Use GPRS in Shanghai

I received query about GPRS today from Boris in Germany:

I like your weblog, lots of interesting information in it :-) Thanks for that!

I have read your messages about mobile phones in china. Now I am interested if you have any more details on GPRS. I have heard that there are different flat rates in China for about 200yuan / month with umlimited traffic and roaming within china. I really can’t believe that but maybe you can comment on that.

200 RMB / Month for unlimited traffic

The good news is, at the time this article is written, it is true. Here is what the Shanghai Mobile announced on their Chinese website.

Monthly fee: 0 RMB, then 0.03 RMB/KB

Monthly fee: 20 RMB for 1MB, 0.01RMB/KB

Monthly fee: 100 RMB for 20MB, 0.01RMB/KB

Monthly fee: 200 RMB for unlimited GPRS access

There is no roaming fee if you use GPRS in other cities.

Run Your Blog with Your Own Domain Name

A lot of people are very interested to know how to run the same website as mine (http://home.wangjianshuo.com). The questions are:

  1. How to get a domain name with my own name?
  2. What do I need to do after I get the domain name? Where should I put my pages.
  3. What is the software you are using to publish your website?

Well. They are all good questions when you have know idea about the Internet world. I’d like to help.

Domain name

Believe it or not, you can get a unique top level Internet name at blahblah.com. Anything you can think of before it is taken.

Here is the tool you can type in your name with .com at the end at my favoriate Domain Name Lookup tool – GeekTools. See if it is taken or not. If they return “no information for that domain”, then congratulations and you can go ahead to register it.

P.S. Here is the domain information for my domain.

You pay: 120 RMB or less per year
You get: Your right to assign an IP address to the domain name and change it at anytime you want.

Read on to see where to get your IP address.

Webhosting

Domain name itself is only a record at the central domain registration administration. It will point your visitors to your website. Having a domain name is just to get a car plate. You have to buy your car seperately. For the website, you need to find the website hosting service. They provide the real machines, hard disks, the Interenet connections to you.

You pay: 300 RMB per year
You get: 1) An IP address, which you can give it to the domain name hosting company

2) An username and a password, by which you can put your own webpage and pictures to the hosting server.

Blogging software

I suggest you to run MovableType, which can be downloaded free of charge at http://movabletype.org. Be aware that it is a little bit difficult to configure and run it for non-technical people. Read my article MovableType Successfully Installed on Windows XP for more information.

Begin blogging

Let me know if you have setup your blogging with your own domain name. I would like to provide link to you on my site. I am very careful to choose which site I link to. You are entitled a link on this site only if you meet the following criteria.

1) You created your site by following the instructions listed above.

– or –

2) You are inspired by this article to begining your blogging with your own domain name.

– or –

3) You followed the instruction in my article MovableType Successfully Installed on Windows XP to run your copy of MovableType.

Let me know by comment here and I will create a special section and link to you – the very unique community on the net.

Questions

Post it here and welcome to join the blogging world.

Back From CultureXChina Party

I just returned from a party hosted by CultureXChina at Club de Eagle near the Galaxy Hotel.

There I met nice guy like Jack, Jason, and Alex. They came from France and Hong Kong. Also I met a lot of local university students there.

Nice idea to bring the two poles together

It is a very nice idea to bring the local people and the foreigners together. The culture exchange, as implied by the name of the party organizer, is exactly the most exciting thing in the big city of Shanghai. It is fun and benifitial for both the local people and foreigners to talk.

Barriers to go out of the country

There are two barriers for people in China to travel to the rest of the world.

The first one is the passport. Unlike people in Europe and U.S., passport and visa are the main barrier for people to go out to see the world. It is become much easier now to get a passport. Can you imagine that for the first 40 years of the People’s Republic of China, seldom can anybody go out of the door of the country and see other places? Well. It is for the historical reasons. In the recent years (1980-2000), more and more people goes to U.S., but passport is not easy to get. Until recently (within one year) did the passport open for citizens. Any one can get a passport with a Citizen ID card within a week. This has been a big step.

The other barrier is the expense. A round trip from Shanghai to San Fransisco typically costs 1000 USD. That is not big money for U.S. people, but when you consider the average income of people in China, it becomes a problem. As one of the richest city in China (which is currently the 11th expensive city to live in the world), Shanghai’s average monthly income is around 1400 RMB – less than 200 USD. Although there are many people enjoy every high salary (200,000 – 5,000,000 RMB), the majority of the city are still not rich. For people in inner part of the mainland, the income are less. In my hometown of Luoyang, 500 RMB (est. 60 USD) per month is considered very good job already.

So you see the big gap between 1000 USD air ticket and the 60-200 USD monthly income, not to mention the hotels and other expenses.

Demand for English skills

Although most of collage students never been to any country outside China, they have huge demand for English. English skill is critical for them to find a good job after gradutation (Refer to my previous article on Is English Skill That Important?)

Beside that, the contact with foreigners gives them the chance to explorer the world outside the country. That is the reason why so many people joined the party organized by CultureXChina.com.

