TwitToday- Pure Twitter Simplicity

Twitter client for Windows Mobile, originally uploaded by dalelane.

TwitToday is a very simple Today plugin for Windows Mobile which lets you send a Tweet without launching anything. The first time I tried it, something wasn't working quite right and it kept giving me an error message.
I gave it another shot tonight and was happy to find that it works beautifully. Tapping the 'T' launches PIE and takes you to the mobile Twitter page.
The only gripe that I have with it, and its a tiny one, is that you need to tap the screen before you start typing, then tap the 'ok' button. I wish it worked by button presses only. But, its such a small issue. If you have the real estate to spare, go ahead and grab it from http://dalelane.co.uk/blog/?p=244

You Need YouMail!

   

In a nutshell, YouMail is the equivalent of having a free secretary screening your calls without having to install any software on your phone. Some ways I use it:

-I have the sound of a fax machine set as a greeting for some of my nuisance callers. They call a whole lot less now!

-Have a custom greeting for my husband that recognizes him from his caller ID.

-Have a greeting for callers with blocked caller ID telling them that I do not accept such calls. 

You can find a million different ways to use it- it eliminates the need to install certain programs to your phone!

A new use for Podcasts

A year and a half ago or so my daily commute consisted of a 90 minute car-to-NJ Transit-to subway trip each way and it was quite tedious. It was during these commutes that my love affair with tech intensified as I spent hours glued to my PDA. In those days, I watched 2 video podcasts- Geekbrief and Best Night Ever-usually on my way home.

Fast forward to last year. Once I got a Tivo Series 2 in my bedroom I realized that I could watch certain video podcasts on TV. Geekbrief and CNET became my staples again. Then, earlier this year when I got my Archos 605 I discovered ArchosLink which is a software that allows me to download podcasts and then watch them on my device or on the TV. And that had been my setup until I got tired of listening to music while sitting in traffic while taking Seth to and from daycare. I couldn't find anything interesting on talk radio and suddenly remembered about audio podcasts which I could put onto my Zune. Suddenly I had a whole new world of podcasting open up for me- I listen to podcasts about Tech, Lost, Parenting...all while I run my errands in the car. In fact, its been such a success that I moved my speakers in the kitchen and listen to podcasts while I do dishes and make up bottles of formula.

Once I stopped having a daily commute via public transit I thought I wouldn't have any use for podcasts anymore- its interesting that I use them more now.

PDAmill Palm Games Free

Well, this just may get me to fire up the old StyleTap! PDAmill is giving all their Palm OS games away for free! So if you've got a Palm device and are looking for some nice freebies, head on over to PDAMill and download them. And if you've got a Windows Mobile device, perhaps now would be a good time to invest in StyleTap.

WVGA Screen- What apps will run?

So, another video of the Sony Xperia has surfaced and this one is more in depth. I looked closely at the specs and noticed that its listed as a WVGA screen of 800 x 480. What is going to be able to run on that? 2 years ago or so I had a VGA Jasjar that had a resolution of 640 x480 and there were numerous apps that couldn't run on it, and then those that could looked really bad and were pixelated horribly. 

Have things changed so much, or is there going to be a problem being able to run apps on this gem?

Vollee- SecondLife on Your Phone

Even though I've pretty much given SecondLife the shaft for the past few months, I am pretty excited about this. Vollee is releasing a beta of their SecondLife client for mobile phones in May and its looking to be pretty robust! They haven't released a list of compatible phones yet, but they have clearly stated that it needs 3G to run (sorry, T-Mobile customers!). If it sounds like something interesting, go ahead and sign up for the beta!

Info At a Glance- iPhone Home Screen

Ever since the iPhone was released it seems that everywhere I look I see homescreens modeled after it. I'm confused. I can't deny that there is a lot of innovation coming from the iPhone, but one of the least useful features in my opinion is the homescreen-it reminds me of the Palm launcher screen. I rely on being able to turn on my device and seeing a substantial summary at a glance. So to me, it is much more useful to see this:

than it is for me to see this:

What's the big attraction?

IM+ Beta Supports Multi LogOns per Client!

