There’s a very good video from ScottGu on the upcoming (ie in-development) MVC Framework. This is going to be great when its done but illustrates how fast technologies and pseudo standards change, that is if you want to keep up with them…anyway good stuff!
October 8, 2007
October 7, 2007
VSTO Variations …
Gosh Darn-it, just when something useful comes along you find it has a missing wheel. VSTO or more properly Visual Studio Tools for Office is a conceptually great idea to help make all the functionality of Office apps like Word or Excel usable as if they were native components in Visual Studio. So far, so good because the previous mechanism of using COM and COM shims was never very satisfactory or seamless.
Unfortunately, nothing comes without a downside and the first downside is that VSTO doesn’t support Office apps pre-version 11.0 (Office 2003). Ok, at first that seems workable since thats 4 years ago and surely people would have upgraded by now, until you discover that that has some big exceptions, proved by me identiying corporate customers still using Office 97 (on NT 4.0!).
The second gotcha is that VSTO is really very compatible between Office 11 and 12 (Office 2007), with 12 having shedloads more functionality and different interfaces, which becomes evident when you doscver that each version needs a different PIA (Primary Interop Assembly) which can’t be mixed.
This is a big downside for an ISV like me. So what can I do ? Well not much, apparently there are some bodges to get some common codebase but in reality we are left to write conditional code and essentially write two versions like this;
private void My_Addin(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
if (this.Application.Version == “11.0″)
{
// Office 2003-specific code.
}
else
{
// Office 2007-specific code.
}
}
This is inconvenient and there’s no guarantee (in fact far from it) that I won’t need a third condition for Office 14.0 next year (there’s no Office 13.0 for superstitious reasons). So how does this make me feel? it makes me feel we should just stick with COM shims because then we can support older versions, but then we lose new functionality like the Ribbon (or do it lower level) or stick with VSTO and make Office 12 our preferred target. No surprise which one MS want us to do! Gosh Darn-it, life is never easy.
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October 3, 2007
Riding the Metro
If you are also a Microsoft ISV partner you will have doubtless suffered the twisting turmoil of the continuosly changing support structures for TAP, EAP, Ascend and Touchdown programmes. It all started with the perfectly good and usable BetaPlace portal which got decomissioned in favour of the not so good (IMHO) Connect site which was mainly aimed at individuals, but partners have been shunted through a whole stream of not very good portals including BetaONE and AirFrame and now the worst yet, Metro.
Metro is in my opinion the ultimate example of how not to build a portal; its slow, badly designed, has awful colours, multi-click link steps and to cap it off, requires a manual to be able to use it! Anyway, the reason I’m writing about this today is that I had a small epiphany with it when I realised, despite signing up back in May, I could see no new content. I had registered, added my project and updated my details, but no info…
Turns out that you won’t see any of the info until you attach your own id back to the company project. Once I did that I could see all the materials, very slowly. For some reason the site uses something like a 5 point font which is almost invisible to the naked eye. So there might actually be something useful on there, but its so badly organised and time consuming I’ll probably never know. MS should talk to me about designing a really usable site.
Anyway, if you are a ISV partner using Metro and can’t see any materials, add yourself to your company project.
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October 2, 2007
WM6 upgrade for HTC P3300
The HTC club site now has a WindowsMobile 6 download for the P3300 (http://member.htc.com/member/login.aspx?fm=eu&ln=en), but sadly T-Mobile haven’t made it available on their site (http://www.tm-phonedownloads.com) for the MDA III.
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September 30, 2007
Unattractive Vista
I just got a new laptop for Vic which came pre-loaded with Vista Home premium. Vic knows as much about computers as I know about drama, but it only took her two hours to ask if she could have XP back like her old laptop… Its a real shame that Vista has turned out the way it has as a visually attratctive but slow and overweight version of XP in drag.
I asked Vic to persist with Vista for a while and give it a chance … but the final straw came when she tried to copy her photos off her usb key … can you see why ?
