MissionDesign

5 Reasons I hate the iPhone

Sun, 23 Oct 2011 11:50:00 -0500

Well..."hate" maybe not hate, but here are the reasons I won't part with my hard earned money on an iPhone or any other "i" apple product. I'm writing this down because I'm tired of having to explain this to my iSheep friends.

No Flash. I'm a flash developer and can't get past this one.
Battery. Come on, I'm an adult, give me a removable panel where I can replace my own battery.
Memory. I expect a microSD card slot so I can add up to 32gb of memory.
iOS developer license. Really? I have to pay $100 just to have the privileged of compiling an iPhone app...I don't think so. I don't mind buying a license to sell in your market, but to compile, come on.
iSheep cult. It used to be easy to stir up the iSheep, because they thought that all things Apple were the only way to go. Anyway, the way I see it, it's technology, I use what I need to get a job or task done. It's not a life style.

Captivate and Paragon RC5.1 ROM

Tue, 15 Feb 2011 17:43:00 -0500

Well. I did again....got the bug to flash a new ROM(Paragon RC5.1), started researching and found Paragon ROM. Read through many , many pages of forum posts about how great it was, so decided to give it a try. I document it here, not for you, but so I have a reference of what I did.

Backed up with TiBU
ODIN to Stock
ODIN Master clear
OneClickRoot
Copy ROM and update.zip to SD Card.
Reboot into recovery.
Choose Reinstall packages (did this twice).
Choose Install zip from sdcard.
Choose zip from sdcard.
Restore from TiBU, apps and userdata.
ENJOY

It's like getting a new phone everytime I flash, sometimes a nice new phone...sometimes a awesome new phone. So far this rom gets, "awesome". GPS lock takes just a few seconds and locks within 10' in less than a minute. Everthing works like butter...nice and smooth.

Cognition ROM 3.0.2 for Samsung Captivate

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 18:04:00 -0500

Not being the type to leave well enough alone...I started looking at the new ROMs being published on XDA developers forum. I noticed that designgears was no longer developing the Cognition 2.xx version and had moved on to Cognition 3.x. I appreciate that he is trying to keep a 'pure' capivate ROM and not a generic i9000 ROM. This one is based on the Roger's Canadian Samsung Froyo ROM.

So far this is the smoothest and fastest my phone has operated. Looking forward to some gingerbread goodness for my cappy one day.

What I did:

[Download mode/USB Debugging on] Flashed back to stock with Odin one click. Also, Had to install drivers as I just rebuilt my laptop (Windows 7 pro 64bit).
Rooted stock ROM with SuperOneClick root.
Downloaded/Installed ROM Manager from Android Market.
Downloaded Cognition ROM 3.0.2, copied to root of internal sd card.
Ran ROM Manager, "Install ROM from SD card" and found zip file I just copied over.
Had to remove the battery during flash because the process hung at "finding install package". Replaced battery and flash resumed as expected. *whew*
Retored apps using TiBU, "apps and user data".
Done

One other note worthy comment, I unplugged my phone ~8am....look at that battery meter! 70% with moderate use, wifi, data, few calls, etc

AT&T Samsung Captivate (Galaxy S) - Root, Froyo 2.2

Mon, 08 Nov 2010 16:15:00 -0500

I have had the AT&T Samsung Captivate for about 6mo and watching the Froyo 2.2 update get pushed back 30days every month I decided to take my froyo fate into my own hands. I began by reading xda forums on the "superoneclickroot" process. Feeling confident that I can root my phone with out creating a brick...I proceed.

I downloaded the v1.5.4 of SuperOneClick, extracted to the desktop, connected my phone, making sure not to mount the sd card and click. "Samsung Captivate", "Get Unlock Code". Runs, get an affirmative response., Then click, "Root" on the other tab. Runs for awhile, then looks like it hangs when it gets to "Installing Superuser.apk", but it had actually finished, just didn't respond the way I expected.

Rebooted the phone, and now I'm "rooted", yippee....so now what, right?

Installed ROM Manager by Clockworkmod, created a backup of my current ROM, then backup my SD card to an external harddrive. At least now I think I can revert, if needed.

