Cory A. Eaves, Managing Director, General Atlantic talking about the important roles in a company. Nice summary to read.Product Manager: There needs to be one single person who owns the product process for each major product in the company.
User Interface Designer: Each product team should have least one person who is an expert in usability and design.
Product Marketing: Product marketing is not the same as product management. Product marketing is responsible for effectively communicating to internal sales-people, prospects, and customers regarding the product.
Product Development: Product development is responsible for understanding what is feasible, both technically and operationally based on available resources, working extremely closely with product management to understand requirements, and, ultimately the on-time, on-budget, on-quality delivery of the product.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Building Products that Customers Love - The People
Monday, November 01, 2010
Mobile Roaming World Summit 2010
Turkcell Technology’s participation
It was specifically nice hearing quite positive feedbacks, both from operators and other vendors, about Turkcell Technology’s presence around the world and our products.
Topics discussed
Several different issues are presented and discussed during the summit, ranging from specific aspects of roaming business to trends in the GSM world in general. The increasing trend in data traffic and its implications to roaming business is highlighted by different speakers, including Informa analyst with numbers taken from their latest report on the issue. Some of the topics catching attention are summarized below.EU Regulations
Like previous years, the EU regulations and its implications were one of the topics which many were interested in. As the decline in the prices was expected to be responded by big increase in the usage by the customers, there were different presentations showing that it is not happening like that. Yes, there was some increase in the traffic, but not that directly proportional with the decrease in the prices.Roman Schneider from Swisscom supported this finding with numbers from their network, after they decreased the roaming prices seriously in the recent years as the market leader in Switzerland. Their main finding was that the competitors did not follow them to decrease the roaming prices and the traffic did not increase that much, maybe because only 20% of the subscribers were aware of this big price reduction even with huge marketing campaigns. Roman also noted that the EU regulations are effecting them in a bad way as being a non-EU operator, as the EU operators are charging them more.
Nick White, Executive Vice President of INTUG, International Telecommunications User Group; provided subscribers’ point of view. He mostly defended the idea that the roaming charges are not based on the cost and the regulations should be extended and there should not be a different roaming tariffs. As most of the participants were mobile network operators and the sector, it can easily be said that his view was not shared by most.
A delegate mentioned that in the real world price for most of the products and services are not based on the cost but value. GSM roaming is offering a very valuable and important service - good accessibility all around the world and it is normal that there is a different tariff for roaming. He used iPhone as example to support his view telling people are OK with paying relatively big amount of money compared to the cost of the handset as it offers good value to the customers.
Bill-shocks
Bill-shocks during roaming was another issue highlighted by many, telling that subscribers do find it extremely expensive and the reaction of most of them was trying to find out how to disable roaming features on their handset as soon as they land. An example given by Stephen Ornadel, Head of Carrier Services from Everything Everywhere (ex T-Mobile) was about 13000 pounds of bill after the kids were using data during roaming to watch a single episode of Friends.
Unfortunately, these packages are only for EU zone and for the rest of the world neither the control nor the attractive prices are available to the subscriber. Still many agreed that these packages are a good way to prevent bill-shocks. T-Mobile noted that these packages could be made available with some big investment in their network, originally intended for national market only.
Other topics
Just like in the previous years, hubbing and solutions from companies offering different SIM solutions to get rid of roaming charges were discussed. Besides these, another topic was LTE. Peter Bergman’s presentation as a case study for TeliaSonera’s LTE roll-out attracted a lot of attention as it is the first LTE implementation. Peter noted that the subscribers were provided 3G-4G combo modems to fall back to 3G, as mostly central locations were covered with LTE.Saturday, September 25, 2010
Mobile roaming revenue trends and EU regulation
Recently Informa TM issued a press release on Sept 23rd, giving some numbers for mobile roaming business for year 2015. The numbers should have been taken from their "Global Mobile Roaming: Operator Strategies and Market Trends" report released in September.
Basically, they expect roaming business to grow 86% between 2010 and 2015. Even with the expectation of a slowdown because of economic downturn in the beginning, data roaming will help the roaming business to grow in the end. They expect 246% increase for the data roaming revenues with the help of smartphones.
