Layout

We’ll start with creating a layout for our main screen.

Components

• 2 Text Strings
• 2 Editable Text Box
• Character Counter in Message
• Send Button

The Home Screen of the SendSMS App

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
 android:orientation="vertical"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="fill_parent"
 >
<TextView
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
 android:text="Enter the phone number of the recipient"
 />
<EditText
 android:id="@+id/phoneNo"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
/>
<TextView
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
 android:text="Message"
/>
<EditText
 android:id="@+id/textMessage"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="160px"
 android:gravity="top"
/>
<TextView
 android:id="@+id/counter"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
 android:text="160/0"
/>
<Button
 android:id="@+id/sendSMS"
 android:layout_width="fill_parent"
 android:layout_height="wrap_content"
 android:text="Send SMS"
/>
</LinearLayout>

HelloSMS Main Activity

In the Main HelloSMS Activity, we’ll do 2 things.

• Bind the Send SMS button to a OnClickListener() for sending sms.
• Bind the Message Text box to addTextChangedListener() for counter.

package com.vineetdhanawat.hellosms;
import android.app.Activity;
import android.app.PendingIntent;
import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.content.IntentFilter;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.telephony.SmsManager;
import android.text.Editable;
import android.text.TextWatcher;
import android.view.View;
import android.view.View.OnClickListener;
import android.widget.Button;
import android.widget.EditText;
import android.widget.TextView;
import android.widget.Toast;
public class HelloSMS extends Activity {
 /* Called when the activity is first created. */
  Button sendSMS;
  EditText phoneNo;
  EditText textMessage;
  TextView mCounter;
  @Override
  public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
    super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
    setContentView(R.layout.main);
    sendSMS = (Button) findViewById(R.id.sendSMS);
    phoneNo = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.phoneNo);
    textMessage = (EditText) findViewById(R.id.textMessage);
    mCounter = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.counter);
    textMessage.addTextChangedListener(mTextEditorWatcher);
    /* On Click Listener on the sendSMS Button. */
    sendSMS.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
      public void onClick(View v) {
        String mobNo = phoneNo.getText().toString();
        String message = textMessage.getText().toString();
        if (mobNo.length()>0 && message.length()>0)
          sendSMS(mobNo, message);
        else
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(),
          "Please enter both phone number and message.",
          Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
      }
    });
  }
}

The sendSMS() is defined as follows: We do not need to instantiate this class directly, Instead we can call getdefault() to obtain the SmsManager Object. sendTextMessage() send the sms with a PendingIntent. In this case it does nothing, but it can be used to monitor the status of sent SMS.

/* Method to send SMS. */
private void sendSMS(String phoneNumber, String message)
{
  PendingIntent pi = PendingIntent.getActivity(this, 0,
    new Intent(this, SMS.class), 0);
  SmsManager sms = SmsManager.getDefault();
  sms.sendTextMessage(phoneNumber, null, message, pi, null);
}

Let us modify the code to monitor the Sent / Delivered status of the SMS. We’ll need to use BroadcastReceiver object for the purpose.

/* Method to send SMS. */
private void sendSMS(String mobNo, String message) {
  String smsSent = "SMS_SENT";
  String smsDelivered = "SMS_DELIVERED";
  PendingIntent sentPI = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, 0,
     new Intent(smsSent), 0);
  PendingIntent deliveredPI = PendingIntent.getBroadcast(this, 0,
     new Intent(smsDelivered), 0);
  /* Receiver for Sent SMS. */
  registerReceiver(new BroadcastReceiver(){
    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context arg0, Intent arg1) {
      switch (getResultCode())
      {
        case Activity.RESULT_OK:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "SMS sent",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        case SmsManager.RESULT_ERROR_GENERIC_FAILURE:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "Generic failure",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        case SmsManager.RESULT_ERROR_NO_SERVICE:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "No service",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        case SmsManager.RESULT_ERROR_NULL_PDU:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "Null PDU",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        case SmsManager.RESULT_ERROR_RADIO_OFF:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "Radio off",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
      }
    }
  }, new IntentFilter(smsSent));
  /* Receiver for Delivered SMS. */
  registerReceiver(new BroadcastReceiver(){
    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context arg0, Intent arg1) {
      switch (getResultCode())
      {
        case Activity.RESULT_OK:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "SMS delivered",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        case Activity.RESULT_CANCELED:
          Toast.makeText(getBaseContext(), "SMS not delivered",
            Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
          break;
        }
      }
    }, new IntentFilter(smsDelivered));
  SmsManager sms = SmsManager.getDefault();
  sms.sendTextMessage(mobNo, null, message, sentPI, deliveredPI);
}

Let us now implement the addTextChangedListener() as Counter.

