Hate Typing Passwords? Log into your Mac Computer with your iPhone

Knock to Unlock is a new iPhone app ($3.99) that lets you easily log into your locked Macbook using the iPhone in your pocket. While you are near your locked Mac, just know the screen of your iPhone twice and the app will automatically enter your password on the computer.

Knock has two components – the desktop app that runs on your Mac and the iPhone app. When you knock on the iPhone screen, the Mac app automatically enters your password and unlocks the computer. Your Mac is still protected with a password, the app just saves you from the hassle of typing that long password every time you sign-in.

And if your iPhone isn’t around, you will still be able to sign in to your Mac by manually typing the password.

Know to Unlock is currently available for Mac only but a Windows version is also in the works. You need an iPhone running on iOS 7 and not a very ancient Macbook or iMac running on Mountain Lion or Mac OS X Mavericks.

One iPhone can only be paired with one Mac computer though the website says that support for multiple Macs is coming very soon.

How to Setup your own Proxy Server for Free

Do a Google search like “proxy servers” and you’ll find dozens of PHP proxy scripts on the Internet that will help you create your own proxy servers in minutes for free. The only limitation with PHP based proxies is that they require a web server (to host and run the proxy scripts) and you also need a domain name that will act as an address for your proxy site.

If you don’t have a web domain or haven’t rented any server space, you can still create a personal proxy server for free and that too without requiring any technical knowledge.

Create a Free Proxy Server with Google App Engine

Here’s one such proxy site that you can build for your friends in China or even for your personal use (say for accessing blocked sites from office). This is created using Google App Engine and, contrary to what you may think, the setup is quite simple.

1. Go to appengine.google.com and sign-in using your Google Account.
2. Click the “Create an Application” button. Since this is your first time, Google will send a verification code via SMS to your mobile phone number. Type the code and you’re all set to create apps with Google App Engine.
3. Pick an Application Identifier and it becomes the sub-domain* of your proxy server. Give your app a title (say Proxy Server), set the Authentication Option as “Open to all users”, agree to the terms and create the application.
4. OK, now that we have reserved the APP ID, it’s time to create and upload the proxy server application to Google App Engine. Go to python.org, download the 2.7 Installer and install Python. If you are on Mac, Python 2.7 is already installed on your computer.
5. Download this zip file and extract it to your desktop. The zip file contains a couple of HTML, YAML and Python (.py) files that you can view inside WordPad.
6. Go to code.google.com, download the Google App Engine SDK for Python and follow the wizard to install the SDK on your computer. When the installation wizard has finished, click the “Run Launcher” button to open the App Engine Program.
7. Choose Edit -> Preferences inside the Google App Engine Launcher program from the desktop and set the correct values for the Python Path, App Engine SDK and the Text Editor (set this is as WordPad or write.exe and not notepad.exe).
8. Click File – > Add Existing Application under the Google App Launcher program and browse to the folder that contain the index.yaml and other files that you extracted in Step 5. Once the project is added to App Engine, select the project and click Edit to replace “YOUR_APP_ID” with your App ID . Save and close the file.
9. Click Deploy, enter you Google account credentials and, within a minute or two, your online proxy server will be deployed and become ready for use (screenshot). The public URL (or web address) of your new proxy server will be your_app_id.appspot.com (replace your_app_id with your App Engine Identifier).

[*] The sub-domain or the App ID will uniquely identify your App Engine application. For this example, we’ll use labnol-proxy-server as the Application Identifier though you are free to choose any other unique name.

Next Steps – Setting up a Free Proxy with Google

You can edit the main.html file to change the appearance of your proxy website. You can even add code for Google Analytics and Google AdSense code to monetize your proxy server.

The proxy server is public on the web (open to everyone) but you can add a layer of authentication so that only Google Account users who are logged-in can use your proxy server.

Convert your Emails to PDF through Email Itself

Google Chrome has a built-in PDF writer so you can easily convert any email message into a PDF file within the browser itself but if you are reading your emails on a mobile phone or a tablet, you would need some sort of a PDF conversion app.

