Which smartphone is better? Compare iPhone, Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry? o_O

Most people want an iPhone if they have the money to get it, it has class, it is a status symbol in some circles. It is worth the money. Unfortunately, It also carries a lot of 'Apple' bullshit.

Next comes Android for the geeks, power users, value-for-money, Google services users, Android v4.0 is cutting edge. Unfortunately, droids have short lifes, low quality apps and market fragmentation which is its Achilles heel.

Next comes Blackberry for the suits! (iMessage & gTalk threaten BBM quite well). Perfect For Thumb-Jockeys. Design is inherently counterproductive to the whole 'touch' scene.

Next comes Windows Phone, a new contender due to the upcoming Win8, sure to make it big if Microsoft plays it right. Attracts Microsoft services users(Windows, MS Office etc), cheaper then Apple phones, connected with windows OS and Office products.

• My first phone was an Android (HTC Desire).
• My second phone is an iPhone 4.
• My third phone will be Windows Phone 8.

Most of those who advocate Android, I agree by the way, are actually 'power users' and are aware of the 'open source advantage' and the 'apple bullshit' I mentioned earlier. But if you go stand in a smartphone store that sells accessories for all types of phones then you will see a pattern emerge.

You have no idea how empowered a non tech user feels when there is only one button on a phone, it negates the very idea of 'what if I press the wrong button?/which button do I press?'! Try handing the iPhone 4 and the Samsung Galaxy S2 to your grandma(any non tech person, who by they way number more then the power users) and see which one she likes. For an average user an iPhone looks like the best choice because it provides a much more managed and smooth user experience. Android 4.0 is mainly targeted at a better user experience to combat this very area.

I am an Indian and Apple is most definitely a status symbol here as it was a couple of years ago in the US/UK. And as it is worldwide when the newest model is released.

The life of a droid – It starts dying as soon as it is born

1. Android OS dev community churns out new features that have new hardware needs.
2. This vanilla OS is then passed on to phone manufacturers who repack it with their own UI, features and branding. They also take the OS to the butcher table to fit it in the various kind of models they make.
3. These phones are then passed on to cellular carriers who again modify the manufacturer's OS and apply their own UI, features(more like feature restrictions) and branding.
4. Finally the user can buy the device and is very happy. Fragmentation is awesome till here.
5. The inevitable happens, the android dev community churns out a new version. This is where the pain starts. The vanilla OS is not usable by the average user, unless they are power users and have rooted their devices and are ready to debrand their device.
6. The new version then has to pass thru the drawing board of the manufacturer, who tailors it to fit the specific models and then it has to pass thru the cellular carrier's drawing board. This process takes a extremely long time. The manufacturer as well as the cellular carrier are both not very good or very fast at it and they dont like to spend money on it.
7. In the end, the user gets the update very late and doesnt like it. In addition it dawns on the user that very soon the manufacturer and the cellular carrier will stop churning out updates for their specific model. They are profit oriented corps after all.

So a droid starts dying as soon as it is born.

An example: My HTC Desire. The latest HTC gave us is v2.3 on June 2011, It took HTC 6 months to churn out the update, vanilla release was on December 2010. HTC also stops supporting the device at that time.. This update is however not recommended for most users and wipes the phone, so officially it is stuck at v2.2 (the original version only). The hardware in the phone is however capable of running Android v4.0 which is the newest. But to get that on my device, I need to be a power user, root it, loose HTC Sense, wait for the community to port the OS to this device (which is very unlikely).

How old is this phone? Born on February 16, 2010 and died June, 2011. 16 months. R.I.P.
How many major updates it received: 1 (v2.1 to v2.2).


* HTC Desire akin to HTC Sensation at the moment. i.e a top of the line phone.

Android Development is messy at best

Google is working hard on trying to remove the manufacturer and the cellular provider from the OS-to-user pipeline. Experts call it one of the reasons for Google's takeover of Motorola. But alas I don’t think it can be fixed. It is the nature of the beast.

There are many other aspects of market fragmentation. The second main one has to do with apps and their quality. An app developer is constrained by the lowest common denominator when developing an app or the app wont function on all devices. The dev also has to handle a variety of screen sizes, performances issues and individual quirks. Never mind the need for the dev to own a number of devices(most droid devs dont have that much money!) to test the app and the extra work hours needed to have the app perform 'ok' on all devices. So due to this fragmentation the life of a droid dev becomes unnecessarily harder and is only worsened by super fast OS updates, new hardware etc.

