The 8th Voyager

Friday, December 30, 2011

HTC rolled out Android 2.3.5 and Sense UI 3.0 update to Incredible S in Malaysia and Singapore

The OTA (Over-The-Air) Android 2.3.5 (Gingerbread) together with HTC Sense UI 3.0 of HTC Incredible S smartphone has been made available to Malaysia and Singapore yesterday (29 December 2011) morning.

You can manually check for the update now, or wait for the automated update alert appear on your HTC Incredible S smartphone sooner or later.

Although this update will not cause any data or setting lost to your smartphone, it is always a wise choice to perform a backup using tools such as MyBackup (or the paid MyBackupPro) or Titanium Backup (or the paid Titanium Backup Pro) prior to the update, just in case...
After the update, you will get a new lock screen as the one in HTC EVO 3D. You can customize this lock screen in Personalize > Lock screen. The background can be either your Wallpaper, Photo Album, Friend Stream, Weather, Stocks, or Clock display. You can also assign the apps linking to the 4 quick launch icons there.

Using the phone becomes more fun with the 3D effects of HTC Sense UI 3.0. However, it is harder to get the carousel effect when fast swiping the home screen than in HTC EVO 3D.

Thursday, December 29, 2011

Auspicious dates for signing contract, register for marriage, etc. in 2012

Here is the list of auspicious dates in year 2012 for signing contract, signing offer letter, register for marriage, receiving religious baptism, and other similar agreement-related activities. It is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Auspicious dates in 2012 for getting a baby

Here is the list of auspicious dates in 2012 for getting a baby (求嗣), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

The dates have good element(s) to embro/faetus. Traditionally, the dates are referred for conception planning (making love and expecting a baby to the family). Nowadays, people also make reference to them for Caesarian delivery of new born.

Monday, December 26, 2011

Auspicious dates for marriage proposal or engagement in 2012

Before becoming the life partner, marriage is proposed by lover and engagement is made.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for marriage proposal or engagement in year 2012 (year of Rabbit), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

You might aware that 12 December 2012 (12-12-12) is among the auspicious dates.

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Good luck in getting your right life partner.

Related articles:

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Auspicious dates for housewarming, open house, party, gathering, etc. in 2012

Here is the list of auspicious dates in 2012 for organizing and hosting meet-up with friends and/or relatives (会友), which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

The dates are applicable for housewarming, open house, home party, gathering, and any other similar functions to meet up with friends and/or relatives. (Click the image to enlarge)

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Auspicious dates for baby first haircut (Mundan) in 2012

In many culture, religion and/or tradition, the first haircut of a baby is considered an important milestone for his/her life. The day is known as Mundan, Chadakarana, Halaqah, Upsherin, etc.

Here is the list of auspicious dates for baby first haircut in year 2012, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Malaysia Employment Outlook and Salary Guide 2011/12 from Kelly Services

Kelly Services has released their Malaysia Employment Outlook and Salary Guide 2011/12.

It is observed that employers are now focusing on employing graduates armed with knowledge of the profession and competency, who are critical thinkers and problem solvers with good communication skills within the sales and marketing functions. Most organizations offer these fresh graduates lower basic salary and higher performance based tiered incentives and commission.

Talent with a genuine ability to build long-term, successful, professional relationships with clients, in addition to selling a product or service are in great demand to keep the business moving forward.

With the rise in "cloud" technology, there will also be an increasing demand for ICT professionals with skills in networking, security and creative multimedia within the next 3 years. Other staffing
trends include rich Internet applications and mobile development arising from smart phones impact into the markets.

Click here to download the Kelly Services Malaysia Employment Outlook and Salary Guide 2011/12.

Auspicious dates for opening business in 2012

Here is the list of auspicious dates for opening business in year 2012, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. It can be applied to new business opening, or reopening of business after a break/holiday. (Click the image to enlarge)

Note that 24/1, 27/1, 30/1 and 31/1 are the auspicious dates for opening business right after Chinese New Year 2012.

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

Related articles:

Monday, December 19, 2011

Auspicious dates for starting new job/post/assignment in 2012

For employees, especially those in leading/managing position, here is a list of auspicious dates for starting new job/post/assignment in 2012, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu.

It can be applied to first day reporting to new company/department/office/position, go for the post to lead/manage a new business unit/team/project/programme. It can also be applied to assuming new job position after promotion/restructuring/relocation exercise.

