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I just want to start out by saying that this is in no way a knock at any developers, or Google, it's just a question I had. I'd figure it out myself, but I haven't had a chance to delve into Android development yet (too busy with other work) so I thought I'd ask some experts.
I love my Nexus One, and I'm a big fan of Android. I'm blown away how far it's come in such a short time, and how much potential I see in its future. One of the only areas I feel the phone is lacking, is in attractiveness of the OS and apps. I feel that people are drawn to pretty things, and it's one of the reasons that the iPhone is so popular. Apple puts a tremendous amount of effort into aesthetic design of their software, and it shows. From what I've seen so far, I feel like a lot of Android apps (or at least third party apps) are lacking in that design and polish, and in many cases seem to indicate that developers are taking the path of least resistance.
I don't think that Android is ugly whatsoever, but I do feel that most of the apps I've seen are not as pretty as they could be. Sure, the HTC widgets add a lot, but I'm talking more on a fundamental level of design, and I actually have a great example to illustrate where I think things should go.
The Gallery app. This is a beautiful work of design in my opinion. The design of the entire application is simple, yet elegant. I love the rounded, clean look of the icons, and the menus, and the way the pictures are displayed and how you traverse the application. To give a contrast, if I go into one of my favorite apps functionality-wise (Last.fm - who has a gorgeous website and 360 app), I'm totally turned off by the appearance. It's plain, and gray, and drab. It's just got those arrowed clickable areas, and that's about it. Seesmic, another great app, is also extremely drab and unappealing. It gives me a feeling of looking at an application created in Visual Basic 6 (if anyone has experience with this ha!). Heck, they just implemented multiple accounts, and instead of having a slick screen, it's just a list of accounts that probably took 3 minutes to implement. The moment I looked at the screen I thought to myself how this would be the perfect place for a Windows 7ish login screen; an enlarged view of your portrait with your info underneath that allows you to swipe back and forth to choose which account you want to use.
I know this is a long post, but I just wanted to illustrate my feelings. My question; is this a matter of Google not providing the proper toolsets, an abundance of armchair developers who don't have the resources to make pretty UI's/lack of professional developers, or just plain lazy developers?
Any insight would be appreciated. I feel that this is one huge component Google needs to focus on to be able to properly compete with Apple. I can understand in the past allowing the TPM's to customize their builds how they want them to look, but with the launch of the Nexus, I feel it's time for Google to step up to the plate and really focus on the design of their OS.
xSiraris said:
I just want to start out by saying that this is in no way a knock at any developers, or Google, it's just a question I had. I'd figure it out myself, but I haven't had a chance to delve into Android development yet (too busy with other work) so I thought I'd ask some experts.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i think you said it yourself, "too busy with other work"
well in terms of Google, one thing I've never regarded them for is design. look at their online presence. it's not all that attractive. functional and optimizable, yes. slick looking, no. but that's their business. Apple really concentrates on the 'feel' of total UX, but at the expense of personalization. Google is more about providing service, but at the expense of design.
that being said, the iPhone OS desktop is looking more and more boring to me all the time. I genuinely like the how Android desktop looks (except for maybe the notification bar).
as for apps, I think the rough edges around Android apps will disappear as Android gains market share. right now, devs don't have all that much incentive to concentrate on Android while iPhone is king. I'm sure inthe next few years it will even out (although I do expect the iPhone to dominate for a good while to come).
j.books said:
well in terms of Google, one thing I've never regarded them for is design. look at their online presence. it's not all that attractive. functional and optimizable, yes. slick looking, no. but that's their business. Apple really concentrates on the 'feel' of total UX, but at the expense of personalization. Google is more about providing service, but at the expense of design.
that being said, the iPhone OS desktop is looking more and more boring to me all the time. I genuinely like the how Android desktop looks (except for maybe the notification bar).
as for apps, I think the rough edges around Android apps will disappear as Android gains market share. right now, devs don't have all that much incentive to concentrate on Android while iPhone is king. I'm sure inthe next few years it will even out (although I do expect the iPhone to dominate for a good while to come).
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Click to collapse
The OS itself isn't really the issue. I'm talking more the controls provided. I think they could be improved, and I feel they ARE improved in the Gallery app. I'd like to see that kind of design in more apps, as opposed to what I'm seeing in most now. There's certain standards of design that just are not found in most apps outside of the first party ones (I think maps, finance, gallery and the browser are all great looking apps, while Calendar, and Translate could use some work).
And Google may not have had to focus on design to this point, but if they want to go up against Apple, I think they will have to.
I think app wise, its due to Android being open & no one is saying yes or no to apps. Developers can slap a few sounds together & call it a soundboard, there's a new app in the market.
Apple, on the other hand, has the final say. If it doesn't look the way they want or up to their standards, they can turn it down. I bet if Apple just let anyone submit apps at any time, you'd see a lot of crap there too.
Its just a matter of having standards... no one is forcing Android developers to make a pretty app. As cool as it is having an open market, it would be that much better to have some sort of standards.
This just being my opinion of course... I have an iPod touch & ever since Android came out, I haven't bought an app from the app store. If Apple let go of the reigns a little, I think they would be so much better. But I don't like being told what I can & can't have on my phone, which is why my iPod is jailbroken.
Google could do a lot just by making their notification bar/widgets/etc black. This (imho) goes a long way to making android look more like a competitor in the smartphone arena.
Doesn't it also have to do with the "default" button style in Android? This might make no sense so sorry if it doesn't.
Go into calendar and choose New Event from the menu. There you see the "default" buttons for Android which are used throughout - the buttons for the time and date. The little grey ones with the slight gradient. I think that the Android SDK just has very limited built in design tools / default buttons to choose from that just make it uglier. I feel like I saw a demo of the iPhone SDK once and they had like a design screen where you could graphically design the UI and they had a bunch of objects to choose from that you could customize but they were all really nice looking.
Android doesn't seem to have anything like this - no "design" view or anything in the SDK and very limited built in design tools or default objects.
Part of the difference you're noticing is in he two SDKs. The iPhone app design is really locked down in a lot of ways. When building a GUI for the iPhone, you start out with Apple's default set of super shiny buttons so it's difficult to make an app that doesn't look pretty and cohesive. If you do manage to do so, your app isn't approved.
With Android, Google gives developers just a framework. Everything is minimalist and bare. This of course gives developers more freedom to build unique GUIs but like you said most don't and like others said, there is no moderation. Making a truly great GUI is a LOT of work and most devs are just engineers. Only the teams with lots of money hire designers and graphics artists. Both methods have their pros and cons
cboy007 said:
Doesn't it also have to do with the "default" button style in Android? This might make no sense so sorry if it doesn't.