Next, find a Froyo 2.2 ROM that I like. After searching unlocker.com I found Cognition - Voodoo ROM, read through the forums, seemed like lots of happy ROM users, so I downloaded. Changed the name of the zip file to update.zip, place in the root of my phone internal SD and Click, "Install ROM from SD card" in ROM Manager, point it to the update.zip file, and sit back and watch in amazement(and nervousness) as my phone does the rest.

Reboots, into 2.2 and done....well not yet. I install appbrain from market and sync all my apps back to the phone. I'm sure there is a better backup method for apps, but I didn't look into it.

Was it worth it???? Well, of course it was!!!! The phone is much snappier, apps load much faster(MUCH)..well at least noticibly faster. Plus, I don't have the AT&T bloatware anymore. On top of that...I have gained some knowledge(albeit useless), still more knowledge :)

My Quadrant Standard score: 1554

[UPDATE]

Decided to flash to the newest 2.3b6 so...here's what I did:

Download/installed Odin One Click. Open, Odin, Booted phone in 'Download' mode, plugged in usb cable(usb debug mode on). Odin does it's thing and flashes back to stock.
Rooted phone using SuperOneClick root 1.5.5. Ran, click get Unlock Code, then 'Root', wait till finished, done, rooted with superuser.apk installed
Download ROM Manager, install.
Copy new ROM to SD card of phone, renamed update.zip.
Open ROM Manager and "install ROM from SD", click OK, then, "back-up existing ROM", I choose not to, I did check Clear Data.
Phone reboots, click 'install', wait for ROM to finish.
Download Titanium Back-up(TiBU), yes I paid for the Pro version. Did the Galaxy S fix, (Prefs, App processing Mode, AUTO/Indirect), then reboot phone.
Run TiBU, Backup/Restore, Batch, Restore missing apps + all system data.
Enjoying my fresh ROM!

My Quadrant Standard score: 1520
not sure why I'd drop 34 pts.

Testing qik.com

Mon, 06 Sep 2010 14:04:00 -0500

Wii, Tiger Woods '09 and Netopia router

Tue, 19 May 2009 14:12:00 -0500

In attempt to play Tiger Woods '09 golf online today, I had to change some configurations on my router. It wasn't that difficult, but I'm sure the average user won't be playing online, unless they have a 'tech' friend to open ports on their router.

Hardware:

Wii
Netopia router(Type: 0x69, Model 3347.02)

Configuration steps:

Click on Configure in the upper Menu bar.
Click on Advanced.
Under the NAT heading in the Network Configuration box, click on the Pinhole selection.
Click on the Add button.
In the Pinhole Entry box, enter the parameters for your pinhole. For example, to add your Wii:
1. In the Pinhole Entries table, in the first line, type the name you would like associated with the pinhole. For this example you might call it Wii EA Sports for the EA server. PLEASE NOTE: Each pinhole you configure must have a unique name associated with it. If you should duplicate the pinhole name in a subsequent entry, it will overwrite the first entry.
2. Protocol Select is TCP by default. Different protocols can be selected from the drop-down menu when appropriate. Select UDP.
3. External Port Start is 100 for this example.
4. External Port End is also 3700 for this example.
5. Enter the Internal IP Address of your Wii. ex. 192.168.1.4
6. The Internal Port is 3678. From the nintendo website.
7. Click on Submit to save the changes.
Save and Restart router.

There's more info on the ninendo website regarding firewalls: www.nintendo.com/consumer/systems/wii/en_na/onlineFirewall.jsp

Inauguration day 2009 - Join the NRA

Mon, 29 Dec 2008 07:11:00 -0500

*From a recent email I sent to everyone in my contacts*:

I'm not usually sending email blasts out to everyone in my contacts, but feel that with the upcoming political power shifts that we need to support an organization that fights for our 2nd amendment rights. If you're offended by this email, sorry...I'll only be sending this once.

My hope is to propagate this message across the internet to everyone you know, they know, etc..

My charge is to have all those people join/renew NRA membership on inauguration day, Jan 20th 2009. Not only will this help the NRA continue to fight for gun ownership rights, but will hopefully resonate this message across our great nation.

The link for NRA membership:
http://membership.nrahq.org/default.aspx?campaignid=nranews

Anyway, if you found this message, great! Please forward it to all your friends, family, etc...

