TECHspot: 2007

How to Save a Wet Mobile Phone

Nov 22, 2007 0 comments

Most people have dropped their mobile phone into something, like the bath, the sink, the toilet, or even a cup of coffee. There are even cases of people jumping into the pool with a cell phone in their pocket or mothers hearing a grinding noise in the washing machine and realizing that Junior did not empty the pockets of his jeans and the noise was caused by his brand new cell phone.

A waterlogged phone often means that the instrument has to be replaced, but if the rescue happens fast enough it is possible to save a wet cell phone.
Remove the Battery and Sim Card

The obvious first step is to get the mobile phone out of the water/coffee/ washing machine as soon as possible. Cell phones have plastic covers that are relatively tight, which keep moisture out, but not water.

Some people recommend removing the battery while the phone is still under water as it helps dissipate heat and prevent short circuits, but others say this is not a good idea.
Anyway, the battery and sim card ( if the mobile phone has a sim card, some don’t) should be removed by whomever can get the phone out of the water as fast as possible, and after gently shaking much of the water out , the cell phone should be placed on an towel or some absorbent paper towels. The sim card must never have any heat brought neat it, so it is a good idea for someone just to pat it dry with a paper towel.

Dry the Cell Phone

This is where the experts differ – there are those who advocate using a hairdryer on a very low heat to blow the mobile phone dry; others recommend using a vacuum cleaner to “suck” the moisture out of the phone; others are proponents of putting the phone in a bowl of rice grains so that the rice can absorb the moisture and a similar school of thought prefers using silicon crystals to draw the water out of the wet cell phone.
Popular Mechanics recommends “Instead, opt for a can of compressed air, an air compressor set to a low psi or a vacuum cleaner (a wet/dry Shop-Vac would be perfect). The idea is to use air to push or pull moisture out through the same channels it entered.”
How to Dry a Wet Mobile Phone – Slowly

Taking a lesson from all the methods to dry a wet mobile phone, it is obvious that the one thing they have in common is that this is no quick fix. In fact, whoever is doing the drying should be careful not to heat the phone at all.

Absorbent paper towels are very useful for drying the outer parts of the cell phone, but the owner should take care not to get wet paper caught in the grooves inside the phone.
A good recommendation is to let the cell phone lie in a warm place (not direct sunlight) in a bed of clean cotton balls for six to 12 hours after it has been dried the first time.

Test the Cell Phone
After about a day it is time to test the cell phone to see if it works. The owner should first make sure that everything is clean and dry- looking and then re-attach the battery to the phone and switch it on. If it does not work, the fault might lie with the cell phone battery. The owner should then remove the battery from the phone and attach the phone to the charger without the battery to see if it works – if it does, then the battery is the problem.

Next, the owner could try to recharge the battery. If this does not work, the cell phone should be taken to a dealer where the owner should explain in detail what happened. They still might be able to save the phone.

What Not to Do When Rescuing a Wet Cell Phone

There are almostas many things not to do as to do, when rescuing a wet mobile phone.
Do not switch it on until it is dry. Don't heat the battery or it could leak or explode.

Warning: manufacturers of most cell phones place liquid damage indicator stickers that will change colors in the presence of a liquid inside their phones. This helps technicians know that you have dropped your phone in water, as most cell phone insurance coverage policies do not cover water damage.
Do not put the cell phone (or any electronic or metal-containing object) into the microwave.
Having followed these suggestions and tips, it might just be possible to get a wet cell phone to dry out and back to working order if the phone owner/ "phone drier-out "remembers to be patient and to do it slowly.

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Wireless Home Network [WIFI] Security

Jun 16, 2007 0 comments

Many folks setting up wireless home networks rush through the job to get their Internet connectivity working as quickly as possible. That's totally understandable. It's also quite risky as numerous security problems can result. Today's Wi-Fi

networking products don't always help the situation as configuring their security features can be time-consuming and non-intuitive. The recommendations below summarize the steps you should take to improve the security of your home wireless network.

