Wednesday, March 26, 2008

How to Send Contacts as Files?

So far, I discussed Windows-, Mac OS X-, and Linux-specific solutions for sending business cards to a Nokia phone. A generic and platform-independent method is to directly transfer the datafiles that represent business cards.

The ISO defines a standard file format for representing business cards. On most computers, the file has a filename suffix of .vcf. Most address book applications on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X support importing and exporting contacts from and to .vcf files. In fact, the Nokia Contact Editor in the PC Suite saves and edits .vcf files in the phone browser's Contacts folder.

A Nokia mobile phone can open .vcf files in incoming messages (email, Bluetooth, or MMS) and save them to the Contacts list. It can also export any Contacts item to a .vcf file and send it to another device.

The thumbnail image, if there is any, can be included in the .vcf file. Please note that not all address book applications generate Nokia-compatible .vcf files with thumbnail images. So, if your phone complains about an "unsupported format" when trying to open an incoming .vcf file, you should consider transferring a text-only business card.

Using gnokii on Linux


gnokii is a cross-platform open source interface to Nokia devices. It runs a variety of hardware and operating system platforms, including Linux and BSD. gnokii features a sophisticated command-line interface for exchanging contacts, calendar items, and even SMS messages between a PC and a connected Nokia device. You can download the gnokii software and read its documentation at http://www.gnokii.org/.

A drawback of gnokii is that it does not integrate with the existing address book program on the host computer.

Several GUI wrapper programs have been developed to make gnokii's command-line interface user friendly. You can see their screenshots and find the download links at http://www.gnokii.org/screenshots.shtml.

How to Transfer Contact Using the Mac Address Book?

The Mac OS X default Address Book program is automatically Bluetooth aware. If Bluetooth hardware is installed on your Mac, a Bluetooth icon is visible in the OS X Address Book program's main window. You can click the Bluetooth icon to connect the Address Book application to your paired phone (specifically, the one you chose to use with the Address Book when you paired). If no phone is paired, you can select one of the Bluetooth phones in range. Such pairing allows the Mac computer to dial phone numbers, receive and redirect calls, and send and receive Short Message Service (SMS) messages via the phone.

To send a contact in the Address Book to a phone as a business card, first choose the contact, select the Card Send This Card menu item, and then choose the recipient device from the Bluetooth device list.

The Card Send This Card option is not available if Bluetooth hardware is not installed on the Mac.

On the phone, when you open the message, you'll see its contents. Choose Options Save business card to save it to the Contacts list. Please note that when you use Mac Bluetooth to send business cards, the thumbnail image and the Note field in the Mac Address Book are lost.

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Using the Nokia PC Suite to Transfer Contact

The Nokia PC Suite includes a Contacts Editor program. The program's main window is a contact entry form. To create a new contact, just fill in the information in the blank fields. You can leave any of the fields blank. You can also add a thumbnail picture and notes to the contact).

After you are done, click the Save button and save the contact to the Contacts directory on a connected phone via the phone browser. You will be asked to synchronize the new contact with the phone.

The Nokia Contacts Editor program can also handle very complex business cards with multiple addresses for each contact. Click the Advanced button in the entry form to switch to that view. Again, you are free to leave any of the fields in the form blank.

Using the Nokia phone browser, you can double-click any contact item in the phone's Contacts directory to edit it and save it back to the phone.

Remote S60 is another Windows program that allows you to control a Series 60 phone directly from a PC over Bluetooth, IR, or data cables. You can use it to update your phone's Contacts list from a PC. But Remote S60 does much more than thatit lets you use your PC keyboard to take complete control over your Series 60 phone, and even displays a copy of the phone's screen on your PC. So, you can use it anytime you need a break from typing on the small keyboard. You can download and purchase the Remote S60 software from http://mobileways.de/M/1/3/0/.

Contact Transfer

The Contacts (a.k.a. Address Book or Phone Book) program is one of the earliest and most successful applications on Nokia phones. Managing contact phone numbers right on the phone is clearly a convenience most people appreciate. In early mobile phones, the on-device storage space was extremely limited. So, the "contacts" were limited to pairs of names and phone numbers. As mobile phone technology evolved, modern Nokia Series 40 and Series 60 smartphones offered a much more advanced address book. The following list is just a sample of notable features in these advanced address books:

You can store multiple phone numbers, email addresses, instant messaging IDs, and physical street addresses for each person.