Blackjack Dropped Calls

Wed, 10 Dec 2008 10:16:00 -0500

I had this problem on my Blackjack, and I was ready to return it! I went to my Cingular store, and the rep told me that the issue is with the stability of the 3G network, not the Blackjack per se.

The fix is to force the phone into GSM mode. There is a *# code you can use for this - it's the same one used to help with power savings.

Dial *#1546792*#
Hit 3
Then 5
Select GSM
Hit Done
Then end

As an alternative create a shortcut in \windows\start menu to \windows\adminsettings.exe. adminsettings.exe give the same menu as the number above.

You can also create a shortcut to bandsel.exe the same way, and select GSM850.

Prior to this trick, I was dropping over 50% of my calls. Since forcing GSM mode, I have not dropped a single call. As an added bonus, the battery life is much better. Even web surfing works fine in GSM Edge mode. The only time I would switch to 3G (WCDMA) is if I were tethered to a laptop.

My Blackjack 2 upgrade to Windows 6.1

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 13:57:00 -0500

OK, I did it. Not sure why...still not sure, anyway I did it. I followed the instructions on the Samsung website and resources from myblackjack2.com. Thought I'd put the steps here in case I need to do it again for some strange reason.

Steps

Step 1: Backed up my stuff on dashwire.com. Thanks Dashwire!
Step 2: Downloaded the Windows 6.1 updater from Samsung's website. Thanks Samsung!
Step 3: Removed my SIM card and microSD card(why? just in case) from my BJ2.
Step 4: Powered up BJ2 and ran the updater, followed all the prompts, clicked were needed.
Step 5: Rebooted BJ2
Step 6: Reinstalled everything

Issues

Had to modify registry to allow ICS:
- * Find the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Comm\ConnMgr\Providers
- * Under one of the GUIDs you'll find a Connections folder that will have an entry for each of your connections
- * Under each connection, find the ReadOnly key and set its value to 0 (zero).
- edit my AT&T ISP connection, changing the Access point to wap.cingular

Benefits of Windows Mobile 6.1

Really cool sliding home page
Voice Command, not bad...might prove useful
Threaded SMS, I guess...but I don't 'text' much.

That's it, not sure it was worth the time involved, but it's done.

Blackjack 2 Registry Hacks for Windows Mobile

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 20:16:00 -0500

This article will cover some of the changes we are able to make to our Windows mobile devices, through our devices registry.
Disable menu animations

To disable menu animations (sliding in/out) and speed up performance of the UI a bit:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GWE\Menu\AniType = 0 (DWORD decimal)
To change it back to the default:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GWE\Menu\AniType = 6 (DWORD decimal)

Disable window animations

To disable window animations (minimizing/maximizing) and speed up performance of the UI a bit:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GWE\Animate = 0 (DWORD decimal)
And to switch them back on:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GWE\Animate = 1 (DWORD decimal)

Increase font cache

To increase the font cache, speeding up font rendering at the cost of a bit of memory:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GDI\GLYPHCACHE\limit = 16384 (DWORD decimal)
To change it back to the default:
HKLM\SYSTEM\GDI\GLYPHCACHE\limit = 8192 (DWORD decimal)
You can set the value to pretty much anything you like

Enable FileSystem cache

To enable the FileSystem cache, speeding up overall performance at the risk of the cache not being written on a sudden reset:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\FATFS\EnableCache = 1 (DWORD decimal)
To disable again:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\FATFS\EnableCache = 0 (DWORD decimal)

Note that by default, the cache size is zero, and you will see no effect. See "Increase FileSystem cache" to incease the cache size

Increase FileSystem cache

To increase the file system cache:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\FATFS\CacheSize = 4096 (DWORD decimal)
To return the file system cache to zero:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\FATFS\CacheSize = 0 (DWORD decimal)
You can set the value to pretty much anything you like

Increase FileSystem filter cache

To enable the file system filter cache, speeding up overall performance with file mangement:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\Filters\fsreplxfilt\ReplStoreCacheSize = 4096 (DWORD decimal)
To return the file system filter cache to zero:
HKLM\System\StorageManager\Filters\fsreplxfilt\ReplStoreCacheSize = 0 (DWORD decimal)
You can set the value to pretty much anything you like