Counter Display = No of Chars Left / Required SMS Count

private final TextWatcher mTextEditorWatcher = new TextWatcher() {
  public void beforeTextChanged(CharSequence s, int start,
   int count, int after) {
  }
  public void onTextChanged(CharSequence s, int start,
   int before, int count) {
    //This sets a textview to the current length
    String smsNo;
    if(s.length() == 0)
      smsNo = "0";
    else
    smsNo = String.valueOf(s.length()/160 + 1);
    String smsLength = String.valueOf(160-(s.length()%160));
    mCounter.setText(smsLength+"/"+smsNo);
  }
  @Override
  public void afterTextChanged(Editable arg0) {
    // TODO Auto-generated method stub
  }
};

Permissions

In the AndroidManifest.xml file, we need to add the two permissions SEND_SMS and RECEIVE_SMS

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    package="com.vineetdhanawat.hellosms"
    android:versionCode="1"
    android:versionName="1.0" >
    <uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="10" />
    <application
        android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
        android:label="@string/app_name" >
        <activity
            android:name=".HelloSMS"
            android:label="@string/app_name" >
            <intent-filter>
               <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />
               <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
            </intent-filter>
        </activity>
    </application>
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.SEND_SMS">
	</uses-permission>
	<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.RECEIVE_SMS">
	</uses-permission>
</manifest>

Broadcast Receiver (Intercepting SMS)

Applications can intercept Incoming SMS as well. To do so, you need to add <receiver> element inside AndroidManifest.xml . Make sure it is included inside element.

<receiver android:name="com.vineetdhanawat.hellosms.SMSReceiver"
  android:enabled="true">
  <intent-filter>
  <action android:name="android.provider.Telephony.SMS_RECEIVED" />
  </intent-filter>
</receiver>

Add a new Class file SMSReceiver.java. Here we’ll be parsing the intercepted sms and displaying as Toast. But this will Toast all the incoming sms. In case you want to Toast particular senders, use getOriginatingAddress();

package com.vineetdhanawat.hellosms;
import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.telephony.SmsMessage;
import android.widget.Toast;
public class SMSReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver {
	@Override
	public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
	    /* Parse the SMS. */
		Bundle bundle = intent.getExtras();
		SmsMessage[] msgs = null;
		String str = "";
		if (bundle != null)
		{
			/* Retrieve the SMS. */
			Object[] pdus = (Object[]) bundle.get("pdus");
			msgs = new SmsMessage[pdus.length];
			for (int i=0; i<msgs.length; i++)
			{
				msgs[i] = SmsMessage.createFromPdu((byte[])pdus[i]);
				/* In case of a particular App / Service. */
                //if(msgs[i].getOriginatingAddress().equals("+91XXX"))
                //{
				str += "SMS from " + msgs[i].getOriginatingAddress();
				str += " :";
				str += msgs[i].getMessageBody().toString();
				str += "\n";
                //}
            }
			/* Display the SMS as Toast. */
            Toast.makeText(context, str, Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
        }
	}
}

That’s it. You can also use two emulators, By default they will have device names as emulator-5554 and emulator-5556. You can test it by sending sms from one of them to another giving emulator-5556 or just 5556 as the number.

App Ideas?

Using the Location Sensing (GPS) post which i posted a while before, and Broadcast Receiver above, It opens up a whole lot possibility of Apps.

Apps like JustDial. Where you have a lot of options like Theatres, Restaurant etc. All you need to do is choose an option. The app detects your location and sends your location to a pre-defined no. The server responds with list of available results (Say nearest Restaurants).

Want to learn more about Android Service and Broadcast Receiver? Check out Vogel’s Blog

Do you have any other Interesting App Ideas? Do share with us in the comments!

You may also like:

1. How to determine location using GPS in Android Phones

• Hacker (computer security) or cracker, who accesses a computer system by circumventing its security system
• Hacker (programmer subculture), who shares an anti-authoritarian approach to software development now associated with the free software movement

Hacker is mostly widely used as a derogatory term for someone who is involved in illegal online activities. Its actually meant for many things including : [a] person who delights in having an intimate understanding of the internal workings of a system, computers and computer networks in particular

Ethical Hacking

The more we advance in technology and its use in security, the more advanced are defacements. There is a certain need for Hackers who foolproof the system mechanisms before crackers find loopholes.

