Based on SPB Quadronica game, SPB Quads is the new arcade game for Symbian in which one has to put together all his/her pattern-finding skills to succeed. A player’s goal in this game is to reveal and mark rectangles’ corners of the same colors in a field filled with color bricks, thus "destroying" them and earning scores. There are two modes in the game: a time-limited mode and an endless, "strategic" mode. This effectively creates two different scenarios of playing.

SPB Quads for Symbian is compatible with Symbian S60 v.5-based touchscreen phones only. A free, 15-day trial can be downloaded, or SPB Quads for Symbian may be purchased for 9.95 USD from www.spb.com. The application can also be purchased from OVI store.

The IWCE event will be held at the Las Vegas Convention Center in South Halls 3 and 4 and is scheduled for 11:10 a.m. through 12:10 p.m. EST on Friday, March 12, 2010. Contact information can be found after the break if you want to attend.

Read the Press Release After The Break:

Howard Melamed, CellAntenna CEO, to Discuss Implications of Cell Phone Jamming Technology

CORAL SPRINGS, Fla.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Howard Melamed, CEO of CellAntenna Corporation and an expert in jamming and enhancing cell phone communication, will participate in a panel discussion at the 2010 International Wireless Communication Expo (IWCE) event in Las Vegas.
“Cell-Phone Jamming: What Are the Implications Beyond the Prison System?”

Who: Melamed, who has a decade of experience with wireless communication signals, will participate with Jack Daniel, owner of Jack Daniel Company; and Alan Tilles, partner with Shulman, Rogers, Gandal, Pordy & Ecker, PA. Tilles will also serve as the panel’s moderator.

What: The panel, titled “Cell-Phone Jamming: What Are the Implications Beyond the Prison System?” will discuss whether jamming the signal is the right solution for combating contraband cell phones in prisons. The panelists will also discuss the implications beyond prisons and if hospitals, schools or even retailers can choose to jam signals at their own discretion.

When: “Cell-Phone Jamming: What Are the Implications Beyond the Prison System?” is scheduled for 11:10 a.m. through 12:10 p.m. EST on Friday, March 12, 2010.

Where: The IWCE event will be held at the Las Vegas Convention Center in South Halls 3 and 4.

Why: Melamed is at the forefront of the national discussion surrounding cell phone jamming. His decade of experience includes the successful testing and implementation of cell jamming solutions. As a result, he knows firsthand what the implications are for the technology beyond the prison walls. At this conference Melamed will provide evidence that the problem of cell phones used by inmates in US prisons is of pandemic proportions.

Journalists interested in meeting with Howard Melamed at the IWCE event should contact Derek James at 408-727-0351 or derekj@mcgrathpower.com. For additional information on CellAntenna solutions, please visit: www.cellantenna.com.

About CellAntenna Corporation
CellAntenna Corporation offers solutions to either enhance or prohibit cell phone signals. For nearly a decade, the company has increased productivity and safety through the boosting of signal strength and reduction of dropped calls. Products include cellular repeaters, cell phone signal boosters and fixed wireless terminals. CellAntenna’s broad portfolio also includes solutions for cellular detection, jamming and passive handset control. Headquartered in Coral Springs, FL, CellAntenna also has offices in the United Kingdom and Poland.

Once upon a time I was driving after dark on a windy unlit road in Westport Connecticut and as I got close to a blind curve on a hill I noticed a car pulled over on one side of the road and an incapacitated deer in the middle of the other. I did some calculations in my head and determined that traffic headed toward that deer wouldn’t be able to see him in time to make an evasive maneuver and that the deer, whom I’ll go ahead and personify for narrative effect as Mister Deer, was presenting a major hazard so I thought I’d do a good deed and pull over to drag him out of the way for the deer scooper man to deal with later.

As I approached Mister Deer, I saw that he was alive and conscious. I heard a car approaching, bam, the deer tumbled underneath and was now twenty feet further away from me and the car kept going (Toyota maybe?). I was briefly relieved that there was no serious accident and that the deer was surely dead this time but as I got closer I saw that the deer was still alive and kicking. Five seconds pass, history repeated itself and if you can believe it he was still alive. Resilient little fella. That has got to be some kind of Westport deer record for surviving so many abrupt introductions to fenders, windshields and tires.

Depending on how your mind works this is going to get a little more disturbing. Don’t judge me.

I have a healthy relationship with animals. I like petting them (I’m really good at it, I know all the special spots) but I don’t mind eating them, I don’t carry around buckets of red paint either and I don’t give to PETA. I’m not a hunter. But Mister Deer needed to die right quick and the three cars had proven ineffective.

