Digital Rover

I received the S60 Ambassador merchandise today. The kit consisted of a cool T-Shirt, 2 notepads, a nice pen and a tag. Too bad, that T Shirt was a little small for me. Interestingly, I am selected as an ambassador for the Ovi program, which is not yet available for India users on the Share Online client. Probably, I will spread the word for the S60 openness till the time we get Ovi on Share Online.

By the way, if you live in a country where Ovi is not yet available, check out this post by Darla, where she provides a link for the configuration for your Share Online client.

Hmmm… I was a Windows Mobile fan in a previous birth. I think I have come a long way to be an S60 ambassador today!!

Image copyright: www.S60.com

The admin panel went through a major revamp in Wordpress 2.5. While most of the changes are welcome, IMHO, I think they made a mess of the widget management system. Gone is the ease of the drag and drop  widget changing on the fly. Lets say if you want to move a widget from sidebar A to B, you have to first select sidebar A, remove the gadget by clicking on Edit and then Remove , then select Sidebar 2, click Show and then add the sidebar from the list of unused gadgets. Sounds like a lot of work, isn’t it? It is. I don’t understand the logic behind this.

Why change something that is easy and is working very well?

If you are like me, probably you are not a fan of the new iMovie ‘08 editor. While it is a great tool for beginneers, users accustomed with editing on iMovie HD will be missing a lot of bells and whistles. Apple even offers the iMovie HD as a free download if you have purchased iLife 08. This is to satisfy the users who were disappointed with the latest version.

Coming to the point, the only feature I miss in iMovie 08 is the ability to import video from the modern DVD and HD based camcorders. So how do you edit the videos you have captured with these devices on iMovie HD? The solution is simple. Use iMovie 08 to import your videos from your HD or DVD based camcorder. Once you have imported, you will be able to see the video clips at your ‘iMovie Events’ folder. The import process simply converts your DVD vob files into quicktime video clips. When you want to edit a movie, close iMovie 08 and fire up iMovie HD. Drag and drop your clips into the edit window and create your masterpiece from here!

Image credits: Apple Inc.,

I upgraded the site to Wordpress 2.5 last night. The new admin interface is indeed cool, but it seems to take a while to get accustomed to it, because we were so much used to the old interface.

The upgrade went pretty smooth, except for one issue with the visual editor. Popup dialogs like Add image, Add hyperlink etc., were showing up with empty dialogs. Tried several times and always ended up with blank dialogs. Later I realized that this was happening because it was pulling data from the cache, which can be fixed by clearing your browser cache once. Now dialogs come up with proper information.

HDR photography has become a popular hobby and craze among many digital photography enthusiasts in the recent times. It is not that you need a high end Digital SLR to shoot these kind of pictures. Mobile phones with high quality cameras like the Nokia N95/N82 can help in creating some amazing HDR photographs. TheNokiaBlog has published a how to on HDR Imaging with n series phones. Worth checking out if you carry one of these phones.

[via All About Symbian]

After a long gap, Palm has announced a new device in India - the Centro. The Treo 650 and 750 were  flop shows in this part of the world, mainly because of the exorbitant pricing. This time, Palm has priced the Centro at a very enticing INR 13,999 (about US$350) which is what most entry level phones cost in this country. A business phone at this price is very attractive, provided you can live with an arcane OS. The lack of Wi-Fi is another concern.

But if you want a cute little business phone with QWERTY, push mail and a decent enough browser, then the Centro is for you. Available at most mobile phone retailers.

Related: Online Electronics and Computer retailers in India.

With the inclusion of GPS chip in many of the new Smartphones from Nokia - like the N95, N95 8GB, N82 and the upcoming N78 and N96, the available GPS based applications are on an increase. Here is a list of some of the best applications that I tried on my N95 8GB. This is a living post and I will keep it updated once I find other exciting new applications.

