Whether you need a budget, debt reduction plan or both, these great apps for Windows Phone 7 will allow you to be organized and stay on top of all your financial responsibilities.

Budgeting Apps

1. Spending Money

This is a great app for someone who doesn’t need a whole budget, but needs to manage money until the next payday. It helps you stick to a weekly or monthly spending allowance by being a mobile bank register. Enter the next payday, spending limit, and spending as it occurs. Then watch the tracker count down how much money you have left to spend until payday. When you want to see where your money went, simply view the chart by day or category.

2. My Budget

This budgeting app allows you to manage multiple accounts tracking expenses for work and home. Assign each transaction a category to see where you are spending most. In addition to scheduling bills and transactions on the go, you can track expenses with spending limits and scan receipts to keep everything organized. View daily, weekly and monthly charts of budgeted expenses, actual expenses, and bills by category. The easy to use control panel and at a glance balance viewing will help you stay on top of your financial goals!

3. Finance Helper

This full budget app allows you to create a recurring budget with fixed and variable expenses. After your fixed expenses are established, you will only need to create a monthly budget for items that vary. In addition to managing a monthly budget, this app has a built in calculator which will estimate your monthly loan payment as well as interest for existing loans. A full repayment schedule will be generated for the loans you enter and the extra payment calculator will show you what interest you could save by paying a little extra each month.

4. MoBudget

This powerful budgeting system can be used to track expenses, as well as organize incoming and outgoing line items. Not only can you set reminders for upcoming payments, incomes and bills, you can also pin live tiles to your start menu so you will never miss a due date again! The colorful budgeting graph displays actual balances versus budgeted balances so you will be more careful to stay on budget. If you are a poor manager of credit cards, use the credit card usage tool which displays credit card payment estimates and warnings. There is a free trial but for $1.99 the full version is a steal!

Manage Debts and Property

A budget is only the first piece of the puzzle when it comes to personal organization and fiscal responsibility. Sometimes we have extra income and don’t spend it where it can best be utilized or we are the ones lending money or personal items never to be seen again. We get busy and as time goes by, we forget who borrowed what. There are great apps for tools to manage those type of debts as well.

5. Quick Snowball

This app is based on the Debt Snowball Method in which you pay the minimums on everything and attack small debt items first. Just enter your debt and interest rates and you will have a calculated balance along with a goal payoff date.

6. Debt Control

This is a great tool to manage borrowed money and items. Fill in the person’s name, contact info, and what they borrowed from you. You can attach a picture of the item so you can see if there was any damage done to the property upon it’s return. The “My Debts” page will display who borrowed what, a picture of the item and how long it has been borrowed. Then, you have the option to call the person about the item’s return. No more forgetting who you lent that book or money to.

As you roll into 2012, what are you going to do to take control of your money and personal property?

Image credit : alancleaver_2000

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As such, several developers have taken advantage of this to introduce alternative user interfaces for Windows Mobile devices. Given that the platform (while under supported in recent years) is the most versatile of all the flavours of mobile available, this shouldn’t be too much of a surprise.

Key among these developers is Spb Software, who over the last few years have released a succession of mobile shells for Windows Mobile. The latest of these is Spb Mobile Shell 3 which is available as a free 14 day trial from Spb Software, full price $29.95.

Configuring Spb Mobile Shell 3

Spb Mobile Shell 3 is the most popular of the Windows Mobile user interface enhancements, mostly due to it being so user friendly, easily configurable and requiring minimal resources. Once installed, there are several things that you may wish to do – such as manage your contacts or organise your mobile desktop.

Finger friendly and capable of being used almost exclusively without having to resort to any Windows Mobile index menus or settings (other than Pocket Outlook screens), Spb Mobile Shell 3 offers a smooth and well presented layout of all of your vital mobile information. A three-screen-wide desktop allows for the effective arrangement of favourite applications, tools and contacts, while a variety of different functions (address book, calendar, settings and others) can be accessed via a carousel system.

The Desktop

The first thing to do once you have installed Spb Mobile Shell 3 is to setup your desktop. There are two choices of desktop:

• The standard “Professional” look that displays time, calendar, upcoming appointments, weather and any email/SMS/missed call alerts,
• The “Lifestyle” layout which can be configured entirely to your requirements.

Spb Mobile Shell’s Lifestyle desktop offers the three-screen-wide option, allowing email notifications, widgets for launching favourite applications and much more to be displayed at the required position and size.

For instance to add a widget of your favourite Windows Mobile game to your Spb Mobile Shell 3 desktop view, press the Menu button on the lower right of the display, go to Add Widget and browse Applications -> Games. Once placed on the desktop you can also resize and reposition the widget before confirming the addition.

Desktop Background

A range of standard widgets are available to begin with, such as analogue and digital clock types, calendar, messaging notifications and it’s also possible to change your desktop background.

To do this, press the Menu button on the lower right of the display and select Change Background. From here you can browse through images in the Spb Mobile Shell folder on your Windows Mobile device and select an image that suits. If you have images elsewhere on your phone to use, they will need to be copied to the Spb Mobile Shell folder which can be found in the Program Files folder on your phone.

Alternative Spb Mobile Shell 3 backgrounds can be downloaded from the website – 40 alternatives from the included 6 are available offering a range of scenery.

