IMAP on GMail ROX!

Okay... this is awesome. I just finished moving my Exchange email into GMail. This is something that I've been wanting to do for a long time (I had a really lame Exchange quota) but there wasn't a way for me to do so until now. With IMAP on GMail I was able to drag and drop all of my mail using Outlook from my old Exchange server to my GMail account. It automatically 'labeled' the emails using my Exchange folder structure, kept all of the Sender, Recipient info and timestamps. I even got a new Thawte email cert for my GMail account and started using it with both my Outlook and Entourage clients. SWEET!

Early iPhone Adopters Given Present?

Early iPhone Adopters Given Present?

Okay, you've all heard about the new 1.1.1 firmware that locks the iPhone (at least for now) tighter than Cameron Frye (...in two weeks you'd have a diamond...) So... maybe we DO. I got to thinking about what it would mean for early adopters that haven't gone down the road of no return and upgraded our firmware. If 1.1.1 does keep people out then Steve just made these Early Adopter iPhones the ONLY hackable iPhones. Cha-Ching! I bet their value will have increased dramatically (more than the $100 difference between what we paid and the rebate we got).

Also, we've only had these things for 90 days and the hacking community has increased the number of features AMAZINGLY! As long as we can either figure out a way to replicate the features that Apple adds (or do without them if they're not that big a deal) then staying at 1.02 will mean not having to worry about these updates anymore. The hacking community can just base everything off 1.02 (or a 'version' of 1.02 if we start flashing custom firmware).

In any case, for those who didn't do the upgrade but are thinking about doing it... it's something to consider. These might be the last great iPhones that are user customizable. I saw a checklist someone had assembled showing a Before 1.1.1 and After and it was pretty striking the number of features we've added so far to this baby.I DO hope that a way is figured out to do upgrades on 1.1.1 and future updates... however, I'm not counting on it. There hasn't been a lot of success with the Touch and I think that might have been Apple's testing ground for locking them both up. When it comes right down to it, however, this time the Early Adopters are ahead of the curve and I say that's well worth my extra $100.

Thanks again Steve! :)

-KennX

Woot! Apple listens, makes things 'alright'.

The Steve wrote an open letter today letting us know that he's giving us 'early adopters' a $100 credit both online and retail at the Apple Store.  While not the full $200, this is the kind of gesture that we were looking for.  After all, this means that Apple is eating $100 million dollars in these credits just to say 'Thank You' to those who made the iPhone a success.

Thanks Steve!

-Kenn

Sign the Petition!!! iPhone Early Adopter Compensation

If you bought an 8GB iPhone for $599 don't take this slap in the face from Apple lying down. Apple has just lowered the value of your 69 day old phone by $200! This petition seeks to get Apple to 'see the light' and do something in the form of iTunes or Apple Store credit for those who helped make the iPhone such a success!

read more | digg story

iPhone Multi-Theme support in upcoming iSwap!

Here's a video showing iSwap v.2's interoperability with some of the other cool programs that have come out recently for the iPhone (Dock and XLaunch for example) as well as a demo of an upcoming feature which allows a different visual Theme for EACH of your iSwap screens!!!

read more | digg story

iSwap 2 code for just 2 or 3 screens

By request, I've written up alternate iSwap.sh files that have less screens than 4.  I've got a d/l available for them here so if you're interested take a look.

EDIT:  This has now been rolled into the iSwap v.2 download so there's no reason to d/l this separately UNLESS you've already d/l iSwap v.2 without it... :)

-KennX

iSwap v.2 Release!

I've put together a 'package' with plist files, a default theme and better docs.  This release version corrects a few problems that people encountered trying the pre-release (thanks for the feedback!) and should be much easier to get up and running with.

I've 'themed' the 4 default screens as: Home, Games, Apps, and URLS and I've uploaded a video showing off the new functionality.

The download is over at modmyiphone.com in the downloads section OR you can click HERE for it as well.

Cheers!

-KennX

iSwap version 2 pre-release

Okay all... the program is ready although I haven't gotten the 'package' all put together like I wanted. However, there are some brave souls out there who wanted me to post what I've got so here it is: iSwap v.2. Please leave me feedback on what you think.

Here are the improvements:

Scalable (can do any number of screens, set up initially for 4)

Safer (uses far less mv commands and deals with symbolic links instead)

Option to "Pick a Screen". Has app icons to allow you to jump between screens (optional) or will cycle through from 1 -4.

What I couldn't do this time:

Refresh SpringBoard without re-logging in. I think this may not be possible with the current SpringBoard.app

Speed it up. The change from one screen to another seems random in timing. Sometimes its very fast, other times it takes awhile. Not sure exactly what is causing the discrepancy but I'm looking into it.

----------

Well, that's all for now. Please let me know here if you d/l it and what problems/issues you run into (or if you don't have any problems let me know that too! :)

Thanks!

-KennX

Star starstruck over... the iPhone!

Okay, so I went to a convention this weekend... Gen Con.  For those of you who don't know, Gen Con is the largest role-playing geekfest in the land.  They also have some sci-fi and fantasy TV and movie stars to meet, sign autographs, etc.  One of this years Media Guests of Honor was Mira Furlan.  Mira plays "Danielle Rousseau" on LOST and played Delenn on Babylon 5.  I was in line to see her and when I got up there I handed off my iPhone to get a picture taken with her.  Well, low and behold she goes into a trance...

"Is that the iPHONE!"  She asks, like it was some kind of alien technology.  "Yeah."

"Can I SEE it?"  She says as she looks up at me.

"Uhm...  sure."  I say.  This is kind of weird.  I'm in line to see her and she wants to see my iPhone.  I let her see it and she wants me to show her "What all it does..."

