Virgin Mobile started selling MiFi modems. These devices allow you to create a mobile Hotspots so devices with Wireless card can connect to Internet over 3G (UMTS) or GSM networks.

Device has following advantages:

• Multiple devices can connect to Internet on the go.
• Device is battery powered and could be recharged using a standard USB cable.
• Devices with WiFi capability, but without 3G connection (such as Apple iPod) can now be connected to Internet from any place
• Other WiFi devices, like Skype or SIP hardware phones could be connected via 3G network

Device which is sold by Virgin is locked to Optus network, but you can purchase unlocked version of this device which is Huawei E5830 on eBay for approximately AU$120. Unlocked version is better if you travel outside Australia frequently, so you can connect to overseas mobile Internet providers just by purchasing their SIM card instead of buying another (probably, also locked) modem.

Today, while recharging my Virgin Mobile phone account I found an excellent mobile data deal. Prepaid customers recharging their account with any cap plan starting from $19 will get a 1Gb of mobile Internet data valid for one month in addition to free Virgin to Virgin calls and $50 for other calls (the catch is that these calls would be charged at $0.90 per minute). The offer is valid for a limited time, but since its prepaid there is no long term obligations. Not a bad deal compared to other providers,

So today I removed my Three mobile broadband SIM card and inserted Virgin Mobile SIM into by beloved Nexus One phone. After that you need to configure your phone to use Virgin APN for Internet access. Here are the screenshots of APN configuration page whch is available at Settings->Wireless & Networks->Mobile Networks->Access Point Names

Name: Virgin Internet
APN: VirginInternet
Proxy: 202.139.83.152
Port: 8070
Authentication type: None

Another reason for switching to Virgin is that Three network appears to be congested while travelling home from Sydney CBD into Engadine on the train, in particular near Kogarah station. I’m sure that is a congestion and not networks coverage, since in the morning while travelling along the same route connection is quite stable and speeds are good.

I’ll compare if Optus netwrork (whch is used by Virgin) provider better results.

Android

• Lifehacker Australia: Top 10 Android Apps
  Collection of useful applications for your Android phone

Linux

• Build a Netbook NAS With Linux
  Got old laptop or netbook collectiong dust? Use it as NAS server for your home network
• Set Up a VNC Linux Server in 5 Easy Steps
  Access your Linux desktop remotely

Software

• MS: Be Careful With Those Function Keys
  Pressing F1 key while browsing some sites in Internet Explorer may infect your PC
• Stack Overflow-like Open Source Q&A Systems for Download
  Found many solutions for your programming problems on Stack Overflow? Want to run something similar for your own company projects? Here are the open source web based products with functionality similar to StackOverflow

Software development

• Hg Init: a Mercurial tutorial by Joel Spolsky
  Mercurial is a modern, open source, distributed version control system, and a compelling upgrade from older systems like Subversion. In this user-friendly, six-part tutorial, Joel Spolsky teaches you the key concepts.
• Paper: High Performance Scalable Data Stores 
  Nicely detailed one stop shop paper comparing scalable databases such as Redis, Scalaris, Voldmort, Riak, Couch DB, MongoDB, SimpleDB, BigTable, HBase, HyperTable, Cassandra, MySQL Cluster, ScaleDB, Drizzle, and VoltDB. The paper describes each system and then compares them on the dimensions of Concurrency Control, Data Storage Replication, Transaction Model, General Comments, Maturity, K-hits, License Language.
• The Daily WTF: Patterns of Failure
  Consolidating all business applications into one generic corporate framework may not be a best thing

Web

• Web Resizer – resize images for blogging
  Provides services to scale image to any size and compression, apply sharpen filter, convert into monochome or tinted, add border. Also shows the result with its file size and dimensions.

For last two years I was using Voipstunt.com for making international phone calls. It saves you money and you can call some destinations for free. The actual company behind Voipstunt is Betamax which brands its services with several dozens of seemingly independent companies.

It does not really matter with which company you will signup with. All of them are using same infrastructure and call quality will be the same.

But prices between these companies do differ, so its best to compare and find a company with lowest price for the destination you are calling most frequently. Comparison table could be found at http://backsla.sh/betamax

You can recharge you account using credit card, PayPal and other payment methods. The service works with hardware VOIP devices (I’m using Dlink ATA2 myself).

If you are travelling or your Internet connection is down you can establish a phone call between any two phone numbers by entering the numbers on website.