Alternatively, you can forward the original email message to pdfconvert@pdfconvert.meand the service will send a PDF version of the message back to you in a second or two. I tried converting a plain text email message as well as one with HTML tags and the conversion was almost perfect in both instances.

If there are any Word, Excel or Powerpoint attachments inside the mail, you can forward the files to attachconvert@pdfconvert.me and they’ll come back to you in PDF format. Zamzar is another helpful service that let you convert files by email but the advantage with PDFConvert.me is that it sends you the converted PDF file by email itself, you don’t have to visit their website to download the PDF.

You may also use the service to retrieve web pages as PDFs. Just send the web address (URL) of the page in the body of the email message to webconvert@pdfconvert.me and the service will send you the full page in PDF format. This feature can be used for viewing pages that otherwise aren’t accessible due to internet filters.

The site’s privacy policy says that they store your email message on their server only during the conversion process.

Protect your Android Phone with these Security Apps

Your mobile phone is probably your most important digital possession that holds your contacts, emails, text messages, personal photos and other confidential stuff that you would not like anyone else to see. Yet, it is so easy to lose one as you are carrying it everywhere you go.

There are a plethora of security apps in the Google Play store that help you safeguard your Android phone and offer options that increase your chances of locating your lost (or stolen) device. The Lookout app was the most popular choice for determining the location of a lost phone but with Google’s own Android Device Manager available, Lookout can be skipped (unless your phone is running an older version of Android).

The Android Device Manager shows a list of all Android phones and tablets that are connected to your Google Account and helps you locate them on a Google Map. You can ring your phone (in case it is hiding beneath the pillow) from the browser, lock the device with a custom PIN or perform a factory reset which permanently deletes all the data on your phone.

Android Device Manager requires that the device is online – connected to mobile data or Wi-Fi – for you to remotely ring, lock or erase the phone. There’re however apps like Prey andWhere’s my Droid app that let you remotely send commands to your phone via text messages.

or instance, an SMS command like “GO PREY” to your lost phone from any other mobile phone will ring the phone, record its geo-location and also captures a picture with the front camera. You can also lock your phone, erase the data, show a system notification or take a picture on-demand through commands sent via text messages.

Both Prey and Where’s My Droid can be configured to send SMS alerts to another number should someone try to change the existing SIM card of your phone. That said, you should also activate the SIM lock on your Android phone (Settings -> Security -> Setup SIM Card lock) and the device will require a password whenever it is powered on.

When you are charging your cell phone at a public station, you either have to watch the device all the time or you can activate the Anti-Theft Alarm app and relax a bit. The app will trigger a siren sound when someone disconnects the charger and your phone screen will flash continuously until the correct pin is entered. You can go a step further and configure the app to trigger an alert when someone moves the phone even a few inches from the original position.

Another Android App LockWatch records the phone’s location and captures a picture with a front camera when someone attempts to unlock the phone but enters a wrong PIN or password. This information is send to your email address and it happen silently so the intruder would never know that their activity has been recorded.

If the device gets lost or stolen, it is important that you report the matter to your carrier and the police and they are likely to ask for details like the device’s IMEI number, IMSI, SIM number, etc. It helps if you can keep a record of this information somewhere outside your phone. You can find the IMEI number by dialing *#06# or get the SIM reader app and it will instantly extract the SIM and Device info that you can save to your email account.

One more thing. You have protected your Android phone with a numeric PIN or a more complex alphanumeric password but these are obviously inconvenient as you have type the string every time you turn on the screen. A free app called SkipLock makes you life a bit easier.

The app will basically remove the lock when you are connected to one of the recognized Wi-Fi networks and restores the lock as soon as you are on 3G or a non-recognized Wi-Fi network. Thus, the phone stays unlocked when you are home but as soon as you step out, the lock becomes active. Since the SkipLock app isn’t in the Google Play Store, you’ll have to enableUnknown Sources to install the APK file on your phone.