Add a Contact and Manage Widgets

Adding a shortcut to one of your contacts is simple too – press the Menu button on the lower right of the display and select Add Widget -> Shortcuts -> Contact.

The required contact will then appear on your Spb Mobile Shell 3 desktop – but if they haven’t got a photo assigned you’ll just see an outline and the contact name.

As with all desktop widgets in Spb Mobile Shell 3, you can move the contact to a different screen of your finger friendly scrolling desktop display, and resize it.

To do this, open the Menu again and select Edit Layout. From here, select the widget you want to change – you’ll see that it is now highlighted with a heavy white outline and a down-pointing white triangle. Touch the widget you want to adjust – a new menu will offer options to move it to a left or right page of the desktop, to display a text label for the widget or to resize it.

Spb Mobile Shell 3 is a superbly configurable interface for Windows Mobile devices that completely re-states what it means to use a Windows Phone device.

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Funambol is a free service that uses the open source model. It replicates the workings of Microsoft Exchange and offers free exchange style email to many mobile phone types, particularly Windows Mobile.

It’s a powerful tool that goes beyond over the air email synchronization – Funambol also offers calendar and contacts synchronization.

Sign-Up And Install Funambol

First of all, you need to visit my.funambol.com to setup an account and tell the system what type of phone you’re using.

Once complete, it is then time to tell Funambol your email details. It’s a good idea to give the email address and password of a rarely used account or one you’ve set up for testing this service. I haven’t come across any security concerns as yet however – Funambol requires the information in order to login to your email account and push the emails to your phone. It’s all completely carried out by automated software, with no human interaction with the systems except for technical support.

Next you’ll need to download the right version for your Windows Mobile device – go to the Funambol download page. Separate downloads for Smartphone and PocketPC models are available (if your phone has a hardware keyboard and is not touchscreen, you’ll need the Smartphone version).

Finally some general information needs to be confirmed, such as timezone and secondary email address.

How To Sync

Once downloaded and installed on your phone (Funambol sends a CAB file to your Windows Mobile device for over the air installation) it’s time to begin synching data.

The most obvious thing to try to sync is your email – however any contacts and calendar items currently held on your Windows Mobile device will be synchronized as ActiveSync sends your Pocket Outlook data to the Funambol open source exchange server.

What is and isn’t synced can be managed from your mobile Funambol client, while the myfunambol page allows you to alter calendar entries and add and delete duplicates.

The following Pocket Outlook data types can be synced or disabled:

• Email
• Contacts
• Calendar
• Tasks
• Notes
• Briefcase

Manage what items are synced by launching the Funambol client on your Windows Phone and saving your Sync Settings.

Email can be set to push, scheduled or manual synchronization with Funambol – to set this click on the Email Options link on the Sync Settings screen. There are no considerable differences between Push service and Scheduled synchronization, so to take advantage of this great service I would recommend setting your device to Push service.

Sending and Receiving Email

When you receive email with Funambol, the software will replicate the actions of an ActiveSync managed connection to a Microsoft Exchange server. The email received in your account will be collected by Funambol’s automated systems and pushed to your phone almost instantly. No other email address is used.

To reply to the email – carry on as normal! Funambol doesn’t utilise any new email addresses for relaying your message, so your intended recipient will have no idea you’re sending via a secure third party. There will be no unusual email addresses aliasing your own usual address, making the experience with Funambol a seamless and impressive one.

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Windows Mobile can be synchronised via ActiveSync with your PC or Exchange server to keep synchonrised your contacts list, calendars and flagged emails and tasks – but tourble can arise in the shape of duplicates.

If Microsoft truly intend on aligning the Windows Mobile/Windows Phone platform to the same market spread as Apple, BlackBerry and Palm Pre, resolving the laughable situation with the contacts, calendar and tasks duplicate should be high on their list of priorities.

Until Windows Mobile 7 is released however, Trinefix is by far and away the best solution to this frustrating problem.

Available from www.trineseries.com, the download file is 518 KB and this can quickly be downloaded either directly to your PC or over the air to your phone via this link.

Once installed, it’s time to setup Trinefix to scan your Pocket Outlook items and fix your duplicates!

Using Trinefix

Before continuing, the first thing to do is configure Trinefix for use with your setup.  The Preferences screen is pretty simple and straightforward and has little to do with what the software does, more how it looks.

Configuring Trinefix for use with your setup means considering how you use your Windows Mobile phone. If you store contacts, keep calendar appointments and manage your current tasks using Pocket Outlook and these are all updated by synching to your PC or Exchange server, then a full clean-up is definitely required.

On the other hand you might just need to tidy up an individual element, such as your contacts – in this case you would only need to use the Contacts clean up. We’ll begin looking at how to use Trinefix by focussing on the Contacts tool.

Fix Duplicate Contacts

Start off by switching to or launching Trinefix and scroll down to the Contacts menu item. Each of the duplicate management tools can be accessed from the main Trinefix menu.

Four options are given:

Fix duplicates – this cleans all duplicates in your contacts list. You can designate which fields to be compared and Trinefix will display all duplicate contacts based on this field, allowing you to choose to delete.

Fix FileAs – with this option you can set the “File As” option to display all of your contacts the same way, such as surname first, forename first, etc.