Change the thickness of scrollbars

To change the thickness of the scrollbars at the right/bottom of documents larger than the screen, adjust...
For the horizontal (bottom) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cyHScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
For the vertical (right) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cxVScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
The default thickness is 13. You can set the value to pretty much anything you like

Change the length of scrollbar arrow buttons

To go with changing the thickness of the scrollbars, you may wish to change the length of the scrollbar arrow buttons...
For the horizontal (bottom) scrollbar arrows:
HKLM\System\GWE\cyVScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
For the vertical (right) scrollbar:
HKLM\System\GWE\cxHScr = 9 (DWORD decimal)
The default length is 13. You can set the value to pretty much anything you like

Enable ClearType in Landscape mode

To enable ClearType in Landscape mode:
HKLM\System\GDI\ClearTypeSettings\OffOnRotation = 0 (DWORD decimal)
To disable:
HKLM\System\GDI\ClearTypeSettings\OffOnRotation = 1 (DWORD decimal)

Bold = hacks I've used

Help ban H2O today!

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:16:00 -0500

Interestingly enough...this doesn't suprise me.

Econ river speed run

Mon, 28 Jul 2008 09:33:00 -0500

With all the rain we've had lately, it was decided to run the river..speed style. Not speed speed...just as fast as Jeremy and I can paddle a tandum yak. Jeremy made the call last week about a <2hr econ run(*What!!*), that obviously meant NO fishing :(

Well..almost no fishing. In a moment of brilliance, I decided to tie a top water soft bait to the back of the kayak with some 14lb line. It bobbed along behind for about a quarter of the trip when a branch snagged and popped the line. Can't blame me for trying.

Anyway, we managed a good pace, with no portages and clocked an impressive 1hr 55min econ river trip. The normal milage on the river is 8.2 miles from SR419 launch to the Snow Hill rd bridge. This trip, due to the flood stage of the river, and a few short cuts, was 7.43 miles.

Next time..maybe more fishing, less paddling. Beat that!

Click here for the map

Blackjack II Internet Sharing

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 09:03:00 -0500

My at&t wireless Blackjack II was not bundled with Internet Connection Sharing which is a part of the standard Windows Mobile 6 application set. For those of us on the go and traveling this is a must have program to connect our laptops to the Internet while sitting in the airport or other locations outside of the office. Why it was left off I am not sure. A few Googles later and I had found out there was already a hack to provide the application. To setup Internet Connection Sharing for the Blackjack II I followed these steps (paraphased from the Howard forums).

Step1: Make sure your device is app unlocked!!; run secpolicies.cab first if unsure or the certs won't take!! **run this cab and reboot; http://sems.org/content/download/secpolicies.cab. Use Activesync to move this file to your 'My Documents'. You have to use 'File Explorer' to install these cab's from the device.

Step2: REBOOT (means turn off/on) THE DEVICE!

Step3: Install the BJ.WM6.ICS.Enable cab file (it might ask you to reboot)

Step4: navigate to \My Documents and click on the certs.cab file

Step5: REBOOT

Step6: Changed settings/connections/gprs/AT&T IMS/Access Point from isp.cingular to wap.cingular. After looking at my data acees on my att bill all internet access(phone or tethered) is logged as to/from as wap.cingular.

Step7: go to Start / Applications and run 'Internet Sharing'. You phone will indicate that it's making a connection, once connected the display will show 'Connected'. At this point you can surf the web, email , etc. You may need to disable Activesync while Internet Sharing. Also, incoming calls will break your connection. I'm connected to my laptop with the USB cable and haven't tried using Bluetooth, which should work as well.