1. Change Default Administrator Passwords (and Usernames)

At the core of most Wi-Fi home networks is an access point or router. To set up these pieces of equipment, manufacturers provide Web pages that allow owners to enter their network address and account information. These Web tools are protected with a login screen (username and password) so that only the rightful owner can do this. However, for any given piece of equipment, the logins provided are simple and very well-known to hackers on the Internet. Change these settings immediately.

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2. Turn on (Compatible) WPA / WEP Encryption

All Wi-Fi equipment supports some form of encryption. Encryption technology scrambles messages sent over wireless networks so that they cannot be easily read by humans. Several encryption technologies exist for Wi-Fi today. Naturally you will want to pick the strongest form of encryption that works with your wireless network. However, the way these technologies work, all Wi-Fi devices on your network must share the identical encryption settings. Therefore you may need to find a "lowest common demoninator" setting.

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3. Change the Default SSID

Access points and routers all use a network name called the SSID. Manufacturers normally ship their products with the same SSID set. For example, the SSID for Linksys devices is normally "linksys." True, knowing the SSID does not by itself allow your neighbors to break into your network, but it is a start. More importantly, when someone finds a default SSID, they see it is a poorly configured network and are much more likely to attack it. Change the default SSID immediately when configuring wireless security on your network.

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4. Enable MAC Address Filtering

Each piece of Wi-Fi gear possesses a unique identifier called the physical address or MAC address. Access points and routers keep track of the MAC addresses of all devices that connect to them. Many such products offer the owner an option to key in the MAC addresses of their home equipment, that restricts the network to only allow connections from those devices. Do this, but also know that the feature is not so powerful as it may seem. Hackers and their software programs can fake MAC addresses easily.

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5. Disable SSID Broadcast

In Wi-Fi networking, the wireless access point or router typically broadcasts the network name (SSID) over the air at regular intervals. This feature was designed for businesses and mobile hotspots where Wi-Fi clients may roam in and out of range. In the home, this roaming feature is unnecessary, and it increases the likelihood someone will try to log in to your home network. Fortunately, most Wi-Fi access points allow the SSID broadcast feature to be disabled by the network administrator.

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6. Do Not Auto-Connect to Open Wi-Fi Networks

Connecting to an open Wi-Fi network such as a free wireless hotspot or your neighbor's router exposes your computer to security risks. Although not normally enabled, most computers have a setting available allowing these connections to happen automatically without notifying you (the user). This setting should not be enabled except in temporary situations.

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7. Assign Static IP Addresses to Devices

Most home networkers gravitate toward using dynamic IP addresses. DHCP technology is indeed easy to set up. Unfortunately, this convenience also works to the advantage of network attackers, who can easily obtain valid IP addresses from your network's DHCP pool. Turn off DHCP on the router or access point, set a fixed IP address range instead, then configure each connected device to match. Use a private IP address range (like 10.0.0.x) to prevent computers from being directly reached from the Internet.

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8. Enable Firewalls On Each Computer and the Router

Modern network routers contain built-in firewall capability, but the option also exists to disable them. Ensure that your router's firewall is turned on. For extra protection, consider installing and running personal firewall software on each computer connected to the router.

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9. Position the Router or Access Point Safely

Wi-Fi signals normally reach to the exterior of a home. A small amount of signal leakage outdoors is not a problem, but the further this signal reaches, the easier it is for others to detect and exploit. Wi-Fi signals often reach through neighboring homes and into streets, for example. When installing a wireless home network, the position of the access point or router determines its reach. Try to position these devices near the center of the home rather than near windows to minimize leakage.

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10. Turn Off the Network During Extended Periods of Non-Use

The ultimate in wireless security measures, shutting down your network will most certainly prevent outside hackers from breaking in! While impractical to turn off and on the devices frequently, at least consider doing so during travel or extended periods offline. Computer disk drives have been known to suffer from power cycle wear-and-tear, but this is a secondary concern for broadband modems and routers.

If you own a wireless router but are only using it wired (Ethernet) connections, you can also sometimes turn off Wi-Fi on a broadband router without powering down the entire network.

