Shreeram's bLoG

Windows Mobile Development: Tips 'n' Tricks

2008-02-25T22:18:00.000-08:00

[Been meaning to post this a long time back but finally got to it, so here's an initial dump]

Sometimes changing a registry key manually via CE Remote Tools doesn't seem to persist, especially noticeable if you soft reset right after changing a registry value. This is a known behavior due to disk buffering/writing optimizations and clarified in this blog post. If you write a registry key programmatically and you want to be absolutely certain its written out to disk, you can either use native RegFlushKey() call or, in .Net CF, the Flush() method of RegistryKey class (Note that RegistryState does not offer a flush mechanism). Use this flushing sparingly and after a group of registry writing activities rather than after each call.
Smartphone/PocketPC Detection:

This article highlights the deprecated features in Windows Mobile 6. Note that it mentions SPI_GETPLATFORMTYPE has been deprecated to be replaced by SPI_GETPROJECTNAME . That's important, as that is usually used to do intelligent behavior to handle Smartphone / PocketPC in the same code. Interestingly, even on WM6, SPI_GETPLATFORMTYPE still seems to work. So it is yet to get phased out in the early WM6 AKUs I guess.
Another way is, if you use same code but shared in separate projects for PocketPC/Smartphone via Visual Studio you get two pre-defined constants 'PocketPC' or 'Smartphone'. You can use these via '#if' directives.

In case you are wondering how to add a source file as a link in Visual Studio [From MSDN]: "To add a source file as a link, right-click on a project in Solution Explorer, and then click Add Existing Item. In the Add Existing Item dialog box, select the file that you want to add. Instead of clicking the Add button, click the arrow to the right of it (as shown in the following figure), and then click Add As Link.".

Doing processing in form Load call: If you have a form Load event handler where you wish to do processing after the form has loaded but wish to display form first while you process information Do a DoEverts() call after this.Show(). The form gets rendered first while you do further processsing in the Load call.

private void Form1_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
this.Show();
Application.DoEvents();
DoStuff();
}

Use SHGetSpecialFolderLocation to get the standard folders path on PocketPC/Smartphone: Not only is it safe in internationalization, but also you skip some systemic differences. For example, if you want to programmatically create a shortcut (via SHCreateShortcutEx) to your application to show in the the Programs folder then on Smartphone the folder is "\Windows\Windows\Start Menu\ " or on PocketPC it is "\Windows\Start Menu\Programs".
Connectivity Detection in WM6

Some very interesting properties can be found in the SystemState class in Microsoft.WindowsMobile.Status namespace (and dll).
Some interesting properties are

Number of network connections: SystemState.ConnectionsNetworkCount

Get the phone GPRS coverage : SystemState.PhoneGprsCoverage

SystemState.PhoneBlockedSim
SystemState.PhoneInvalidSim
SystemState.PhoneNoService
SystemState.PhoneNoSim
SystemState.PhoneRadioOff
SystemState.PhoneRadioPresent

Assembly Strong Naming, Type Loading and Plugins

Trying to load types dynamically using the AssemblyQualifiedName, say via Type.GetType() (format: [assembly], [version], [Culture], PublicKeyToken=)
The assembly has to be strong named to load a type by version. If its not strong named, then the version you specify is ignored, and the type would get loaded from an assembly irrespective of version.
Also, the assembly name is the name of assembly during the creation (i.e. during strong naming process). I.e. if you rename the assembly, and try to use the new name to load a Type from it, it will not work. GetType looks into the assembly metadata to get the original name of assembly.
If attempting to use this in say a dynamic plug-in manger/plug-in model you may come across InvalidCastException problem since the interface/shared elements are being used from the specific plug-in. To load different types in different plugins/assemblies, but which use the same interface, you can move the interface into its own little project so that the interface type is referenced by the plugins and the plugin manager/loader. Here is a nice post about the plugin model: http://www.yoda.arachsys.com/csharp/plugin.html

Wireless data connections such as WiFi on device get turned off when device is connected to computer via Activesync:

If you wish to have it enabled while device is connected to computer via ActiveSync it automatically turns off the Wireless connections. If you wish to enable this goto ActiveSync properties and check the last option.