Go into calendar and choose New Event from the menu. There you see the "default" buttons for Android which are used throughout - the buttons for the time and date. The little grey ones with the slight gradient. I think that the Android SDK just has very limited built in design tools / default buttons to choose from that just make it uglier. I feel like I saw a demo of the iPhone SDK once and they had like a design screen where you could graphically design the UI and they had a bunch of objects to choose from that you could customize but they were all really nice looking.
Android doesn't seem to have anything like this - no "design" view or anything in the SDK and very limited built in design tools or default objects.
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No one has commented on the Gallery buttons I referenced. I think these are much better looking than the controls found in other apps. If they were to use something more along those lines in other apps, I'd be much happier.
But I understand what is being said, and I hope Google does something about it. I appreciate the freedom they are giving to developers, but appearance counts, and if developers don't have the time or resources to make the pretty GUI's, then Google should provide the tools to help them do so.
I just had an idea that may actually help. One of the things third party developers are complaining about (I'm talking about the professionals here, not armchair) is that their apps aren't being seen, or bought, and getting lost in the shuffle. What if Google created an authorized/registered developer program, where a third party developer could register with Google. At this point, they would be held up to higher standards and practices, but Google would create a separate place on the marketplace, or some way to filter by registered/authorized developers.
The way it is now, everything is getting lost in the shuffle. This method would give the exposure the professionals want, it would improve the quality of apps on the marketplace, all while leaving the open market that exists today.
I agree. Sounds like a good idea--right now, even the most polished, best apps can easily get overlooked if they aren't spammed up on several tech/Android blogs. It's why it took me so long to discover, say, Home++
desktop app browser
also, an online desktop app catalogue would help, simply because there is not enough space on a small screen to display a lot of variety. I guess they want to keep everything on-phone, as opposed to iTunes where you have to be plugged-in to install apps, but they could do something where you choose an app from your desktop browser and it pushes a notification to your phone. then when you go to the notification, it brings you to the app in the market, where you can DL and install it.
this would preserve the ability to get apps on the go if you need them with the expanded view of a desktop, creating more visibility for the apps, without compelling you to connect your phone to your desktop.
S
j.books said:
also, an online desktop app catalogue would help, simply because there is not enough space on a small screen to display a lot of variety. I guess they want to keep everything on-phone, as opposed to iTunes where you have to be plugged-in to install apps, but they could do something where you choose an app from your desktop browser and it pushes a notification to your phone. then when you go to the notification, it brings you to the app in the market, where you can DL and install it.
this would preserve the ability to get apps on the go if you need them with the expanded view of a desktop, creating more visibility for the apps, without compelling you to connect your phone to your desktop.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Orrr you can just go to AndroLib.com, scan the app, and donwload it in the market!
Several reasons...
1. Google simply doesnt have a good visual design team or a good visual design lead.
The gallery app looks wonderful becuase it was made by cooliris. Not google.
I admit they have gotten better. The transition to home/apps and live wallpapers are great and have great visual appeal.Standard N1 UI w/a live wallpaper is better looking than iphone and just slightly behind a palm pre. Where as it was way behind in 1.6
So they obviously have tried to focus more on there visuals.
They still have some improvements to make but its always iffy since they dont have a track record for great visuals.
2. The visualtools arent uniform. Thats a good thing for Devs not needing to get "approved" for everything... But it does mean that Iphone apps are drawing from a pool of buttons/icons/layouts that were made by some of the visual people in the business.
3. Even without that the visual people on the Mac/Apple side of things are more talented. To be long winded theres a world of designers and coders. Few VERY few can do both well. Its become clear to me in a short time just how good Android devs are on addressing needs and issues. Heck even the OS experience changes becuase of there talents.
But they cant visually design worth a damned.
Very few apps on iphone even from the jailbreak community seemed as well made or intuitive. Even there hallmark cydia was utter crap. It could be apples closed system of course but just got a sense of clunkiness and low level winmo app making.
4. $$$$$$$
At the end of the day a company or App dev can make beautiful apps on iPhone with little gambling. Its easier to make money in the Apple store thus easier to hire quality visual people to give coders great layouts pieces to work with.
Not much incentive to go hire out some UI designer when you can slap together some easy photoshop stuff yourself.
If Fandango or Directv (just examples) hire some visual dudes to help make its app for iphone..then 6 months later for android the chances are really high hes going to see the lack of Apple given/mandated visuals and realize he has to do everything himself. Unless hes really dedicated hes not going to max out that potential hes going to slap together the best look alike he can.
This has and is happening regularly from what I understand.
Thats it in a nutshell.
to the people who switched from the iphone 4 to focus. any thoughts?
In the last year and a half, I've gone through a Nexus One, iPhone 4, Samsung Captivate, and now I'm on a Focus.
TLDR version at the bottom, since after writing this out I realized this is a mini essay..
Here are my thoughts:
Android is the OS you should be on if you want (nearly) complete control and lots of features not necessarily supported by your carrier (free tethering!). Unfortunately, assuming you're on AT&T, your options for serious Android phones are limited to a Nexus One or a Captivate. Between the two, I actually preferred the Nexus. Slightly weaker CPU, but you'll get updates pretty immediately, and it's a lot easier to mod that phone vs the Captivate. Also, I never had a single problem with the Nexus One as a GPS unit, but like many others my Captivate was sketchy at best when it came to GPS.
So far, the iPhone in my experience has the best battery life. I never really had to worry about it, and I'm a fairly heavy text/web browser/email user. It's obviously going to have the widest selection of apps, though that didn't necessary mean they were all useful. If games are your thing, the iPhone was also ahead of that by a long shot. However, without jailbreaking, it really is locked down. Tethering through AT&T's rate is a joke, seeing as it uses your already purchased data plan, and outside of changing your ringtones and wallpapers, you're fairly limited in customizations. Despite this, there isn't currently an option to tether at all on WP7.
Now having a Focus with WP7, I can say that the interface is very refreshing. Sometimes I just want to stare at the home screen because 1) the live tiles are cool and 2) the SAMOLED screen is amazing with a black background and brightly colored tiles. The web browsing experience is fast, but noticeably lacking compared to Android and iPhone (due to lack of webkit/html5). It's not a deal breaker by any means, but it was something I noted. The keyboard is about on par with the iPhone.