Each contact entry can hold a picture (e.g., a head shot or an icon) of the person.

For each incoming call, the phone matches the caller ID with contacts in its Contacts list, and displays the caller's name and picture if a match is found.

Each contact entry in your phone's Contacts list is also known as an electronic business card, which now holds more information than a real paper business card. However, despite the evolution of the phone's Contacts list, the mobile keypad has changed little over the years. It is still slow and error prone in terms of text entryindeed, it is a major pain to enter all that text-based information into a contact on the phone.

Your desktop or notebook computer comes to the rescue here. You can create contacts on a PC using a full-size keyboard and then send them to your phone. Or, if you already have a contact on your phone, you can easily send it over to other people's devices and save them from having to type it in by hand. In this hack, you will learn all about business card exchange with Nokia phones. I do not discuss contacts synchronization in this hack. Synchronization is covered in several separate hacks later in this chapter.

Using MMS to exchange file

You can compose MMS messages on your Nokia phone and attach media files from the Gallery to them. You can also save file attachments in incoming MMS messages to the Gallery. MMS messages can transfer files from device to device, or from device to email address. You need special software to send MMS messages from a computer to a phone. From the user's perspective, using MMS to transfer files is very similar to using email, except for the following differences:

MMS messages are pushed to the target device. The user sees the message as it arrives. There is no need to check the Inbox from time to time.

MMS is usually easier to configure than email. Most devices are sold with MMS preconfigured.

Since MMS traffic is a low priority in wireless networks, it might take some time (perhaps tens of minutes, or even longer) to reach the destination device. In addition, the MMS message might not arrive at all, if it takes more than 24 hours to deliver it.

If you're not on an unlimited data plan, MMS traffic might be cheaper than email traffic over the General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) network.

MMS messages are typically limited to a maximum of 100 KB.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Email

Email attachments are very popular for sending files across the Internet. You can use email attachments to transfer files to and from mobile clients as well. The Nokia native email client allows you to attach media files from the device's Gallery to outgoing email, or save media file attachments in incoming messages to the Gallery. Using more advanced email client applications, you might be able to send and save any attachment file outside of the Gallery. Then you can manipulate those files with programs such as FExplorer.

MMC Reader and Writer

Many Nokia phone models have expansion slots for Memory Card , which provide additional memory space for images, multimedia files, third-party applications, etc. For some devices, such as the original N-Gage, the Memory Card card is directly accessible from a computer. When you hook an N-Gage to a PC via a USB cable, the Memory Card card appears as a removable disk in the Windows OS. For other devices, you can buy a generic Memory Card reader/writer and connect it to your computer via USB. In both cases, you can manipulate the files and directories via Windows Explorer, Mac OS X Finder, a Linux file manager, or the good old command line.

If you do connect in this way, you might find some interesting files (.DS_Store and .Trashes on a Mac, for example) on the
Memory Card card. My advice is to ignore these, since they will be re-created each time you plug them in, and they do no harm.

Infrared Data Connection

Another popular choice is to "beam" files via the Infrared Data port. This method is particularly effective for transferring files between two IR-enabled Nokia phones. Since IR communication requires a clear line of sight, first you have to make sure the two devices' IR ports are facing each other and that there is nothing in between them. On the sending device, you can just choose the Send Via infrared menu for the target file; on the receiving device, the IR port must be turned on and the incoming file will be saved into the message Inbox, just as with Bluetooth file transfer.

Using IR to transfer files between a phone and a computer is more complex, since most computers do not come with an IR port. You can buy an add-on IR adapter and plug it into the computer (usually via a USB port). The device driver that comes with the IR port should include a file transfer utility.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

File Transfer using Bluetooth in Mac OS X.


Mac OS X has a Bluetooth File Exchange program under the /Applications/Utilities directory. You can also launch it from the Bluetooth menu item (if you've enabled it in System Preferences Bluetooth) by selecting Send File from the Bluetooth menu item. You can use this program to send files to devices. The Bluetooth settings management tool in System Preferences allows you to specify where to store the incoming files in the local computer. Figure above shows the file-sending window in the file exchange utility, and the configuration window for how to save the incoming files.

