N73 Special Edition (Islamic)

Nokia announced the launch of the Nokia N73 Special Edition which will be initially exclusively available in the Middle East and North Africa markets. The device targets Muslim markets in the Middle East and South Africa. Offers built-in applications for Ramadan, prayers, Qibla, Hajj and Umrah. Also contains a Universal Dictionary application which supports English, Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and French. Although I don't prefer Nseries phones for smartphone usage, but it's a good work from Nokia.

Read the full post in Nokia NSeries blog for details.
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Community Blog

Yesterday, I had the idea to create a blog that contain all my old companions that I have their email addresses now. The idea is to create a team blog on Google Blogger where I'm its admin. I invite them to it, and they become authors in it. Everyone can post his latest news and events so we can keep in touch. We can also open discussions and post any funny posts in this blog.

Well, I invited near 63 persons, and waiting for replies about the idea. Only one of them replied until now, haha. OK, I'll wait for them for a week, and I hope to increase the participants. :)
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Google Your Life (3): Gmail (Ep.2)

Continuing with our email star: Gmail. I mentioned general information about it. I also described how its page is organized. In this post I'll talk about how email messages are organized in Gmail. In this concern, there are some terms:

• Inbox
• Archive
• Labels
• Star

Between Inbox and Archive

Any email has folders that are used to organize and group messages. Inbox, Sent Items, Spam (Bulk), Drafts, and Trash can are special folders that user cannot modify. Other than that, user can create his user folders where he can organize messages. Message can be put only in one folder.

This concept is different in Gmail:

• Messages are stored in one of two primary places: Inbox, and Archive, except some special cases I'll mention later.
• Any received message is stored in Inbox (if not filtered).
• User can archive a message, so it hides from Inbox and move to Archive.
• To show all messages (in Inbox and Archive), you click All Mail in the upper left nav.

For the first moment, you will think that it's an unorganized email. But wait, I'll tell you how you can organize email in the next section. So no filders, it's only those two places.

Some special cases are:

• Sent emails appear only in Sent Mail and All Mail.
• If a sent message has a reply, it appears in inbox as a conversation.
• Spam messages appear only in Spam.
• Deleted messages appear in Trash.
• Gmail site says that you don't need to delete any message. Just Archive any unwanted message, so you can refer ro it through search.

Labels

That is new. Labels are used in instead of folders. For folders, messages are moved to only one folder, and so hides from the old one. This concept treats Inbox as a folder.For Gmail, labels are different:

• You apply labels to the message while it remains in its place (Inbox or Archive).
• You can apply more than one label to the message as you want to organize.
• Applied labels appears in the message board before the title of the message, in small green font.
• If the message is in Inbox, you can let it there, or just Archive it.
• To access messages that has a specific label, you can access labels in the Labels box (the green bordered box in the left nav). It seems like folders. You can find a message in two different places.
• You can Archive labled messages to clean-up your Inbox.

Starred

You can sign messages with stars in their places by clicking the white star on the left of the sender of the message. A yellow star will apear. You can identify important messges in their places by stars. You can access all starred messages from different places through the Starred section.

Next post, I'll talk about how I practically use my Gmail according to these new concepts.

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Khobar Tour

After 9 months here in Jubail, and without a car in a must-have-car town, I got bored of every thing, of all my life. This affected my work performance. That is because you cannot go anywhere without a car in Jubail, wirh high temprature and moisture. I had the chance to take a vacation on last Thursday, and went with Mohammed Ali (the Egyptian computer engineer we met in the Royal Commission) to Khobar, the nearest city to Jubail. We visited some stores like:

• Jareer Bookstore: a large bookstore that is not limited to books (as you will see in photos).
• S'amaa House Store.

We also stayed on the Corneesh of Khobar having pizza dinner picked from Domino's Pizza. We have taken some photos which I uploaded on my Flickr account on this Flickr set.

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Smartphones Show

This is a periodic video podcast concerned with smartphone world. It contains recent news about smartphones, hands-on reviews of leatest smartphones, also comparisons between them, and Steve's hints and tricks in smartphone life. It's produced and introduced by Steve Litchfield, a smartphone writer from the UK. Most of my readings for him is in All About Symbian website, my favourite smartphone site. He is also my favorite smartphone writer and reviewer. He also writes for PDA Essentials in the UK, and produces his own website, 3-Lib, which Smartphones Show is part of it. I added the URL of Smartphones Show to my Favorite Sites list.
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S60 Wishlists, be productive

An excellent feedback way. S60 official Website included two interesting sections (some time ago): the Application wishlist and the Feature wishlist. The first lets you make a wish of a function you miss in your S60 smartphone and you want a 3rd party application to achieve it. A developer may take ideas from such wishes, or another user may add a link to an application that has this function if exists. In fact I had the benefit of this section. I miss a key shortcut to change writing language in my E61i keyboard, and I have to do so using the Options menu that does not have this option in all cases. Someone adds a link for an application that does that. I'm waiting to sign it, because it refuses to be installed on my device.