Build quality compared to the iPhone feels just as sturdy, in my opinion, despite the plastic body. It actually feels better in the hand to me, because of the curve back and slight lip on the bottom. It's also noticeably lighter to hold and carry around. So far the battery is holding up nicely with moderate to heavy text/web browsing/email/staring at pretty tiles.
Call quality was good, found the ear piece to be a bit clearer and louder than the iPhone. The biggest difference for me at the moment is of course the Marketplace. This is where the iPhone's ~4 years on the market really shows the gap. But given that this is Microsoft we're talking about, I don't expect their market to go the way of the Pre (which I also briefly owned) and be a barren wasteland (comparatively).
TLDR
iPhone 4 has ~4 years of exposure behind it with it's marketplace and iOS functionality, and it shows. Focus/WP7 has a fresh UI and is promising with Microsoft backing it. Build quality is very different between the two, but both feel sturdy and reliable. If you're making the leap to Focus/WP7 from an iPhone 4, you shouldn't have any big regrets, so long as you're not tied deeply into the iTunes ecosystem or your life depends on certain iOS only games.
I have both still and am trying one against the other for everyday use for my needs. So far, the Focus lacks on a few things, but no deal breakers, as the functionality should come with future updates like cut and paste.
Since I fired up the Focus, it has given me hope that this OS will give Apple a run for the money.
I like the iPhone 4 but the whole iOS thing has gotten kind of stale for me after 2 1/2 years of iPhones so I bought a Focus to try out and so far so good. It lacks many of the nicities and features in the iPhone but overall it's been easier to use, it's MUCH lighter and doesn't feel like brick in my hand. I'm also a big user of Slingplayer and man, there's no comparison with the video and audio. HD shows up as bright, colorful and full screen and the audio is much louder and more understandable then when using the iPhone or iPad. I still have 3 weeks to return the Focus and I'm not committed yet but it's a damn good Rev 1 phone.
I agree with all of you but for me there have been some things I just don't understand why MS did what they did.
Notifications - There is a noticeable space at the top of the screen that hardly used. It is sometimes used for notifications as in text messages but not for email or twitter notifications.
Keyboard - In portrait its on par with iphone and even MT Android but why not a full landscape keyboard have you guys seen it? The empty space at the top of the screen is there on the side now and wasted.
Phone - 2 keystrokes to get a dialer why and to make it worse why no smart dialing in the dialer. I know you can use the search button but its not the same.
From a hardware perspective the phone is great light and long battery life so far. I just wish MS would have polished it a little more I dont really see a lot of Apple users jumping ship to it. Just my 2cents
boogieboogie said:
to the people who switched from the iphone 4 to focus. any thoughts?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have both a Droid Incredible and an iPhone 4 and I love the Focus and WP7 interface over both. what I'm having trouble with is the little things that allow you to control the phone more that are still missing from WP7, probably because MS rushed it to get it out before the holidays. What I miss and need on WP7 include:
A Sound Profiler that allows you to control various preset sound modes and volumes for Alarm, ringer, music, system and keyboard clicks...why is this missing
An equalizer in the zune music App
An integrated favorites app for quick dialing. I'm using the tile approach for some contacts, but it does take more real estate than necesary.
Ability to change system font size. Some of the fonts are a bit too large.
Background processing for Facebook, Twitter, and some of those other things that require that.
That ability to connect to hidden Wifi networks! Come on MS this is suppose to be a corporate phone, corporate networks are often hidden. how do you miss that!
Abiltity to fast dial using the number keys in the phone app, ala HTC Sense! Much quicker to look up contacts that way.
Contact Pictures in Call history and SMS. they are everywhere else, why not there.
Native turn by turn directions Like Android has. Come on, this is a big one the iPhone is missing out of the box and MS is making the same mistake.
the notification system is a little wacky on WP 7...if the tiles that are changing are within view, then you are good, or if you are on the lock screen you can see certain things change via the icons at the bottom, but I'd still like to see an android like pull down.
this isn't microsoft, but can someone tell me why Google Reader doesn't format on WP7 and Windows Mobile like it does on the iPhone and Android. It's annoying! and none of the Google Reader market apps like gReadie and WReader work very well....
And why can't I get WP7 on Verizon! the AT&T network seems to be extremely slow, even more so with teh focus than the iPhone.
When will this stuff be fixed!
codyt01 said:
I have both a Droid Incredible and an iPhone 4 and I love the Focus and WP7 interface over both. what I'm having trouble with is the little things that allow you to control the phone more that are still missing from WP7, probably because MS rushed it to get it out before the holidays. What I miss and need on WP7 include:
A Sound Profiler that allows you to control various preset sound modes and volumes for Alarm, ringer, music, system and keyboard clicks...why is this missing
An equalizer in the zune music App
An integrated favorites app for quick dialing. I'm using the tile approach for some contacts, but it does take more real estate than necesary.
Ability to change system font size. Some of the fonts are a bit too large.
Background processing for Facebook, Twitter, and some of those other things that require that.
That ability to connect to hidden Wifi networks! Come on MS this is suppose to be a corporate phone, corporate networks are often hidden. how do you miss that!
Abiltity to fast dial using the number keys in the phone app, ala HTC Sense! Much quicker to look up contacts that way.
Contact Pictures in Call history and SMS. they are everywhere else, why not there.
Native turn by turn directions Like Android has. Come on, this is a big one the iPhone is missing out of the box and MS is making the same mistake.
the notification system is a little wacky on WP 7...if the tiles that are changing are within view, then you are good, or if you are on the lock screen you can see certain things change via the icons at the bottom, but I'd still like to see an android like pull down.
this isn't microsoft, but can someone tell me why Google Reader doesn't format on WP7 and Windows Mobile like it does on the iPhone and Android. It's annoying! and none of the Google Reader market apps like gReadie and WReader work very well....
And why can't I get WP7 on Verizon! the AT&T network seems to be extremely slow, even more so with teh focus than the iPhone.
When will this stuff be fixed!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
WP7 is coming to Verizon in January along with turn by turn directions and Flash support.
