https://github.com/shaftekbiz/android-language-settings-app

—————-

One of the interesting aspects of the new Kindle Fire is how much Amazon had customized or simply overrode the default UI, including some of the settings pages. One issue that has come up recently is how to enable ability to use languages other than English. A fellow Kindle Fire in Germany, named Gero Zahn, managed to figure out how to do that by using two separate apps which trick the Kindle Fire to opening the input language settings UI page which while hidden still remains on the device. His approach is described in detail in the following blog post and the credit for discovering this goes to him:

http://blog.gerozahn.de/2011/11/kindle-fire-keyboard-layouts-solved/

I was looking for a simpler way to do this and came up with a very simple Android app using Google’s AppInventor that does just that – gives you access to the input language settings. This approach does not require installing outside applications other than this app itself. If you already have Android Market sideloaded into the Kindle, you can find the app here.

If you do not have the Market installed, you can download the app here:

http://goo.gl/NfEqO

This app is also available on the Amazon’s AppStore but it has not yet been approved for the Kindle Fire. To see this app on Amazon.com, click here.

Make sure to enable ability to load outside apps into your Kindle by tapping the top right corner of the screen to enter the settings section, then click on “Device” and check off “Allow installation” for non approved applications. I have submitted the app to the Amazon AppStore for approval as well, and hopefully it will be available directly from it.

For the technically inclined, here is a short explanation of what is happening:

Actions on Android that cross application boundaries are triggering using something called “Intents“. There are two of those that trigger language settings, of which the first (com.android.settings.LanguageSettings) has been customized by Amazon to show their own keyboard options. The second is the one that actually triggers the language selection menu and is called “com.android.inputmethod.latin.InputLanguageSelection“. The action for it is called “android.intent.action.VIEW“.

UPDATE #1:

In my testing, only the following languages work:

• Danish
• English UK
• English US
• French
• German
• Hebrew
• Norwegian
• Russian
• Serbian
• Swedish

UPDATE #2 – January 22nd, 2012

The app has been updated to v1.3 and it is now a fully native Android app and no longer uses App Inventor. The size has been brought down from 1.4 MBs to 22 KBs. I also added support for Android 4 (ICS). The code will be open sourced shortly. You can use Google Market to update, or the same link above.

WHY PLANT?

I find gardening an interesting hobby and it is useful for the kids as well. Additionally, being that we plant vegetables and fruit, we are hoping to eventually save some money on what we grow.

So far we have not broken even financially, primarily because the cost of transplants is high, and we buy new soil every year as well.

WHERE TO PLANT: LAND / SOIL / GROUND

In my back yard there is a section of ground right next to the neighbor’s fence, already surrounded with concrete and even has a small groove for water. That small strip is about 5″ wide and 45″ long, for a total of about 225 square feet. This is where we usually plant our garden. The problem is that the soil is extremely heavy clay, so heavy in fact that I can probably make pottery from it! I have looked into various possible solutions ranging from clay conditioners and just plain compost, but there is nothing that does not take a few years.

What we have done in the past, is weed whack the entire row, and than make burrows for the plants we are planting. We would then supplement those areas with freshly bought garden soil and hope for the best. The problem is that weeds tend to continue sprouting like crazy and a lot of work goes towards weeding. Another problem is that a lot of grass tends to grow in that area which makes things harder to plant. And to make things even crazier, there is a whole colony of kudzu in the end of the strip which spreads like wild fire. Because almost everything we plant is edible vegetables and fruits, I am afraid to use any sort of chemicals to kill the weeds.

Last year we have tried a new thing by using newspapers to block out the weeds and planting in soil on top of that. While that worked relatively well, the corn we planted did not make it in the end. There was a lot of work involved in stapling the newspapers to the ground, putting new soil on top, etc.

Earlier this year, we tried something new – putting out black plastic garbage bags to cover the ground and kills the weeds underneath. This worked somewhat well, but the weeds starting coming back after we took the cover off. The biggest problem however started once I begun preparing the ground – it is just way to hard to plow. Our neighbor spends several days with a pick ax doing just said, but don’t have that luxury. I did end up trying an electric cultivator but it did not work as well as I thought.

HOW TO PLANT: SEEDS / TRANSPLANTS / FERTILIZER

What we have done in the past is buy seeds from reputable companies like Burpee and Ferry Morse Co (Amazon actually sells a lot of Ferry Morse seeds). While we haven’t specifically focused on buying non-hybrids, starting this year we may begin to because non-hybrid plants produce seed that can be used year after year, forgoing the yearly purchase of seeds.

For certain types of plants like tomatoes and peppers, we buy transplants from Bonnie Plants, usually in Home Depot. We have never tried growing transplants in doors yet, but may try in the future.

I haven’t not used any sort of fertilizer in the past because we eat what the plants product. This may explain why some of our plants did not make it. Instead, we usually buy soil with fertilizer already in it and supplement our existing soil in the burrows where planting is done. It does not look like this is really working.

