Tech Bangalore

We Meet: Location aware, SMS based group messaging system from Nokia

Prashanth — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:11:39 +0000

We Meet is a pilot project developed by Nokia Research Centers in Bangalore & Palo Alto collaboratively. We Meet has been developed mainly keeping India in mind. We Meet is a group messaging system in which user can create groups & send messages to group. Well, we know there are many group SMS systems already available like SMSGupShup. But these SMS groups are one way, only administrator of the group can send messages to the group. But in We Meet all the members can post messages & hence it is more interactive. So, at the cost of one SMS you can reach out to an entire group of people. We Meet is purely SMS based & doesn’t require GPRS active. We Meet is location aware, location of the user will be attached to his message. We Meet compares tower information with it’s database to get the location of a user.

We Meet is available in three forms, java based client, text only client & web client. Java client is very nicely designed as you can see in the screenshots. Using java client allows you to perform all the operations including creating groups, add members to group, chat with a group..etc. Java client also has privacy settings to enable/disable location sharing and also options to turn off the service for a while. SMS counter in java client gives you a glance of how many SMSs you have sent & received. For those who can’t install java application, can still use We Meet with text only mode. In text only mode, everything happens over SMS, user has to prefix his mesaages with keyword commands (ex: ACCEPT BLOGGERS will accept the invitation to join group Bloggers). Web client is still under development & might probably go live very soon.

We Meet java client makes sure that messages sent & received using it won’t appear in your phone’s SMS inbox. That actually helps in keeping your phone’s inbox clean & organized. Messages which are sent & received using We Meet gets stored in the server & hence doesn’t eat up phone’s memory. We Meet is a free service, but you have to pay your operator for SMSs as per the plan you are on. We Meet is currently using a Karnataka based mobile phone number, so if you have got plenty of free local SMSs, you don’t have to worry about charges!! Even if you are in any place outside karnataka, it still can workout cheaper since one SMS goes to entire group of people.

Know more about We Meet & get your hands on the application at wemeet.nokiapaloalto.com

Nokia initiates charger exchange program for Nokia 7210

Prashanth — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:01:06 +0000

Nokia is replacing charger of the phone Nokia 7210, for the ones which are manufactured in between June 15th to August 9th. Chargers manufactured in this date range have a problem with plastic that it opens up as you use & exposes internal components. This might lead to electric shock when touched. Though there is no complaint against this product yet, Nokia is taking preventive measures to avoid possible injuries in future. The charger model which is part of exchange program in India is only AC-3E.

Eligible consumers can walk into any nearest Nokia Care center from November 10th onwards to claim exchange. To check whether your charger is part of the exchange program or not visit http://chargerexchange.nokia.com/. You can also fill in your address, details in the same link to receive charger via courier.

Tech Bangalore featured on todays Vijaya Karnataka

Prashanth — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 02:58:05 +0000

This is Rajyotsava gift for me!! Tech Bangalore is featured on kannada daily Vijaya Karnataka. This is the most well written article about me till date. If I myself write an “About Me”, it won’t come this good. Thanks a lot to Sudhanva for writing such a nice article.

Bangalore Windows 7 community launch party on November 7th

Prashanth — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 02:28:38 +0000

Venue:
GM REJOYZ – Galleria (Top Floor Party Hall) #158/1, 8th Cross, 8th Main, Malleshwaram, Bangalore 560 003.
Time:
5:00 PM to 8:00 PM
Contact:
Venkat KL
(98809 26030; venkat.kl@live.com)

Go-Wave: A Blog dedicated to Google Wave

Prashanth — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 03:15:08 +0000

Hello to readers of Tech Bangalore! I am writing this post to announce another blog from me which is not a Tech Blog, not on Mobile Phones too, not on Hacking & off course not on free GPRS trick . A blog completely dedicated to Google Wave. The idea is to create a single place to get updates/news about Google Wave & to review all interesting Robots & Gadgets. All posts will be nicely categorized & tagged which makes it easy to find robots & gadgets.

Check out the new blog at www.go-wave.net

If you are still wondering what is this Google Wave is about, check this video: A Simple video on Google Wave

Tata Docomo pulls down unlimited GPRS plan within a week of launching it!

Prashanth — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 06:01:22 +0000

Before:

After:

Tata Docomo has pulled down the most hyped & popular Unlimited GPRS plan which was available at just Rs.95. Few of my friends called me yesterday saying plan is been on hold. I called customer care & they too said the same. As you can see in the screenshot, Docomo has modified the Unlimited GPRS plan & set the download limit to 100MB, so it’s no longer Unlimited.

