Uzzap is Smart Communications' answer to Globe's now defunct IM Evrywhr. It is an instant messenger that you can run on your mobile phone.

Smart, however, was wise enough to include that one feature which will guarantee at least a couple of days traffic overload: Yahoo Messenger. Yes, ladies & gentlemen, it can hook up with your Yahoo Messenger account, the one IM that we Filipinos can't seem to do without.

It also has built-in chatrooms, and can integrate with your MSN messenger account.

Uzzap also has a PC client, which enables you to use it from your PC. Why you would use the PC client when your computer already has a bloated Yahoo Messenger client is beyond me. But it's there, available for download, just in case you suddenly start growing fond of your Uzzap ID, you weirdo you.

There is something amazing with Uzzap that you usually don't find in other mobile messengers: SMS integration.

You can set up your Uzzap account so that all offline messages sent to your Uzzap ID are automatically forwarded to your mobile phone via SMS.

(Take note that I said Uzzap ID, not your Yahoo or MSN ID. Anything sent to your Yahoo or MSN ID while you are offline is Yahoo's and Microsoft's business. Commenters, you have been warned.)

Charges

Uzzap is free for the time being. This means no internet charges until further notice.

So go ahead and chat all you want, grab all the text mates you can find, and do us a favor and refrain from using text spelling.

Uzzap mo me?

Download

You can download the Uzzap app from the Uzzap website. The best way to download it, however, is by sending a text message with the word UZZAP to 7272. This will automatically send you the download link to your phone.

This is a free download, and be thankful it is, because it is a whopping 915 kb file.

After installing the file, go to your list of apps, and click on the blurriest icon that you see. Now you're ready to start Uzzaping.

To put it mildly, Uzzap is not the most user friendly app. It has redundant icons, an overload of textual instructions, menus in all the wrong places, and insists on using your last saved network connection (despite repeated attempts on setting it on manual).

But it's Yahoo IM and SMS integration is enough to stifle the screams of frustration. Or at least for the time being.

Working with Mantis has been sweet. It was a project manager’s delight – full-blown features and a powerful back-end.

However, if you are concerned with usability, it can be a nightmare. Getting Mantis to display the barebones essentials required too much editing. Mantis, after all, doesn’t (yet) have a templating system to make it easier to customize & remove fields.

Task type (bug, feature, task) wasn’t also built-in – custom fields have to be used (which will prove later on to be a templating horror), or maybe recycle the not-so-often used Severity field.

Most agonizing is in customizing the “look” of Mantis. It is bursting in the seams with its sheer number of tables .... probably to make up for its pitiful number of CSS classes?

Enter Flyspray

Flyspray came to the rescue. Well, sort of. All the pertinent fields are in plain view – due date, target version, percent completed, and yes, task type.

It is also highly customizable – numerous classes & ids are meticulously included to make the CSS fanatic in you real proud. In a short amount of time, I was able to transform Flyspray’s horrendous default template to something utterly glorious.

Exit Flyspray

Upon entering more data, however, Flyspray’s weakness started to kick in:

The actual editing of global & project permissions leaves much to be desired. It took a lot of hits & misses before we finally figured out the difference between the project & global permissions (even where & how to edit them, for that matter).

A function similar to Mantis’ My View or Trac’s My Tickets was conspicuously missing. This is a page where users can see all the issues assigned to them, regardless of project. In the forums, however, we were informed that this is not needed, as there is an advanced search feature which can be used to search for tasks assigned to them. Oh … oh okay.

Most painful is the lack of support for subprojects. I’m still wondering if the Flyspray team never realized that people with more than 20 projects will want to use their product. Unfortunately, I am one of those people, and I have to play with prefixes just to get those damn projects ordered right. And did I mention that the project switch drop down is now extending near the end of my browser window? Really.

Meenie, minie ...

If you are part of a small team (maybe 5 people) and handling a couple or so projects … yes, Flyspray would probably perfect for you. However, they are not for developers of medium sized to large teams, those handling more than 5 projects, and for Project or QA Managers who use bug trackers intensively for issue, assignment, and project tracking.

Don’t expect much in the future developments either. Based on their roadmap and posts in the forums, their primary customers are the self-managed developers.

And we are left with no choice but to pray to the highest heavens that someday, somehow, the developers of these bug tracking systems will finally listen to the users who actually use it the most.

Due to uncontrollable factors, I had the misfortune of subscribing to PLDT MyDSL in our condo in Salcedo Village. From the installation to troubleshooting, it was already the worst experience I have ever encountered. And that’s not even an exaggeration: Due to my line of work, I have first-hand experience with all the Metro Manila broadband services.

A summary of my experience in hell:

• It took 3 weeks for the DSL to be installed.
• MyDSL has a newly released modem with their logo proudly stamped on the top. This broke down twice in a span of two days. (It was finally replaced with a Nokia DSL modem, which is fine, thank you very much.)
• Experiencing bad customer service? Why don’t you try calling PLDT DSL’s 172 and experience what bad really means?