[i]Phone or not?

2008-02-17T02:03:00.000-08:00

I'm going to skip the already discussed iPhone pros and cons like lack of 3G, GPS etc. I'm looking at it the way it is and what it is:

Pros:

Beautiful screen
Beautiful clean design - typical Apple
Crisp clean font
Multi-touch zooming and simple flicking of objects (pics, album art, text etc.)
Web Browser (first usable web browser on a phone in my opinion)
Love the proximity sensor that turns off the screen while talking (Cannot count the number of times my 'ear' would dial a number or click an application while I'm talking!)

Cons:

Packaging is great, but Apple could atleast include a basic sleeve or a transparent film for the screen or something. As it stands now, one pretty much has to buy an iPhone cover right away or risk scratching it. Something like the 5G iPod sleeve would be nice.
When dialing the number it would be nice to have the SmartDial features like in Windows Mobile (and other phones probably). Scrolling contacts is not always the easiest to find a contact. One always knows the name or number you want to call. SmartDial not only helps quick searching the contacts, but also inherently validates a number from the contacts list if you are typing by the number and not name. It also helps, if you partially remember a number you had dialed earlier and this smart lookup helps to narrow down the number you vaguely remember.
When typing in the search box (google/youtube) the automatic dictionary match shows below the text box and as soon as you hit 'Search' it picks the dictionary word instead of the one I typed! (usually one has to press a key like 'space bar' or something to pick the suggested work. The only way around this is, to type in the word, then tap/click on the text box again to dismiss the dictionary lookup and then hit 'Go'. Lame. [This one is very irritating and some other friends also mentioned this]
Copy-Paste: I actually came across the need quite a few times for example trying to send a phone number of one of my contacts via text message to a friend.
No disk mount. While there are solutions around this -- is this too much to ask for when someone wants to use those GBs on the phone to transfer/carry personal stuff.
Simple thing like wanting to drop a certain image from my mac to the iPhone (to set it as wallpaper) is sooo hard. Only way (in the auto sync mode) to get the picture on iPhone is is to sync an album containing that pic. Ridiculous!
Bluetooth/WiFi file transfers not allowed: Fine go ahead and block music file transfer an stuff. Atleast allow receiving other types of files (pics?).
As beautiful the UI is, its pretty ugly in its proprietary and complex underlying storage. It very difficult to understand the file structure and mappings. (Granted this is a beef for only geeks). Maybe it does it for optimizations, speed, security whatever..., but basically its not easy to get in->copy stuff into->view it (Oh wait, am I expecting a PC?). In this respect, I agree with Linus.
Battery life is OK ... but this applies to all my wireless devices. (Please someone, do something great here or make every furniture and fixture have mandatory a USB port :) )

Overall, its a solid device and most of the quibbles can be fixed easily. And best part is that Apple has entered a very fast moving and fierce market, it is going to have to respond quickly to get to the top. And seems they are listening these days ...

Indian Movies++

2008-02-11T23:40:00.000-08:00

Indian movies that go beyond the usual song+dance routines.
[By no means complete ... just the ones I enjoyed]

Luck by Chance (2009)

Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! (2008)

A Wednesday (2008)

Rock On!! (2008)

Sarkar Raj (2008)

Johnny Gaddar (2007)

Manorama: Six Feet Under (2007)

Cheeni Kum (2007)

Guru (2007)

Namesake (2007)

Khosla Ka Ghosla (2006)

Omkara (2006)

Rang De Basanti (2006)

Sarkar (2005)

Iqbal (2005)

My Wife's Murder (2005)

Swades (2004)

D (2005)

Lakshya (2004)

Teen Deewarein (2003)

Company (2002)

Bend It Like Beckham (2002)

Monsoon Wedding (2001)

Dil Chahata Hai (2001)

Lagaan (2001)

Sardar (1993)

Gandhi (1982)

Mint.com

2008-02-10T11:57:00.000-08:00

I've been following Mint since it got the mention as the TechCrunch40 award winner. No one can argue that the idea of a unified view of personal finances is utopia. Mint promises this.
However ...