Fix Country Code – allows you to add a default country code to all numbers with none defined. Trinefix can collect all numbers without a country code to allow you to set one of your choice.

Bulk Delete – this obviously facilitates a bulk removal of contacts, either based on a search term or just the whole lot. A confirmation screen allows you to double check your decision.

Fix Duplicate Calendar Items

This intelligent tool compares the start time and date, end time and date and the subject/appointment name and checks for duplicates which are then displayed and an option to delete offered. The  bulk delete option works in the same way as above.

Bulk Delete Tasks

There is no easy way to manage your tasks – Trinefix offers only a bulk delete tool that works in the same way as the contacts and calendar items bulk delete.

With all of these tools at your disposal, time spent resolving Pocket Outlook duplicate issues can be considerably reduced with this very cool freeware app!

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If you want to install some old games or apps or simply want to push the limits on your Windows Mobile device, MS-DOS emulation is a good way to go. Modern Windows Mobile devices are more than capable of running old MS-DOS games and applications, but emulation is a tricky business. Surprisingly there are just two emulators available.

The Emulators

While emulation of games consoles and 8 bit platforms are commonplace on Windows Mobile, there is a huge vacuum in the DOS emulation field, with barely filling the gap. Given that fans of so many classic and retro games want to be able to play their favourites on a mobile platform, it’s astonishing there aren’t more PDA MS-DOS emulators generally, let alone on Windows Mobile.

First of all, there’s pDOSBox – probably the most well known of the MS-DOS emulators for Windows Mobile, pDOSBox is 100% free. PDOSBox (the “p” is for “pocket”) is available as freeware and is currently a beta release for version 2.0 – however it is tricky to setup and not compatible with all Windows Mobile screen resolutions. pDOSBox isn’t suitable for use with all Pocket PC devices and fails to run satisfactorily on Windows Mobile 6.5.

Secondly, there’s Pocket Dos. This MS-DOS emulator is also available for free but requires registration to get rid of an annoying reminder every 15 minutes. The registration is in the $30 area and as there really isn’t very much between the two emulators in terms of performance and compatibility, it’s down to the user’s preference which they opt for.

We’ll carry on now and look how to successfully achieve emulation on each of these applications.

Emulation with pDOSBox

Installation of pDOSBox veers away from the standard CAB file or ActiveSync-managed desktop installation. First download the pDOSBox zip file. Extracted it and copy the folder to the Storage Card on your Windows Mobile device.

While viewing your Windows Mobile device in Explorer (usually opened via ActiveSync) right-click on the file pdbfend.exe in the pDOSBox2.0 folder and select Create Shortcut. Rename this shortcut to pDOSBox 2 and then right-click on this shortcut and select Cut.

Navigate to the Windows folder on your WinMo device, right-click on the “Start Menu” and select Paste

You’re now ready to run pDOSBox!

Configuration of your pDOSBox requires the mounting of your Storage Card as a drive. To do this, browse to the  pDOSBox2.0 folder and open the dosbox.conf file in Notepad.

The following line should be altered as appropriate, depending on how your additional storage is named in the Windows Mobile device and whereabouts you’ve saved your DOS programs.

By default, the line reads:

mount c "/Storage Card/pDOSBox0.63-p1/DosPrograms"

You might change this to:

mount c "/Internal Storage/Games/"

Once this has been done, the C:\ drive should automatically mount when pDOSBox 2.0 is launched and you’ll then be able to carry on and install and launch the games or application using standard MS-DOS syntax:

cd path-to-app-folder
install.bat

Entering the two lines above would – in turn – change directory to the game/app directory and then run the installation procedure.

Once the installation is completed the game could be run by entering:

name-of-game.exe

Although tricky to setup, pDOSBox 2.0 can be an effective MS-DOS emulator and is 100% free.

Emulation with Pocket Dos

Pocket Dos meanwhile is “nagware” (meaning that every so often a notice is displayed asking you to purchase the software) but is easier to setup.

Once downloaded and installed, Pocket Dos can be quickly launched from the Program menu on your Windows Mobile device.

Using the emulator is more straightforward than pDOSBox – Pocket Dos doesn’t require the mounting of new drives, and detects your Storage Card and mounts this as C:\ when the app is launched.

A freeware MS-DOS title – such as Sid Meier’s RailRoad Tycoon as shown here – can be saved to your Storage Card and via Pocket Dos installed and run on your Windows Mobile device.

To do this, load up Pocket Dos and type

DIR
CD Rails
rails.bat (or game.exe)

to play!

Obviously there is a good deal of MS-DOS in this tutorial. It should be noted that the emulation offered by each of these apps goes beyond running old games. Each offers full emulation of the old Microsoft disk operating software, so there are plenty of opportunities to explore the system in full.

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Windows Mobile comes with a number of onscreen input options.  Various stylus methods are provided such as Block Recogniser and Letter Recogniser which both involve scrawling the stylus within a specified area of the screen, as well as Symbol Pad and Transcriber. Each of these methods has its own peculiarities for attaining a reasonable success rate of conversion from the input squiggle into a legible sentence

Finally there’s the poorly designed micro keyboard designed for Windows CE and the larger display handheld devices from companies such as HP that when resized for a typical Windows Mobile smartphone screen are almost as difficult to use with the stylus as without!

