cazh1 » BlackBerry

Third Time’s the Charm? Blackberry Bold

Jim MacLennan — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 05:11:00 +0000

I recently had to part ways with my Blackberry Pearl – some heartache, I suppose, but time and product innnovation march on. There is a lot to like about the Blackberry Bold – I am definitely happy to have made the change …

Acceptable Form Factor: Yes, the Pearl was “perfect” because of it’s candy-bar size – unlike the classic 7200 series, which felt strange when held up to your ear as a cell phone. Bottom line – the Bold still fits comfortably in jacket, shirt, and pants pockets. Plus, when I’m using it as a phone, I’ve typically got the Bluetooth headset plugged in.
QWERTY is Back: You can get used to the predictive typing on the Pearl’s compressed, two-letters-to-a-key keyboard, but the Bold’s “standard” layout has help reduce my typos considerably (alas, I have to take ownership of misspelings again).
So That‘s What WiFi is For … It didn’t register until I connected to my local Tomato to get out to the intarweb – much faster than anything I’d ever seen before, very useful.
Improved Screen: More real estate really helps here, and the applications are much more useful. Not just the “native” Contacts, eMail, and Calendar clients, but the web browser as well; pages just render better on this thing. I mean, it was usable before, but now it’s actually quite effective.
More Applications: A few more games, big deal – I don’t play in meetings anymore. However, there is a wide range of free, Blackberry-aware apps that are really useful – the Google suite, of course, plus Facebook and the Wall Street Journal. I’ve even re-downloaded Twitterberry, which has made a few updates since I last played with it (trying microblogging again …)

Subtleties that Really Deliver: No, I’m not an iPhone hater – but I have discovered a number of little features – not widely talked about, but spot-on useful – that apparently are not matched in the BBKWT. Face it – the Blackberry is spooky self-aware that it’s a phone, first and foremost; open up an eMail, and if a phone number appears in the body, you can click on it to initiate a call. Or start a conversation with Messenger, and click the green phone button – a pop up asks if you want to call the person you are chatting with. Nice.
My Desktop: I also like the fact that I can add custom folders and rearrange icons, even moving them within these new folders. The home screen gives me space for six icons, so I’ve got a folder for messaging apps (email, gmail, IM, SMS, and tberry), Internet apps (browser, Google apps, WSJ, Facebook), plus direct licks to calendar, contacts, and Google Maps (my fave application for the handheld).

No, it’s not perfect – I don’t understand why I can’t create shortcuts for my favorite web sites (Bloglines, Ping, Weather Underground, etc.) in the folders – but I can see myself growing more independent from the luggable [notebook]. If I could only get a decent VNC client …

Previously …

eMail on Blackberry Changes Definition of Acceptable eMail (September 19, 2005)
My first month with the Blackberry Pearl (February 26, 2007)
Rare event: Design problems with my Blackberry Pearl (May 24, 2007)
New Twitter features starting to make things more relevant (June 3, 2007)
Communication is the responsibility of … (August 19, 2007)
Innovation That Matters – Substance Over Style (January 12, 2008)
The Innovation Generation and User Interfaces (April 9, 2008)
Stretching Your User Interface Design Muscles (April 16, 2008)
Finally! Relevant Applications for YouTube and Twitter in the Enterprise! (July 11, 2008)
On the Road: Business Travel, Fall 2008 (October 13, 2008)

Technorati Tags: blackberry, design, hands on, innovation, productivity, technology, twitter

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New Twitter features starting to make things more relevant

Jim MacLennan — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 20:12:00 +0000

Here’s a new plugin for Firefox that’s helpful for my use of Twitter – twitterbar. Yes, there’s a number of plugins designed to integrate Twitter with Firefox, but this one seems to work fine. Note that it works better now that I’ve upgraded to Firefox 2.0 – always a good idea to keep up with your software upgrades.

Also, the good folks at Twitter have completed some nice updates to their mobile site – here’s how it looks in my Blackberry browser …

Click on the picture for a full-size image!

These are the kind of incremental improvements that applications go through until they settle into that comfortable niche of relevant, soon to become in use daily. I will admit I am forcing myself to enter “tweets”, but that’s because I now see them as adjuncts to my CV page; I’m taking them off of this blog – not sure if they are useful here – but if someone is looking to understand what I’m working on Right Now, that’s the place to look.

Technorati Tags: blackberry, twitter, Web 2.0

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Noisy little Blackberry Pearl

Jim MacLennan — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 01:38:00 +0000

Dave Taylor made a comment on my previous post …

… One negative that’s really bugging me … is that the Pearl puts out a LOT of RF
interference. Enough that I’m really surprised it got an FCC approval
to be sold, actually. Try it: have your phone near any sort of speaker
system and after a minute or two you’ll hear buzzing and other random
noise. It’s so bad that I can’t have my Pearl on my desk because my
external computer speakers just emit loud buzzes and are darn
distracting. Haven’t figured out the range, but it’s at least 3-4 feet
but less than 10 feet or so.

Yes, I’ve absolutely experienced it – for the past 18 months, as we’ve been rolling out Blackberries where I work, it’s been a recurring thing – interrupts meetings when the speakerphone console starts chirping, and everybody reaches to move their ‘berries away.

I’ve become used to it – it’s not just Blackberries, even my iPod will throw out some RF intereference at night. Plus, when I need to keep close to my phone / email, I like to keep it next to my bed – and that becomes a tad problematic when the speakers go off at all hours.

However … now that you mention it, Dave, I believe this might be a relatively recent phenomenon. At my previous employer, on-call 24×7 was pretty much expected of all in IT, and I slept with the Blackberry on the nightstand every night – and I don’t ever remember this much RF noise!

[hmmm ... googling ensues ...]

Found the answer – see here , here , and here … and a short explanation (attributed to RIM) …

Unfortunately, this “buzzing” is a characteristic that is
unavoidable on any mobile phone that operates in the GSM 850/1900 MHz
range (not just BlackBerry, but all other phones also).

Essentially, whenever the phone transmits or receives on the
850/1900 MHz band any nearby speakers are “excited” and there is an
audible buzzing.

The only suggestion I have to reduce the annoying buzz, is
to keep the BlackBerry handset away from any speakers (or any wires
leading to speakers). So when you set it down on your desk, try putting
it as far away from the speaker as needed (or you can turn off the
speakers when they aren’t needed).

This is a trait of the GSM design and not specific to BlackBerry.

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