Biggest concern I had with Mint (and its pretty obvious), is what happens to my bank/credit card/investment account data on mint's servers if they are compromised. Can they get and use the information? Can anyone access my financial accounts I have setup with mint, outside of Mint?
Also, Mint didn't have the feature to add brokerage accounts, that would leave out a an important share of finances.
There are various other similar offerings -- Quicken, MS Money and Wasabe to name a few, but reading online, Mint seems to be the favorite of many.

Then I [re]read some more information on the web:

How Mint Keeps You Safe
My friend, Matt's blog article.
Another article "Mint Myths Debunked" also helped.
And then I came to know (thanks Matt) that they allowed adding brokerage accounts just recently.

That's it ... I gave in. And in 10 minutes I was setup.

Pros:

Easy and quick setup.
Safe based on the information I found on web (above).
As expected from use of all the AJAX stuff.
Love that cool pie chart of 'Spending Trends' with categories such as food & dining, utilities, healthcare etc. Then you can click into any of the categories (food & dining) and see sub allocation e.g. groceries, restaurants, coffee shops etc. Now you know how much you really spend at Starbucks! (OK, maybe this might stop some from signing up).
The 'Ways to Save' feature is pretty neat. It suggests that I'll save a couple hundred by getting the Comcast Triple-play rather than what I have now. I think this advertisement is most targeted and useful form I have seen on the web. And given the information Mint can extract, it can get really valuable (but I hope not intrusive).
The search in Transactions has auto complete which is pretty handy.
Free (I must say I've begun to expect this and assuming they are making money via Ads :)).

Cons:

They don't do much with brokerage account information. But then, it was just added like a few days ago, so I expect they will add more features for using that information. I don't know if they get details of stock/mutual fund holding. They can potentially build a really nice unified view for asset allocation, ticker prices, news -- they can go crazy with that stuff.
I have not been able to add my First Tech Credit Union account (bank and visa card). Others have reported the problems and I think Mint is already working on that.
There could be an error margin since categorization is store-based: if you walk into Bartell Drugs and buy light bulbs, it would count it as healthcare. If it was by the itemized bill, it would be even cooler, but its problem for another day. It pretty well as is.

Give it shot ...

Australia Trip Report (5/5)

2007-01-04T19:36:00.000-08:00

Planning/Research Websites/Books
www.tripadvisor.com (forums, trip reviews)
www.frommers.com (e.g. Sydney: Goto Destinations-> Australia-> Sydney-> Attractions. The star rating is great helper in deciding.)
Frommer's Australia 2006 - Good
Lonely Planet Australia - Good
Frodor's Australia 2006 - OK. (Went to a highly rated club as per the book, only to realize that it had folded 3 years ago!)

Airline Booking
Quantas AirPass (+reasonable $$$ | +Web Itinerary Creator)

Hotel booking
http://hotelclub.net/
http://www.wotif.com/

Sydney - Sheraton on the Park [5/5 | +Location | +Rooms | -$$$]
Port Douglas - The Archipelago [4/5 | +$| +Location | +-Rooms]
Uluru(Ayer's Rock) - Outback Pionner Lodge [3.5/5 | +$(relatively) | +-Room]

Tours/Trips
Sydney

The Rocks Tour (5/5)
Bridge Climb (5/5)
Sydney Aquarium (4/5)
Manly (by Ferry) (5/5)
Blue Mountains

Three Sisters (3/5 -Overrated)

Jenolan Caves (5/5 +Oldest caves | +Tour | -Distance from Sydney)

Port Douglas

Daintree Rainforest 4WD Tour via Deluxe Safari (5/5)

I tried to get on Tony's tours, but they didn't have room on a track I wanted, so we went with Deluxe Safaris which was recommended by Christel (owner/concierge). It was a good decision.

