reinstalling apps on a Symbian phone after a hard reset

The Symbian Series60 3rd Edition OS (used on Nokia's E61, E62, and E70 phones, for instance) can be more than a bit flaky. My E70 suddenly stopped receiving SMS messages a few days ago, and the only fix that I found was to perform a hard reset on the phone to wipe all my settings.

The list of installed applications persists across a reset. Furthermore, the phone will try to reinstall missing applications every time it starts up, and will pause for a while and then beep and give you a bitchy message if it's unable to install any of the apps. You can see the missing apps in Menu -> Tools -> App. mgr., but the list unfortunately displays a hexadecimal GUID-looking-thing for each missing app instead of its actual name. I haven't found any good way to get the name, so I'm stuck trying to remember what I had installed before the reset.

For reference, though, a00007a6.sis is Y-Browser and I think that 200018ff.sis is IM+, although I haven't been able to install it successfully. I don't speak (or read) French, but this post appears to claim that you can delete a file using a program like Y-Browser to make the phone stop trying to install an app. I couldn't find the file on my phone.

I also had trouble getting Internet access up and running again after the reinstall. I'm on Cingular-I-mean-AT&T as a former AT&T Wireless customer (a.k.a. "Cingular Blue"). This means that I'm using mMode rather than MEdia Net. Nokia provides a service that will send you an SMS message containing settings for your phone, but I still didn't have any luck after using it ("Nokia E70" -> "WAP/GPRS" -> "United States" -> "AT&T (Former AT&T Wireless customers)" -> "mMode"). To finally get things working, I had to go to Menu -> Tools -> Settings -> Connection -> Access Points, select the new "mMode" connection that was created by the SMS message, choose Options -> Advanced settings, and clear "Proxy serv. address" and set "Proxy port number" to 0 for good measure. Whew.

I swear, one more problem and I'm buying an iPhone. :-(

burning man clothing

I went to Burning Man for the first time this year and found that I brought too much of some things and not enough of others. I'm going to write down my experiences while they're still fresh so I can refer to them next year.

• sturdy pair of shorts
• two t-shirts
• three pairs of socks and underwear (eww, just three?)
• long pants
• sweatshirt
• wide-brimmed hat
• sandals suitable for walking long distances on hard ground
• closed-toe shoes
• a dust mask or two
• closed goggles
• sunglasses, if sunniness irritates your eyes
• a plastic poncho, if you're worried about rain
• two bottles of high-SPF sunscreen

You're going to be disgusting after a week in the desert, regardless of your typical hygiene standards. I erred on the side of bringing too many items of clothing (which isn't really a big deal; you're car-camping, not backpacking).

Most days were sunny and in the 90s, and I generally walked around wearing just a pair of shorts, sandals, and my hat. It didn't get as cold as I'd heard at night; I was generally okay wearing long pants, a t-shirt, socks, and shoes. There wasn't more than a few minutes of rain, and I think I would've been fine just staying under shelter without raingear if there'd been more.

There were hour-long dust storms the last few afternoons, so don't forget the dust mask. I had brought ventilated safety goggles and found that dirt got into my eyes when I was perpendicular with the wind. Swimming goggles would've been a better choice.

You'll want to bring or borrow some costumes too.

More to come later.