Thankfully there are alternatives to this input method. If you’re looking for direct onscreen software keyboard access to services such as Twitter or text messaging – situations when it would be quicker to use a more accessible input device than the slide-out hardware keyboard, then there are plenty of alternatives. These can either be downloaded free or purchased and then setup on your Windows Mobile device as the default software keyboard.

List of software keyboards

A wide selection of soft keyboards are available for Windows Mobile devices, offering is a good range of features such as haptic feedback, an iPhone-like pop-up for each key pressed and various shortcuts such as copy and paste, access to all standard keyboard characters and compatibility with multiple screen rotations and resolutions.

• SPB Keyboard from www.spbsoftwarehouse.com (this is a premium keyboard but a 30 day trial can be downloaded)
• FingerKeyboard2 available via xda-developers.com -possibly the most popular soft keyboard
• Touchpal 2.0
• Smart Keyboard
• PocketCM
• TapTap Keyboard
• HTC Touch Diamond Keyboard

(Note the last 5 keyboards are all available via www.freewarepocketpc.net)

Each of these keyboards comes as a CAB file which can be downloaded directly to your Windows Mobile device or to your PC for transfer later.

Once installed, a software keyboard can be selected and used as simply as the other software input methods – however this might not be 100% to your liking.

Thankfully, this can be changed thanks to a very useful tool called SIPChange.

Using SIPChange

Windows Mobile comes with a standard SIP (Soft Input Panel) that allows selection between the supplied soft keyboard and the various stylus unput methods. However it isn’t keen on allowing the permanent selection of additional soft keyboards, which is where SIPChange comes in.

Available from xda-developers.com, SIPChange can easily be installed onto your Windows Mobile device and takes control of the management of your software input method. With it you can install and select from multiple soft keyboards, and the one selected as the default choice remains the default.

It doesn’t sound much but it saves a lot of messing about when tapping out text messages or Twitter updates to have the right keyboard there ready and waiting without having to reselect it every time.

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Happily there is a simple way to create an XML file to store your settings and turn this into a CAB file which will apply your IMAP and/or POP3 settings for single or multiple email accounts.

This process will work on Windows Mobile 6, 6.1 and 6.5 devices.

Tools You Will Need

In order to build the CAB file, you’ll need to know the following:

• CHARACTERISTIC TYPE – give your email settings a name
• CHARACTERISTIC TYPE – this time visit www.guidgenerator.com to generate a GUID to enter in this field.
• SERVICENAME – The name you give to your email account in Pocket Outlook
• SERVICETYPE – This will be POP3 or IMAP4, depending on your email setup
• INSERVER – Your incoming mailserver name
• OUTSERVER – The name of your outgoing mailserver
• NAME – Your sender name
• AUTHNAME – Email account username
• AUTHSECRET – Email account password
• DOMAIN – The email domain – not usually required for webmail accounts
• REPLYADDR – The address you require emails to be replied to.

This information can be acquired from your existing email account setup or your email provider details.

To carry out this task, you’ll need the following free software:

A good text or XML editor – I would recommend Notepad++, the superb open source alternative to the aging Windows notepad text editor, which is available free from Sourceforge.net.

Microsoft Cabinet Software Development Kit – this tool, free from Microsoft, will create the CAB file that holds your email settings and can be run whenever you need to restore your details.

The Code

In order to begin, first of all download and install Notepad++.

Next it’s time to create your email setup. The code required should be copied from below, and pasted into a new text file in Notepad++.

<wap-provisioningdoc>
<characteristic type="EMAIL2">
<characteristic type="">
<parm name="SERVICENAME" value="Example IMAP"/>
<parm name="SERVICETYPE" value="IMAP4"/>
<parm name="INSERVER" value="imapmail.example.com"/>
<parm name="OUTSERVER" value="mailto.example.com"/>
<parm name="NAME" value="Your name" />
<parm name="AUTHNAME" value="yourmailloginname"/>
<parm name="AUTHSECRET" value="password"/>
<parm name="DOMAIN" value=""/>
<parm name="REPLYADDR" value="yourmailname@example.com"/>
<parm name="LINGER" value="15" />
<parm name="RETRIEVE" value="2048" />
<parm name="KEEPMAX" value="25" />
<parm name="DWNDAY" value="3" />
</characteristic>
</characteristic>
</wap-provisioningdoc>

You might also want to configure SMTP Authorization settings if your email host required it – insert these lines above the first </characteristic>.

<parm name="SMTPALTENABLED" value="1"/>
<parm name="SMTPALTAUTHNAME" value="yourmailnameauth"/>
<parm name="SMTPALTPASSWORD" value="smtpauthpassword"/>
<parm name="SMTPALTDOMAIN" value="smtpauthdomain"/>

Once you’ve copied this across, save it as “_setup.xml”.

Next, you’ll need to complete the blank fields, as explained above.

Once you’ve done this, take a look at the final 5 lines. Some of these can be altered, depending on your preference:

The setting “DWNDAY” value=”3″ sets Pocket Outlook to retrieve only messages that arrived in your inbox within the last 3 days.

“KEEPMAX” value=”25″ – this will retrieve up to 25 emails.