Reef Tour (Snorkeling + Scuba Diving) on Calypso (5/5)
Kuranda Scenic Railway (3/5) + Skyrail (5/5) + Breakfast with Birds (Rainforest Habitat) (5/5)

Uluru (Ayer's Rock)

24 Hr Uluru Eco-Pass (inc. Sounds of Silence Dinner) (5/5)

Includes rock base walk, airport roundtrip, Kata Tjuta sunset
We pre-booked this a month before, as the Dinner is pretty popular

Melbourne

12 Apostles (5/5 +The route | -3hr drive from Melbun)
Philip Island Penguin Parade (4/5 +Penguins | -No Photography)
Ian Potter Center: NGVA (4/5)
Melbourne Museum (4/5)
Federation Sq (5/5 +Contemporary | +Location | +Museums/Galleries)

Replacing a 12" PowerBook Hard Drive

2006-09-18T22:07:00.000-07:00

Of late, my hard drive was noticeably slow indicating it was nearing its end. Some simple signs that told me its going to give up on me were:

Application startup time slowed down quite a bit (the icon bounced a lot longer that usual :)
Spotlight searching/response was getting slow.
Slow in general when doing any new activities (i.e. when accessing something not in RAM).

The moment this started, I bought myself an external hard drive (I've been meaning to for a while; backing up over the network was too slow for me) and started backing, cloning [bootable] actually, using Carbon Copy Cloner.

And then, one fine day, the powerbook would not startup. It hung at the basic loading screen, I could tell by that repetitive disk seeking sound that its dead!

Here are the steps I followed to replace my hard drive AND start-off with the new one as if nothing happening i.e. not installing the apps again, no re-configuring etc.

Bought a new one (HITACHI Travelstar 7K100 (HTS721010G9AT00) 100GB 7200 RPM) at newegg.
Using Carbon Copy Cloner I kept bootable clone of existing drive onto my external hard drive (Maxtor OneTouch III) that I had got from costco. Notes: Before you decide to replace the hard drive its a good idea to test your bootable clone by actually booting into it (At OSX startup keep 'Option' pressed..)
The actual hard drive replacements instructions I followed this guide at www.ifixit.com. Notes:

Make sure you have the #0 Philips Screwdriver and the T6 Trox Screwdriver. I didn't have this initially, and since another one worked I started using it until I was unable to remove a screw and almost chipped off a screw head. I drove down and bought this kit from the local Radioshack and everything was a breeze after that.
I would also layout the screws on a clean paper/surface in the exact order and layout as you remove them. It helps a LOT when putting it all back together.
Overall, the taking apart took much longer than putting it back. Probably because I was trying to be ultra careful + the trip to Radioshack :).

Now having the hard drive installed, and put the machine back together, plug in that firewire external hard drive and boot up the machine holding down the 'Option' key. Select the external hard drive to boot into.
Open up disk utility and format/create a partition naming it what ever you want. (I just kept it to the very default 'Macintosh HD')
Open up 'Carbon Copy Cloner', and now clone backwards - from the ext hard drive to the new drive. (make sure to mark it as 'bootable').
Restart the machine.
[If you had backed up fairly recently] You would find yourself right at home!

BillMonk.com: Pretty cool service

2006-05-21T21:04:00.000-07:00

So its Sunday evening, and I am doing one of those typical chores of settling all accounts between friends for the shared lunches/dinners/events. Few problems -- all the numbers are scattered across in emails, IMs etc., and over a period of time since I am not a regular. So, now, I have to find that trace, recollect who was at which dinner/lunch/event and again notify everyone. The process repeats itself. Its a pain ...

I knew what kind of a system I wanted -- flux between social networking and money management. A distributed, yet personal and without divulging my credit card and stuff. So, I googled around and discovered this article at techcrunch.com talking about billmonk.com ... bingo! Just what I was looking for.

I've hardly used this service and already love it. So do my friends whom I added via the service.

Some highlights:
-Clean, Simple and Fast UI
-Friends can edit the common event with their share and it will manages the math
-Nice view of the history of payment with each friend.
-Email notification (of course) / SMS
-Has a "Library" to manage CDs, Books etc lent to friends.
-Able to export the current status as a csv file.

