Mobile Programming Pit Stop

Another Attack hits Mobilepit.com

mypapit — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 19:09:48 +0000

Well seems Mobilepit.com has been subjected to yet another attack from spammers and has been unavailable for a duration of almost two weeks. This time the attackers injected the spam on each header of the Wordpress themes, and the payload was obfuscated using the base64 encoding.

How does the attacker managed to inject those code still baffles me, as I’ve already taken measures to remove write permission on every php files (and even directory!) on my account. Those with wordpress out there, better becareful as spams can crept into your blog without you realizing. So stay vigilant!

Mobilepit has recovered from badware attacks!

mypapit — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 18:35:12 +0000

Those who has been visiting this website for the last few days might notice that MobilePit has been subjected to injection attack. Causing it to distribute Badware unintentionally. This has triggered the Google Badware warning whenever somebody visited MobilePit website.

Rest assured, the injection attack has been fixed and this has been verified by the StopBadware.org to be free from malicious code. Additionally, the website has been secured to prevent similar future events from recurring.

Needless to say that, you should take care of your website security to prevent it from being compromised by spammers/crackers.

ClearContacts – Remove all contact list from your Windows Mobile Phone

mypapit — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 15:30:33 +0000

I’m sure at some point you may have come across this problem where you need to rid every contact information that are stored inside your Windows Mobile (Pocket PC) device. The problem is, Windows Mobile address book/contact list does not allow you to delete multiple contact at the same time. That would leave you with only one choice, to delete the contact detail one by one, which is a hardly productive work for your time.

Fortunately, there’s ClearContacts, a small application that loop through your contact list and deletes contact information at the same time. This would eliminate the hassle that you’ve to go through when clearing your Pocket PC device from unwanted contact. Just copy/sync the ClearContacts into your device, and execute it. A dialog will appear to confirm your action, before all your contact list will be cleared.

ClearContacts requires Windows Mobile devices with at least Microsoft .Net Compact Framework 1.1 installed (don’t worry, most modern devices already have this.

a simple Click-A-Tell SendSMS HTTP POST API library

mypapit — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 14:01:45 +0000

Click-a-tell is a simple web service that allows you to integrate sms sending capability into your web application. Its simplicity and wide range of API available is very attractive to small to medium web application developers. Among the API supported by Clickatell are :

HTTP POST
HTTP GET
FTP API
SOAP
EMAIL-to-SMS
COM Object

Clickatell website offers examples of how to use their API in several programming language including but not limited to : VB.net, PHP, ASP, ASP.NET,PERL, Python, Coldfusion, etc.

However I found that the example written for PHP is a little bit outdated and it uses the file() function to initiate HTTP GET request which is generally restricted on webservers as it pose a huge security risk. The other Clickatell class found through PHPClasses website are either too cumbersome for my project or supported other protocol than I intended to use.

As a result I wrote my own Clickatell SMS (clickatell_sendsms_0.5.zip) class specifically for my own use.

Here are a sample code using the SendSMS 0.5 class

PLAIN TEXT

PHP:

require('SendSMS.php');
$sendsms = new SendSMS("username","password","HTTP POST API key");
/* if the login return 0, means that login failed, you cant send sms after this */
if ( ($sendsms->login()) == 0 ) {
die( "failed");
}
/*other wise, you can send sms using the simple send() call*/
$sendsms->send("0132073011","testing send sms - camna? boleh dpt ? - mr hafiz");
?>

You can download the clickatell_sendsms_0.5.zip">SendSMS 0.5 PHP class from this website, note that the class is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2, and the class is only meant to be use with Click-A-Tell HTTP POST API.

The class can also be use with the libcurlemu library whenever applicable.

Don’t SMS and Drive, it’s bad for your health

mypapit — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 15:18:56 +0000

Fixed the annoying stale front page bug on MobilePit.com

M.H Ismail — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 17:20:12 +0000

I've finally have the time to fix the most annoying bug on this blog. This bug manifest itself as the Wordpress "page cache" bug, where new posts were not shown on the front page of this blog, which would give the impression that this blog was not updated for quite some time to visitors.

The bug however does not affect the actual posts and web feeds, as the new posts can be accessed via their actual URL. The remedy of the problem (which i do) is to completely delete the current Wordpress installation (don't forget to backup "plugins" and "themes" directory) and replace it with a fresh installation, which a new "wp-config.php" will be created to point to the old database.

Reload the webpage, and your blog will be free from the "stale" front page bug.

