iPhone – The user name or password for Gmail is incorrect

Say you are using Google Mail on your iPhone, everything is working perfectly, until one day it just refuses to connect to the mail server, with a message “The user name or password for Gmail is incorrect.”

This has happened to me a couple of times already, and it drove me absolutely nuts, since I could access Gmail through Safari, rechecked password in mail settings, even tried deleting an account and adding it again on iPhone, but nothing worked.

After also trying numerous other things suggested on various forums, the only solution that worked every time was to go to https://www.google.com/accounts/UnlockCaptcha?, enter your details and click on “Unlock”. Not sure why Google seems to lock access every now and then, but this resolves the issue.

Visual Basic 2010 Express

Visual Basic 2010 Express is part of Microsoft’s Visual Studio 2010 Express, a free development suite.

Along Visual Basic, Visual Studio 2010 Express also includes Visual C# and Visual C++. You might also be interested in Visual Web Developer Express or SQL Server 2008 R2 Express.

Visual Basic is a great way to introduce yourself into the world of programming. It is considered to be an easy to use language for beginners.

Installation

1. Download Visual Basic 2010 Express installer and start Setup

2. Click “Next” on Welcome screen

3. Accept licence agreement

4. Click  “Install”

5. Click “Exit”

Hello World

Now that you have Visual Basic installed, lets make a simple application. “Hello World” is the first and simplest program written by every programmer.

1. Start Visual Basic

2. Click File -> New Project

3. Enter application name and select “Windows Forms Application” and click “OK”

4. Select “Toolbox” tab on the left side.

5. Select Button

6. Click on the form to place the button

7. Double click the button to open the code window

8. Type MessageBox.Show(“Hello World”)

9. Click Debug ->Start Debugging

Your application will now start. If you click the button a message box saying “Hello World” will appear.

If you are interested in looking into Visual Basic further, some good resources are Microsoft’s Visual Basic Developer Center, VB.Net Heaven, ASPFree and Dev Aricles.

Happy coding!

Revisiting nostalgia with Amstrad emulator

When I was 7 years old, I got my first computer – Amstrad CPC 464, which the time was quite a powerful home machine. Being 7 years old, initially I spent a lot of time playing games. Over time as my interest in computing other than gaming grew, I started teaching myself how to program in BASIC, and that was when my journey through computing began, and it still lasts today.

Now unfortunately I don’t have my Amstrad anymore. However, there are several software emulators available for free, with WinApe being one of the best. So I downloaded it, found some games, and began a little trip down the memory lane..

Enjoy the gallery of screenshots of some of the games I have tried. Even after all these years they were still fun to play.

Update: If you want to emulate Amstrad on OS X, you can use Arnold.

How to: Clone your hard drive using Clonezilla

Clonezilla is a free hard drive imaging / cloning utility. You can clone disk / partition to another disk / partition, or you can clone disk / partition to an image file. This article explains how to clone your hard disk to a file image on another hard drive (e.g. external USB drive).

First, you’ll need to download Clonezilla and create a bootable CD. Once you have done that, follow instructions below.

1. Insert Clonezilla CD and restart your computer

2. Once Clonezilla boots up, choose interface language

3. On the next screen, “Configure Console”, select “Don’t touch keymap”

4. Select “Start Clonezilla”

5. Select option “Work with disks or partitions using images”

6. Select “Use local device” (local_dev). Connect USB drive when prompted, wait for 5 sec and press enter

7. Select where to save an image. If you are saving to external USB drive, it will usually be device sdb1.

8. Select image save directory

9. Select beginner mode option

10. Select mode savedisk

11. Enter file image name

12. Select source (that you want to clone). Here you can select a single partition or an entire hard disk.

13. Select “yes” on prompts that follow and wait for the cloning to finish.

Review: Seagate Expansion external drive (1TB)

Few days ago I purchased Seagate Expansion external drive (1TB), mainly to use as a backup drive.

HD enclosure looks very nice and modern, and the whole package is quite light compared to some other external drives, which is good if you need to carry it around (it is an external drive after all).

This drive comes with usual components inside the box – USB cable, power cord and a manual.

After powering it up and plugging into USB on my laptop, the driver got automatically installed and recognised. It is already formatted using NTFS file system, so it’s ready for use straight away.

And that is it regarding installation. The whole process (unpacking and plugging in, installation) took about a minute.

Easy installation and plenty of space make this hard drive a good choice in it’s price range.

 

Review: Glary Undelete

Few days ago I have accidentally deleted some files. After realising my mistake, I started looking for a good undelete utility that would help me get the files back.

I have tried several free applications, some of which worked and some of which didn’t work, and found Glary Undelete to be the best free app that I have tried.

I found the application easy to use with a nice interface. All you need to do is select a drive and click on Search. There are also several filter options if you need to narrow down your search, such as file type, file condition, size, etc. It supports FAT and NTFS file systems, and can also recover compressed, fragmented and encrypted files on NTFS. Also works with removable devices (files that I have recovered were on USB hard drive).

You can download Glary Undelete here. Highly recommended application, you never know when you might need it.