Widespread Augmented Reality

Widespread Augmented Reality
Click on the image to get the Android Augmented Reality Heads up Display

Sunday, December 23, 2012

ChromeOS - Vanilla

As luck would have it, a buddy just finished a legal briefing that took most of the day, forgot to e-mail himself a copy, and now sees a blank screen when he turns on his laptop. The bad luck part of this has to do with me reformatting my ChromeOS bootable USB drive just yesterday, so now we are both staring at a blank screen and the restaurant is too noisy to listen to the hardrive and speakers.

It's now time to revisit Hexxeh and donate to Builds by Hexxeh so I can boot the laptop into Chrome and hopefully find the document.

But of course it could just be that the screen is out, which would require more than a bootable USB.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Content Management Systems

I answered an ad requesting help with PHP and MySQL. Upon accepting the task, I learned that Wordpress is a black box with a bunch of pretty wrapping paper pasted on top.

Problem: A carousel element was disappearing when clicked on.
Resolution: After synchronizing the staging and the production sites, the problem disappeared.

Phew... Apparently the shop knew enough about Wordpress to know that its guts are MySQL and PHP, but good luck trying to change any of that. An on-line magazine should not use an off the shelf CMS like Wordpress and be concerned with modifying PHP scripts and MySQL tables. Focus on content and just pay for a Wordpress plugin professional.

Unrelated perhaps, but here is a very good blog article on Drupal injection.

Monday, December 17, 2012

Augmented Reality Potential

Imagine being able to post your own Points of Interest (POI) for friends in your clique to see when they are within 3 miles of the target location. If you can get past the cumbersome site and the shopping network, that was the potential for Graff-It. But never mind the website as the Android app was the real treasure find at Google Play. Clicking on the marks in the camera view would bring up a marker on Google maps. Imagine further hooking up that mark to Google + video chatting. I compiled slides of augmented reality in action at www.xqzmoi.com. The reason for this compilation is that Graff-It is shutting down soon and I want to remember what could have been.

Thursday, December 13, 2012

Graff-It and Augmented Reality for the masses

According to the owners, Graff-It and its sister Android app at Google Play will be shutting down before year end. This system placed the power of creating points of interest (POI) markers in the hands and minds of private citizens instead of relying on the "Man". For example, one could use the desktop browser to place a mark (art, photo, image or text) at a location on the world map. Folks within three miles of that location would see that interactive mark as they scan their surroundings through a Graff-It enabled device. This mark would be floating in the sky above the target location like a virtual billboard. As you might have guessed, the Android app and the GPS would allow members to upload marks from an actual location in real time, essentially leaving an interactive "I was here" for other members to see as they travel within three miles of the upload spot. Pair this with real time social networking through the Augmented Reality view and you have the sky as the limit, not to mention one hell of a world wide scavenger hunt. Why the shut down? Don't shoot me as I am just the messenger.

Friday, December 7, 2012

Zend server and PHP Errors

If you have Zend LAMP installed on your local PC and you are able to view pages with http://localhost/yourFile.php, then you can view errors in the following directory: C:\Program Files\Zend\ZendServer\logs\php_error. Enjoy.

Friday, November 30, 2012

Mule (ESB) Enterprise Service Bus

Yet another tool to consider over just firing up a text editor and coding.

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Tor Tails

One must wonder who is watching who downloads what, but here it is anyway: Tor Tails. Also, for kicks, there is BlackBelt privacy for the super paranoid, but one must think that using such a tool instantly identifies one as a person who is hiding. I'm just saying.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

Avoiding LinkedIn

I do not want to list on LinkedIn so I develop my own lonely profiles at Network Solutions and XQZMOI.

Saturday, November 17, 2012

OSE - other search engines

Testing this custom Google search by GHacks while I also have the Yacy client installed on Windows 7 Ultimate.

Friday, November 16, 2012

Not Reinventing the jQuery Carousel

Although I'd prefer to be clever and write my own jQuery plugins, there is a case to be made for being more productive. So here are some expedient links.

Monday, November 12, 2012

PHP on Android Galaxy Tab 2 7 inch

  • Root device (see previous posts)
  • Mount drives as read/write. See EHow.
  • Download PHP/Lighttpd from Hex.Ro
  • Modify ini and conf files to get rid of "No Input File Received" when browsing on the Android device for http://localhost
  • This last part is a work in progress. Specific instructions are forthcoming
  • Meanwhile reviewing

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Back to Basics

7 Web Site Design Tips by Green Host; however, I am partial to Free web hosting with PHP and MySQL where I can ignore all good web design at the following domains:
SpiderOnFire
XQZMOI
ThisAgent
MyA55
Onassis

Monday, November 5, 2012

Galaxy Tab 2 Developer Machine

Aside from practicing with the on screen key pad, I will need the following.

This is a list in progress.

Saturday, November 3, 2012

Blue Question Mark Cube of Death

It is time to detect whether http://onassistheplay.info/novtest2.php or http://onassistheplay.info/novtest.php is rendering on a mobile phone. Shall I start with [www]netrafic[.][com]?

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Graff-It video by Arnaud Millet

This bad-a55ed video belongs on Graff-It floating at all key points around the world.