Google Maps: The ubiquitous mapping application is one of the best in terms of providing maps for even very remote places on earth. Can interface with the on-board/external GPS to accurately indicate your current position, which you can use as a starting point to get directions. Go to http://www.google.com/gmm on your handset.

ExtGPS: A very useful Java Midlet which will help you use your GPS enabled handset to act as a external bluetooth GPS receiver for other handsets/computer. I sometimes use my N95 as a external bluetooth receiver for my Windows Mobile based phone. Download here.

Shozu: While primarily not a GPS application, it has the option to GeoTag your photos - which means embedding the geographical coordinates of the location where you took the picture. This can be later used for fun uses like geo-laying your photographs on a map. Apart from this utility value, Shozu is a great application for photo sharing and mobile blogging! Get it from www.shozu.com for your mobile phone.

Nokia Maps: Ok, this comes with your phone. But then, there is this new beta version (v2.0) which adds plenty of exciting new features including walking directions! The navigation feature is not free though. You can download it from Nokia beta labs.

Nokia SportsTracker. Probably one of the most sophisticated sports tracking application in the world. You can jog all around the country with the N95 in your pocket and then comeback to plot your entire route on the map. Has a very nice companion website too. You can get it from the Downloads application on your N95.

Apart from these, there are other Navigation applications like Wayfinder, Route66 etc., which have compatible versions for your S60 device.

Its hard to believe, but yes - there is an official Windows  Mobile fan group at the popular social networking site: Facebook. The group is here and you can join as a fan.

[via Mr. Mobile]

When I went to purchase a carrying case for my N95 8GB this weekend at a leading mobile phone retail chain in Bangalore, I was in for a surprise. I noticed them selling an Apple iPhone to a consumer there! For a moment, I thought I should have got temporarily sunk in a time warp when Apple released the iPhone in India. On further questioning, I was told that they are selling the piece without warranty. That explains clearly that it is a grey market unlocked handset. Seeing the demand for the iPhone from the customers, they have started selling these in the show room. The price was quoted at Rs 26,500 for the 8GB model, which means $200 premium over the AT&T version in US. This makes it pretty clear that it is high time that Apple officially released this in India.

Till the official release is made in India, there are several ways to purchase the iPhone. If you live in Chennai, you can get it from Burma Bazaar where the current going price is about Rs 25 to 26K for the 8GB model. Don’t pay more, as they are found in abundance here. Similarly in Bangalore, you can purchase iPhones from the Burma Bazaar near Majestic. You will find many shops selling these around Tiribhuvan theatre. The prices are similar to Chennai’s. You could also buy it from the retail chain, Sangeetha, who has shops all around Bangalore.

I do not know about other cities, but there is an easier way to get it if you live in a small city: Online. There are some online shops like Gadgets.in and GadgetsGuru.com which sell iPhone in the price range of 25 to 26K. I have seen some iPhones being sold at shopping.rediff.com also. Of course there is eBay.in too, but be extra careful as many sellers have single digit feedback. Always pay through paisapay if you are purchasing from eBay India.

Disclaimer: I am not endorsing any of the above sites or shops. The above post should be treated of informational value only and please apply common sense and and extra vigilance when buying products in grey.

Yes, the iPhone as we know of is dead. A fully loaded feature phone with a fancy UI which could only do what Apple wanted to it to do is officially dead.

Come June, the firmware 2.0 will make the iPhone a smart phone. You can enhance the functionality of your existing phone with 3rd party applications, which will be innovative and  will make you more productive. From Adium to Quicksilver, you will find all of them running on the iPhone.

To me, more than the SDK, the biggest announcement from yesterday’s event is the support for Microsoft Activesync on the iPhone. Now you can get your corporate emails delivered on your iPhone instantly. No need to use a Windows Mobile or a Blackberry phone anymore. This will help iPhone move beyond the consumers to the enterprises. No doubt, this will help Apple get bulk orders, which will make it possible to achieve the 10 million mark by the end of the year.