I had to agree that it would be somewhat unreasonable to wait nearly 24 years for the copy to complete. This put the 6 days the DVD burn dialog told me into perspective!
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September 29, 2007
Xtended Play
I was pleased to see Microsoft actually listened to the many voices asking for Windows XP to remain available until Vista’s successor appears. Although the extension is only until mid-2008 I expect this will be extended again until a suitable successor appears.
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August 25, 2007
Doing something useful with the T-Zone button
The pink T-Zone button on the T-Mobile Dash/Mail has its function defined in the \Windows\Sort_IE.lnk file which by default contains the line:
36#”\windows\winwap.exe”
I can think of a far more useful way of re-assigning the key to CommManager so I can switch bluetooth on and off for use in my car. So, a simple edit to the file deleting the old line and replacing it with this;
36#”\windows\CommManager.exe”
Now I can launch CommManager with the T-Zoes key.
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August 24, 2007
FN key too fiddly on Excalibur/Dash/Mail ?
If you find holding the FN key on the Excalibur fiddly there is a simple solution … just press and hold the appropriate key down until the key legend symbol appears. So, on my UK T-Mobile Mail the H key also shows the ? symbol, so holding the H key down produces a ? symbol automatically after about a second. Keeping the key depressed causes the symbol to repeat like ????
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August 23, 2007
Turning XT9 off on Excalibur/S620/Dash/Mail/Cosmo
Resetting the Excalibur turns it back into XT9 predictive text mode and you will find that a and z keys no longer display characters. Holding the FN key just temporarily switches between XT9 and 123# mode, so not much help. To change to abc mode so that a and z work as designed you need to hold FN and SPACE which will pull up the text entry selection menu where you can select the abc mode
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August 22, 2007
My Home Screen
This is my edited simple home screen for the WM6 based T-Mobile Mail (Excalibur). One of the big changes to my taste is to change the font form 16 point bold to 18 point normal as I think this looks more elegant.
<?xml version=”1.0″?>
<home>
<author>Tim Carmichael</author>
<contacturl>http:/blog.timcarmichael.com</contacturl>
<title>Tims Simple Home Screen</title>
<version>1.0</version>
<!– filename tim.home.xml - copy this to application data\Home directory on your device –>
<!–The HTC Excalibur has a Square 320 x 320 screen so target height and width are both 320 –>
<!– I use normal weight Segoe font (instead of bold) but increased in size from 16 to 18 point –>
<default target-width=”320″ target-height=”320″ font-face=”Segoe Condensed” font-size=”18″ font-weight=”normal” padding-left=”5″ padding-right=”5″ bgcolor=”transparent” fgcolor=”COLOR_HOMETEXT” padding-top=”3″ b-border-color=”COLOR_HOMERULE” b-border-width=”1″>
<format state=”unselected” fgcolor=”#FFFFFF” bgcolor=”transparent” font-weight=”normal”/>
<format state=”selected” fgcolor=”#FFFFFF” bgcolor=”COLOR_HOMEHIGHLIGHT” font-weight=”normal”/>
</default>
<!– This was designed for a T-Mobile Dash version of the Excalibur so I use the T-Mobile background, change to your own choice –>
<background bgimage-rotated=”TMobile.jpg” valign=”top” />
<!– Standard colour scheme settings which I haven’t changed –>
<scheme>
<color name=”COLOR_WINDOW” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_WINDOWTEXT” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_STATIC” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_STATICTEXT” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_HIGHLIGHT” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_HIGHLIGHTTEXT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_TEXTSELECT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_MENU” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_MENUTEXT” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_GRAYTEXT” value=”#CCCCCC” />