Shape Services posted on HowardForums to announce a beta version of IM+. In the past I've tried IM+ but ultimately the lack of support for multiple accounts on the same service (i.e. 2 AIM logins simultaneously) has left me wanting more. But this new beta changes everything!
So far, I'm reasonably impressed with it. In addition to support for multiple accounts per service they also have improved its appearance and made some minor tweaks to it.
What would really make IM+ killer is if they would add Skype support. Even just for text would be such a great feature! Do it, Shape Services! You know you want to!

The new layout shows status messages in a hover-field now, saving space on the screen and eliminating the need for horizontal scrolling.

Something Ain't Right

I knew there was something off about the photos of the HP900 on the FCC site. The original released pictures look like the device was initially a whole lot more polished and professional looking! This looks like it should be a before and after photo, but its really an after and then before. Ewwwwwwwwwwwww!

The Perai-H Looks Suspiciously Familiar!

I was browsing the web and checked out the TechFaith Wireless page to see what they have going on when I stumbled on the Perai-H Windows Mobile Phone which looks exactly like the UBiQUiO 503G, and has the same specs. A search on Google led me to find that the Perai-H was only submitted to the FCC last September, which means that this could very well be coming a carrier in the US soon. 

Suddenly, the lack of response from Ubiquio makes perfect sense. If this phone is about to be released on, say AT&T in the near future it would be supported by that company. Ubiquio has probably passed on the information that it gathered from the test subjects (i.e.ME!) and passed the info on. Now watch. AT&T will probably release this phone with a nice sheen on the software to fix the very issues that we 503G owners have been moaning about for months. The good news about this is that there will likely be more accessories and attention paid to the phone now. And if I'm very, very lucky, any released ROM upgrades may just be able to work on the UBiQUiO 503G. 

HP Ipaq 900 Lust Kinda Waning....

The HP Ipaq 900 has shown up on the FCC and its being met with mixed reviews. Personally, its looking a bit squat to me and not at all attractive. I'm feeling a bit blah about it now...in fact, I'm feeling a bit blah about everything now. I was listening to Bonnie Cha of CNET on a podcast yesterday and she made an observation that pretty much sums up my feelings lately. She pointed out that there seems to be no real innovation lately in the PDA Phone market- more memory here, more megapixels there, but nothing really to bowl you over. 

In fact, I suspect that when the HP 900 comes out, there will be forums full of complainers of things not working quite right on it. *Sigh* At least with my UBiQUiO I know what the flaws are and have pretty much been able to work around them. 

For now, I think I'm going to wait patiently for my UBi to be repaired/replaced and returned. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder. Any new phone is really, really going to have to be bringing the sexy to lure me away from my UBi. And so far, the HP Ipaq 900 definitely isn't it.

What on Earth Happened to BluePulse? *Sob*

Back in 2006 I was ecstatic at having found BluePulse, which I wrote about in "BluePulse-Tastes Like Saki but Goes Down Smoother". BluePulse seemed like the answer to the void when I left SakiMobile; a nice small community, cool functions. It worked based  on java, which opened it up to bunch of different phones, and in turn to users from different countries. 

But sometime in the past few months, BluePulse opened up to the general public via web.  It seems that in conjuction with the additional press that BluePulse received it was inevitable that it, too, would become the cesspool of junk and spam of its predecessors. I recently signed in and found that my mailbox was clogged with seemingly thousands of spam comments, endless friend requests, and just plain weirdness.

I don't know why this happens. I just wish that there could finally be a powerhouse for the Mobile set. Kind of like a FaceBook for the Mobile crowd. And I wish that there could be a way to prevent good social sites from becoming overriden with porn and spam.

I HATE the Treo Keyboard

APR07_p16_1, originally uploaded by lulugirl896.

It seems like a million years ago when I had a Treo 650 and all was absolutely fabulous in my tech world. With all the great memories of my Treo 650, I was somewhat excited to get my hands on a Treo 750-even if it was just as a placeholder. But I am suprised at how unpleasant a typing experience I am having with it! My hands feel so cramped using it, and I can't seem to find the perfect way to hold it in such a way that I can easily type one handed without feeling like its about to topple out of my hand. I miss my UBiQUiO!
Luckily, I was able to track down my eBay seller and he is going to attempt to get my UBiQUiO fixed by Expansys. If he doesn't have any luck, I got a comment on an entry from an Expansys staff member a few entries ago who may be able to help.
Apart from the keyboard, there are some other Treo-specific quirks that are bugging me. While I like the threaded text messages, I don't like that it is a separate app and opening messages no longer shows texts as one of the accounts. And the Today softkeys are uselessly programmed in such a way that even using Tweaks2K cannot reprogram them.
And every once in a while when I type, the Treo seems to take a second to 'catch up'. In fact the only thing that I have really been enjoying as a major improvement over my Ubiquio is that the LED flashes when I receive an email.
So, the moral of this story is that I want my UBi back. In fact, I don't even want the Velocity Mobile 111 when it first comes out. I want to enjoy the experience of having a device that works which I enjoy and am used to!

