Arc migration problem - Bugger!

It turns out that the Arc problem was because I only copied over the ConfigDB.mdf file but not the ConfigDBlog.ldf file (Because I didn't want any logs from the old build - they were unnecessary).

Copied that over - bish bash bosh it works...

Grr - Arc Connect migration problem

I had some fun and games with Arc today which wasn't pleasant. The problem was the following:

Existing server needs to be replaced with a new platform, migrating over the same version (4.1.3) to a different server. The method I followed is below:

• Stop all services on old server and stop SQL Server
• Copy ConfigDB to a repository somewhere
• On new server, create a new ConfigDB in Arc
• Stop all services on old server and stop SQL Server
• Overwrite the ConfigDB file on the new server with the file from the repository
• Start everything up

Now usually all would be well, and have used this method many times. The difference in the past is that I would take say, a 4.1.0 database and then use the DBUpgrade.exe to upgrade the database to 4.1.3 which i'm guessing makes changes to the servername of the database.

My guess here is that because the old server was called something else and I didn't make any modifications to the database, it refused to work (Database would report as not found in Arc, and "Suspect" in Enterprise Manager). I attempted to change the servername but completely forgot that the server name alteration wipes out all the licenses. Bugger.

Need to work on this tomorrow, and will post the solution!

The future of Windows Mobile

An interesting article over at www.coolsmartphone.com got me thinking. Unfortunately I think the problem is that new versions of Windows Mobile don't come with enough new features, and don't offer me enough new, useful features as an IT professional. Who cares about the general consumer? As long as companies such as HTC refuse to concentrate on features such as cameras (with flash?!) then there's no point MS bothering on about consumer grade devices.

Comparing my SPV M600 to my new HTC Touch it's clear that the majority of improvements are with the HTC interface. In fact been as I used to have Remote Desktop support and now don't, it's easy to see why people get a bit miffed with MS. And MSN Messenger on my phone - why must it add all my MSN contacts into my Outlook contacts list? That's just crap.

Ok there are plenty of reasons under the hood no doubt that contribute as improvements over previous versions of Windows Mobile but I can think of loads of easily implementable features that could be added to the system that would make it better. I want to see a colleagues' calendar for instance. And i'd also like to tightly control my phone status (silent, aeroplane mode etc) based on more customised calendar settings rather than just the generic appointment options.

Microsoft are doing a great job - but could do better...

Jed tries Vodka infusion thing...

After visiting my good friend Mark who was making all sorts of alcoholic homebrews I couldn't help but get excited about seeing what I could come up with!

I went to my local Wilkinsons (The bigger store the better) and Sainsburys, and picked up:

• 2x demijohns and CO2 release valve corks
• 1x bag of cherries (405g it turned out to be after de-stalking)
• 1x bag of 500g frozen "Summer fruits" consisting of blackberries, rasberries, strawberries and redcurrents
• 2 Litres of cheapo Vodka
• 1KG castor sugar

So I have no idea if this procedure was the right way of doing things, or in fact I have no idea how long to leave the mixture but heyho, it'll still be a merry Christmas!

I tried to dry up the fruit as much as possible but I found the frozen stuff was rather juicy! I didn't bother cutting up or pitting the cherries (Maybe I should have done?), chucked it all into the jug with 500g of sugar, and then lobbed in the Vodka.

Will post to say how tasty it is!

Just a quick catchup...

As usual i've been busy with a flurry of jobs so i've not been able to do half the things I wanted to do in the time that I have - including the blogg0r. Several things come to mind though:

• The IronKey: https://www.ironkey.com/demo looks like the absolute dogs' plums in terms of security - I wonder how long it is before someone gives cracking it a go? :)
• I had a new Golf Match turn up - woohoo! Overall a very very nice car, though I still can't figure out how to adjust the mirrors...
• I joined the IET! I'm considering doing a CEng and if I get round to it i'll post up my experiences of this.
• I went to see a customer yesterday who had a water mains pipe installed above the main PDU of the server room. Some people...
• I think i'm addicted to innocent smoothies.