The result is a low quality app because the hands of the dev were tied behind their back!
Just for a comparison, see the iOS (Apple mobile device OS) development. Apple guarantees that an OS update will work on all but the oldest models. There is a strict standard that the devs can rely on. There are high quality development tools available. The dev does not need to buy a bunch of devices to test the apps. The dev gets support from Apple. For all that they have to give up control and a larger profit share to Apple. It hurts but seems like the lesser of two evils.

Apple phones users have their own personal nightmares

• Dependence on iTunes.
• The feeling of being only able to do what Apple ‘allows’ as to do.
• No widgets, advanced apps like File System browser, Advanced settings etc
• The so called ‘major features’ like crop in photo gallery or snapping pics using the volume button, which should have been there right from the start.
• Restriction on hardware peripherals, Apple devices are notorious to work up to their potential only when paired with Apple products.
• From the developer POV, you have to pay a premium to get Apple hardware to develop apps, Apple eats up a large share of the profits, the app screening process are unfair with a policy effectively of ‘we are the kings, we decide your fate’.

Developing for the Windows Phone Platform

I have high hopes for this gambit because Microsoft seems to be keeping in mind both the issues. Market fragmentation will be lower then Android as Microsoft restricts the type of devices that can run Windows Phone 8 OS and provides a much better development environment then Android. Microsoft platform will also have less restrictions on what Apps can do or not and historically Microsoft has a lesser tendency to exert control on the platform, in comparison to Apple. Also, due to the large number Microsoft of users, any lockdown will be torn apart soon.

In the end all I can say is each phone/platform has its good and bad sides.

An update: A much more eloquent and more accurate article was posted about the Android updates issue by MICHAEL DEGUSTA which shows how Android updates fair.  It paints a picture much worse then I thought..

"It appears to be a widely held viewpoint that there’s no incentive for smartphone manufacturers to update the OS: because manufacturers don’t make any money after the hardware sale, they want you to buy another phone as soon as possible. If that’s really the case, the phone manufacturers are spectacularly dumb: ignoring the 2 year contract cycle & abandoning your users isn’t going to engender much loyalty when they do buy a new phone. Further, it’s been fairly well established that Apple also really only makes money from hardware sales, and yet their long term update support is excellent (see chart)." read more

* I am a developer on the web and mobile platforms so I do believe I know slight, just slightly, more then the average Joe. But please understand that that assessment is based on a very small 'data sample' and no scientific methods whatsoever. It is just my opinion.

Say yes to mobile blogging!

Trying out the new android app from Google. It seems to have good features and is designed to do micro blogging.

iPhone 3G/2G on BSNL 3G settings and WiFi on BSNL Dataone Speed tests

 

I recently got an iPhone 4 32GB after already being a droid fan for a long time. Now I am torn between the two. Some things are great in the iPhone and other in the HTC Desire running Android 2.2.

And to top the cake with a cherry, BSNL recently launched 3G in my home town, Dehradun. I went thru the whole bureaucratic red tape and got a prepaid 3G SIM for Rs 180 (120  + 60) thats gives me Rs 50 talktime and 500MB data for one month. Good enough for a test run.

After dealing with the minisim - microsim fiasco, which was a tough thing to sort out in itself, I got the phone running on Cellone (BSNL) carrier network.

This was my first time with 3G and it was liberating. It goes to say even wifi is not true wireless freedom as it has a very limit range. 3G helps a lot with that.

To activate 3G I have to put ‘bsnlnet’ for APN Settings under Settings>General>Network>Cellular Data Network. It took a few switching on and off of the ‘Cellular Data’ settings. Toggle ‘Enable 3G’ to switch between 3G and 2G(Edge/GPRS)

The good thing is that bsnl push notifications work great and let us know hwo much data we used up as soon as we switch off ‘Cellular Data’.

The browser and youtube work fine but it is hard to tell if the speeds are faster then wifi. (i have a 512Kbps Unlimited plan from BSNL Dataone).

In this screenshot of the “SpeedTest.Net” app you can see the speeds that I get. The first one is Wifi which is not surprising as I have a 0.5 Mbps dataone landline connection. The second is the 2G setting for cellular network. It is pathetic. But as soon as we switch to 3G the beasts are unleashed! 1Mbps+ is more that sufficient for a mobile connection.

This also opens up the possibilities of using the phone as a WIFI or USB tethered device for mobile internet access on your laptop. I switched on wifi tethering and connected my laptop to the phone’s wifi hotspot and I was browsing 720p videos on youtube! It was amazing. Take that USB Stick modem!

PS: To take a screen shot on you iPhone, press and hold the home button while you press the power button and the screen will flash and save the image in the camera roll.