Phone ReUnion: A little bit of iPhone Joke

M.H Ismail — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 04:50:53 +0000

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

Porting JavaME apps to Android is easier with J2ME Polish

M.H Ismail — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:45:42 +0000

Great news for JavaME developers! The J2ME Polish project has announced that their upcoming j2mepolish 2.1 toolkit suite will support porting JavaME apps to Google Android mobile platform automatically! This means that the current JavaME developers will enjoy the advantages of porting their existing mobile application to Android effortlessly.

According to their press release, the next j2mepolish release will focus on automating the process of converting JavaME MIDlets to iPhone application.

J2ME Polish 2.1: Android support?

Currently I've yet to see how a ported JavaME application would look like on an Android mobile phone, but hopefully it would be as good as the ordinary Google Android app. At this time of this writing, J2ME Polish 2.1 is only available as a preview release which can be downloaded from J2ME Polish website.

I'll update this blog about this feature once J2ME Polish 2.1 has been released.

p/s: I'm Eager to know how a JavaME app will look like once its ported to Android.

Test post

M.H Ismail — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 09:44:10 +0000

This is a test post

JavaME JSR-179 Example Code : Detect Location via TinyGeocoder

M.H Ismail — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 13:19:39 +0000

I've completed the JSR-179 Location API code for reverse geocoding in JavaME. This code essentially is an expansion of the previous JSR-179 example that i've posted in the blog before, plus the Reverse-Geocoding feature, thanks to TinyGeocoder service.

What this sample MIDlet does?
It obtain coordinates via the mobile phone JSR-179 Location API and subsequently display the name of the location using TinyGeocoder reverse geocoding service.

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

import javax.microedition.midlet.*;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.*;
import javax.microedition.location.*;
import javax.microedition.io.*;
import javax.microedition.location.*;
import java.io.*;
public class Geocoder extends MIDlet implements CommandListener
{
public Display display;
public Form form;
private Command cmdExit,cmdOK;
public StringItem si, sili;
public Geocoder()
{
display =Display.getDisplay(this);
form = new Form("Location Api test");
cmdExit = new Command("Exit",Command.EXIT,5);
cmdOK = new Command("OK",Command.OK,1);
si = new StringItem("Coordinates", "Press OK");
sili = new StringItem("Location", "");
form.append(si);
form.append(sili);
form.addCommand(cmdOK);
form.addCommand(cmdExit);
form.setCommandListener(this);
}
public void startApp()
{
display.setCurrent(form);
}
public void pauseApp()
{}
public void destroyApp(boolean flag) {
notifyDestroyed();
}
public void commandAction(Command c, Displayable d)
{
if (c == cmdOK){
Retriever ret = new Retriever(this);
ret.start();
} else if (c == cmdExit) {
destroyApp(false);
}
}
public void displayString(String string)
{
si.setText(string);
}
public void showAlert(String message) {
Alert alert = new Alert("Alert",message,null,AlertType.WARNING);
display.setCurrent(alert,form);
}
}
class Retriever extends Thread {
private Geocoder midlet;
Form formRunning;
Gauge gauge;
public Retriever(Geocoder midlet)
{
/**
* Constructor
*
* EFFECTS: Initialise the server and store midlet information
*
* @param midlet The main application midlet
* @param server Forecast Server URL
*
*/
this.midlet = midlet;
formRunning = new Form("Retrieving Info");
formRunning.append(new Gauge("Processing",false,Gauge.INDEFINITE,Gauge.CONTINUOUS_RUNNING));
midlet.display.setCurrent(formRunning);
}
public void run()
{
/**
* Entry point of the thread
*
* EFFECTS: call to connect() method
*/
try {
checkLocation();
} catch (Exception ex)
{
ex.printStackTrace();
midlet.displayString(ex.toString());
} finally {
}
}
public void checkLocation() throws Exception
{
String string;
Location l;
LocationProvider lp;
Coordinates c;
// Set criteria for selecting a location provider:
// accurate to 500 meters horizontally
Criteria cr= new Criteria();
cr.setHorizontalAccuracy(5000);
cr.setVerticalAccuracy(5000);
// Get an instance of the provider
lp= LocationProvider.getInstance(cr);
// Request the location, setting a one-minute timeout
l = lp.getLocation(120);
c = l.getQualifiedCoordinates();
if(c != null ) {
// Use coordinate information
double lat = c.getLatitude();
double lon = c.getLongitude();
string = "\nLatitude : " + lat + "\nLongitude : " + lon;
new GetData(midlet,lat,lon).start();
} else {
string ="Location API failed";
}
formRunning.append("Obtained coordinates...");
midlet.displayString(string);
}
}
class GetData implements Runnable,CommandListener {
Geocoder midlet;
double lat, lon;
public GetData (Geocoder midlet, double lat, double lon) {
this.lat = lat;
this.lon = lon;
this.midlet = midlet;
}
public void commandAction (Command cmd,Displayable disp)
{
}
public void start() {
Thread t = new Thread(this);
t.start();
}
public void run() {
HttpConnection conn=null;
InputStream is=null;
String sb;
try {
String sUrl = "http://tinygeocoder.com/create-api.php?g="+""+lat+","+""+lon;
conn = (HttpConnection) Connector.open(sUrl,Connector.READ);
if (conn.getResponseCode() == HttpConnection.HTTP_OK) {
is = conn.openInputStream();
byte buf[] = new byte[128];
int total =0;
while (total <128) {
int count = is.read(buf,total,128-total);
if (count<0) {
break;
}
total += count;
}
sb = new String(buf,0,total);
if (sb.length() <10) {
midlet.showAlert("Connection error, please try again");
is.close();
conn.close();
return;
}
midlet.sili.setText(sb);
//midlet.form.append(sb);
//vectorized();
//midlet.saveCurrency(false,midlet.vector);
//midlet.display.setCurrent(midlet.form);
} else if (conn.getResponseCode() == HttpConnection.HTTP_NOT_FOUND) {
midlet.showAlert("URL not found");
} else {
midlet.showAlert("Server busy or unavailable. Please try again later");
}
} catch (SecurityException sex) {
midlet.showAlert("Connection failed. You need to authorize this application to access network");
} catch (IOException ioex) {
midlet.showAlert("Connection failed. Please try again later.");
} catch (Exception e){
midlet.showAlert(e.toString());
e.printStackTrace();
//midlet.display.setCurrent(midlet.form);
} finally {
try {
if (is != null) {
is.close();
}
if (conn != null) {
conn.close();
}
} catch (IOException ioexception) {}
is =null;
conn =null;
midlet.display.setCurrent(midlet.form);
}
}
public String URLEncode(String s)
{
if (s!=null) {
StringBuffer tmp = new StringBuffer();
int i=0;
try {
while (true) {
int b = (int)s.charAt(i++);
if ((b>=0x30 && b<=0x39) || (b>=0x41 && b<=0x5A) || (b>=0x61 && b<=0x7A)) {
tmp.append((char)b);
}
else {
tmp.append("%");
if (b <= 0xf) tmp.append("0");
tmp.append(Integer.toHexString(b));
}
}
}
catch (Exception e) {}
return tmp.toString();
}
return null;
}
}