Mike Out.

Push Email

We currently have a problem with using Push Email at our office because we use SBS Server, in that if we enable firewall port access to the server for OWA you can also access the server's Sharepoint system - gah.

I'd find Push Email really useful (and i'm sure other colleagues would too) but our security comes first.

I just happened to be browsing around http://www.coolsmartphone.com/ and noticed a little link at the top of the page. Lo and behold I ended up with a program called Emoze which is a nice Push Email program that can either be run using OWA (If it's available) or your desktop PC. Essentially then, a client program sits on your desktop PC and integrates into IMAP on your PC to monitor your inbox and push changes out. The problem with this method is as soon as you shut your PC down, you lose the functionality as the desktop client connection gets severed.

All you have to do is sign up for a free account, enter your phone number and install the client on your Windows Mobile device and wahey - it works straight away! I like it nice and easy :) In fact, emails ended up in my mobile inbox faster than appearing in my Outlook box on the desktop!

[Devil's Advocate]

• I am a little unsure of how configurable the software is in terms of how large emails can be that get sent across the GPRS connection. However I confirmed that Emoze does remove attachments from emails automatically and you can click on the attachment in the email on your mobile device to download it next sync.
• That doesn't really matter because i'm likely to uninstall the program very soon. I work with a laptop at work and as soon as I turn it off to go home i'd lose the push email function anyway. What's the point unless if you have a desktop somewhere logged on as you in the background? Still i'm sure some people will find this invaluable!

[/Devil's Advocate]

Overall a great product!

Vista slowness on the Asus R2H

This post on the inquirer made me jump for joy that I might see some extra performance from Vista in my Asus R2H. However considering the firm involved confirmed a 50% increase in performance in XP over Vista it made the use of Vista on the UMPC rather hard to swallow. It also reminded me that Gemma tried to use the device on the weekend and complained about the speed of things.

Time to go back to XP methinks...

Advice on CallManager 6 BAT tool

I hate BAT. I truly think that Cisco have actually made the BAT tool more unusable this time round and it sucks!

My advice to you is to start BATting earlier in your implementation process as it's likely to take you a longer amount of time (and leave you with bald patches with all the head scratching).

Oddities include:

• All sorts of odd fields crop up when you export Device Profiles (most of which are blank) such as Device Pool! When I exported a Device Profile i'd configured and then deleted it from the system I found that (without editing) I couldn't use that exact file to import the same record because I got a "Audible Message Waiting" field was not a valid field. Stupid thing...
• The User export now contains a "PKID" field which looks to be the CallManager's Primary Key field for users in the system. Attempts to import users while leaving this field blank failed due to a "Duplicate value in index field" error. To fix it I had to generate 250 hex strings and stick them into the spreadsheet.
• Both the Phones import and the Device Profiles import failed to recognise that I had configured a Service and Service URL buttons. Every attempt to get this to work failed and I ended up manually adding Extension Mobility Service to 250 phones and 250 Device Profiles. I hope I never have to do a 1000 phone system using CM6 - it would just be a nightmare...

Fun!

HTC Touch fun!

Well following on from my previous post (and now that i'm a little better for the sleep!) i'll continue with my experiences with the HTC Touch over my trip to Paris.

General Features

Well i'm sure there isn't much I can say in this section that you couldn't ascertain from any review of the HTC Touch out there on the net - so i'll just have to resort to conjecture and opinion!

The device is very light and thin yet packed with features. I managed to successfully figure out how to BlueTooth pictures to my girlfriend's phone without a hitch, and use the free wireless in the hotel which proved to be a great asset - who needs long distance calls when you have free access to email? I won't venture into the world of a phone call vs email etc, but email is good enough to be able to say "we're safe, and we'll be back before you know it!".