Auspicious dates for renovation in 2012

Here is the list of auspicious dates for renovation in year 2012, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

If you are going to renovate your house, don't forget to visit the "home idea" section of my blog to find out some of my sharing there.

Related articles:

Auspicious dates for moving to new house/office in 2012

Here is the list of auspicious dates for moving to new house/office in year 2012, which is produced based on the Chinese almanac Tong Shu. (Click the image to enlarge)

Bear in mind that although the Tong Shu is a compilation of Chinese astrology and calendaring studies gathering wisdom of thousands of years, we should use it wisely and rationally, but not be too superstitious on it.

If you are going to move to a new home, don't forget to visit the "home idea" section of my blog to find out my sharing on mortgage, renovation, furnitures, electrical appliances, pest control, etc.

Related articles:

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Citibank giving out 500 new Apple iPhone 4S 16GB in its contest

On the same day the new Apple iPhone 4S smartphone debut in Malaysia, Citibank has announced a new contest with 500 unit of Apple iPhone 4S as prize.

Residents of Malaysia who are existing or new Citibank cardholders (credit card, debit card or ATM card issued in Malaysia) can participate in this contest.

Contest period is from 16 December 2011 to 24 March 2012, spanning 100 days. There are 5 winners for each day, and each winner will be awarded one unit of Apple iPhone 4S.

You can gain contest entries by:

Use credit card to swipe at least RM50 in single receipt locally
Use credit card to swipe at least RM50 in single receipt, charged with foreign currency
Sign up Citibank Online account
Sign up to receive e-statements
Successfully apply for Balance Transfer / Cash Advance / Dial For Cash / Card Protection Premier / Flexi Payment Plan / One Bill / Credit Shield Plus / Credit Shield Premier / HomeSafe / Cash Assure Plus 400
Successfully upgrade your credit card
Successfully apply for new credit card / debit card / ATM card
Successfully apply for supplementary card
Accept a Citibank initiated permanent increase of credit line

At the end of each day during the Contest Period, each Contest Entry received during the day will be given a serial number. The Contest Entries will then be arranged according to the serial numbers assigned to them. The total number of Contest Entries received for the day will be divided by 500. The result will then be rounded down to the closest whole number (“Multiple Number”). The first twenty (20) serial numbers which are multiples of the Multiple Number, beginning with that Multiple Number, will be selected as the shortlisted serial numbers.

Each of the Short-listed Participants will be contacted by Citibank or its appointed representatives up to 2 times at the latest telephone numbers furnished to Citibank as shown in Citibank’s records at any time during office hours (9.00am – 6.00pm) to answer a series of 5 questions. In the event Citibank or its appointed representative is unable to contact a Short-listed Participant after 2 attempts and/or the
Short-listed Participant withdraws its participation in the Contest upon being contacted by Citibank or its appointed representatives, the Short-listed Participant will be deemed disqualified from the Contest. Only the principal cardmembers will be contacted.

The five (5) out of the 20 Short-Listed Participants who answer the most number of questions correctly in the fastest time will be the Winners for that relevant day and will each win a Prize.

Click here to read the detail terms and conditions of Citibank's "Win 500 Apple iPhone 4S Contest".

Click here to participate in Citibank's "Win 500 Apple iPhone 4S Contest".

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

BNM to issue new series of Malaysian coins in 2012

Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) is issuing commemorative coins in the denominations of 5 sen, 10 sen, 20 sen and 50 sen, to mark the new 3rd Series of the Malaysian coins which will be available for circulation early 2012.

This series of new coins are smaller and lighter, making its more user-friendly for the public. The yellow and silver coloured coins and the edge designs enable the public and also the visually impaired to identify and distinguish the different denominations.

The new series of coins embodies the latest advancements in minting technology which incorporates improved counterfeit resistance security features. The new metal alloy used for minting has enhanced durability against wear and corrosion.

The alloy used in 50 sen coins is Nickel Brass Clad Copper, in 20 sen coins is Nickel Brass, in 10 sen and 5 sen coins is Stainless Steel.

This new series of coins are legal tender and will co-circulate with the existing series. The existing series will be gradually phased out.

Vendors of cash handling machines are given 6 months to calibrate their machines to ensure convenience for the use of the new coins.

Thursday, December 8, 2011

Find out if your smartphone is installed with the infamous Carrier IQ

Nowadays, one of the hot topics among the smartphone (iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Symbian, ...) users is about Carrier IQ.

Carrier IQ is spy agent pre-installed in certain smartphone that can capture information about the phone numbers you are dialing, your GPS location, the webpages you have visited with your mobile browser, etc. Those information are sent back via the Internet without your notice, invading into your privacy.

