Contact tile comes alive with photos from Facebook

If you have a contact tile pinned to Start for a friend with Facebook account linked, you will notice that the tile not only cycles through the profile photo and friend’s name but it also shows the latest photo upload from your friend.  This really makes the Start page come alive!  Awesome!

How to bring the full status bar back in Windows Phone 7

Windows Phone displays useful system information such as battery status, cellular signal strength, Wi-Fi connection, clock, etc. in the status bar at the top of the screen.  You can see the complete list of icons and learn what each one means from http://www.microsoft.com/windowsphone/en-us/howto/wp7/start/what-do-the-icons-on-my-phone-mean.aspx.

Unlike other Smartphone OS such as iOS, Windows Phone 7’s status bar is dynamic.  An application can display custom information in the status bar.  And not all icons show up all the time.  This design helps keep the UI simple and clean.  However, there are times when you need to see all of those icons.  For instance, you might want to check the cellular signal strength while checking email.

To bring the full status bar back, simply tap on the status bar area and all active icons will show up briefly.  It will go back to simpler version after few seconds.

Windows Phone 7 Diagnosis Mode

** WARNING: Be careful when working in diagnosis mode as it can potentially have negative impact on your device. **

Windows Phone 7 includes a diagnosis mode which can be used to access low-level system information.  Complete list of what you can access from this mode is not yet known but here are several you can try.

Here’s how to access the diagnosis mode in Windows Phone 7:

1. Launch your phone tile from your Start screen.
2. Tap Keypad icon to bring up the phone dialer.
3. Dial ##634#.

Following above steps will bring up the diagnosis page and also put a Diagnosis tile in your application list so that you can access it later without dialing special code from now on.

Once you have the diagnosis mode open, try following codes.  Please note that “-” icon at the top can be used as a backspace.

Battery Info

• Code: *#2*#
• This code will show 3 pages of Debug Mode (Chg/Bat).  Looking at these pages, you can quickly tell that they are system level information about the battery and charge status.
• The most interesting data is numerical battery charge level which is displayed in percentage (1st page, (MV) Bat_Per).

Tethering

• Code: *#7284#
• If you have Samsung Focus or Omnia 7, you can use this code to turn on tethering support.  This seems like an unofficial method.  In fact, the title of the page says “Micro USB Test” which suggest that this is something device manufacturer used for testing.  Regardless, there have been reports of this actually working.  Follow steps below and see if you can get it working.  Note that this is NOT a supported feature by either Microsoft, Samsung or AT&T.  Follow steps below to see if you can get it working:
  1. From the Diagnosis Mode, punch in above code.  It will bring up “Micro USB Test” screen.  You will notice that “Zune Sync” is selected from three options.
  2. Choose “Modem, Tethered Call”.  You will be asked to restart the phone.
  3. After your phone restarts, connect your phone to your PC via USB cable.  Drivers will be installed on your computer.
  4. Go to your connections on your PC and you will notice that a Samsung Mobile Modem was added.
  5. Change the setting for the Samsung Mobile Modem from your PC.  Set it to prompt for user name and use following login information if you are on AT&T:
     • Dial number: *99***1#
     • Username: WAP@CINGULARGPRS.COM
     • Password: CINGULAR1

Others

Code	Usage
*#0*#	LCD Test
*#2*#	Debug Mode
*#3*#	TestBrightness
*#05#	Simple Test
*#0011#	Test Mode – WCDMA
*#0673#	MP3 Test
*#0782#	RTC Time
*#1234#*	Version
*#0842#	Vibrator Test
*#2470#	CameraFWUpdate
*#2263#	Test Mode – BAND PREFERENCE
*#2580#	INTEGRITY CONTROL
*#9090#	Test Mode – DIAG CONFIG
#32489#	Test Mode – CIPHERING CONTROL
*#232337#	BT Mac Address
*#7465625#	Personalize – Lock Status – Network Lock – Subset – SP Lock – Cp Lock
*#0002*28346#	Sound Tunig
*#1472365#	Location Service