Prox for Android lets you do pretty much the same thing, but it actually works. You gently tilt your device to one side, wave your hand over it, and the Messaging app opens. Tilt it to another side, wave again, and the browser launches. You can also open and close the notification bar with a simple wave of the hand. It definitely adds a bit of dramatic flair to the Android experience, and makes the whole thing feel vaguely magical (or a bit silly, if you’re using it in public).

Make Sure Your Phone Is Compatible

I’ve had Prox on my wishlist for a while now; sadly, I was stuck using an Acer Liquid E. While it’s a nice device, Acer tried to reduce the price as much as it could, and integrated the proximity and ambient light sensors. So while this combined sensor is good enough for shutting the display off when you put it near your face (the proximity sensor’s main job in life), it doesn’t cut the mustard for Prox. Prox is a paid app ($1.50), but the developer was kind enough to publish a free version that helps you check if Prox works on your phone without being pressed for time by the Market’s annoying 15-minute refund policy.

So first things first: install the free version and play with it. It doesn’t do very much; you can use it to open and close the notification bar, launch the browser and the dialer, and go to the home screen – all with a single wave of the hand while the device is tilted. If this happens to be exactly what you want to do with Prox, you’re done. You can just keep using the free version indefinitely.

If you desire a bit more power and customization options, and Prox Free works on your phone, then you should go ahead and plunk down a buck fifty for Prox Pro. That’s what I did, and I will now take you on a quick tour of the Pro version, powered by my awesome new Galaxy S.

What Prox Pro Is Like

The first thing you’ll see is a short introduction text:

Do take a moment to read it; Prox is innovative, and you might need a little bit of help getting up to speed.

Prox works using a service that runs in the background, so you’ll need to tap the large START button to load it up:

I like that starting the service is an explicit operation, and not something that “just happens” when I run the app. This way, if Prox is giving me some trouble or I just want to disable it for a while (for example, when a child is playing with the phone), I can just run Prox and tap the STOP button, rather than use a third-party tool to forcibly kill it.

Half the screen is dedicated to “loadouts”. There are only five possible ways to tilt your phone: Left, right, forward, flat and away. Loadouts are used to have Prox do more than just five actions. You can configure each loadout with several actions, and then switch between them using Prox (tilt your phone away and swipe over the proximity sensor).

Let’s look at the list of possible actions:

It doesn’t look like much, but Launch Application lets you start just about any app on your phone. One action that’s missing is “Trigger Shortcut“, which would let you access specific operations within applications; I hope the developer adds this in the future.

Learning To Tilt Your Phone

Using Prox may take a bit of practice: You may think you’re tilting your phone to the left, while Prox actually thinks you’re tilting it forward (because you are doing that, too). Prox’s Tilt Values option lets you look at the app’s innards and understand what the app is thinking you’re doing with your phone:

With this screen, you can play around with the phone a little bit and see the readings, and actually learn to hold it “better”, or at least in a way that’s easier for Prox to understand. I didn’t have trouble with this, but a friend of mine did, and this screen can help.

Weaknesses

Prox is a very impressive app, but there are a few things you should know before installing. Documentation does exist, including a nice YouTube demo, but it’s not comprehensive.

Specifically, there’s no way to edit the default layout, and I couldn’t find the actions linked to it, so I had to figure it out by trial and error. It turns out that one of the actions (tilt right) is “disable Prox”. That makes sense, but unfortunately, once disabled using this action, Prox has trouble starting back up. Tapping the Start button starts the service and it’s immediately stopped again. The only way to solve this was to force-close the app and try again. This is definitely a bug, but it’s the only one I’ve come across during my time with the app.

Bottom Line

It’s apps like Prox that make me love Android. The unfettered access developers have to the hardware allows them to do all sorts of crazy and innovative things. Prox is one of the coolest and most interesting apps I’ve seen in a while, and I will certainly be adding it to my daily repertoire.

Wouldn’t it be cool if your computer acted a little bit more like one of those advanced computers you read about in science fiction novels, where you can simply walk up to it and it can sense that you are there and respond accordingly? I mean, these days almost every computer comes with a webcam of some sort, often embedded right above the monitor, so the potential for smarter, more automated computers is there.

There may be some newer computer systems that already do this, but for the most part people are still stuck with tapping the keyboard to disable the screen saver. I started thinking about this the other day and decided to try to put together a combination of applications and scripts that would accomplish this simple automation task (yes, these are the sorts of things automation engineers do for fun).

The Motion-Detection Screensaver Solution

What I came up with was an application-script combination that would constantly monitor the webcam for motion, and then instantly run a script that would remove the screensaver. Deciding on the webcam software was easy. I was tempted to use the Active Webcam software that I previously wrote about, but then I realized that YawCam, which Mark covered before, is much simpler and more effective for this sort of task.

Once you install and run YawCam (and give them a nice donation for offering us this free software), you’ll see the following screen over the webcam video.