Bluetooth File Transfer in Linux

If you run the KDE or GNOME desktop systems on Linux, you can use their Bluetooth graphical user interface (GUI) tools to send and receive files to and from mobile phones:

You can download the KDE Bluetooth Framework from the project's web page at http://kde-bluetooth.sourceforge.net/. Figure above shows a Bluetooth incoming file received by the KDE Bluetooth Framework GUI.

You can download the GNOME Bluetooth Subsystem from the project's web page at http://usefulinc.com/software/gnome-bluetooth.

How to Transfer File Using Bluetooth?

The Bluetooth File Transfer service allows any two Bluetooth-enabled devices to exchange files.

To send a file (e.g., an image file in the Gallery application) from your mobile phone, navigate to the file and choose Send Via Bluetooth from the Options menu. Then, choose a device from a list of local devices to send the file to. The devices are identified by their Bluetooth names.

When a Nokia phone receives an incoming file, the file is delivered to the Inbox. When the user opens the message, the phone automatically identifies the file type and processes it accordingly. For example, a received image is saved to the Gallery, a business card is stored to the Contacts list, and an application installation package is executed. To send a file from a computer, you need to use an operating systemspecific Bluetooth file exchange utility, described in the following sections.

You can send only one file at a time over Bluetooth. Hence, this method can be tedious if you need to transfer many files (e.g., photos from a multiday trip). The ZipMan application, available from Symbian (http://www.wildpalm.co.uk/ZipMan7650.html), allows you to create a zip archive of multiple files on your phone and send them all together to a computer. If you need to send many files from a PC to your phone, you can also zip them together first and then use Zip-Man to extract the files from the archive once the phone receives the zipped file.

Windows versions before XP Service Pack 2 (SP2)
With the WIDCOMM Bluetooth utility installed, you can use the File Transfer service to send and receive files. You can right-click the Bluetooth icon in the system tray to bring up the pop-up menu that lists all available services. The received files and business cards are automatically stored into specified directories on the local disk. You can configure those destination directories in the Bluetooth configuration tool.

Windows XP SP2.
On Windows XP SP2, a Bluetooth File Transfer Wizard is located under the Start Programs Accessories Communications menu. The wizard allows you to send and receive files to and from other Bluetooth devices. If you choose to send a file, the wizard first prompts you to choose a target device and then asks you to select the file to send from the PC. If you choose to receive a file, the PC listens for the incoming file and prompts you to save it once it arrives. Alternatively, you can right-click the Bluetooth icon in the system tray and select the "Send a file" or "Receive a file" menu item to directly invoke the appropriate functionalities in the Bluetooth File Transfer Wizard.

You have to click the "Receive a file" choice to prepare the PC to receive files over Bluetooth. Otherwise, the device will show a Connection Failed message when you try to send a file to the PC.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Using the Nokia PC Suite for File Exchange

You can exchange files between a Nokia mobile phone and a computer in a variety of ways, including via the Nokia PC Suite, Bluetooth file transfer, infrared beaming, email, MMS, and web downloading and uploading.

In this section, I'll discuss ways to send and receive files to and from a mobile phone. Why do you want to do that? Well, here are some example scenarios:

If you have a camera phone, you probably want to download your pictures to your PC or web site for editing or sharing.

You might want to customize your phone with wallpaper and ring tones stored in media files.

You might want to exchange contacts (i.e., business cards) and calendar items between the computer and the phone via VCF-formatted files. The native Personal Information Manager (PIM) applications on the computer or on the phone can process these files once they arrive.

The list goes on. But this gives you an idea why file exchange with a mobile phone is important. As you can see, it is often the basis for further hacks.

Once a file is transferred to your phone, you can use the appropriate program to locate and process the file. For instance, media files are handled by the Gallery program, application installation files are handled by the Application Manager program, and VCF files (business cards) are handled by the Contacts program. If a file has an unknown format, you can locate and examine it using a file browser program such as FExplorer.

The easiest way to exchange files between a Nokia phone and a Windows-based PC is to use the Nokia Phone Browser program in the Nokia PC Suite. The program adds a Nokia Phone Browser folder to the root directory in the Windows File Explorer. Each device that is connected to the PC Suite shows up as a subdirectory in the Nokia Phone Browser folder. Each device directory is identified by its name (e.g., its Bluetooth name if the device is connected via Bluetooth).

