October 26, 2010

A cracker of a security flaw has been discovered in iOS 4.x. Update on it’s way Apple?

Just a brief post this morning; I have just read that somebody has stumbled upon a security flaw in iOS 4 which allows somebody to access the contacts of a LOCKED iPhone. Not only is it possible to access the contacts, but it is possible to place a call, send an email, or send an SMS. It also appears possible to create, edit and delete contacts. Clearly the whole point of the lock screen is to prevent access to your phone should anybody else pick it up, or find it. It is specifically access to phone numbers and contact details that is supposed to be blocked so this is a pretty major issue. I’m sure Apple with be getting a fix out very soon for this.

As any new update will not initially be jail-breakable, it leaves many of us in a difficult position; if we update to fix a hole that the entire world will know about sometime time today, then we lose our Jailbreaks and unlocks, yet if we choose not to update then everybody in the world will try and mess with our phones! I expect the jailbreak community will come to the rescue on this one and release an unofficial patch via Cydia to allow us to remain on 4.1 whilst protecting against this flaw.

from the iPhone download blog website: On a password protected iPhone, tap the “Emergency Call” button then enter ###. Tap the Call button and immediately hit the Lock button. It will open your iPhone Contacts app from which you’ll be able to browse, edit, email, any contact.

October 25, 2010

BBC One HD launch on November 3rd, BBC One’s 74th Birthday

A new FTA (Free To Air) HD TV Channel is launching on the 3rd of November. The channel is to be, as the name would suggest, a “simulcast” of the existing BBC One service. The new HD channel promises to carry many of our favourite programs in glorious high definition, with those shows not making the grade being upscaled to 1080i. Eastenders is being aired in HD for the first time on Christmas day, and hopefully shows like Spooks, Match of the Day and the F1 will appear in HD sometime in 2011.

If you receive your BBC channels via ”generic’ satellite equipment (i.e not a service managed by Sky or Freesat) you will have to re-scan to continue viewing as many of the BBC services have changed transponders to accommodative this new channel.

I’m lucky enough to use a Media Centre computer for all my TV viewing so have complete control over the guide. I think I will replace the main BBC One channel with the new HD version, as I have with ITV 1 HD. I dont see the point in watching the none HD version as even if shows are only upscaled they look better.

Now all I need is to make the switch from DVB-S HD (Satellite) to DVB-T2 HD (Terrestrial HD) as at present my tuner card is only a single tuner, and also DVB-T2 (Freeview HD) carries C4 HD whereas Satellite doesn’t at present. At present however no PC tuner hardware is available for the DVB-T2 standard.

October 23, 2010

Remote Potato – Remote Recording for Win7 MediaCenter

I think I’m uncharacteristically late to the party with this one, but I have stumbled across a brilliant free application for Windows 7 which allows remote recording and sheduling via the web. It’s very similar to “WebGuide” which I used to use with Windows XP and Vista Media Center, but this seems a lot more polished. Basically Remote Potato installs a web server on your Media PC which can be accessed via the internet. The TV Guide is presented in a nice looking web page using Microsoft Silverlight. Once you ae viewing the guide in your chosen browser you can set recordings, as well as schedule series recordings and manage existing schedules! I’ts fantastic. The app also appears to support media streaming so you can access your existing recorded TV shows. This could be useful too, but it is the remote record features I am most interested in.

The caveat I suppose is that because this is hosted by a little web server on the media PC, the PC must be switched on for the service to be accessible. I think once my PC wakes up to record something it tends to stay on for a long time anyhow, so my chances of this working are quite high ! The app also offers a basic HTML version of the site which works well on my iPhone, and from what I have read in the forums it looks like a full iPhone app is on it’s way which would be BRILLIANT.

October 21, 2010

Apple releases FaceTime BETA for Mac OSX

Although somewhat predictibly Apple have released FaceTime as a BETA application for the Mac following their recent “Back to the Mac” conference. This is significant as it means that owners of the iPhone 4, the new Ipod Touch, and (possibly – it’s a guess!) owners of next years iPad will be able to not only hold FaceTime calls between their mobile devices but they will also be able to call somebody on a desktop iMac or MacBook / MacBook Air. This is far more useful as if one half of the the FaceTime call happens to be at home it is likely to be more comfortable for them to be sat in front of their computer than holding their phone. It also opens up many more possibility; such as interoperability between other providers of chat clients and operating systems…. Continue Reading

October 14, 2010

Ben “The Stig” Collins, his book, and the BTCC

“The Stig” in his well known white suit and helmet

As most people in the world now know, unless they have been living in a bin for a few months, Ben Collins is the Stig. I suppose more accurately WAS the Stig; as although Ben had been the famous man in the white suit for a number of years, he has recently revealed all in a new autobiography and left the show.