Want to check connection quality before making purchase (which is as low as 10 Euro)? Make a free call from Australian landline phone to any other phone in zero-priced destination such as another Australian landline or landline in UK, US or other countries using a Voipstunt home page at http://www.voipstunt.com.

Related resources:

• Comparison chart of Australian based VOIP providers with monthly plan cost and per call or per minute costs

Photos taken at Zermatt during my trip to Switzerland in 2008.

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You can get this stylish keyboard for $400 (%450 for glass version).

Having less than pleasant experience with similar keyless keyboards in the past, I wonder if it is really good for actual typing.

Links:

• http://cleankeysinc.com/
• Evict Bacteria With the Cleankeys Touch Sensitive Keyboard

Corsair, a worldwide leader in high-performance computer and flash memory products, today announced the availability of its new Flash Padlock 2 secure USB flash drive. This unique USB flash drive is very cleverly and comprehensively designed to protect your critical business or personal data from unwanted exposure.

Source

.NET software development

• WPF Toolkit – February 2010 Release
  New release of open source library with additional WPF controls such as DataGrid, DatePicker, Calendar and VisualStateManager

Linux

• 6 of the Best Free Linux Disk Cloning Software – LinuxLinks News
• 7 of the Best Free Linux Configuration Management Tools – LinuxLinks News

Other

• How To Cook Something In The Dishwasher
  In case yor oven gets broken, here is a recipe how to cook chicken in the dishwasher.
• Open Thread: Old Fogeys v. Young Whippersnappers, Ageism in Tech
• jsFiddle
  Experiment with HTML, CSS and JavaScript using online editor and see results instantly. Also supports inclusion of popular JavaScript frameworks and your own code

Web

• ABCya: Thousands of educational & browser based games for kids
• FillAnyPdf makes it easy to share forms and collect data online – Download Squad
• Find Similar Websites in Google Chrome – the How-To Geek
• Google Reader goes realtime with PubSubHubBub support

.NET software development

• 60+ .NET libraries every developer should know about.
• Code Project: Consuming WCF / ASMX / REST service using JQuery

Android

• WikiPock – browse Wikipedia from mobile device without Internet connection
  WikiPock is a mobile phone application that allows you to search and read Wikipedia without an internet connection (offline). All the articles are stored in your mobile phone’s memory so there is no need to download anything from the network. It’s the world’s largest encyclopedia with over 3.1 million articles in English. The cost for Android is 10 Euro
• eBay launches an app for Google Android

Mobile devices

• Americans Sending 4 Times as Many Text Messages as Brits
• Google makes biggest gain in smartphone market share

News

• Remains of 2 found after Austin plane crash
  Joseph Stack III, 53, an Austin resident with an apparent grudge against the Internal Revenue Service, set his house on fire Thursday and then crashed a Piper Cherokee PA-28 into the building, which houses an IRS office with nearly 200 employees, federal officials said.

Other

• Parents: school used webcam to spy on our kid at home
  Orewell’s telescreens become a reality. Webcam built in into laptops given to kids could be activated remotely by school stuff and monitor what kids are doing at home.
• The Book Depository offers free worldwide shipping for paper books – Download Squad

Software

• 7 Ways To Become More Productive With Firefox Tabs
• Picasa Album Downloader Snags Entire Albums In A Few Clicks
  Works on Windows/Mac/Linux

Software development

• Coding Horror: Nobody Hates Software More Than Software Developers
• MF Bliki: Version Control Tools
  Shortcomings of Microsoft’s TFS and ClearCase. Reasons for not using SourceSafe. Subversion compared to Distriuted Versioning Systems such as Git and Mercurial.
• Stevey’s Blog Rants: (Not) Managing Software Developers
• Top 25 Most Dangerous Programming Errors

Web

• 30 Useful (and Unknown) Web Apps You Need to Bookmark | Maximum PC
• Creately: Simple Yet Powerful Diagram Creation Program Online
• PleaseRobMe and the Dangers of Location-Based Social Networks
  Location-based social networks like Foursquare, Gowalla, Brightkite and Google Buzz are currently among the fastest growing new mobile services. All of these apps have one thing in common: they encourage you to share your current location with the rest of the world. By doing this, though, you are also telling people where you are not: at home. A new site, PleaseRobMe, plays on this theme and displays real-time updates from Foursquare users who broadcast their check-ins on Twitter.

Here are the photos taken during my trip to Tokyo in 2008.

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