Demystification: GPS and GPRS
[This post talks about the difference between GPS and GPRS. If you already know the difference you may skip it.]
As an engineer, I would like to apologize to everyone for confusing acronyms being shoved down normal people's throats. GPS and GPRS is one such pair of acronyms in the mobile domain which normal people tend to use interchangably. But these terms are totally different and have nothing in common and I will try and make it clear and easily distinguishable.
Global Positioning System (GPS):
GPS is used for establishing your location in the world.
General Packet Radio Service (GPRS):
GPRS is a service offered by your cell company which allows transmission of data to/from your phone.
If you have Internet on your phone - it's probably coming through GPRS (or EGPRS, EVDO or all the new fancy high speed methods). If your phone has a special system by which it can accurately find out it's location in the world then it is GPS.
Facts:
GPS is a free service. GPRS costs money. GPRS connects your phone to the Internet. When you check your mail, browse the web etc. through your phone, then you are using GPRS.
Tip to Remember: GPS does only one thing and it is a shorter acronym. GPRS lets you do many things and it is the longer acronym.
Confusing but perfectly correct usage:
I get my location coordinates through GPS. I get information about this position through GPRS.
So, my GPS tells my phone that I am in Ann Arbor. My phone uses a GPRS connection to get a list of restaurants in Ann Arbor from the Internet.
… I love you … Please Repeat?
Me: What time is it?
She: It's 10:48 pm
Me: What day is it?
She: The date is Tuesday, December fifth two thousand and six.
Me: When is my next appointment?
She: Tomorrow at 4:30 pm in 2260 USB
Me: Play music
She: Do you want to listen by genre, album, artist or anything?
Me: Artist
She: Do you want to listen to U2, Phil Collins, Collective Soul, ...
Me (interrupting): U2
She: Playing U2 ... (Windows Media Player opens up and Zooropa starts)
Me: I think I am falling in love with you!
She: Please repeat!
Me: I said I think I am falling in love with you!
She: Please repeat!
End of converstation.
I had the above conversation with my phone after installing Microsoft Voice Command on it. It really is one of the most amazing voice command softwares I have seen. It's a good example of the serious research microsoft has been doing in "speaker-independant voice recognition". You do not need to train this software, just speak to it in natural english and it works fine (if she can understand my Indian accent, I think she is pretty good).
Oh yes, I call the software a "she". I just can not bring myself to calling her an "it". Examples of other things I can ask her to do:
"What is my schedule for today", "Change profile to silent", "Turn off all reminders", "call john at work", "start calculator" etc. She even reads out the contents of emails that I receive. This software is a good reminder of the fact that we really are getting somewhere with digital assistant technology. I would really recommend watching the demo video to get a sense of what it really feels like.
GPS track of Flight from Mumbai to Rajkot
I recently flew to Rajkot from Mumbai. I had my GPS receiver on and captured the raw NMEA data of the entire flight. Here is the take-off part of the flight-path.
The plane took-off in the South-East direction, looped over South Mumbai and finally took a bee line NorthNorthWest path towards Rajkot. I got a chance to see my own house from a height of 1000 metres (3000 feet)
Motorola SLVR
Motorola's new phone. The SLVR
The RAZR sucks. You realize it when you open it. It's just too big. And the interface sucks.
This new phone leaves behind the clamshell of RAZR and offers a nice CandyBar phone.
Nice is a big understatement. See it to know:
Philips presents Rollable display
Rollable display.
Sorta like a strip of paper rollled up, and you can un-roll it and read it. like a scroll.
You can even make your own electronic paper display.
unlock an audiovox 5600 for free
I didn't know you could do this, but seems like you can unlock an Audiovox SMT 5600 for free.
Don't know if the same thing works for SPV C500.
I don't need to find out. Am already unlocked.
Applied the Orange French ROM update
After much pain and deliberation, the "keeda" in me made me run the French update on the Orange UK phone.