<color name=”COLOR_GRADLEFT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_GRADRIGHT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_INTGRADLEFT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_INTGRADRIGHT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_TRAYGRADLEFT” value=”#0a4476″ />
<color name=”COLOR_TRAYGRADRIGHT” value=”#155D9C” />
<color name=”COLOR_HIGHGRADLEFT” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_HIGHGRADRIGHT” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_TRAYTEXT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_WINDOWFRAME” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_BTNFACE” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_BTNTEXT” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_SCROLLBAR” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_HOMETEXT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_HOMEHIGHLIGHT” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_HOMEHIGHLIGHTTEXT” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_HOMERULE” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_ALERTWINDOW” value=”#FFFFFF” />
<color name=”COLOR_ALERTTITLE” value=”#444444″ />
<color name=”COLOR_ALERTRULE” value=”#000000″ />
<color name=”COLOR_TITLEFLATCENTER” value=”#3485ce” />
<color name=”COLOR_SOFTKEYFLATCENTER” value=”#3485ce” />
</scheme>
<!– This is the icon bar at the top with signal strength and battery status, remove if you add another custom battery/signal strength plugins –>
<plugin clsid=”{837FC251-FE69-43ad-84E0-EBCEDEBA0884}” name=”iconbar” height=”25″>
<iconbar y=”5″ fgcolor=”#ffffff”/>
<background gradient=”title” bgcolor=”#114676″ b-border-color=”COLOR_HOMERULE” />
</plugin>
<!– This is the most recently used (MRU) list of applications displayed as icons under the iconbar–>
<plugin clsid=”{79EFB752-CB70-446d-B317-499723482B3D}” name=”startmru” height=”35″>
<background>
</background>
<mru icon-size=”16″ max-buttons=”6″ x=”2″ y=”6″ valign=”center” button-transparent-color=”COLOR_HOMERULE” highlight=”COLOR_TRAYGRADLEFT”/>
<appname halign=”right” x=”0″ y=”8″ w=”320″ font-size=”18″ />
</plugin>
<!– This is the plugin carrier which says which operator I’m connected to –>
<plugin clsid=”{E09043DF-510E-4841-B652-388316977A7A}” name=”carrier” height=”24″>
<allowselection/>
<background>
<format state=”selected” bgimage=”" />
</background>
<!– I set x=0 below so that the ‘carrier’ name is displayed left justified –>
<label bgcolor=”transparent” halign=”left” h=”20″ font-weight=”normal” y=”0″ x=”0″ w=”81″ font-size=”18″>
<text><carrier/></text>
</label>
<label bgcolor=”transparent” halign=”left” font-weight=”normal” y=”0″ x=”0″ textwidth=”115″ font-size=”18″>
<text><wifi/></text>
</label>
<clock>
<time font-weight=”normal” font-size=”18″ valign=”top” halign=”right” y=”0″ x=”0″ w=”320″/>
<!– I set mode below to long so I see the date in long format eg 24 August 2007 –>
<date font-weight=”normal” font-size=”18″ valign=”top” halign=”center” mode=”long” y=”0″ x=”58″ w=”320″ />
</clock>
</plugin>
<!– Calls Plugin –>
<plugin clsid=”{0BA8ABB8-1F1D-417f-88C6-DA8530E2E7A6}” name=”missedcalls” height=”22″ width=”320″>
<background>
</background>
<!– visible=false means this text is only visible if there is an actual missed call –>
<format state=”nocall” visible=”false”/>
<label font-weight=”normal” fgcolor=”#FFFFFF” font-size=”18″ x=”0″ halign=”left” y=”0″ >
<text>Missed Calls : <calls/></text>
</label>
</plugin>
<!– Messaging plugin –>
<plugin clsid=”{2F930BF0-6FE9-4a53-9E17-88E9247BAB48}” name=”SMScount” height=”22″>
<background>
</background>
<label halign=”left” h=”23″ x=”0″ y=”0″ w=”290″ font-size=”18″ padding-right=”0″ >
