Windows Mobile on the Q9C

Synchronize your contacts, appointments, etc., Part II - Microsoft's My Phone

2009-02-19T22:57:00.002-06:00

This is Part II of synchronizing your data...you can find Part I on Google Sync here. In this part I'm talking about Microsoft's new My Phone service which is in beta. On their Windows Mobile blog they posted a code to get into the beta. I'm not sure how long it will be valid, but try this if you can't get in: 987M-HDQM-5UI2-ZNEZ

Unfortunately My Phone doesn't play very nice when you have an Exchange sync setup. It detects there is an existing Activesync partnership, and it tells you it will not sync contacts, calendar, and tasks unless you either remove the partnership or disable Activesync. I like the immediacy of Google Sync since it pushes changes to my phone, so I had to use My Phone for other things like text messages, photos, and music. Hopefully they will realize people want to do multiple syncs and they will let you sync to both. But for now, I couldn't sync those things that overlapped.

It's kind of nice how My Phone has a single web interface to view all your phone's information once it has been uploaded, though it is quite basic right now. Also, since things like files are getting backed up, there is storage space associated with your account. Currently it's a mere 200MB, though in the forum they indicated this will be increasing progressively.

Besides the Exchange limitation, there's some other features of My Phone that need improvement. You can have it sync a storage card in your phone, but it either syncs it or it doesn't. There's no way to select specific folders or filetypes, so if you have a 2GB card and you have a lot of stuff on it, you can't pick and choose what gets backed up. There are checkboxes for filetypes like Pictures, Videos, etc. but I think those only apply to the phone. But it's possible it does apply to both phone and storage card, in which case there'd be a bit more control. Still it doesn't get nearly as granular as it probably should.

The app menus are similar to Activesync, which led some in the My Phone forums to wondering exactly what Microsoft is doing, since their mobile sync is all fragmented now. You can do all the file syncs I mentioned above with My Phone, you can sync to an Exchange server for email, tasks, calendar, and contacts using Activesync, and you can also do file sync using Live Mesh. So why three different apps? There should be 1 app that handles all of that. And even if they can't unify them, they shouldn't be stepping on each other, like use of Activesync crippliing the sync ability of My Phone as it does now.

Hopefully, given some time, they will work out some of these kinks. Until then, like I said for Google Sync, this is a good first step. It's also worth reiterating my summary from Part I: Microsoft's My Phone is capable of syncing a lot more information (text messages, photos, music) and presenting it in a single interface intended just for that data. But My Phone syncs on a schedule (and is normally expected to sync once a day), while Google Sync pushes changes immediately. So which one you choose depends on exactly what you're looking for.

In my case, I'm keeping both around because they each have their benefits and I'm interested to see how they both evolve. And I'll continue syncing regularly to my computer as well, because Google Sync and Microsoft My phone are both test versions of software and you never know when a mis-sync can mess everything up.

Synchronize your contacts, appointments, etc., Part I - Google Sync

2009-02-19T22:35:00.009-06:00

It's fitting that I delayed writing something about the release of Google Sync for Windows Mobile, because now there's 2 different big-name options for automatically synchronizing your data for free, and they both came out within 3 weeks of each other. This is Part I where I describe Google Sync, and Part II will describe Microsoft's My Phone service.

First up, Google Sync. If you already have a Google Account, this is great. If you're a Gmail and/or Google Calendar user, even better! Basically this new service uses Activesync on your phone to push updates to contacts and appointments to your phone. And it's true push, you get things on your phone "as they arrive" so it's not constantly checking for updates. It's cool to add an appointment to Google calendar for the same day, and see the homescreen of my phone update to display the appointment within 10 or 15 seconds without my ever touching the phone. And the sync works 2-way, so anything you add/edit on your phone gets pushed back up to Google.

To me Google Sync has a dual benefit - preserving a backup, should I ever lose or break my phone, and allowing me to access and update my calendar anywhere, while hooking into Windows Mobile to show me appointments on my home screen.

