As a long-term Ubuntu user I am extremely interested in what Canonical and the Ubuntu community are doing on the mobile front. Their convergence strategy (I am testing Snappy Core on IoT devices as well) seems very well thought through and once the the Meizu MX4 phone was released I got myself an invite and ordered a unit. It took a while to ship and then also had to make it’s way down under as Meizu only ship to Europe (and Asia I believe).

Every once in a while you find a gem. One of these for me is SShuttle – until now I have not known about this one. Use-case: I just been trying to get Ubuntu Make to install Eclipse IDE and the local AARNET download mirror is just refusing to cooperate (https://github.com/ubuntu/ubuntu-make/issues/90). A quick forward to a remote VPS fixed the issue without headaches Install sudo apt-get install sshuttle Run sshuttle -r username@servername.

Add SDK repository sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-sdk-team/ppa<br></br>sudo apt-get update<br></br>sudo apt-get install ubuntu-device-flash Enable USB Debugging on the device Make sure you have developer mode enabled (see http://developer.android.com/tools/device.html if you are unsure). Navigate to Settings > Developer options Enable USB Debugging. When a device is connected, you will be prompted in Android to authorize it. Unlock Bootloader adb reboot bootloader<br></br>fastboot oem unlock<br></br>fastboot reboot Check that you have the right device adb shell grep ro.

Just a quick update of the previous article on “Sony Xperia Z2 upgrading to CyanogenMod 11“. One thing is that CM now included the custom recovery and you do not need to download any other custom recoveries ! Download the CM 12 ZIP file for Sony Xperia Z2 (sirius) and extract the ‘boot.img’ file Download link: https://download.cyanogenmod.org/?device=sirius Get the device into fastboot (bootloader mode) fastboot -i 0xfce flash boot boot.img<br></br>fastboot reboot

One of the main reasons for setting up a cloud desktop is that I tend to use a lot of different devices some of which are not very powerful. One of my favorite devices of late has been a HP 11 Chromebook. I originally bought it for a new employee and wanted to check myself how this thing stacks up to do day-to-day computing tasks more efficiently than a standard laptop without all the headaches of running Windows (viruses, endless driver installs, bloatware, malware, …).

I have had some issues recently with getting LTE (4G) connectivity on the Vodafone Australia Network using CyanogenMod 11 on multiple devices (http://forum.cyanogenmod.org/topic/92919-no-4g-signal-on-vodafone-au/). Turns out that it was an APN issue after all. The APN provisioned by default when the Voda SIM card is inserted (vfinternet.au) does not work for the LTE Data Network. It works with GPRS & WCDMA, but fails to connect when the phone is set to prefer LTE (4G) Networks and they are actually available.

Contrary to my normal inclinations not to buy anything but Stock Android phones I ended up with a Sony Xperia Z2 in a hurry over the weekend (it’s a long story…). It appears to be quite a decent handset (with a pretty good camera actually) and one of the main reason to choose this over the other options was that is was one of the few high-end devices which already had a CM snapshot rather than just nightly releases.

Foursquare decided that it was too hard for them to compete with location services like Yelp and split their app into two separate apps. Whilst that might make sense to the 4Square CEO and his VC masters, it makes no sense from a users perspective. Foursquare can be a bit of a battery hog already, and having 2 apps to open and “annoy” you with notifications is not an improvement by any means.

The Nokia X seems to be a nice piece of hardware for just around $125 AUD. Nothing spectacular in terms of computing power, but much better build quality than your average cheap Chinese Android clone. I have always been a fan of Nokia hardware until they decided to commit suicide by firstly adding CEO Stephen Elop and ditching all of their software for Windows Mobile. The problem with the device out of the box is that is has a horribly butchered version of Android.

Apache Cordova has very nice documentation, however as so many projects it is focused on the Windows/MacOS duopolies only. Fortunately it’s not too hard to work out the differences. Installing dependencies Thanks to: https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Installing-Node.js-via-package-manager sudo apt-get install python-software-properties python g++ make ant openjdk-7-jre openjdk-7-jdk Installing Android SDK Please note: one of the problems I found was that I had some Android tools from the Ubuntu repos that were conflicting with the SDK install.