Monday, October 29, 2012

Android Debug Bridge

Handy ADB commands:
  • adb start-server
  • adb kill-server
  • adb devices
  • adb install
  • adb pull
  • adb push
  • adb shell pm set-install-location 2
  • adb shell pm set-install-location 0 (revert the previous)
  • More ...

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Now this DOES root a Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0

Rooting an Android device requires that you override the stock recovery manager to point to the SDcard so that you can run scripts to grant super user permissions. This is similar to booting a PC into safe mode to recover files and repair the system. Follow these steps to root aka gain super user (SU) access
  1. Run ICS stock on Samsung Galaxy Tab 2. (Factory reset and do not install Samsung updates)
  2. Download root tools from http://www.4shared.com/zip/JZn8aVQs/root_requiredfiles.html
  3. One can also download the required Micro SD card files from http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1788625 (scroll down to find them)
  4. Carefully follow the directions at
    • Detail - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1788625
    • -OR-
    • Summary - http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1728987
  5. List of all files used.
    1. Odin3 v1.85.exe(this overwrites the stock recovery manager with Clock Work Mod(CWM))
    2. Fix-Recovery.zip (copied to external sd card)
    3. cwm-root-gtab2.zip (copied to external sd card)
Another resource to x-check against is here. EOM

Friday, October 26, 2012

This too does not root Android ICS

Also not working on a Galaxy tab 2 7 inch, but you can download the root script from The Next Web.

Trying to root Android Galaxy Tab 2 7.0

This does not work on a Galaxy TAB 2.0 7inch, but for grins and giggles, I am using Tom's Guide to try for super user access on Ice Cream Sandwich.

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Galaxy Tab 2, ICS and Flash

Developing presentations in both Flash and Powerpoint, I found it necessary to install the Flash player for Ice Cream Sandwich on a Galaxy Tab 2, 7 inch tablet. This is the download link. So is this.

Saturday, October 13, 2012

Kernel Panic

Per Leo Laporte, The Tech Guy One can access the Parameter RAM or PRAM, which is similar to the Windows/Intel BIOS, by rebooting the Mac and holding the [command] + [option] + [p] + [r] keys. Per me, one can also boot into safe mode on a Mac by holding the [shift] key. Then look at the Activity Monitor.

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

UI Wireframe Sketching

Ran into a buddy at Trader Joes who said that he is working on a website. When I asked for the URL, he explained that he is drawing it on paper. Genius! So here is a link for inspiration. Web Design Ledger

Friday, September 28, 2012

Surfing Silicon Beach

By the sea...
Over the hill...

Throwing this one in just for kicks. AdMedia

I'll expand on this in later posts, so check back.

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Google Web Master Tool

Dear Webmaster Tools user,
We know that having a healthy and well-performing website is important to you. To keep you informed about your site's status Webmaster Tools will now automatically send you a notification email if there are critical or important issues that we detect with your site.
We'll only send you email for issues that we think have significant impact on your site's health or search performance which have clear actions that you can take to address. For example, we'll email you if we detect malware on your site or see a significant increase in errors while crawling your site.
For most sites these kinds of issues will occur rarely. If your site does happen to have an issue we cap the number of emails we send over a certain period of time to avoid flooding your inbox.
If you don't want to receive any email from Webmaster Tools you can change your email delivery preferences at https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/preferences.
We hope that you find this change a useful way to stay up-to-date on critical and important issues regarding your site's health.
If you'd like more information about Webmaster Tools and building Google-friendly websites please visit http://www.google.com/webmasters.
The Webmaster Tools Team

Monday, September 24, 2012

SEO Site running on Wordpress

Tying in the previous post that lists components of the Wordpress engine,  I present to you an excellent article by SEO-News on the 5 deadly sins.

By the way the only tie in is that the site runs on Wordpress.

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Enable LiveAndroid networking in VMWare

  1. Start VMWare and boot the LiveAndroid image.
  2. Hit Alt-F1 to switch to root console.
  3. Type mkdir /data/misc/dhcp
  4. Log off and turn off LiveAndroid.
  5. Exit VMWare Workstation
  6. Find and edit the .vmx file in the directory of VMWare.
  7. Change the line "ethernet0.virtualDev" to read "ethernet0.virtualDev="vlance"
  8. Launch VMWare again and set to at least 348MB.

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Automobile Hacks

Techspot on protecting drivers against automobile software hacks. What about hacking into warranty repair systems that often span continents and rely on vendor interfaces?  Hmmm... Toyota?

Saturday, August 4, 2012

jQuery vs Flash

Note to self:  Employ this jQuery solution, www.philparsons.co.uk, versus my Flash attempts as evidenced at Anthony Skordi 1 and AnthonySkordi 2.

Friday, July 6, 2012

Android an iOS web pages

Construct the mobile app as a browser and employ the proper HTML, CSS and JavaScript to render the page on the device. Start with blog.dreamcss.com

SpeckBoy Design

I found me a new site to learn from jQuery security and forms

Sunday, July 1, 2012

Flash 8 3D workaround

Mad props to John Bezanis for automating the code for the photo cube that is now running on the server for Onassis, The Play.

Saturday, June 23, 2012