Ventrillo on iPhone

Image via Wikipedia

Ventrilo, the Internet‘s answer to the phone… perhaps except for Skype! So is it a bad idea to expect it on the iPhone? Probably. While it would be fun to have it on the iPhone, it would probably make the phone itself redundant, something that Apple probably wouldn’t be too happy about.

So, has anyone found anyway to get past this? Having a search around Google mostly brings up threads asking if the app exists or is in the making, but one person seems to have found a… sort of solution:

I just bought a new cell phone and I am sitting in a 3-month “Unlimited Local Talking”. Now I thought that it would be cool to be able to call a number and get linked into Ventrilo while you are out. Totally useless in my eyes as no one would ever use it except for this one moment that I wanted to use it. In thinking about that though, I got even more ideas which eventually lead me to develop (or think up) a portable Ventrilo Client.

1) I set up Ventrilo‘s speakers and microphone to my “Sound Blaster” card. I set my microphone to “What U Hear” so that any noise my computer made, was transmitted on the microphone channel.

2) I opened up Skype (as I have a $3.00 Unlimited Canada-US Calling Plan on it) and set the microphone also to the Sound Blaster’s “What U Hear” mode and the speakers to “Sound Blaster” (you can probably see where I’m going with this now).

3) I called my cell phone from Skype. When I spoke into my cell phone, it was sent to Skype, which then in turn sent it to Ventrilo so everyone can hear. Anytime someone talked on Ventrilo, Skype would pick up the noise as my microphone’s signal and send it to my cell phone allowing me to hear what was happening in Ventrilo.

Now the only problem that I was faced with was the ability to keep transmitting the signal. Taking off “Push To Talk” and leaving the sensitivity on did not produce any results as the program was canceling out its own sounds causing the “talk light” to never come on. So I had to use “Push To Talk” in order to transmit.

While it isn’t a hands on and easy app, it might give us some way to use Ventrilo on the iPhone. The problem is, it probably isn’t worth the trouble in the end. I was actually looking for something to hold me over instead of looking up free SIM cards, but this method may be a little too complicated for me 🙂

Overall, I wouldn’t expect this to appear as an official app any time soon, and I imagine that if it was made as a jail-broken app, Apple would probably take a much, much stronger stance against it.

War: Soldier Vs Demo

Image by Cystie via Flickr

War is upon us, gentlemen. For the last few days we’ve been unable to leave the safety of our homes without being caught in the splash damage of a stray rocket or grenade… Perhaps not that much has changed… but what is to blame for the increase of crit rockets being fired into your spawn? Friendship.

It seems as if the Demo and Soldier have been caught out. A visit to the eye museum together, sharing a car rental to the gravel pits of America, even fishing… Fishing! Surely the bond they have forged cannot be broken?

With this war, we find out that very man has a price, and friendships are easily broken. While I would happily start shooting rockets at any of my friends for the price of an iPhone with mobile broadband or a new PC… It seems some people aren’t so cheap.

The Demoman and Soldier will be given a new and custom weapon everyday from here on out until we reach the weekend. What do they have to do to earn these? Wipe each other out. The class which accumulates the most kills until then will win a bonus weapon as reward.

The current standings:

Soldiers killed: 4,923,531

Demomen killed: 5,056, 134

Who do you want to win, and why?

I feel my reasons for wanting Demo to win are just:

1) Soldiers already two hit me as a sniper (the first hit leaving me with about 10 health and difficulty aiming because I’m in mid-air)… I understand the irony here, but at least I have to aim for their head and predict where they’re going to run (Huntsman!)

2) I usually play on a map where demos jump very high up on the map. Perfect for free kills!

The war still continues, and if you’d like a taste of it, Team Fotress 2 will be free this weekend starting on Thursday night.

You can read about the war here.

Pros and Cons of Jailbreaking your iPhone

My jailbroken phone

The Apple store is full of goodies, from the simplest games to the app made by the car rental companies to lock your car from anywhere, but does it have everything?

The answer for most people is a very big ‘No.’ There are many useful features which aren’t provided by Apple through the default iPhone firmware or as an add-on through the App Store.

So, if you’re asking yourself ‘Should I jailbreak my iPhone?’, or even if you’re interested in finding out about Jailbreaking, read on.

First off, what exactly is jailbreaking?

Jailbreaking essentially removes the limitations of your iPhone software. The iPhone comes pre-set so that you can’t put anything onto your phone that Apple doesn’t like… Basically, this would be like buying a laptop running Windows to find out you can’t install anything unless Microsoft looks at it first and evaluates if they want you to use it or not.  Or like buying a burger and finding out you can’t put ketchup on or garnish it without asking the guy who grilled it, except burgers don’t have a warranty. Note that jailbreaking is not unlocking your phone to be able to use any carrier, although it is part of the process to do this.

So what are the pros and cons?

