Make some money developing for (your) phone.

If you know Java Script (I don’t) and have some experience developing for the web (I don’t) and fancy a bit of fame (I don’t?) and money (I don’t??) then get yourself over to http://developer.palm.com/

Click on Building you first app “Learn more” then “Install the webOS SDK” then go back and follow the Hello World app. The SDK includes an emulator so you don’t need a phone (yet - see below).

To do clever stuff you’ll really need to know the webOS as well as Java Script - you may need to buy a book but you can find a lot of info with google! Basically the Palm runs java script but exposes it’s API so you can make a lot of other calls as well.

Before you invest hours writing the app that will make your fortune though have a look at
http://developer.palm.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1840&Itemid=34
to tell you what is involved in publishing it.

And if you are serious, register as a developer and look through what you need to submit an app. (submit a dummy one and then remove it?). They want company names, tax details, support emails and web sites and the app must be tested on actual hardware so just using the emulator isn’t enough for submission.

Anyway, for now at least, registration as a developer is free (future costs of $99?) and publishing your app is free (was $50 for a chargeable app, free for open source) and money apart how cool would it be to see your app on peoples phones?

Back at http://www.itpro.co.uk/blogs/davef/2010/01/08/free-songs/
I was enthusing about capturing streamed audio. Seems I’m not the only one to see this as a good way to “acquire” music.

Roxio have just spammed me with:

“Capture free, high-quality digital music from the Internet
There are millions of great music tracks available to play for free from Internet music sites, Creator 2010 makes it easy to capture1 hi-quality streaming Internet audio, to add to your music library, burn onto CD and DVD, and convert to enjoy on iPod or other music players.”

I’ll stick with free Audacity http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ but Roxio are here http://www.roxio.com/ if you want to spend money.

You know me - or maybe you don’t, that is the nature of a blog - but anyone who does would know I’m fond of free stuff, love music and quite like gadgets. So,
http://software.aziraphal.com/Metronome.php is a site that make me very happy. A free metronome for any Java phone. A metronome is really useful tool for practising and should be to hand for professional musicians / serious students.

I have an old wind up proper soothing tick-tock job but modern ones run can be set for different tones on different beats and anyway my phone is more likely to be to hand than the metronome is - and weirdly enough the phone is smaller and easier to carry.

If you do any music and have a Java phone you should go get a copy. The guy who wrote it seems a nice chap too - he did say it should work everywhere (in theory) but unfortunately in most cases it’s not very reliable (especially on newer phones where J2ME is almost obsolete and not implemented very well) but I have had no problems just playing system sounds or beeps - midi and wav’s did cause a crash that meant a battery removal reset but I just avoid them now.

The author did give me some more feedback:
It works decent enough on older Nokia’s (most people who let me use their phones for testing had Nokias) that have built-in J2ME MIDP2 java support (as opposed to a client inside Symbian or some other “modern” OS) and was actually usable at slower BPM’s. Judging by some online reviews it was most disappointing to Blackberry owners.

Finally, although it is free it is described as albumware - if you like the tool the author asks you to listen to (and I guess potentially buy) some of his music. A whole new marketing ploy to me and although I probably won’t buy any as it’s not my cup of tea I enjoyed a listen!

If you know much about passwords / security / etc don’t read on, you’ll only get bored (unless I’ve got it wrong, so feel free to read and correct!). Anyway,  I was explaining some basics to someone the other day & though there might be others interested.

Passwords have a long tradition of identifying friends from foe by exchanging a secret data. The problem is, once it’s exchanged in the open it’s no longer secret. Whispering may work but if you have to shout it, put it in a letter or plain text email it isn’t going to stay secret.

Say my password is “3″ (numbers are easier to work with and we know computers turn everything into numbers sooner or later so lets start with them). You know it is 3, you ask me for it and if I give it you, know it’s me - trouble is everyone else overheard it so now its useless..

Instead you pass me a number and I add it to mine and pass it back, if it adds up to what you add it up to it’s still me - you say “5″, I say “8″ you figure out 5+3=8 so yes it’s me. Now any listeners in have got to know or figure out the formula and then calculate my password. If we are using a publicly defined standard formula (which on a computer system we probably are) they know the formula so they can figure out from 5+X=8, X=8-5 that my password is 3. If they don’t know the formula they can probably figure it if they hear enough exchanges.

What we need is a formula that isn’t so easy to work backwards - like a square. You say “5″ I add it to 3, square it and say 64. You do the same calculation and get 64, yes it’s me. Now the listener has to do the inverse function, 64=(5+X)^2,  X=square root of (64)-5. Easy with 1 digit numbers or a calculator not so easy with big numbers and just a paper and pencil.

That’s how most security works, don’t exchange the password but mess up some random data with it in such a way that the sender can mess it up them same way and check your answer. Anyone listening CAN figure out the password by reversing the “messing up” process but if we make it complicated enough they will requires years of super computing to figure it out (a figure quoted for RSA 129 digit key is 5,000 years of 1 million instructions per second computing).
A step on from this is public key encryption where I tell you how to mess it up but only I can un-mess it - loosely speaking! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public-key_cryptography is a bit more accurate

http://www.ephesus.com/Encryption/PGP-Steps.html, and http://home.clara.net/heureka/sunrise/pgpsec.htm seem quite informative too.

I blogged a while back about the exciting(!) purchase of my new Dyson http://www.itpro.co.uk/blogs/davef/2008/09/09/hoovering-up-engineering/

I’ve just had an email asking me to write a review. Being an opinionated guy and someone who values user reviews I thought I would just type a quick “yes it works” at http://www.comet.co.uk/shopcomet/product/406848/DYSON-DC14-ANIMAL.