WHAT TO PLANT: Vegetables and Fruits

Majority of what we have planted over the years have been sweet bell peppers. One year there were only banana peppers left and we tried those, but they were not quite as good as the regular sweet peppers. The sweet peppers we used were various Bonnie hybrids. We have had great success with peas and green beans, in particular, Wando peas and Blue Lake green beans.

Cantaloupe, cucumbers, corn and watermelon were tried but all either got some infection or did not produce good fruit. We also tried sun flowers but couldn’t figure out how to dry the seeds properly.

NEXT

In the next few posts I am hoping to cover some of the experiments we are doing this year.

First of all, about versioning: there are two current versions of Eclipse – 3.5 aka Ganymede and 3.6 aka Helios. Ubuntu 10.10 which I use on home box comes with the 3.5 version. Visual Editor also has two versions, 1.4 dating from 2009 and a more recent 1.5 release from late 2010. Because I wanted the 1.5 version with Eclipse 3.6, and after reading multiple posts describing issues with the Ubuntu packaged Eclipse, I installed the default packages and installed Eclipse 3.6 manually as follows:

1. Download the Eclipse IDE for Java developers, 32 bit or 64 bit Linux version from here.
2. I setup up Eclipse on my machine in the /opt/eclipse folder as root, however you can also do it on a per user basis in the home directory as described here.
3. Create a shortcut to the Eclipse application itself and put it anywhere you want (I stuck mine directly on a panel).

To install Visual Editor 1.5:

1. Click on “Help”, “Install New Software”, “Add” to add the Visual Editor repository. Use the follow URL: http://download.eclipse.org/tools/ve/updates/1.5.0/
2. When you try to install VE, you will get an error about a package called org.eclipse.jem. This package is part of Eclipse’s GEF tools, so go ahead and add a repository for GEF wit hthe following URL: http://download.eclipse.org/tools/gef/updates/releases/
3. Install the GEF SDK itself or Draw2D.
4. Go back and install Visual Editor, then restart Eclipse.

http://my.qoop.com/forums/announcements/85/

Actual books available here:

http://my.qoop.com/google/

I took some time to check various state corporation databases and actually managed to find who Nabu Press is. They are … BiblioBazaar / BiblioLife, a company started by former BookSurge partners after they sold their POD company to Amazon. It is no surprise that they print their POD books through Amazon.

How do I know this – take a look at the SC filing for Nabu Press LLC. The registered agent is for Nabu is:

ERIKA V. HARRISON
18-A CAROLINA
CHARLESTON, SC 29403

A search of the same site, reveals that only two other corporations have the same registered agent – BIBLIOBAZAAR II, LLC and BIBLIOLABS, LLC. BiblioLabs is part of BiblioBazaar as stated on their website.

So the final word is that Nabu Press is actually part of BiblioBazaar. HOWEVER, why did they NOT mention this on their website, and especially in the list of their imprints here? Could it be for legal reasons?

UPDATE: BiblioBazaar/BiblioLabs mentions Nabu Press as their reprint right here.

UPDATE #2: You can see all of Nabu Press titles on Amazon here, and all of BiblioLife titles right here.

UPDATE #3: You can contact Nabu Press / Biblio Labs right here.

Thanks for notifying us of this situation, which our engineering team is currently addressing. When this issue is resolved, we’ll contact you by email.

Meanwhile, my money is sitting at Google.

Others are reporting this problem in the forums as well, some as far back as January. In addition, the Checkout blog had a post in early January about the same issue which was supposedly fixed.

I am sending a strong worded letter to both Google Checkout and my state regulatory body which regulated money transmitters (with which incidentally Google did not register to obtain a license, which itself might be a problem for them). I will try to post updates if anything happens.

UPDATE #1: Here is a copy of the letter that I send to the Maryland Commissioner of Financial Regulation:

Commissioner of Financial Regulation
CC: Google Payment Corp.

March 4, 2009

Honorable Commissioner,

I am writing to you today to file a complaint against Google Payment Corp., which operates “a money transmission business” [as per the Maryland Money Transmission Act, Section 12-401 (l)(2)(iii)] known as Google Checkout (http://checkout.google.com). This service provides ability to businesses to receive credit card payments from consumers over the Internet. I currently hold a Seller’s account with Google Checkout under merchant ID # XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.

As described on their website (http://checkout.google.com/support/sell/bin/answer.py?answer=134475), Google Checkout deposits the received funds within two (2) business days of the day when the original order was charged. One of my customers charded order # XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX on February XX, 2009 for a total of $X,XXX.XX. The net revenue amount after Google’s fees is $X,XXX.XX and was supposed to have deposited into my account no later than this past Monday, March XXX, 2009. HOWEVER, this money has not been deposited nor has it been listed under the “Payouts” section as being planned to be deposited. I had contacted Google Checkout via email since they do not provide a phone number for support. I had received the following reply:

“Thanks for notifying us of this situation, which our engineering team is currently addressing.”