It is also mentioned that 65% of the roaming revenues is generated by enterprise segment, and the the largest roaming market is Western Europe with 41% share.
The same day (Sept 23rd) Neelie Kroes, European commissioner for digital agenda, was speaking at the annual conference of European Telecommunications Network Operators Association (ETNO):
I do not know if it can happen before 2015, no roaming charges in EU; but seeing these two news reports made me curious if Informa TM was foreseeing such a move this close and if the numbers they provide would be still valid with such a move in the biggest roaming market.
Quoting from Financial Times, we see that operators do not like the idea as any can expect:
You can read more here for the comments of executives of France Telecom, Telecom Italia and Portugal Telecom.
Here, you can see that this tren in EU may affect others too.
See also for more:
Update:
Basically, they expect roaming business to grow 86% between 2010 and 2015. Even with the expectation of a slowdown because of economic downturn in the beginning, data roaming will help the roaming business to grow in the end. They expect 246% increase for the data roaming revenues with the help of smartphones.
It is also mentioned that 65% of the roaming revenues is generated by enterprise segment, and the the largest roaming market is Western Europe with 41% share.
The same day (Sept 23rd) Neelie Kroes, European commissioner for digital agenda, was speaking at the annual conference of European Telecommunications Network Operators Association (ETNO):
I want the gap between roaming and domestic prices to approach zero, the sooner the better. Significant differences between roaming charges and national tariffs cannot be justified in a true single market. The present financial and economic situation in the EU does not give us much room and time to postpone the creation of a well-functioning telecom and digital internal market. A true single market is one where the price differences between voice, SMS and data relate only to the actual cost of providing these different services.
I do not know if it can happen before 2015, no roaming charges in EU; but seeing these two news reports made me curious if Informa TM was foreseeing such a move this close and if the numbers they provide would be still valid with such a move in the biggest roaming market.
Quoting from Financial Times, we see that operators do not like the idea as any can expect:
Senior European telecoms executives reacted coolly to the European Union’s proposals on regulating the next generation of broadband internet networks, warning that excessive regulation could make large-scale investments less likely.
You can read more here for the comments of executives of France Telecom, Telecom Italia and Portugal Telecom.
Here, you can see that this tren in EU may affect others too.
See also for more:
- Informa TM press release
- Europe cracks whip over 'exorbitant' data-roaming fees
- Mobile roaming charges must fall, EU says
- Europe wants to end roaming charges - Commissioner Kroes wants EU-wide domestic rates
- Telecoms fear impact of EU regulation
- Commission vows action to cut roaming data premiums to almost zero
Update:
- Spain & Portugal are hoping to set a benchmark for telecoms in EU by agreeing to eliminate cellphone roaming charges
- Kazakhstan mobile operators,GSM Kazakhstan,Kar-Tel&Mobile Telecom-Service,face fines for unreasonable intl roaming prices
- Azerbaijani mobile operator Azerfon is considering the possibility of reducing the tariffs on roaming in the CIS
- Russian mobile operators agree to slash roaming tariffs
- Vimpelcom (Beeline) slashes roaming rates for subsidiaries within CIS
Monday, September 13, 2010
The illustrated guide to a Ph.D.
Matt Might's explanation to define PhD is really nice. He says he needs to explain this to many every year and he found a really good way to describe it. A picture is worth a thousand words, right?
Here is re-publication of his explanation, The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D. with his Creative Commons license.
Here is re-publication of his explanation, The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D. with his Creative Commons license.
Imagine a circle that contains all of human knowledge:
By the time you finish elementary school, you know a little:
By the time you finish high school, you know a bit more:
With a bachelor's degree, you gain a specialty:
A master's degree deepens that specialty:
Reading research papers takes you to the edge of human knowledge:
Once you're at the boundary, you focus:
You push at the boundary for a few years:
Until one day, the boundary gives way:
And, that dent you've made is called a Ph.D.:
Of course, the world looks different to you now:
So, don't forget the bigger picture:
Keep pushing.
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
"Innovation is Not Creativity"
From a blog post of Vijay Govindarajan:
Creativity is about coming up with the big idea. Innovation is about executing the idea — converting the idea into a successful business.