As a keen follower of the BTCC I was interested to read at the beginning of 2010 that Ben had been testing a BMW 320si for the Montorbase team (Airwaves BMW) at Brands Hatch Indy. Autosport ran a really interesting feature in which Ben explains what it is like to drive a touring car, specifically a rear wheel drive BMW. At this time many Continue Reading

October 12, 2010

GeoHot strikes again with "LimeRa1n" all device iOS 4.1 Jailbreak for iPhone

Geohot the iPhone (and lately PS3) hacker who developed the blackra1n jailbreak last year, as well as the blacksn0w unlock has unexpectedly and dramatically released a new all devices unlock for iOS 4.1 called “Limera1n”. I say dramatic, as GeoHot had claimed to have left the jailbreak scene for good, and another team working on a jailbreak were only days away from releasing their jailbreak . The other team, known as the “Chronic Dev Team” have since been forced to re-write their tool to use the exploit used by Limera1n rather than their own, thus avoiding having to burn two perfectly good exploits on 4.1 jailbreaking, which would be pointless. This leaves the Chronic Team’s exploit intact for later use, after the next release of iOS by Apple. If both had been revealed to Apple at this stage, both would be fixed prior to the next release and nothing would have been achieved.

I had already upgraded to 4.1 so tried the Limera1n jailbreak. I can confirm it works! There were a few strange things happening in Cydia when it tried to download updates, but a reboot cured this. This jailbreak used a cable like the Redsn0w tools, and isn’t quite “one-click” as it used DFU mode, but it’s still very simple.

Roumour has it that GeoHot is now working on an unlock for 4.1 (as 4.1 came with a new, and so far “unbreakable” baseband)

click HERE to download and donate. Please do donate to GeoHot. I think people should donate to people like this, why not make them rich, they might continue their great work, sticking it to Apple.

October 12, 2010

Jason Plato is the 2010 British Touring Car Champion

I’ve followed the BTCC all year, from Thruxton to Knockhill and back again! With the introduction of the Chevrolet Cruze way back on Media Day (and Plato setting a new lap record around the Indy circuit that day) it was obvious that the combination of Jason, RML and the Cruze were going to be a force to be reckoned with.

Right from the get go he was on the pace, or thereabouts and took a convincing win in the earlier rounds at Rockingham, after strong finishes at Thruxton in the opener. Electrical problems at Brands Hatch GP thwarted his early tittle charge but I think overall he was comfortably superior than the opposition. Mat Neal, Shedden and Onslow-Cole would have been even further away if it weren’t for al least 3 Plato DNF’s this season which if anything masked the stength of the outfit.

The Cruze seems to be a good all round car; strong everywhere and slow nowhere. Most cars have a disadvantage in some areas; BMW’s are rear wheel drive which have definite pros and cons, Turbo (and LPG) cars seem to hurt their tyres due to extra engine weight, and some cars have a poor aerodynamic shape (Honda Civic). The Cruze just seems to work everywhere. Combined of course with the fact that RML have heavily developed this car as a factory car for Chevrolet in the World Series too, the Cruze has to be by far the strongest car and engine on the grid. Jason is of course the best driver. He deserved the title this year, it’s just a shame the Fords couldn’t give him a real run for his money as they had their performance turned down a number of times over the year.

October 6, 2010

Google Goggles finally makes its way onto the iPhone

The Google Mobile app for iPhone was updated today to include Google’s visual search feature, ‘Google Goggles’. Goggles has been available as a “lab” on the Android platform for a while, and has raised a fair amount of interest.

Google Goggles allows you to take a picture anything in real life: buildings, books, CD Covers, DVD Covers, Art, wine bottles, or just plain text, and get Google search results related to that item. For example, if you’re touring a city and you see a building that interests you, you can take a picture with Google Goggles and see the information about that building within the app.

It’s great fun to play with initially, but I think it will have some good real -world uses too. Check out Google’s promo video on YouTube…

October 3, 2010

We all got Glastonbury tickets for 2011 !

I feel very lucky! Myself and my friends have never failed to get Glastonbury tickets. Sure we messed up one year by not even trying as we didn’t think they would sell out so quick (Doh!) but each time we have tried, we have triumphed!

Today was no exception, although the usual negativity was in the air at first… We had all arranged to meet at 8:45 am on Windows Live Messenger. Sure enough we were all there ready for 9am hitting refresh, refresh, refresh! Nothing. The page just timed out. http://www2.seetickets.com/g2011 wasnt playing! We all tried combinations of ie8, ie9 beta, Chrome and Firefox with varying degrees of nothing! I even made a Live Sync remote connection to my office PC and tried from there, nothing.

Around 10:20am I read a random tweet saying that somebody had some success using mobile broadband so I tried on my iPhone and got straight to the queue! I switched off my Virgin Media router, and connected my iPhone to my laptop as well as my girlfriends iPhone to her netbook and we both tried again, tethering on the three.co.uk network.

Using the three network for data we both got into the queue and within 30 mins Helen was in, and had booked all 7 tickets! Fantasic! Roll on 2011 !

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Month: October 2010