Well there is such an app –> Hide My Stuff and best part is its FREE and runs on Android 1.6 and above

Below is a tutorial on to how to use this app

The moment you First install and Run the app you’ll be asked to Enter a new Password . Please enter your desired password and click Save 

Once the setup is complete you’ll be presented with a screen like the one below. This is the screen you’ll be seeing when you launch the app from now onEnter your password and click Login. Next you’ll be shown your Pictures and Video Vault. Since we have not yet added anything to the vault , we are seeing Pictures and Videos to be zero

Click on Lets Hide Some Files to add Files , there is another very awesome way to add files to our vault using the default pictures gallery , but onto that later

On Clicking the Lets Hide Some Files a File Browser Pop into view which enables you to hide any folder or file . Long press on a folder to hide it. Now lets go to the Vault by clicking on Go To Vault button or Vault in the Options Menu

Now in the Vault –> Click on the Pictures –> Now you’ll be presented with two Albums Random and Camera (the one you just put in) Click on your Album and browse images in the inbuilt gallery. Click on the arrows to go to next and previous images (or you can Flick forward and backwards) , double tap to zoom in/out and pan around . You can even start the Slideshow and set up duration of photo change

Before exiting Please ensure that you have hidden the files by running the Media Scanner by going to Vault and clicking Run Media Scanner in the Options Menu

Now onto an another awesome way to hide files directly from the gallery . Go to your Default Android Gallery , Select the Picture / Folder / Multiple Pictures you want to Hide. Click Share , Then select the “Hide It” option from the Popup menu , Then select which folder you want to hide these files in… and voila your files are Hidden

FAQs

Q: How do i Un Hide the Files that i have hidden using this application

Answer : Long Press on the Album that you want to Un Hide –> Select Un Hide It from the popup menu

Q : I have hidden the files but it is still showing in my picture gallery

Answer : Please ensure that you have run the Media Scanner after you hide your files. To run the Media Scanner . Go to Vault and Click Run Media Scanner from the options menu

Q : I am getting a lot of force closes and application crashes.

Answer : Please write down in the comments below what were you doing when the force close happened. I will try to sort your problems personally

Problem #1 :-  The Orientation Sensor has a Factory Offset

How I know :- Try any game that uses Orientation Sensor (eg. Abduction) from Market Place. You’ll see that the cow jumps slightly to the left even when the phone is perfectly erect.

How to Solve :- To solve this problem you’ll need to root the phone.
This is how i rooted my phone.

1. Check for your phone firmware . Under Settings –> About Phone –> Baseband Version. By default my phone had I9000DDJF3 . Now you need to Have firmware I9000XWJG1 to continue. If you have that firmware you can skip the steps below and go straight to Rooting part. Else you can install the new firmware.
2. To install the new firmware you need to download the following files
   
   

   Firmware : http://www.multiupload.com/BW9A3F2HH8 (download from any of the 4 mirrors)
   Odin : http://www.multiupload.com/DLS7TWUVPY (download from any of the mirrors)
   Pit File : http://www.multiupload.com/4N0NMBO0WE (download from any of the mirrors)
   Guide on flashing the firmware : http://samsung-firmware.webs.com/Flash%2520guide%2520english.pdf from samsung-firmware.webs.com

   Watch the videos for more info :
   

   

   Galaxy s Flashing Part One
   
3. Now that you have the the I9000XWJG1 firmware you can go ahead an root the phone by installing the Modaco’s Custom Rom 2(MCR r2) . Download the MCR r2 from here
   Video on how to update to MCR r2 given below . Please note installing the rom also roots your phone
   
   
4. Now to correct the orientation sensor problem do the following. Install the Better Terminal app from Marketplace. And type this one line at a time

   su
   /system/bin/sensorcalibutil_yamaha

5. Before pressing Enter make sure you have put the phone on a flat surface . Note that the Lower end of the phone has a slight elevation so make sure that part is hanging out to make the rest of the phone perfectly straight
   
6. Do not forget to reboot the phone to apply the changes. Now your orientation sensor is calibrated.

In next part of the series i’ll talk about how to run your PC and Samsung Galaxy S in perfect Harmony. (i know Kies can be irritating)

For eg. To Create Image Map of Image like this (see below) is a herculean task if done manually

The tool i use is Adobe Fireworks. And probably it is the best tool for the same task.

Step 1 : Open up the image in Adobe Fireworks

Step 2 : Click on Magic Wand Tool in the toolbox and click on the area you want to select. You’ll see it will automatically create a selection around the “similar colored area”.

Step 3 : This step is optional, This is just to make our image map look and function better.  Go To Select –> Expand Marquee.. and Expand the marquee by 1px

Step 4 : Now Go to Select –> Convert Marquee to Path

Step 5 : You’ll now the see the image turn up something like this.

Now Right Click the portion which is highlighted by blue dots , or in other terms the Path that you just created and Click Insert HotSpot or press Ctrl+Shit+U

Now the image will turn up like this.