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Creating a simple Flash Website

May 12, 2007 1 comments

This tutorial is divided into the following parts.

1)Creating the layout (Starts below)

2) Creating the Main Movieclip

3) Adding Some Content

4) Optimizing the Images

5) Adding More Content

6) Making the Buttons

7) Preloading the Website

Part 1) Creating the Basic Layout

For the first part, we're going to create the basic layout for the website.

Step 1.

First of all create a new Flash document with the settings shown below. For the background color I've used #55666D

Step 2.

We're going to create a rectangle for the background of the site. Set the stroke color (circled in blue), using the icon circled in red. This will prevent there from being a border around the rectangle.

Step 3.

Set the fill color (circled in blue) to white (circled in red).

Step 4.

Choose the rectangle tool (circled in red) and create a rectangle with the settings shown below in the properties panel. The stage has been zoomed out to 50%.

art 2) Creating the Main Movieclip

Step 5.

Next we'll be creating the main MC (movieclip) where all the parts of the website will go. The main MC will be on the root timeline of the flash movie. So, click on the white rectangle and convert it into an MC called 'main'. You can do this by either pressing f8 or by going to Modify > Convert to symbol.

Step 6.

So, now that we've created the main MC, double click on it.

Step 7.

Click on the white rectangle again and convert into another MC, this time named 'background'

Step 8.

Double click on the background MC and choose the Selection Tool (V). Drag your mouse over the white rectangle, selection around 3/4 of it.

Step 9.

Set the fill color (circled in blue) to a dark grey color (#484848)

Enlarge Image

Step 10.

So that's the background MC created, go back to the Main MC. Name the layer with the background MC "background" and create 2 other layers called "content" and "buttons"

Part 3) Adding Some Content

Step 11.

In part 3 we're going to be adding some content. Using the Text Tool (T), add a title for the site's homepage, using the settings below.

Step 12.

Convert the text into an MC called 'content'

Step 13.

Go into the content MC and name the layer "sections"

Step 14.

Add a subheading, if you like, using the settings shown below.

Step 15.

And some body text.

Step 16.

You can use the Align Panel (Window > Align) to align all the text to the right, by click on the icon circled in red.

Step 17.

I've copied (edit > copy) the title and subtitle and pasted (edit > paste in place) it to the right for a 'featured' section.

Part 4) Optimizing an Image & Making it a Button

Step 18.

Now we're going to add an image and optimize it. When importing images (File > Import > Import to Stage) into flash you have the ability to optimize them, but a balance must be struck between quality and low file size, to allow for quick loading of the flash file (SWF). It's good to optimize your images from within flash, becuase you can tweak their quality whenever you want, without having to open them up again in an image editing program. So the file extension i usually use for images is PNG, which provides a high quality image. So below you can see a image, that I've imported, as the featured item of the Flash site.

Step 19.

The image is called "best.png". You can optimize it by right clicking on 'best', from the layers panel, and by choosing properties. You'll then be shown the panel shown below.

Step 20.

Un-check the 'Use document default quality' settings, and the default quality (50) will be revealed. You can see a preview of th quality in the image to the left which, as you can see, is quite poor. You can also see the size of the image at the bottom.

Step 20.

Step 21.

Now that the image has been optimized, we're going to create turn it into a button, that opens up a browser window. Convert the image into an MC (F8) called 'bestMC'

Step 22.

Give the MC an instance name, from the properties panel, called 'best'.

Step 23.

The image can now be given some functionality by refering to the instance name. In the content MC, create a new layer called script and click on the 1st frame of the layer. Open up the actions panel and enter the code shown below. This code refers to the image, using the instance name 'best', giving it an onRelease function. So when ever the image is pressed and release, it can be told to do something. In this case, it's told to open up a browser window (getURL), using the address of this website. We also have to add a stop action, because we're about to create more frames in the content MC.

Part 5) Adding More Content

Step 24.