The code requires mobile device which implements JSR-179 Location API and has been tested on Nokia E71 and 6210 Navigator.

TinyGeo-coder : A cool free geocoding/reverse geocoding service

M.H Ismail — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 17:25:06 +0000

I was searching for a free and easy to use geocoding web service over the internet for my experiment involving Location Based Service (LBS). Then suddenly i came accross tinygeocoder, a web service which really suits my need.

tinygeocoder services that caught my eye :

geocoding - you can feed it with name of place like "San Francisco, CA" and it will return result in latitude and longitude pair "(37.775196,-122.419204)"
reverse geocoding - feed it with a coordinate, and the service will return you the name of the corresponding place.

Personally I like the "reverse geocoding" functionality more as it would be handy for my LBS project. Keep an eye for this blog as I'll be posting JavaME JSR-179 (Location API) codes which utilizes tinygeocoder services.

p/s: If you find tinygeoder helpful, consider making donations to them.

Kirodict – a Compact, Lightweight JavaME mobile dictionary

M.H Ismail — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 14:04:06 +0000

Finally after spending a couple months working on this on and off personal project, I decided to release the final version of Kirodict - a lightweight mobile dictionary.

As it name implies, Kirodict was designed to be small in size while maintaining its functionality as a fully fledge dictionary for mobile and embedded device. Kirodict acts as a front-end to an RFC2229 (dict.org) compatible server which it obtain the word definition from.

Its small and compact size as well as its portability makes it an attractive application to be downloaded and installed on your mobile phone. Kirodict requires mobile phones with at least these feature :

MIDP 2.0 /CLDC 1.0 compatible phones
128kB of free storage space
Phone with network connection (3G, GPRS, Wifi, wimax)

With lower requirements, it can be installed on a lower end phone without much problem. Kirodict does not use additional storage space as it does not cache its results.

Kirodict can be downloaded from Kirodict Google Code project website and it is licensed under the GNU General Public License version 2.0

Google Android Phone Kogan Agora delayed?