Changing the software on your iPhone can have its good sides and bad sides, I see a lot of advocates for jailbreaking say there are no cons, when of course, there are.

Pros

• New app store – In in addition to still being able to use Apple’s App Store, you’ll now have a new App Store full of hundreds of free apps. I’m using Cydia, but there are a few different ones.
• Themes – If you take a look at my screenshot, you can see that it now has a theme, no more boring springboard! There’s a huge amount of themes available for use and you can even use multiple themes at once, mixing and matching is easy. If you like the look of the theme from my screenshot, you can find it here. To change your themes you will have to use ‘WinterBoard’ from Cydia.
• Video recording – Although the iPhone is a very up to date and modern phone, it doesn’t support video recording by default. If you install ‘Cycorder’ from Cydia, you’ll now be able to record videos using your camera. I would expect to see this coming in an official release from Apple soon though.
• Minimise/Minimize apps – This is one of my favourite things about jailbreaking the iPhone. Using an app called ‘Backgrounder’, you’ll now be able to do things like minimizing Spotify and games without losing their data or sound. This means you don’t have to quit a game to read your text messages and you can listen to Spotify while you browse Safari or any other app.
• Full control – Using apps like ‘SBSettings’ from Cydia, you’ll have full control over your phone. What does this mean? With the flick of a switch you can choose to turn individual features off:, 3G, Bluetooth, Rotation, WiFi and SHH. You can also easily adjust the brightness of the screen and see which processes are running in the background of your phone (and kill them if you need to free up some memory).
• More icons on springboard/dock – The default iPhone has 4 spaces on the dock and 4 columns of apps on the springboard. Using ‘Five Icon Dock’ and ‘Five-Column Springboard’, you’ll have even more space for your apps and folders. Again, you can see this in the screenshot.
• Games – There are tons of free games on Cydia, but the most impressive thing is the NES emulator. Play classic roms on your iPhone!
• Direct access – Using SSH you can have direct access to your phone from your PC, upload ringtones and anything else into your phone.
• “Desktop like” lock screen – One thing a lot of people don’t like is having no desktop, just a list of apps. With certain apps you can edit your lock screen to show things like the time, weather, unread emails, texts and calendar appointments without even unlocking your phone.
• Easy to jailbreak – You don’t have to smash open your iPhone and add 7 different chips then sellotape it back together for it to work (hello modded Xbox). It’s as simple as plugging into iTunes and pressing a few buttons (because that’s what you have to do).
• Categorise/Categorize your springboard – If you don’t want a cluttered screen, you can create folders on your springboard to easily categorise your apps into. I’m not sure which app is best for this at the moment, but I know that you can do it.
• Unlock your carrier – Until very recently, all phones in the UK were tied down to o2, now that the iPhone is open to new companies you might want to unlock yourself from o2; jailbreaking is part of that process.
• Lots more – There are many apps that I haven’t even tried, or looked at. The possibilities are pretty endless when it comes to 3rd party apps.

Cons

• Warranty – Applying a jailbreak to your phone will void your software guarantee but not your hardware guarantee. Either way, you can use an app to back up your jailbreak and reset your phone to factory settings if you need to get your phone looked at.
• Bricking your iPhone – There is a very rare chance that jailbreaking might just turn your phone into a brick, meaning that it kicks the bucket. No fixing it. You should be able to get a replacement from Apple, but you’ll have lost all the data on your phone – so back it all up before you jailbreak.
• 3rd party apps – There’s always a chance that 3rd party software could be corrupt or contain a virus. Cydia signs apps that are free of this, so be careful when installing things on your phone. You shoud be fine, as long as you make sure it’s signed. Again, make sure to back up!
• Apple – Apple does not support jailbreaking. Like I said, make sure you reset your phone to factory settings if you’re asking them to fix it etc
• Updating Firmware – Apple are constantly battling jailbreakers and when they release new firmware, they will most likely have patched over the previous firmwares exploited point (the bit that allows us to over ride the software and do whatever we want). Jailbreakers take a while to find a new way in, so you will have to wait longer than every body else to use the new software.

Now that you’ve read this, only you can figure out if you should jailbreak. You might be wondering ‘Do you think that the pros outweigh the cons?’ Yes. I do. Jailbreaking the iPhone increases its usefulness 10 fold, but do remember that it isn’t essential to jail break your iPhone. As a mobile broadband user, and iPhone user, jailbreaking the iPhone is very refreshing.

If you read this and have something to add to the pros and cons sections, or if you want to ask questions about jailbreaking, feel free to comment. I can also take screenshots of any of the apps, if anyone wants to see them.

For those who want to know how to jailbreak 3.1.2 firmware, I followed this guide: Jailbreak iPhone 3.1.2 Firmware with blackra1n

Lock your Car with your iPhone… and also stalking?!

Image by Cystie via Flickr

Sometimes I find really awesome apps for the iPhone. Sometimes I find really creepy apps for the iPhone. Yet both of them are usually funny.