A futher review of the Google Checkout Merchant Forum (http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/checkout-merchants/label?lid=12de2eed05d80c5b&hl=en) showed that numerous other merchants were having similar issues, some as far back as January, and no reply or planned time for resolution was received by anyone via email from Google Checkout. Being a small business, I rely on the quick turnaround of my payments and this unexplained hold up of funds may cause significant damage to my business if it continues. Additionally, I am stymied by both lack of any concrete timeline for resolution. I would like to request your assistance in order to obtain my funds in a timely fashion.

Additionally, I would like to bring to your attention the fact that Google Payment Corp. does not appear on the list of licensed money transmitters on your website which would imply that it is not licensed to do business within this state, thus violating section 12-405 of the Maryland Money Transmission Act. Their competitors, PayPal, Inc. and Amazon Payments, are licensed within Maryland. Additionally, Google Payment Corp. is licensed as a money transmitter in the states of North Dakota, Arizona, Hawaii and Oregon, which implies that they are aware of the need to obtain such license on state level.

Sincerely,
Yakov Shafranovich

UPDATE #2: I have received the following email from Google Checkout customer support. The money has shown up in my Google Checkout account but has not posted to the bank yet. Their reply is as follows:

Hello,

Thank you for your email and continued patience. I understand you are concerned about your payouts from February XX, 2009.

I’ve researched your situation and can confirm that our engineering team has resolved the technical issue you reported. Furthermore, our records indicate that Google should initiated a payout for $X,XXX.XX to your bank account on March XX, 2009. For your reference, I have included information detailing the standard payout schedule below.

UPDATE #3: The money is listed this morning as a pending ACH transfer in my bank account. On a side note, Philip Lessen posted a story of how someone’s AdSense account got closed without explanation, and how the owner was only able to get the money owed to him via small claims court.

UPDATE #4: I have received a letter from the state regulator with an attached reply from Google. Google apologized for the delay but did state that they are of the legal opinion that state registration is not required. They are registering anyway.

I did find something else. When Google registered with states to obtain a local state license for a money transmitter, they did provide some real contact info which you can find here as follows:

Phone: (650) 253-4801
Fax No: (650) 618-2682

This presumingly goes to their regulatory guy who probably have an idea of how to get in touch with customer service.

An important thing to keep in mind: most businesses have some sort of a regulatory body on the state or federal level. Complaining to those bodies usually gets results. In this case, if a payment service be it Amazon, Google or Paypal, is licensed in your state, then your state agency is the best bet. They will first relay the complaint to the company, where it will probably get better attention than via some email form.

Coming soon – new printing vendors, new binding types, and more features!

Over the next few months we will be adding functionality to split, combine and otherwise mash up public domain content from multiple books into a single new book.

Stay tuned!

http://www.publicdomainreprints.org/m

You can search, read and request reprints from your mobile phone. Unlike Google Book search mobile, this supports any mobile phone AND does Internet archive books as well – it includes an experimental mobile reader for Internet Archive books.

Everything is highly experimental, so do not rely on it

Causes of the Financial Crisis (January 29, 2009)
Economic Slowdown: Issues and Policies (January 02, 2009)
Economic Stimulus: Issues and Policies (January 23, 2009)
Medicaid: The Federal Medical Assistance Percentage (February 02, 2009)
Proposed Funding for Workforce Development in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009 (February 02, 2009)

As per Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp. (36 F. Supp. 2d 191 – SDNY 1999), exact photographic reproductions of public domain works, which seemingly applies to digital scans of books, cannot be protected by any sort of copyright under United States law because they are not considered “original works”. Therefore, we treat as public domain any scan we obtain where the underlying work is in public domain.

Please also see my earlier post and this post.

Paul Durrant in a comment on the TeleRead blog cited a very interesting factoid:

In the US, at least, you can’t claim copyright on an out-of-copyright work just through simple mechanical reproduction of the work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Corel_Corp.

According to Wikipedia:

Bridgeman Art Library v. Corel Corp., 36 F. Supp. 2d 191 (S.D.N.Y. 1999), was a decision by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, which ruled that exact photographic copies of public domain images could not be protected by copyright because the copies lack originality. Even if accurate reproductions require a great deal of skill, experience and effort, the key element for copyrightability under U.S. law is that copyrighted material must show sufficient originality.

The full text of the decision can be found online right here.
While the original decision was about photos of artwork, the implication for digital archives is enormous. This decision, if applied to sites like Google Books and the Internet Archive, would simply mean that no copyrights can be claimed in any shape or form over digital copies.

HOWEVER, as I have stated in the original post, it remains to be seen whether contractual arrangements such as the terms of service on a website, can obligate someone to follow restrictions on a public domain work.