Certified Ethical Hacker (CEH)

With the increasing need of Hackers, so came the need of Certification.  A Certified Ethical Hacker has obtained a certification in how to look for the weaknesses and vulnerabilities in target systems and uses the same knowledge and tools as a hacker. One such Certification is given by EC-Council.

In India, there are many organizations which offer courses similar to EC-Council’s CEH and are great to start like the Ethical Hacking – Certified Information Security Expert (CISE) course by Innobuzz.in. CISE is an International certification not just offered in India, but about 20 more countries.

Why CISE?

Online Security Breaches are happening at a very fast rate and experts are needed to check and cure these. ITS (IT Security) Experts are in demand. According to NASSCOM, the demand for ITS Experts is going to rise substantially worldwide. ITS is a THE next big thing in ICT and you should make the best of it.

• One of the most recognized courses for Information Security and Ethical Hacking in India.
• Pre-requisite : Basic knowledge of Computers will suffice.
• Covers all important aspects including Basic of networking to Trojans, Reverse Engineering and Session Hijacking.
• Only certification with a “Live Online Lab based Exam“, in comparison to multiple choice questions which most of the exams have.
• Moreover its economical! (:P)

By the end of course you’ll have a great deal of know-how on how to spot system vulnerabilities by performing typical hacks in a controlled environment and understanding its working.

Disclaimer: Paid Content by http://www.innobuzz.in/

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I joined twitter on April 1, 2010. Almost 2 years of Happily Tweeting. I’m not sure why / how, But my account was simply suspended. No warning / notification email as well!

At first i thought it to be mistake. Refreshed a couple of time, then did a logout-login, but all to my dismay. My account was really suspended.

Within minutes i was scanning through my mind for all the tweets i did in past 24 hours. Did i tweet a image violating copyright? Did i tweet something abusive? Nothing was going right. In my mind I was cursing Twitter for doing so.

Take away my Facebook if you want, I do not deserve to be banned from twitter! I opened Facebook and Google Plus. Felt odd.

A simple google search revealed that 1000s of account has been banned in past few months, associated with spam accounts. Every-time few users get involved in middle. With hope I clicked on Suspended Accounts for help. Immediately dropped a mail to support folks.

[Update - Mar 30, 2012 4:00PM] 24 Hours over. No Reply yet. Account still suspended.

[Update - Mar 31, 2012 3:00AM] Account restored. Everything seems to be working fine. No Emails though.

[Update - Apr 04, 2012 5:09AM] Finally an email response from twitter support

• Make sure you’ve read The Twitter Rules
• Email Support for Requesting a Review for Suspended Accounts. If you cannot submit, email them at suspended@twitter.com
• Check the Twitter status blog, the @spam account, and search the public tweet stream to see if there is a lot of account suspension activity

Ever got suspended yourself? Do share with us in the comments!

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• MTNL
• BSNL
• Tikona
• Reliance
• Airtel

Earlier, Indian Govt had requested Facebook and Google to screen the content. This time, No Public statement was released, but it was observed nationwide, but yes things were back to normal in a couple of hours!

What is DNS?

DNS means Domain Name System.  The DNS Servers are primarily responsible for query translation. With a vast no of websites being registered everyday and IP addresses are difficult to remember, the concept of DNS came into being. Basically DNS server resolves the domain queries to IP addresses.

Why Public DNS?

Whenever you type a website name onto address bar, the query first goes to your DNS Server at ISP which are often unreliable and slow. There are many more faster superior Public DNS available and you should choose one of them. Here is great step-by-step tutorial to change your DNS on Windows/Linux/Mac/Mobile (Linux Users: Still reading, really?).

After changing DNS, make sure you flush your DNS resolver cache and web browser caches to ensure that your new DNS configuration settings take immediate effect.

Performance Issues with CDN?

Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) use a Global Load Balancing Technology. They use DNS Tricks and redirecting to the nearest server, basically using DNS Dynamically. DNS was never meant for this purpose.

Using the IP source address of a DNS request, the CDNs locate the source of requests geographically. Now based on the factors like Load on each Content Delivery Network Server, Network Traffic / Load and Proximity to the request origin, a DNS response is crafted to direct that source to the closest or best content server for that URI domain.