First off, lets talk about the car app (saying car app over and over really fast does not represent my view on the app). Basically, this turns your iPhone into a key for your car, and even more.

Using the app, you can unlock and lock your car, open the trunk of your car, turn the alarm of your car off and on, turn the heat off and on and of course, start the ignition.

‘What’s the point?’, you might be asking. ‘Why would I want to use the iPhone to open my car when I have a perfectly good key?’ The app can actually do any of these things from anywhere, no line of sight involved because it is done over your network. Need to de-ice your car everyday, all winter? Set your alarm for an hour before you need to get up, turn on the heat, and voila, you’ve de-iced the car without leaving your bed. Plus you won’t need to carry your keys around in your pocket any more. Ever fallen and landed on your keys? Yeah, you know what I’m talking about.

I imagine it’s also helpful if someone wants to use your car, you can unlock it from anywhere. If I remember correctly, the app (or an app like it, I can’t remember) starting in car rentals – it’s cool to see it out for the public to use.

You might be wondering how it works, this is the catch. Hardware will need to be installed in your car which costs about  £185 ($300). However, the app itself is free for now.

I wonder if you can honk your horn at people with it? Personally I’d be sitting on my living furniture watching people walk past and pressing it. 😀

You can find out more about the app here.

The stalking app just…. scares me. I’ll let you make your own call on this one (no pun).

Flash on iPhone Without Jailbreaking

Flash on iPhone without jailbreaking. Is it finally coming?

I’ve been wondering when they might bring flash to the iPhone – I have an MSN app on there, but if someone sends me a flash cartoon, I can never open it. Having flash on the iPhone would bring a seemingly unlimited amount of entertainment to your pocket. Browsing flash cartoons or sites like Kongregate, which houses hundreds of really fun games would become an easy thing to do on the bus, or at that beach (why are you playing flash games at the beach?!). Plus anything else you might use flash for.

When I first found out the iPhone didn’t have flash, I was quite surprised. Phones have come a long, long way. I can use my phone as a GPS device, I can use my phone to access millions of songs on Spotify, I can get a car rental with a few taps of the finger… Yet I can’t watch the badger badger badger song? That’s not right, something’s up with that, ya know?

I’m sure a lot of people have wondered the same thing (possibly not the badger badger badger song, but shame on those people). Putting the question into Google gives a lot of results on the subject, mainly jailbreaking the phone (this invalidates the warranty I think?) and using slower flash programmes which really don’t cut it.

Which leads me onto this article. Yeah, when I read ‘Flash coming to almost every smartphone’, I thought that iPhone must be in on it, but nope. Nearly every smart phone besides the iPhone.

Adobe has announced a whole pile of deals with manufacturers of almost all the world’s major smartphones. It’s done deals with RIM (who produce the BlackBerry handsets), Symbian, Windows Mobile, Palm, and Google. Notice one name missing from that list? The iPhone hasn’t joined the party.

Interesting that Apple isn’t there, but then you read this bit:

Meanwhile, the iPhone is conspicuous by its absence. Adobe has said it’s working with Apple, but that’s all running on a different timescale to the rest of the companies.

So perhaps something good is going on behind the scenes? Apple can’t go forever without giving us access to flash. What will the badgers do?

Spotify Outside of the UK

What do you think?

or:  ‘Another Spotify post?!’

I have recently talked to a few friends who really like the sound of Spotify, as I’ve talked about before.

So, they live outside of the UK, that sucks. There’s no real legal way for them to access the kind of service that Spotify provides. So I went for a look about on Google to see what I could figure out.

First off, the only ways to listen outside of the UK is to either use a proxy (f.e. http://proxy.org) and create an account through that. This is fine, but after a couple of weeks from a non-english IP address you won’t be able to use Spotify anymore.

Or an idea which came to my mind the other day was to just… Get someone from the UK to sign you up and renew it now and then. That way it’s made from a UK IP address and can be easily logged into to reset the ‘you can only use this for 2 weeks if you’re travelling outside of the UK’ message.

I don’t in anyway encourage people to use these methods, by the way. I’m not sure how much it hurts Spotify as a company, but I’d hate to have enough people doing this to damage them.

Another question that came to mind was does the travel access on premium allow you to use your account outside the UK on a permanent basis rather than just the normal 2 weeks?

Also, what about mobiles? How do they figure out where you’re listening from? I assume mobiles have IP addresses tied to the correct country, and not where they were made. That or they figure it out by checking your ISP, since getting coverage on mobile broadband abroad would be hard. I would guess either IP addresses or that you’re using a UK phone provider.

Hopefully with the sudden growth of Spotify, it’ll be hitting other countries soon (maybe there should be an online petition made that nobody would look at?!). However, Spotify still have Apple/iTunes to compete with. I wonder what move Apple will make to make sure it stays on top of Spotify, will we be seeing the same type of service or a paid service with a lot more options? We’ll have to wait and see.