I've been playing with mine for a couple hours now. I like the device itself but it's probably going back in the morning. Couple thoughts, IMHO:
The back cover is worthless. Cheap. I never know if it's going to break when I pull it off. Having a removable battery again? Priceless. The SIM slot, specifically the contact nodes themselves, are poorly designed and I think mine bent/broke when I inserted and removed my microSIM adapter with my microSIM inside it. That's insane for a new device. They are just three little prongs waiting to break. Love the TILES!!! Love the font and the clean look of the whole OS!!! Gmail refuses to display my full email box. This makes me angry. Love the screen, when displaying the primary colors of tiles and most of the apps. On the other hand I Can't stand the washed out appearance of the IE and the screen when browsing. PTI podcast works, so big points on that one. Contacts sync is annoying, particularly since I don't have anything save for email in my Gmail contacts. My choice, my fault. I don't have a Live account and really don't want one but see no choice to download anything from the Marketplace. This is tomfoolery. Love the lightness of the phone along with the 4 inch real-estate.
Interesting so far but nothing that makes me want to replace my iPhone.
bmstrong said:
I've been playing with mine for a couple hours now. I like the device itself but it's probably going back in the morning. Couple thoughts, IMHO:
The back cover is worthless. Cheap. I never know if it's going to break when I pull it off. Having a removable battery again? Priceless. The SIM slot, specifically the contact nodes themselves, are poorly designed and I think mine bent/broke when I inserted and removed my microSIM adapter with my microSIM inside it. That's insane for a new device. They are just three little prongs waiting to break. Love the TILES!!! Love the font and the clean look of the whole OS!!! Gmail refuses to display my full email box. This makes me angry. Love the screen, when displaying the primary colors of tiles and most of the apps. On the other hand I Can't stand the washed out appearance of the IE and the screen when browsing. PTI podcast works, so big points on that one. Contacts sync is annoying, particularly since I don't have anything save for email in my Gmail contacts. My choice, my fault. I don't have a Live account and really don't want one but see no choice to download anything from the Marketplace. This is tomfoolery. Love the lightness of the phone along with the 4 inch real-estate.
Interesting so far but nothing that makes me want to replace my iPhone.
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Click to collapse
Just out of curiosity, where do you keep your phone contacts?
emjee87 said:
Just out of curiosity, where do you keep your phone contacts?
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Click to collapse
In my head and in a backup email labeled "contacts" that sits in my inbox. I redraft and resend the email to myself when I need to update any information. I only have about 10-15 or numbers to remember.
I like the OS very much. I think it has great potential, great upside. But the hardware side still leaves much to be desired against the gold standard Apple offering.
bmstrong said:
In my head and in a backup email labeled "contacts" that sits in my inbox. I redraft and resend the email to myself when I need to update any information. I only have about 10-15 or numbers to remember.
I like the OS very much. I think it has great potential, great upside. But the hardware side still leaves much to be desired against the gold standard Apple offering.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
"redraft and resend"
What?
Really?
mcmexican said:
I agree with all of you but for me there have been some things I just don't understand why MS did what they did.
Notifications - There is a noticeable space at the top of the screen that hardly used. It is sometimes used for notifications as in text messages but not for email or twitter notifications.
Keyboard - In portrait its on par with iphone and even MT Android but why not a full landscape keyboard have you guys seen it? The empty space at the top of the screen is there on the side now and wasted.
Phone - 2 keystrokes to get a dialer why and to make it worse why no smart dialing in the dialer. I know you can use the search button but its not the same.
From a hardware perspective the phone is great light and long battery life so far. I just wish MS would have polished it a little more I dont really see a lot of Apple users jumping ship to it. Just my 2cents
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree about the notifications. I would of love to seen Twitter or Facebook notification heck even e-mail for that matter pop up and have a option to disable it if need be. I'm sure this is something coming in the future.
Also agree about the keyboard. I am shaking my head and wondering why there is a significant amount of unused space on the screen in landscape mode.
More active live tiles. I would love to have a live tile that would update the weather for me. I'm sure there is a app in the making but it would be nice to see that.
Also...there is no YouTube app? (I'm not talking about the YouTube that brings you to the mobile version of YouTube) Is that just a way for Google to stick it to M$?
Update:
Spoke to soon about the live tile for the weather. Weather bug has an app out for it.
AllTheWay said:
I agree about the notifications. I would of love to seen Twitter or Facebook notification heck even e-mail for that matter pop up and have a option to disable it if need be. I'm sure this is something coming in the future.
Also agree about the keyboard. I am shaking my head and wondering why there is a significant amount of unused space on the screen in landscape mode.
More active live tiles. I would love to have a live tile that would update the weather for me. I'm sure there is a app in the making but it would be nice to see that.
Also...there is no YouTube app? (I'm not talking about the YouTube that brings you to the mobile version of YouTube) Is that just a way for Google to stick it to M$?
Update:
Spoke to soon about the live tile for the weather. Weather bug has an app out for it.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've been using Lazy Worm as my YouTube app in the mean time. It doesn't have all the functionality of the other YouTube apps yet, but it does keep the theme of WP7 and it works well enough.
i know this is an old thread, but i will add my 2 cents.
i owned the 3G, the 3GS, and the iphone 4. the worst of the 3 was the iphone 4. it was practically worthless as a phone. i dropped 80% of my calls with it. i returned it after a few weeks because of this.
the 3G was fine and i owned it for a year and a half, but it was really slow. the 3GS was my favorite by far, and really i have very few complaints with it.
obviously the iphone was revolutionary. it started the wave of multi-touch displays and the app world was pretty phenomenal. but the truth is that technology is uncapped now and apple doesn't have the entire market, nor should they.
while MS has some glitches, they were to be expected. the marketplace doesn't provide the number of apps that the iphone market does, but how cool is it that you get to own a focus now and be on the ground-level and see new and refreshing apps as they come to life? i find that pretty cool.
my main reason for switching was just to do something different, and so far i am very pleased with the phone. i think it does everything the iphone does and potentially more, you just have to be willing to learn new techniques as you would with any new phone.
Gonna try to not repeat what others have already said.
Loving WP7 OS and everything it does. Fresh start, smooth UI and a great design paradigm. Missing some features but nothing has been a deal breaker yet. I can tell it's just a matter of time (short time) and a lot of these features will land in the OS.
Focus is OK. It's not great. I don't like the camera as much as I did on my iPhone 4. I used to take a ton of pics with my iPhone 4 but not as much now with the focus. You have to tinker with the settings to get similar quality pics and even then not all the time. Specially in low light settings, the iPhone crushed the focus clarity-wise. In day light, they are mostly the same.
If I could have WP7 on my iPhone 4, I would be extremely happy. But that's not the case. WP7 is good enough to make up for me missing my iPhone 4's hardware so far though.