Contacts can be a bit tricky to merge the first time between your phone and Gmail, but they've done a pretty good job explaining it here.

They haven't done a good job with using the most current version of Windows Mobile in the setup overview, however. On WinMo 6.1, follow these steps to setup:

1. Leave the email address as "@" which is the default, since Google Sync does not support email sync currently (you can use IMAP until they do). I think I also had to uncheck the option to automatically determine Exchange server settings.
2. Hit next will to enter your account info. Put in your full email address, including the @gmail.com for the username, because you can also use a Google Apps account with your own domain name. Leave the domain field empty (it should actually become disabled when you put @gmail.com in your username). It should be checked to use SSL and save your password by default.
3. Only check the boxes to sync Contacts and Calendar, as these are the only supported items right now. If you leave anything else checked, you will get a connection error.

Once that's done, it should try doing a sync right away. At some point, either before the sync or afterwards if you go into Schedule, you can set how often it syncs. If you pick the "As items arrive" option, all changes will get pushed to your phone in real-time. This also saves your battery versus having it check on some schedule.

This is currently in "beta" as a new service, and it does lack some options like handling multiple calendars, syncing tasks and email, etc. But it's a nice first step. However, Microsoft's My Phone, which I cover in Part II, is capable of syncing a lot more information (text messages, photos, music) and presenting it in a single interface intended just for that data. But My Phone syncs on a schedule (and is normally expected to sync once a day), while Google Sync pushes changes immediately. So which one you choose (currently My Phone won't sync certain things when an Exchange sync like Google Sync is setup) depends on exactly what you're looking for.

And as always when trying any sync software, make a backup before you try it!! You never know when some conflict or misconfiguration can either wipeout or create a bunch of duplicates, incorrect appointments, etc.

Skyfire rocks

2009-01-31T14:12:00.007-06:00

If you haven't heard of it yet, Skyfire is a free web browser that renders websites as they would appear on a computer, and through their server-side technology they are able to do a lot of things most other web browsers today can't, including enabling Flash on websites (letting you play videos directly on sites), allowing zooming into sections of a website, etc.

I've found that while Skyfire isn't a replacement for PIE (Pocket Internet Explorer) which comes with the phone, it is extremely useful to have both alternatives. Skyfire is great at rendering websites as you'd see them on a computer which is useful for media-rich, flash-heavy, and other websites that require you to be able to view dispersed content or interact with the page. On the other hand, text heavy websites such as Wikipedia pages and Google searches tend to be viewed quicker and easier in PIE.

While Skyfire is a fantastic product at the right price (free), it does have a downside besides being clunky on text-heavy sites as I mentioned above. The battery definitely drains quickly when using it. This wouldn't be a big deal if you charge your phone frequently, but it is very noticable when you're out and use the browser to look something up. As could be expected, using it on video and Flash sites (especially something like Hulu or YouTube) will run the battery down pretty quick. You can probably get just under a handful of hours when using Skyfire constantly. Hopefully this will be something that continues to improve as newer versions of the software are released.

Unlocking and editing registry entries

2008-06-22T15:45:00.002-05:00

I realized I've mentioned making registry edits and never mentioned a couple of utilities that make doing that possible. There's a HTC Unlock utility which unlocks your phone to allow edits (though I think you might not need to use this if you're on Sprint). And then PHM Registry Editor is an excellent free registry editor you can use on your phone to make changes.

Chome Configurator for 6.1 Sliding Panels

2008-06-11T12:28:00.006-05:00

Someone's already created an awesome application to configure the sliding panels on the Windows Mobile 6.1 homescreen...apparently by starting to work on it with the 6.1 emulator in the SDK since the phones with 6.1 weren't out yet.

Get Chome Configurator here.

The app is incredible, though a little confusing at first. It basically lets you create new panels and edit some of the existing ones. You can add pages that can launch applications, launch websites, dial contacts, etc. It also lets you associate an icon with each of those activities and comes with a dozen or so that may be useful. (You can easily add your own images...I suggest using 48x48 PNGs with transparency since the tranparency makes it much better and they'll be really small in size).