Finally, “RETRIEVE” value=”2048″ will retrieve only 2kb of each email message, with the rest of the message being downloaded when required. This allows headers, sender and subject details to be downloaded, although it is possible to set this value to “header only”.

As long as the fields are all complete as required, save the document and exit.

(Note that multiple email account details can be stored – simply remove the lines:

</characteristic>
</wap-provisioningdoc>

…then copy the previous code again, filling in the  secondary account details. As long as the file ends with the 2 lines you moved, all should work fine.

Creating the CAB File

Next, unzip the Microsoft Cabinet Software Development Kit. Cabsdk.exe is a self-extracting executable that needs to be unpacked somewhere memorable, such as C:\CABmaker.

Once completed, go to Start > Run and type CMD to open the Command Line.

Switch your prompt to the location of your _setup.xml file, and enter:

makecab /D COMPRESS=OFF _setup.xml mail.cab

This will create a file – mail.cab – in the same folder as _setup.xml – and that’s it!

Copy this to your Windows Mobile device memory card, or keep in a safe place on your PC.

Next time your Windows Mobile device has been reinstalled or had factory settings restored, simply run the mail.cab file on your handset to populate your email settings!

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Overview

If your phone line, WiFi or cable connection is down, or you’re on the move with your laptop and Windows Mobile device in tow, as long as you have a data connection with your mobile contract and such a service is available (dependent on location) you should be able to use your handset as a modem.

This process is commonly called tethering – Windows Mobile users are able to take advantage of the platform’s version of Internet Connection Sharing in order to get online.

For users of Windows Mobile 6.0 and later, this is a relatively simple task – if you’re on Windows Mobile 5.0 however it’s a bit trickier.

Windows Mobile 6.0 and later

The most recent Windows Mobile devices come pre-installed with a useful enhancement to the operating system. Internet Sharing can be found on the Programs menu, and is a quick and straightforward method of routing your mobile device internet connection through to your PC or laptop.

A once fraught exercise (see below) can now be done with the minimum of fuss- however the quality of the web pages might be somewhat reduced, while your connection speed is at the mercy of the strength and type of signal you receive from location to location. Certainly using this method of connection while in transit can be problematic as your Windows Mobile device connects and disconnects to and from a vast number of transmitters and relays.

Page and image quality can also be affected by your mobile network compressing images before they’re passed on to you. This is a matter of the carrier managing their bandwidth, but it can restrict the sort of work or tasks you’re able to complete.

Many carriers also block the FTP protocol, so if you have any plans to upload any files to a web server while utilizing the tethered Internet Sharing this is something to bear in mind if things don’t go as expected.

Windows Mobile 5.0

Windows Mobile 5.0 devices equipped with AKU 3.0 (Adaption Kit Upgrade – software sent out to Windows Mobile phone providers) or greater also come equipped to allow sharing of the internet connection – however with devices without the AKU 3.0, it’s a little more complicated to get the connection setup.

To begin, visit www.PDAGold.com and pickup the USB Modem & Driver zip file. Download and unzip the two files to your PC hard drive.

Your phone should be connected to your Windows machine via USB cable when you begin the process – on your Windows Mobile device go to Settings -> Connections -> GPRS -> Add New.

You’ll need to know the name of your mobile network’s Access Point at this stage and enter it in the appropriate field. This can either be acquired via a telephone conversation with your provider, or a search on Google.

OK this, and check you can connect to the internet via your mobile browser.

Next it’s time to activate the modem – go to Accessories -> Modem Link and choose the USB connection, again entering the Access Point name as before.

When you click on Activate, the Windows Mobile device – now acting as a modem – will prompt Windows XP to install a driver. Follow the wizard through, choosing the .INF driver file in the USB Modem & Driver zip file you downloaded earlier.

Finally, browse to the folder you unzipped the USB Modem & Driver files to and run the USBModem_Dialer.exe file. This will prompt you to select a modem and enter the Access Point in the APN field – once this is done you’re ready to click Connect and enjoy mobile internet via your Windows Mobile device!

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Poor application programming is usually the cause of these apps retaining system resources and the usual fix is to perform a soft reset of the device – although a Task Manager is included on Windows Mobile 5 and later, it usually only assists in closing difficult to exit programs.

CleanRAM therefore is a vital tool in managing memory resources on Windows Mobile devices, and is available free from FreewarePocketPC.net. We’re going to look now at how to use CleanRAM in different ways to control allocated memory.

Getting Started

Once installed, cleanRAM displays two icons in your Windows Mobile programs view – the basic launch/clean app and the cleanRAM Config app.

cleanRAM Config determines the type of clean up that will be performed when the cleanRAM app is launched, with three cleaning “depths”:

Level 1 is a “Basic Purge”, best for closing non-responding tasks without resorting to Task Manager. Some versions of Task Manager – particularly that found in Windows Mobile 5 and 6 – are slow to respond when instructed to close the application in question, and fail to fully end all related processes. Basic Purge is quick and is the default setting on cleanRAM.

Level 2 is known as the “Quality Purge”. This option is recommended for best performance – in reality it cleans deeper than the basic option, but in around the same sort of time frame. Quality Purge is a good option to choose to save you performing a soft-reset. It will exit virtually all Windows Mobile apps and non-required processes, leaving your device to run as if it had just been switched on.

