May 19

How To Prevent Car Theft

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While victims of car theft may feel that they are at the mercy of thieves, there are a few things that we all can do to deter would be criminals, many of which are extremely basic. Something as simple as parking your car in a well-lit and open area is an easy yet effective means of deterring potential thieves from breaking into your car. It may seem obvious, but it is alarming how many people think that their car may be safe in dark, secluded areas. Keeping valuables out of plain sight, or better yet, out of the car completely is another effective way to get thieves to pass your car by. Even something like an aftermarket stereo unit is enough to catch the eye of criminals and make your car their next target.

Ensuring that you always leave your car locked with it’s windows wound up sounds like basic practice for all of us, but it’s on that odd occasion when you just quickly need to run into the house to grab one more thing that an opportunistic passer by makes off with your vehicle and it’s contents. Even running back into your home for a split second is more than enough time for a criminal to pounce. All these things sound painfully obvious, but the statistics show that an alarming number of car thefts result from people ignoring common sense. Couple this with the fact that the majority of insurance companies employ policies that are void if an owner leaves their keys in the ignition and the whole situation gets very expensive.

Aside from these rudimentary means of keeping your keys and possessions safe, there are other things you can do to ensure that thieves keep their hands off of your property. If your car doesn’t already, having an immobiliser installed is an effective means of keeping your car where it belongs. Immobiliser’s have been mandatory in new cars since 2001 in Australia so if you own an older vehicle, you may need to have one fitted so that even if you are unlucky enough to have your car broken into, it ensures that without the key thieves will be unable to take the vehicle. Car alarms may be looked upon as useless but they are still very effective ways of keeping your care secure. Abiding by the ‘common sense’ measures of car security in conjunction with having a car alarm fitted is a proven way of keeping your car and its contents secure.

May 11

LG Optimus Elite Hitting Virgin Mobile with NFC on May 15th

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Virgin Mobile has announced its first NFC-powered device, the LG Optimus Elite, which will be headed to the carrier in mid-May.

The LG Optimus Elite is going to be Virgin Mobile’s first device that features Near-Field Communication abilities which means it will be the first device in Virgin’s lineup that is compatible with services like Google Wallet, Google’s mobile payment platform.

This will allow users to tap their Optimus Elite to pay for goods at locations where Google Wallet is available.

Additionally, the LG Optimus Elite will feature Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 3.5-inch touchscreen, an 800MHz processor, and a 5 mega-pixel rear facing camera. It will also have access to the Google Play Store for applications.

Clearly, this phone is not going to appeal to hardware buffs or those that want Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box, but along with NFC, it has a price that should appeal to some folks.

Virgin Mobile offers its phones off-contract and the LG Optimus Elite will be priced at a mere $149.99. Again, that price is off-contract. Customers can then pair the device with Virgin’s Beyond Talk unlimited data and messaging plans starting at $35 per month.

Of course, Virgin doesn’t offer pure unlimited data as this year, it started throttling the data of those going over a 2.5GB data threshold. Those who exceed that cap will see data slowed to a 256Kbps crawl.

The carrier has put the phone up for pre-order today and it expects the device to start shipping out on May 15th.

Apr 14

Sony Announces New Cyber-shot Digital Cameras

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Sony has announced three new Cyber-shot point-and-shoot camera models, bringing the total number of new cameras in 2012 to six. The DSC-WX50, DSC-WX70, and DSC-TX200V, all of which will be available for purchase in March, all feature 5x zoom lenses and Exmor R CMOS sensors. They will be available in March, a month after the DSC-W610, DSC-W620, and DSC-W650 cameras that were announced at CES.

The WX50 and WX70 are almost identical in form and function. Both slim shooters feature a 25-125mm f/2.6-6.3 (35mm equivalent) Carl Zeiss zoom lens, a 16-megapixel image sensor, 1080i60 video capture, and optical image stabilization. The WX50 features a 2.7-inch, 460k dot screen, while the WX70 has a larger, sharper 3-inch, 921k dot touch-screen LCD. The WX50 will sell for $199.99 and the WX70 for $229.99.