Managers seem to be enamored with the Big Idea Hunt for three reasons. First, coming up with an idea does not create tension with the core business. Second, ideation is sexy, while execution is long, drawn out, and boring. Third, companies think they are good at execution. But generally they're good at execution in their core businesses; the capabilities making that possible are poisonous for innovation.
Thomas Edison, the greatest innovator of all time, put it well: "Innovation is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration."
Friday, July 09, 2010
Your foursquare checkins on Google Maps (or Earth)
Using Foursquare and would like to see all your checkins on map? Foursquare is providing feeds in KML format which you can view on Google Maps. Here you can read about the very simple steps.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
Saturday, April 17, 2010
Do you want control on your Internet traffic while you're on VPN?
If you're like me, requiring to connect to corporate VPN to check stuff frequently when you are home; you might be getting annoyed of default VPN settings which routes all my internet traffic through VPN so that even my VoIP calls or Internet surfing traffic goes over company. This may cause poor performance for your normal Internet traffic as it has a longer (and possibly slower) path now. But what is worse is that you are limited with corporate network usage policies now, checked with firewalls, proxies and tools like websense.
Yeah, maybe you're lucky that the default settings of your VPN connection seperates corporate destined traffic from the rest automatically, but if not and if you do not want to have to make a choice between office and the rest, you need to alter the routing tables of Windows manually. It's simple actually and here are the steps for that.
Before connecting to VPN, I'm checking my routing tables:
Here we see my default gateway is 192.168.1.1, which is actually my DSL modem. Lets see what changes with VPN connection.
Yes, I have a new interface (0x90008) and the default route is changed to my VPN assinged IP address (192.168.112.45).
When I check it, I can verify I can access the nodes on the corporate network but cannot access to any websites on Internet without using proxy (as it is like that in the company network). I can connect to Internet using corporate proxy, but they will block certain connections which they do not like, like VoIP etc.
To fix it, we'll change the default route back to my DSL modem and configure a route for nodes on the corporate network (which all are on 10.0.0.0/8 private network luckily).
If I try to connect to Internet without proxy, I can see it works but I cannot connect to any node on corporate network. Yes, we need route for it.
Now my traffic for Internet goes directly from my DSL connection skipping VPN, which I can access nodes on corporate network.
Yeah, maybe you're lucky that the default settings of your VPN connection seperates corporate destined traffic from the rest automatically, but if not and if you do not want to have to make a choice between office and the rest, you need to alter the routing tables of Windows manually. It's simple actually and here are the steps for that.
Before connecting to VPN, I'm checking my routing tables:
C:\>route print
===========================================================================
Interface List
0x1 ........................... MS TCP Loopback interface
0x3 ...00 ff dd 08 e7 3a ...... TAP VPN Adapter
0x4 ...00 ff 4d 14 1d 6d ...... Anchorfree HSS Adapter - Packet Scheduler Minipo
rt
0x10006 ...00 19 d2 37 cc 6f ...... Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connec
tion
0x20007 ...00 17 a4 d2 57 7c ...... Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet
===========================================================================
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
65.54.166.122 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
66.235.133.14 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.130.139 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.136.136 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 20
127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 1
192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.1.3 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 20
192.168.1.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
207.38.101.11 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
207.38.101.12 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
208.92.236.184 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 4 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 10006 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 1
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.1
===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
NoneHere we see my default gateway is 192.168.1.1, which is actually my DSL modem. Lets see what changes with VPN connection.