Bought New Hardware: Microsoft Sidewinder X6 Keyboard, Sidewinder X8 Mouse, Corsair TX650W PSU

I got really tired of using my Logitech S510 wireless  Media remote/keyboard/mouse set for the last 4 years. 4 Years! It has served me well but man was it time for change. Well This time I wanted to get the best of the best (with as usual in a affordable price range). The Razer Mamba and Lycosa set was awesome but too expensive and their server coverage it not much in India so I went with the next best. Microsoft Sidewinder X6 Keyboard, Sidewinder X8 Mouse. I am still keeping the media remote tho :)

I also had a strange problem for the fast 3 months. When ever someone switched on the tube light in my room, my PC froze! Seriously man. It drove me insane and dont even ask how I pinned down that that was what was happening. Totally crazy. An educated guess was that the PSU was not filtering the spikes caused by the flickering of the tube-light when it switches on. I decided to buy a new PSU and a proper one this time. Also a new PSU gives me the ability to add another graphic card (in Dual SLI mode) which would give my aging PC a new lease on gaming life. You can imaging how sad I felt when I tried out the game Metro 2033. It has minimum sys requirements that are my PC specs! So sad. My (once) top of the line gfx card was fading away, even before its warranty ended.

Anyway, here is my take on the three main items I purchased.

Microsoft SideWinder X8 Wireless Gaming Mouse

Trust me gaming grade wireless mice are no simple piece of hardware. This sweet mouse can track on anything (M$ even tested it on human hair) and it has this awesome magnetic charging cord that gently snaps into place when bought near the mouse! no fumbling around for the cable in the dark. It also provides a break free transition from wireless and wired mode and you never have to worry about batteries again. Oh and it tracks at 4000 DPI o_O.

 

Microsoft SideWinder X6 Macro and backlit Keyboard, detachable numpad

One thing I have learned, you cant have enough keys on a keyboard! And this one has a whole bunch of extra keys. the numpad can be removed and attached to either side of the keyboard and can be converted into a macro pad with each key programmable. Though the pretties and the coolest thing I liked right in the beginning is the backlighting. It is insanely cool! They also have a near knob that can change the brightness of the backlight, which is awesome and I also liked the fact that this monstrosity also has media buttons and a volume knob and a whole bunch of keys that can be programmed on the fly!

One thing I hated was (might be a mis-config on my part). The macro keys dont work in visual studio. i.e they dont fire the macros. So sad. It is a priority for me to find a fix.workaround for that. You can imagine the usefulness for programmable keys for coding. Imagine a button to insert a button control from the toolbox :D and other super cool things that we can never remember the shortcut for.

It is amazing the power so many macro keys bring. When surfing, use a dedicated key to open up google search, another to open youtube  and another to initiate a new compose window in gmail. It is a huge benefit and I couldn't possibly switch to a standard keyboard now. It would feel like a handicap.

Corsair TX650W 650 Watt Power Supply

This baby is Single Rail, 80% efficient with active power correction. Super quite and very sturdy. The best part is it comes with a 5 year warranty! That is a loooong time. I doubt anyone was to hear much about power supplies so I will keep it simple and just show you some pics-

I purchased all these from . They have good customer service and great prices. But best of all they have a lot of cool products available. The only drawback is their shipping costs are a bit higher as they are in south and I am in north India and they only use सरकारी SpeedPost to send across state borders.

Here are some videos

Add Calibre libraries to Windows search Indexer and use it efficiently - (The Modern Reader Series - A guide to getting more out of Calibre – Issue #2)

Windows Indexing service is an operating system level service that maintains an index of most of the files on a computer and updates them without user intervention. To Modify your indexing options:

1. Open the start menu and start typing “Indexing Options”. It should appear in the results. Select it to open
2. You should see a list of locations already being indexed. Click the Modify Button.
3. In the new window select the folders you want to index and press OK to save.

Or alternatively, when you are searching a location in explorer that is not indexed, you get a yellow bar at the top asking you to add it to the indexing service. Right click on that yellow bar and select ‘Index this location’.