You can drag files into and out of the mapped device folders in the Windows File Explorer. The changes are automatically synchronized to the device. In addition to the phone browser, the Nokia PC Suite also provides audio, image, and video manager programs so that you can manage mobile multimedia files on your phone.

You can also use the Nokia PC Suite to transfer and install Java and Symbian application installation files into your phone.

The advantages of the Nokia PC Suite are its easy-to-use interface and its support for multiple connection methods, including Bluetooth, infrared data connection, USB cable, and serial cable. However, as I discussed in "Use the Nokia PC Suite", the Nokia PC Suite does not fit all usage scenarios. In the rest of this hack, I will discuss other ways to exchange files between a Nokia phone and a computer.

Using CallRecorder for recording phone calls

CallRecorder (http://www.symbianware.com/product.php?id=callrecorder60) is another Symbian program for recording phone calls on Nokia Series 60 devices. Like Extended Recorder, it records both incoming and outgoing calls.

The unique feature of CallRecorder is that it provides finely grained control over exactly which calls are recorded. For instance, you can configure it to record all calls made to numbers with the 512 area code, or all calls received from a certain person in your Contacts list. You can also decide whether to record on a per-call basis. The CallRecorder program can prompt you to elect whether to record the call when the caller or called number matches a certain pattern.

On the other end of the spectrum, SymbianWare's CallCheater program (http://www.symbianware.com/product.php?id=callcheater60) generates static sound and injects it into your conversation. That simulates bad signal reception and allows you to drop an unwanted call without offending the other party.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

How to do Extended Recording for your phone?

The Extended Recorder program from Psiloc
(http://www.psiloc.com/index.html?id=167) supports recording phone conversations on Nokia Series 60 phones. Unlike most answering machines on landline phones, the Extended Recorder program records into a digital audio file, which you can copy, share, and manage on a computer. The program supports several convenient ways to start and stop the recording. By default, you can use the Pen/ ABC key to start and the green Call key to stop the recording at any time in the conversation.

Extended Recorder provides more features than call recording.

You can also configure the program to record all incoming calls from specific numbers in the Settings menu. The Extended Recorder program needs to run in the background for the function to take effect. To put Extended Recorder in the background, just start it as you normally would and then press the red End key to return to the Main menu without exiting it.

To confirm that Extended Recorder is indeed running in the background, press and hold the "menu" key on the phone keypad. You should see the Extended Recorder icon in the icon list at the upper-right side of the phone screen.

If you want to record an outgoing conversation, you can use the Make & record call menu to make the call

Record a Phone Call

Record important phone conversations on your Nokia smartphone.

From time to time, we often need to record phone conversations for business or personal reasons. For instance, when you order merchandise over the phone, you probably want to keep a record of exactly what was agreed on in case a dispute arises in the future. On a landline telephone, you can use an answering machine to record phone conversations when you talk with lawyers, accountants, technical support, or even sales agents. But for mobile phones, the "answering machines" are located in the operator's server room. They record messages for missed calls but do not provide a way to record a conversation once you pick up your phone. How do you record a phone conversation on your mobile phone?

In some jurisdictions, the law requires you to notify the other party that the conversation is being recorded.

On a Nokia Series 40 phone, you can record a phone conversation using the Options Record menu from the idle screen while the phone call is in progress. The recorded conversation is saved as an audio clip in the phone's Gallery. Most Series 40 phones support up to three minutes of recording time.

Nokia Series 60 phones do not support phone conversation recording out of the box. But third-party programs are available that add powerful recorder functionality to Series 60 phones. In this hack, I discuss two such programs.

How to Make Conference Calls?

Once you have more than one connected call (i.e., several text boxes appear on the idle screen), you can activate all of them at once by choosing Options>Conference. This opens up a conference and allows all callers connected to your phone to hear each other. Please note that, for you to do this, your mobile operator and your service plan must support conference calling. Also, when you look at your statement, you'll see that the number of minutes is the actual number of minutes you used, multiplied by the number of callers. Hence, it's a good idea to use mobile-to-mobile minutes or night and weekend minutes for long conference calls.

As a simple tips, you can also put the phone on loudspeaker via the Options >Activate loudsp menu item while the call is in progress. If the volume is loud and the room is quiet, all the people around the table will be able to hear the conversation and participate in the call.