C:\>route print
===========================================================================
Interface List
0x1 ........................... MS TCP Loopback interface
0x3 ...00 ff dd 08 e7 3a ...... TAP VPN Adapter
0x4 ...00 ff 4d 14 1d 6d ...... Anchorfree HSS Adapter - Packet Scheduler Minipo
rt
0x10006 ...00 19 d2 37 cc 6f ...... Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connec
tion
0x20007 ...00 17 a4 d2 57 7c ...... Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet
0x90008 ...00 53 45 00 00 00 ...... WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
===========================================================================
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 2
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
65.54.166.122 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
66.235.133.14 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.136.136 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 20
127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 1
192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.1.3 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 20
192.168.1.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.112.45 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 50
192.168.112.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 50
207.38.101.11 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
207.38.101.12 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
208.92.236.184 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
212.252.168.241 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 10006 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 4 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
Default Gateway: 192.168.112.45
===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
None
C:\>ipconfig /all
PPP adapter YYY VPN Connection:
Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-53-45-00-00-00
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.112.45
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.255
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.1.2.1
Primary WINS Server . . . . . . . : 10.1.2.1Yes, I have a new interface (0x90008) and the default route is changed to my VPN assinged IP address (192.168.112.45).
When I check it, I can verify I can access the nodes on the corporate network but cannot access to any websites on Internet without using proxy (as it is like that in the company network). I can connect to Internet using corporate proxy, but they will block certain connections which they do not like, like VoIP etc.
To fix it, we'll change the default route back to my DSL modem and configure a route for nodes on the corporate network (which all are on 10.0.0.0/8 private network luckily).
C:\>route delete 0.0.0.0
C:\>route print
===========================================================================
Interface List
0x1 ........................... MS TCP Loopback interface
0x3 ...00 ff dd 08 e7 3a ...... TAP VPN Adapter
0x4 ...00 ff 4d 14 1d 6d ...... Anchorfree HSS Adapter - Packet Scheduler Minipo
rt
0x10006 ...00 19 d2 37 cc 6f ...... Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connec
tion
0x20007 ...00 17 a4 d2 57 7c ...... Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet
0x90008 ...00 53 45 00 00 00 ...... WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
===========================================================================
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
65.54.166.122 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
66.235.133.14 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.136.136 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 20
127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 1
192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.1.3 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 20
192.168.1.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.112.45 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 50
192.168.112.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 50
207.38.101.11 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
207.38.101.12 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
208.92.236.184 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
212.252.168.241 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 4 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 10006 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
None
C:\>route add 0.0.0.0 mask 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 if 0x20007
C:\>route print
===========================================================================
Interface List
0x1 ........................... MS TCP Loopback interface
0x3 ...00 ff dd 08 e7 3a ...... TAP VPN Adapter
0x4 ...00 ff 4d 14 1d 6d ...... Anchorfree HSS Adapter - Packet Scheduler Minipo
rt
0x10006 ...00 19 d2 37 cc 6f ...... Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connec
tion
0x20007 ...00 17 a4 d2 57 7c ...... Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet
0x90008 ...00 53 45 00 00 00 ...... WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
===========================================================================
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
65.54.166.122 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
66.235.133.14 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.136.136 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 20
127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 1
192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.1.3 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 20
192.168.1.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.112.45 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 50
192.168.112.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 50
207.38.101.11 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
207.38.101.12 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
208.92.236.184 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
212.252.168.241 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 4 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 10006 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.1
===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
None
If I try to connect to Internet without proxy, I can see it works but I cannot connect to any node on corporate network. Yes, we need route for it.
C:\>route add 10.0.0.0 mask 255.0.0.0 192.168.112.45
C:\>route print
===========================================================================
Interface List
0x1 ........................... MS TCP Loopback interface
0x3 ...00 ff dd 08 e7 3a ...... TAP VPN Adapter
0x4 ...00 ff 4d 14 1d 6d ...... Anchorfree HSS Adapter - Packet Scheduler Minipo
rt
0x10006 ...00 19 d2 37 cc 6f ...... Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connec
tion
0x20007 ...00 17 a4 d2 57 7c ...... Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet
0x90008 ...00 53 45 00 00 00 ...... WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
===========================================================================
===========================================================================
Active Routes:
Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
10.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
65.54.166.122 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
66.235.133.14 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
86.108.136.136 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 20
127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 1
192.168.1.0 255.255.255.0 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.1.3 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 20
192.168.1.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 20
192.168.112.45 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 127.0.0.1 50
192.168.112.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 50
207.38.101.11 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
207.38.101.12 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
208.92.236.184 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
212.252.168.241 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.1 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 10006 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 192.168.1.3 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.3 4 1
255.255.255.255 255.255.255.255 192.168.112.45 192.168.112.45 1
Default Gateway: 192.168.1.1
===========================================================================
Persistent Routes:
None
Now my traffic for Internet goes directly from my DSL connection skipping VPN, which I can access nodes on corporate network.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Ericsson's Telecom Report on online / mobile games
From Ericsson's Telecom Report:
But a significant trend is happening: Online games for free. How does a business model work when the user pays nothing?