Now that you have indexed you calibre libraries it is time to have fun with the searches. I recommend reading  this short tutorial about windows searches and available operands like AND OR etc before continuing. (Power users: Advanced Guide)

We all agree that calibre does a great job of managing out ebooks and what not but in my personal opinion, calibre’s search and presentation is more targeted towards a user who knows what he is searching for. Say I want to see all the books in the Dune Series. I can go ahead and quite easily do that in calibre. But what about the peruser user. In today’s world an average personal library may hold anywhere from 1000 to 10000 books depending on how mad the owner of the library is :) . How about when you want to see the books you read in the last 2 weeks? or a list of reference books that one would want, usually, on a moments notice? etc etc… Well I have tried here to make some of those easy. Read on dear ebook worm (Open Explorer and navigate to one of you libraries. Now in the search box enter one of the following)

List all the books in a library -

NOT type:"file folder" NOT name:cover.jpg NOT name:metadata.db

 

This works best when you want to quickly access a book and don’t want to wait for calibre to load. I use it all the time to access my tech books library. For smaller libraries such as a tech books library or an encyclopaedia this work very efficiently and the search is very fast. So create a separate calibre library for this kind of categories.

Create and save a search for recently accessed books -

date:thismonth OR date:lastmonth NOT type:"file folder" NOT name:cover.jpg NOT name:metadata.db

You should then see a list of all the books that have accessed this month or last month. Pretty Neat? :)

Browse the covers as if it were a bookshelf - 

NOT type:"file folder" name:cover.jpg NOT name:metadata.db

Select the “Extra large Icons” view option and you have a bare minimum of a bookshelf here.

• I find this a very good way to browse thru what I have as it is much faster then calibre’s cover browser
• I have found many interesting items to read that I added to the library and forgot.
• This is also useful to remove useless covers like some group covers or default covers added to .lit files
• Use the Preview Pane to see larger versions of the covers
• Hide the navigation pane and the details pane and use full screen (F11) for best results
• If you save this search(see below) Most newer applications like Windows Preview will treat it as a folder

Save a search for easy future access -

For all of the above and any custom searches you make, you can save them. Just go ahead and click “Save Search” button in the explorer toolbar and give it a friendly name like “Recent books” or “My Covers” etc. This will add the search to you favourites(can be removed) and save it in the Searches folder under the current user (Start menu>[CurrentLoginName]>Searches). This way you can use the search as if it were a folder and apply additional search filters like by type or size and use various sorting and grouping options.

Filter Covers by Author-

For e.g., Navigate to you searches location and open “My Covers” and in the empty search box enter an author and see the magic happen. This will work even better with recent listing and book listing search above. (only work for author names due to the folder structure of calibre).

 

Use Saved searches smartly -

This technique can be used in countless ways like when you want to search for -

• Authors : add author name e.g. “Robin Cook” to a saved search or ‘ name:”Robin Cook” ’
• Title: add “name:dune” to list all books with “dune in their title”
• Format: add “name:.mobi” or ‘ type:”MOBI” ‘ or “name:.lit” or ‘ type:”LIT” ‘
• You can in fact use any column name in the format  columnname:”query” (note: remove space from column name like Date Modified becomes datemodified) See Rigth-Click in empty area> Sort/Group>More.. for a list of columns

Other options for cooler searches yet -

• Use different View options to make the results more pleasing and fun
• Use the preview pane as windows can show content preview for some file types like text, rtf, doc, images etc
• Right-click in an empty area and choose Sort By to get neat results. such as by folder or by name or size
• Right-click in an empty area and choose Group By to group the search results. Very useful for separating by type so that you see all mobi files in one group and pub files in another
• use the More… option in Sort, Group and Details View options to access from a ton of file property options.
• You can increase the size of the search box by dragging the divider to the left of the search box
• To view the location of a file in the search results Right Click>Open File Location (Press shift for a new window)
• Indexing service also searches inside books it can read like txt, rtf, doc etc. If you dont want to search inside files then add column names to you searches. e.g. search for “name:dune” instead of “dune”

I think I have list a lot of options for you to play with and as it may be apparent it is just a beginning! Discover searches of your own and share

Jumplist for Calibre: The eBook Management Software - (The Modern Reader Series - A guide to getting more out of Calibre – Issue #1)

I am a reader. You are a reader. Everyone is a reader and Calibre is open source! Aren’t we living in a golden age?

Calibre is a great application and it belongs to the community, but this also means that the community is in return responsible for calibre and its development. I was thoroughly impressed by it the first time I used it and am still surprised by its modular flexibility and potential. So I decided to participate and try to make the ‘calibre experience’ more smarter as that seems to be the mantra of this age.  So I have decided to start with a simple yet powerful tip for Calibre Users in the form of utilizing Win7’s Jump list feature. Here is does….

Aim : Facilitate launching of calibre and related tools with different start parameters.