At the time I wasn’t packing so I asked myself what MacGyver would do. I surveyed the scene, found a bowling ball-sized rock, hauled it toward Mister Deer, fired off a quick prayer for good aim, acquired the appropriate target (we maintained eye contact actually), I raised the rock way up high, then I swiftly did the opposite — goodnight Mister Deer, may you heal a lot during your ascent into Deer Heaven.

Finally managed to accomplish my initial objective, got him and the improvised gravitational device out of the way. The woman who had first hit him was hysterical throughout all of this (did you know that the the Greeks came up with that word because they believed that it only afflicted women and was therefore triggered by disturbances in the uterus?) so I went up to her, told her that it wasn’t her fault, could have been anyone, the deer wasn’t suffering anymore, “maybe you should talk to someone about this tomorrow,” yada yada yada, and was Oscar Mike.

Doug Simmons

• showing map in fullscreen
• finger friendly user interface
• map tiles are automatically downloaded if internet connection is available
• map tiles are stored locally for offline use
• GPS support and GSM triangulation
• show actual position on map
• follow-mode to automatically scroll the map
• search addresses (testing)
• calculate routes (not yet implemented)
• gps and gsm tracking (not yet implemented)
• choose between different OSM servers (not yet implemented)

Download this app here. It is still a work in progress. So try it out and give the developer some feedback at his XDA thread.

Opera Mini, with more than 50 million users worldwide, enables Web browsing on almost any handset by compressing data by up to 90 percent before sending content to the phone, resulting in significantly improved page loading and speed. With a simple, easy-to-use interface, Opera Mini offers a desktop-like Web browsing experience on a mobile phone, with favorite features such as Speed Dial, tabbed browsing, password manager and bookmarks. With Opera Mini optimized for Android, more people will be able to get a PC-like browsing experience on their mobile handsets.

“Android users should not have to compromise when it comes to surfing the Web on their phones. Opera Mini will give Android users a fast and cost-efficient access to their favorite Web sites and services,” said Dag Olav Norem, Vice President of Products, Opera Software.

Download

Download Opera Mini directly to your Android phone. To download, simply visit m.opera.com/next with the Android browser or search for Opera Mini 5 in the Android Market. For more information, visit http://www.opera.com/mini/next/.

(via)

FEATURES:

• Rugged, Dust, Shock & Water Resistant
• 3.2 Megapixel Camera/Camcorder with Flash
• QWERTY Keyboard
• Bluetooth® Stereo Support*
• Rev. A Push to Talk Capable
• Hearing Aid Compatibility = M4/T4
  For details on Hearing Aid Compatibility, see About Us — Accessibility.
• Meets FCC SAR limit. Manufacturer’s highest FCC reported SAR 0.813 W/kg at ear, 0.752 W/kg on body. Actual SAR may vary.

*Supported Bluetooth Profiles: Headset, Handsfree Profile, Dial−up Networking, Stereo, File Transfer, Phonebook Access, Basic Printing and Object Push Profile (for vCard and vCalendar)

Head on over to Verizon for more information or CLICK HERE

So I went to the AT&T dealership after leaving work early, hoping that at 2:30pm, I’d be able to beat a lot of the traffic there.  Well I get to the dealership and I notice there are a lot of people in there, every sales person is occupied with a line waiting for the next available.  I stood around the iPhone equipment, looking at accessories, looking salesmen in the eyes with a look of “I’m willing to shower you with money if you’ll give me 5 minutes of your time”.  Did I get attention?  Not for 15 minutes, when someone FINALLY took my name and put it in the queue….wonderful.

After about 10 more minutes of waiting, I finally got a salesman, not exactly Johnny Enthusiasm, but whatever.  Whole transaction took 10 minutes.  Registering the SIM was probably the longest part.  Salesman didn’t even have to migrate my contacts for me (phone was FUBAR’d anyways, hence my need for a new one).  But, I have the dang thing, finally.  I miss the days where you could just walk up and pay someone for something.  Now there’s a whole process to it. So I have the piece of crap and I’m taking it home, kinda itchy to play with it, but no one in this state can freaking drive so I had to keep all attention on the road (and don’t start in on me about “no texting” laws, I REALLY don’t want to hear your communist banter).

And when I finally get it home, I start going app-happy. Then I notice.  There aren’t any free SSH clients.  WTF?!?  Seriously, no free SSH applications?  The majority of the logic code is already done and F/OSS, the only thing left to do is integrate it with Apple’s GUI and you Mac lovers brag about how easy that is anyways.  So I fork out the cash for a premium SSH client (might as well go big while I’m going to have to pay anyways), and download a few other pay apps (equation reference for math/physics/etc, XMPP client, IRC client, etc), and then go a little crazy with the free apps.