Click on “Window” and then choose Motion detection from the dropdown list. On the next screen, you’ll see a page where the motion detection software logs each time a motion event takes place (when the detection is activated). Click on the “Actions” tab to set up the file that you’ll have YawCam run whenever motion is detected.

On this screen, you’ll see a “Settings…” button next to Run.exe. Select the checkbox next to “Run.exe” and then click on the settings button.

Click on the Activate check box for flood control (you don’t want the script launching 50 times a second), and put some delay (I put 10 seconds, but you can use up to 60 or more). The next step would be to click on the browse button and choose your script file that you want to run. Alas, you don’t have one yet. Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered.

You’ll notice that the default filter looks for .bat or .exe files, but you can also choose a Windows Script file (.wsf). For this article, I hunted for a whole list of ways to kill the screensaver via script. I searched for programs that already exist, or batch job methods that disable the screen saver. In each of those cases the screensaver stays disabled – not good. So then I turned to methods to send keyboard keys or mouse clicks to Windows – and sure enough, that was the solution.

After digging around Microsoft help files, I found the SendKeys code that simulates pressing the “Enter” button on the keyboard.

The following is the script.

<package>
<job>
<script language=”VBScript”>
set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject(“WScript.Shell”)
WshShell.SendKeys(“{ENTER}”)
</script>
</job>
</package>

Save this script to a .wsf file and point the Action event in YawCam to that file. Now, every time there’s motion in the webcam, it’ll kick off your script, which simulates pressing the keyboard enter key – which will disable the screen saver.

If you find that your script isn’t getting launched or the motion detection doesn’t seem to be working (or it’s too sensitive), make sure to check out the “Settings” tab in YawCam. Make sure that the tolerance is high enough so it’s not too sensitive, and make sure the sensitivity is high enough so that it picks up when you sit down in front of the computer.

As with most automated solutions, this one isn’t perfect yet because you have to turn it off when you actually want to use the computer or it’ll keep sending the “Enter” key whenever there’s motion. I’m sure there are other creative ways you can probably perfect this automated screensaver trick. The solution above will work best for situations where you have something running for hours (like a virus scan) and you want to just walk up to the screen and have it automatically show you what’s going on, but then the screensaver will reactivate after you walk away.

Did you install this automated screensaver setup? How well did it work for you? Did you find a way to perfect the system even more? Share your insights in the comments section below.

Image Credit: Vivek Chugh

When you search through the Android market, you’ll discover a number of very useful surveillance apps. There are three in particular that are especially useful for parents that would like to keep a close eye on their kids to ensure their safety.

Imagine being able to check in at the house while you’re away from home, just to make sure the kids are okay. Wouldn’t it be useful to peek in to make sure that the babysitter is doing his or her job? What about listening in while your teen is at a party? Surveillance can really put your mind at ease.

The following three mobile surveillance apps for the Android will help make sure your kids are safe even when you can’t be with them.

Use M-Spy to Listen In

Have you ever heard those urban legends that the CIA or NSA can connect to any cellphone in the world and hear what’s going on in the room? Well, with M-Spy from the Android Market, you can do that too. After you download and install M-Spy to your phone, all you have to do is set up a PIN number, and the phone is immediately enabled to act as your own personal audio bug no matter where it is.

This is one of the easiest surveillance apps that you’ll ever use. Once M-Spy is running on the Android phone, all you have to do is leave it wherever it will have good coverage of a room. If you ever want to listen in, all you have to do is send the phone an SMS message with the PIN number and the phone number for it to call.

If you text “5555 call 16035551212″, the system will call the Android phone without ringing it, and then it will call the phone number you’ve entered in the message. When you pick up the phone at that number, you’ll hear everything that’s going on at the other end. Here’s the SMS calling my own Android phone without ringing it.

Get it by scanning this QR code with your Android phone’s camera.

Use the Android as an IP Webcam

While audio is useful, it would be even more useful if you could position your Android phone to monitor your home while your kids are being cared for or home alone. Using the IP Webcam app on the Android Market, you can transform your Android into an IP webcam. Setup is a cinch. All you have to do is run the software!

When the software is running, it immediately starts transmitting. If you want to see your new Android webcam server, just open up a browser and type in the IP address listed at the bottom of the setup page. To access from outside your home network, configure port forwarding on your router.

As you can see, you have lots of options to view your Android webcam. Click any of the options, and you’ll have a clear view to everything your phone can see from wherever you placed it. Here’s my phone spying on my Pug as she sleeps in the living room.

Get it by scanning this QR code with your Android phone’s camera.

Remotely Sense Motion, Movement or Sound

One of the most advanced remote surveillance apps is RL Watcher. This application lets you enable your phone to remotely sense movement, sound or even just the slightest motion of your phone.