BillMonk is quite spiffy and if you are in similar shoes you will love it!

-Shree

P.S: I won't bat an eye if it gets acquired by PayPal or the likes.

Adventures with Cruise Control.Net, Nant, Perforce

2006-03-29T22:19:00.000-08:00

For the most part it works fine [rocks!].

This is just a simple inventory of small fixes / tweaks I gathered during my CruiseControl.Net (CCNet) setup:

The Playground: Trying to configure CCNet to use Perforce SCM. Our build system uses Nant scripts and unit testing is done via NUnit.

1. My most useful page from all the documentation was for the Project Configuration Block. Everytime I wanted to add a functionality I would come here and then follow some link on this page and get the task done.

2. During the source control block:
-- I had a hard time getting CCNet to sync the source from perforce. Turns out, I needed to set the P4PASSWD variable so CCNet could use it at runtime. Once set, the syncing worked liked a charm. Other ways conceivable around this are to have an un-expiring login session in another prompt via 'p4 login' or if you use P4Win have it automatically log you in.
-- I also put in some filters so that CCNet doesn't kick off a build when someone checks in a .doc file for instance. Heres a sample filter to be put inside the <sourcecontrol> block:
<inclusionFilters>
<pathFilter>
<pattern>//depot/abc/dev/**/*.*</pattern>
</pathFilter>
</includeFilters>
-- After resolving those issues, I discovered that CCNet was still not checking out all the code. Hmm...so I realized that my lt;view> tag was pointing to a path which was not included in the ACTUAL P4Win view for that client spec (i.e. <client>). Once I modified that client spec in P4Win to include the path I was trying to use here, it worked!
<sourceControlProvider type="p4">
<view>//depot/abc/...</view>
.....
<client>alice_ccnet</client>
....
</sourceControlProvider>

3. Getting greedier I wanted email publishing feature of ccnet. So I go and <publishers> tag after <tasks> tag. E.g.:
<publishers>
<email .... >
</publishers>

I did a force build to test it out, and it worked great. But then I started getting an exception when I tried to view the build results (by clicking on the project in the web dashboard). I was getting an internal cruise control exception. Looked like it could not find the log of the build it did. Hmm...it turns out once you add the publishers field, you need to add the tag. See this. I did that and it started working. So my <publishers> tag looks like this:
<publishers>
<email ...>
....
</email>
<xmllogger ...>
</publishers>

When I re-read the PCB page I found it says "If you don't specify a section at all then a default Xml Log Publisher is used as the sole publisher." Duh! That explains it. (Note: if you add new <users/> tags in the email publishers you may need to restart ccnet service.)

4. I also thought that the default font size in the was too small, so I increased it via cruisecontrol.css (look for font-size: __px) file in /server/ and /webdashboard/. I increased the font-size element by +2px and it did the trick.

5. If you use the File State Manager block to save the state of project make sure you point it to a directory which exists. It will not create it for you.
<state type="state" directory="C:\CCNetState" /> (make sure directory C:\CCNetState exists)

6. A small thing that bothered me was that the in the automated build report email, the modification section (i.e. "Modifications since last build ...") is at the bottom. I personally think it should be like the one in webdashboard i.e. near the top, just below the header information.
To achieve that: Goto <CCNet_INSTALLATION_DIR>\server\, open the file ccservice.exe.config for edit and locate the <xslFiles> tag. Move the node with "modifications.xsl" to just below the header.xsl element. i.e. Your xsl tags should look like
.......
<xslFiles>
<file name="xsl\header.xsl" />
<file name="xsl\modifications.xsl" />
<file name="xsl\compile.xsl" />
<file name="xsl\unittests.xsl" />
<file name="xsl\fit.xsl" />
<xslFiles>
......

Thats it. The order defines how the report is created. If you want to change the layout of the web dashboard, then you can do similar stuff in <CCNET_INSTALLATION_DIR>\webdashboard\dashboard.config

Backup Mac on a Windows over a network.

2006-03-22T23:10:00.000-08:00

Many people (read 'geeks') have heterogeneous environments with a Mac and/or Windows and/or Linux box running in their homes.