Side effects : Multiple libraries, Integration in Windows 7  using Jumplist feature, Easy of launching and grouping calibre related links

Requirements: Calibre eBook Management Software, Windows 7, Hedgehog’s JumplistLauncher (Download 476.6 KB), (Administrator Privileges may be required based on the location of the installation of the launcher)

Limitations: Only runs on Windows 7

Setting Up Icons:

1. Open Explorer with Ctrl+Shift to start it in Admin mode and Navigate to calibre’s installation directory (usually C:\Program Files\Calibre2)
2. Create a new folder and Extract JumplistLauncher e.g. C:\Program Files\Calibre2\Jumplist   (power user tip: can be anywhere, can have multiple installs)
3. Right Click on JumplistLauncher.exe and select “Create Shortcut”. Select yes when asked to place on desktop. You can optionally cut-paste the shortcut back in the jumplist folder.
4. Rename the shortcut to “Calibre E-Book Management”. Optionally change it’s Icon to use calibre’s. See tutorial to change icon here
5. Right click the shortcut and select “Pin to Start Menu”
6. Right click the shortcut and select “Pin to Taskbar” (drag the icon to your preferred location)
7. The Icons should appear on you task bar as well as in start menu. Congratulations you are half done.

Setting up Jumplist items:

1. Press Ctrl+Shift and Click on the new icon to start the JumplistLauncher interface in admin mode. (Don’t worry if yours is empty, We are going to create these links.)
2. Add Items to the jump list
1. Click the ‘Add File’ button to create a new item.
2. Browse to calibre’s executable (C:\Program Files\Calibre2\calibre.exe) and press ‘Open’
3. In the ‘Selected Entry’ field group you can specify the name of you choice. for e.g ‘Calibre’
4. In the ‘Parameters’ field add command line configuration parameters. 
1. To launch calibre with another library location then default enter “--with-library <path>” where <path> is the path to that library e.g. E:\Books\Library2 . See the official support guide for more parameters.
2. To add a URL (for e.g. a friend’s content server) use a browser’s exe for the file and the URL for the parameter. For e.g. I used Firefox with is normally located at C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe
3. Add Calibre-server.exe to easily start your content server. see available params
4. If you have a skydrive, network backup etc, you can specify it’s path for the library
5. If you use the various modular executable in calibre’s directory, create batch files for common tasks and add them by creating a shortcut with the Run minimised option
5. Optionally change the icon of the jump list item by pressing the icon button.
3. Use the ‘Add Group’ button to great sections in the list. To edit a group’s name click on it in the list and it changes to a editable textbox.
4. Selecting one of the checkboxes in the list makes it the default launch operation when clicking on the icons we added to the task bad and start menu. If none is selected then this configuration window opens up.
5. Press the ‘Update Jumplist’ button to same you options and update the jump list without restarting the launcher.
6. Exit the configuration  window and you are done!

I hope this is a very helpful tutorial and will go a long way to utilizing calibre to its full potential. I will be create more posts and tutorials in the future so please send me feedback on the calibre’s mobileread forum or here.

My Application Owns the Computer!

A pervasive attitude among programmers is that the only reason people own a computer is to run their application. Symptoms include:

• Usurping shared resources like the desktop, system folders, task bar, registry, ... ("The whole machine is for my use.")
  
• Can't turn off the app ("The only reason the machine would be on is to run my app, so I'll install an auto-startup service, a startup app, an Explorer plug-in, ...").
  
• Resource hogging ("I can just grab exclusive access to files, database, or network connections when I launch and keep everything open.")
  
• Interrupts workflow with pop-up messages, tooltips, alert balloons, taskbar messages, status messages, sound effects, ... ("Look at me! I'm working! Do you see me? I'm doing something!!")
  
• Collateral damage ("I don't use that so I'll delete it.")
  
• Race conditions ("Anything I do will stay that way forever until I change it.")
  
• Security breaches ("I can expose everything on the machine, since I am the only one that will ever access it.")
  
• Lack of interoperability ("My app has everything it needs so I don't need to support file export or cut and paste.")
  
• No deployment ("I will never have to update or uninstall my app; they'll just get a new machine.")
  

IRCTC’s new face

Online booking is now very common and more appreciated then the brainless babus on the counters and the sweaty, slow moving lines they rule on. But Indian sites have really stayed behind in providing a clean and effective consumer experience. Who doesn’t curse a few times when using the IRCTC site or other govt sites. But the new beta interface seems to be on track. Have a look -



It is no longer a mad struggle between a bunch of pages and little popups. You don’t have to ‘Find Trains’ every time for different kind of seats like Chair Car or Sleeper Berth. It is really better now. they have gone with the generic booking design with a From/To/Date panel on one side and trains in the rest. The great part is when you click on a radio button for a train/type, it immediately loads the relevant info like Fair and Availability.