Level 3 is the maximum clean up option, “Fundamental Purge”. This option is vital for cutting ties with bad applications, perhaps online services that are hanging due to a poor data connection or those that the Quality Purge option failed to end. Fundamental Purge can take a bit of time to complete and as such should only be used in the most extreme cases.

These three options provide the best memory cleaning available to a Windows Mobile user free of charge, and using cleanRAM is a simple case of selecting the purge option, setting it as default and launching the clean up via the cleanRAM app button.

Advanced Customization and Scheduling Options

Along with these three options, cleanRAM offers a variety of options for customizing and scheduling your Windows Mobile system clean up.

The Customized Processes List allows you to select the running processes you wish to clean up (or end) whenever the cleanRAM tool is used. These processes can be added to the Customized Processes List, which means they will be the only ones cleaned when cleanRAM is run. The Customized Processes List is disabled by default, and must be enabled via the check box.

Conversely, the Exceptions List allows you to select processes that are never cleaned. The Exceptions List is activated via the check box.

Scheduling is accessed via the cleanRAM config menu and must also be enabled via the check box.  Using scheduling you can choose your purge level, set a time (hourly, every 4 hours, etc) and choose which days of the week of the cleanRAM runs.

Finally, it’s a simple task to backup your cleanRAM settings. This means rather than resorting to careful reselection of exceptions and scheduling following an uninstall of the tool or a hard device reset (restoring the factory settings of your Windows Mobile device) you simply restore your cleanRAM configuration settings from a backup stored on your Windows Mobile device memory card.

cleanRAM is one of the best utilities available for the Windows Mobile platform. If you do use it and gain benefit from it, remember to consider contributing a donation to the developers at www.htcaddicts.com.

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However if you’re blogging to a Movable Type or WordPress platform blog, the best solution is Pocket Sharp MT  for touchscreen “Professional” Windows Mobile devices (or Phone Sharp MT for non-touchscreen WinMo handsets). Pocket Sharp MT is available from www.randyrants.com.

Once the installation is complete, you can configure Pocket Sharp MT to connect to and publish to your WordPress or Movable Type blog, and comfortably blog from the comfort of your Windows Mobile device, employing basic formatting, assigning categories and even uploading images.

Setup Your Blog Connection

To begin, you need to make a connection to your blog. This first of all requires that your Windows Mobile deice is connected to the Internet, either directly via your network operator or via a WiFi connection. Note that prolonged use of Pocket Sharp MT can result in a high data usage charge.

When you first launch the blog software, you will need to setup the connection to your Movable Type or WordPress blog. This can be done by going to Tools -> Options.

The options screen requires:

• Web Server
• CGI-BIN Path
• Username
• Password

You should already know your blog username and password; you should also know the URL of your blog, which is entered as the Web Server. (Enter the full path, including the ‘http://’)

The CGI-BIN part can prove to be more difficult. The default is set in Pocket Sharp MT for Movable Type blogs – /cgipath/mt-xmlrpc.cgi – so if you’re using Movable Type as your blogging platform you’re laughing at this point.

WordPress platform users need to change this entry to refer to the WordPress version of this linking gateway script. Thankfully it’s a lot easier to type in: /xmlrpc.php

With a correct username and password entered and a connection to the Internet established, click on refresh. The Blog List drop down will now display your blog, so you can click OK to continue or if necessary update the Proxy tab with any relevant information you need to connect to the web and try again.

Note that this guide is written using a WordPress blog connection. The Pocket Sharp MT software functions remain the same for either platform, however.

Writing a Blog Post

Once the connection to your blog is setup, you can go straight into entering the text for your blog post.

Enter a title, select a category and enter the body text – it’s all straightforward and can be entered either by a hardware device-mounted keyboard or a software keyboard.

Longer entries can continue over onto the Extended tab, while Tags (Keywords) and Excerpts can be entered on the Advanced tab, along with a list of URLs to Ping. The status of the post (Draft or Publish) can also be set here, as well as allowing or disallowing comments.

The Authored on tab lets you set the date and time of writing – alternatively you can sync Pocket Sharp MT with your server time.

Save Drafts

It’s always good practice to save as you go, particularly when blogging from a device that doubles as a phone. This can be done via the File menu, simply select Save Draft or hit the Save button on the menu bar. The saved post will be stored as a text file with the .MT file extension.

The Format menu will apply any of the preset formatting (bold, underline, italics, URL link) to the selected text, while copy and pasting can be achieved via File -> Edit.

Finally, use the Tools > Upload Media category to upload images to the specified uploads location on your server. Using the standard <img src=”[filename]”> you can enter the image into the blog post, or simply use let Pocket Sharp MT insert it into the post on your behalf.

Submitting Your Post

Submitting your blog post is a matter of deciding whether to change the status from Draft to Publish, and then hitting Post to Server.

You can check the resulting post on either your mobile or your desktop browser to check the outcome, and I think you’ll agree the results – while limited – are very good indeed.

Pocket Sharp MT is one of the most functional Windows Mobile blogging clients available, but there are other solutions that operate on similar principles.

image credit: ittsai

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Thankfully as part of an overdue concerted move to develop the Windows Mobile and Hotmail/Live platforms, Microsoft have developed the My Phone, a secure online repository for contacts, SMS messages and other vital information stored on your Windows Mobile device that can be added to or cut down as the user sees fit.

