this only applies to sms’s that come from a short-code. There is a form on the site that allows you to see which wasp the short code is registered to. Once you have that information it is easiest to contact the wasp directly. They are governed by a strict code of conduct so should their actions not follow the CoC they stand a change of receiving a huge fine or having them selfs removed as a registered wasp.
The last resort is to lodge a complaint with waspa. This should generally only be used as a last resort should you be unable to contact the wasp or the 3rd party.
My Experience with waspa.
Last week was the final straw. I got another spam sms from X an under18′s event co-coordinator party planer type effort. I have no idea how I got on their list but their website didn’t provide a means to contact/un-subscribe. It originated from a Long code so I was unable to use Smscode to determine the wasp that the message was sent by. I logged a complaint on the waspa website on Friday 30th of April. I almost instantly cc’ed on the email to their support team containing all the relevant information. Later that day I got an email saying that one of waspa’s representatives was looking into this and I should receive an update with in 5 working days….
This afternoon(Friday 1st May, public holiday) I got a call from SmsPortal the wasp who actually sent the spam. He was extremely polite and assured me they had removed my number from X’s list and I should not receive any further contact from them.
Something else to note these methods are also valid for subscription services as well. Also note the un-subscribe sms needs to be on the cheapest possible short code since they can vary from R1.00 all the way up to R30.00. They take subscription services way more seriously then just standard bulk messaging.
Only time will tell but the quick response time and the guy really didn’t seem like first line support makes me feel as if this issue is now closed. I hope this will help any one else that relieves mobile spam. At least you know there is a relatively easy way of stopping it.
ZA’s nokia store joins others in failing
Further more on Nokia’s music store fail I recently found out that The South African branch or what ever they call them launched a localized version of the music store.
Nokia has a large(55.07%) share of the mobile’s with in South Africa in fact they have the largest, Yes I know this is only from people downloading applications but most of these users will be tech savvy enough to be able to use a mobile music store.
Back to the problem at hand. With this huge potential market Nokia’s za version of the store is even worse then worldwide and uk at least even with their bugs they allow any browser(mobile/web) to view their site and is mostly usable.
Firstly viewing the site from firefox. “Unsupported Device”
Nokia Music Store does not currently support your device. Further information about Nokia Music Store and compatible devices can be found at the Nseries web site.
You can access the Nokia Music Store from a PC using Internet Explorer
So that is what I did using Useragnet Switcher set to N85 one of the required Nseries I get redirected to an error page
An error has occurred – we apologise for the inconvenience.
If you are using a mobile device please try reloading the Nokia Music Store
If you are using a PC with Internet Explorer click here to try the main Nokia Music site
If the problem persists, then click here and tell us which page you were trying to view
Nokia are you trying to get users to use your product? The Uk version is complaining about slow sales? Maybe their product just doesn’t work good enough.
Their profits seems to be falling quite drastically is laying off staff an attempt to fix this?
Android Is Expanding
- Android releases CupCake (1.5) with some major improvements.
- Vodafone launches HTC-Magic in Spain.
- Samsung launches their first Android based phone the i7500
I must say from the pics of the HTC-Magic it looks like it has quiet a aesthetic improvement on the G1 although I think my black version looks much better.