All the geeky stuff
PC
A Symbian Client
Mar 10th
One thing that troubles me is that developers pay attention only to iPhone and Android, Symbian is an afterthought or many a times Symbian is completely ignored, they don’t even acknowledge that there is a mobile platform called Symbian. Now why does Symbian need developers attention? – For completing the service experience. And what is service experience? It means that you should be able to enjoy the service like everyone is.
There are services like Groveshark, LastPass, Paypal, Last.fm, Spotify, Evernote, Dropbox etc. These services have mobile client also which makes life much more easier. But… But… they are not available for Symbian. I pay to use most of these services but I’m not getting the full benefit of it. The number of Symbian users are more than iPhone, Android, Palm and Windows mobile users combined.
These services and developers don’t realize that by embracing Nokia and Symbian they will be getting more new customers. And developing for Symbian is not hard, in fact Symbian gives you more options to choose from when building an app. For developing apps for android, you can use only higher/better version of java on the other hand on Symbian you can use QT, Python, C+ + and Java.
Some of the apps that I should mention are Gravity, Mobbler, the official WordPress app (early testing stage), TuneWiki, Opera Mini, Opera Mobile, Skyfire, ereader, SmartMovie, Midomi, Nimbuzz, Playlist DJ, Handy Apps, AccuWeather, Symtorrent, snaptu are some of the apps which are very good.
For the last two weeks I’ve been trying sending emails to customer care of various services demanding a Symbian client, telling them the benefits of having a Symbian client and threatening to quit the service if I don’t get a symbian client. ;p
Here are some of the responses I got -
1. Evernote – Evernote does have a Symbian client in the shape of a WRT widget. It is slow and clunky and has not been updated for months and customer service politely said – Sorry, we have no information about our Symbian plans.
2.LastPass – lastpass is a password management service and you get a symbian client with premium service which costs $1 a month. The symbian client is again very clunky and doesn’t work with touchscreen phones — They were concerned about my problem, wanted more information and assured me they will fix it soon.
3.Last.fm – We do have Mobbler and it is better than other clients, even the official ones. I want last.fm to acknowledge and include Mobbler is their official page. — sadly no response so far.
4.Paypal – It has a mobile site which doesn’t come close to the iPhone app experience, and as expected no response from paypal people.
5.Groveshark – The music streaming service have me a nice reply – ” Thank you for the email. We are working on a Symbian mobile version as we speak. However, its in the early stages of development so there’s no release date yet. —- That’s ok, we can wait, as long as there is something in the pipes.
Next I’ll be knocking the doors of Dropbox and many ebook services. So stay tuned.
Microsoft Browser Ballot has arrived
Feb 23rd
To keep the guys at European Commission happy, Microsoft had agreed to give a users a choice of browsers. Today Microsoft has started sending a ballot on Windows Update to let Windows users in the United Kingdom, Belgium and France select their browser of choice. The rest of Europe will follow around March 1.
The browser choice screen software update will be offered as an automatic download through Windows Update for Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. Microsoft Vice President and Deputy General Counsel Dave Heiner explained in a blog post announcing the move -
“The software update will be installed automatically, or will prompt you to download or install it, depending on which operating system you are running and your settings for Windows Update.”
I still think that this is unnecessary, what most users do the first time they start their computer is go and download their favorite browser. Maybe this will make that process easier.
Run Windows 7 in iPad
Feb 3rd
At the time iPad was announced I tweeted that it would be cool if one could use Windows 7 in iPad. It seems my wish was answered.
Citrix Systems, an American multinational corporation with a focus on software and services specialized in virtualization for delivering applications over a network and the internet.
Did you notice the last line? – over a network – Windows 7 will not/cannot be installed in iPad, it will run from a server and will be simply displayed on iPad.
This is done via the citrix system’s desktop virtualization platform XenDextop or XenApp.
According to Chris Fleck, the company’s vice president of Community and Solutions Development, any windows application will run unmodified and securely in data center and you’d be able to multitask also.
I suspect there will be loss of performance because all the "over the network" and "virtualization" thing.
For now lets wait and see how things shape up.
Google Chrome 4 & extensions
Jan 26th
Google Chrome 4 is out of beta which means you don’t have to be a beta tester to get the latest Chrome features.
So what’s new? According to Google, there are 1,500 new features. Really!!?? Um… not exactly Google is talking about extensions.
You can find extensions for Google Chrome in our extension gallery, and install the ones that interest you. Extensions on Google Chrome take only seconds to install, and can be uninstalled just as easily. You can view and manage the settings for your extensions by clicking on the Tools menu and selecting "Extensions." 
Some cool must-have extensions are –
- Google Dictionary – View definitions easily as you browse the web.
- Slideshow – Turn your favorite photo sites, such as Flickr, Picasa, Facebook, and Google Images into a slideshow.
- Docs PDF/PowerPoint Viewer – Automatically previews pdfs, powerpoint presentations, and other documents in Google Docs Viewer.
- RSS Subscription Extension – Adds one-click subscription to your toolbar.
- Email this page – This extension adds an email button to the toolbar which allows you to email the page link using your default mail client or Gmail.
- FlashBlock – FlashBlock for Chrome. Block them all, or be selective with the embedded whitelist manager
- AdBlock – AdBlock for Chrome! Blocks ads all over the web. Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars by our users!
Extend Windows 7 trial
Aug 21st
Windows 7 have been earning rave reviews everywhere but there are people who are still unsure about Windows 7, who are still sticking to Windows XP or Vista.
If you are not sure about switching to windows 7 and the trial period of 30 days just isn’t enough for you; you can extend the trial period for 120 days. This is achieved via a command which can be used upto 3 times to reset the countdown.
If you install Windows 7 and don’t enter an installation key, the 30-day activation clock starts. To see how many days you have left, click Start, right-click Computer, and choose Properties. At the bottom of the dialog under Windows Activation, you’ll see the number of days left in your trial period.
When that number gets perilously close to zero, you can extend the free period another 30 days via the following steps:
- Step 1: Click Start, All Programs, Accessories. Right-click Command Prompt and choose Run As Administrator. Enter your administrator password.
- Step 2: Type the following command and press Enter:
slmgr -rearm
Note the space after slmgr and the hyphen in front of rearm. - Step 3: Restart Windows 7.
Once the OS restarts, the Properties dialog described above will indicate that Windows 7’s activation grace period has been reset to a full 30 days.
You can run the -rearm trick a total of three times. If you perform a -rearm at the end of each 30-day period, you end up with 120 days of full, unfettered Windows 7 use without having to supply an activation key in the interim.
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