For foriengners

For foreigners to come to the mysterious country, China, besides business trip, what else can you expect to do? Besides the guided tour to the city, there is seldom a chance to make local friends, to learn some Chinese, and to under the culture of the city/country.

So joining a party with lots of local people is a good choice. In the party, there are so many local students. Most importantly, they are willing to talk with you and share their experience. Most of them can speak English and some of them are fluence in English. Isn’t it nice?

Nice party

I talked with the organizer of the party and he said there will be this kind of party almost every week. Everytime, there are about 100 to 300 people every time. Pretty nice, isn’t it? They can be found CultureXChina.com.

Alcatel OT715 Software

Many people are seeking Alcatel OT715 software, as can see from the hot discussion under my previous OT715 page. I have bought OT715 and enjoy the wonderful OT715 phone and the software. I’d like to introduce this model of business mobile to my friends. Regarding the OT715 software, there is no where to download on the Internet. They can not even easily got from Alcatel. That is bad. I can not publicly share the software on the Internet since I am very serious on the copyright and license issue. Let me see how I can help you on that.

The Package

Here is the Directory structure of the OT715 disk.

Volume in drive D is Data

Volume Serial Number is 6C27-48E1

Directory of D:\Download\OT715

07/06/2003 03:08 PM <DIR> .

07/06/2003 03:08 PM <DIR> ..

07/04/2003 06:07 PM <DIR> Acrobat

02/19/2002 10:18 PM 57 AUTORUN.INF

07/04/2003 06:07 PM <DIR> Customization Tools

07/06/2003 02:33 PM <DIR> Desktop Tools

07/04/2003 06:10 PM <DIR> Documents

07/04/2003 06:10 PM <DIR> IntelliSync

07/04/2003 06:13 PM <DIR> Mobile Phone Tools

07/04/2003 06:14 PM <DIR> OpenObex

07/04/2003 06:14 PM <DIR> patchIrCommW2K

07/04/2003 06:14 PM <DIR> Quickbeam

06/13/2002 11:28 PM 1,760,523 setup.exe

02/24/2002 05:49 PM 17,021 setup.ini

Component

The whole CD is about 350Mb in size or 311Mb as Zipped file. Not all the components in the disk are useful.

As I marked above, the Adobe folder (95.4Mb) contains Adobe Reader to read the content of the help document. So I can safely remove this one.

For OpenObex, patchIrCommW2K, Quickbeam, I don’t know what it is so it shouldn’t be important.

For Desktop Tools, it is basically useless – just give you an interface to launch the other three key components. For the documents, it is not well written.

Custmization Tools

This is the tool to help you create customized background and idle screens and transfer it to the mobile via IR port or COM port. It is 27 Mb in size. I have shared it on my website. Click the link in the directory list above to download it.

IntelliSync

This tool help you to sync between your mobile and your Outlook. It is useful – the only problem is, it is not compatable with Windows XP. It is 35Mb in size. Since I don’t have disk space on my ISP now and I cannot share it. I will put it online after I remove the Custmization Tools.

Mobile Phone Tools

This tool helps to send SMS and fax via the mobile. I haven’t made it work yet, so there is no comment for it.

IMPORTANT NOTICE

The copyright of the software belongs to Alcaltel Business System. Please read the license carefully before you install – it requires you have a OT715 mobile phone and can only be used for this mobile.

Support needed

In the last week, I tried to setup my computer in my home to provide download for my friends who sent mail to me. However, we encountered technical difficulties and the files are too large.

I don’t have enough disk space to hold it, so I choose to seperate the software and provide download for one component at a time. I have to remove the last one to put a new one.

If anyone want to sponsor me the disk space, I’d like to share more stuff – including more pictures about Shanghai, video about Shanghai and other software – if license permit with you.

I need $50 (Fifty USD) to rent a larger disk space to hold the disk. Maybe you can sponsor and I will give you credit for it. Use the award-winning PayPal service to donote. Even one USD is good for the site.

Update Oct 12, 2003

Actually, there is only one file on the disk that is so important and the file is only a plain text file – the Modem Configuration File – OT715.inf

The file will help to install the OT715 driver on Windows XP. Click the link to download. I doubt to have time to write more on how to make it work on Windows XP yet. Try yourself. The result is, you can use this file to turn your OT715 to a moderm and access Internet if you subscribed GPRS service.

Tongli – Beauty at Night

The most impressive spot on my journey from Shanghai to Taihu is the small town of Tongli 同里. The accient town, Tongli, may seems quite boring at day time if you have visited lots of similiar town like Zhouzhuang, Luzhi….. However, if you experience the town at night, you will definitely be as impressed as I did – Tongli is definitely the beauty at night.

tongli-street-near.arch.bridge.jpg

Tongli Street Near Arch Bridge © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: The night of Tongli. There is no passengers on the street. The whole town is completely empty and let you forget it is a town with 10K residents. Look at the arch bridge on the right side of the picture and the perfect reflection in the water.

tongli-blue.skey-early.morning.jpg

Tongli Blue Sky © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: The dawn of Tongli. The blue skys appeared behind the trees and the houses in Tongli. Taken at about 4:00 AM.

