I’ve released Torrent Remote to all of the currently available Windows Phone markets and I have lowered the price for each market to free. This is a permanent move until I release an update version.

The current version has a few performance issues in it (it does not like significant amounts of entrys) and I’m working to fix this.

Enjoy!

- Beau Allison

Hail to the King that never was

It’s been a while and I should start doing something here again. For those that don’t know I’ve been working at IBM for the past year on Tivoli and Websphere products, so far it’s been quite a ride.

I’m going to try and make a few Windows 8 apps, have a few ideas penned but nothing critical (suggestions welcome!)

Speak soon,

- Beau Allison

I have to firstly apologise for the lack of updates on Torrent Remote. I’ve been developing a few other sideprojects as well as starting a full time job; getting settled in I now have some time to code Torrent Remote again. I have to thank everyone for their support and feedback over the past few months, it’s been great!

I’ve got a new engine planned to handle a few of the more larger scale problems I had as well as a re-worked interface and new features.

If you do have any feedback or problems please don’t hesitate to ask.

Cheers,

- Beau Allison

Yesterday I posted an application for a shortcut to the Wifi Settings page as a request I got from Judge; as another request here are three more!

Connection Manager

An aggregation of all the Setting Applications specifically related to Connections. This one will see a further update in the future to mimic closer the real Settings Application with the “turned off/on” related statuses under each button. Download the XAP here.

Bluetooth Shortcut

A replica of the Wifi Shortcut yet instead launches the Bluetooth Application. Download the XAP here.

Flight Mode Shortcut

A replica of the Wifi Shortcut yet instead launches the Flight Mode Application. Download the XAP here.

Notes

- These have been tried and working only on Samsung devices. From what I know the HTC and LG devices as of yet are unsupported.

- Special courtesy goes to RustyGrom

- If someone would like to make nicer icons for these feel free to send them along.

If anyone has any more requests, comments, or suggestions feel free to ask. Time for some games programming.

Cheers,

Beau Allison

This has been my second request now for a shortcut application and this time it is for quickly opening the Wifi Settings menu (thanks Judge!). Using the app you are able to quickly open the Wifi Settings menu to turn Wifi on and off and connect to a network. I have to give 99% of credit towards RustyGrom whose fair amount of code I reused to re-create this application.

For the icon I took the standard settings icon from the Microsoft Icon Pack. If anyone is willing to create a nice icon for the XAP feel free to do so and send it along (just make sure the 173 x 173 tile is transparent background with a white icon). I should point out that this XAP won’t run within the emulator and only works on device.

Download:

In order to install the app you will need a Developer Unlocked Device. You can download the XAP here. If you do not have a developer unlocked device you can unlock it from Microsoft for a $99/USD year fee or through one of the unlocker tools available.

Update:

Two comments have alerted me that this doesn’t work for the HTC HD7 or LG Quantum. This was tried using the Omnia 7; if anyone knows the name of the executable used on those devices (on the Omnia 7 it is WiFiUXSplash.exe) please inform me and I will make an update for each phone. Cheers.

Update 2:

The Connection Manager, Bluetooth shortcut, and Flight Mode shortcut are now available here.

If anyone has any questions, suggestions, or comments, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Cheers,

- Beau Allison

As a follow up to my New SMS Shortcut app @Ramontrotman and @TheDavidk from Mobility Digest asked for the same type of shortcut yet used for launching a New Email. I was a bit late on my delivery times but here it is. New Email is a simple and small application (about eight lines of code in the Source File, excluding the references) that serves as a shortcut for opening a new email message.

You can download the XAP of New Email Here. At current I will hold off putting this into the marketplace as New SMS is surprisingly having a tough time making it past validation. N.B. My arts skills suffered at creating a legible email icon so I used the email icon from the Microsoft Windows Phone 7 icon pack.

If anyone has any suggestions for applications or ideas you would like us to create send them through to thejoker [at] codejoker [dot] com.

Everyone here at codeJoker would also like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Update: I should point out (thanks David!) that if you have more than one active email account on your phone this will open up  a selection panel from which email account to choose from. This defeats the one click opening yet can save time where you may otherwise be scrolling through your applications list to find your email account (a problem I sometimes have).

- Beau Allison

One of my very minor issues with Windows Phone 7 is that opening a new SMS takes too many clicks; to solve this I have made a small application – New SMS. With one click of the home tile or app button it will launch a new SMS. I have also titled the application “Add New SMS” in the Applications List (Right swipe) so it generally sits very close to the top.

Download:

Surprisingly the application has been having a strange time making it into the marketplace so until then (I just re-uploaded it for testing) you can grab the XAP of New SMS here. (Will require a developer unlocked phone).

- Beau Allison

Every now and again we like to do things which push the boundaries of standards and policies. Sometimes these work and sometimes they don’t. Our first application, Torrent Remote, was the first example of this in getting approval for a torrent related application on the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace. Fast forward to the present and our latest application didn’t quite make the cut.

This application is SMS Bomber – An app used to select a contact and repeatedly send the recipient messages over and over again. The application supports sending up to 140 messages (a strange limitation on Windows Phone 7′s part). Not a new or original idea but an application which I wanted none the less – my friends often bomb each other. Readily available on Android phones you can often find an application like SMS Bomber which is used to repeatedly send SMS to an individual. Unfortunately the application was rejected by Microsoft citing concerns that a consumer could easily rake up an unanticipated bill etc.

Now for the fun facts:
- The application was made in about 2 hours total
- 10 Minutes was spent on coding
- The remainder 110 minutes was spent on drawing icons – I am a terrible artist

How does it work?
Due to limitations in the API the easiest way to send a contact multiple messages is to repeat the contacts number over and over again. The steps behind this are below:

1. The user selects a contact to send a message to. Once the user selects a contact a phone number is returned to the application.
2. The user selects the amount of messages to send to the contact and the message they would like to send
3. A new SmsComposeTask is created and for every message that you wish to send repeat the contacts phone number in the Contact List (aka SmsComposeTask.To – This is a string)
4. Show the new SMS and it will be populated with the repeated contacts and the message

Step 3′s Code:
//This will be the Phone Number you receive back from the PhoneNumberChooserTask
string contactsNumber;
//This will be the String that is used for SmsComposeTask.To
string contactsList;
//The amount of Messages to Send
int numberOfMessages;
for (int i = 0; i < numberOfMessages; i++)
{
contactsList += contactsNumber + "; ";
}

Download the XAP

Disclaimer: For every Message you send this will incur an additional cost by your carrier. If you send multiple messages and incur a large bill this is your own responsibility.

You can download the XAP for SMS Bomber here. Please note that in order to install SMS Bomber you will need a Windows Phone 7 device with developer access to install XAP files. For more information on this you can go to the Windows Phone 7 Developer portal (in the short it will require a $99 USD/year fee to unlock your phone).

- Beau Allison

The team at codeJoker would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas!

To celebrate this wonderful time of year and the worldwide release of Windows Phone 7 we have temporarily dropped the price of Torrent Remote to $1.29 USD ($1.70 AUD) for the holiday season!

Enjoy,

- Beau Allison