The camera is actually the reason I've shelved the Focus until there's an update for it. I have to change a bunch of settings to get a half decent picture out of it and then, of course, it doesn't save those settings so I have to do it....every.....single..........time. Hard to believe Microsoft hasn't released a fix for this by now. Well, no...not really. Typical Microsoft, actually. And the hardware button isn't doing the phone any favors, either. The iPhone's on-screen button is nice because it takes no pressure so the phone doesn't budge when you take the picture. The hardware button means you can't help but move the camera when taking a picture and if it's not taken with plenty of light good luck getting a picture that isn't smeared. And finally there's the complete lack of any real features. No panoramic shots, no effects, nothing. I use the camera all the time and the Focus' software makes it almost useless so I went back to the iPhone.
nazeeh said:
Gonna try to not repeat what others have already said.
Loving WP7 OS and everything it does. Fresh start, smooth UI and a great design paradigm. Missing some features but nothing has been a deal breaker yet. I can tell it's just a matter of time (short time) and a lot of these features will land in the OS.
Focus is OK. It's not great. I don't like the camera as much as I did on my iPhone 4. I used to take a ton of pics with my iPhone 4 but not as much now with the focus. You have to tinker with the settings to get similar quality pics and even then not all the time. Specially in low light settings, the iPhone crushed the focus clarity-wise. In day light, they are mostly the same.
If I could have WP7 on my iPhone 4, I would be extremely happy. But that's not the case. WP7 is good enough to make up for me missing my iPhone 4's hardware so far though.
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To be honest, I have to strongly disagree....I am a photographer, not a pro, but lots of experience and the iphone 4 camera is NOT that good. Im actually able to produce much nicer results with the focus now than my friends iphone 4. Downside is the focus doesn't save the settings you use...which will be fixed. The iphone 4 quality is WAY to oversaturated...Im not saying the focus quality is amazing...but when I change my settings its definetly acceptable quality. EV and ISO can be your best friends when used properly.
to me the focus wins hands down, my friend who is a self confessed iphone/ iphone 4 BIG time fanboy, has had all the other iphones he had got his iphone 4 like a week before he met up with me tooled around on my samsung focus for like a hour packed up his iphone 4 went to at&t store and exchanged it for a samsung focus....
Paolo01 said:
"redraft and resend"
What?
Really?
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That was my thought maybe it is time for him to setup a Hotmail account,
iPhone vs Focus
I have no regrets switching from iPhone 3GS and 4G to Focus.
They both have pluses and minuses, but I thing WinMo 7 is a new OS and the market place is catching up quickly.
What I miss in WinMo 7 is the customization and low level access (e.g. registry, file system).
EVERYONE has a few gripes with Android...Everyone...however this blog is so biased and uninformative it seriously annoys me.
The first post was about how SOME iOS apps look better than their Android counterparts...a fault entirely with the devs of those apps, not Androids fault...which is obvious but not on that blog...
Then they start posting half truths and lies and it's absurd.
Such As:
one post is entirely opinion based (Android looks like crap)
Another uses the recent Skype scandal as if it is somehow Androids fault that the devs were incompetent.
Another actually disses the notification panel...seriously...
And the most recent one disses flash...as if A) it has to be always on and B) is worse than it is...
the blog is seriously frustrating...
check it out....
android-gripes.tumblr.com
there are iOS haters, so there are Android haters too
don't worry we love our Android.
I agree with houzuoguo. The thing about this blog that will infuriate many is the lack of comments section, each post should open to discussion. It's closed (ahem iOS) and would cater to Apple fanboys.
I blog about my gripes with Android sometimes, but the majority of which are geared at the carriers and manufacturers actions, not Android itself. Android is so customizable, I'd have a hard time believing that Android looks ugly. I also keep my comments section open for discussion which I enjoy. This blog just seems like a shill for Apple.
tkgod said:
I blog about my gripes with Android sometimes, but the majority of which are geared at the carriers and manufacturers actions, not Android itself. Android is so customizable, I'd have a hard time believing that Android looks ugly. I also keep my comments section open for discussion which I enjoy. This blog just seems like a shill for Apple.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that's what pissing me off the most...the first post I read about devs making android apps look like crap compared to iOS apps...I was like yea, good, bring this to the forefront...but soon after it seemed to be overwhelmed with half truths and lies and just all around BS.
Seriously...the dude who dissed the Android notification panel even went as far as to say that iOS's notifications are better....even the most diehard Apple blog has never said something so retarded before right then.
That blog is full of crap...not even close to being creditable. Android is in 1st place for OS's and continues to rock!
omg he quoted you! (out of context, naturally, him being an iTard)
He does have a right to spew his crap on his blog,twitter and fb. Create a new androidRocks id and challenge every single of his lines, with rock hard evidence.
His biased opinion is clear here (quote), I wont even try to correct him as every single statement is false.
Why do I write this blog?
I have been an user of iPhone, iPad, iPod and Mac for years. I like Apple’s products for some reasons and I like Apple’s culture.
I admire what Google has done for the Internet, but I do have some negative opinions on Android. I’m fine with new products coming into the market and competing with Apple’s. What bothers me is that Android gets into the market in an “evil” way - it proposed “openness” and claimed Apple products are “close” so Android is better. This is absolutely nonsense marketing buzz. So sad that a lot of medias also blindly jumped into it. “Openness” is such a vague concept and whatever it tries to say means almost nothing or even something negative to consumers. Smartphones do not need the so called “openness”.
I have constantly heard many gripes about Android. Recently I happened to have access to some Android phones and use them in a daily base. The more I use Android, the more I feel that Android is indeed a half-baked OS, its UX/UI is horrible and various hardwares are poorly designed. It’s true that those phones are working like smartphones, better than feature phones from old school, but they ignore a lot of the details. Just for Google’s own benefit, they helped handset manufactures brutally dumped a huge amount of unpolished devices to the market. They made people think this is how smartphones should work. This is so unfair to consumers. IMHO, it is no different from committing a crime. That’s why I made the cartoon of “Android Gripes” as a Monopoly “Go Directly To Jail” card showing an Android on it.
As much as I believe in Apple, I think everybody deserves great user experience, especially when it comes to phones. I think it is my mission to let more people know that Android does not provide you that. Android only provides inferior user experience. You either admit it and bear with it, or go for better alternatives. That’s why I started writing this blog.
