$1 is not a lot of money. In fact $1 per month for something I would use daily on multiple devices is not much to ask. LastPass provides password management cross platform and cross devices. Today, I use 1Password and Roboform for password management. 1Password is restricted to Apple’s platforms (Mac and iPhone). Roboform is restricted to Windows on the desktop (for now I am ignoring the Online option) but runs on multiple mobile platforms such as Windows Phone, Blackberry, Palm, Symbian, and iPhone.
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I too have recently upgraded from a notebook with embedded Verizon EVDO to one that does not have this ability internally. I had to make the decision of USB vs. MiFi. For me, the decision became a lot easier with a chance discovery. In the Fall of 2007, when I first started evaluating Windows 7 seriously, one of the proposed functions was the ability to support virtual WiFi connections. In the same way modern OS platforms support virtual Operating Systems (with virtual Network adapters), Microsoft proposed to support virtual network connections in the Core OS.
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With all the talks of the Jan 5th event and the Nexus One it makes me wonder if Google could use targeted ads network to subsidize the cost of hardware. Maybe up front I pay $530 as reported by Gizmodo but as I get pushed targeted ads based on location, survey data, or a variety of other means I get paid back by Google via my google checkout account. Essentially, do what the phone companies are doing but let my contract be with Google to receive ads. My goal as the user is to earn my money back. Thus, if I purchase things by using coupons pushed to my phone based on location I get more credit back from Google.
I’m not saying it is going to happen. Just asking what if.
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Like others, I find myself traveling nearly every week for work. If you are like me, it all starts to blur together and occasionally I have an epic fail! A few weeks ago, I left a client site just a little bit short on time to make my flight to yet another city and another client. Imagine my shock when I arrived to check-in and found that my flight had already boarded and was ready to go. I had confused the departure time due to timezone issues, as well as not paying attention. At that moment, I decided I had better take control or I would experience the same again and again.
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There are days I feel like a professional traveler, but the reality is I only do it as a needed aspect of my job. I am always looking for new gadgets that make my life easier. Every universal or all-in-one gadget comes with a downside and in recent times, that has been battery life. With my iPhone, it was great because it was an all in one media player, mobile phone, GPS device and more, but the downside was landing with a virtually dead battery after a short business flight.
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The phone wide search in Android 2.0 has built into it a fantastic voice dialer. To be clear, it is a general phone wide search app that takes voice commands. The beauty is the commands accepts statements like Call John Doe Mobile and as it should, it dials the number without delay just like a blackberry.
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What’s stopping you? For me, the answer to that question is the keyboard. My current smartphone has a wonder large screen, but even with a slide-out keyboard, it is not conducive to complicated or lengthy text entry. Interestingly enough, I had the same problem with my last phone, a BlackBerry Storm from RIM. Sometime in the past year, I decided to solve that issue in a fashion that had worked (sort of, almost) for me in the past with Windows Mobile phones: use a Bluetooth Keyboard. At that time, I had bought the ThinkOutside Stowaway keyboard. What a marvelous piece of portable engineering.
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“Auto complete/spell checking” on mobile devices is an essential need. Each of the major vendors (Microsoft, Research in Motion, Apple, and Google) have implemented spell checking slightly different. The focus is always on usability with the way auto complete/spell checking works. Which vendor has the best method is a matter of debate, and at the end, it comes down to personal preference. Regardless of the way it has been implemented, we have all seen the funny message via email or text that looks to be written by a 1st grader. So to account for these “features”, users have adjusted to put disclaimers in email signature tags like; [click to continue…]
Google has said privacy is dead many times, but I still like to protect my privacy regardless. A very cool feature on Android is Frequently Called located under Phone | Favorites. This is automatically built by Android. Again it is an amazing feature as you can use it as a quick way to call people. The problem is you cannot clear the list. This is without a doubt a bug, and it was not fixed in the recent 2.0.1 update. I am not suggesting I or most people call someone they want to keep private, but this type of bug could doomed the next Tiger Woods wanna be.
After left the iPhone for Android I stated, “Never again will I have a phone that requires me to plug into a computer.” Let’s be honest when Apple does this it will be hailed by the Apple fanboys as the next coming of Steve Jobs despite the fact Windows Mobile, Blackberry, Symbian and others have had this for years.
Face it; the requirement of iTunes on the iPhone is the one thing that really makes the iPhone feel like dated technology. I attempted to travel with only my iPhone over a 3-day weekend, this turned out to be a mistake. My iPhone fell into some strange loop that required it to be reconnected to iTunes. I lost no data however my Phone would remain a paperweight until I traveled 400 miles back to my computer.
Now contrast that to Android. I was sitting in DFW before a flight and wanted to see what would happen if I restored my phone never having connected to a computer. I was concerned for my purchased apps but android backups my settings to GMail and that is pure genius. Once I entered my credentials all my apps and information got restored.
Most users don’t backup their computers let alone backup their mobile phone data. Google understood that automatic backup if far more valuable then relying on the user to backup. Call it brilliant, Call it innovation but it is a feature that the iPhone cannot match.
