Monday, December 31, 2012

Set up avast! Anti-Theft on an Android phone


By 

Takeaway: Find out why Jack Wallen recommends the free avast! Mobile Security application for your Android phone.

We lose things, including costly smartphones. But when we lose a smartphone, we lose more than just a handset — we lose data and information we most certainly do not want out in the public. For some businesses, Exchange can be set up do to a wipe; but for those that don’t have that option, what do you do?
Well, AVAST Software has a solution tucked inside the avast! Mobile Security application. Within avast!, there’s an Anti-Theft system that’s well designed and works like a champ. If your Android device is lost or stolen, avast! can help you in the following ways:
  • Lock your phone
  • Erase all data
  • Sound a siren
  • Deny program manager access
  • Deny phone setting access
  • Receive SMS with the new phone number and phone location
These actions will take place if the SIM card is changed or the device is marked as lost.
Now, let’s take a look at how to install and use this system. I will demonstrate on a Verizon-branded Samsung Galaxy S III, but the software should install fine on most Android devices.

Installation

The installation of the software is simple. Just follow these steps:
  1. Open up the Google Play Store
  2. Search for “avast” (no quotes)
  3. Tap on the avast! Mobile Security entry
  4. Tap Install
  5. Tap Accept & download
When you open the app, you’ll be prompted to accept to the license agreement.
Now, you can continue with the setup process. This requires that you enable the installation of Non-Market apps in your system security settings. You’ll also be prompted to enter avast! account credentials or create a new account, which you can elect to complete at a later time.
[Note: At this time, the application will update the virus definitions. After the definitions are updated, a scan might begin (it did on the HTC Incredible 4 and Motorola Droid Razr, but not on the Samsung Galaxy S III).]
Follow these steps to complete the set up of avast! Mobile Security:
Step 1: Anti-Theft configurations
From the main avast! page, click Anti-Theft, and then tap continue. Select Easy Installation Mode, as the Advanced Installation Mode installs avast! as a rooted installation. Once you tap this, avast! will download the customized installation package. After the download completes, tap Install and then Install again. When the installation is complete, click Done.
After this is complete, there is one more step for the Anti-Theft system. You must set up Anti-Theft as the device administrator. Tap the Setting button and then
Step 2: Activate device admin
The next screen that appears prompts you to set Anti-Theft as a device administrator. If you’re not concerned with being able to remotely wipe the phone, don’t bother enabling this feature. However, if you do want this ability, follow these steps:
  1. Tap the Setting button
  2. Click Ok
  3. Tap the Activate button (Figure A)
  4. Click Ok
Figure A
You must activate avast! Anti-Theft as a device admin to be able to remotely wipe the phone.
Step 3: Set up basic settings
From within the Set up basic settings window, click through and fill out the information for the following sections:
  • Your name
  • avast! PIN (this includes the Recovery phone number)
  • Remote control (without setting at least one friend who’s allowed to send SMS notifications, you can’t remotely control your phone)
Next, tap the box next to Enable Anti-Theft (Figure B). Click Yes to continue, and then Ok.
Figure B
When you enable this feature, it will go into stealth mode and will not be visible.
With Anti-Theft enabled, avast! will hide the Anti-Theft feature from the Android app launcher. In order to access Anti-Theft when in stealth mode, you must open up your phone app and dial the avast! PIN you set up in the basic settings window. Once you’ve done that, Anti-Theft will be visible until a phone reboot.
Step 4: Set up advanced settings
From the Anti-Theft window, tap Set up advanced settings to enable various protection behaviors (Figure C).
Figure C
Here you can prevent actions from occurring when you set your phone to lost mode.
The first thing you should do here is tap Protection behavior. In this new window (Figure D), you can set:
  • Lock phone
  • Sound siren
  • Deny program manager access
  • Deny phone setting access
  • Low battery notification
Figure D
All options are enable/disable.
Once you’ve taken care of the Protection behavior, go back to the Advanced Settings window and configure the rest of the settings that you want to enable.
Step 5: Usage
Now that you’ve set this up, how do you use it? If you lose your Android mobile (or you know it was stolen), send an SMS (text) to your number (of the stolen/lost device). The available codes you can send are listed below. All commands must begin with the avast! PIN that you set up. For example, if the PIN you created is 1234, here are the commands you can send:
  • 1234 LOCK: Lock the device
  • 1234 LOST: Set the phone to “lost” mode
  • 1234 FOUND: Unset “lost” mode
  • 1234 UNLOCK: Unlock the phone
  • 1234 MESSAGE : The is the message you want to send to whoever has your phone
  • 1234 SIREN ON: Turn the siren sound on
  • 1234 SIREN OFF: Turn off the siren sound
  • 1234 LOCATE: Locates the device
  • 1234 LOCATE : Continuously tracks device for minutes
  • 1234 LOCATE STOP: Stop tracking
  • 1234 CALL : Use the phone to call a number
  • 1234 FORWARD SMS : Forward all text messages to a new number
  • 1234 FORWARD SMS STOP: Stop forwarding text messages
  • 1234 CC SMS : CC all SMS messages to a new number
  • 1234 CC SMS STOP: Stop CC’ing texts
  • 1234 CC CALLS : Forward all incoming calls to a specified phone number
  • 1234 CC CALLS STOP: Stop forwarding calls
  • 1234 CC ALL : Forward both SMS and phone calls
  • 1234 CC ALL STOP: Stop forwarding all
  • 1234 WIPE: Wipe the phone
  • 1234 GET SMS: The is a numerical value of SMS messages
  • 1234 GET SENT SMS: Gets the last of send text messages
  • 1234 GET CONTACTS: Gets the contacts from the address book
There are a few more commands that can be sent, but the above should cover everything.
The avast! Anti-Theft system is a great way to help you retrieve your lost phone or, at least, keep unwanted eyes from seeing your important data. Give this system a try, and see if it isn’t exactly what you need to keep your information secure.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