This blog, and related Twitter account and Facebook Page, are all run by myself. I’m not affiliated with Apple Inc. in any way, neither with Google Inc., apparently. I only have very limited time, so I often cite others’ articles and occasionally write down my own experiences and opinions. You may sometimes find my writing sound unusual, that’s because I’m not a native English speaker. I started writing articles in English since not very long ago.
Happy reading and I appreciate your support.
Lastly, competition should always be encouraged. Wish the best to Android.
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Lol, the way he gets his point across may may appear as bashing, but he isn't entirely lying. Stock Android is hideous, and people only prefer it to anything else because of it's speed. It isn't polished and it simply isn't too lovely. However I do like how Google focuses on "Dark", iOS seems somewhat too bright and colorful. Yes colorful is usually good, but iOS also makes everything shiny, somewhat childish or something... it's hard to explain why I don't entirely like it, but something about iOS in general seems eh to me.
I was going to actually give this guy the benefit of the doubt and assume that he actually wanted to better Android. Then I noticed that he only post news related to Android when it makes Android look bad. Only when it makes Android look bad. What does random news articles have to do with your problems with Android? It also seems to me he hates Android and wants everyone to hate Android as well. Then again, the title of the blog is "Android Gripes", so I guess focusing on the negatives on the OS is the point. Posting how Skype had a vulnerability does seem extremely odd though... it again makes me assume he just wants to create a site to make Android seem pathetic. The "Is Samsung’s New Galaxy Tab Fibbing About Its Figure? And About Those Galaxy Tab Fans…" post is completely irrelevant to the blog. And video of the new, thinner 10.1 tab has been out for a few days: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdu5PVjCGo0, sadly not before that post.
I agree with him entirely from a design standpoint, several Android apps and Android without being properly modified in general is ugly. There is no denying that (well it is an opinion, so you could deny it) but it is also highly customizable -- and it also seems that developers do not try as hard on their Android apps at all. However, I do not like his hate toward Android. He is trying to use every minuscule flaw, or even things that that aren't really even "flaws" of the operating system to make it seem inferior to iOS. I honestly hope such a blog inspires Google to focus a little harder on Android's user interface. Google sucks at this. And they always have.
You will not find a bigger Android guy than me, but I admit, that the design of many of our apps is crap. This is actually why I got into application design. I love Android and want to make it better, and before Honeycomb it didnt look like Google was really making big strides in the design arena. But then again, I dont think they are a very design heavy company as a whole, and there have been numerous stories throughout the years of how their designers get fed up and leave because the engineering heavy company just doesnt seem to understand design as a whole. Fortunately with Mathias Duarte now on board I believe things are going to change quite a bit, and imho already have with some great new ui stuff on Honeycomb.
I dont think the Android phone ui is hideous or anything, but when you have such great functionality as Android has, it really brings you down to see such poopy design sometimes. For instance do a search on "calendar widget." There is only one I would consider being well designed, Pure grid, while the other 200 cal widgets may have great function, but look just awful.
All that being said, if anyone is interested in getting an application designed professionally by my company, feel free to dm me. We have some great stuff coming out for iOS, and since I'm one of two guys at my company that uses Android I would love to get some more Android apps to work on. Plus it would be nice to throw in my bosses face when he bad mouths Android designs
I admit there are more polished looking apps on iPhone over android. But I happen to find stock gingerbread just pure elegant and beautiful. With launcher pro of course, but I find it beautiful. I mean how could stock android be "ugly" and not have iOS ugly as well? Stock android looks way better to me.
AbsoluteDesignz said:
EVERYONE has a few gripes with Android...Everyone...however this blog is so biased and uninformative it seriously annoys me.
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I guess the best way to get back at him is to make a blog of your own called iOS-gripes.tumblr.com
As far as the look of the operating system I would have to say that stock Android is nicer than iOS.
Main reasons I ended up switching to the iPhone 4 was due to:
1. HID bluetooth keyboard support built into the OS.
2. Netflix app that streams video.
3. Navigon GPS app for iOS that I actually prefer over Google Maps Navigation (doesn't need data, lane assist, turns down music instead of just pausing it). I tried out the Android version of the app and it seemed really half-assed like how it would talk over the music playing instead of trying to pause it or turn it down so you couldn't hear what it was telling you.
4. Better resale value when selling it on Craigslist. Usually the top android phone gets replaced by something better within 3 - 6 months and the resale value goes down accordingly. With the iPhone there are always tons of sheep wanting to buy yours and its guaranteed to stay at the top of the food chain for an entire year.
I agree though AD the guy is just being a troll and should either be less biased or needs to keep his mouth shut
I in no way deny the fact that iOS apps as a whole are better designed than Android apps...that's a fact...an unfortunate fact, but a fact.
I also think Stock Android is about 2 or 3 steps away from being much better (and from what I've seen and "felt" of Honeycomb it'll be closer once that hits phones).
I just do not like a select few posts which show an obvious bias...
The Samsung post...like that has anything to do with Android.
The Skype post, like that is Androids fault in the least.
The notification panel post which is just ridiculous.
And the snide comments in the article itself.
I respected the blog when I first said it as I felt it was bringing to light a big issue about app quality...then he kept updating it and yea...BS.
Well I have a Nexus One and an iPad2.
Let me just say that I fight with the iPad 2's iOS constantly. And while it may look pleasant, the design and functionality are lacking.
2 Examples that blow my mind:
AppStore: Browsing through tons of pages until I find an app I want to try. Click. Download. Exit. Homescreen... Ok I see it installing. Flip back. Re-Launch AppStore.... oh wait... I'm back to page 1 out of 254,325. Great...
SketchLive HD: Sweet doodle app. Click Send. Pop's up asking to set up an email account. No back button. No exit button. Back to the homescreen. Relaunch SketchLive HD.
This is like this for almost every app. You only have 1 option, the home button. I'm new so I'm exploring lots of apps. Almost every one of them has something that wouldn't allow me to go back... forcing me to close out and relaunch.
My thinking: Android is created by geeky logical coders where functionality > style. Apple is just the opposite where style > functionality.
I'll take functionality any day. I'm glad I never bought an iPhone as my daily communication device as it would be shattered on a road somewhere. Nothing is more aggravating then knowing what you are trying to do, but the software is too stupid to do it.
Here's more: The App Store shouldn't ping me to enter in my password every 15 minutes. It's freaking annoying. iTunes required me to setup a password that has Numbers and Capital and lowercase letters. It's a pain in the butt trying to go through Caps and Numbers on the iPad.
Also: The keyboard is atrocious. Why are the letters Capped when I'm using lowercase? Why can't you press and hold for numbers? Why does it FORCE a capital letter as the first letter of an input box? Very annoying and it makes me want to simply break it.