M.H Ismail — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 10:52:15 +0000

Probably a stale news for most of you, the touted second Google Android Phone on the market, Kogan Agora product has been canceled despite having received huge pre-orders. The official statement from Kogan Technologies website states that the Kogan Agora release is delayed indefinitely citing technical issues regarding is screen size and resolution.

Kogan Agora, estimated to be available by Christmas 2008, might not even be ready by this year (2009). Customer who pre-ordered Kogan is being refunded as this article were written.

Its a pity to see such affordable Google Android phone to be delayed indefinitely, while there are a lot of phone manufacturers behind Open Handset Alliance (OHA, the organization that backed Android), we have yet to see other Google Android phone surfaces besides HTC manufactured T-Mobile G1.

As for my personal opinion, I don't think Android platform is worth investing in right now since the only supported Android phone in the market is the SIM-locked T-Mobile, and although there has been news that Motorola, Huawei and Sony Ericsson are preparing to release Android phone, I don't think I will give in much hope for Android until I've seen on the shelf of my local mobile phone store (SIM-unlocked, just like normal phones that is)

Primosync: Synchronize Google Calendar with Mobile Phone

M.H Ismail — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 06:46:10 +0000

This week, I've tried Primosync, a JavaME application which allows you to synchronize your Calendar, Events and activities with Google Calendar.

Primosync is compatible with mobile phone which supports JavaME JSR-75 PIM API, a feature that becoming common in latest modern phones.

Advantages of syncing phone calendar with Google Calendar :

You will be able to access your event, activities and reminders anywhere with internet connection
Your events and reminder will be more portable across various phone models as you can sync it with Google Calendar to update your Calendar
Easier to keep track of your reminder and events
As a backup measure in case if your mobile phone is stolen or lost

You can download it from Primosync Google Code project website (yes it is open source!) or from Primosync.mobi download site (mobile phone friendly). Available in 3 versions (Blackberry, JavaME Signed, JavaME Unsigned), for some reasons, I was unable to install the Signed version of Primosync in my E71. So I figure the Unsigned version might work in more phones.

So lets start syncing!

I bought a new phone – Nokia E71

mypapit — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 18:58:41 +0000

I know I've been slacking lately on my post.. but hey, I got myself a new phone - The Nokia E71!

Phones model and features are getting diverse now and I've noticed that its getting harder and harder to choose a phone that really suits my needs. For example, one feature found on Phone A isnt necessarily can be found on Phone B.

So it took me a while to replace my good old 6630 that has been stolen few months before. But hey, I'm back on my feet now.

Among the key feature that attract me to buy this phone are :

Location API support (JSR-179) with built in GPS receiver
QWERTY keyboard
Ease of handling, my hands a bit slippy on its sister's phone E66
Battery last longer
Hot swappable micro-sd card
More than adequate internal memory

Supports WiFi

The only drawback that I could think of this phone is its camera that is not as good as the N95,N96 series phone. But I can still live with that since I rarely use the camera anyway.

Other additional feature
The phone comes with Advance Call Manager and Multi Scanner free of charge, making it easier to filter out unwanted call and to manage phone blacklist.

Multi Scanner allows you to take a photo of name card and automatically store important information (Name, Phone Number, Address, Company's Name, Fax Number) right into the phone.

I hope I can be more productive at updating this blog and producing new mobile applications with this phone.

How to get Nokia Battery Level in JavaME

mypapit — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 00:17:49 +0000

Nokia Symbian 3rd Edition phone introduces "com.nokia.mid.batterylevel" properties which you can get the current battery charge level by calling System.getProperty("com.nokia.mid.batterylevel") from within your midlet application. Its up to your imagination for you to do the rest.

Sample source code (displaying battery charge level on gauge):

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

/**********
/*
/* Nokia Battery Level midlet
/* Copyright 2008 Mohammad Hafiz bin Ismail (info@mypapit.net)
/* http://mobilepit.com
/*
/* May be use freely
**********/
import javax.microedition.midlet.*;
import javax.microedition.lcdui.*;
public class NokiaBattery extends MIDlet implements CommandListener {
int value;
Display display;
Form form;
Gauge gauge;
Command cmdExit;
public NokiaBattery() {
display = Display.getDisplay(this);
form = new Form("Nokia Battery");
cmdExit = new Command("Exit",Command.EXIT,1);
form.addCommand(cmdExit);
value=Integer.parseInt(System.getProperty("com.nokia.mid.batterylevel"));
gauge = new Gauge("Level",false,100,value);
form.append(gauge);
form.append("Value :"+value);
StringItem item = new StringItem("Network Signal",System.getProperty("com.nokia.mid.networksignal"));
form.append(item);
form.setCommandListener(this);
}
public void startApp(){
display.setCurrent(form);
}
public void pauseApp() {}
public void destroyApp(boolean flags) {
notifyDestroyed();
}
public void commandAction (Command cmd, Displayable disp)
{
if (cmd == cmdExit) {
destroyApp(false);
}
}
}