A Rented Life?

Once we bought a home, I imagined that we would be free to do anything we wanted with it. Not anything wild or crazy....just anything. But it seems that everything we do must be preceded by a moment when we stop and think about how the project may affect our home's value. So, we own the home- but we just need to be mindful of the next owner.

Same goes for electronic gadgets. I purchase a new phone or gizmo and carefully stash the box and manuals in a cabinet. I know that someday, sooner rather than later, I'll be listing it on eBay as an item gently used in the original box. 

So, at the end of the day is it all just a rented life? How different is it from a Rent-A-Center? What items do you own but still treat in a manner to get top dollar after use?

Why Can't We Let the Dead RIP?

What a salacious society we have become. Last week's People magazine was all about the possible existence of Heath Ledger's secret love child and today the big news from beyond is of a Marilyn Monroe sex tape. Why are these big news items? The celebrities are deceased, for goodness' sake! The media should be able to allow the dead the respect and dignity that they deserve.

"I'll Be Back"

The past few days I've been sick. In fact, we all have- Seth must have brought some germs home from daycare and we all got knocked out. Between the Ubiquio mishap of last week then getting sick I feel like I missed week. Hopefully by tomorrow I'll be back to 100% and will be able to jump back on the blogging bandwagon.

Labels:my life

The Sweet Agony of UPS

There is something wonderful and terrible about waiting for a new gadget to be delivered. I ordered the Treo 750 and I am in that horrible limbo of having no phone and being constantly refreshing the UPS tracking page. 

So far my tracking number isn't even showing up in the system and this is meant to be an overnight shipment. Fingers crossed. Later.

AOL MyMobile Beta

YahooGo raised the bar pretty high in the playing field of search engine/email mobile offerings. MSN Live has become the Windows Mobile defacto. Google2Go, not made by Google, was a dismal disappointment so we've been waiting to see who would step into the ring next.

AOL MyMobile is the next one to hit the scene and is in beta now. It looks pretty interesting, but its going to have to be something special to knock Yahoo out of its top spot.




Naturally, I don't have a way to test this as my Ubiquio died yesterday and the seller of my Treo 750 is taking his sweet time even responding to me. Anyone try it so far? What's the verdict?

My Name is Lulu, and I have a problem

I've just realized that I have a serious problem. I tried to guilt/force/trick the husband into swapping and lending me his Tmobile SDA until my Treo comes. He didn't want to and I got genuinely annoyed about it.

Is Windows Mobile ruining my marriage?

Death of my UBiQUiO 503G

The past few days I'd been noticing minor odd behavior on my UBiQUiO 503G- periodically failing to connect to the network, turning itself on and staying on...just enough to make me decide that it was time to do a hard reset soon and start over. But with everything else I'm working on at the moment, that was on my agenda for next week.

This morning I woke up and found that the device would not connect to the network at all- and apparently hadn't been able to all night. I tried a soft reset and it wouldn't come back on. I finally managed to get it to turn on after a hard reset, and dashed to drop Seth off at daycare.

I came home and decided that I would call Cingular/AT&T to find out if they could help me sort out why I still couldn't make a data connection. The service people had me perform a soft reset, and that was it. It just wouldnt turn on again.

I know its not a power issue, the light indicator lights up when I plug it into a power source. I get the logo screen for UbiQUio and then it just turns off. I was able to email the eBay seller he was nice enough to offer to ship it to Expansys for repair. I don't have a lot of faith in the company right now, but its worth a shot.

I ordered a used Treo 750 to tide me over in case it doesnt work out with the Ubiquio repair. And in the meantime I dug an old Motorola phone out of Dean's drawer and stuck my SIM card into that. I haven't used a phone phone in about 5 years. I'm totally lost.

