If you use Volume+ and Poweramp on your Android device, you might notice that Poweramp seems to wipe out/reset Volume+'s sound effects.* I've raised the issue with developers of both apps via Twitter - both are very responsive to users - and now Poweramp has a solution:

@jdrch Volume control is very immature on Android platform. You may try to disable Settings=>Audio Engine=>Advanced=>Direct Volume Control.

— Poweramp (@Poweramp2) April 2, 2012

As it turns out, that setting was already disabled on stock, unrooted Galaxy Nexus, but enabling it fixed the issue with no further action required. So if you're experiencing the same, simply toggle that setting and you should be fine.

* Oddly enough, Volume+'s and Android's audio settings will remain ostensibly unchanged, but you can definitely hear the difference.

I made the above point recently in response to an article bemoaning Microsoft's improved high resolution screen handling being limited to the Metro interface only. I figured I'd reiterate it here for emphasis.

The reason small high res (e.g. 2560x1440 at 10.1") mobile screens work is the fact that they're handheld, which makes viewing tiny pixels easy. Try doing the same thing at desktop monitor range and you run into problems, mostly vision limitations.

The point of traditional large high res screens (e.g. 2560x1440 at 27") in desktop usage is not to increase the number of pixels per element, but to allow more elements on the screen so that users can work with multiple applications/windows/documents simultaneously.

Combining the above 2 points: the motivation for high res is different for mobile as opposed to desktop. For mobile, it's about close range visual crispness of the same amount of content shown on a lower resolution screen. For the desktop, it's about showing more content than a lower resolution screen, period.

I've listed to the recordings and read the articles (if you're pressed for time, the Miami Herald has an excellent wrapup of everything, 911 recordings and all). Let's get a few things out of the way, simply because the most damning fact about the situation has nothing to do with tem:

• This isn't a race case. The neighborhood in which it happened is mixed and so is Zimmerman (look at the pictures, folks)
• The histories of Zimmerman and Martin are irrelevant, since neither was doing anything illegal at the start of the situation when Zimmeran first spotted Martin

Here's why Zimmerman should be charged: he initiated the confrontation between himself and Martin by chasing an innocent person. By his own account, Zimmerman said Martin did 3 things before the chase: walking around, looking about, looking at Zimmerman and having his hand in his waistband, and then coming to check Zimmerman out. None of these activities are illegal.

It's obvious from what follows that Zimmerman became the pursuer - the aggressor - which ended in him shooting Trayvon. In my opinion, that rules out self defense. I don't think it's premediated either, but it is murder.

It's understandable that the Sanford PD are hesitant to charge him though. He a community security volunteer. Also because he was a watch captain they - not including the dispatcher, who sounds unfamiliar with him - may have made him feel that his actions were in fact the proper way to deal with an unfamiliar person. The PD're therefore probably afraid of damaging their relationship with the neighborhood watch by charging George.

There's a way out for them, though: allow federal investigators to take the case. If they vindicate Zimmerman, then all's well. If they charge him, the PD can claim it's not their fault. While this has nothing to do with justice for Trayvon, ignoring the politics of any particular situation severly limits your ability to understand it.

UPDATE: Shortly after I posted this, Twitter user @CSGV asserted that under Florida's Stand Your Ground law, Zimmerman was in the right and beyond arrest. I think that's incorrect for 2 reasons:

1. Section (possible incorrect terminology) 776.041 of the law has this fantastic gem (emphasis mine):

   Use of force by aggressor.—The justification described in the preceding sections of this chapter is not available to a person who:
   ...
   (2) Initially provokes the use of force against himself or herself, unless:
   (a)  Such force is so great that the person reasonably believes that he or she is in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm and that he or she has exhausted every reasonable means to escape such danger other than the use of force which is likely to cause death or great bodily harm to the assailant; or
   (b)  In good faith, the person withdraws from physical contact with the assailant and indicates clearly to the assailant that he or she desires to withdraw and terminate the use of force, but the assailant continues or resumes the use of force.

   As I argued above, Zimmerman provoked the use of force against himself by chasing an innocent person, which satisfies (2). The fact that he was fast enough to catch up to Martin means that he was also physically capable of disengaging and reasonably escaping danger as (2)(a) says. He did NOT attempt to escape. It's also very arguable that the unarmed Martin could not have presented a "force so great" at all.

   I also read stories of several cases in which people have either avoided arrest or been acquitted based on the law. In none of those cases was the acquitted person the aggressor. If Zimmerman is not arrested, it sends a scary message that it's legal to kill someone as long by starting and then escalating an altercation with them, which clearly is NOT provided for under the law.