<text>SMS : <unreadSMS /> Email : <unreadEmail /></text>
</label>
</plugin>
<!– Calendar plugin –>
<plugin clsid=”{865A354A-4A96-4687-B001-C155DC0DBE76}” name=”Calendar” height=”41″>
<background>
</background>
<label halign=”left” h=”22″ x=”0″ y=”17″ w=”285″ font-size=”18″ padding-right=”0″ >
<text><time/> <location/></text>
</label>
<label halign=”left” h=”22″ x=”0″ y=”0″ w=”285″ font-size=”18″ padding-right=”0″ >
<text><subject/></text>
</label>
</plugin>
<!– Show All Day events –>
<plugin clsid=”{2FFD93B3-0FF0-4228-A6D6-D2DF177D7D92}” name=”alldayevent” height=”24″>
<background>
</background>
<format state=”noevent” visible=”false”/>
<label halign=”left” h=”20″ x=”0″ y=”1″ w=”280″ font-size=”18″ padding-right=”0″ >
<text>All Day Event: <subject/></text>
</label>
</plugin>
</home>
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August 17, 2007
UK Keyboard mapping for T-Mobile Mail or HTC Excalibur S620
The devices I just bought on ebay were already flashed with the US version of WM6 for the T-Mobile Dash, however the UK T-Mobile Mail has butle differences with the euro symbol being the only really obvious one to me. But to make sure nothing in life is easy they moved around a couple of symbols on keys for no really obvious reason. This means that the Q key on my keyboard which has a ! symbol on produces a % instead. Nothing major, just a bit irritating.
There is a solution however. With the UK region set the device looks for a file called \Windows\eT9.Excalibur.0409.kmap.txt containg keyboard remappings. This is a standard file and you can replace the excalibur part of the filename with your devicetype name and the 0409 with your region code.
Anyway, you can edit this file using notepad to overide particular keyboard responses. You must save it as UNICODE however when you finished editing. Here is the correct uk version of the file, just copy it to \Windows directory on your device.
//
// eT9.Excalibur.0409.kmap.txt
// N O T E: This file must be saved as Unicode
//
// This file contains the virtual keys mapping table for the
// Excalibur device. The mapping table is define as follow
//
// VK_TPOUND = 0×78
// VK_TSTAR = 0×77
// VK_TAB = 0×09
//
// We do not support escape value yet. So the key/char values should be
// entered explicitly or by encoding start with 0x
//
// Format:
// {VK VK’ CH1 CH2}
// VK -> value from keyboard driver
// VK’ -> printed on keys
// CH1 -> symbols produced by Fn + key
// CH2 -> symbols in 123 mode
{Q Q ! !}
{1 W 1 1}
{2 E 2 2}
{3 R 3 3}
{T T + +}
{Y Y ( (}
{U U ) )}
{I I - -}
{O O _ _}
{P P ” “}
{0×78 A # #} // VK_TPOUND maps to Device Button A
{4 S 4 4}
{5 D 5 5}
{6 F 6 6}
{G G / /}
{H H ? ?}
{J J £ £}
{K K $ $}
{L L € €}
{0×77 Z * * } // VK_TSTAR maps to Z
{7 X 7 7}
{8 C 8 8}
{9 V 9 9}
{B B ‘ ‘}
{N N @ @}
{M M = =}
{0xBC , ; ;} // 0xBC = VK_COMMA
{0xBE . : :} // 0xBE = VK_PERIOD
{0 0×09 0 0} // 0×00 = VK_TAB
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August 15, 2007
Hard (cold) resetting a T-Mobile Dash Mail or HTC Excalibur S620
Just in case I ever forget, the hard reset key combination for Excalibur is holding down both soft keys whilst powering on the device. I think they should make this a standard procedure for all smartphones rather than the range of weird and wacky combinations you have to do on each different model.
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August 13, 2007
WMDC 6.1
In case anyone didn’t see this yet, Microsoft released Windows Mobile Device Center for Vista 6.1. You can read about the changes here http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/devicecenter.mspx and download the 32-bit version here http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=46F72DF1-E46A-4A5F-A791-09F07AAA1914&displaylang=en and the 64 bit driver here http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=4f68eb56-7825-43b2-ac89-2030ed98ed95&displaylang=en.