The second wishlist is good. The Feature wishlist lets you make wishes of features you want future versions of S60 platform have. This includes platform UI, tools, and built-in applications. I have a big list of wishes in this concern, and I'm going to fill it. I may post them later on this blog.

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Google Your Life (2): Gmail, new way to mail (Ep.1)

Going to the first Google service I wish to describe, it's Gmail. When I enjoy a useful thing in my life, I have a big want to have everyone know it and ustilize it. That's why I have the pleasure to post posts like this. Gmail is not a normal email service. It has a different taste in using email, at least as I think. But you will enjoy using it.

I started moving to it because I wanted to check my email using smartphone. Yahoo!, my previous mail box, supports POP service but for charge. Even Yahoo! launched Yahoo! Go for mobile phones (Java), but it's not so flixible and is slow. Gmail supports POP for free. And for that I moved to it. But I discovered different way to use my email.

In my posts about Google I'll only decribe its service features and how I utilize it. But for Gmail, it needs deep explanation, which may take more than one post to finish.

In Brief
Gmail is a normal email service. It has an inbox, sent mail section, drafts, spam protection, and trash can. Here these are not treated as folders, they are just sections you may find in popular email services now.

What is different?
Gmail features the following different, in my opinion, ways to use:

1. All email messages are received into Inbox (except spam which is strong, and filtered addresses). This normal until now.
2. Messages are called conversations. Any related messages appear as one piece.
3. No folders. Messages are divided between two main places: Inbox and Archive.
4. Labels are used instead of folders. The difference is not just the name, as I'll describe later.
5. Stars are used instead of flags.
6. Search.
7. Built-in chat to Gtalk.
8. Free POP service.

These are brief points, but hide more potentials. I'll take all in details post by post, mentioning my own feeling with it.

Gmail Main Page

Gmail page is organized as follows (according to numbers):

1. The general Google bar.
2. Gmail Search. It's a simple comprehinsive search like Web search.
3. Side nav. It contains main sections of your email.
4. This is called Web clips: links ot different services on the Web.
5. Email control bar, at top of the message board.
6. Message board.
7. Labels.
8. Chatting box.

Messages or Conversations
Gmail collects messages in a way called conversations. Every related messages are collected into one conversation. When I send a message from me to Tamer, then Tamer replies to me, the two messages are collected into one conversation. Even a sinlge message is called a conversation. A conversation that has more than one message is diplayed in the message board like follows:

(A conversation)

The number between parentheses represents the number of messages in the conversation.

When you click it, the group of messges that represent the conversation are listed one by one in a collapse/expand form. The following image describes that:

(An open conversation)

You can expand/collapse messages by clicking the head of the message (at number 1). Last message cannot be collapsed. If there are more than one unread message in the conversation, they are expanded. To reply, simply click into the text area at the bottom and full message composing will appear there (at number 3). More options are available in the menu at number 2.

The taste of Ajax

Gmail uses Ajax, even its page does not appear to be. It provide flixible performance, and let you organize your email faster. I'll talk about organizing email in a separate post.

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New appearance

Well, it's a small comment: I've chnaged the color of my blog's template. Also shortened posts of the home page to have only a starting symmary of it, so it became shorter. If you are blogging using Google Blogger (this blogger), you can do this using this Help article.
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Control your S60 smartphone using your muscles!

I've just read this article in one of Forum Nokia Blogs, and I had to post it here. Amazingly, and in such a way I cannot imagine, there are researches to control S60 smartphones using human muscles. Well, no more talking, read the article to know about it.

(Image taken from the article, Forum Nokia Blogs)

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And finally 3G coverage!

Some days ago, I found my phone accessed UMTS network. Jubail was not covered by 3G netwrok in Mobily before, but now covered in some parts, my house is within them. Using my new E61i, I can access Internet faster. Not only using my smartphone, but also I use it with my computer. It provides me a fast connection of 380 Kbps, great in fact. I can even play YouTube videos conveniently, without frequent pauses to load movies. I'm so happy for that. It makes some different for me in that boring, closed life in Jubail.

With cheap Internet plans of Mobily, as I mentioned in previous post, accessing Internet using this method is cheaper than having a dedicated ADSL line, and you can control the amount of data you want to use. ADSL of 256 Kbps bandwidth costs more than 300 SAR a month here, while I use 1 GB of data 2 months ago for 100 SAR, and only used less than 400 MB of it.
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Google Your Life

A strange title, may be. Google is, for me, the best and simplest search engine on the Web. It thinks about what I think about. It brings me what I need if it exists on the Web. In fact with it, I feel that anything I need or look for, I'll find on the Web. But Google now does not mean only search. It's extended now to many tools of various types. They changed the sense of Web surfing, all for free. You will not miss the pleasure of using them.