Now I'm starting to wonder if this might not be a good time for me to consider a separate phone and a standalone PDA. It sure would sting a lot less when something like this happens.

An Exciting Adventure-eBusiness

Today I made a decision. I'm going to begin a career to allow me to work from home. In fact, I already secured my first client! 

I've always dreamed of owning a home, and now that we finally do it seems inconceivable to me that I would leave it every day for several hours. I love our home! And we've spent money to make a home office which I really think I could maximize. I want to have my own business, and I want to do it virtually. 

I know certain things are out of the question: I can't make candles, I can't/won't sell Avon, and I just don't like doing anything that means I have to go and knock on my neighbors' doors and annoy them peddling some product or the other (I'm sure my son will have plenty of cookies to sell door-to-door when he gets to school age!) So, I need to sit down and make a list of all the things I am good at and that I would like to dedicate time to doing professionally. My first client needs a no-frills website built- so that's going on my list. 

Fortunately, at this point in my life, I'm in a place where I can try something new. I have a supportive husband, a substantial nest-egg and a ton of ambition to doing this right.  So, I'm going to give this a try and give myself 2 months to make some headway with it. If you have any resources that would help me towards the goal, please share. And if this sounds like something that you'd like to do too, stay tuned. I'll be documenting my progress along the way!

Triforce-Ditch Your Stylus

This ones so new theres no pricing available yet, but I'm getting one for my Archos 605G which oddly has no built-in stylus holder. Its a combination lanyard and soft stylus called the Triforce.se Touchscreen Pointer. I have to say, I've never really gotten into using a lanyard, but this one seems like the builtin stylus function would make it well worthwhile.

XperiaX1- Style or Substance?

XperiaX1, originally uploaded by lulugirl896.

I can't decide if I'm really into the Sony Xperia or if I've just been blindly seduced by its interface. I wish there were more information available about it already. And does anyone know if that's just the standard 6.1 interface?

MoFuse-Mobilize Your Blog

If you're like me, then you're still figuring out this whole maze that is the Web. Perhaps through connecting to a broader audience on Twitter, or the freedom of Blogger but I feel like I've been learning much more about how to enrich my Webspace. 

As a mobile enthusiast, I have always wanted to have a nice clean mobile version of Mobigasmic. Windows Live Spaces has an automatically reconfigured mobile version of their pages, but it didn't quite come up to par. I wanted one that would work regardless of what browser you happen to be using. 

I found MoFuse, and it seemed to be exactly what I needed. It creates a mobile version of your website, and also has a nice emulator for desktops attempting to access the mobile site. So, Mobigasmic has a nice mobile version which can be accessed on any desktop or device. On your pda it will appear like this:

  

While from your desktop you'll see:

And be sure to add http://mobigasmic.mofuse.mobi to your mobile links. If you use Windows Mobile, remember you can add the bookmark on your desktop in your Mobile Links folder. And if you have a blog of your own, be sure to check out Mofuse to see if this free resource can't help you reach a broader audience.

Nappak sleeping cube is a home away from home

The large nature of this and the fact it includes wheels when rolled up is definitely peculiar. Expect to have a slumber party in this thing, rolling it from cube to cube? Well, I guess that would work if you have a really relaxed office environment.

Full story here

Playboy on your Phone- Porn on Your PDA

***Adult Content- Reader Discretion Advised***

Let me just start by expressing my disappointment at the lack of mobilen adult resources for the ladies (seriously, where is Playgirl Mobile?). But now Playboy has launched iPlayboy, which is basically mobile Playboy formatted for the iPhone. They've even had a Miss Playboy Mobile contest ( which was apparently won by Amber James of Seattle). 

In August of 2006 I put out a podcast on various ways to get Porn on Your PDA. As a novice, I uploaded that podcast to Bolt.com, which seems to have since become defunct. Luckily,I saved the transcript:

Lets face it, most of us do it- you just never really hear anyone talk about it and I don't think I've ever heard anyone give instructions,either! I decided to do this topic because these days spamming has become so bad that if you even try to do a search of "porn" cross referenced with "pda" so many trojan (no pun intended!) and spam sites come up that its almost impossible to get any comprehensive information!

