How to Migrate between two smart phones

Migrating between phones is really a pain .
Data can be migrated easily by just changing the SD card given that all the data is stored in SD card and not in phone memory.
However, two things which are not so easy are SMS messages and Contacts.

1) Contacts.
Contacts can be exported to a .csv file from old phone and that file can be imported in the new phone.
(Contacts Options >> Import/export )

2) SMS messages
Install SMS backup restore app on both the phones and export the xml file from old phone and import to new phone :)  In case import is not working, one can open the xml file with this app.
Similar apps is available for all the platforms.Since this app works with any xml file, it allows interoperability.

3) For important docs, and other things, use cloud services like Box,Dropbox,Google Drive,Skydrive etc and backup your docs.

How to tackle Spam Attacks in Facebook

This week, I was a victim of facebook spam attack twice.It took sometime to understand what happened and how to avoid it.I have listed down sometips to tackle this issue.
Looks like that i was an victim of ClickJacking.

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO IF YOUR ACCOUNT IS SENDING SPAM TO YOUR FACEBOOK FRIENDS.

I have seen people who have deleted their facebook accounts just because their account was phished or was part of a spam attack.Below are some tips on how to handle this with peace.

1) Change your password (Account Settings -> General -> Password) 

The number one thing you should do when your account is exhibiting some mischievous behaviour is to change password. If you change password from web interface, it will also prompt you to logoff from other locations where your facebook session is active.

        
2) Disable other sessions (Account Settings -> Security  -> Active Sessions)

Disable all your other active sessions . This will allow phishing to cease in case its a simple one and is not an automated one.

3) Disable Third party applications using your facebook 
      (Account Settings -> Apps  -> Apps you use ).

99% of the time its a third party application which you might have inadvertently accepted which went rogue .Click on  "Turn Off the platform." . This will disable all third party applications using your facebook activity and blocks anything they want to do with your facebook account.
This will take some time (not sure why though ?)  Till then you can remove all apps activity in the same tab.

4) Remove the content that triggered this.
You might get an idea what have triggered this mischievous activity by now.Most probably it would be "like" you did on an external website or a facebook post from a third party app. Remove that or any recent activity which is done from any external entity other than facebook.
If not and in case of Clickjacking , it will trigger this spam attack whenever you login back to facebook. Beware.
Report the app to facebook support /Report as Spam.
( In my case, it was a status update made from a third party app 'Selective tweets' ).

5) Cleanse your system 

Remove all the cookies in your  browser.
Update anti spamware software in your system and run a scan.


But "Prevention is better than Cure" . Do not allow third party tools to access facebook  and do not click on mischievous links.


- VolTa

Tech tricks, tips and Tantras - 06/01/2012

Some tech hacks which are interesting,helpful  and hopefully insightful .


1)  Whenever you are on a long journey or going to a place where there would be no cellular signals, better put the phone in Flight Mode.This will save a lot of battery. Cellphones use lot of power just to search for signals.

2)  If you have an android phone , you dont need to go to playstore in your phone and download the apps. One can browse the playstore from web interface and install it from there. I believe this is true for all appstores.

3) Skype is completely free for 1 month as trial offer. Follow this link  for signing for this and this link  for instructions. Yes, you an call US numbers for free for a month :)

4) Utorrent remote is an amazing app to monitor your utorrent downloads from anywhere .

5) If you think, your email is getting spammed a lot , just search for "unsubscribe" and unsubcribe to all those unnecessary things you might have subscribed earlier and are no mood to read all those now.


Happy Weekend !!

- Vams

Websites of the Year - 2012

Its the new year , new aspirations , new resolutions, new insights and new hopes.leaving all the bad and cherishing all the good  Internet plays a major role in our daily life. And this is my tribute to the Best of Internet for me in the year 2012. Hope you like this as well:)

1) Quora

If browsing something has inspired me, made me addicted , made me Q(C)urious and Qu(V)oracious , its Quora.
The most wonderful discovery i made on this internet space this year.Hop on and thank me later.The real knowledge Hub of the internet . Question Jimmy Wales,Checkout answers of Ashton Kutcher, Stephen Fry and follow the most intelligent people on this planet.And get credits :)

2) Paytm

If there is a option to recharge your Indian cellular phone with maximum benefit and miniumum effort, its this paytm.com . They even launched bus tickets with a bang offer of flat 50% discount on Dec 12, the online shopping festival day. You can even store your credit card and can complete recharge in a whiff. Did i tell you there android app is awesome.

3) Pocket

I am a big time procrastinator and a voracious internet reader. So what can be my biggest internet tool than a facility to read all those internet stuff later when i have time. Initially i was a fan of Instapaper, but after the Samsung Tab added to my digital ecosystem , I had to shift to Pocket as Instapaper App was a paid one.And this is one shift i regret not doing earlier.
Pocket has one of the awesomest user interfaces i have seen. Love the way it displays those Arrays of my to-read list.