I have a similar one and I wanted to backup my mac's /Users directory (I used to do it on my iPod, but my music got bigger). So I thought, well, I have about 100gigs empty on the windows box, why not use it!

So I tried the simplest thing. I shared a folder on windows (gave full permissions to it for the account I use, no one else.) Then mounted the folder in OS X, and started copying the /Users folder on it. It worked happily for a while, but then failed while it was trying to copy a file with a name like "abc|def.txt" -- problems with file name characters. I had to look for other options...

What I needed was to format a portion of that NTFS formatted hard drive as HFS and that would do it. So I reached for "Disk Utility" and followed these steps:
- Mount the windows shared folder
Tip: If possible try to connect over a wired Lan. I tried to create a big image (about 20gig) over the 802.11g network and it timeout twice. I connected the two via ethernet cable and it worked fine and fast. (obviously)
- Start "Disk Utility"
- Hit "New Image"
- Save As:
(name of the image you are creating i.e. it will be .dmg)
- Size: GB
(Tip: I read somewhere, that if you want to pre-allocate disk space for backup of files, a rule of thumb is allocate 3 times the space you currently use. It sounded reasonable and I did so.)
-Encryption: none
-Format: read/write disk image
-Hit "Create"

This will effectively:
-Create a volume called /Volumes/ that is visible as "Mac OS Extended" of the size that you created.
-You will see a file .dmg in the windows share.

Now I had the bytes ready, in the format I wanted, I just needed a tool transfer stuff. I tried a few but am currently using iBackup:
- iBackup - pretty good: you can select specific files/folder to backup
- rsync: I have previously used rysnc in shell. Works great, very powerful with the switches e.g.: rsync -av --delete --exclude "temp" --exclude ".Trash"
- RsyncX - basic UI for rsync; but can't exclude sub folders
- Other software I've heard raves about are SuperDuper, CarbonCopyCloner (CCC), etc.

The whole thing is pretty cool, so I thought I'd share it. Hope it helps ...

Connecting to wireless network

2006-03-15T09:48:00.000-08:00

So I was trying to connect the snazzy Toshiba Tecra M4 Tablet (QuickReview: great specs and screen, but too heavy to swing around in the arm as a tablet) to my home wireless network, what I thought would be a breeze turned out to be gust.

I have a Linksys WRT54G router. For security, I am using WPA (w/ TKIP) and I simply could not connect the laptop using the windows wireless configurator. The wireless card on the notebook is the "Intel PRO/Wireless 2915 ABG Network Connection". I did the best thing known to work in windows world - a reboot. Tried again, still the same problem. Must be the driver problem, I thought (yoda). So I upgraded the drivers from 9.0.2.x to 9.0.3.9. Rebooted. Still the same problem. It would hang at "Acquiring Network Address", and then give up with a balloon saying "Limited connectivity ..... ".

Then I downloaded the Intel PROSet/Wireless utility and voilÃ ! It worked. This post (and the comments on the post) were useful in guiding me to a solution.

Of course the powerbook never had any problems connecting. And neither on my desktop (windows) using the Linksys 802.11g PCI card.

--------------------------------------------------------
Update 14th March 2007
The laptop was upgraded to Vista and it seems to work with both networks without any new software or changes to existing networks. Yay!

HTH
-Shree

5 features I want to see in music players (iTunes / WMP / Real whatever ...)

2006-02-20T15:57:00.000-08:00

Here are five things I want to see in the next version of popular music players (at least iTunes, its my favorite):

A feature for music discovery within a collection (and the online music store) based on the acoustic analysis of a song(s). Like Predixis MusicMagic Mixer
A Way to 'fix' a song info based on metadata (even the analysis). For example, if a song has just song name and album information, it should fill in the artist information.
During the usage of the player, the user preferences get accumulated in the form of 'Ratings' for songs. ID3 tags don't have room for such information, so the ratings are maintained outside song itself. Ideally if I backup / move my songs, I would like the ratings to move with it. I might change music players but my '5 star' songs should maintain its '5 star' status. I want a way to embed the ratings into the song's metadata (and be able to restore from it) [applescript]
Tagging of songs in music stores? Even local tagging. And obviously, a search built on it.
There should also be a feature so we can let the the ratings of a song increase with increase in its play count. [applescript]

Some of the above features can be had via applescripts for iTunes via some websites. But it can be done way better if it was handled by the player itself.