A great storage facility for MP3s, videos and photos, Microsoft currently offers 200 MB of space to My Phone users – enough to keep a back up of vital documents, ringtones and videos.

To use My Phone, you need a Live or Hotmail account (sign up at accountservices.passport.net), and a Windows Mobile device with an internet connection. When using any web service on a mobile device it is vital to have a generous data plan setup. There’s a potential of up to 200 MB of data being transferred to your My Phone storage from your Windows Mobile device – as such a flat-rate monthly data transfer tariff is vital unless you have reliable, regular WiFi access.

Download My Phone from myphone.microsoft.com and install on your Windows Mobile device; meanwhile visit the sn1-p3.myphone.microsoft.com domain in order to login to your My Phone account on the web.

Once installed on your Windows Mobile device, run Microsoft My Phone. You’ll be prompted to login – use your standard Microsoft Live or Hotmail details here, the same credentials you use to login to the web service.

Once logged in, My Phone will determine which type of synchronization to run. The vital contents of your Windows Mobile device can be backed up to the My Phone storage either automatically on a schedule determined by you, or manually, whenever you command the app to sync.

Depending on the volume of data to be stored, Microsoft My Phone can take a while to complete synchronization on the first attempt. Subsequent syncs are appends however, meaning that only information that has changed is synchronized.

To decide what to synchronize, in Microsoft My Phone go to Menu > Options and choose from:

• Contacts – all contacts from your phones address book. This is a good way to backup the contacts from your SIM card.
• Calendar and Tasks – if you sync your phone with Outlook or an Exchange server, your calendar and tasks will also be synced with Microsoft My Phone, so these might be options to ignore.
• Text Messages – a great way to keep a backup of vital text messages.
• Photos – the chances of losing vital photographs are long gone with My Phone providing remote online storage
• Videos and Music – depending on the type of device you use, videos and music might be no-goes, or you might find that with the limited 200 MB of space you choose one of the other. Modern Windows Mobile devices come with 3 MP cameras or better, resulting in higher file sizes, which means your My Phone server space could get eaten up.
• Documents – Photos, videos, music and documents can all be uploaded from your PC or from your phone. Vital documents in particular can benefit from this functionality, with My Phone giving you a remote backup option that means documents can be restored to your Windows Mobile device or your PC. Sadly at present however there is no synchronization client for Windows XP or Vista, meaning that uploading to the My Phone storage area must be done manually, one item at a time.
• Sync storage cards – if there is any space left on your My Phone storage space it can be used to backup any storage cards installed on your Windows Mobile device.

From the same Menu, you can also access the Schedule screen to set a daily, weekly, monthly time for the synchronization. Microsoft My Phone will synchronize in the background without causing any serious interruption to your general phone use – however it is a good idea to schedule syncing to take place during the night.

Microsoft My Phone is a free service, one that brings the matter of remote storage for the Windows Mobile platform into line with other smartphone providers such as Apple and various mobile networks.

The 200 MB capacity is modest; however it is expect that Microsoft will increase this considerably over time, so now in this post-beta phase it is the best time to get to grips with Microsoft My Phone.

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Prior to the actual act of installing the application, there are several things you need to check. These are:

• operating system version
• framework
• spare memory
• hardware functionality

Each of these elements of a Windows Mobile device can make or break an installation. A suitable comparison with a desktop device would be trying to install a game that requires a light gun but you don’t have one attached. On a PC, the game will simply be useless – you might be able to run the game, but won’t be able to interact with it. On a Windows Mobile device, the handset will be looking for the peripheral or hardware and if it can’t find it the application won’t run.

Operating System Version

Most Windows Mobile software of any lasting use will be compatible with at least Windows Mobile 5 and upwards. Windows Mobile Professional is the version usually found on touchscreen devices, whereas non-touchscreen devices run Windows Mobile Standard (also known as Windows Mobile Smartphone). Ideally your device should be running Windows Mobile 6 if it is to successfully run a modern WinMo application.

Check your Windows Mobile version by going to Settings > System > About

Framework

With the correct operating system, you;’ll find  you also need the correct version of Microsoft’s .Net Compact Framework for Windows Mobile. Having this is vital to running any application written for the .Net framework.

Check your .Net CF version via Settings > Remove Programs and identifying the version there – careful you don’t uninstall it, forever!

Spare memory

Obviously you need enough memory on-board to run the intended application; however in many cases you’ll need enough memory to save the installer file beforehand. Windows Mobile phones with an expansion slot can of course have the available RAM expanded usually by the addition of Flash memory.

To check your device memory, go to Settings > System > Device Information > Hardware. To check the current memory usage, go to Settings > Memory

Hardware Functionality

Installing hardware-specific software is going to end in disappointment. A key example would be the recent proliferation of applications that require a g-sensor (also known as accelerometer) which detects the motion and movement of your Windows Mobile device. Devices with this enhancement will run motion-sensitive applications and novelties without problem – however devices without a g-sensor might accept the installation, but they won’t be able to run the software.

(A general rule of thumb – if your phone is a HTC Touch series phone, then you can be pretty certain it has a g-sensor. The Samsung Omnia is similarly equipped.)