Yes I did download a fart app thank you.  I’ve earned my man points for the year, and now I don’t have to watch pro football on Thanksgiving, thankfully. Also got a few music apps (Pandora and Slacker).  Please note however, that I am an audiophile.  I’m one of those guys that spends the absurd amounts of money on high end audio gear and even makes my own stuff all in the pretense that a high-hat will sound a little less like someone blowing their nose into a crunched up aluminum can. And ON that note, I will note that the audio connector on the iPhone sounds like crap.

More crappy writing after the break.

I know they use the high end Wolfson DACs but I got some serious distortion from audio on this thing.  However its really only noticeable on my non-portable over-ear cans, on my IEMs, its negligible.  And my over-ear cans in particular have a reputation in the audiophile community for leading to the demise of equipment because they reveal EVERYTHING wrong with the source.  Plus the SMD caps they’re using in the amplifier in the unit are puny compared to proper capacitors that should be used.

And when is someone going to make a phone that does multiple Exchange servers?  Yes I know it can be hacked into being done, but I don’t want a hack to deal with this.  Is this a licensing issue or what?  You’d think it’d be a relatively simple thing to do with UNIX to do multiple Exchange servers (if it does envelop the system, used chroots or even friggin FreeBSD jails, if you want to be 1337).

I also want to address the worst piece of sh** I’ve ever bought.  And that’s the Otterbox Defender for the iPhone.  Sure the box itself works GREAT, I’ve had INFINITE amounts of fun throwing my iPhone around only to giggle with glee as my coworkers and anyone in the immediate vicinity turns a new ghastly shade of white, only to pick it up and it continues working, but the problem is the belt clip that comes with it.

I was walking to work today, which I have to walk over two blocks from the parking garage to my office, thank you my wonderful corporate overlords, and when I get in the building, I reach down. OH SH** my iPhone is gone!  So in a panicked frenzy, I run out of the building so fast that the hair on the rent-a-cop at the door flies the OPPOSITE direction that I’m running, and find my iPhone IN THE STREET where I had crossed.

I’m still rather unclear of whether it was hit or not by a car, but either way, the Otterbox itself protected the thing.  I still have my doubts as to how well the Otterbox would succeed against a semi, but raincheck on that particular test.  So ran upstairs with it and cleaned it off with a Clorox wipe, and kept it in my pocket the rest of the day, defeating one of the big things I liked about the case in the first place (yes, I’m a nerd, I keep my phone in reach because I use the push feature of Exchange to respond to giddy salesmen that like to call my phone, only to realize I’m actually a WORKING server admin and am down in the datacenter doing stuff).

But, a few weeks in, the device is still in one piece, I haven’t trashed it yet.  We’ll have to see how it fairs in the weeks to come as I travel, work, and recreate (recreate, not procreate, get your mind out of the gutter).

The new bicycling layer for Google Maps, accessible via the “More…” drop down menu at the top of the map, will display an overlay of the various bike-friendly roads and trails around town. The layer is color-coded to show three different types of paths:

• Dark green indicates a dedicated bike-only trail;
• Light green indicates a dedicated bike lane along a road;
• Dotted green indicates roads without bike lanes but are more appropriate for biking, based on factors such as terrain, traffic, and intersections.

Check out the video that Google released as well:

Even though Google Maps with Bicycle Directions has only been released to desktop versions, Google says a Mobile Version is planned. If you want to learn more about Google Maps with Bicycle Directions, jump after the break for the Google Press Release, or check out the Google Maps web page or CLICK HERE.

March 10, 2010 – If you’re one of the 57 million Americans who ride a bike, mapping your daily commute, exploring new trails, and planning recreational rides just became a little bit easier. Google is announcing that we have added biking directions in the U.S. to Google Maps. This has been the most requested addition to Google Maps, and we’re delighted to be unveiling this new feature at the National Bike Summit in Washington, DC.

This new feature includes: step-by-step bicycling directions; bike trails outlined directly on the map; and a new “Bicycling” layer that indicates bike trails, bike lanes, and bike-friendly roads.

The directions feature provides step-by-step, bike-specific routing suggestions – similar to the directions provided by our driving, walking, or public transit modes. Simply enter a start point and destination and select “Bicycling" from the drop-down menu. You will receive a route that is optimized for cycling, taking advantage of bike trails, bike lanes, and bike-friendly streets and avoiding hilly terrain whenever possible. Just like Google pioneered with driving directions, you can click-and-drag your route to customize it as you’d like. You can also access the other features in Google Maps, such as Street View, so you can tell exactly where you might need to turn on your route or preview how wide a bike lane is, and Local Search, so you know where you can take a water break or where the bike shops are along your route. Biking directions provides time estimates for routes based on an algorithm that takes into account the length of the route, the number of hills, fatigue over time, and other variables.

