Category: Technology

I’m writing this blog post on my phone, something I never thought I would have the patience for due to the input method of a touch screen. But swype enables me to swype my finger over the letters in the word a want to type and like magic it knows what word I meant.

It didn’t come on your EVO by default. In fact according to their website, you only have a few days to get on board for the beta program.

Go to https://beta.swype.com, sign up with a real email address to get a link in your email to download it. I did have some difficulty getting it installed since they email you a link, that you then have to click on from your phone, which then installs an installer (see image). The installer then downloads the actual install which for me failed the first two times I attempted it. I had to uninstall the app and

uninstall the installer in order for it to then reinstall without errors. In the end, it worked and I understand it is a beta program. Still very worth the efforts!

In interest of full disclosure – I uploaded my post and went to a browser in order to position the pictures where I want them since the wordpress app does not have a wysiwyg editor or the ability to position images – overall however, typing with Swype is truly an intuitive and amazing experience. If you can get it – do it!

A friend of mine asked me this question and I told him if I took time to figure it out I would blog it and send him a link – there may be several ways to accomplish the task of setting your ringtone to use an MP3 but you can’t select an MP3 from the ringtone menu (home screen, settings, sound & display, Phone ringtone).

So how do you do it?  I wouldn’t call it intuitive, but I would call it simple.  Open your Music player, navigate to the MP3 you want to use as a ringtone, hit menu and select “Set as ringtone”.  Yep – its that simple!

*** Update *** You cannot verify your phone with Qik if you have SMS from short codes blocked on your phone. If you have ever called Sprint because you found a charge from a text message – they most likely blocked SMS from short codes. Qik is working on a solution where you do not need this verification step – but if

you are like me and don’t like to wait around for somebody else to solve your problem – call Sprint and have short codes unblocked. You can always re-enable the block after you verify with Qik! *** Update *** I’ve covered the QIK failure in a prior post – but I want to cover actually getting Qik to work. First – you need to go download the app from the Market… go ahead, I’ll wait… No – sorry, I should be more clear – you need Qik Video. I’ll wait… Doh! My bad… you need Qik Video for the HTC EVO. Seriously – I’ll wait…

You back? Ok – now that you have the correct version of the app – you can uninstall the Qik Video app you got the first time. If you don’t see the Video Chat button – then you have the wrong version of the app. Now you may think you are off to the races, but not so fast – you need to confirm your phone number with Qik. Goto http://qik.com – sign in (create an account, if you don’t have one) – then click on “Settings”, “Profile”, Then Phone Numbers.

Enter your number and hit the big blue plus sign. This *should* send an SMS text directly to your phone with a verification link. I say should because it didn’t work for me. I continued to refresh the page and click on the “Resend verification SMS” link as though it were going to change the fact that it was not working for me. So – if you are like me and cannot get the SMS to show up on your phone – you have to send an email to support@qik.com. Once you have verified your phone – you then need to have a friend to call. If your Qik My Friends page looks like this:

Then you aren’t going to make any called anytime soon. How do you add friend on QIK? Follow that link and you will soon be teaming with other Evo owners!

So – you have the right app – you have confirmed your phone number, you have friends in QIK – finally, we are off to the races. One thing you may notice right away is that QIK has decided that in order to deliver high quality video and audio in a video chat – they needed to impliment a push-to-talk method. In other words – while you won’t have to push any button in order to be heard – the

person you call with see a button on their end that they are required to hold down while they talk to you. As long as they are holding down the button – you can hear them but they cannot hear you. As I write this post – I’m still waiting on the verification process. I sent my email to the support email and I’m awaiting their response. As soon as I am able to experience the QIK’ening myself (old Highlanders reference there) – I’ll let you know!