I used it to create an application panel for launching programs and a web panel for launching my website favorites. I also added some entries into the existing settings panel like my registry editor and the file manager.

To give a quick overview, once you launch the app, the right softkey does most of the work. You can customize an existing panel (though several are locked) or create your own new panel under the Menu->plugin option. Once you have your panel (or an existing one), you basically want to create a new page and then pick a template for the new page. The template makes it a lot easier to fill in the fields on the page as it does nearly all the work for you. You can view existing pages as examples of what goes in the fields.

Chome Configurator is actually making all the changes behind the scenes in the registry...really it's just a nice GUI. You could make the changes yourself if you wanted.

Windows Mobile 6.1 released for the Q9C!

2008-06-08T23:39:00.004-05:00

This is a great development for users of the Q9C, as 3 days of Windows Mobile 6.1 has made me quite pleased. You can get the update from Motorola since Sprint doesn't seem to be doing it yet (or at least some techs don't know about it) and it's pretty painless to do. I recommend doing the update using the "Via Your Computer" option since the phone will need to reboot and continue installation. There's already a rundown of the new features by Microsoft:

Instant messaging-like texting
Improved Internet browsing
Simpler e-mail and Bluetooth setup
New Home screen interface
New Getting Started Center
Security enhancements
Easier Wi-Fi connection
More personal choice

Of those, I've found some great changes. It's nice to have copy/paste functionality in texts, emails, and IE. Texts are now threaded, meaning your conversations get grouped which is much nicer than a linear list of texts where you can't follow a conversation. The phone seems to respond quicker, and I'm pretty certain the battery life has improved. The new Sliding Panels homescreen is really slick and very functional. IE seems to load pages more quickly, lets you zoom in or out on the page, and finally lets you set your homepage without some ugly registry tweak. Most apps from 6.0 still work fine, as do the tweaks.

Bottomline: If you own a Q9C you want this upgrade.

We'll see if I come up with more benefits in the coming days...for one, I've spotted a feature in text messaging that lets you use some predefined messages (you can create your own too) so if you like using a phrase a lot or find yourself sending a "Where you at?"-type text message frequently, it just got even easier.

Wifi via the Spectec MiniSD card

2008-05-29T16:09:00.003-05:00

The Q9C says it supports WiFi, though you don't get that functionality right out-of-the-box. You can get an SDIO card that fits in the MiniSD slot to add the functionality, which is useful if you don't have a data plan and want to use the internet or if you are traveling internationally and won't have access to your data plan.

The only company I'm aware of currently selling a MiniSD WiFI card is Spectec, and they're surprisingly reasonably priced. The card most people are getting for this phone is the SDW-822 which supports 802.11b (the card that supports g costs nearly twice as much). There's a "regular" version of the 822 card for around $35, and a "Motorola" version with the same model number for around $45.
I tried to verify with Spectec what the differences were and was essentially told that the Motorola version was required since I had a Motorola phone running WM 6.0. However, the seller got mixed up and sent me the regular version of the card so I decided to try it anyways using the updated WM6.0 driver off their website. It turned out that card worked just fine, and I confirmed with Spectec that there isn't any risk of issues down the road if I got it working right now. Basically they said that the Motorola version was designed for a lower power requirement since older/other versions of the Q didn't supply enough power through the miniSD port.

So you can get the Spectec MiniSD Wifi card, and the regular version will work just fine in the Q9C. I do not know if it will work in other versions like the Motorola Q9M.

Shrink the width of the scrollbar

2008-05-07T14:30:00.003-05:00

You can adjust the size of the scrollbars to take up less precious real estate, which is especially beneficial for web browsing. In order to change the size of the scrollbars, you can tweak the registry settings under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/System/GWE. The relevant values are:

cxVScr: This is the width of the vertical scrollbar on the right side of the screen, in pixels. I changed mine to 3 so it is visible enough without taking up a lot of space.

cyHScr: This is the height of the horizontal scrollbar on the bottom of the screen, in pixels. I also changed this to 3 for the same reason.