Simply speaking, If you use a Public DNS based at USA, High chances you will be served using a CDN server at USA and not the one at Asia, thus increasing the Latency. Read more about Impact of third-party DNS on CDN here.

List of Free Public DNS

1. Google Public DNS (Fastest & Recommended)
   • 8.8.8.8
   • 8.8.4.4
2. OpenDNS
   • 208.67.222.222
   • 208.67.220.220
   • 208.67.222.220
   • 208.67.220.222
3. ScrubIT
   • 67.138.54.100
   • 207.225. 209.66
4. Level 3 DNS (GTEI DNS, now Verizon)
   • 4.2.2.1
   • 4.2.2.2 (most famous)
   • 4.2.2.3
   • 4.2.2.4
   • 4.2.2.5
   • 4.2.2.6
5. Norton
   • 198.153.192.1
   • 198.153.194.1
   • 198.153.192.40 (security)
   • 198.153.194.40 (security)
   • 198.153.192.50 (security + pornography)
   • 198.153.194.50 (security + pornography)
   • 198.153.192.60 (security + pornography + non-family friendly)
   • 198.153.194.60 (security + pornography + non-family friendly)
6. DNS Advantage
   • 156.154.70.1
   • 156.154.71.1

Were you using the default DNS till now? Which one are you planning to switch to? Do share with us in the comments!

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Statistics / Graphs

Notice the spike in bandwidth (green) and then the drop when the spam techniques were implemented.

Again, notice how much bandwidth is used before and after spam techniques were implemented.

The Damage SPAM Can Do

Clearly its a case of spam bots / links exchange program run via softwares like XRumer etc. Nearly 100% of comments were genuine-looking with a single purpose of posting their links as username. Without any plugin or rel=”nofollow” attribute, it acts as a back-link and helps boost their Google PageRank.

As you can see the Traffic (Hits) increased nearly 5 times, whereas Traffic (Bandwidth) increased nearly 50 times!

This was mainly because of spam. The wordpress installation was default with no comments plugin. Each comment was approved and loaded as part of post in HTML Format. With days, no of comments increased an so did the size of each post, accounting for huge daily data transfer.

Measures Taken

1. Old SPAM?

Well the million dollar question is – “What will you do with 16000+ approved comments (spam)?”

DO NOT directly install a plugin like Disqus. It will retrieve all the existing plugins and upload, making them almost impossible to remove. You must get rid of them before proceeding.

As of now WordPress does not allow to delete ALL Blog comments at once.

Login to your cPanel -> phpMyAdmin -> SQL . Execute the following queries there.

delete from wp_comments where comment_approved="0";
delete from wp_comments where comment_approved="spam";
delete from wp_comments where comment_approved="1";

<?php include('wp-config.php'); // Needed for login details to WordPress database to make necessary changes
function updateCount()
    {
        $posts = mysql_fetch_row(mysql_query("SELECT ID FROM wp_posts ORDER BY ID DESC LIMIT 1")); // Fetch row in WordPress database containing information about post data
        for ($i = 1; $i < ($posts[0] + 1); $i++)
        {
     $comments = mysql_query("SELECT SQL_CALC_FOUND_ROWS comment_ID FROM wp_comments WHERE comment_post_ID = '$i' AND comment_approved = 1;") or die("Failed to calculate number of approved comments"); // Calculate the number of approved comments for a post and store in a variable. If unsuccessful, end program.
     mysql_query("UPDATE wp_posts SET comment_count = '".mysql_num_rows($comments)."' WHERE id = '$i';") or die("Failed to update the number of comments calculated"); // Update the comment count using the comment number fetched earlier. If unsuccessful, end program
     echo "Updated Post #$i - ".mysql_num_rows($comments)." comments <br />"; // Display message to user for each post comment count successfully updated
        }
    }
updateCount();
?>

2. Install Plugins

Plugins are a definite way to stop blog comments spam.

• Akismet The Best one ever! Installed by default, but you need to register before actually start using it. This plugin trackbacks all the spam on various blog and blocks it globally. These load the comments dynamically from their server, thereby reducing load on your database / hosting server.
• Disqus, IntenseDebate, Facebook Comments are good alternate comments system.
• Math Captcha, reCaptcha are must-install in case you want to stick to WP Native Commenting system. Not all comments are from Bots, but few are actually done by Human Farms for backlinks. Nevertheless, it will reduce spam drastically.