Carrier IQ has been reported to be found in iPhones, and it is told that you can disable its information sending action with About > Diagnostics & Usage > Don't Send.

There are multiple vendors and multiple models for Android phone, and not all of them are affected. If you have an Android phone, good news is that now there are several free tools available in the Market for you to find out whether your Android phone is installed with the infamous Carrier IQ or not.

Just open the Market app, and search for the keywords "carrier iq detector" and you will get a list of the detector tools for Android.

Use them to check on your Android phone. You can install multiple of them to assure that your phone is not affected. Once you have done the checking, you can go ahead to uninstall the Carrier IQ detection tools.

If you find Carrier IQ in your Android phone, removal will be a bit tricky, as you need root access. There are apps such as Logging Checker (a.k.a. Logging Test App) that claims to be able to help you eliminate Carrier IQ in your phone.

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Understanding Advance Instalment and Capital Repayment in OCBC Bank home loan prepayment mode

OCBC Bank in Malaysia has been giving quite a competitive housing loan facility since they introduced the so-called semi-flexi scheme.

Unlike the fully flexible home loan provided by some other banks, this OCBC semi-flexi home loan is more difficult to understand, more troublesome to manage, and also introduces cost and constraint when come to excess payment (a.k.a. prepayment) redraw.

Anyhow, many people still consider OCBC semi-flexi home loan, as they give among the lowest interest rate, highest possible margin of financing, longest possible serving term, and short lock-in period.

If you were to take up this OCBC semi-flexi home loan, you need to understand about their definition and operation of Advance Instalment and Capital Repayment, which are the 2 options of prepayment for you to put in excess money into your loan account in order to reduce the outstanding balance, and therefore will reduce the overall interest paid as well as shorten the overall loan tenure.

These 2 prepayment modes are clearly spelled out in the Main Terms & Conditions document that come together with your home loan offer letter. I'll summarize it here.

Both Advance Instalment and Capital Repayment will reduce the outstanding balance, and therefore will immediately help you to save on interest charged the next day onwards (since the loan is on daily rests). If you have the current version of the Main Terms & Conditions document, it is stated in Clause 6.6 (a) in that document.

Advance Instalment:

Non-redrawable. Once you banked in, you cannot take it out from your account.
You can use it to automatically set off future monthly instalment, provided there is enough Advance Instalment in your account for the deduction. This is useful if you are going away to oversea for a long period, and might not be convenient to serve your monthly home loan repayment for quite some times.
Can make payment with cash (over the counter), cheque, ATM machine, inter-bank transfer, etc.

Capital Repayment:

Redrawable to your saving or current account with OCBC Bank, subject to the terms and conditions.
You still need to serve your monthly home loan repayment on time as usual. The automatic set off mechanism does not apply here.
Can make payment with cash (over the counter) and cheque only.

The redrawal terms and conditions for Capital Repayment is typically like this:

Redrawing must be made at the OCBC branch.
Need to submit the Redrawing Notice to OCBC 3 days before the redrawing occur.
RM10 will be charged for each redraw.
Only 1 redrawing per day.
Redrawing must be in multiples of RM1000.
Minimum redrawing amount is RM5000.

Sunday, December 4, 2011

The mobile view of this blog

Google Analytics shows that about 15% of my visitors to this blog are actually reading with mobile device. Last month, 37.37% of the mobile visits are from iPhone, 29.43% from Android, 27.31% from iPad, 1.86% from Symbian, and the rest from others.

If you are accessing this blog (or any other blogs hosted in Google's Blogger a.k.a. Blogspot platform) with your mobile device, you will be able to browse its mobile view, which is a simpler, faster loading version. Here is how it looks like:

Scroll down to the bottom of the page, you can find the "View web version" option to switch to its web view.

Actually, web view is also pretty nice when browsed with my favourite mobile browser - Dolphin Browser.

It is even better if you rotate your phone to read in landscape mode.

Actually, there is a trick in the blog's URL to switch it to mobile view and vice versa.

Mobile view - http://voyager8.blogspot.com/?m=1
Web view - http://voyager8.blogspot.com/?m=0

If you are also blogging on Google's Blogger a.k.a. Blogspot, you can check how your blog looks like in its mobile view by accessing it with your mobile phone, or by accessing from any browser using the mobile view URL as above. There are several templates and settings which you can configure in the Settings > Email & Mobile tab.