Transitioning into project management without a tech background


By 
December 19, 2012, 8:55 AM PST
Takeaway: Help a TechRepublic member figure out how to transition into a technical project management job without a tech degree.
I recently received an email from a TechRepublic reader regarding applying for a technical project management job even though the candidate didn’t have a lot of technical experience. Below is the reader’s question and my response.

The scenario

“I have 20+ year experience in creative services management for busy in house graphic design teams. We produce promotional materials for off-line and on-line purposes.
Recently, I have started working with the new Digital Director here. I have volunteered to help him build a user experience design for a new web site.  I am interested and motivated about user experiences with technical products and I believe I was built to work in this field.
However, most technical project managers come from a technical background. I am very good at task management - highly resourceful, creative, curious, detail oriented and functional thinker keeping the big picture in mind. My strengths also include intuition, successful staff and resource management. My degree is in Business Administration with an emphasis in Direct Marketing.
There is an opening for a Technical Project Manager job at my company and I am interested in learning more about.
Would you ever consider hiring a person without a technical background? What does someone with my background need to do to get a job managing projects with user experience and design?”

Pursuing the technical PM opportunity

Sometime during my college days, I heard the saying, “You’ll change your career six or seven times in your lifetime.” I’m sure we’ve all heard this saying in one form or another. I consider it useful advice when trying to transition to other job roles that you find interesting even though your background may not be a perfect fit.
Your challenge with this position is demonstrating relevant experience compared to the other people applying for the position. However, in a technical project management position, the hiring manager and you need to assess the amount of technical work required in addition to the project management requirement.
If the candidate has a good understanding of how the technology layers fit together and has past management experience but doesn’t have a technical background, I would still hire that person. I often see this in project management positions for Information Technology jobs. Typically, the Computer Science student is the coder, and the MIS major is the business analyst or systems analyst; either person would make good project managers as long as they can demonstrate an understanding of how the technology fits into the overall plan.
You have more than 20 years of work experience and have gotten an informal education in the digital design and user experience domain. I use experience in the subject matter drive the evaluation rather than the academic credentials. After all, we’re designing websites not engineering pyramids.
Technology keeps changing, so the tools you use today will likely be different in 3-5 years. Your management skills, on the other hand, should improve with experience. By demonstrating past experience and competency performing the technical work, you can position yourself as a strong candidate. Since the job is a project management role, I would highlight the management strengths over the technical competency.
In order to deemphasize the lack of technical experience, I recommend taking an introductory technical course so you’ll have a foundational understanding of the actual application. For instance, it has been 14 years since I coded in Java, yet I took an Android development course to get a better understanding of the work required for creating Android apps. I won’t be developing Android apps any time soon, but I now have a better understanding of the process and the issues developers face when developing apps on mobile platforms, and I am confident that I could manage an Android development project.