Though, I also think it is looking so good now because their previous interface was so damn dirty and clunky. Like a bully, the norm is getting picked on and the day that stops it feels extraordinary. But dear, that is what is ordinary supposed to be!

So IRCTC seems to be reaching ‘ordinary’ level which is extra ordinary based on previous experience!

PS: the link to the beta interface is in the top right corner of the homepage.

Christmas.NET - Dedicated to all the programmers out there

using Self;
using Self.Emotions;
using Self.Online.Blog;
using Self.Rides.Bike.Pulsar150;
using Self.Offline.GirlFriend;
using Self.Offline.SocialCircle.Dudes;
using Self.Gadgets.Canon500D;
using Self.Gadgets.AmazonKindle;

namespace Self.Life.Experience
{
    public class Christmas
    {
        public Christmas()
        {
            InitialiseComponents(Self.Life.Instances[CURRENT_INSTANCE]);

            GalacticDomination.Thread.Suspend();

            Emotion emo = Chrismas_Start(new System.TimeSpan(48, 0, 0));
            Self.Life.Experience.Add(emo.Summary);
            Self.Life.Components[2009].Vacation.Add("Chritmas", emo);

            GalacticDomination.Thread.Resume();

            var settings = new { Audience = "Public", LevelOfDetail = "Overview", OutputLanguage = "Human, C# v3.5" };

            Blogs[TECH_BLOG].Post(this, emo, settings);
        }

        [System.Serializable]
        [System.STAThread]
        public Emotion Chrismas_Start(System.TimeSpan duration)
        {
            if (Self.CurrentStatus == Status.Married)
            {
                Monotonus.Do("boring, chistmas tree, boring, big dinner, boring, gifts under tree, boring");
                throw new InvalidSystemStateException("maybe try a few linux commands like sudo. If not on mono then no chance buddy");
            }

            Shopping("Gifts", "for friends, family, her");

            WithHer("Bike to Secluded spots, Curvy Hilly Roads", "use lots of breaking ;)");
            WatchMovie("London Dreams", "could have been better movie but only spent half the time actually watching movie");
            WithHer("xoxo", "[censored]");
            WithHer("Dinner", "Chinese");
            if (GiveGift("Her", "Necklace").IsHappy) Self.MentalState.SaveSnapshot();
            WithHer("xoxo", "[censored], snuggle, [censored], snuggle");
            Gadget("Kindle", "Read some more from 'Spin by Robert Charles Wilson'");

            duration.Subtract(new System.TimeSpan(24, 0, 0));

            BikeTo("Mussoorie", "No Snow, still lots of fun");
            WatchMovie("De Dana Dan", "great Hera Pheri like fun");
            Gadget("Kindle", "Catch up on blogs using google reader mobile ed.");

            BikeTo("Back Home", "make too much noise, overspeed, pit stop for beer");
            WithBuddies("Get Drunk", "best part of the day");
            GiveGift("Buddies", "Suspicious dvds, " + Emoticons.EvilGrin.Load());
            Gadget("Canon500D", "takes pics of buddies in wierd and compromising situations");
            WithBuddies("Passed Out", "best part of the Night");

            duration.Subtract(new System.TimeSpan(24, 0, 0));

            return new Emotion(this, "Happy", "Huge Handover");
        }
    }
}

Buying an Amazon Kindle 2 in India? Bollywood estyle!

Scene 0 – The hero spots the heroine. Love at first sight – General Specs

First off, I purchased a Kindle 2 and am very happy with the product. It is what it is said to be and then some!

But acquiring this neat gadget is not so easy if you are in India. It makes for a neat story with a whole lot of bollywood style twists. Read: kicking the ass of the hero(me) for the whole movie and then unite with the heroine (kindle 2 global) right at the end. o-O.

Like everyone else outside the US, The hero went crazy for a few seconds when he learnt about the Kindle going international global :D He simply had to have it. Any science fiction bookworm would agree. Reading about awesome alien worlds and insane time-travel ideas on a comparably cool gadget is boundless fun.

So sit back, relax and enjoy the saga.

Aside from being extremely hot, the Kindle 2 is an amazing device. It’s form factor is surprisingly thin and E-Ink is so clear and easy on your eyes that it looks even better in the sun unlike other displays we are accustomed to. It can show a whole variety of file formats and for those it cant, one can find even more converters to get the job done. The Wispernet is great and covers almost all over the world. Via EVDO and falls back to 3G, EDGE and GPRS respectively based on the cellular service. It can charge via USB too and functions as a pen drive when plugged in.