One of the assumptions I tend to make is that if you've got porn on your palm, you don't necessarily want the whole world to know it...which is why I'm always a bit confused by adult themed today screens and such.

Over the past years I've looked into discreet and interesting ways to experience porn on my device. The first recommendation that I would make is to use the password feature on your device. This should be a habit anyway, but if you work in a corporate environment, you definitely want that extra protection. Another cool thing I've seen is a special screen protector- it scrambles the image on your screen so that if viewed from an angle, nothing can be seen. This works great if there is a possibility of having someone peering across at your screen.

The first method is to convert your naughty pictures into a format you can easily view or watch on your device. My very first foray led me to Resco Photoviewer. This software from resco.net will allow you to create an album from your desktop which will consist of the pictures that you chose. The best plan is to create a folder on your pc and move all of your pictures into that location. This will make it easier to create your resco album. Resco albums are great because you can easily chose to encrypt them.

If you're okay with converting from your desktop, you can also create a powerpoint slideshow on your device and use your built-in slideshow viewer to watch.

The next is to use TCPMP to watch video clips. TCPMP is the premiere media player, and its free. Download it from the corecodec website and include all the available plugins to make sure you can play any media file thrown a it. Create a folder on your memory card and you can actually use programs like resco explorer to encrypt the folder.

There is also more and more software being created under the category of erotica. Strip poker games are extremely easy to come by, of course they are shareware. Adult games can be a fun way to entertain yourself when all you really need is a glimpse and not an outright ogle! But you'll have to get skilled at the games if you hope to see any skin.

Hubdog is a suprising source that will allow you to select channels with adult content such as Devil's Films- I'm talking real porn here, not the watered down teasers. The benefit of this is that it updated regularly- new content is only an update away. There are also several blogs that you can subscribe to and get images on your pda. The term subscription here is different from the conventional adult term- it simply means that you plug the address into your rss reader and the feed will be updated regularly.

And speaking of the world wide web, there are tons of sites that are optimized for mobile viewing. In the next few weeks I aim to compile a list and post it for those who are stumped. Hopefully this will be a group project... The list not the porn!

I updated a few of the links, and I was suprised to see that a lot of the products are still in existence. 

Minority Report Technology Already Here

PocketPC Thoughts has a story about the Microsoft Surface and the fact that the technology will be available in select AT&T stores by April 17th. Remember when we saw Tom Cruise manipulating data in Minority Report:




I for one thought it would take decades before we saw it in real life (kinda like the1981 future forecast). But here we are, barely 6 years later, and the public is going to have access to it:




Makes me soooo envious of what my son will see in his lifetime!

YouTube App Built Into Coreplayer!

Take that, iPhone users! Now Windows Mobile, Symbian and Palm users can get full YouTube support built in to the latest version of CorePlayer! The downside is that you'll have to purchase the third-party application, CorePlayer includes enough great features to make it worth the money. 

I've been playing with it today and was not happy with the initial video quality until I realized that it has an option to adjust the video quality based on your connection speed-neat trick! 

I went ahead and chose the highest quality since I'm on a 3G device and network. The video playback is exceptional. And you also have the option of viewing the site's most viewed, most discussed, etc videos. When you perform a search you get a nice thumbnail of the video content, the creator, duration and rating. 

One app that can be your default media and music player as well as a YouTube player built in? Not too shabby!

Mobigasmic has been Awesomesauce Approved!

One of the best things that has happened to Mobigasmic in the past few months has been me joining Twitter. Its put me in contact with a lot off great people who share a lot of cool ideas and concepts. And the brief nature of Twitter means that even if I can't pop in for hours, it only takes a short while to catch up on what I missed.
The other benefit of has been that it exposed me to many likeminded-bloggers and included me in a neat network that I otherwise might not have found. Mobigasmic's move to Blogger has also boosted exposure and seems to be getting onto the radar of people who could really benefit from it.
In the course of my Twitter progression, I've come across one particularly fun young woman called Corvida, of SheGeeks. Corvida's main area of enthusiasm is in Social Networking, and I learn as much from her about it as I could from Wikipedia. She's also the first person who I've ever heard use the word Awesomesauce. So its a particular honor for my tiny piece of the web to receive the honor of being Awesomesauce Approved:

Velocity111...Hey There Sexy....