Your degree doesn’t determine your entire career

My peers and other executives I know have a mixed bag of degrees and backgrounds. Finance, Math, and even Biology majors have all succeeded in earning senior project management and executive positions despite their lack of a technical IT degree.
Your lengthy career cannot be predetermined by the piece of paper you earned when you were 21 years old; your skills and your collective set of life experiences determine your career. There are no guarantees you’ll get the next position. There may be a better-qualified candidate who has the right mix of technical background, management experience, and the political corporate capital within the company.
I encourage you to apply to the position and consider taking additional technical training to earn enough certifications to balance your experience. Learning doesn’t stop with the initial degree, and hiring managers recognize the importance of a balance between management and technical skills.
What’s your advice for this reader? Please comment your suggestions in the discussion.

Three Pieces of Career Advice That Changed My Life


Looking back over my career to date, I can identify at least three clear influences that forever altered my career path. In retrospect, it's interesting to see how different the context was for each: parental advice, a passage in a book, and a persistent boss. Despite the contrasts, all three share one thing in common -- reinforcing the importance of knowing what it is you ultimately want to accomplish, and being open to allowing outside forces to help clarify, reinforce and facilitate the path to making it happen.
Here are the three pieces of advice that helped shape my career:
1. You can do anything you set your mind to
As a child, I can't recall a day that went by without my dad telling me I could do anything I set my mind to. He said it so often, I stopped hearing it. Along with lines like "eat your vegetables," I just assumed it was one of those bromides that parents repeated endlessly to their kids. It wasn't until decades later that I fully appreciated the importance of those words and the impact they had on me.
Today, the question I'm asked most often by students and interns is how best to achieve their career goals. As simple as it sounds, the short version of my response is that you have to know what it is you ultimately want to accomplish (optimizing for both passion and skill, and not one at the exclusion of the other). As soon as you do, you'll begin manifesting it in both explicit and implicit ways.
Without question, this first principle has been the most consistent driver of my own career path over the last 20 years. (For a more comprehensive summary of this advice, you can check out the final Q&A exchange included in this "Corner Office" interview.)
2. Everything that can be converted from an atom to a bit, will be
In August, 1994, I signed up for an Aol account. I'll never forget my first "a-ha!" moment online which occurred soon thereafter. It came through witnessing the power of collective intelligence on a Motley Fool message board. There, a community of engineers, logistics experts, and individual investors from all over the country had joined together to reverse engineer the cost basis to manufacture what would eventually emerge as a hit computer peripheral product. I remember thinking to myself, "This is going to change everything."
About a month later, I was reading "Being Digital" by Nicolas Negroponte after seeing a rave review in Wired Magazine (for historical context, it was the print version). In the opening chapter of his book, Negroponte posited that by virtue of the ensuing digital revolution, everything that could be converted from an atom to a bit would be. Having just started as an analyst in the Corporate Development group at Warner Bros, it didn't take much to realize this coming transition would have material implications on the studio and the entertainment industry in general.
In light of those experiences, when the opportunity arose to write the first online business plan for Warner Bros, I quickly volunteered; this despite the fact that at the time, most if not all of the investment focus was on CD-ROM. The first draft of that online plan was completed in December, 1994. It would ultimately be approved several months later and thus began my nearly two-decades-long career in digital media.
3. Do you want to push paper around or do you want to build products that change people's lives?
I started at Yahoo in May, 2001, as co-head of the Corporate Development team. By virtue of the breadth of the role and the company's operations, and Yahoo's influential position within the digital ecosystem, the job provided me a front row seat to a period of extraordinary transformation within the consumer web industry.
Roughly a year after I started, Dan Rosensweig joined as Yahoo's new COO. In addition to being an experienced web operator, Dan is one of the most effective sales people I know. I learned this firsthand after he tried recruiting me to an operating role on his team literally every time I saw him over the first year of his tenure. Though I'd politely decline each time -- telling him I was happy having the opportunity to work directly with the CEO, founder, and other executives in a strategic capacity -- he never stopped persisting.
Then, almost a year to the day he started, Dan said, "Jeff, you've always told me that your lifelong ambition is ultimately to reform the education system in the U.S. Let me ask you something: Do you think you are going to be better prepared to make that a reality by pushing paper around, working on strategy, and doing deals; or by moving in to operations and building teams, inspiring people, and developing great products that change people's lives?"
Suffice it to say, I accepted on the spot and haven't looked back since.