...
"The trends in our industry are multiple, there are games that are going to be free to play, so to say, you can download them for free, play them. we have a couple of those already up and running. and then we are looking to get a smaller part of the player base to start paying for bits and pieces of extra content basically in that game."
...
But free games on social media sites are proving to be a hit.
"If you're looking at it from a gamer perspective, social media, is I think goint to turn into one of the main distribution channel. so you will see a lot of the gams including some of the ones that we have launched recently have links into some of the sites like Facebook"
...
Selling 5 million games on a console, like Xbox or Sony Playstation is considered to be a great success. But it compares nothing to companies like Zynga who have free games on social media sites like Facebook and attract over 100 million users every month. Games such a Farmville, Yoville, Petville and many more are free to use, but encourage the gamers to buy, swap, send gifts and attend different activities thourhgou the course of their experience. experiences that can be played on both the fixed computer and mobile devices.
"In say five years time it could be a market where there are five hundred million smartphones being sold per annum with an install base of maybe one to one and a half billion smartphones."
"I mean that is the largest addressable market for hardware worldwide. Mobile games, worldwide about 5.5 billion dollars at the moment. forecasted to doubel over the next three or four years, so a ten billion dollar mark. a lot of that growth is coming from the smartphones."
Global mobile data traffic surpassed voice during December of 2009
From telecoms.com:
Global mobile data traffic surpassed voice during December of 2009, after growing 280 per cent during each of the last two years. According to Swedish vendor Ericsson, which published the figures, global mobile data traffic is forecast to double annually over the next five years.
Ericsson said that the crossover occurred at approximately 140,000 Terabytes per month in both voice and data traffic, while traffic on 3G networks also surpassed that of 2G networks.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
playing more with maps
Below is another google maps app using the latest Turkish earthquakes from Kandilli.
And here is a bigger version.
Update
Just read some about Google Maplets for such needs with a similar and sure better example.
Update, Jul '11
Just noticed that there is a website doing almost the same
And here is a bigger version.
Update
Just read some about Google Maplets for such needs with a similar and sure better example.
Update, Jul '11
Just noticed that there is a website doing almost the same
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
iPhone GSM test mode
I google'd it when I needed to check some GSM radio network values when I'm home. It appeared out that iPhone has a "field test mode", which is enabled with *3001#12345#* code. You just need to type this and hit "Call". I wanted to save the number as a contact to "call" later, but when I call that contact it actually places a real GSM call for that number which is leading me to an announce for the failing call :)
When you do this, you reach to the main "Field Test" screen.
Notice the signal strength indication on top left of the screen. The unit for this number is dB as summarized here.
Here, I find "MM Info" and "GSM Cell Environment" items interesting.With the first one, I can see the serving network and LAC (Location Area Code).
"GSM Cell Environment" has details about the cells the phone is talking to. I could not find the serving cell ID with a quick check.
And it shows details of 6 possible neighboring cells.
The thing is when you're using 3G, it is not working properly. You can see the signal strength at the top left, but all you see is "Unknown" for all the fields.
I still could not find what I'm looking for, at iPhone's "field test" menu; but sure it looks useful and I'll dig it more :)
BTW, these images are taken on firmware 3.1.3 (7E18)
When you do this, you reach to the main "Field Test" screen.
Notice the signal strength indication on top left of the screen. The unit for this number is dB as summarized here.
In the upper left hand corner, the 5 bars are replaced with a decimal indicating the power ratio in decibels (dB) of the measured power referenced to one milliwatt. These are measured on the negative side of zero so of course the closer you are towards a positive number, the stronger the ratio is and likewise a better chance of good service. Anything above a -85 is shows as 5 bars. Anything below -105 is zero bars and loss of connection usually occurs.
