Gadzooki

You can install Android on your iPod touch

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Now if you’d like your old first generation iPod touch to be a bit more… open, wait a little while and you can run Google’s Android operating system on it.

Now the person who ported Android for the iPhone 2G and iPhone 3G is now working to bring Android OS to the first generation iPod touch. Obviously, you can’t make calls on it, but then this is an exciting project if you’d like to run an operating system other than iPod OS on your iPod touch.

It’s not quite ready for primetime though. From the developer’s blog:

Meanwhile, I am working on some stuff that is slightly more fun. Last night, I brought openiboot for the first-generation iPod touch up to scratch so that it supports all the features the other ports of openiboot support: sound, multitouch and SDIO (for WLAN) are the notable things I had to fix. Earlier today, I figured out how to drive the piezoelectric tweeter on the iPod touch.

Hopefully, we’ll be able to roll out the iPod touch binaries with the 3G binaries and get on with the real work: power management and the little details that will make Android a truly viable alternative on our three early ports.

Now I was hoping that they can get it to work on the second and third generation iPod touch, but we’re getting this all for free, right? There’s just no way we can make demands on busy developers spending some of their time to make a free port of Android for the iPod touch.

So, would you risk installing this on your iPod touch or are you perfectly happy with a good old jailbreak?

Google to stop online sales of the Nexus One

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If you’re planning to buy the Nexus One from Google’s online store so you can get it contract-free, you well, you better act fast. Google will soon stop selling their flagship Android phone online. Don’t think for a moment that this move means that Google is going to drop the Nexus One. This is merely a change in strategy.

It seems that Google has realized that people don’t like to buy phones without seeing them first, so they’re switching strategies and are selling the Nexus One via retail outlets.

From Google’s official blog, the changes to Nexus One’s availability are:

More retail availability. As we make Nexus One available in more countries we’ll follow the same model we’ve adopted in Europe, where we’re working with partners to offer Nexus One to consumers through existing retail channels. We’ll shift to a similar model globally.

From retail to viewing. Once we have increased the availability of Nexus One devices in stores, we’ll stop selling handsets via the web store, and will instead use it as an online store window to showcase a variety of Android phones available globally.

Innovation requires constant iteration. We believe that the changes we’re announcing today will help get more phones to more people quicker, which is good for the entire Android ecosystem: users, partners and also Google.

Once Google sees stable sales of the phone via traditional retail channels, they’ll pull the plug on the web store. They say that it was a great niche channel for early adopters, but it’s not for everyone.

Another next-generation iPhone leaked

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Oooh boy, Apple’s legendary secrecy standards seem to be a little bit lax lately. You’d think they’d tighten up security after Gizmodo’s now-legendary iPhone leak, which resulted in a collective gasp heard round the web, along with the obligatory lawsuits and raids. you’d think Apple would take precautions to keep this from happening again.

Apparently, another iPhone has been leaked and is being scrutinized by the Vietnamese blog Taoviet. And yes, you got it right: Vietnam. How the next generation iPhone landed in the hands of those guys is beyond me. Well, except for the fact that they allegedly paid $4,000 for it.

This iPhone seems to be a similar model from the one that was leaked a few weeks back, save for a few differences like the missing screws at the bottom. Now we can’t be a hundred percent sure if it’s the real thing – you see the guys at Mashable and Engadget can’t exactly confirm it because, you know, Vietnam – but the innards look suspiciously like the real thing. The processor running this baby looks a lot like the A4 processor running the iPad (if this is true, this is a great deal), and there’s a sticker labeled “N90” inside – which is rumored to be Apple’s internal codename for the next-generation iPhone.

More from Engadget:

From the looks of these images, the Vietnamese site has nabbed an honest to goodness 4th generation iPhone — a 16GB model to be exact. It’s clearly pre-production judging by the XXX placeholders on the backside stamp and likely lacks any OS other than a “Bonfire” test routine. Nevertheless, it looks authentic enough that we expect Apple’s henchmen to be busting down the guy’s door before he pries it open to reveal Apple’s chipset of choice.