3. Other Measures

• Close Comments on Older Articles – This one is NOT recommended, but you know your readers better. You can choose to block comments on all posts (say older than 30 days). Go to wp-admin >> Settings >> Discussion >> Automatically close comments on articles older than (tick).
• Ban IP Address - This should be your Last Option. You can either see the stats for Hits v/s IP log via Awstats in your cPanel or you can directly see most common IPs in your Comments Logs. You can now Block certain IPs directly from cPanel or in case you love using WordPress Plugins use WP-Ban or Perishable Press 5G Blacklist.

4. Conclusion

These did not reduce the no of hits on my blog. After installing Akismet approved comments reduced drastically but it still let through roughly 5% of the SPAMs.

After installing Math Captcha, the no of comments now reduced to roughly 10% of post akismet spam. (Intelligent bots? Or Human Farms)

No of daily hits are still the same. I guess the bots havent learnt yet! It will take time, definitely. Meanwhile it just messes up your Google Analytics.

This Post has been Featured at wpLifeGuard.

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The Top Result https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/submit-url/ actually gives a 404 error (Jan 22, 2012 – 3.16 AM IST)

Surprisingly when you remove the / (forward slash) from the end of URL, it starts working https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/submit-url

The URL has been fixed on Google “Submit Your Content” Page, but search results are still returning old URL.

Question!

I always assumed a URL is same with or without the ending / (forward slash). How can they behave differently?

More importantly why cant Google fix it? Maybe a simple redirection!

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Now several people suggested methods for blackout. Lets take each of them.

1. Delete The Content

Never do this mistake. Since you dont have any files on your web folder anymore, it will return a 404 error. Now neither your visitors will see any content on your site nor any crawler/bot will be able to get anything.

2. Simple Message Post

Again, this is WRONG. This time your visitors will get the message, but the crawler/bot will access your site and consider the message as an updated post. Thus your ‘Message’ will be crawled eventually affecting search results.

3. 503 HTTP Header

Yup, The correct way.

• It will return a 503 error to bots/crawlers, notifying them that the site is not available at the moment but will return. This way there will be no change in search results.
• Apparently Google’s crawl rate will drop when it sees a spike in 503 errors. But this is normal and it will return to normal in a couple of days.

Robots.txt File

• The current GoogleBot works in a way, that it will halt crawling as soon it gets 503 error for the robots.txt file of the site. It will continue to blackout untill unless it gets an acceptable code (200 or 404). So in case you plan to block a section of your website, make sure robots.txt is accessible.
• Few webmasters use “Disallow: /” . This will simply block Google Bot from crawling your website, and there is a very high chance that crawl rate recovery can take longer than expected.

Crawl Errors

Google Webmaster Tools will report about the blackout. Make sure you keep checking the crawl errors section, for around a couple of weeks. In case of any errors, fix them / resubmit URLs.

Code Implementation

Create a 503.php file in your webroot directory, with the following code. The first two lines indicate 503 HTTP Error to the bots / crawlers and the third line informs them with a come back date-time.

<?php
header("HTTP/1.1 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Status: 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Retry-After: Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT");
?>

Now you need to redirect all your visitors on that page. On a linux/apache server, its really easy. Look for .htaccess file in the webroot folder. In case you already have a configured .htaccess file for redirects etc, make sure you create a backup. Use the following code in the new .htaccess file.

Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^00\.00\.00\.00
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !^/503.php [NC]
RewriteRule .* /503.php [R,L]

In case you are blocking parts of website, use absolute url instead of relative. Currently the code blocks all IPs, in case you want to access the site at all time, modify the 00\.00\.00\.00 part to your IP in 4 set of octets.

You may want to display different message to your visitors. Just edit the 503.php like normal HTML file.

<?php
header("HTTP/1.1 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Status: 503 Service Temporarily Unavailable");
header("Retry-After: Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 GMT");
?>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Site is Temporary Unavailable.</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Site is Temporary Unavailable. </h1>
</body>
</html>

Our task is done!

Note taken using suggestions from

• Pierre Far’s Google+ Post on Website outages and blackouts the right way.
• and SEOMoz post on How to Handle Downtime During Site Maintenance

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Recently i attended Droidcon India 2011 and had a quick chat with a team installing CyanogenMod for interested attendees there. I finally decided to give it a shot. In this part of tutorial I’ll explain till rooting of the phone. Next tutorial will contain instructions to install Cyanogen Mod.