  It is easy to forgive ignorance – but it is very hard to do the same thing with arrogance. And that, my friend, is what PLDT’s customer reps are known for.

  A few examples of MyDSL customer rep's famous last words:

  “We know more about the internet than you.”

  “There is no such thing as what you’re saying.”

  “I don’t have to report that because our calls our recorded anyway. Our manager will already know about your complaint herself.”

After two weeks, I thought I had seen it all – until I installed iTunes. I have been wondering why my podcast subscriptions will take forever to download. A 20mb file, for example, was downloaded in 7 hours. Another one was downloaded in 4 hours.

Finally giving up on reinstalling & reconfiguring my network devices, I decided to hook up Smart 3G. These same files were downloaded in 15 minutes.

Don’t bother calling customer service, because chances are, you’ll get the same reply I did: “It’s impossible to change your bandwidth so that’s not PLDT’s problem.”

(And by the way, how are your torrents downloads lately?)

I love you Smart Bro. I will probably stay with you forever.

PLDT MyDSL, may you rot in hell.

J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books, is being considered, once again, by TIME Magazine as Person of the Year.

If I know J.K. Rowling (yes, I probably don't), it is almost inhumane to put up a fight against the likes of Al Gore. She can probably beat the lights out of Steve Jobs and Petraeus. But Al Gore? It's like stealing from the nuns … and beating up their puppies afterwards.

You can cast your vote by clicking here.

Take note that the editors of TIME Magazine "reserve the right to disagree." Let's just hope that they wouldn't be such cowards (& idiots) as they were last year.

I read SMS spam. It doesn't abhor me like email spam. Plus it gives me a chance to read something during those waiting times.

That boring introduction is meant to bring a point across: It takes a lot to make me sick of SMS spam. But then again, I underestimated the power of the Philippine telcos to annoy their users. A few seconds ago, I finally ended by year-long relationship with SMS spam.

In the Philippines, almost 95% of SMS spams are sent by the telecommunication companies themselves. Unfortunately, as their direct marketing capabilities are not up to par with their technical ones, I feel as if I owe these idiots a brief runthrough of some spamming/marketing essentials

FYI:

1. Timing. SMS spams should be sent during office hours. This should be a no-brainer. But then again, since they send SMS spam even at 2AM, this basically means they have no brains.

   Kids, repeat after me: "I will not send spam past 6PM."

2. Repetition. Surprisingly, this annoyed me more than timing, & was impetus for my unsubscription.

   I have received almost 10 messages in the past week informing me of my chances to win a Nintendo Wii. You sent it. I read it.

   When I didn't join your contest, it is not a go-signal for you to persist. It is a signal for you to stop.

3. Frequency. My limit is about two SMS spams per day. Anything more & irritation start to seeps in.

   But the human mind can be deceiving: It can actually ingest more spam if the spammer play his cards right with intervals (next).

4. Interval. Last August 30, I received 3 spams in a span of 1 hour. Whoever is the marketing genius behind this strategy probably attended the seminar on "How to Achieve Ultimate Death to your SMS Marketing Campaigns."

   Needless to say, I typed ALERTs OFF, and happily sent it to 211.

P.S.

Dear Marketing Geniuses of the Telco Industry:

If you don't understand what I'm talking about, kindly leave your cellphone numbers in the comment section of this post. We will be more than happy to forward to you all the spam that you infest on our cellphones.

Are you surrounded by #$@%#^$& colleagues who insist on touching your LCD just to make a point? Fingerprints are facts of life for LCD users all over the world. Fortunately, cleaning LCDs aren't too bad. Actually, it's quite painless. Read on.

The cloth

Lint-free cloths work best. Try to have a 2nd one in handy for wiping away streaks.

Most brand-new eyeglasses nowadays come with a free lint-free cloth. You can also purchase these supposedly premium cloths specifically made for LCDs. I bought a bunch of these, & couldn't really tell much of a difference.

Please do not use paper towels.

The liquid

The nice surprise? Most LCD cleaners are just mixtures of isopropyl alcohol & water (1 part : 1 part).

Don't use cleaners which contain ammonia, as they damage the LCD.

The application

Do not apply the liquid directly to the LCD. Rather, moisten the cloth with the liquid. Then use the moistened cloth to clean your screen.

Easy & cheap.

Living in the Philippines has its perks – I get to read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallowsearlier than most of the world (legally, that is).

I am still in that delirious-mourning state that you usually get after reading Harry Potter, but nevertheless, there were a lot of questions answered.

For one thing, I can finally put to rest all my questions about the history of James, Lily, Dumbledor & Snape. And of course, I know who lives/dies, got a reprieve, etc.

It was definitely a closure.

But then again, some little questions cannot be avoided:

• I guess technically, Harry wasn’t a Horcrux?
• What happened to the other characters had 19 years later?

And some other notes:

• Action-packed. Really. Will give you goosebumps
• There is room for a sequel/prequel. Whether or not J.K.Rowling will undertake it is another story.

Thank you, Harry Potter, for letting us into your world. It was pure magic.