Spaced Out :: 2010

The number of people that lose their phone and all their contacts….. too numerous to count. With PDAs, synchronisation was done to a desktop app (HotSync for Palm and Active Sync for Microsoft), but with a 3G access common and cloud computing pervasive many people now sync their phones to an online service. This is very easy to do out of the box for a droid device. Set up a GMail account and then enter the details in your phone.

I also wanted a desktop app and, of course, all my contacts and calendar were in my Palm T

The first step in starting to do more interesting things with your droid device is to connect it to your PC. For that you need some USB drivers. OK, I know when you plug the phone in a PC will automatically recognise the on board usb storage, but you actually need “developer level” access to the phone. Google’s software development kit provides this and an awful lot more…. in fact so much more that it’s a right faff to get it all. So to save some effort read this thread to see how to download and install just the drivers themselves. These will then give you the access to the phone needed for working with the ROM.

Note: ZTE also produce drivers which are specific to the Blade and can be used to tether it and use it as a modem.

The first steps to getting your San Francisco (aka Blade) to do what you want it to do are:

1. Unlock the device so you aren’t tied to Orange
2. Gain root (superuser) access to the operating system so you can add apps that rally get under the bonnet

So, without more ado:

1. To unlock phone:
Type *#06# to get the phone’s IMEI number. Then visit:
http://www.nextgenserver.com/calculator/
Type in the details and use the phone model SFR-341
Put a non-Orange SIM in to the phone, start it up and enter the unlock code.

(Note: the Orange help pages are actually quite helpful!! And… if you stay on PAYG for at least 3 months you can request an unlock code from Orange. Seems the simplest option!)

2. To root the handset, the simplest option (given the Blade is running Android 2.1) is to use Universal Androot
Download the app
Copy it to the SD card on your phone
Install either Linda File Manager or Ghost Commander from the Market
Use the file manager to install the application on to your phone
Run Universal Androot

All very simple; some useful apps that make full use of root access include Titanium Backup (the best backup app for your Droid) and AdFree (for removing app ads).

I have finally succumbed and laid my Palm T

James Fee notes that ESRIs file geodatabase is finally to be (sort of) opened up with a beta of the API coming out in January (C++ based). The binaries (but probably not the source code) are being released and as the blog notes:

“This API is targeted for advanced developers who require access to the File Geodatabase without an ArcObjects license for purposes of interoperability.”

So you won’t need to buy ArcGIS by the sounds of things to read FGDBs, but it will be a Windows only solution (until its reversed engineered anyway).