"Okay..."  I'm thinking, if she's interested in one of these things why doesn't she already have one.  I show it off to her and she's oooing and awwing over the the thing.  This is kind of freaking me out.  The she says...

"But aren't they, like $600?" with a little scowl.  I'm  thinking... you're a freakin' TV star you probably make that in a minute...  why do you care.  Of course, I don't SAY that...  I tell her:

"Yeah, but if you bought an iPod, and a smartphone it's not that much different.  And you can check email, blah, blah, blah..."  I show her the photo of the two of us and do the pinch and zoom.  She likes that but when I mention the email she perks up even more, "Oooo... email!  Yeah, I have to get one of these."  Just like a little kid.

She thanks me, autographs one of her pictures for me, and I walk on.  She didn't really even notice that I was wearing a hand-made Babylon 5 Psi Corps officers dress uniform...  (I did say I was a geek didn't I?).

*sigh*  Blinded by the glare of my iPhone.

Sample plist files

Okay... I'm caving in and posting copies of my DisplayOrder.plist and Screen2.plist files. Remember. THESE WILL NOT WORK FOR YOU! If you just copy them into your iPhone they won't work unless you have exactly the same desktop theme configuration and apps. These are ONLY for example to see what I've done.

That said... they're available here: http://www.gigasize.com/get.php/3195316063/plists.zip

Take care,

-KennX

More iSwap Info

I am currently working on v.2 of this app.  Hopefully, I can get it posted tonight or tomorrow depending on how the tests go.  It should be faster, more reliable, and allow for nearly infinite expansion.

Thanks once again to all those people who've encouraged and supported me in this endeavor!

-KennX

Too many iPhone Apps? Watch my solution!!!

Here's a short video demonstrating my iSwap app in action!

read more | digg story

iPhone iSwap application

Okay, so I was getting too many apps on my iPhone to hold on just one screen so I wrote a little script to swap out the home screen to a second screen.  If anyone is interested in d/l-ing the file I put it up here: 

EDIT:

I originally put this up on a site called 4shared but they invalidated my account after 24 hours and said that I hadn't logged in for 30 days...  I had signed up that night.  Sheesh!  Well, I'm going to try someone else.  Hopefully this site will be more reliable:

Download Here

This is the same version as I'd put up earlier, however, I changed the icon.png (it's the one that's shown in the video and matches the default.png screen) and I put another .rtf file from a post I made on a forum trying to better describe the DisplayOrder.plist file.

BTW, after trying to figure it out for a while I found out how to launch a shell script from an icon (which is what I'm doing in this app).  I'll post another entry explaining how if anyone is interested.

1 Step Closer to the Matrix! Humans used for batteries!!!

Scientists are using nanotechnology to turn your blood flow and heartbeat into electricity to power small electrical devices. You're now one step closer to being just a copper-top just like in the Matrix! At least then Keanu can serve some useful purpose in the future :)

read more | digg story

The Police Reunion Tour 2007 Cleveland, OH

Add to my blog

iPhone week 2 and the future...

So far there have been 2 annoying things about the iPhone that I've found.  The first one is the VPN bug which I blogged about earlier.  The second, and in some ways more annoying, was the tendency of the iPod functionality to crash out while browsing web pages.  I found this especially on Digg.com for some reason.  It's a great feature to be able to browse and listen to your iPod on the same device... but it has to work reasonably reliably and for me it hasn't.  Hopefully, this will be one of the fixes that comes out in the first update.

So, what do people think will be included in the updates this year?  I say 'this year' because I could see them trickling out, coming all near the Leopard release, or being spaced more evenly.  Best, and most hopeful, guess would be a bug-fix/feature update somewhere between now and Leopard (to keep the hype sufficiently going) and then a big one at Leopard's release, perhaps followed by a smaller one around Christmas.

As far as feature updates, here's what I think is coming in no particular order:

iChat

MMS

Flash support

'Pinch and Zoom' for the camera

Video for the camera

The ability to make podcasts from your iPhone using the headphones

File browser using cover flow with some file rudimentary file editing

Custom ringtones (duh) we already know they're non-DRM'd mp4 files

Ability to purchase/download iTunes tracks and ringtones

Ability to see and stream from local iTunes shared libraries

SDK for 3rd Party widgets

Well those are my thoughts... anyone else care to look into the crystal ball and speculate on the future? 

iPhone VPN issues

One of the really great features of the iPhone is its ability to connect to a VPN network.  It can use either PPTP (with MSCHAP2) or L2TP (using ipsec and shared secret).

HOWEVER...  There's an implementation problem.  When you put in the VPN information it loses the password and prompt you to re-enter it when you click on the icon to turn the VPN On. This wouldn't be a big deal if a normal keyboard came up BUT instead a numeric only keypad (like what you use in the phone app) comes up.  So... unless your 'password' for your VPN is numeric only (not likely) then you can't connect.  This is an obvious programmatic screw-up that I hope Apple addresses in the next update.

There is a work around, sort of...  You can connect to a VPN that has a non-numeric password by re-setting your password in Settings > General > Network > VPN > VPN Settings and then turning on the VPN from Settings > General > Network > VPN > VPN 'on/off'.  After re-entering your password this way you bypass the prompt for a password.  However, it will lose your password again and you'll have to go through the whole tedious procedure when you need to VPN again... *sigh*  On the bright side the iPhone's VPN seems pretty robust and I haven't had many disconnects or speed issues with it.

I'm hopeful that Apple will correct this obvious oversight in bringing up the WRONG keypad to allow you to enter a non-numeric password.  Come on, Steve!

The 'glitch' in it losing your password still needs to be fixed since that's a bug but the other part would make this bug at least tolerable and should be a very quick fix to the code.