MobileViews Blog

Category: Mobile Devices

  • Tellme By Mobile

    Microsoft bought the telephony company Tellme.com (best known for its VoiceXML work and early telephone speech recognition work). Tellme announced Tellme By Mobile during a keynote demonstration at the Web 2.0 Expo this morning. This client side software provides some added features when using it with Tellme’s backend voice server.

    Couple of observations though. First, the service is only available to AT&T Wireless and Sprint PCS customers. The second observation is even more interesting for a Microsoft owned company though. Not being an AT&T or Sprint customer turned out to not be the main roadblock for me to try out this application. The problem is that I use devices based on Microsoft Windows Mobile which is not supported by the Microsoft owned Tellme application. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson, “Doh!” So, if you are fortunate enough to own a supported phone (including models from Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola, LG, and RIMM (as in Blackberry)), check out the Tellme application. It looked pretty impressive during the demo this morning.

  • Nokia N95

    Nokia N95I finally saw the Nokia N95 smartphone up close and personal. And, it is quite a phone. The top (left in this phone) slides out to reveal the multimedia controls. The bottom (right on this photo) slides out to reveal a dialing keyboard. The lack of a QWERTY thumb keyboard is the only shortcoming to this otherwise remarkable looking phone. I wish Nokia had used an LCD soft keypad like Microsoft does in Windows Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition devices and provided a pull out QWERTY keyboard at the bottom instead.

    The web browser appeared to render much faster than my Windows Mobile Smartphone or Pocket PC Phone Edition devices. It uses a full-screen desktop-like view with a thumbnail navigation window that zooms in like the Microsoft Research Deepfish experimental browser does. Of course, the difference is that this is available in a production Nokia device. That said, the device is unavailable from carriers in the US at the moment. Navigation between applications seemed very crisp.

    Speaking about applications, Nokia announced their Series 60 Web Runtime and Widgets for S60 phones today. I’ll have more to say about that tomorrow.

  • Streets & Trips 2007 vs. Pocket Streets

    I never understood why Microsoft kept creating new maps with each new release of MapPoint/Streets & Trips that were incompatible with earlier versions of Pocket Streets. Now add one more data point to this sillyness. Microsoft stopped releasing Pocket Streets after the 2005 map editions. However, Streets & Trips 2007 can still create maps for Pocket Streets. The gotcha? It doesn’t seem compatible with the version I’m running on my Windows Mobile 5 devices. Ah well. I really do need to find an affordable map applications for the Pocket PC and Smartphone that works with a Bluetooth GPS. Any recommendations?

  • Nokia iSync Info Page

    I haven’t used a non-Windows Mobile phone in years. However, the last Nokia I tried was the venerable 3650 (a Series 60 phone) and I liked it a lot during the time I used it. So, the combination of my interest in the new Nokia N95 and John’s comment about Nokia sync support on Macs being poor gave me pause for thought. I still don’t have a definitive answer. However, I did find that Nokia posted what looks like iSync plug-ins for use with some of their newer phones with Macs linked below.
    Nokia – iSync

    If anyone has experience using this Mac plug-ins with the targeted Nokia phones, please let us know how they worked for you.

  • Want a 61 Page Windows Mobile 6 Reference Manual?

    If you want to get a soft copy of the new 61 page (PDF) Windows Mobile 6 Reference Manual, head over to Jason Langridge’s blog (Microsoft’s Mr. Mobile) for a download link. The manual describes 6’s features in various categories. The New Features By Audience section starts on PDF page 4 and is categorized by Mobile Operators, OEMs, Business Customers, IT Professional, and Developers. Note Consumers is not a category considered at all. The bad news is that reading the first four columns of features may put you to sleep. The good news (features) tends to be in the Developers column. If developers take advantage like AJAX support, SQL Server 2005 Compact Edition, and the new Sound API, we should see some interesting 3rd party apps in the future. But, out of the box, 6 doesn’t look like anything to write home about (and remember, I say this as a person who likes Windows Mobile).

    There are a lot of screencaps to illustrate the features as they are described in detail throughout the rest of he document.

    Let’s hope we see something more interesting in Windows Mobile 7. Maybe, the Apple iPhone and Nokia  N95 will inspire Microsoft. Until then, 6 depends on the talent and marketing skills of 3rd party developers to make the platform interesting.

  • What Happens When You Search for “Windows Mobile 6” on Amazon?

    I guess I’m just easily amused. It occurred to me that Windows Mobile 6 is generating zero buzz (or at least so little that I don’t see it). The iPhone buzz has died down for the moment (too much lead time between its announcement and summer availability). The phone that seems to be getting a lot of buzz lately is from good ol’ Nokia: The Nokia N95. Built-in GPS, 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics (same as used by Sony’s digital cameras), nice new mini-browser paradigm, installable applications (unlike the iPhone), and a nice form factor. If the Nokia PC Suite can sync half decently with a Windows or Mac OS X box (I’d lean towards a Mac for syncing), it will get very high on the list of devices to replace my current Windows Mobile 5 Smartphone.

    In any case, I decided to search for “Windows Mobile” on Amazon. The first result was my friend Frank McPherson’s great book How to Do Everything with Windows Mobile (How to Do Everything) (no doubt due to superb technical editing :-). But, what happens when you search for “Windows Mobile 6” instead? Did you guess that the first hit would be the BlackBerry 8800 Phone (Cingular)? Yep, if you search for “Windows Mobile 6” on Amazon, it pops up a RIM Blackberry phone as its first hit. WiMo6 just can’t get any respect 🙂