Starting with this post, and next coming posts, I'll present my personal experiment with Google tools. Tools that I used, and as I used. I'll share the benefits that I gained from them. I'll focus on the following tools and services:

1. Gmail: The Google email service. It may be strange not to start with search but Gmail is an amazing email service. It carries new concepts of email usage, and has its own different taste of email. In fact I'll concentrate on it deeply, and explain most of its features, because it's completely different. It worth moving to it.
2. Search: Of course, the crown jewel of Google. It's Google. Of course all of us know it well, but I'll add tips that I met during using this great engine.
3. Mail Notifier: A small tool equipped with Gmail. Simply it checks for new mail and notifies you.
4. Toolbar: A great integrating tool, accompanied with most of Google services that makes using them more easier. It's the back bone of your Web Google world.
5. Bookmarks: It represents a centralized bookmarks store. I stopped using Favorites of IE. It becomes more handy with the toolbar.
6. Web History: Unbelievable feature. All my Web usage and vsists are stored on Google's servers. I can use it to search my Web history from any computer. I think it's one of Google's top services. It requires Google Toolbar to be installed.
7. Translation: Also great. Most of us know it. Now, I can read any site of any language in English, with good translation.
8. Reader: Amazing. In fact I started using it today. It's a great Web-based RSS feed reader.
9. Documents: I use it rarely. Using it you can edit and view Word and Excel documents in a Web-based fashion.
10. Earth and maps.
11. Blogger: Google Blogger is an easy-to-use, rich blogging tool. You have to try it to know it. Of course my blog was established by it.
12. Mobile: In fact Google mobile tools are limited now, and I expect more from them. But it's very useful. I'll focus on the Gmail Java MIDLET on Symbian S60 OS.

There are more, but those most services and features that I use, and think that are very useful in your Web life. I may add more. We will meet again soon.

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XP PRO IIS Admin

When I started my work in Royal Commision of Jubail (Saudi Arabia), I faced a problem. The only licensed OS here is Windows XP Professional SP2. I used on Windows 2000 DataCenter Server, in Egypt, to use more than one Website in the IIS. That is not possible in Windows XP; only one Website can run at a time. I searched for a solution and found this great free tool: XP PRO IIS Admin. It's free and simple.

As you can see in the image, you can create more than one Website using it, without having to use the IIS console at all. All sites use the port 80 (the only available port). Of cource only one site is running at a time, all are accessed through localhost. To develop or run a site, simply double-click it in the tool's window. You can minimize it, and it will not appear in the Taskbar, but as an icon in the Notification Area of Windows XP (System Tray).

Now all my Web development relies on it.

You can find this tool at http://www.jetstat.com/iisadmin/.

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Back to my blog!

Assalamo 'Alaikom

I created this blog some months ago, to be my primary personal blog. In fact, I don't know what useful to do with this blog at the beginning. But after nine months here in Jubail, I had more intereset to make it grow. I'll try to enhance it to be a space for thoughts sharing, meeting community, and even just extracting ideas and thoughts, even I know that only one person will visit it now, my nearest friend now: Tamer Rizk :). I know that he got bored of me, but that is his fate.

Well, I planned some directions to start from strongly. As in my mind I'll go on the following branches:

• Google Your Life: One of the most amazing tools that I use in my Web experience is Google. Google may mean only search for most of users, but it means more for me. I'll explain my personal experiment with Google in my life, and how it could make your Web surfing more easier and interesting.
• Smartphone Life: One of my most interests is smartphones. It may take much time of my sparetime while surfing Web. I want to explain what a smartphone is, what is the difference between it and a regular mobile phone, how it can make our life different.

Well. I think it's a good start for me. In fact after staying here in Jubail for nine months, and got bored of my life, I'm trying to re-discover my life again to make it better, blessed by obeying Allah SWT. And I want to make my own Web world. A world that cannot be sensed. It only affects its owner.

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سلام الأوهام

ألم يدركوا بعد؟ إلى أى سلام يتجهون؟
لن أقول المعاهدات السابقة التى ضربت بها إسرائيل عرض الحائط، و لكن لنأخذ جانبا واحدا بعين المنطق، و هو حق العودة. ما لا يقل عن أربعة ملايين فلسطينى يجب أن يعودوا إلى بلادهم و أراضيهم، هل يعقل أن ترضى إسرائيل بهذا، إنها بذلك تحفر قبرها بنفسها. و إن ألغى بند كهذا، فإنها خيانة للقضية.
نعم إنها الخيانة و لا غيرها، فلا السلام حرك محمود عباس و زبانيته، إنما هى الخيانة، فهو أول من يعلم أن لا سلام مع إسرائيل.
يجب أن تعلم إسرائيل و يعلم الصهاينة أن النهاية قادمة، و لن يؤخر مكرهم أمر الله، و إنما علينا أن نعمل.
فإن تنصروا الله ينصركم.

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