The Velocity Mobile 111 is one hot piece of....phone. With Windows Mobile 6.1, WiFi, 3G and the  all important QWERTY keyboard, this one is bringing it all to the table! At this rate, I may see this one before the HP910c....I looove the look of this, except that I don't see the soft keys on the front.
More info on this at Velocity Mobile as well as Engadget Mobile

Why I Love Naomi Campbell

The bitch just doesn't give a damn. And I mean that in the most complimentary way possible- who amongst us had not had the urge to throw something at someone? My only gripe about that incident was that she threw a Blackberry (everyone knows you need to throw like a Jasjar to do any real damage!)

And lets not forget her using community service as her personal red carpet/runway last year. Love it!

And now she's been arrested for being allegedly assaulting a police officer in a dispute over her misplaced baggage. Come on! They lost her bags! Cut a supermodel a break already!

Update-TV Guide Mobile

I added a reminder for a program but couldn't find it in my calendar after. It seems that the application sends you a text message at the scheduled time- pretty neat!


Labels:applications, pda

Mobile GBlogger and Feedburner Incompatible

All day today I've been fighting to figure out why Mobile GBlogger which I paid for, suddenly stopped working on my UBi. There are so few Windows Mobile blogging clients that work on Blogger that I couldn't just shrug it off. Well, I finally figured out the problem- I created a Feedburner account today and had selected in the option for my feeds to be redirected to the Feedburner-created feed. For some reason, Mobile GBlogger cannot find, post or draft entries when this is selected.
I had hoped to use Feedburners analyst tools, but I guess the information will be slightly skewered because some readers will choose to use the alternate feed. However, thats a price I'm willing to pay to enjoy the luxury of a full post composer, and editor on my Pocket PC Phone.

TV Guide Mobile now FREE!

Handmark's TV Guide is now free, and better yet, they are issuing prorated refunds for those who bought a subscription. It does display ads on the screen now, but they are relatively unobtrusive and therefore manageable. I found some glitches in the way it displays listings but I had that problem with the paid version so I'm more forgiving now. It also has a neat reminder feature which lets you add a reminder x minutes before your show starts. Like the prior paid version, it has Entertainment News, Watch List and Watercooler features built in.
So if you've got any flavor of Windows Mobile or blackberry device, head on over to www.tvguide.handmark.com And give it a try!

Evening News Teasers *do* Make Me Feel Like This!

Drip, drip,drip...Memory Leaks

Lately I've been more aware of a memory leak or two on my device. Most notably it happens in Pocket Internet Explorer- if I try to launch a large page the used Program memory goes from this:


To this:



In fact, its gotten to the point that I switched back to Opera mobile as my default browser because even though it uses more Storage memory, it doesn't swell up the Program memory.
TinyTwitter does also do this to some degree over time. so I've pinpointed it to applications that require wireless updates. I'm going to try and find out how to fix this over the next few days.

Labels:os, pda, troubleshooting

FlightStats- Mobile Flight Info

Here's something I could have used last week! This mobile site (http://mobile.flightstats.com/go/Mobile/ ) gives you info on real-time flight statuses as well as notifications about the airport of your choice. I've added it to my mobile bookmarks- it'll come in handy I have to pick up guests from the airport...and when I drop them off!

What a Difference a Day(care) Makes

If I knew that daycare would agree with Seth this much, I'd have sent him at 6 weeks! I had a lot of anxiety about him going, especially in light of all the horror stories that have been in the media these days, but I've never seen him so happy. I think it has something to do with there being other babies around him but he just seems more patient and less fussy. And, despite all my insecurities, he still loves me just as much when we bring him home :)

Modu Jackets- A New Spin on an Old Idea

Almost 10 years ago I bought my first pda- a Visor Handspring, and at the time it was the cutting edge of technology. One thing that set it apart was the ability to add modules to it and enable additional functionality. The Springboard modules could add MP3 functions, GPS functions, Wireless capabilities:




The new Modu phone is now recognized as the world's lightest phone, and is able to accomplish this feat by the interchangeable jackets that it slips into:



Its a shame that Handspring wasn't able to capitalize on this technology as clearly they were headed in the right direction. More info on the Modu phone can be found on the CNET Crave blog.