MeeGo – Nokia’s Plan B
If you had a mobile in the 90s and early 2000, chances are that phone was a Nokia. Nokia was a giant at the time, and it is only recently that they’ve been knocked off the top as the ‘top handset manufacturer’ by Samsung. Many believe that their fall from grace was primarily due to their slow start in taking smartphones seriously; they did manufacture smartphones, however Symbian, when compared to iOS or Android, doesn’t hold up well.
Why we love SMS
In 1992 the first text message was sent from a PC to a phone on the Vodafone network. Neil Papworth sent the message “Merry Christmas” to the phone of Richard Jarvis. 20 years later we each send an average of 40 messages a month; some may send thousands a month. Why do we love the SMS, how has it affected our lives and is it for the better or worse?
The Dream Phone
For many the pinnacle of mobile phone technology is the Nokia 3310, a phone that has sold more than any variant of the iPhone. For others, mobile phones did not exist until after the iPhone and no other phone will replace the iPhone is their dream phone. What we here at Freedom Mobiles have written is our idea of the dream phone that is not all fantasy requirements, in our opinion it is all feasible with today’s technology but may not be cost effective right now.
Sim Only V Contract, How To Save A Fortune
Many people are so used to getting an upgrade when their contract is up or enjoy going into phone shops to marvel at the latest handset, all of which are normally contract only, locked to a certain carrier, are usually only available on the pricier price plans and locked for 24 months. Other people may opt for Pay as You Go however once again the phone is almost certainly locked to the carrier and high end or even mid range phones aren't normally for sale on Pay as You Go.
Augmented Reality
In Google’s secret X Lab Google plans to develop a pair of augmented reality glasses codenamed ‘Project Glass’ which will allow a hands free experience of augmented reality. This is planned to be done by utilising a heads up display integrated into a pair of glasses whilst commands will be executed by voice. This backing by a major company has brought huge media attention to AR. So we at Freedom Mobile set out to explore this technology, its future and what exactly has it to do with your phone!
Is My Phone Safe From Viruses?
Virus is a scary word, you certainly don’t want to be infected by one so why would you want your phone to catch one. With smartphones being considered by many to be pocket computers, it’s a sensible suggestion that phones may be prone to the same infections that PCs are famous for. How likely is this and how useful are these ‘Anti-Virus’ apps you see for your phone?
The Cliff Theory; ‘What is Nokia doing these days!?’
Unless you are in charge of PR at Nokia you can’t help but notice that unlike in the late 90s, not everyone is carrying a Nokia phone these days. Nokia isn't alone in this respect, look at Blackberry, Palm and Motorola; all of whom very recently had significant market shares in the mobile handset market.
The ‘Free’ Market
How would you react if you were told that you could only shop at Tesco? Although Tesco may stock thousands of items, they may not stock the item you want or the item you want is actually cheaper elsewhere. You find out that Asda has the item you want but you are not allowed in as you are only allowed in Tesco! This is a basic analogy of the problems facing mobile phone users and their respective App Stores or Markets; it is expected that you can only use the store permitted by the phone manufacturer.
The Future That is 4G
With the release of ‘The New iPad’ (A silly name if you ask us here at Freedom-Mobiles) the idea of a 4G phone connection has crept into the public mindset, many of whom have only just got their heads around 3G. But what is 4G? Many may ask what 3G was all about! Let’s find out.
Magento Amazon Integration Solution
An off the wall specialist post here for anyone who runs a Magento site like Freedom Mobiles and wants to port over their stock to Amazon.
Here at Freedom Mobiles we're not shy about doing our research and the final solution we have is pretty reasonable. If anyone has any better ideas feel free to shout about them here in the comments!
The main tool you need is Camiloo Amazon Module. Its a fairly well established tool but if like us you have one of a kind items with variations in condition then you'll need a little help from the Magento inbuilt features. Unfortunately while advanced the Camiloo module does have one glaring weakness. When you select your items to list, there is the assumption that all items in the same category will have the same condition and condition note (the longer description you can customise for your amazon listing). For us this was a sticking point of course because we stock used items. there is a bulk editor built into the Amazon module but sadly its not quite able to do everything you need, partly because it has problems accessing the internal Magento product ID and partly because the Magento data flow feature is far superior and more flexible.
If you have Magento 1.6 or better then take a look at "data flow" exports; its very easy to create a CSV file which can be plugged directly into Amazon upload file page. So we use data flow to create your stock listings and then use Camiloo to deal with order importing and stock syncing.
2 words of warning.
1) You need to manually select any new products in the Amazon module and set to "allow to upload" in order to sync and import orders for that product. That applies every time you create a new product.
2) If an item is set to "pending" on Amazon, then Camiloo will automatically restock the item immediately on Amazon (it doesn't have a complete order with which to reduce the stock quantity) so you are in danger of double selling. Amazon may hammer you for this if it happens regularly. Best bet is to check your pending orders regularly and manually remove anything thats at risk of double selling. Either company can stop this happening with very simple adjustments but for some reason its not on the cards at the moment.
Thats about it, thought we would share some knowledge in the spirit of open source tools. If we' have been of any help then feel free to leave a comment (or buy a phone!)