Downloads:
BJ.WM6.ICS.Enable cab file is temporarily hosted at:
http://www.mdots.net/misc/BJ.WM6.ICS.Enable.cab

http://sems.org/content/download/secpolicies.cab

References:
I found this example on the the following board:
http://howardforums.com/showthread.php?t=1290859&page=2&pp=15

Also found on the at&t wireless support forums:
http://forums.wireless.att.com/cng/board/message?board.id=samsung&thread.id=45502&view=by_date_ascending&page=4

Disclaimer: Don't hack your phone if you don't know what you're doing. I provide these instructions UNSUPPORTED. So don't get upset if I don't reply to requests for help...all though I may ;)

Coldfusion and Geocoding with Google & Yahoo Map API's

Wed, 07 May 2008 22:52:00 -0500

Recently I needed to create a Google map driven solution that required geocoded addresses. After poking around the Google Maps API and looking at other solutions I decided that I'd batch geocode the address I needed and store the coordinates in the database with the address data. This would prevent numerous geocode call to the API and should make things run a bit faster. While looking for examples of Coldfusion and Google maps I really didn't find anything that met my needs so I started from scratch. Here's what I did:

First thing that you'll need is a Google maps key. Get one here.

{code}<cfset ghostKey = "yourKeyGoesHere">{/code}

Next make the http call to Google. You pass in three parameters: q='address to geocode' output='xml' key='hostkey'. So your request is formatted as:

{code} <cfset address2geocode = "4151 N. Atlantic Ave., Cocoa Beach, Fl, 32931">
<cfhttp url="http://maps.google.com/maps/geo?q=#address2geocode#&output=xml&key=#ghostKey#" resolveurl="no" /> {/code}

I chose xml as output and was easy to work with. You can choose XML, KML or JSON. Look at the Google API for more info.

You can view the http results here: results.xml

Cool, two lines of code so far and we have a result. As you can see the XML is well formatted and easy to parse at this point. There are a view 'gotcha's' as well. First check to see if XML was returned.

{code} <cfif isXML(cfhttp.filecontent)> {/code}

If so, xmlParse it:

{code}<cfset geocodedXML = #xmlParse(cfhttp.filecontent)#>{/code}

Next you want to make sure you're getting a response code of 200, walk the XML to find Status.code:

{code}<cfset curResponse = #geocodedXML.kml.Response.Status.code.xmlText#>
<cfif curResponse is "200">{/code}

Great! we can proceed. If you look at the result.xml file you'll see an node for Accuracy. For my application I needed an accuracy of 8.

{code} <cfif geocodedXML.kml.Response.Placemark.AddressDetails.XmlAttributes.Accuracy eq 8> {/code}

Now I can grab the Longitude and Latitude to update the database:

{code} <cfset coords = #geocodedXML.kml.Response.Placemark.Point.coordinates.xmlText#>
<cfset accuracy = #geocodedXML.kml.Response.Placemark.AddressDetails.XmlAttributes.Accuracy#>
<cfset longitude = listFirst(coords)>
<cfset latitude = listGetAt(coords, 2)>
<cfquery datasource="dsn" name="updateCoords">
update myTable
set longitude = '#longitude#',
latitude = '#latitude#',
geocode_accuracy = #accuracy#
where pk = #pk#
</cfquery>
{/code}

Pretty straight forward. But, if you remember I had a cfif that wanted an accuracy of 8, if not try Yahoo. No problem...just as easy as Googles...pretty much, just different. You guess it! you'll need a Yahoo API key too.

{code}<cfelse>
<cfset yahooAppID = "yourYahooAPIKeyGoesHere">
<cfhttp url="http://local.yahooapis.com/MapsService/V1/geocode?appid=#yahooAppID#&street=#address#&city=#city#&state=#state#" resolveurl="no" />{/code}

Do the neccesary check for good reponse Yahoo's XML Result:

{code}<cfif isXML(cfhttp.filecontent)>
<cfset geocodedXML = #xmlParse(cfhttp.filecontent)#>{/code}

Yahoo deosn't have a 'Accruacy node, they have precision and the best 'precision' you can have is address level. Any way, walk the XML grab the coords and off you go.

{code}<cfset longitude = "#geocodedXML.ResultSet.Result.Longitude.XmlText#">
<cfset latitude = "#geocodedXML.ResultSet.Result.Latitude.XmlText#">{/code}

That's it. simple geocoding using Coldfusion and/or Yahoo! I don't blog much, but hope to get a post on how to create dynamic Google maps using Coldfusion.

Santos 'Epic' ride

Sat, 09 Feb 2008 22:29:00 -0500

Click here for the map