Now, what do you think of this? Is Apple becoming really lax, or is this one leak already deliberate? Is this making you want the next iPhone, whenever it comes out?

[via]

Give us a 4-inch smartphone with multiple OS support

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Finally, Nokia’s Design by Community project is almost finished. If you don’t remember what the project is about, it is Nokia’s push to create the “ultimate concept device,” and they utilized Nokia fans so they’d know what people want.

Now they have a mock-up of the winning phone, and if Nokia manages to create this, I am going to be excited for this. You see, Nokia fans have dictated that the winning phone should have a 10mm thin Monoblock form factor. Also, it should have a 4-inch capacitive screen with a 16:9 aspect ratio, open source operating system, unlimited multitasking, Wi-Fi 802.11 n/b/g, USB 3.0, HDMI, Dolby surround sound, and an 8MP camera with 4X optical zoom, dual LED and Xenon flash, and HD video recording. Users also want the concept phone to be able to run multiple operating systems, which means if Nokia is able to create this phone, we should be able to switch between Symbian and MeeGo.

Now I’m actually suprised by the feature requests. Everything seems so… modest and realistic, and they are all on phones everywhere. I just haven’t seen all these features combined on one phone before. Well, except from multiple OS support. Now if Nokia comes out with a phone that lets me switch between operating systems as much as I please, we’d have a winner in our hands.

Now here is a mockup of the concept phone, created by Unwired View:

The operating system on the phone is an early version of Symbian^4, by the way.

[via]

Nokia Messaging for Social Networks Beta now available for E71, E72 & E63, sluggish

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Gravity may currently be the king of S60 Twitter applications, but the thing is it’s not free. Also, there really is nothing that should stop any other app developer from making a Twitter application that can rival Gravity’s reign on the Twitter S60 market. Okay, there’s Tweets60, but I honestly find it to be a bit clunky and once you’re used to Gravity’s gorgeous interface, everything else just pales in comparison.

Nokia finally decides to join in the mobile social messaging space with Nokia Messaging for Social Networks Beta. From Symbian World:

The Nokia Beta Labs have announced that Nokia Messaging for Social Networks Beta is now available for three additional devices; the Nokia E71, Nokia E72 and the Nokia E63. Nokia Messaging for Social Networks a great little solution that provides contextual homescreen widgets that allow you to jump directly to your Facebook and Twitter posts and tweets to comment, has support for live Facebook and Twitter updates pushed to your phone homescreen and moreover gives you multiple ways to interact with your friends and social network circles straight from the client.

A bit a warning to those who are going to download Nokia Messaging for Social Networks Beta, though. Since it is beta, the Twitter client is sluggish beyond imagination. I tried it on my Nokia E63 and I had to uninstall it right away. I won’t go as far as to say that it was slowed down to the point where the entire app became unusable, but the speed is really unwieldy. Maybe if it were running on a phone with better hardware like the N97, it won’t be a bad experience.

Download and install here.

The new iPhone has been leaked

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So, the lucky guys at Gizmodo were able to get their hands on an iPhone 4. There’s a bit of a story behind their acquisition. Apparently, Apple has been testing the new iPhone in the wild already, and one of Apple’s employees have, well, misplaced one. A lucky soul found the iPhone in a bar in Redwood City, and was sent to Gizmodo. Wow.

Now, we really can’t be 100% sure that this is indeed the new iPhone. But there are lots of clues that point to it being real. There really is an Apple employee who reported that he lost a prototype iPhone. It was covered in a rubberized casing so it can be disguised as an iPhone 3GS. Right now, it looks like it’s a major departure from previous iterations of the iPhone. Let’s start with the design of the phone itself. Gone is the curved back that defined the first three iPhones. It’s now flat at the back, and if you don’t see the front of the iPhone, you’d think it was made by Nokia or something. I won’t go as far sa to call it ugly, but I’m not exactly a fan of the new look.