This is the last of a series of alternative mobile OS installs and the easiest install by a country mile ! Install Everything is quite well documented here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Touch/Install. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:phablet-team/tools<br></br>sudo apt-get update<br></br>sudo apt-get install phablet-tools android-tools-adb android-tools-fastboot<br></br>phablet-flash ubuntu-system --channel devel --bootstrap That is it really ! This is how a OS change on a mobile should work ! Issues Ubuntu touch can not yet handle the radio firmware past Android 4.

Or as an alternative title “Liberating your Galaxy S4 Hardware from Samsung Bloatware”. Unfortunately there is lots of (ad-infested) blogs and forums with dodgy pieces of information on this topic and I found it pretty hard to get descent concise information. So hopefully this might help some poor Linux User liberate their phone. Whilst this has been tested on a Samsung GT-I9505 S4 International LTE device (JFLTEXX series) it should be applicable to other similar Samsung phones that are not fastboot capable (ie.

Just got myself (actually it’s for our Office Manager back in OZ) one of these Chromebooks while in Europe (since Google Australia with their absolutely hopeless hardware strategy do not seem to be able to ship any devices – Nexus 4 anyone ?) . Since the first days turned out to be a bit of a frustrating experience, I thought I share some of the findings as I had a hard time finding much useful info on troubleshooting ChromeOS.

As a Galaxy Nexus Owner I have been waiting for months for an OTA (over the air) upgrade to the factory installed Firmware (4.0.2). I am finally sick of waiting and complaining to Google (an absolute lost cause). After some research it turns out that (contrary to popular opinion) not every unlocked Google Nexus actually has the ‘official’ Google Firmware. Some of them have a Samsung variant (WTF !?) of the firmware.

Debugging things on the Android Emulator (incluced in the SDK) can be a very slow and cumbersome process. Thanks to the Android-x86 Project it’s quite easy to run Android in VirtualBox. This is highly useful when you need to test mobile apps and websites from the Android Browser (as well as Chrome Mobile). Download an Ethernet enabled ISO from Tablets x86wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/75945873/android-x86-4.0-eth0-generic_x86-20120426.iso.torrent<br></br>transmission android-x86-4.0-eth0-generic_x86-20120426.iso.torrent Create new ViratualBox VM Important Settings (see screenshots) OS: Linux, Version: Linux 2.

After upgrading my Toshiba Z830 Ultrabook to 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) I noticed that the ability to control the screen back-light was not working using the Toshiba Fn F6/F7 keys. Thanks to http://www.linlap.com/wiki/acer+aspire+s3 the solution was found quite quickly. sudo vim /etc/default/grub This will open the grub configuration file. (Grub is the initial boot selection software) To be able to dim the screen brightness, You’ve got to modify the line: GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

To use a Samsung Galaxy Nexus as a media device (MTP) there is a utility called gMTP. sudo apt-get install gmtp mtpfs mtp-tools NOTE: Unfortunately there is a bug in the 64-bit version at the moment (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/mtpfs/+bug/936165) – which means it’s not all that useful to me at the moment.

Having a guest account might be useful on a home computer, but it’s generally not what I want enabled on a notebook. To disable the default Guest account you need to edit lightdm.conf and add a line (allow-guest=false). sudo vim /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf [SeatDefaults] greeter-session=unity-greeter user-session=ubuntu allow-guest=false Tested in Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Precise Pangolin & Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot

As a follow-up on a very old post I thought it’s worth providing an update. Despite it’s age (& only costing $350 at the time) my little Asus EEE PC 900 it is still a useful device. It has turned out as one of the better IT investments in my lifetime. However it’s not (and was never) the fastest kid on the block and recent OS upgrades have become increasingly resource hungry.

The latest instalment in my never-ending quest to find a decent SIP client (see Ubuntu SIP I & Ubuntu SIP II) I came across JITSI (http://jitsi.org/). Since the website looked very interesting and the project seems very well maintained (http://jitsi.org/index.php/Main/Screenshots) I decided to give it a go. The installation is a breeze with a Ubuntu/Debian package available and the installation also adds the repository to keep the package up to date.

To get an idea on the current power usage and some suggestions on how to improve power-management ‘powertop‘ is a must-have. sudo apt-get install powertop

EDIT: Here are some tweaks if you install 12.04 (Precise Pangolin). Since I will have to do a fair amount of traveling in the next year I was in need of upgrading my trusted workhorse of Toshiba Qosmio F60 to a more portable option that will be easier on the shoulders during long travels. After doing some research into which of the major manufacturers offer the best support for a Linux based Operating System it came down to a final two: the Intel i7 variants of Samsung Series 9 and the Toshiba Z830.