Apple found the magical formula to polishing a turd, and selling it for butt loads of money. Well played.
Just glanced quickly over at that blog and I agree completely with "Too many apps “live” in the notification panel".. If I want to be 100% sure Android won't kill an app I have to have it as an ongoing notification at ALL times? That is so ridiculous
crachel said:
Just glanced quickly over at that blog and I agree completely with "Too many apps “live” in the notification panel".. If I want to be 100% sure Android won't kill an app I have to have it as an ongoing notification at ALL times? That is so ridiculous
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Notification icons are optional and completely up to the developer, however a windows style "hide inactive icons"/manual configuration will be nice.
britoso said:
Notification icons are optional and completely up to the developer, however a windows style "hide inactive icons"/manual configuration will be nice.
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right, but even if the developer allows for no icon, there is still a blank space.. so if you have 2 or 3 ongoing notifications, you might have 2 icons with 1 blank space in between which looks even dumber..
crachel said:
right, but even if the developer allows for no icon, there is still a blank space.. so if you have 2 or 3 ongoing notifications, you might have 2 icons with 1 blank space in between which looks even dumber..
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Huh? In my experience, Apps that have an option on whether or not to display a notification panel icon (like Trillian or Skype) don't leave "blank space" in the notification area, they just aren't present there.
If an app developer opts for a non-visible phantom icon he is probably doing it wrong.
PartyMango said:
Huh? In my experience, Apps that have an option on whether or not to display a notification panel icon (like Trillian or Skype) don't leave "blank space" in the notification area, they just aren't present there.
If an app developer opts for a non-visible phantom icon he is probably doing it wrong.
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If you want your app to avoid potentially being garbage collected by Android you have to have an ongoing notification (running in the foreground) which means an icon or a blank space on the status bar
If the app is not running in the foreground (ongoing notification), Android could possibly see fit to kill it in the event memory is needed elsewhere.. so in this case, you're correct the app wouldn't be present at all
Nevermindz, lol.
crachel said:
If the app is not running in the foreground (ongoing notification), Android could possibly see fit to kill it in the event memory is needed elsewhere.. so in this case, you're correct the app wouldn't be present at all
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Thanks for the information, didn't know about that.
Eclair~ said:
The Speedtest.net app was updated for Android to look exactly like the iOS (which is beautiful) version:
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This is their new design, Speedtest.net redesigned their website as well. It is very unlikely that this is in any way related to the android gripes post.
Now that the Rise has become a Fall with many stranded in ICeySch reboot hell, it's time for some fun thread.
FaceUnlock worked quite well recently, but reared its ugly head not recognizing me but should have said instead, "sorry, you are too stoned to recognize you".
Now maybe some dev is willing to add extra lines to this app's messages if possible, f.e.:
"Sorry, is that your dog staring at me?"
"Sorry, you are too f-ing drunk to even operate this device. Let alone driving."
"Hello, [insert name]'s secret boyfriend." On your gf/wife's Transformer of course.
Perhaps we have some more multilingual input lines, which can be added below. Eat your heart out.
I guess these enhancement pics made in Settings and somewhere stored on the device (there is no network traffic at that moment) and can be tagged with customized lines? Know zilch about coding and like to keep it that way, so I leave that up to you if you want. Now on a serious note, reading the latest leaks in iOS and Android concerning pics on our smartphones, this is a bit worrying to me or is it just me being paradroid?
Cheers.
"Your face, your a**, what's the difference?" /dukespeak
I haven't tried this yet, so if you're a guy should you redo it if you've shaved or grow a some facial hair, will it still work
Yes, in enhancement it takes different conditions, glasses, bearded into account, and adds them to a database somewhere. Read somewhere colored people have difficulties being recognized, so it's also racist.
"Please, leave the dark room for better lighting."
that was uncool. you could change what it says in the strings xml when decompiling the apk
Will look into that. What's uncool about it?
the racist stuff +the lighting conditions
^ That was not an opinion just an observation: http://androidcommunity.com/ice-cream-sandwich-face-unlock-has-issues-with-dark-skin-tones-20120126/
Wait... what?
You realise that op is (likely) being flippant and that skin tone does have an adverse effect on image contrast, making edge detection and hence recognition difficult. CCD cameras are nowhere near as sensitive as the human eye, until they start approaching that sensitivity software algorithms will struggle to identify some individuals.
There was a recently reported case of a person making a complaint to HP about face unlocking features on a laptop performing in a sub par manner depending on skin tone. Terms such as "racist" were banded about for a day or two by alarmist individuals (racism being a social prerogative, not an equipment function) until common sense prevailed and the news outlets stopped running the story.
Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk
Saw this article over at Pocketnow; what do you guys think? http://pocketnow.com/2013/01/30/bb10-vs-wp8-video
sinister1 said:
Saw this article over at Pocketnow; what do you guys think? http://pocketnow.com/2013/01/30/bb10-vs-wp8-video
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Click to collapse
From a recent android to WP8 user, I will put in my two cents worth.
Lockscreen - Yea, I have to hit the button on my 8X, but I would be worried about accidental unlocks on the BB. Also, battery life knowing the screen is looking for that touch. Its a nice touch, but I am hesitant. The animation is nice, that faded edge is a cool touch, but I like the bounce the WP8 gives, and I am always trying to see how little I have to slide to get the unlock to happen, or how slow I can make it go.
Notificaitons - Ok, why is everyone complaining about the notificaitons? I don't have any problem, and I am getting texts all day, as well as emails to two accounts, and other notifications. Yea, there is no blinking light to tell me I have them, but since I keep my phone with me all the time, I know when it vibrates or makes a sound, I have a notificaiton. I remember as well if I have or have not checked what that notification is.
Local search - The video corrected it. So thats a wash.
Launching an app - Live tiles just rock. The static view on the BB is too reminiscent of Android. I think its neat that you can have the most recent apps shown, but only 4? I use about 8 to 10 a day, so scrolling up and down as I go about isn't that intuitive when I can set my screen on the WP8 to have those 10 in the first page.
Multitasking - Ok, BB got it easy here, the click on corner to completely close is nice.
My observations:
Its still too static, and I think its actually a cross between iPhone's all icons and Androids customization (most recent apps shown). I didn't see any widgets, so assuming there are none, it makes it more bland to me. That tells me its much more business orientated. I thought they would have gone personal this time, but guess not.
