Thursday 9 July 2009

BlackBerry Curve 8310 crashing/freezing behaviour

Recently I have had problems with my BlackBerry Curve 8310. It was crashing all the time, even a few minutes after a reboot. As I figured out later, there was an disk error on the memory card that caused the issue - everything is now fine after I have had formatted it.

An interesting thing happens when the device crashes - if you are playing an audio file it will continue playing, but if you unplug the headphones it will not switch to the speaker/speakerphone. The light sensor will still react to changes in lighting condition and will adjust the brightness of the screen and back light the keyboard and clitmouse, errr I mean trackball.

Surprisingly the [Shift] key will also work. Interesting.

Monday 6 July 2009

BEIKS Keyboard Locker 1.0 for BlackBerry

Recently I've noticed that if I'm on the go, keys on my Curve 8310 get accidentally pressed. I don't use the lether-ish holster because I listen to music and podcasts all the time. The phone can be locked using an icon on the home screen or assigning the locking action to one of the convenience keys, but it's not very handy.

The problem has been solved on the Curve 8900, which has a dedicated keyboard lock key, just above the status led.

If you stuck with an older 83xxn The BEIKS keyboard Locker for BlackBerry is an app that you might consider. Upon installation the application adds a control panel in the Options/Settings application where all other global settings are.

It will automatically lock the keyboard after a period that you can define. The application is free and very straightforward - to give it a go, go to http://mobile.beiks.com for an OTA installation.

Thursday 2 July 2009

The Brain percives tools as temporary body parts

Researchers have confirmed that when we use a tool, even for just a few minutes, the tool becomes a part of what is known in psychology as our body schema, according to a report published in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication.

"Since the origin of the concept of body schema, the idea of its functional plasticity has always been taken for granted, even if no direct evidence has been provided until now," said Alessandro Farnè of INSERM and the Université Claude Bernard Lyon. "Our series of experiments provides the first, definitive demonstration that this century-old intuition is true."

In the new study the researches reasoned that if one incorporates a used tool into the body schema, his or her subsequent bodily movements should differ when compared to those performed before the tool was used.

Indeed, that is exactly what they observed. After using a mechanical grabber that extended their reach, people behaved as though their arm really was longer, they found.

It's a phenomenon each of us unconsciously experiences every day, the researchers said. The reason you were able to brush your teeth this morning without necessarily looking at your mouth or arm is because your toothbrush was integrated into your brain's representation of your arm.

The findings help to explain how it is that humans use tools so well.

"We believe this ability of our body representation to functionally adapt to incorporate tools is the fundamental basis of skillful tool use," Cardinali said. "Once the tool is incorporated in the body schema, it can be maneuvered and controlled as if it were a body part itself."

Read the full article on Science Blog.

Karen Hopkin of Scientific American reported on this on 60-Second Science, a daily podcast.