The new bicycling layer for Google Maps, accessible via the “More…” drop down menu at the top of the map, will display an overlay of the various bike-friendly roads and trails around town. The layer is color-coded to show three different types of paths:

• Dark green indicates a dedicated bike-only trail;
• Light green indicates a dedicated bike lane along a road;
• Dotted green indicates roads without bike lanes but are more appropriate for biking, based on factors such as terrain, traffic, and intersections. 

Thousands of miles of trails in the US have also been added directly onto the map. This helps cyclists better plan their routes, and can also expose the availability and convenience of bike trails to a new audience. Maybe you’re planning a trip to Seattle and notice that the Burke-Gilman trail goes right past your hotel and decide to do an afternoon bike tour of the city, or maybe you notice a trail that will make your daily bike-to-work commute safer and more scenic.

Google has partnered with the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy, a nonprofit that creates networks of trails from former rail lines, to provide information on bike trails in more than 150 cities.

“The demand for trail maps and information has never been higher, especially as more people recognize biking as a viable, inexpensive and healthy alternative to driving,” says Rails-to-Trails President Keith Laughlin. “Sharing our trail data is an exceptional way to introduce the world to what 150,000 RTC members and supporters already know—biking is the ideal way to get where you’re going. The addition of biking directions to Google Maps makes life easier for bikers, whether they are commuting to work or biking for fun, and it can introduce our network of trails to a whole new audience of cyclists-to-be.”

Visit http://maps.google.com/biking to try out this new feature. Biking directions for Google Maps is currently in Beta.  We are constantly adding new trail information and encourage bikers to send feedback and route information for inclusion via our reporting tool that you can find at the bottom of the map. Biking directions is currently available on desktop versions of Google Maps for the United States, but a mobile version is planned.

Wow, who would have thought that Dell would have come out with all those colors? Well, even with all the eye candy, the Dell Mini 5 gets real as engadget scores some promotional material that validates the Dell Mini 5 will soon be upon us. The Dell Mini 5 let’s out some secrets and confirms some of what we already knew:

• 5 megapixel camera with autofocus and flash
• Capacitive touch front buttons
• 30 pin docking connector
• Front VGA camera for video chat
• 5” Diagonal capacitive touch display with WVGA 800×480 resolution
• Bunch of colors and personalization

Engadget is also saying that the Dell Mini 5 may also be released as the “Streak”, or it may be that it is in internal Dell Code name for the Mini 5. Either way, it is a pretty sweet looking device that is also mentioned to be released on Amazon’s Content Partnership: “which will bring a Kindle e-book reader app, Amazon MP3, Amazon video streams and pretty much any other material that Amazon sells in digital form right to the slate.”

Pretty cool stuff from Dell coming soon, we just need to know when and how much! Stay tuned!

“We are excited to add the Walsh DL400 and DL450 Data Logger to our ever-expanding portfolio of exclusive products and services. And furthermore, bring a value added wireless solution to the UBI Auto Insurance and Fleet Management industries.”

The UBI model helps insurance companies be more innovative and competitive in their approach by improving their risk assessment process, reducing customer churn and ultimately reducing the claims received. Drivers could see a reduction in their premiums by being rewarded for low mileage and/or safe driving habits. The Walsh Data Logger provides the ability to wirelessly monitor in real-time the performance of a vehicle, its location and the driver’s driving pattern through an easy-to-use, self-installed device. It can also benefit government entities and businesses that need to better manage large fleets of vehicles.

“This is one of many excellent examples of how we work with various industries to radically change business models to drive more value for developers, customers and end-users,” said Wayne Ward, vice president of Emerging Solutions, Sprint. “This is a great addition to our industry-leading portfolio of M2M embedded devices and we’re pleased to work with our long-time partner, Walsh Wireless, to bring another industry-first solution to the marketplace that leverages our dependable 3G mobile broadband network.”

Chick Walsh, chief strategy officer, Walsh Wireless Solutions, added, “We are excited to add the Walsh DL400 and DL450 Data Logger to our ever-expanding portfolio of exclusive products and services. And furthermore, bring a value added wireless solution to the UBI Auto Insurance and Fleet Management industries.”

In October 2009, Sprint announced the formation of its Emerging Solutions Business group, which focuses exclusively on the rapid delivery of end-to-end M2M and mobile computing solutions to businesses and consumers. Sprint’s relationship with Walsh Wireless builds on more than 10 years of experience in working with an open network of ecosystem partners to provision both Sprint-branded and non-Sprint-branded devices to operate on its networks, as well as extensive expertise in operating multiple platforms and assets. For more information, visit www.poweryourideas.com/m2m.