If you need to check websites for mobile compliance on a regular basis you know that having a device to constantly check is painful and slows down your work during debugging and phases of constant change. by adactio There are a few tools that will make this work a lot easier: Google Chrome Chrome does have some nice dedicated plug-ins to help with this task Ripple Mobile Environment Emulator (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/geelfhphabnejjhdalkjhgipohgpdnoc) appMobi HTML5 XDK (https://chrome.

One of the lesser known free Google services in our experience is Google Goggles. Specially in it’s lastest release (Version 1.7) it has received a few enhancements that make it very useful for some mobile learning applications Scanning of barcodes Google Googles will scan most standard barcodes and provide information on the product scanned. Here is an example from the Google Mobile Blog: Let’s say you’re reading a magazine article you really like and want to share it with your friends.

This is an interesting report and info-graphic by the folks at VisionMobile on a new way of measuring the openness of some mobile open source projects. The Open Governance Index measures the true openness of eight open source projects – Android, Qt, Symbian, MeeGo, Mozilla, WebKit, Linux and Eclipse – and analyses how governance, and not licenses, tell the full story of a project’s openness, across transparency, influence and control.

The release of the latest Ubuntu Version has been seen by a number of commentators as the most end-user friendly yet and signals another milestone in the readiness of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) for more widespread (and business) use. As a long-term user of a number of different Operating Systems and as SME Owner for the last 15 years I have overseen the gradual replacement of a number of proprietary software solutions with FOSS Alternatives.

One of my oldest pieces of hardware is a trusty Nokia SU-8W Bluetooth Keyboard. I have tried to revive it on an Android 1.6 & 2.0 device with not much luck. However I got it working successfully on a Gingerbread (2.3.4) Google Nexus S. Pre-requisites SU-8W Manual (http://nds1.nokia.com/phones/files/guides/Nokia_SU-8W_Wireless_Keyboard_UG_en.pdf) BlueKeyboard JP (https://market.android.com/details?id=elbrain.bluekeyboard.ime) Steps Install the BlueKeyboard JP from the Android Market Go to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Bluetooth Settings Scan for devices and click to pair the Nokia SU-8W Enter a passcode (I used the highly inventive 0000 combinaton) on the phone and click ‘OK’ Enter the same on the SU-8W (need to use green ‘fn’ keys for numbers) and hit enter The phone should show the Nokia SU-8W as paired but not connected Go to Settings > Language & keyboard > BlueKeyboard JP Settings Select the Nokia SU-8W as the keyboard and make any other changes you might need Click the ‘Back’ symbol and tick the option box to enable the ‘BlueKeyboard JP’ keyboard In any data entry field (i.

As one of those who grabbed a HP Touchpad at the recent firesale (after announcing the killing of the product line) I did it as in full knowledge that this device in it’s current form is of limited use and (highly) unlikely to have lots of additional applications created for it. After casually using it for a few nights of use I am personally not surprised that HP decided to ditch this product.

Since some older hardware (Toshiba Satellite A300 for example) has issues with the current version of Grub as well as the newer Kernel I still need to run 10.04 on some machines. However since the 10.04 Repository still uses Firefox 3.6 you need to add a PPA repo to upgrade to Firefox 4. Either go to Ubuntu Software Center > Software Sources and click the ‘Other Software’ tab. Press ‘Add’ and enter ppa:mozillateam/firefox-stable

Note: this has been verified to work on 11.04 (Natty), 11.10 (Oneiric) & 12.04 (Precise) To convert a DVD and make it viewable on your mobile device Handbrake seems to be the most useful tool I have discovered so far. Since it is not part of the default Ubuntu Repositories here is the installation process. The first step is to insure libdvdcss2 is installed sudo apt-get install libdvdcss2 sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stebbins/handbrake-releases sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install handbrake-gtk

After upgrading to Ubuntu 11 (Natty) I did some further research on VoIP clients (SIP) for Ubuntu Linux as XLite seems horribly out of date now. I came across QuteCom (formerly WengoPhone) and from first testing it seems to work quite well. The install is easy as it’s part of the Ubuntu Community Software (Universe) and that means it can be installed via apt-get, Software Center or Synaptic. So far the early testing has been very positive and the interface seems quite workable as well as having a number of other instant messaging options available.