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

10 skills for developers to focus on in 2013

http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/10things/10-skills-for-developers-to-focus-on-in-2013/3525?tag=nl.e101&s_cid=e101

By 
December 16, 2012, 6:21 AM PST
Takeaway: Development trends that began to emerge in 2012 are picking up steam. Here’s a look at the must-know technologies for the year ahead.
Editor’s note: At the beginning of 2012, Justin James wrote a list of technologies that were gaining momentum in the dev world. Now he revisits that list with an eye toward 2013.
Looking back on this article after nearly a year, I’m struck by how quickly some of these trends have steamrolled. Of course, mobile development was expected to be big. But the growth in tablets, especially in Android tablets, has propelled that market to new heights.
Thanks to mobile devices that receive frequent updates (notably iOS devices) and the short release cycles of Chrome and Firefox, it has been possible for HTML5 to rapidly ascend to the top of the pile in many ways. The Web development world has divided itself into two segments:
  • The enterprise market running Java and .NET on the backend and using SOAP for communications
  • The consumer market using PHP, Ruby, and Python on the backend with lightweight REST Web services
In fact, I am starting to encounter folks dropping the backend server layer away significantly, in favor of a REST API and an HTML5 + JavaScript front end communicating with the API. And thanks to the power of jQuery and similar tools, the Web now easily matches the functionality of the desktop in the UI department — something that’s becoming obvious on more and more Web sites.
Looking ahead to 2013, I really do not think that the items on this list need to change much. Learning Ruby and Python (and NoSQL databases) are not mandatory items for your career, but they can certainly open some doors to alternative career paths. Windows 8 development is not a must-have either, and it remains to be seen whether Windows 8 picks up adoption quickly enough to justify making it a priority. But this list can still serve as a fundamental guide for your 2013 “techs I need to learn” list.

What skills do you need?

Software development had a few years of relative calm. But now the rollercoaster is back on track and it’s picking up speed, as HTML5 gains a foothold and Windows 8 threatens to significantly change the Windows development landscape. If you want to stay ahead of the curve, you should consider learning at least a few of these 10 software development skills.

1: Mobile development

If you don’t think it is worth your time to learn mobile development, think again. According to a recent Gartner report, Android mobile device sales outstripped PC shipments in the third quarter of 2012. Add in the other big-name mobile devices (iPhones, iPads, and even the “dying” RIM devices), and what you see is that mobile devices now dwarf PCs in sales. What does this mean? If you make your living from software that can run only on a PC (which includes Web sites that don’t work or are hard to use on mobile devices), now is the time to learn mobile development.

2: NoSQL

I appreciate a well-designed relational database schema as much as the next person, but they just are not appropriate for every project. We’ve been using them even when they aren’t the best tool because the alternatives haven’t been great. The last few years have seen the introduction of a wide variety of NoSQL database systems. And now that major service vendors (like Amazon and Microsoft) support NoSQL as well, there is no technical limitation on their use. Are they right for every project? No. Are they going to replace traditional databases? In some projects, and for some developers, definitely. This is the year to learn how to use them, as they will only become more prevalent in the year to follow.

3: Unit testing

We’ve seen unit testing go from being, “Oh, that’s neat” to being a best practice in the industry. And with the increasing use of dynamic languages, unit testing is becoming more and more important. A wide variety of tools and frameworks are available for unit testing. If you do not know how to do it, now is the time to learn. This is the year where it goes from “resume enhancement” to “resume requirement.”

4: Python or Ruby

Not every project is a good fit for a dynamic language, but a lot of projects are better done in them. PHP has been a winner in the industry for some time, but Python and Ruby are now being taken seriously as well. Strong arguments can be made for Ruby + Rails (or Ruby + Sinatra) or Python + Django as excellent platforms for Web development, and Python has long been a favorite for “utility” work. Learning Python or Ruby in addition to your existing skill set gives you a useful alternative and a better way to get certain projects done.