4) Livemocha.com

Havent made much progress in my 2012 new year resolution of learning a foreign language, but livemocha.com is one of the best website if you also have a similar bucket list.

5) http://kaipullai.com/
And why should we not end the list with an awesome blog which has some excellent stories to tell in more excellent way. These blogposts blew my mind .if you are interesting in  history and current affairs of India, visit this .

- Vams.

PS- Happy New year 2013.

WesBites for the Week - Oct 14

Continuing the series :)

There is a saying in internet world "If you are not paying for the product, YOU are the product" .
And this link http://rcs.seerinteractive.com/money/ gives you details of some free websites we use regularly and how they are monetized and how are they surviving. Interesting business models like freemium, Selling data etc.

And let me introduce  the best search engine i have come across .
http://duckduckgo.com/ is even better than google. It doesnt show results based on user preferences and uses crowd sourced sources like wikipedia for better results.

Ever wonder what are the best radio resources on web for listening music. Yea, leave Pandora , spotify etc which doesnt work in India . http://www.sky.fm/ is one which is awesome when it comes with some super radio streams . Tune it in.!!

Many say that the ambience of the work desk is most important for one to be productive. Would it not be awesome to have the http://raining.fm/ with rain as background song while you are focussing on something. :) Try it .. Its awesome...

Iam sure everyones bucket list contains a "World Tour" . If not , you should :) . Well, it might not be possible to see the whole world even if u can . Google simplifies this  and brings http://www.google.com/culturalinstitute/worldwonders/wonders-of-nature/
Start touring !!

Thanks to the social networking and instagram-ish sites, everyone is a photographer now ..  No offence to the those guys .. but you should look at this http://camerasim.com/camera-simulator/ and improve your skills . It will help you simulate the various feature available in the DSLRs.

And, last but not least, some mind crunching reading..http://www.ijreview.com/2012/04/688-tax-system-explained-beer/ Iam not sure how to explain 'Taxes" in better way. Also, tells you whats wrong with our world.

Cheerio.. Have an  Awesome week !!

Websites for the Week - Oct 7

This is the list of websites i have found interesting while i do the 'random" browsing everyday.


There is no excuse now if you wanted to learn something on the web and time has flown . This has been the inspiration for Xuan Li  , the curator for this awesome website http://www.noexcuselist.com/index.html .
All the open course ware links are brought under one roof. Learn Music, learn cooking , learn a new language and what not.And all the links are FREE and not some tutor sites .

If u miss having a HD tv at home with an music channel on it. This http://grapevinyl.com website substitutes you for this . Wonderful songs with an HD format and can play randomly . Yea, you can do this on youtube as well with some effort by yourself . But if someone takes care of curation of content, are we not happy a little bit more :)

Well, the perfect address for  edutainment, inspiration and most awesome talks is the TED. http://blog.ted.com/2012/08/21/the-20-most-watched-ted-talks-to-date/ gives the best TED talks , rather the most watched TED talks of all time. I completed this bucket list and you should also give it a try.

Ever wonder, how awesome your office can be . http://www.officesnapshots.com/ is the link you should be browsing . Well, i am not responsible if your management doesnt agree to the changes you suggest to office landscape after seeing this link .:)

This one is for techies and the guys who want to START. http://whattouse.com/toolkit/web-site-launch-toolkit gives a list of things you need to take care when your website is being started.

And this one is for Indian history, political buffs like me . http://kiranasis.blogspot.in/2012/01/jammu-and-kashmir-injustices-and-myths.html illustrates brilliantly about the notions we have about Jammu and Kashmir .


PS: Hoping to run such series every sunday :) 

IFTTT– IF This Then That

One of the most awesome things i came across the internet is IFTTT. 

Put the internet to work for you. Seriously, automate everything what you do on internet.

For example, If u want to send out a tweet whenever u upload a video on youtube , that can be done.

Do you want to add ur favourite tweets which contain links  to the instapaper to read later , that can be done.

If you want an SMS to be sent whenever some stock raises , that can be done.

If you want all your instagram pics to be saved into dropbox, that can be done.

The total permutations and combinations one can do with all the services listed here is huge.

One such example is

 

The thing in background is pretty simple, take api of one service and poll it for every interval and if found, trigger another service.

Such an awesome idea you see. Add to that the awesomest interface to work on.

 

PS- Iam still exploring all these things.

Right now , iam using this for whenever i favourite a tweet with a link, it adds to up to my instapaper read later list.

whenever i add  a favorite to my readability list, it gets bookmarked to delicious.

Whenever i star an item in Google Reader, a tweet is sent.