The other two values (cyVScr and cxHScr) should also affect the scrollbar sizes in the other directions, though I left them at 0 which I believe causes them to fill the height/width of the screen.

Sprite backup is excellent

2008-04-18T00:14:00.004-05:00

I am not a big fan of apps that cost money because there's always more features I'd like to have and it would cost a boatload to pay for every app that improves the Windows Mobile experience. However, in the case of Sprite Backup I'm willing to make an exception.

Sprite Backup is a pretty simple app that lets you create a complete backup of your phone, with apps, contacts, registry settings, and literally everything on your phone getting backed up. The full version will even let you schedule backups and give some more options, but I found the lite version was all I needed since it lets me intiate backups from my computer that get stored on the computer as well as initiate a backup on my phone which can store the backup to a storage card for when you're not in reach of a computer.

It's extremely reassuring knowing that if I install an experimental (or even an established) application and it ends up killing my phone, I can restore it to exactly the configuration it has today. And if I lose my phone or even upgrade to a different Windows Mobile device, I can still recover the things I want again.

Sprint Q9C users getting Windows Mobile 6.1 this summer

2008-04-01T17:46:00.004-05:00

Microsoft officially announced Windows Mobile 6.1 today, also releasing the fact that Sprint plans to update all current Windows Mobile 6 phones to 6.1, which is great news. Particularly because 6.1 has truly useful improvements that will make everyday tasks easier.

Major Improvements from 6.0:

Getting Started Center
- Get help setting up your new phone—from e-mail to a Bluetooth headset, so you can start using it right away.
Sliding Panel Home Screen
- The home screen has a whole new look. View notifications and calendar appointments. Go straight to the Getting Started Center and settings. Listen to your favorite music and view your favorite photos.

Threaded Text Messaging
- When you text with a friend or colleague, the messages are threaded together into a single conversation, so you can view the entire conversation as you type.

Internet Explorer Mobile Zoom Support
- Zoom in on a Web page to view small text or images.

Internet Explorer Mobile Page Overview
- View an entire Web page at one time, navigate to a specific segment, and then select that segment for a closer view.

Cut, Copy, and Paste
- Select and copy text from Web pages in Internet Explorer Mobile. And cut, copy, and paste text in e-mail and messaging.

Home screen music and photos
- Music can be played/paused and photos can be viewed, all on the homescreen itself

Sprint's press release lists Summer 2008 as the date for updates to existing devices.

Move your Pocket Internet Explorer (PIE) Cache to SD

2008-03-28T11:45:00.003-05:00

You can get Pocket Internet Explorer (PIE) to store your cache, cookies, and history to a storage card instead of to your phone. This is a really good thing because otherwise the cache can grow quite large and slow down the phone unless you clear it out regularly. In order to point PIE to an SD card there's just two steps, but one of them is a registry hack which can be risky if you've never done one before.

First, use File Explorer in ActiveSync or the File Manager on your phone and make 3 folders on your storage card like this:

\Storage Card\ietemp\cache
\Storage Card\ietemp\cookies
\Storage Card\ietemp\history

Also, make sure to clear your current cache, cookies, and history through PIE so you don't leave lingering files on your device.

Then, use a registry editor (you can find one called PHM for free) and go to
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders

Edit these values:
Change the Value Data for Cache to \Storage Card\ietemp\cache
Change the Value Data for Cookies to \Storage Card\ietemp\cookies
Change the Value Data for History to \Storage Card\ietemp\history

After that, make sure to restart your phone, and you should be good to go.

View YouTube Videos

2008-03-28T09:09:00.004-05:00

It is possible to view YouTube videos off their website without using their mobile site, where the video/audio quality is not as good. You just need to use TCPMP and the FlashVideoBundle to do so, and then it adds a nice context menu when you click on a video on YouTube's site that lets you save the video to your phone as well. You must make sure you're on the regular or classic version of the site, not the mobile one.