Besides, its been a while since I saw some 'significant' new features in the music players ...

-Shree

Nice Hardware! Bad Stickware?

2006-02-04T19:35:00.000-08:00

Now why would anyone [in their sane mind] ruin their nicely designed laptops (even phones, digi cams etc.) with these shiny stupid, ugly 3D ... Stickers! I'm talking about the logo stickers from companies like Microsoft, Intel, Nvidia, ATI, etc. Well, I'd compare it almost like some graffiti on a new house I just bought!

Why, when you have shelled out some grand(s) on a machine, is it that these manufactures put these stickers/logos on the machine. They have already paid for the software/hardware, so why are they obliged to put on the stupid sticker? (my apologies if you love 'em)

The consumer knows what he is buying. Why put another sticker and say it out louder? Its is just plain irritating! One might think that some companies probably don't put design on their to-do list, but what about those slim Sony Vaios, Fujitsu tablets, and the mean machines from Alienware? I hope (and bet) that the Apple Intel Macs don't have those stickers on their beautiful machines.

And while writing this article I noticed that there are other netizens who have already complained! Also, the stickies don't come off nice and easy. In fact there are people on the net asking how to cleanse their machines. (Tip: Apparently this [goo gone] does the job well.)

So, here is my guesstimate as to why the OEMs put others stickers:

1. Its not a big deal.
2. They're used to the stickers now.
3. They love the stickers! They have it on their cars, in the homes, office cubes ... everywhere.
4. They think the stickers look cool -- shiny 3-D and all!
5. What stickers?
6. The robotic machine that snaps on the cover also puts in that sticker, you can't override it. period.
7. Their design has so many other problems that these stickers are of least concern. (possible ... ?)
8. They get good discounts from these vendors? (ah ha! $-> )

And why are these NOT TRUE:
1. New cars come with a few bumper stickers advertising which part came from which company.
2. The 'For Sale' sign from the realtor lives with the house you just bought.

As technology become a part of our fashion, daily lifestyle, personality (even the living room!) we would like these things blend in -- not out.

-Shree

Collaborate + Compete = ??

2006-01-24T22:21:00.000-08:00

Apple dumps IBM PowerPCs and moves to Intel. IBM decides to support Mac OS X for its Lotus Notes suite.

IBM competes with the x86 platform while producing PowerPC architecture but they also sell Intel (xSeries) and AMD servers. IBM provides the Power architecture that was used exclusively for Mac OS, but it used to sell PCs using Microsoft Windows. Big Blue also stands tall behind Linux and Open Source development.

Microsoft declares a 5 year commitment of Office for Mac while Apple teases and challenges Microsoft's Windows. At the same time Microsoft ditches support for Windows Media Player for the Mac. Microsoft had also purchased some insurance for DOJ and for a premium of $150 million in Apple. And as we can see it has turned out to be a very nice investment.

Yahoo founders Jerry and David actually introduced Larry and Sergy to VCs and even helped get funding to start google. Yahoo even has a stake in google from the start. I think its paying pretty well. :)

Sony and Apple are deep 'HD pals' with Apple supporting the next gen contender - Blue Ray. On the other hand Sony is feverishly minting new 'walkmans' in a bid to catch-up and beat the iPod. Ditto for Samsung, who is one of the largest supplier of flash memory for the iPod and busy producing iPod killers.

Samsung and Sony are two huge Consumer Electronics companies competing in pretty much every category. However, they join forces to compete better.

And so on ...

.. you get the point. Its all justifiable, but somehow just amazing to the conventional eyes. I remember they said, may you live in interesting times (the quote itself is interesting).

-Shree

Yes, I have an iPod.