EDIT: As of Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) this is now much easier as KeePass 2 has finally made it into the repositories apt-get install keepass2 ————————————————————————————————————- If you need to read KeepPass 2 data files (.kdbx) on Ubuntu (as well as from other platforms such as Windows or Android) you need to run the Portable Version under Mono (.NET Runtime). Make sure you download the Portable Version 2.x from http://keepass.info/download.html

Taking part in MobiMOOC has given me the opportunity to take stock of my own MobilePLE – the top 5 tools I find most useful as part of my ongoing learning. Catch Notes (previously 3Bananas) – mobile note taking the most critical component. Whenever I get a new device – this is what has to be installed as one of the first actions. For those not familiar with this software – it’s like Evernote without the bloat.

I am using the opportunity of me taking part in a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on mobile learning as an excuse to add some more content to this neglected blog. On of the issues I am facing with my participation in the MOOC is the massive amount of e-mails generated and my already overflowing inbox would not cope (let alone me managing it). That is not taking into account other sources such as Twitter & Flickr

If you upgrade you Ubuntu Netbook release to 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) you will notice a change to the new ¨Unity¨ user interface. Personally I think the new interface is absolutely horrible (from a usability perspective) and I wanted to revert to the previous Netbook-Launcher. HOWTO Install the required components via terminal: sudo apt-get install netbook-launcher-efl After install just change the “Login Settings” Log out and after the next login: voila – the laucher interface:

Having used IP Telephony for a number of years I need a workable SIP client for all of the devices I use. I have found a very capable client for my Android phones (SipDroid) and on Windows/MacOSX I generally use X-Lite (as well as it’s paid version EyePhone) from Counterpath. Having tried several different Linux SIP clients (Ekiga, Twinkle, …) but all discarded them because of weird UI’s and/or problems with stability I noticed that there is a Linux version of XLite available.

Since I have switched my 3G data network from Hutchinson Three to Vodafone AU recently I also upgraded the USB modem from a Huwaei E220 (which used to work fine on recent Ubuntu NBR releases on my trusty old ASUS EEE 900) Unfortunately the new Huawei K3765 would not be recognised as a valid modem by the network manager. After a fair bit of searching it turns out that you only need to install one additional package (usb-modeswitch) to make this modem work (be recognised) on the current stable 10.

Due to the hype generated by the recent launch and my reservations on using the Apple Inc. iTunes I was doing some research into alternatives to the proprietary and completely locked iPad device (and the associated lock-down to Apple’s iTunes Store). Hopefully this list can be of use for other people as well. I can see the form factor and the tablet style with a cut down (mainly web-browser based) Operating System as useful in a number of settings not least in educational institutions and libraries.

Since a fair bit of my time is spent working and researching in the field of Mobile Learning and there is not a lot of recent listings of Software useful in practical m-Learning implementations I have compiled the following list from my bookmarks and Software I commonly use for these purposes. This list tries to represent currently usable applications not applications in the development stage. Rather than writing this in the form of a blog entry I decided to keep this as a live document within Google Apps that people can contribute to.

This one nearly escaped my attention yesterday. Google has just announced the ability to edit Google Docs on your mobile device via their Google Mobile Blog. Just point your mobile browser to m.google.com/docs and start editing. Along with the use of 2D barcodes this will open a few interesting m-learning possiblities for educators that would previously have required custom coding to achieve. I can see this being very useful in situations where you have students being in the field and allowing them to enter data gathered using a standard mobile phone.

I have been a user of an EEE PC 900 for over 10 months now and in general very happy with the form-factor and it’s portability. I has been very useful in public transport, waiting rooms, coffee shops,… However – in terms of Operating Systems I am now on my 3rd OS (despite initially telling myself that I will stick with the default and avoid tinkering) and it looks like I still have not found what I am looking for.

Being out and about a lot, I am a fairly heavy user of my mobile internet plan (currently with Hutchinson 3). One of the more common tasks when there is some down-time while in transit or waiting for coffee is checking out what’s happening in the twittershere. Personally (being a web-app developer for years) I generally prefer browser-based apps over ‘native apps’. Dont even get me started about J2ME apps. One of the main reasons for this preference is that I tend to switch handsets fairly frequently.

One of the nicest ways to get photos straight from your mobile to Flickr (without having to use e-mails) on Nokia devices is the Flickr Plugin for the Nokia Share Online application. Since a lot of my clients in the educational sector are starting to use Flickr as part of their online teaching I decided to create a short HOWTO. The application itself comes with the phone on most recent Nokia S60 devices (with recent Firmware – check Nokia Software Updater for new firmware).