Here, I find "MM Info" and "GSM Cell Environment" items interesting.With the first one, I can see the serving network and LAC (Location Area Code).
"GSM Cell Environment" has details about the cells the phone is talking to. I could not find the serving cell ID with a quick check.
And it shows details of 6 possible neighboring cells.
The thing is when you're using 3G, it is not working properly. You can see the signal strength at the top left, but all you see is "Unknown" for all the fields.
I still could not find what I'm looking for, at iPhone's "field test" menu; but sure it looks useful and I'll dig it more :)
BTW, these images are taken on firmware 3.1.3 (7E18)
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Having custom maps with labelled markers
I checked it first when I thought about having a map with some data/markers on that to provide some information. I checked Google Maps and Google Maps API for that and saw that it is really easy to have a map with markers on it but having some text on the markers is not in the standart API.
Here it is talking about having a LabeledMarker, with an extension from Mike Purvis. I took one of his examples and modified to have a basic mechanism to load a datafile and show it on the map. The original example was showing data from Google docs retrieved in JSON format. As I wanted to keep data locally in a format I know, I modified his example a bit to load data from a file provided as a parameter to the webpage.
Below is an example of that, with for the list of spots I might like to see. I just passed SpotsToSee as data file to the page.
Or, here it is shown with another data file showing some operators I've been working with.
Here it is talking about having a LabeledMarker, with an extension from Mike Purvis. I took one of his examples and modified to have a basic mechanism to load a datafile and show it on the map. The original example was showing data from Google docs retrieved in JSON format. As I wanted to keep data locally in a format I know, I modified his example a bit to load data from a file provided as a parameter to the webpage.
Below is an example of that, with for the list of spots I might like to see. I just passed SpotsToSee as data file to the page.
Or, here it is shown with another data file showing some operators I've been working with.
Saturday, February 20, 2010
converting Cell ID to coordinates
You know you do not need to have a GPS capable phone in order to enjoy location based capabilities on mobile phones, thanks to Google. Since 2007, Google mobile maps can plot your location without need of GPS with some reasonable precision (sure it is using GPS if it is available). That's how, you can check your location and what is around using your mobile phone. Google is being able to find your location using its internal database of cellular antenna IDs and their locations. Google maps application on the mobile set can query this database as the it knows the ID of the cellular antenna it is talking to.
I'm not aware if that cellular tower to coordinate database is available to developers, but here basics are examplified with a code for Windows mobile platform. There are examples around in C# or PHP around, possibly based on the original reverse engineering work.
These examples are considered to work on the mobile terminal as you have the required data on the terminal. If you have access to the GSM network, you can get this data using MAP messages. Yes, you do not need Google's database if you have access to the GSM network as it means you're possibly the GSM operator's itself :)
Below is a PHP code, a mix of C# and PHP examples; letting you to query coordinates of a LAC/CID pair for any country/network. You can play with it or download the code. Though MCC/MNC is sent as parameters, it looks like the result does not depend on them. This is weird as LAC/CID pair is unique only within a certain GSM operator. I have to be making a mistake which I could not figure out :) Still, I used LAC/CID pairs for two different countries without MCC/MNC, and Google still could point the correct spot.
Related post: Drawing GSM cells on Google Maps
I'm not aware if that cellular tower to coordinate database is available to developers, but here basics are examplified with a code for Windows mobile platform. There are examples around in C# or PHP around, possibly based on the original reverse engineering work.
These examples are considered to work on the mobile terminal as you have the required data on the terminal. If you have access to the GSM network, you can get this data using MAP messages. Yes, you do not need Google's database if you have access to the GSM network as it means you're possibly the GSM operator's itself :)
Below is a PHP code, a mix of C# and PHP examples; letting you to query coordinates of a LAC/CID pair for any country/network. You can play with it or download the code. Though MCC/MNC is sent as parameters, it looks like the result does not depend on them. This is weird as LAC/CID pair is unique only within a certain GSM operator. I have to be making a mistake which I could not figure out :) Still, I used LAC/CID pairs for two different countries without MCC/MNC, and Google still could point the correct spot.
Related post: Drawing GSM cells on Google Maps
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