Scene 1 -  The seduction – Geek specs

It uses a Lithium-polymer battery which does not degrade after each charge cycle. It has a processor faster then the Iphone. It has a Cellular modem that has hidden GPS features. It is extremely easy to use as it follows the minimalism  methodology set by google. It has stereo speakers albeit not a full blown MP3 player. It runs linux! and with some cool software you can easily be looking at the root prompt and happily compiling a custom kernel. It has many experimental features like a browser, picture viewer (manga), MP3 player, audio books and Text 2 Speech in addition to the million and one hacks out there in the wild due to the OS being linux. Oh and did I mention, an internet access is free.

View Full Album

All this in a 290 gram, super sleek, white hot body. The hero yells within ‘just take me. take me right here…’

Scene 2 – First date, her daddy is strict, no dates before marriage - Import fees and ways around

So, The hero trotted of to her home (Amazon.com) all giggly and bubbly and gobble up all the information on the new release and decided to ask her out on a date (check out the payment options).

The large import fees really made me mad and like all desi people couldn’t find it easy to pay the proper fees, need a jugaad shortcut. So I scour google with all the search trick i know. I find a few options like using one of those sites that provide you with a US address where you can ship the item and they forward it to you for a modest fee. The other one was a Chinese site selling Kindle at a much reduced price. However since kindle has a tiny cell phone for its eyes and ears I couldn't risk one of those options due to the fear of void warranty or wispernet not working.

So our hero wastes a lot of time on her from afar and finally succumbed to the Righteous ways. Marriage with the full 7 rounds. (i.e. the displayed $259 become $378.57). That is what girls do a guy’s pocket so the hero shouldn’t be surprised :)

Scene 3 – Family wants NRI - Payment options Credit card only

Soon thereafter the first hurdle comes, You have to have a credit card which I dont have (a whole other rebellious policy I subscribe to but best left out of this post). It wiped the smile off my face. More days pass searching and looking for options. Come up with only two. Either get someone to buy it for you or get someone to buy you a gift card which can then be used to make the purchase. I was a bit worried as, like other mobile devices, they get tagged to the purchaser.

The hero doesn’t want some random NRI to marry her and bring her to him. She is too hot to be trusted with anyone else.

After some talk here and there I find another in the middle option, Get someone to buy it for you as a gift ! In such a case the kindle is unregistered and one can then register it themselves. However, that options is some what hidden and not easy to catch. There is only one option and that is gift wrapping and that costs further more money. God help our hero. However after reading a lot more text in amazon support on the not so easy on eye non E-Ink monitor I find that just select gift wrap and dont select any wrapping method and add some gift message text and you are done. The purchase is made via a trusted friend

The heroine will stay single! All roads appear clear and our hero sings a couple of melodies. But he doesn’t know the mafia (whole shipping industry) is after her. The Mafia sends their minions all over the route. Will the heroine survive? Will they unite? The mafia is sure to be badass, what will the hero do?

Stay tuned for the next episode.

Ever thought what goes on in the mind and life of a scener(pirate)?

 

Ever thought what goes on in the mind and life of a scener(pirate)?  Watch The Scene series and see the first season first.

 

I was(am) a big fan of 'The Scene', a mini series that you can freely download and watch online, and stumbled back to their site today. This series is an awesome creative work about the life of pirates and it started the cycle of thought in me. I have researched this subjects many times and wanted to write a post about it as it is a very interesting world as well as a community of exceptional talent.

‘The Scene’ refers to the online piracy world including the real world aspects of it and the Sceners are the people who make warez(pirated stuff) available to us i.e. the public. They put themselves in real danger and, if caught, are exposed to very real consequences. This is not to be confused w ith hackers as that is a whole separate world and much more evil ;).

 

Organizations and Governments all around the world spend millions of dollars to try and stop piracy both by developing newer and difficult to pirate protection systems and legal teams to catch the culprits but we, the people, still get everything without paying anything. All due to the sceners.

We find it so easy to just go about downloading anything in sight, but the story of how that ‘thing’ found its way to the public sharing sites is a long and interesting one with all sorts of organized crime like aspects to it. Generally speaking, releases(warez) are created by a Release Group. In such a group there are sources and couriers, like someone in a DVD printing factory who will sneak one out to send to the encoders who convert the original stuff and package it into online deliverables via top-sites and uploaders. After going thru all those ranks of the group do the files reach out in the public. There are also the Primes  who are people who donate hardware to the top-sites for access rights on their servers so that they can get the very best releases, post requests for special items and to get the rights of bragging that they are the first ones to enjoy the releases.