2. The law states that the person using deadly force must legally have a "right to be" where he currently is. Zimmerman was neither on his own property nor public property during the altercation. Both were in Mary Cutcher's backyard, which erases his coverage under the "right to be" provision of the law.

My research above leads me to believe that those who think Zimmerman can be easily acquitted based on the law either haven't read the law itself for themselves or are so rabidly against private gun ownership that they're willing to omit facts so as to demonize the concept.

Also, as I suggested above, the Sanford PD have already turned the case over to the DOJ and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. As a matter of fact, the Orlando Sentinel says some Orlando area PDs simply hand self-defense shooting cases over to the state by default.

I'm not sure if the DOJ or Florida authorities will see things the way I have, but I sure hope they do. Even if that happens, the case will likely go to trial by jury, and might take years. Let's hope justice gets served.

NOTE: This post does not address the legality/constitutionality of the warrant or the intent of the party who requested it. The sole point of this post is to determine exactly what the warrant can realistically achieve, based on engineering/technical limitations and assuming Google's total compliance.

Google was recently served a warrant by law enforcement, requesting that they assist in unlocking a suspect's Android phone that was seized on January 17, 2012. The phone was locked via a pattern password. Here's what the warrant requested, with my comments on some of them to the best of my knowledge:

• The subscriber's name, address, Social Security number, account login and password

Assuming there's some way to access the device ID of a locked phone, I suppose Google could get to the account login at the very minimum. AFAIK Google passwords are stored in encrypted form, which means even Google can't reach them. Google doesn't require a real name or address - or at least they can be easily spoofed - for account creation. Also no current Google service uses SSNs.

Google might be able to force a password reset, but I'm not sure if that works remotely for a phone as the device would have to receive the updated password from Google's servers. IMO unless remote password reset works, then there's no way to unlock the phone without the owner's compliance.

• “All e-mail and personal contact list information on file for cellular telephone”

With the account login, email can be accessed. Personal contact list can be accessed by Google remotely (without access to the phone) if the suspect synced his contact data with Google Contacts. Otherwise, it's on the phone only and requires unlocking to be read.

• The times and duration of every webpage visited

I think remote access for this works only if history syncing is enabled on the phone or in the browser app. Otherwise it requires unlocking the phone too. Carriers do store IP destination information, but this handy data retention chart shows that only Sprint and Verizon would be able to recover anything from before the phone was seized:

UPDATE: According to the application, the phone model in question is a Samsung SGH-T69, a T-Mobile device, so it looks as though recovering web history from the carrier is a dead story

• All text messages sent and received from the phone, including photo and video messages

AFAIK Google doesn't store texts (though some of its apps may read them). I've seen some comments suggesting that this could be obtained from the suspect's carrier, but the abvove data retention chart shows only 1 carrier - Verizon - stores SMS content at all, and they do it for a maximum of 5 days only. All carriers store SMS details for at least a year, however, so that might be a productive avenue.

• Any e-mail addresses or instant messenger accounts used on the phone

Assuming the device ID is accessible, the email addresses can be pulled. IM account details require unlocking, especially if the suspect used 3rd party IM apps.

This is a pretty interesting case both to law enforcement and private citizens alike, it'll be enligthening to see whether Google can unlock the phone and what data they can come up with if they can or can't.

UPDATE: Law enforcement may already have part of what they need. The application says they already have the device's IMEI, which from my reading appears to be used by Google to tie user accounts to devices. IMEIs are device specific and (usually) unique. It doesn't give them the data that's stored on the phone, but it does give them everything that's on Google's servers under the matching account name. Of course, if the phone is registered to a Google account other than the suspect's then the Google server data might not be useful.

Every now and then, a spam link goes around for a new app claiming to show users who's defriended them on Facebook. I usually ignore those as any such apps actually violate Facebook's Terms of Service (TOS) and are eventually shut down.

The good news is there's another way to find out via an existing Facebook feature. The bad news is that this method finds people you might actually talk to and consider real friends. Ready for some dismay? Follow these steps on the Facebook for Android app:

1. Open the app
2. Navigate to your Friends list
3. Click the magnifying glass icon on the top right of the screen. This makes the app find people in your contacts you're not currently friends with, including those you were previously friends with
4. Read the list
5. Be shocked

An alternative title to this post might be "How To Find Fake People." Do what you want with your findings, but personally defrienders are dead to me.* Oh yeah, especially if you ask me to meet up to talk shop. Ha, that's a NO, buddy. Yes, I take that personally. Limited Profile and privacy settings exist if there's stuff you don't want me to see. But saying we're not friends?

*Exceptions apply, but the bar for that is high and the qualifications highly specific