Live Mesh for Windows Mobile – US/UK workaround

The Live Mesh service just released 2 new clients today: Windows Mobile and Mac. The Mac version is available for download in any country, but the WIndows Mobile version is only for the United States and United Kingdom.

What? You don’t live in the US/UK?

Therefore, I am posting a workaround that does not involve making a new account and using that for Live Mesh.

It is relatively simple:

1. Go to http://account.live.com
2. Login with your main WIndows Live ID account (the one you intend to use Mesh with)
3. In the middle column, there should be a link to “Registered Information”. Click that.
4. Make sure your birth date is set so you are over 18! This is important. If you aren’t over 18, set it over 18, or else you won’t be able to use your account anymore. If you can’t set this, I can’t help you. Abort this process now.
5. Click “Save”
6. Return to the Registered Information page
7. Under Home Country/Region, select “United States”
8. Click “Save”
9. Click here (thanks LiveSide)
10. Click on “Add device”
11. You should now have a link available for Windows Mobile
12. Download it to your device
13. Return to Registered Information, set Country/Region back to your country, save, then set your age back to current age if you changed it

This works because after the Mesh promotion is activated, it doesn’t check anymore to see if you are still a “US resident”. It worked for me. Have fun, and grab it whilst its hot!

The HTML/CSS problem

The problem itself is with div tags and alignment. To align a div, all you have to do is add “style=”margin:auto”" to the div tag, and there you have it: a centered div tag. But what if you want it vertically aligned?

As far as I know, aligning a div tag onto the middle of the screen still needs a div tag spanning the whole screen, which is vertically aligned to the middle, in which case you have your other div tag wrapped inside.

In other words, it’s easier to use a table.

Most people are telling you not to use tables to wrap your whole webpage in, as they’re slow to load and don’t display until they’re fully loaded. Well, some people just got to ask “is it for my convenience I just use tables, or is it better to use CSS and extra tags, which sometimes doesn’t even work in some browsers?”.

Go figure -.-

Windows. Mobile.

I hope this would be my last fustrating outrage towards Windows Mobile. After that, the product probably won’t improve and I would probably just give up ranting about it.

Windows. Mobile.

7.

Delayed. Til the second half of 2009. I really don’t get it. How are they supposed to try and increase their market share with the Android platform, Blackberries and iPhones ever increasing their own percentage of users? The last Windows Mobile update was 6.1, and what did that bring? Finger-friendly interface? No. Numbers you can actually put your whole finger on in the dialpad or calculator? No. A today screen that has bars big enough for your finger to tap on? No. Uncluttered menus? No. Being able to close a program instead of minimizing without going to start, settings, system, task manager? No.

Woah, that’s a lot of stuff done there. I can’t believe I didn’t get it the first day it was out! Oh… right… HTC didn’t release an update for my phone until a week before today. Even though it didn’t cost them a thing to get 6.1 into their hot little hands.

The reliance on third-party software to do something the OS should be able to do is massive. WinMo doesn’t even come with a registry editor.

And yet the third-party software has their own massive range and no quality control. There’s the good (SPB software) and the bad (too many to list). Without a standard system of distributing applications from one place, where ratings can be compared from program to program, the platform is set up for failure.

And now the next update won’t come until 1 year after Android gets a foothold or handhold into the market. How good can it get?

If Microsoft doesn’t do something drastic, soon, my next phone’s definitely not going to be a Windows Mobile, no matter how many Microsoft Word documents it can read.

Google Chrome FTW!

Yes, Google Chrome is released. Chrome’s such a weird name for an internet browser. Why in the world did they choose that name? Anyways, it’s released, and like all other people, you should go and test it. For windows only.

http://www.google.com/chrome

I find it funny how Chrome has it’s own task manager… but meh, you can find out the “amazing abilities of Chrome” by yourself. I’ll leave you to it

P.S. It’s actually quite a nice, quick, neat browser. I would’ve liked to use the word “minimalistic”, but the fact is it isn’t. It has tabbing, flash, download manager, whatever! And it’s all packaged in an app that actually starts when you tell it to. So I’ll just say it has a minimalistic interface.

Google releases Street View, stalks all of Australia

Yay, Google’s street view feature for Google Maps has finally made it to Australia. And with that comes the endless images on street-level of people. That just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.

Now there is a ton of images which you can rotate and travel down streets for some random reason. Yes, you can travel on “Bradfield Highway” in Street View and then boast to your friends “I’ve been on the Sydney Harbour Bridge!” Wouldn’t that be interesting? You’ve got to be sorry for those people who were having a nice time on the streets then caught by one of Google’s cameras. The cities are bugged!

I dont’ even know if this is a good thing or not. Is it really necessary to go onto Pitt Street to do “something”?

Large areas of the east coast, Perth and Tasmania has been covered by their cars (which don’t look that great, according to images found on Google, image search). Oh noes, who knows where they might strike next… Probably mount cameras on the Indian Pacific or The Ghan…