*WARNING: This will void your Manufacturer’s Warranty

What is S-OFF (Security Off)

HTC recently added an extra layer of security on their Android Phones, NAND Security. S-ON basically means read-lock on /system , /recovery partition etc.

What is Flash Custom Recovery

Custom Recovery allows you to do advanced tasks like recovery,  installation etc on your Android device that are not possible with the available stock recovery. We are going to use ClockworkMod Recovery for the purpose.

What is Rooting

Rooting is a process that allows users to gain root-access. Its similar to JailBreak in iOS.

1. Revolutionary Method

Always have Backups!

Before proceeding, you should backup as much data as possible (Just in case). As an extra precaution, make a copy of your SD Card as well.

• If you have synced contacts at Google account, Good! else export all Phone contacts to SD card.
• Use SMS Backup & Restore to backup all your SMS and Call Backup & Restore to backup all call records (available).
• You can backup all your application APKs as well using Astro File Manager.

Revolutionary Tool

We are going to use Revolutionary Tool, which is a complete solution for gaining S-OFF, Custom Recovery and Rooting.

Revolutionary currently supports the following Android phones and HBOOT versions: (as per RootWiki)

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1. Implementing Location Listener

Lets start with the code. Inside the onCreate() method include these lines

/* Use the LocationManager class to obtain GPS locations */
LocationManager mlocManager = (LocationManager)getSystemService(Context.LOCATION_SERVICE);
LocationListener mlocListener = new MyLocationListener();
mlocManager.requestLocationUpdates(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER, 0, 0, mlocListener);

If asked, import all required packages like import android.location.LocationManager; etc The Location Manager Object is obtained by calling the method with Context.LOCATION_SERVICE parameter. 0, 0 in parameters to requestLocationUpdates is the min Time & min Distance respectively, after which onLocationChanged() is called. Lets implement a nested class for LocationListener now

public class MyLocationListener implements LocationListener
{
	@Override
	public void onLocationChanged(Location loc)
	{
		String Text="Location Not Set";
		Text = "My current location is: \n" +
		"Latitude = " + loc.getLatitude() +
		"\nLongitude = " + loc.getLongitude();
		Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(),Text,Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
	}
}

This will basically display a notification on screen (Toast), as soon as the GPS Coordinates changes Now just implement rest of the required methods as follows

@Override
public void onProviderDisabled(String provider)
{
	Toast.makeText( getApplicationContext(),"GPS Disabled",Toast.LENGTH_LONG ).show();
}
@Override
public void onProviderEnabled(String provider)
{
	Toast.makeText( getApplicationContext(),"GPS Enabled",Toast.LENGTH_LONG).show();
}
@Override
public void onStatusChanged(String provider, int status, Bundle extras)
{}

2. Layout and Manifest File

Lets look at main.xml (UI) now. Just display a string on the main screen. GPS coordinates will splash anytime it changes

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
android:orientation="vertical"
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="fill_parent">
<TextView
android:layout_width="fill_parent"
android:layout_height="wrap_content"
android:text="@string/hello"/>
</LinearLayout>

Define the app name and display text in string.xml file

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<resources>
    <string name="hello">GPS Coordinates will splash on screen</string>
    <string name="app_name">GPS</string>
</resources>

One Major change in AndroidManifest.xml file this time is GPS Permission. <uses-permission android:name=”android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION”></uses-permission>

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION">
</uses-permission>

3. Test Application

a) DDMS

You can test application by using an Emulator Control. Window > Open Perspective > Other … > DDMS Now under Location Controls, pass any thing in decimal form in latitude and Longitude. The same will splash on screen.

b) Telnet

Emulator has an inbuilt Telnet Server. To connect, first make sure you have a telnet client.

4. Location using Network Provider

You need to make a few changes.

/*mlocManager.requestLocationUpdates(LocationManager.GPS_PROVIDER, 0, 0, mlocListener);*/
mlocManager.requestLocationUpdates(LocationManager.NETWORK_PROVIDER, 0, 0, mlocListener);

In AndroidManifest file, this works for both GPS and Network Provider

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_FINE_LOCATION">
</uses-permission>

In case you want to use only network Provider, use

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_COARSE_LOCATION">
</uses-permission>

Location manager also allows to get the last known location

LocationManager.getLastKnownLocation(LocationManager.NETWORK_PROVIDER)

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Sounds interesting? Then go ahead and give it a shot

Tutorial: Part 1 | Part 2

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