Tongli River in the morning © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: Houses and river in dawn. I am so glad that I got up early that day to capture the beauty of the town of Tongli with my Sony P8 in the morning.

© Jian Shuo Wang

Above: Houses and it reflection on the water. It looks like a piece of Chinese painting.

Tongli Tongxinnong © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: Tongli Street – a typical narrow and long street in Tongli.

tongli-old.walls.jpg

Tongli, old walls © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: Look at the walls! Time have left so much marks on the accient walls.

tongli-covered.bridge.jpg

Tongli Covered Bridge © Jian Shuo Wang

Above: The bridge at the entrance of Tongli.

tongli-river.in.bridge.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Above: The tri-bridge area. Rivers are flowing in the town and bridges connects the seperated part.

tongli-jianshuo-lieing.on.reading.bridge.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Above: Me, lying on the Reading Bridge (Dushu Qiao) in Tongli. The stone surface was very smooth after so many years.

tongli-fanrong.hotel.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Fanrong Inn where I stayed. It has very nice equipment (in the context of such an accient town) and reasonable price (less than 70 RMB). The owner of the inn Mr. Xu Fanrong is a very nice guy. He showed me around in the town for one hour. He grows up in the town and knows the town so well. He even brought me to the dark streets – streets covered by roofs and are 100 meters long – so it is completely dark. You can move forward use you foots and hands, not your eyes. Keeping your eyes open or closed makes no difference in the “dark streets” Xu showed me. The pictures of the street and the place I sit and drunk teas are just before his inn. Call him at 0512-63337665 for reservation – I will be very happy to advertise for him.

More pictures

Some of the pictures on this page was shown in my previous blog: Back from Taihu by Bike. A complete set of the pictures are stored on ImageStation.

Top Commenter of the Month

As always, I am going to announce the Top Commenters of the Month award for this website. The Top Commenter of the Month Award for June goes to:

Nick 6

cuanyu 5

Xu 4

andrea 4

Top 10 list

Jian Shuo Wang 65

Nick 6

cuanyu 5

Xu 4

andrea 4

Vivian 3

samuel 3

Jan 3

Euthenics 3

David 3

History

In June, 117 visitors contributed 216 comments to this website.

In May 2003, 175 visitors contributed 453 comments to this website.

In April 2003, 157 persons (distinguished by display name) posted 437 comments.

In the first 5 months of this blog (Sept 11, 2002 to March 31, 2003), 216 persons (distinguished by display name) posted 478 comments.

EndAds and BlockMessenger

hlb felt very painful when he was hit by the EndAds spam.

I keep getting pop ups from endads.com telling me how to get rid of pop ups. But I only get pop ups from them so I’m certainly not paying them to get rid of themselves!! Mr Norton is supposed to do this for me. But he’s failed miserably.

Spam is a good business, isn’t it?

It is obviously a good business to spam others and ask others to pay to get rid of the spam. EndAds.com did it and BlockMessenger.com is doing it too. This is what I call: ROBERY.

Simple steps to turn it off

The easist way to stop receiving this kind of message is to turn off Windows Messenger service. If you are running Windows XP or Windows 2000, following these steps:

  • Click Start button on your Windows taskbar.
  • Click Run…
  • Enter “Services.msc” (without quotation marks) and click OK.
  • Browse the list till you find “Messenger” in Name column.
  • Double click it. The Messenger Properties (Local Computer) dialog box comes out.
  • Choose “Disable” in “Startup type” drop down box.
  • Click OK.

It will definitely work. If you don’t believe that so simple steps can stop the annoying pop-ups, see the comments of about 100 people on this page.

Note: These steps will NOT affect your usage of MSN Messenger, AIM, Yahoo! Messenger or ICQ.

I have also put the instructions here and there on this site. I hope EndAds.com cannot get a single penny if people spread the easy cure on the Internet.

Updated: Shutdown EndAds.com Together July 31, 2003

It is a shame that the spammer EndAds.com is still accessiable on Internet and is still collecting money by its “day-light robery” spam. My reader Chris Mikeson have given us very good suggestion to shutdown EndAds.com together by complain to their hosting company at abuse@level3.net.

Everyone who has been abused by endads.com should email abuse@level3.net. If they get enough of them they will shut them down and ban them from returning. It will only take about 5 customers complaining. I can usually do this alone but it adds credibility of others of you also send email to abuse@level3.net.

By Chris Mikeson

Please paste your complain to abuse@level3.net and their response on this page as comment and we can clearly see the progress.

Updated EndAds.com Spammers Caught Nov 06, 2003

Good news! The EndAds.com, actually D Square LLC was caught by FTC and was sued. I believe it is the final ending of this nightmare. Read more: EndAds.com Caught by FTC

About this site

Wangjianshuo’s blog is a personal weblog written by Jian Shuo Wang. It is updated daily with events that affects people’s life from Shanghai, China.