Each remote sensor can be individually enabled so that you can receive a notification any time each sensor is tripped. Notifications of any activity can be via SMS, e-mail or by phone. For example, you can set the phone up so that if it moves, it’ll call you at any phone number and you can listen in to whatever is going on where the phone is situated.

Did you ban your teen from using their car? Put your Android phone in the car while you’re at work, and it’ll call you if the car starts moving. Put it in an empty room, and it’ll email you when there’s movement in the room. The possibilities are endless.

You can set up the phone to capture screen shots, video or sound whenever it’s triggered by one of the sensors. Here, I’ve set up the phone to sense motion. It sends you an alert when the sensor gets triggered and it’ll even attach the snapshots.

This is probably one of the most flexible and feature-filled surveillance apps that can really help with any of your remote parenting needs. Monitor your new teen driver or make sure your kids aren’t throwing a party while you’re away from home – your remote Android surveillance unit can really set your mind at ease when you’re a parent.

Get it by scanning this QR code with your Android phone’s camera.

Can you think of any other useful ways to use these awesome surveillance apps? Share your ideas or other useful apps in the comments section below.

Image credit: peterfeije

In addition to these sensors, there are also more practical things that you may want to know about the status of your Android phone and the network and the environment where it is located. To this end, I decided to go out in search of some more cool Android apps that integrate with your phone’s sensors to provide you with some interesting information about the status of your phone.

Check GPS Satellite Status

Many GPS-enabled Android apps simply connect to GPS satellites and initiate the application with your location. However, there are times when you may want to know what the status of your phone’s GPS system is – such as how many satellites are transmitting, your current GPS directly and location and more. The GPS Status app taps into your GPS receiver and provides you with all of that information in a very cool graphical format.

The app displays everything all in one screen – the magnetic field, your current position including pitch/title, your compass direction and of course the location of satellites. It’s actually very cool to watch the location of the satellites as they slowly move across the sky.

Check Your Battery Juice With JuicePlotter

Have you ever wondered where all your battery power is going? Curious what your charge and discharge pattern looks like? One awesome tool that may help you troubleshoot when and why your battery is getting drained is JuicePlotter. JuicePlotter tracks and plots the history of your battery level, allowing you to review when your battery was nearly fully charged, how quickly it drained and when you recharged the battery.

For testing purposes, I let my phone gradually drop from 80 percent down to about 20 percent. As you can see from the graph, it took the battery from 4am to 12am to drain down to that level – not bad! Obviously, unless you have something enabled that’s draining your battery more quickly, the shortening of this graph could represent a battery that needs replacement.

Analyze Your Network

One common use for a mobile phone is to identify local Wi-Fi networks. The Android Market offers a number of cool Android apps that show the current speed, strength and even the volume of transmitted data for the Wi-Fi signals that your phone can connect to. The following are two of my favorite apps. The first is called NetCounter, and it simply displays a tally of the data transfer that took place over either your cellular line or your Wi-Fi connection.

This is a cool way to keep track of your data transfer rates, especially if you don’t have an unlimited data plan through your cellular provider. Another cool app to tap into the status of your Wi-Fi signal is aptly called SpeedTest. The application lets you run a data transmission test to check the transfer speed of the current data network you’re connected to. When you fire off the test, you’ll see the dial launch as the system pings the remote server.

Once the test completes, the dial rests on your current upload speed in kbps, and the application reports both your upload and download speeds resulting from the speed test.

In addition to the data transfer speed of your current network, you might also want to know the general signal strength of the local Wi-Fi network. The Wifi Analyzer app provides a cool graphical display of the current strength of your Wi-Fi connection. The signal strength shown here was the strength of my home Wi-Fi network in dBm sitting across the house from my wireless router.

As I walked across the house closer to where the router is located, the needle gradually worked its way up the scale. I was pretty impressed with how accurate the application appeared to be – every little movement I made either closer or further from the router resulted in a bounce of the display needle.

Turn Your Android Into a Motion Detector

The last app that I’d like to cover that makes use of the accelerometer (if your phone has one), is Seismo. This application basically senses every little shake or wobble of the phone, and plots it out on a graph. I produced the chart below by holding the phone steady, and then very gently bouncing the phone in intervals. The sensor was very sensitive, and caught every movement I made with the phone.

I can think of a number of uses for this application that would really come in handy. In any situation where you need to determine if an object or a flat surface is wobbling or shaking, all you’d have to do is lay your phone down flat on the object or surface and run this application. The motion gets logged and you can save the chart to a log file on your SD card.

This is definitely one of my favorite apps for the Android. It’s especially useful for engineers, scientists or other researchers, but almost anyone may have the need for such a delicate measurement device at some point. At the very least, you can turn it on when you feel an earthquake coming on, and record the size of the quake!

These examples are only a few of the many cool Android apps out there that tap into your Android phone system sensors and report back with data. Do you know of any other cool apps that provide phone or network status? Can you think of any other cool uses for any of these apps? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.