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August 10, 2007
T-Mobile Mails on Ebay
Just recently purchased a couple of used T-Mobile Mails on ebay since T-Mobile wont sell me the handsets offline. Both are already unlocked and both have had the US WM6 update for Dash already installed before I got them. Both appear fine and not blocked from T-Mobile network (phew) now I just need to reconfigure them over the next few days. I’ll post the steps I perform to get them to my spec.
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July 31, 2007
Can software be obese ?
The answer has to be yes. Anyone who knows me will be aware of my obsession with making my apps smaller and more optimized, its a legacy of memory constrained systems I grew up with computers like the 1K ZX80 and Apple ][ and CP/M systems with 64K RAM. I can’t stand software bloat, and it shows in altaVENTE apps with our players and viewers are generally about ~300KB in size even though they do amazing things.
So, imagine my disbelief today when I was told that adding a Vista compatible set of icons would double the average size of our players! That is software bloat gone mad!
Of course the reason for this is the support for all sizes of gorgeous Vista icons right up to 256 x 256. I love these icons but because we need to place them as resources in our apps they just bloat them completely. I wouldn’t mind if we could ship the icons as a separate file if the user wanted them, and keep them out of the EXE, but we can’t, as Explorer relies on being able to enumerate the icon from the EXE…
So, the solution ? Well, my plan is to go to an 8-bit grayscale icon, which can still look gorgeous, but is svelte as well. Less is more if you know what I mean. We’ll do some prototype and post them for feedback soon.
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July 30, 2007
Spare T-Mobile Mail
I’ve been trying to get a spare T-Mobile Mail to replace mine. Its a brilliant device and WM6 capable and looks gorgeous in total black from T-Mobile. the only problem is T-Mobile UK won’t sell spares to anyone. Thye have it listed at £139 but no way to purchase. I found these guys http://cgi.ebay.de/T-MOBILE-MDA-MAIL-SMARTPHONE-BLUETOOTH-USB-HAMMERPREIS_W0QQitemZ190135222020QQihZ009QQcategoryZ22343QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem selling new german spec devices at 199 euros, about £145. No idea if they are reputable or not. The only technical downside is the QWERTZ keypad. You can change the locale to UK and flash it with WM6 for use in UK, but you can’t escape the different keyboard layout for the german market. Anyway, its an option and I could get used to it ….
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July 18, 2007
I still keep trying …
I was in London today so I thought I’d take my HTC P3300 ‘Artemis’ with me as it has built-in GPS with TomTom 6 and would help me get to the street I was trying to find in the city. It was newly pipmped up with a WM6 upgrade so I thought this was a good chance to see how it performed and once again try an overcome my aversion to the PPC format (and PDA’s in general).
Everything was fine on the way up on the train, the Artemis functioned perfectly as a phone and gave no problems except using the stylus is the only way to get accuracy. However, (and there always a however with PPC), as soon as I needed it when I stepped out of the tube station I was hit by multiple problems. Firstly the screen was almost impossible to read in full daylight glare. People must have been amused by my squinting at it a few inches from my face trying to read the display, well apart from those eyeing my distress to mug me for it. Eventually I could make out the display, ‘No GPS Signal’. In my hour of need, without a map, and now without GPS, I was forced to rely on a string of passers by for a breadcrumb journey to my destination. The signal never returned until I reached my destination. Fortunately I could just follow my sweat and tears to find my way back to the tube station, so I didnt bother trying to use the GPS again.
Back on the train home the Artemis functioned fine as a phone, albeit with careful use of my fingers on the touchscreen and eventually succumbing to using the stylus for accuracy. So, I still can’t embrace PPC, but I won’t stop trying….