Why do they do it. The most common reasons are along the lines like – they can do it so they do it, for the fun of it, for the thrill of doing something wrong and getting away with it and also for the fierce competitive world that The Scene is. Scene lifes are made and  destroyed based on who goes thru the process of obtaining and releasing an item first and in the correct way, leaving the others sulking in the dust behind them.

Despite what you might thing, The Scene is cut-throat and yet self-regulated community i.e. has its own rules and principles which the participants must follow or be removed. Without trust between the members of a group they would be caught easily or simply not live up to the competition. Due to the high risk life of a scener they use sophisticated anonymity and security software to fool anyone looking for them. They spoof, hop, run in circles and spew garbage leaving very little if any trace behind them. To this effect, there are a lot of methods that have evolved to keep some measure of control like release lists, where bad releases are nuked and access controls mechanisms to keep the blacklisted out, most of which the common man cant get a glimpse of.

 

The most hardcore of all sceners live a very secretive life and definitely are not the ones who like fame and exposure. It is extremely difficult to get in contact with such people even though be sure that they live among us. I like to think they live on a separate plane of existence :).

Now that you know a tiny bit about The Scene, next time you download ‘stuff’, take a moment to thank the uploaded and keep those speed limits off.

Cheers. Peace Out.

Links: Wiki 1 2 3 4. I was going to post a bunch of links here but it better to let you search it yourself and there is a whole lot of stuff out there.

Cooler Master Storm Scout Cabinet – Ramp Walk

My cyborg arm has been itching for a few days due to the lack of the modding for an insanely long time. So, solely to satisfy the inner BuckRodger, I decided to dump my previous cabinet and freshen things up.

I am also a photography hobbyist with a Canon 500D and since spending the whole Diwali snapping fireworks, I wanted to do something different. So, I went with a mod that would look the coolest in pictures :D As you may be able to tell, shooting colourful lights is the best kind of photography I like. (Straight LowDown -  See all the pics of this cabinet – slideshow, set)

Enter Cooler Master Storm Scout (see manufacturer page, video review). I purchased one from theitdepot.com along with some neons and internal lighting paraphernalia. I spent the last weekend switching cabinets and installing the internal lighting.

This is my first time with a ‘proper’ cabinet. I was amazed by the tool-free design, the solid steel, wire management, dust filters, wire mesh and side window. The best however is the quality of cooling it provides. My system temperatures went down 10 degrees right away in comparison to the temps in the previous cabinet. The handles on the top are really sturdy and made it very easy to move it around for the ‘photoshoot’ ;)

It is such a shame that I didn’t move to a branded cabinet earlier then now. The benefits are so many and indispensable once you have tasted them.  The stock fans are huge and very well placed. It is also such a wonder that the cabinet is so quite. 

Radical Modes (Green/Red/Blue) - Rear View

Another feature I really love is the small switch on the front panel that can switch ON/OFF the LEDs and attached with the other additions I made works very well when you need it to be dark. In addition I installed a parallel port controllable relay to turn off the chassis fans as well. It is very handy when you want that zero decibel  sound level. I use Win7’s powershell to switch to a quite mode that throttles down CPU and GPU clocks and runs my tiny utility to switch of the fans. When I get time, I am planning to write a full utility to control the internals of a system via the age old parallel port electronics addon method.

Frontal Assault - Mode Green and Red

Other owners of the same cabinet may be really happy to know that the ceiling fan actually has speed control support. The default wireup of the cabinet just attaches it to the +12v rail and we can disconnect it from that and plug it into the mobo. Which will allow us to monitor and control the fan speed. Unfortunately, and this is the only thing I dont like about this cabinet is, the other fans dont have speed control capability. It would have been nice to have a switch like the the ones offered by Antec.

HDD Rack, Read Exhaust and the GPU

This cabinet is a far cry from my last 500Rs one. That one was so old and so modded out that it had become rickety like a UP Roadways Bus. Years ago, I had to mod it out to make it functional(new HDD rack, front exhaust, addition front panel USB etc) to my hardware and was unable to upgrade from a long time as I knew that the other local ones would have the same shortcomings and would required modding. So I am very happy that this cabinet is already functional and so I am free to concentrate on visual pleasure alone!

This brings me to the end of the outside view of the cabinet. I will do the internals next time, when I get time. I hope you guys enjoyed it. Dont forget the view the other equally awesome pics slideshow, set.