Blog Archives

Google Puts Free Books on iPhones, Androids [Books]

Posted on February 6, 2009
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Google has opened up its entire archive of 1.5 million books to mobile iPhone and Android browsers, and converted all their page scans to text for much easier reading.

The works, almost all in the public domain realm, can be accessed by heading to books.google.com/m in an Android or iPhone/iPod touch browser. Those outside the U.S. get access to just over half a million books, for various copyright reasons. Every page went through Google’s specialized Optical Character Recognition (OCR) scan, the same type of process your scanner uses to create Word documents. If you discover a bit of gobbledy-gook in extracted text, tap the text and the original page image will load for source checking. If offline ebooks on your iPhone or touch are more your speed, try the Stanza ebook reader we dig.

1.5 million books in your pocket [Inside Google Book Search]






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Save Money by Making Your Own Ringtones [Cellphones]

Posted on January 23, 2009
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Web application Make Own Ringtone creates ringtones from your own music files with an easy to use interface and optionally sends them directly to your phone via SMS or email.

Using the application is as simple as uploading your music files in MP3, WMA or OGG format, dragging the sliders to the point of the song you want to cut, and clicking the Make a Ringtone button. You can choose to download the files, send them to your cell phone directly, or even download them through your phone’s mobile browser. If you are a Verizon Wireless customer you might want to try using the email option, which allows assigning the files as ringtones; everybody else should consult their manual on how to actually activate the ringtones on your specific phone.

For an alternate method with a little more control, check out Gina’s guide to creating a ringtone from any MP3. iPhone users have it easier, as they can use GarageBand on the Mac or previously mentioned iRinger on Windows. Got a favorite ringtone maker of your own? Let’s hear about it in the comments. Thanks, Trish!






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Check if Your Carrier Will Support an Unlocked iPhone 3G [IPhone]

Posted on January 5, 2009
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Wondering if your cell carrier can support your jailbroken iPhone 3G after unlocking it? PC World rounds up a great collection of unlocking tips, and points to a extensive list of carrier results.






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Yellowsn0w Unlocks the iPhone 3G (for Some) [IPhone]

Posted on January 2, 2009
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iPhone 3G only: The iPhone Dev Team responsible for jailbreaking tools like QuickPwn and PwnageTool release the unappetizingly-titled Yellowsn0w, unlocking software that makes using a different carrier on your iPhone possible. In theory.

Gizmodo reports that the unlock didn’t work on their handset, as well as a significant percentage of other users (though it did for many, too). To try it out, take a deep breath, jailbreak the phone, and install yellowsn0w via the Cydia or Installer app.

Did you give the unlocker a try? How did it go for you? Post up your experience in the comments.






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iPhone 3G software unlock

Posted on December 30, 2008
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The friendly iPhone Dev Team hackers have been hard at work over the holidays and have promised to release the iPhone 3G software unlocking utility, called yellowsn0w, sometime tomorrow for New Year’s Eve.

A few details from the iPhone Dev Team blog:

We have been working hard on a few other things. The main one being the 3G unlock codenamed “yellowsn0w”. This is now completed and is currently being packaged into a user-friendly application with the simplicity that you see in QuickPwn or BootNeuter.

  • The target release date for the unlock is New Year’s Eve 2008.
  • This unlock method is available to iPhone 3Gs that have 2.11.07 baseband or earlier, we did warn you.
  • You can tell what version baseband you have by going to Settings->General->About->Modem Firmware
  • The unlock requires a jailbroken 3G iPhone. It’ll be installable via Cydia and so it doesn’t matter if you have a Mac or PC.
  • Please refrain from updating your baseband, regardless of what version you’re at.
  • We’ll have complete directions on New Year’s Eve.
  • We’ll stream a live demo of the unlock before Christmas (see the update at the end of this post)

The software exists, as you can see from the video above, which was released last week, so I’m pretty confident we’ll see the release as promised. From what I understand, the software is non-invasive and needs to be run every time the phone is booted, which will be executed during boot and invisible to the end user.

You do need an un-upgraded <2.11.07 version of the baseband, and for the near future you'll have to be careful not to upgrade it if you want to keep your phone unlockable. If you want to upgrade your phone but not kill the possibility of unlocking it, the team has some information on using PwnageTool to upgrade the iPhone firmware while keeping the baseband firmware intact. If you've already updated your baseband, consider yourself stuck with AT&Tuntil a new hack comes along.

Dev Team Blog (watch here for updates)
Original yellowsn0w Announcement
yellowsn0w Preview Demo

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iPhone 3G Unlocked, Free Unlock Software By End of Year [IPhone]

Posted on December 16, 2008
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The jolly band of hackers known as the iPhone Dev Team have successfully unlocked the iPhone 3G for use on unsupported GSM networks. Right now they’ve simply confirmed the 3G unlock, but according the the Dev Team blog post, a free unlocking software should be available by New Year’s Eve. [via]






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