TCPMP is also useful in that it plays a lot of different video formats well.

There's an excellent step-by-step that works for Windows Mobile 6.0, 6.1, and I think even 5.0 here.

Turn on Assisted GPS

2008-03-20T14:49:00.001-05:00

I still can't tell if it has sped up the GPS acquisition time or not, but it certainly has not hurt it. Doing the following should turn on assisted GPS (aGPS) which uses cell towers in addition to GPS to get a quicker lock on your location.

You need the MSL unlock code for your phone to do this, and you can get this by calling support and saying you need it to install a 3rd party app. You may have to try more than once to get it.

Here's how to enable aGPS:

Dial ##073887*

Hit Send/Green Key

Enter your MSL

Hit H (GPS Settings)

Enter 68.28.31.49 for the IP address

Enter 5017 for the port number

Save/Exit

I think if you go back into that menu it clears the settings, so you have to trust that it saved correctly.

Also this may not work the same way on other versions of the Q9 (Q9m, Q9h, etc.).

Surprise Keyboard Shortcuts, Part II

2008-03-20T12:51:00.000-05:00

Ever wondered why you can't type a pipe character ("|") on the Q9C? Or why it's so complicated to get to the less than or greater than signs? It's actually quite easy! If you weren't aware, the longer method is to hit Fn and then CAPS when you're typing to get the full character menu. But this still doesn't have all the characters. The quicker way to access the characters is to hold down Fn and hit either of the slashes ("/" or "\"). Then, while still holding down Fn, hit the spacebar repeatedly. You'll see it cycles through a forward slash, back slash, and pipe character. Similarly, the other keys will let you get other characters by holding down Fn and hitting the spacebar after typing one of them. For instance, the opening parenthesis will cycle through a straight bracket, curly bracket, less than sign, and double arrow. Odds are the special character you need is easier to type than you expected.

Surprise Keyboard Shortcuts, Part I

2008-03-20T10:19:00.000-05:00

I expected there would be a better way to quickly move down a webpage in Pocket Internet Explorer (PIE) than breaking your thumb on the scroll wheel or the down button on the D-Pad, and it turns out I was right. Hitting 8 triggers a Page Down, while 2 triggers Page Up.

Google Search Box on Home Screen

2008-03-19T22:31:00.005-05:00

Today Google released a tool for Windows Mobile devices which will put a Google Search box right on the homescreen, saving you the steps of opening the web browser, typing google.com into the address bar, and then performing a search. Personally I find this incredibly useful and it's transparent background does not disrupt the homescreen. Check it out below:

You can get it by going to http://mobile.google.com on your mobile device, and then clicking on the "Search (Download)" link.

NES Games

2008-03-19T22:18:00.002-05:00

One of the things I was most excited about hearing was that an NES emulator had been created for Windows Mobile. For those that are unfamiliar, NES emulators can run classic Nintendo games on your computer...you just get ROM files for each game you want to play, and map the controls to your keyboard and you can play virtually any NES game you can think of.

Using PocketNesterPlus, you can play NES games on a Windows Mobile device, using the same ROMs as the PC emulator uses. The tricky part on the Q9C is getting the controls mapped right, as some keys can map to the same codes, making them unusable. Also the direction pad setup is not very intuitive. There's a great post on the everythingq.com forums that describes how to set it up right.

As for the emulator itself, it can be found with ease. The legality of such a thing is dubious, so I won't directly link to it.

Welcome!

2008-03-19T21:59:00.005-05:00

I've found it to be quite difficult to gather information covering all the different things I've wanted to do with my Motorola Q9C, so I figured I could use this blog to make it easier for people. Or at the very least, create a repository of resources for future reference for myself. But considering the number of Windows Mobile users, I think this won't be a wasted effort.

The Q9C

Questions and feedback

2008-03-18T11:38:00.001-05:00

Please post questions and general comments under this post and I will respond to them.