Features-wise, this is also a totally different monster. Here’s Gizmodo’s roundup of the new features:

What’s new
• Front-facing video chat camera
• Improved regular back-camera (the lens is quite noticeably larger than the iPhone 3GS)
• Camera flash
• Micro-SIM instead of standard SIM (like the iPad)
• Improved display. It’s unclear if it’s the 960×460 display thrown around before—it certainly looks like it, with the “Connect to iTunes” screen displaying much higher resolution than on a 3GS.
• What looks to be a secondary mic for noise cancellation, at the top, next to the headphone jack
• Split buttons for volume
• Power, mute, and volume buttons are all metallic

What’s changed
• The back is entirely flat, made of either glass (more likely) or ceramic or shiny plastic in order for the cell signal to poke through. Tapping on the back makes a more hollow and higher pitched sound compared to tapping on the glass on the front/screen, but that could just be the orientation of components inside making for a different sound
• An aluminum border going completely around the outside
• Slightly smaller screen than the 3GS (but seemingly higher resolution)
• Everything is more squared off
• 3 grams heavier
• 16% Larger battery
• Internals components are shrunken, miniaturized and reduced to make room for the larger battery

What do you think? Is this the real deal or a really elaborate hoax that Gizmodo fell for hook line and sinker? If this is the real thing, what do you think of the changes?

The Microsoft Kin: Wait, what about Windows Phone 7?

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So Microsoft just announced not just one but two new phones. Calling them Kin One and Kin Two (no, seriously), these are Windows Phones designed specifically for people who are actively navigating their social lives. Brought to life through partnerships with Verizon Wireless, Vodafone and Sharp Corporation, KIN is designed to be the ultimate social experience that blends the phone, online services and the PC with breakthrough new experiences called the Loop, Spot and Studio. KIN will be exclusively available from Verizon Wireless in the U.S. beginning in May and from Vodafone this autumn in Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom.

The thing is, didn’t just Microsoft announce Windows Phone 7? And isn’t everyone like praising Microsoft’s new phone operating system to high heavens? So why is Microsoft going to release another phone that’s social network-centric, but has no app store – or even any ability to create apps at all? And why make one that is competing with Windows Phone 7? It really sounds like a dumb marketing strategy, but when you take a closer look at it, it’s actually brilliant.

According to Engadget:

Last year, something like 200 million smartphones were sold. Lots. But that’s only one sixth of the total phone market of 1.2 billion phones, as reported by Gartner.

No matter how fast the iPhone market is growing, and how badly Microsoft wants to get back into that business, there’s other action to be had. And if Kin’s cost is kept low—both the handset price and the monthly data fees—then going after Samsung and LG and Nokia, hoping to draw people away from their cheap generic phones, could be easier than fighting Apple and Google (and BlackBerry and Palm). If so, then there’s success to be had, too.

Ah, there we go. The Kin is made for people who would like to be connected with their social networks all the time without worrying about apps to install or anything of that sort. I can see it now: a Windows Phone 7 phone for me and my needs, and probably a Kin for my 16-year old cousin who only wants to tweet and post to Facebook. Sweet.

Nokia Bots for N97 and N97 mini – let your phone do your thinking

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Nokia Beta Labs have released a set of widgets that will monitor the way you use your phone and adapt to your habits. These small apps, called Nokia Bots, will then use the data they’ve gained from your activity and they will personalize your phone according to your habits.

These are the Nokia Bots currently available:

  • Profile Bot – which automatically changes profiles and is therefore handy for daily and/or weekly meetings.
  • Alarm Bot – learns how you set your daily alarms and suggesting alarm and profile changes nightly.
  • Shortcut Bot – instead of you picking apps for the shortcut widget, let this Nokia Bot pick apps for you. It learns which apps you use at which time of the day, modifying the widget instead of you.
  • Battery Bot – lets you know if battery needs to be charged in the evening before you go to sleep.

This is pretty exciting and all, but currently Nokia Bots work only on the Nokia N97 and N9 mini. We can also assume that Nokia Bots will show up on other Symbian S60 5th edition devices in the future. I can also write off the possibility of Nokia Bots showing up on S60 3rd edition phones and lower.