Next Step is to repeat the stuff with as many regions as you want. And then to export the image as HTML. To export the image Go To File –>Export (or press Ctrl+Shift+R)

And then save the HTML file anywhere. Now open up the HTML file to get the Coordinates to the area or the image map.

Hope you find this tutorial useful , if you have any doubts pertaining to Image Maps feel free to ask it in the Comments.

btw – here is a demo of the website i was working on where i implemented this map

http://anuj.im/gqa/ . Please note this is just a development setup for the website.

Well this is a screenshot after i got it working so you’ll see my httpd daemon is already running. I posted it just to make sure you guys are following me 

Now after some research i found some solutions , so i am going to list them all here. But none of them worked for me , (well they might for you)

Here is one solution from the site cameroncooke.com

1) Launch RegEdit:

2) Go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\HTTP

3) Add a new DWORD (32-bit) value

4) Name it ‘NoRun’ not including the quotes

5) Double click the new property

6) In the Value data field type ‘1? not including quotes and click OK

7) Re-boot your computer

But obviously it didn’t work for me.

Second solution from the comments on the same post

Go to Services (search for “services” on windows start menu ) and then disable Windows Remote Management

Third solution that worked for me was to disable the Running IIS server on my computer. It is disabled by default and i have turned it on some days back for some reasons . Turning that off solved my problem. Go to Windows Start menu and search for “turn windows features on or off”

Then start the program and uncheck the Internet Information Services

Then just reboot your computer and try to start the apache (it will start ofcourse).

I hope it helps a few fellow web developers. if you are still facing trouble please ask in the comments section

Update : Sometimes SKYPE also occupies port 80. So make sure to run your apache server before you start skype

1

<textarea rows="5" cols="40"> </textarea>

Do you see the red-dotted underline beneath “textarea” and “smartanuj” , they just are not good. Whatever firefox thinks to me both textarea and smartanuj are correct spellings. So how can i get rid of this problem.

Now here is a another subtle but significantly good looking textarea

You see how the textarea and smartanuj both are free of the red-dotted underlines. Lets see how you can accomplish the same.

To create the above textarea i used the following code.

1
2

<textarea spellcheck="false" rows="5" cols="40" style="border:1px solid #ccc;-moz-border-radius:4px;padding:5px;font-family:Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;font-size:20px;color:#4B4949">
</textarea>

Lets break down the textarea bits by bits and understand whats going on there

spellcheck="false"

Disables the firefox spellcheck functionality on that textarea

 rows="5" cols="40"

Sets rows and columns of textarea or width and height of the textarea

 border:1px solid #ccc; 

Sets border around the textarea which is 1px in width , solid and has color code #ccc

 -moz-border-radius:4px 

Curves the border around the corners in an arc of radius 4 cms

 padding:5px 

Sets padding 5 pixels , so the characters are some pixels away from the borders

font-family:Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif;font-size:20px;color:#4B4949

Sets font-family to “Verdana , Geneva , Sans-serif ” , the size to 20px , and font-color to color code #4B4949

Isn’t it fairly simple. Important thing to remember , the make the styles inline to give the textarea proper formatting

If you have any questions please use the comments area below

and here is the search page

Now if Google can hear this.. please bring the old interface back…

What do you guys say for the new interface.. lets hear it in the comments.

Update : Google has implemented this interface (rather slightly less colorful) interface permanently… oh we are doomed !!

Update 2: Firefox users can now use the a Old Google userscript to get back the same look and feel

To see this Easter Egg simply just click on the “I am feeling Lucky” button with a blank search field and voila you have the Easter Egg. Just in case you miss it i am attaching a screenshot for you.

This animation runs indefinitely so you can just see random “Happy New Year” appearing all over the screen forever

To get this folder all you have to do is the following

1. Create a new folder anywhere on your hard drive
2. Rename this folder Everything.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}

That is it. When you open the folder you’ll see everything which inside. Please leave your comments below.

To see the easter egg simply click on I’m Feeling Lucky button with nothing in the search field and voila!!

Google Easter Egg , Countdown to end of the year 2009

After the restart when i tried to boot into Ubuntu , the GRUB screen came and i was like what do i do now ? I am a techie but i am not that into Linux so i was clueless there.

So i had to boot into Windows again , fire up Firefox and hunt the web for a solution as now i had everything in my Linux Environment.

Finally i found a solution  and compiled everything at one place.

Please follow the following steps if you too got stuck at the GRUB screen in a WUBI installation after doing a Linux Kernel Update / Update to Ubuntu

sh:grub>set root=(loop0)

sh:grub>linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.31-14-generic root=/dev/sda1 loop=/ubuntu/disks/root.disk ro

sh:grub>initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.31-14-generic

sh:grub>boot

please note /ubuntu/disks/root.disk is the location of your WUBI installation (default being C:\ubuntu)

this will enable you to boot into Ubuntu Back

After booting  into Ubuntu follow these steps to not to see that GRUB screen again during starting up.

Open Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal)

Type sudo update-grub2 and click Enter, enter your administrator password and voila your GRUB list is made again. and you’ll not the GRUB screen again

I hope that helps. if you have any doubt please say in comments.