It is important therefore to check your handset specifications and the software’s hardware requirements before proceeding to download.

Once you’re happy that the application is suitable for your phone and you’ve downloaded it, the type of file that is downloaded depends on the type of installation that will be carried out.

Installation via .EXE file and Microsoft ActiveSync

Any Windows Mobile application that is an executable file (one with a file name ending in .exe) will need to be installed via Microsoft ActiveSync and a USB or Bluetooth connection with your PC.

First of all, make sure you’ve got Microsoft ActiveSync installed on your PC. The latest version can be downloaded from Microsoft.

Next, ensure your Windows Mobile device is switched on and connected either by USB or Bluetooth to your PC, and that a relationship is established via ActiveSync.

Once this has been done, double click your downloaded Windows Mobile executable (.exe) file to begin installation. ActiveSync will prompt for you to confirm installation, while your handset will require you to OK the installation.

After installation is complete it should be safe for you to disconnect your Windows Mobile device from the PC and run the new application.

Installation via .CAB file

An increasingly common method of installation is via a .CAB file – this method is particularly useful for installing directly to a Windows Mobile device, cutting out the PC connection.

If a PC is being used to download Windows Mobile applications however, don’t be put off – .CAB files can be installed via the ActiveSync managed connection with your device.

To acquire a .CAB installer, either visit the website hosting software form your PC or from your Windows Mobile handset.

If you’re visiting from your PC, download the file before copying it to your Windows Mobile device via your ActiveSync-managed USB or Bluetooth connection. Ensure you have saved it to a memorable location and when the from PC to handset is complete select the .CAB file to initialise the installation procedure.

If you’re downloading from the website directly from your Windows Mobile browser of choice, save the file and when download is complete select the .CAB file to being the installation.

Final note

Although the majority of Windows Mobile applications no longer force the handset to reset following installation, it is good practice to manually implement this step to avoid errors running the software.

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Available as a free download from www.viigo.com, this superb RSS feed reader can be downloaded and installed in a matter of minutes via a multitude of different options.

Download and installation

To download, visit www.viigo.com/download and choose the Windows Mobile Desktop Install option from the right-hand menu.

Depending on your Windows Mobile device, you will need to choose between the options:

• Download to your PC
• Download including .NET CF 2.0.

This can be quite a daunting choice – one which depends on your knowledge of your phone and operating system. As a rule of thumb, if you purchased your Windows Mobile device as new in 2008 or later then you can take the first option. For all other Windows Mobile handsets take the second option. This will be a larger download, but will equip your phone for a lot of other modern Windows Mobile applications.

Once the download has completed, you’ll need to check your Windows Mobile device is switched on and connected to your PC or laptop via USB cable. USB cable is more reliable for installing software than Bluetooth.

ActiveSync should be installed and running on the Windows desktop or laptop and a connection have been established with your mobile device. Once this has been achieved, find the file you downloaded from Viigo.com (for instance ViigoPublicBeta.exe) and double click to begin the installation. Follow the onscreen instructions on both your PC and Windows Mobile device for installation.

(Advanced Windows Mobile users may opt to download Viigo via the various over the air options, such as SMS, email or direct download from the mobile browser. These options are all available on the viigo.com/downloads page. Once downloaded to your phone, simply select the .CAB file to install.)

It’s always worth restarting your Windows Mobile device after installing new software, so switch your device off and back on again to fully complete installation.

Configuring RSS feeds

Once installed, Viigo can be run from the Programs menu of your Windows Mobile device. An account with the service is required, and this can be setup at www.myviigo.com. This account will retain all of your current RSS feed settings, useful in the event of loss or damage to your phone, or you need to reinstall the application.

With your account setup on the Viigo website, log in to the application on your Windows Mobile handset. There are a considerable number of feed categories – most of these include preset feeds that can be subscribed to or unsubscribed to, depending on your preference and how well they meet your needs.

To subscribe to a preset Sports feed, select the Sports menu item and select Add Channel. A list of sports from Golf to American Football and Soccer are available to choose from, with some categories depending on level, region, etc. For instance Motor Sports is split into F1, IndyCar and NASCAR.

Within these subcategories, select the feed you require to subscribe to it – the RSS feed icon will change from greyed out to orange when the feed has been synchronised.

To view the feed, return to the main menu by clicking Back and then return to the Sports category – the feed you added will be available under the appropriate sport heading.

You might prefer however to add your own choice of RSS feeds. This can be done easily via the News & RSS menu item. Using the Menu in the lower right of the screen, choose Add Channel to choose from a range of Viigo recommended feeds and blogs or choose the Add you own channel to add a feed URL of your own choice. It’s also possible to set up a variety of other feed options from this screen, such as a Google Reader aggregator feed.

Note that you can keep up with your position within the menus and screens on Viigo via the tree that runs across the top of each screen.

Finally, depending on the available memory on your Windows Mobile handset you might need to alter both the number of posts downloaded as well as the frequency of feed synchronisation.  These settings can both be applied via the Options on the main Menu, where you can also change language preferences.

Frequency of synchonrisation and post download volume may also be a consideration for Windows Mobile users without generous dataplans, so bear this in mind when installing Viigo for Windows Mobile

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