Docomo launched this plan exactly a week back, on 18th September, no one would ever thought it will pull this plan off so early. This move by Docomo hurts the trust customers had about it.

Link: http://www.tatadocomo.com/gprs-pack.aspx

Tata Docomo launches Samsung Galaxy, Google Android based mobile phone

Prashanth — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 12:49:27 +0000

Tata Docomo has announced exclusive launch of Samsung Galaxy, first Google Android based mobile phone from Samsung. Galaxy is the third Android based phone launched in India after HTC Magic & HTC Hero. Android Market, Google Applications, 5MP camera, 3.2 inch AMOLED touch screen with haptic feedback, 8GB internal memory with memory card slot, expandable upto 32GB are some of the unique features of Galaxy.

As bundle offer Tata Docomo is offering 500MB/month of free internet usage for 6 months. Samsung Galaxy is priced Rs.28,990 which I think is very competitive. To know more about the phone you can check out Tata Docomo official page.

India to get mobile numbers starting with 8!

Prashanth — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 04:21:32 +0000

Cross-Posted from Saurabh Minni’s blog with his permission

Well its was well known that mobile numbers with 8 are going to start soon. But it so happened that my dear friend Daaku took a new Tata Docomo connection. Now the amazing thing was that it starts with 805xx-xxxxx. So now if I try to call this friend of mine, my Vodafone network tells me that its an invalid number. I was confused and so I asked my friend daaku to call me. I got his number in caller ID but calling it was again not possible. Obviously its not mistake in dialing the number, rather its a stupid things that Vodafone and possibly other networks too have done.

So here is my guess what has happened. Vodafone, takes the number +91805xx-xxxxx as 91 for country(that India), 80(Code for Bangalore) and 5 would be Tata Indicom as they provide landline with that series. Interestingly Vodafone seems to have not configured its network to this change which happened for mobile numbers starting with 8.

I tried contacting Vodafone customer care, they seemed to be unaware of the issue and they said they would get back to me soon(24hours it seems).

But the point here is, whats TRAI and DoT doing. Have they not informed the operators of this change or are the operators at lax. Who ever it might be, the fault must be found and it must be ensured that in future such stupid things do not happen.

Finally! Tata Docomo launches unlimited GPRS plan for just Rs.95 per month!

Prashanth — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:22:38 +0000

Unlike other network providers who don’t care a shit about their customers & keep pushing their crappy tariff plans, Tata Docomo listens to customers! I wrote a post about Tata Docomo not being serious about GPRS plans & they commented on that post in a day saying they are going to launch unlimited plan soon. They just did what they promised!! I received a mail from them saying unlimited GPRS plan has been launched. Here is the email:

Hello Prashanth,

We can now announce that the long wait has finally ended. That’s right, TATA DOCOMO has launched another innovative offer in the country, Unlimited GPRS plans. Through the Unlimited GPRS plans, we aim to introduce GPRS plans at prices never seen before in the Indian telecom market. Unlimited GPRS plans will be introduced in two packages.

The first package will be the ‘Rs. 15 GPRS Pack’. This is a pre paid pack wherein a customer can recharge with Rs.15, and thereafter the customer will be allowed to access unlimited data for next 3 days by selecting Docomo internet APN on their handsets. The second package will be the ‘Rs. 95 GPRS Pack’. In this pack, the customer can recharge with Rs. 95, and thereafter the customer will be allowed to access unlimited data for the next 30 days. These packages will be applicable to TATADOCOMO home and roaming network only.

For further information please visit the Unlimited GPRS URL: http://www.tatadocomo.com/gprs-edge-faqs.aspx

We feel it is our privilege to let this information out to you before we let it out to anyone else!

Warm Regards,

TATA DOCOMO

This email says it all. Go have fun with unlimited GPRS!!! You can refer to this post for GPRS Settings.

Tata Docomo GPRS Settings

Prashanth — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 17:26:49 +0000

GPRS settings for Tata Docomo is as follows:

Connection Name : Docomo {or name it anything!}
Data Bearer : GPRS
Access Point Name : TATA.DOCOMO.INTERNET
Username :
Password :
Homepage :
Connection Security : Off
Session Mode : Permanent

GPRS is active on Docomo by default, so you just need to add this settings to start using it. On Nokia phones these settings can be added by going to “Settings–>Configurations–>New Access point”. Some phones have this setting in browser settings also. Just look for something which says “Add new access point” & add the above settings. Right now they are charging 1p/kb which is bit expensive. As people from Docomo commented on previous post of Tech Bangalore, they will launching unlimited GPRS plans very soon. So, keep checking this space for updates on it.