Next we're going to add the rest of the content. Later on we'll be creating some buttons which. when pressed, will display it's corresponding section. In the content MC we''re going to create each section at a different frame. When one of the buttons is pressed, the content MC will go to the frame with the right content on. To do this, we're going to give each section a label that we can tell the content MC to go to. So, create a new layer called 'labels', inbetween the script and section layer. Click on the first frame of the labels layer and, at the properties panel, enter 'about' under 'frame' (cirlced in red).

Step 25.

Select frame 10 of all the layers and then insert key frames for each layer (F6)

Step 26.

On frame 10, of the labels layer, add another label called "portfolio". You can add more frames, extending them fto frame 20, by using f5 while layer 10 of all frames are selected.

Step 27.

Change all the text to suit this section and add the first thumbnail for your portfolio

Step 28.

Convert the image to an MC called 'thumb0'

Step 29.

Add more thumbnails, also converting them to MC's called thumb1, thumb2, thumb3 etc. Then give the thumb0 mC the same instance name, which we'll use to give some functionality. Do the same with each of the other thumbs, giving thumb1 MC the instance name 'thumb1' etc.

Step 30.

Click on frame 10 of the script layer and open up the Actions panel. As we did with the featured image, add the code show below, this time swapping the URL address for what ever you want the thumbnails to open up.

Step 31.

Add an onRelease function for each of the other thumbnails.

Step 32.

For the 3rd section, create another key frame (F6) at frame 20 of all the layers

Step 33.

Create the a label for the 3rd section. As you can see i've made it 'resume'

Step 34.

So that's all the sections completed in the content MC, go back to the main MC and give the content MC and instance name. We can then use the instance name to control the content MC.

Part 6) Creating the Buttons

Step 35.

Now we're going to create some buttons to tell the content MC to go to the corresponding label. First of all, double click on the rectangle tool and set the corner radius to 10 points.

Step 36.

On the buttons layer, create a rounded rectangle, using the same grey that was used for the background.

Step 37.

Conver the rectangle into an MC called "button_background"

Step 38.

We can now use and instance of button_background MC for each button. So copy and paste the 1st one, placing it to the right.

Step 39.

Create a 3rd instance, and then convert the 1st one into another button symbol called 'about'. This button will be used to tell the content MC to go to the 'about' label.

Step 40.

Convert the button_background instance into a button symbol called 'portfolio' and the 3rd into a button symbol called 'resume'.

Step 41.

Double click on the about button symbol and you'll be displayed with what's shown in the image below.

Step 42.

Create a new layer and add the text 'about'

Step 43.

Then do the same with the portfolio button symbol, but this time placing the text 'portoflio' in the 2nd layer.

Step 44.

Go back to the main MC. Do the same for the resume button, and then give the about button symbol the instance name 'about'. Give the portoflio button the instance name 'portolfio' and the resume button the instance name 'resume'

Step 45.

Create a layer called "script", above the buttons layer in the main MC. Open up the Actionc spanel and add the actionscript shown below. This script give each button functionality, so that when they're pressed, the content MC goes to the corresponding sections.

Preloading the Website

Step 46.

For this final part, of the tutorial to create a basic Flash website, we're going to create a preloader for the website. Go back to root of the time, where the 'Main' MC is, and move the frame, that it's on, to frame 2.

Step 47.

Now make a text field on the 1st frame, with the text "loading", using the settings shown below

Step 48.

Convert the text field (F8) to an MC called 'loader'

Step 49.

Double click on the 'loader' MC and create a 2nd text field on the right, with the text "99%". From the properties panel the text has been made "dynamic", and a Var (variable) has been given to it called "percent". When the website is preloading, this variable will hold the percent value that's loaded so far, and it'll be displayed in the dynamic text field.

Step 50.

Go back to the root timeline. Instead of placing the code on a frame on the timeline, put it on the loader MC, by clicking on it, opening up the Actions Panel, and then entering the code, shown in the image below. This block of Actionscript will check to see how much of the website has loaded and display the percentage in the text, using the 'p' variable. Once all of it is loaded, the timeline will go to frame 2, and the site will be displayed