Download source code and sample midlet : NokiaBattery_midlet.zip

Free Skype JavaME (J2ME) client for mobile device

mypapit — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:01:47 +0000

Great news for those who are using Skype to get connected with their contacts, now they can do so while on the move with the free Skype mobile client.

The mobile client offers chat feature as well as receiving calls from Skype contacts. However airtime charge may incur for receiving voice call, depending on the subscribers' data plan.

The main advantage of this J2ME client is portability across a wide-range of mobile devices which implements MIDP 2.0. Although the Skype Mobile website lists only handful of supported device, in reality Mobile Skype is supported on a lot more devices.

Disadvantages include its inability to send SMS to your contacts and the inability to make voice calls. However in my opinion, the free Mobile Skype does its best considering it is written for mobile devices with limited capabilities.

You can download Skype Mobile from this website : http://mobiledownload.skype.com/

Tips
With little creativity on java jad file, you can install Mobile Skype on any MIDP 2.0 supported device without much trouble

Upgraded to Wordpress 2.5.1

mypapit — Mon, 19 May 2008 06:12:17 +0000

This website upgraded has been upgraded to wordpress 2.5.1 to ensure quality content delivery for its reader. Thank you for subscribing and reading this blog after this long years. I'm planning to continue to write in the blog again some time after next month.

So stay tuned!

Create PC Bluetooth application easily with pybluez

mypapit — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 04:19:46 +0000

pybluez is a python bindings for the bluez application which enables you to interface with bluetooth devices on your computer.

Combined with the power of python dynamic typing, you will be able to do Rapid Application Development and test mobile bluetooth application quickly on your computer

Here's a snippets which combines pyosd and pybluez which scans for nearby bluetooth devices and display the result on screen :

PLAIN TEXT

PYTHON:

import bluetooth
import pyosd
from time import sleep
p = pyosd.osd()
p.set_pos(pyosd.POS_MID)
p.set_align(pyosd.ALIGN_CENTER)
p.set_colour("green")
p.display( "Scanning for bluetooth device")
nearby_devices = bluetooth.discover_devices(duration=20, lookup_names = True)
str= "found %d devices" % len(nearby_devices)
print str
p.display(str)
sleep(2)
for name, addr in nearby_devices:
p.display( " %s - %s" % (addr, name))
print (" %s - %s" % (addr,name))
sleep(2)

Python enables Rapid Application Development on your computer without much fuss. Coupled with pygtk and wxPython acting as GUI, you can create a lot of bluetooth application to interface with your mobile devices, limited only by your imagination.

[tags]python,pybluez,bluetooth,gtk,gnome,linux,mobile,pda,programming,development,RAD[/tags]

How to get Phone IMEI number with J2ME / JavaME

mypapit — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:57:53 +0000

International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) is used to identify valid devices connected to GSM and UMTS network. This number can be accessed from a mobile phone by dialing *#06# on the keypad. IMEI is commonly use by software developers as part of software protection scheme to prevent it from being pirated.

JavaME developers however suffers from a drawback because MIDP/CLDC specification does not include an API to obtain IMEI from mobile devices. However there are few phone manufacturers included this functionality through System.getPropery() calls.

Here's how to get IMEI number from mobile devices of different manufacturers
Nokia

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

System.getProperty("phone.imei");
System.getProperty("com.nokia.IMEI");

Note ; Requires signed midlet. S60 3rd edition device does not requires signing for this to work.

Sony-Ericsson

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

System.getProperty("com.sonyericsson.imei");

Note ; might not work on all model, YMMV

Motorola

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

System.getProperty("IMEI");
System.getProperty("com.motorola.IMEI");

Samsung

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

System.getProperty("com.samsung.imei");

Siemens

PLAIN TEXT

JAVA:

System.getProperty("com.siemens.imei");

Hopefully this information can aid you in your J2ME programming projects.

Quick Tip :
It's quite hard to determine the phone model/manufacturer well ahead beforehand. For a more robust solution, I suggest that you combine the above call with System.getProperty("microedition.platform").

[tags]j2me,javame,mobile,opensource,imei,nokia,sony ericsson,samsung,motorola[/tags]