Ofcourse, it can't be done directly, so had to downlod ths tool called Typhoon, changed the Header, reclaculted hash, and went ahead and installed it.
If you want to know if this is relevant to you:
You need an Orange SPV C500 4.1.1.4 UK
You need the New ROM released by Orange France.
You can read more about all this here:
http://www.modaco.com/Orange_France_release_C500_Update_with_WMP_10-t205284.html
The installer was in french, so i was extremely scared while running the update.
But its all done with, and its running all fine and extremely well, so no problemo.
Lappy Bag
Wanted something small. something compact. and most importantly, something that could let me use the lappy without requiring me to remove the lappy from it.
- This bag is an exact fit for my lappy
- has enough room for the adaptor, mouse and other accessories
- is the bestly padded one in the market (found it better than samsonite)
- has a very low self weight
- and i can use the lappy right from within it when i am travelling
what more can a man want?
Delsey
COMPUTER CASE
Dimensions and weight
Inch : 15,5x12x4,5
1,5 KG
6,5 L
Color(s)
Black
Price: Rs. 2,245 (or around $50)
Mobile data revenue to surge
A new study by Research and Markets expects the market for mobile data to grow dramatically from $16.7 billion USD in 2003 to nearly $78 billion USD in 2007.
The majority of that revenue will go not to the content creators, however, but to mobile operators and carriers. Third party content providers will account for about 40% of the total, according to Research and Markets' predictions.
Read more
OQO handtop just around the bend
http://www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/5374.html
OQO confirms its Windows XP-powered handtop, the OQO 01, is slated to go on sale on October 14th, featuring a WVGA touch screen, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, 20 GB of storage - and more.
Buy me this!
To use the wireless village
For the Wireless Village service you need a IMPS compliant presence-enabled phone chat client. The following phones come with an embedded manufacturer chat/presence client:
* Nokia 3220
* Nokia 6220
* Nokia 6820
* Nokia 6230
* Nokia 5140
* Nokia 6810
* Nokia 7200
* Nokia 7610
* Motorola V500
* Motorola V600
* Sony Ericsson T630
* SonyEricsson F500i
* SonyEricsson K500i
* SonyEricsson K700i
* SonyEricsson Z1010
I am on the Mobile Village!!
Just yesterday I was wondering how exactly does Wireless Village work.
And here I am, chatting away on my cell phone with my friends on MSN & Yahoo messenger!!
If your phone supports Wireless Village, go on to Yamigo
Not many people seem to be using that service & its still under development.
Wireless Village
http://www.pcquest.com/content/technology/2004/104010501.asp
Imagine if you could use your mobile phone to chat with others, either on their cell phones or even computers. Sounds interesting? Enter the wireless village.
The wireless village is a part of the Mobile IMPS (instant messaging and presence services) initiative formed by Ericsson, Motorola and Nokia in 2001.
There are four key features of wireless village: presence, IM (instant messaging), groups or chat, and shared content.
Presence is an extension to IMs. It will include your status (online/offline/on a call/in a meeting), device capabilities (GPRS, text, voice, multimedia), device availability (is the phone or mobile device on/off), and your mood and hobby information.
IM will be essentially the same as today, with interoperability between desktops and mobile devices.It will allow you to create and manage chat groups. These groups can be taken a step ahead by having an online storage for this content.It will also include access control features to enable or disable the above-mentioned services.
When do we see it?
Mobile manufacturers have started building support for wireless village in their upcoming models. Starting 2004, you will be able to see it in the features list of the new models, the prominent ones being Nokia 6230 and Sony Ericsson T630. Now the big question is, will it be popular?We saw a big hype over WAP but it eventually bombed. The same hype went up for GPRS, but we do not see much action happening on that front also, except on MMS and gaming.
While the browsing technologies did not do well, the messaging and gaming counterparts are quite popular.
So lets wait and see if the wired city becomes a wireless village!