But then, since Nokia’s on the move to switch the N series from Symbian to Maemo/MeeGo, I don’t know how relevant will Nokia Bots be in the future.

What do you think? If you want to download Nokia Bots to your N97 and N97 mini, click here to give these apps a try!

[via]

Nokia’s Design by Community

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Nokia is bent on creating the “ultimate concept device,” and it enlisted the help of a very dedicated group of supporters – the internet nerds! The Finnish company’s latest project, called “Design By Community,” is aimed to ask cellphone users to help them create a smartphone device for the future.

The problem with the current system is that phones are designed by a committee and there’s no feedback from the users during the design process if they like the phone’s features or not. Design by Community aims to fix just that. Cellphone users can vote on the following criteria:

Display and user interface – voting opens March 15
How much does size actually matter? If you want a big screen, do you also want a QWERTY keyboard? Compromises need to be made here, so choose wisely. At every point of the design process, all sorts of considerations need to be made. If you add a sliding form factor (to fit that QWERTY keyboard and a big screen) then you’re going to have a big impact on the depth of the device.

Size and shape – voting opens March 22
This will be heavily influenced by the decisions you made with the display and user interface, particularly the depth of the device. Added to that you have the choice of clamshell, tilt ‘n’ slide or monoblock, each of which will have a huge influence on depth.

Materials – voting opens March 29
What about a device toting Kevlar? We’re not there yet, but who knows what will kind of materials our devices will use in the future. As manufacturing techniques improve, so do the opportunities to create seamless designs. Nokia designers work as hard at understanding manufacturing as they do creating new devices. Keep this in mind when making your decisions.

Operating system – voting opens April 5
This is a straight run thing – should this device of the future have Symbian or MeeGo? The choice is yours.

Connectivity – voting opens April 12
We don’t like wires, do you? Of course wireless electricity hasn’t hit us yet, and wireless HD video transfer is still a way off for mobile devices. What do you see as being most important when it comes to connectivity?

Camera – voting opens April 19
The camera has become a staple part of Nokia mobile devices as the phone itself. But where next? More megapixels? Faster speed? Better zoom? Hi-def video recording? You decide.

Enhancements – voting opens April 26
It’s bolt-on time. Adding curious features and functions to the device to make it more interesting, useful and in some cases, more entertaining. We’ve got a couple of gems lined up for you here. What would you have?

What do you think of Design By Community?

Opera Mobile 10 and Mini 5 released

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I have a Nokia E63, and believe me, the WebKit-based default Nokia browser just can’t cut it when I need to go online if I need to check out a couple of things. I’ve downloaded and installed quite a number of browsers, and I really had a hard time looking for one browser that’s good enough. Fortunately, we have Opera Mobile 10 beta, which was pretty light, fast, and really functional. Tabbed browsing on a phone? You got it.

So when I heard that Opera is finally releasing the final stable versions of Opera Mobile 10 and Opera Mini 5, I went to their site and downloaded it right away. How could I not download it? It’s one of those apps that I really love using.

Now here’s a few snippets off Opera’s press release:

Today, Opera Software released the final versions of Opera Mini 5 and Opera Mobile 10. Now, nearly any mobile phone can support an Opera-driven Web experience, complete with unmatched speed, style and cost savings. Simply go to m.opera.com/ to download it directly to your phone today.

Today’s release puts the finishing touches on the Opera mobile-browsing duo. The focus is on delivering the best Internet experience on nearly any mobile phone, along with a unified look and feel and innovative favorite features, such as Speed Dial, password manager and tabbed browsing.

“Keeping in mind the needs and wants of our 50+ million users, we have emphasized speed, desktop-like functionality and data savings in our mobile browsers. Today, we have made it even easier for everyone to surf, search and socialize on the Web,” said Lars Boilesen, CEO, Opera Software.

Download Opera Mobile 10 and Opera Mini 5 by going straight to m.opera.com on your phone.