Just came across this post about barcode tombstones in Japan. Shows very clearly how much public acceptance the 2D barcode technology has got in Japan. It allows visitors to the grave to access to the biography and photos of the deceased person and leave a personal message. This concept probably takes some time to get used to, but you can see that it could clearly add some value for people visiting cemeteries.

As people that know me are aware I am not the biggest fan of the iPhone (3G – hello ???), but obviously from a professional perspective it is another phone that is with us and gaining market share (although not much happening in OZ yet). And to be fair it is breaking some technical ground as well (just not in the areas I most need). From my own anecdotal evidence I was expecting a high percentage of users to choose the iPhone because it ‘looks cool’ or is a ‘chick magnet’ – but I can not back this up by an empirical research (yet) ;-).

I came accross this article last week which I found quite interesting in terms of it’s impact on m-Learning. University inks unmetered Web access deal with Bigpond The unfortunate thing is that this is only limited to one particular university and one provider only. It would be interesting to see if there are any other institutions that are going down that track. How about a general unmetering for the ‘edu.au’ TLD ?

Another good sign that 2D tagging is here to stay and there is some (long overdue) standardisation on the way. Original Article – Herald Tribune

After reading an excellent article by Brad Reed on Network World (this seems to be the online version: Co-working: the ultimate in teleworking flexibility),�I finally got motivated enough to do some more research about this�phenomenum in the two places of interest to me (Austria and Australia)�as well as write a quick entry about this. The whole co-working concept has been interesting me ever since it started, but the organisational issues associated with starting such a�venture (and as with everything else – a lack of time) have always�prevented any serious attempt to actually move in this direction.

FINALLY !!! As somebody that has been experimenting with this technology for over 2 years now I am quite exited to see that the adoption of this technology is gathering some steem. While it has bee widely adopted in Asia for some years now, it has taken some time to get a foothold in the rest of the world this seems to be changing now. At least in Europe as I can see for myself at the moment.

Since my working world is centered a little more on educational topics at the moment (while attending ICL) I came across this Youtube Video which I think is a very good visual example of what’s commonly referred to as Education 2.0. Personally I hope that I actually comprehend this and a good part of my working life is spend improving this situation. The fact that I am sitting in a ‘lecture’ myself and watching a Youtube video should hopefully illustrate that I am can (despite my actual age) understand the students perspective quite well.

The ability to host your own content from your mobile phone opens some interesting possibilities to engage students and will allow the integration of user generated content in the education process. David Johnson from the University of Reading is working on serving portfolio data from your mobile. Some of the current limitation of this approach: -cost of the bandwidth -speed The ability to proxy the users content on the Mobile Web server Gateway as well as the ability to integrate content outside of the mobile phone seem to be the main points that will have to be improved for this to become a more mainstream technology.

This is Part 3 of the Nokia SIP settings. This time for NodePhone (Internode – Australia). It has been hard to find this information (particularily the Registrar Server settings). NOTE: The Realm setting in the Registrar Server are CASE-SENSITIVE. For some screenshots check the ENGIN Australia setup entry. General Profile name: nodephone Service profile: IETF Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point} Public user name: sip:{NodePhone Phone No}@sip.internode.on.net User compression: No

This is Part 2 of the Nokia SIP settings. This time for sipgate.at (Austria), but it should also work for other SIPGate domains. It has been hard to get this information from the providers themselves. For some screenshots check the ENGIN Australia setup entry. General Profile name: sipgate Service profile: IETF Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point} Public user name: sip:{SIPGate UserID}@sipgate.at User compression: No Registration: When needed Use security: No

Since I had to look all over�for the correct settings and there was a lot of trial and error involved (specially for the Realm). Thanks to Engin Support that finally provided this info after logging a support request. The screenshots are from a Nokia E65, but should be applicable for similar Nokia phones. General Profile name: engin Service profile: IETF Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point} Public user name: sip:{phone number}@voice.

Since I had to do some research on this topic recently, here are the results that I have found. These plans are interesting for people that do not call out a lot, but rather use the phone to be accessible. GoMobile – Pay as you go plans Southern Cross Telecom – Pay as you go plans AAPT – GO15 plan (**needs to be bundled with Landline phone) ** – some conditions apply to qualify for $0 minimum spend)