The DSC-TX200V is a completely new camera, rather than an upgrade of an existing model. It features a glass front plate and an ultra-slim body. The 18-megapixel point-and-shoot features a 5x (26-130mm) zoom lens, 1080i60 movie capture, GPS, optical image stabilization, and Carl Zeiss optics. Its 3.3-inch touch screen features OLED technology for a clear and bright image with deep blacks, and the camera itself is sealed against water and dust. It can autofocus in as little as 0.1 second in bright light and manages an impressive 0.2 second focus speed in dim conditions. The camera is compatible with Memory Stick Micro and microSD memory, and is set to retail for $499.99.

The W610, W620, and W650, announced at CES and scheduled to hit stores in February, are entry-level models. The W610 features a 14-megapixel CCD image sensor, a 230k-dot 2.7-inch LCD, a 4x (26-104mm) zoom lens, and VGA video recording. It is set to sell for $109.99. The W620 is almost identical, save for its ability to record video in 720p HD resolution and 5x (28-140mm) lens. It will sell for $119.99. The W650 steps things up a bit with a 16-megapixel CCD sensor, 5x (25-125mm) Carl Zeiss zoom lens, and a 3-inch 230k dot LCD—all for $139.99.

Mar 26

Make a Landscape Layout in Android

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Handling screen orientation changes is one of the more frustrating parts of programming for Android to me. Users will often switch to landscape orientation for comfort or more horizontal screen space, but regardless of why you need to make sure that your app can make appropriate use of the screen changes. If you are displaying data in a table style, then it would make sense to have the rows more spaced out or even show more rows when the user switches to landscape. Luckily, this is very easy to do in Android. Here’s how:

HowtoDevelopAndroidapps.java:

import android.app.Activity;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.widget.Toast;
public class HowtoDevelopAndroidApps extends Activity {
    /** Called when the activity is first created. */
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.main);
    }
}
The Java code is actually irrelevant to this example. It just sets the content view to main.xml.
main.xml (in ‘layout’ folder):
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="horizontal" android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent">
    <Button android:id="@+id/button1" android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:text="Button1"></Button>
</LinearLayout>

main.xml (in ‘layout-land’ folder):

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="horizontal" android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent">
    <Button android:id="@+id/button1" android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:text="Button1"></Button>
    <Button android:id="@+id/button2" android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:text="Button2"></Button>
</LinearLayout>
The key to this is having a copy of your XML layout in both the ‘layout’ and ‘layout-land’ folder. If you do not have a ‘layout-land’ folder, then just create one. The XML files need to have the same name in each folder, but you can make tweaks to each one to optimize them for their respective screen orientations. What happens is that Android will detect the screen orientation and size and then search the custom layout folders for the right XML file. If no other layout folders are found then it just searches the default layout folder. Like so:

Android also supports different layouts for a range of screen sizes. For example, you could use ‘layout-xlarge-land’ to support tablet screens with a large resolution. More can be found here.

Anyways, here is how the example looks:

And after changing orientation:
Mar 24

Microsoft builds a Ford Mustang

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This could prove to be a distraction.

Microsoft has teamed up with West Coast Customs to build the most high-tech 1967 Ford Mustang ever created.

“Project Detroit” started out with a 2012 Mustang GT that the team modified using a 1967 Mustang replica shell made by Dynacorn. Already equipped with the Microsoft-designed Ford Sync voice-controlled infotainment system, the team went to work installing just about everything else Microsoft makes, and more.

The car features a full digital dashboard with skins that can be changed with a swipe of the screen; Windows tablet over the glove compartment; head-up displays on the windshield for both driver and passenger, the latter of which can use it as a monitor to play an X-Box fitted with Kinect; a rear window that doubles as a projector screen for using the X-Box outside of the car or displaying messages; and an external speakers that can play music, double as a PA system and provide a choice of customizable horn sounds.

The car is a rolling wireless 4G hotspot tied into the Windows Azure cloud-based system and has been integrated with a Windows Phone app that allows it to be tracked, unlocked and started remotely.

Matte black paint and Windows blue LED lights inside the grille and wheels are a classic, if crude, West coast Customs touch.

While there are no plans to recreate it for showrooms, you can watch the car being built and pick up a few ideas if you’re interested in creating it on an upcoming episode of Inside West Coast Customs on the Velocity network.