The Touch interface proved to be more useful than I first expected. I soon learned that you could grab the interface and scroll up and down windows, as well as the basics you will have seen in any other review on the web. However I found that there were a few things missing from the interface that i'd seen on the iPhone such as full integration with Pictures and Videos, and other places. The Audio Manager was nicely integrated into the interface for easy access to the music player, and also with the rather useful HTC Today Screen addon, I found the interface sufficiently improved my experience in using the phone over previous touch screen models, such as the Orange SPV M600. There's a few things that need work so for now i'd say it's a great attempt by HTC - but will improve over the next versions.

Applications and Toys

I found the applications and tools on the Touch were as expected of a touch screen based Microsoft Smartphone but it was also nice to see that Orange had not removed any of the Windows Live components. HTC has also added to the phone it's own applications which are certainly an improvement over their previous phones that i've used. These apps include:

• Task manager integration into the main interface. Tapping and holding the "x" button of an application terminates the process in memory.
• "Audio Manager" turned out to be a HTC version of Media Player that was integrated into the interface. While this sounds nice, it's clear that HTC haven't managed to integrate original Microsoft components into their own interface as cleanly as we'd like. Audio Manager is pretty rubbish at Playlists and for that reason alone I ended up using Windows Media player as my music player of choice.
• Weather application on the Today screen is a nice touch (no pun intended); HOWEVER if you're in the UK you'll find that you can only have a choice of London, Manchester, Edinburgh and Plymouth! How lame!

It's worth noting that Remote Desktop is missing. Bummer.

Camera and Photo's

As I mentioned I was suprised at how good the camera was. I grabbed the photo's off the phone using Activesync and it was clear though that I have some kind of tremor! Seriously though - in dark environents it's very easy to blur a photo because of camera shake combined with a poor lense/no flash. It's also quite easy to do the same in the light. Annoying! So great for still photo's but rubbish for action shots.

Here are some example photo's:

Notre Dame:

A night shot from the Eiffel Tower:

Shaky handedness! :

Don't buy this phone on the strength of the camera!

Biggest problems

As always i'm playing devils advocate. The following problems annoyed me sufficiently to post them up:

• The "Audio Manager" doesn't have a very good library system. Suppose I had an album of music contained in a folder on the memory card. If I wanted to listen to that album, the library manager of "Audio Manager" adds the songs in alphabetical order rather than song ID or filename (such as 01 - songname.mp3). It means that you have to painstakingly contruct playlists for your albums. I stuck with Windows Media Player throughout - which is a great shame.
• I absolutely hate the Microsoft Smartphone "connections" system. It just isn't intuative! This concept of "Work" and "Internet" is utter crap and I have never got it to work how I want (Or if I did, I couldn't replicate it). For instance I could be connected to WiFi but if I then tried to connect to MSN Messenger it would start off my GPRS connection! ARGH! Also a massive problem is that out of the box, I couldn't/still can't connect to my Exchange server every time. In most cases, the phone would report "Cannot connect using these settings - check your connection settings and try again". If anyone can give me a definitive fix for this, please help!
• I can't customise the default location of "Pictures and Videos" unless I go into the registry somewhere...
• There just isn't enough memory for me. When I syncronised my Exchange email for the first time I have 200mb of email altogether (including attachments), and without attachments I couldn't syncronize all of my email to the phone. The biggest problem? You can't (out of the box) change the default repository for standard email (you can only change the location of attachments). Grrr.
• Sometimes the phone will continue to play music when I press the power button (which is what I want it to do so I can save battery) and other times the music stops. God knows what's going on there...

Overall though - much better than the SPV E650 - which will be on Ebay soon!

Back from Paris!

I'm on the umpc in bed (As you do) and need sleep - So i'll keep this one brief!

• The HTC Touch has been awesome over the holiday with extra long battery life and connections! I was really surprised at how great the camera was and i'll figure out somewhere to upload the pictures and provide some examples. There were a few grievances though which ill cover soon.
• I passed my CVoice exam! Only 4 more exams to go...
• I get company car soon!