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July 9, 2007
HTC Easy Network Setup
I just found a simple but incredibly useful tool on the HTC site which automatically sets up your operator settings on your device. You run it from Windows with your device attached and it asks you your country and operator, then sends the settings direct to your device over ActiveSync. This is so useful if you have a non-standard device like a Dopod, and takes all the work out of remembering and setting the correct configuration. I was browsing through to see if anything new was available and this was listed for the S710, but I just used it on my Excalibur (Dash) and it worked fine and quick too. This reminds me of a previous generation tool we built at DAT for HTC a few years ago as an in-ROM tool, but its much more flexible as a Windows/ActiveSync app so it can be easily updated. I’m looking at how we altaVENTE could integrate this into our Mercury device security platform as a lauchable app, as its jolly useful.
It supports these countries/operators
- UK operators (O2, Orange, T-Mobile, Vodafone, Virgin and 3)
- France (SFR, Orange, Bouygues…)
- Germany (O2, T-mobile, E-plus, Vodafone…)
- Italy (Vodafone, Wind, TIM, 3)
- Spain (Movistar, Orange, Vodafone)
- Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland
You can find it here http://www.europe.htc.com/support/software/htcs710.html
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July 8, 2007
HP iPAQ 500 Mini Review
Well, I have spent nearly 2 days with the iPAQ 500 now and I am far more impressed than I thought I would be, but there are some annoyances too. Despite my earlier reservations about the size I have found it easy to use, hold and carry. In fact Vicki has been threatening to steal it to replace her beloved Qtek 8500, so it appears to work for girls too. In the end it only took 45 minutes to charge, and I only know that because I heard a strange buzzing which turned out to be the iPAQ finishing charging. I love the fact that it set everything up for T-Mobile straight away using the wizard and I didn’t have to do anything extra. Although the screen is low res its quite pleasing and more than adequate. Battery life seems good, better on balance than anything else I have (which is most everything WM). It uses a standard mini-USB for charging (great!) and even better, has a separate headphone mini jack.
However, there’s a few things I don’t like; There is no separate on/off switch, you have to use the End Call button which has the knock on effect that the Home key becomes Quicklist and most frustratingly (and stupidly in my view) the Call button becomes the keyboard lock. Why HP didn’t keep End Call as lock, and use Call as power on is beyond me (and rationality). What this means in practice is that you can accidentally make a call whilst locking the keyboard….doh!
The other minor irritant is that the right soft key is not Contacts by default, its called Shortcuts, and true to the name, it takes you to a ladder menu of 9 shortcuts (which you can change) of which contacts is option 0. This means performing 2 keypresses to get contacts. Once you get used to it its ok, and in some weird way, strangely logical and useful, but its different, and takes getting used to. Lastly I don’t like the irritating startup music which I haven’t found anyway to disable. I mean it just wouldn’t work for Jack Bauer whilst hiding from baddies, he be found straight away!
Other than that I really liked it, not as much as my Cavalier or Excalibur, but well worth it when you consider you can buy it from Expansys for £161+VAT. http://www.expansys.com/p.aspx?i=146093
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July 7, 2007
unboxing the HP iPAQ 500 SmartPhone
Just got this new WM6 smartphone from HP. I’d kinda forgotten HP as a WindowsMobile vendor and this certainly brings them back to the front of my mind. Its cheap too, about £150 + VAT. Comes in a small neat package, different to the HTC packaging model, this is outer box and egg crate, not sleeve and preformed card. I’m going to use this for some compatibility testing on our new Mercury WindowsMobile security product.
Small neat package
Not many bits inside, but its all there, neat and tidy
And the phone itself feels good in my hand. initially, when I read that it was 16.3mm thick I was considering whether I would need to get a backpack to carry it round in, but I was pleasantly surprised at how neat and compaq it feels in my hand. I’ve left it on charge now like a good boy because there are dire warning about charging for at least 4 hours prior to use. I suspect that’s over the top but I fell like being good.
I’ll update this when I have had a chance to use it more. At least the battery cover fits well!
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