5: HTML5

HTML5 is quickly pulling away from the station. The release of IE 10 made the full power of HTML5 available to most users (those not stuck with IE 6 or IE 8). Learning HTML5 now positions you to be on the forefront of the next generation of applications. Oh, and most mobile devices already have excellent support for it, so it is a great way to get into mobile development too. And don’t forget: HTML5 is one route for UI definitions in Windows 8.

6: Windows 8

Windows 8 may be getting off to a slow start, but being the top dog in an app store is often based on being the first dog in the race. The first mover advantage is huge. It is better to be in the Windows Store now than to take a wait-and-see approach. Even if Windows 8 sales disappoint, it’s better to be the only fish in a small pond than a fish of any size in a big pond, as recent app sales numbers have shown.

7: RESTful Web services

While I personally prefer the convenience and ease of working with SOAP in the confines of Visual Studio, REST is booming. Even Microsoft is starting to embrace it with OData. JSON really was the final straw on this matter, relegating SOAP to be for server-to-server work only. Unless your applications can run in isolation, not knowing REST is going to hold you back.

8: JavaScript

Before Windows 8, it was easy for non-Web developers to look at JavaScript as a Web-only language. No more! JavaScript is now a first-class citizen for native desktop and tablet development, thanks to the Windows 8 Modern UI and WinRT API. XAML + C# or VB.NET may be a good way for you to get things done. But if you want to maximize what you can get out of your knowledge, HTML5 and JavaScript are the best bet. They give you Web and Modern UI/WinRT, and you can use them for some of the cross-platform mobile systems out there, like Appcelerator’s Titanium product.

9: jQuery

If you are going to do any kind of Web development where you are working directly with HTML, jQuery is a must-know skill. While there are plenty of credible alternatives, jQuery is quickly turning into the de facto tool for rich UIs with HTML.

10: User experience

Other than getting that first mover advantage in new app stores, there is little to differentiate many applications on a feature basis; it’s a crowded field. User experience, on the other hand, is a different story.
Creating a great user experience is not easy; it starts before anyone even downloads your application and continues through to the uninstall process. In the age of instant $0.99 and free app downloads, and ad-supported Web apps, the barriers to switching to another application are mighty low. If your user experience is poor, do not expect much business.

Additional resources

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Inspirational quotes

If you succeed in cheating someone,
Don't think that the person is a fool....
Realize that the person
trusted you much
more than you deserved....!!!

Don't be afraid to
CHANGE.
Yo may lose
something good
but you may gain
SOMETHING BETTER...!!!

My room may be a mess !!
But I know where everything is....!!

It is easy to hate and
it is difficult to love,
This is how the whole scheme of things works.
All good things are difficult to acieve,
and bad things are very easy to get.

Positive thinking isn't
about expecting the
best to happen everytime
but, accepting
that whatever
happens is the best
for this moment.

The secret of being
HAPPY
is accepting where
you are in life and
making the most
out of everyday.

NEVER REGRET !
If it's good,
     it's wonderful.
If it's bad,
     it's experience.


You can not change
THE PEOPLE
around you.
But you can change
the people that you
choose to be
around.....

"Strength does not come from
winning. Your struggles develop
your strengths. When you go
through hardships and decide
not to surrender, that is strength"

Education is not the
learning of facts,
but the training of
the mind to think.

Love is not
about how much
you say
'I love you',
but hoe much you
can prove that
it's true.

I don't trust easily.
So when i tell you
'I trust you',
Please, don't make me
regret it.

Inspirational posts

https://plus.google.com/u/0/103670983662739975187/posts

Monday, December 3, 2012

Android - SQLite

Assuming a table called 'stocks' with a colum called 'items' that holds numeric data then the following may be what you are after: 

SQLiteDatabase db = WrenData.readable(); 
Cursor sum = db.query("stocks", "sum(items)", "", null, null, null, null); 
startManagingCursor(sum); 
sum.moveToNext(); 
result = sum.getLong(0); 
stopManagingCursor(sum); 

Cursor count = db.query("stocks", "count(*)", "", null, null, null, null); 
startManagingCursor(count); 
count.moveToNext(); 
result = count.getLong(0) 
stopManagingCursor(count); 

The variable 'result' in the above code is an int and 'db' is what would be returned by a call to SQLiteOpenHelper.getReadableDatabase(). The third parameter of the query is a where clause.

Android book links

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