2006-01-12T21:53:00.000-08:00

I love music. So after getting used to the (read as 'spoiled by the') iPod, its ease, the navigation etc.; burning CDs was history for me. I had to get that way of listening to music into other domains of my life.

Namely ...

Car
I've ipoded my Car. I tried the Griffin iTrip.

It didn't quite cut it for me. Downside: Some hiss, location specific, car antenna location specific and gets easily suppressed by radio channels.

Burning CDs of my songs was out of question, so I decided to go all the way on this and got myself a kenwood solution:

Kenwood KDC-X5028 + Kenwood KCA-iP500 iPod adapter + installation (inc wires etc) = ouch! ( ~$400)

I got it done at Magnolia in Bellevue. I would really recommend them. You pay a slight premium, but it can save you money by paying for the right stuff.

The Result: Its awesome. Just replacing the factory stereo itself put new life into my car speakers. The ipod integration works pretty well. But its not perfect. I would put it as a RC (release candidate) quality as its got some hiccups:
- At times it won't be able to load the song after connecting ipod that was playing a song. solution: reboot ipod.
- Sometimes it takes a while (few tens of seconds) to display the song information after the song has started playing.

Recently I have been having none of these problems though (Magic? its more likely that I've got acclimatized). Hopefully as the market grows, and this stuff graduates from being just a fancy idea, things will get even better.

Home
I am yet to get anything great for the home. But its already itching me ... The Griffin TuneCenter. It looks great. Its pretty much sends over the iPod screen over to your TV. Plus a lot of other snazzy stuff. Hope it stands up to its description and I'll feel my hand reaching for my wallet.

Simple Technology ...

2006-01-12T21:29:00.000-08:00

"Everything should be as simple as it is, but not simpler." - Albert Einstein

Here are some of the technology products and concepts which stand by this:

Craigslist - easy classifieds
iPod - a scroll wheel and your music
iTunes - easy play and organize music
Blogs - write and update a page on the web
IKEA - simple, modern, cheap
Wiki - easy way for everyone to collaboratively build information
Google Search - just a text box
Gmail - Internet mail 2.0
Google Maps - Internet maps 2.0.
XML - a simple representation for data

When they came out, they dug new ways for old things. Made life simple in some respect or the other. Today the competition has caught up with many of them. But they still hold the high ground. What is simple to use is not easy to create...

-Shree

powebook + mobile + iSync + Salling Clicker = digilife heaven

2006-01-06T21:17:00.000-08:00

Life in the US sucks when it comes to the choice of mobile phones. The choice is truly dictated by the carriers selling you locked phones. But if you are ready to $pend a bit you can get the latest & greatest. So, tired with my free-with-2yr-plan phone, I recently took the plunge into my pockets and got Sony Erricson k700i. (Great phone btw. here is good review). Downside: I notice that the navigation thumbstick has started to act on me. At times it just doesn't want me to scroll up! I think I prefer the button-style navigation to the thumbstick. [Update 07/29: Unfortunatley, as I feared this thumstick has made this phone just a doorstop. Its can only side navigate now, making searching/scrolling a pain. I even opened up the faceplate and dusted it. Didn't work. I've moved on to a i-mate Windows Mobile.]

I have a powerbook. So, using iSync I was able to synchronize the contacts, calenders, todo etc. seamlessly. I know syncing has been around for a while, but still being able to do it right out of the box, no software installs -- simply rocks!

Now, using Clicker I was able to do the uber cool. I could remote control iTunes, iPhoto, even the whole system. Its awesome to see and change songs, playlists, even rate them while maintaing the couch potato status quo. Downside: Because of the constant talk between the phone and machine over bluetooth, the phone battery noticably drains faster.

-Shree

post gets on /.

2006-01-04T19:35:00.000-08:00

Let me start this with my first slashdot story. I admire the apple keynote presentations in macworld and came across a story about them in the guardian. So I send the article to /. and guess what, it got posted! I'm just getting the 'bumps in fact that it got posted. Having sent interesting stuff earlier that didn't show up, I hardly expected this to get picked up ... but hey, here it is. yay!

-Shree