The keyboard - I don't like that line between rows, seems like they just wanted to make it different than other OS's, so the only thing left was to add a line instead of increasing the size of the keys or adding a gap between them.
Screen - didn't seem as crisp as the WP they were using, but not seeing it in person, cant really make that a definitive claim on my part.
Responsiveness - Seemed just as snappy as any good smart phone out there.
Build and design - It seemed a little simple, which isn't a bad thing. With this being a lifeline to RIM (or Blackberry) I thought they would have come out a little more 'radical'. But the quality seems there, and its a simple phone with some pleasing lines.
Over all, I think its going to appeal to the working force, but the trick is going to be making it affordable and easy to set up for the corporate officer. Personally, I don't think it will go well, but I am not a power user nor a reporter.
I think the WP8 platform still has it beat, and at least the 8X is much more visually appealing.
My two cents. For what its worth now a days!
http://pocketnow.com/2013/01/31/bla...nderdog?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
sinister1 said:
what do you guys think?
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The reviewer really seems to be avoiding talking about how things are done on WP8, and why they're done that way, he even misses a lot of points for WP8, possibly because he hasn't even used it for a long enough time - at least this is the impression he leaves me with.
The Lock Screen - BB has notifications on the lock-screen on the left, possibly if any app has something to say, it will show up there, plus the calendar is showing appointments in the middle. WP8 has only 5 notification icons, customizable(point BB), but there is a main and secondary app that can show info as well - one for the lock-screen background, and one for under the time/date zone.(point WP8)
I agree with the power drain issue, when constantly looking for a touch-slide from the bottom vs physical button.
Notifications - This Notifications fetish comes from Android(I think), and it's a useful feature for Android. WP7&8 has Live Tiles. Different concept. A pencil and a pen are both used to write, but don't blame your pencil for not using ink. If we count the steps on BB to know what happened last - say you received an email - it takes you a complex swipe(from bottom to middle to the right), a swipe to the right(to get rid of Twitter), a tap on the Unified center, and a tap on the email itself, and you're done(if that tap opened the actual email and not just the email app). On WP8 it's a tap on the home screen(if you're not already there), a tap on the email tile(because you see it flashing with a 1 on it), a tap on the conversation and you're done. OR maybe you can omit the last two, if your email tile is set to large - then you see the whole email without even entering the email app.
Lets do a recap:
BB: Complex swipe -> Optional Simple Swipe(if say Twitter is open) -> Tap on Unified Center -> Tap on email | That's 1 complex step, 2 simple steps and 1 optional simple step.
WP8: Optional tap on start -> Optional [Tap on email -> Tap on conversation] because if tile is maxed, then you can already read it. That's 3 optional simple steps.
The Windows Phone method may not have the bling you like to see on your BB, but you have to admit, its faster.
jerrya said:
I think its neat that you can have the most recent apps shown, but only 4? I use about 8 to 10 a day
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Actually he scrolled down to show a total of 8. Its nice to have a list of recently used apps. But if you want that I guess you can just place them toward the top of your home screen on WP8 for easy access.
jerrya said:
Multitasking - Ok, BB got it easy here, the click on corner to completely close is nice.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have to agree with you. WP8 is nice with the frozen app states for non-active apps, but spamming the back button to keep my navigation list clean kinda sucks.
About the notification light - My phone is in my pocket - in this case the light is useless. Even when it leaves my pocket it goes on my night stand. In the morning, the first thing i do is check if I have anything new and place it back home - into my pocket. If I wouldn't check it for new stuff, I'd probably forget it there for the whole day...
And of course while RIM is a dying company ATM, solely producing both software and hardware, compared to Microsoft - not a dying company - producing software(and hardware rumored), with HTC, Samsung, Nokia, ZTE, Huawei, ASUS, LG, etc backing it with hardware, I believe WP8 has a very strong chance to keep the 3rd place for now.
- My opinion.
jerrya said:
The keyboard - I don't like that line between rows, seems like they just wanted to make it different than other OS's, so the only thing left was to add a line instead of increasing the size of the keys or adding a gap between them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Current BB devices with physical keyboards have gaps between the keys, they are trying to replicate that look and feel with the silver spacing.
It's a good idea but doesn't necessarily mean it's a good implementation.
I've had it just about to here with the notifications moaning. The majority of men carry their phones on a belt holster/case and the majority of women carry their phones in a purse. Based on this, how can you see a blinking light? Isn't a vibrate notification better? Or even a ringtone/alert? I can understand (a little) if you're stuck behind a desk all day, but even then I'm sure employers insist on keeping phones on vibrate or off altogether. You certainly can't see a blinking light if you're driving. For those that do, kindly tell me what city and state you're in so I can stay away.
Looneytoon98 said:
I've had it just about to here with the notifications moaning. The majority of men carry their phones on a belt holster/case and the majority of women carry their phones in a purse. Based on this, how can you see a blinking light? Isn't a vibrate notification better? Or even a ringtone/alert? I can understand (a little) if you're stuck behind a desk all day, but even then I'm sure employers insist on keeping phones on vibrate or off altogether. You certainly can't see a blinking light if you're driving. For those that do, kindly tell me what city and state you're in so I can stay away.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
A notification light is just as handy as vibrate. Surely it cant be that hard to believe that people take their phones out of their pocket or purse...Such as placing it on a dresser before bathing or to do a task where you dont want to bang your phone around. Coming into the room to glance at whether their is communication waiting is apparent with color coded notifications. I dont even have to pick up my phone. For the record, I'm not one of those types that incessantly has to be toying with my smart phone.
Understand now? Samsung learned this too, as most of their latest flagship phones now incorporate this. Geewhiz, maybe thats why their the topdog android handset maker now? They know whats good.
UrbanConquest said:
A notification light is just as handy as vibrate. Surely it cant be that hard to believe that people take their phones out of their pocket or purse...Such as placing it on a dresser before bathing or to do a task where you dont want to bang your phone around. Coming into the room to glance at whether their is communication waiting is apparent with color coded notifications. I dont even have to pick up my phone. For the record, I'm not one of those types that incessantly has to be toying with my smart phone.
Understand now? Samsung learned this too, as most of their latest flagship phones now incorporate this. Geewhiz, maybe thats why their the topdog android handset maker now? They know whats good.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Would you rather have to go into a room and glance to see if there's a notification, or would you rather be alerted when one comes in? I know I don't have that much energy to burn.
Looneytoon98 said:
Would you rather have to go into a room and glance to see if there's a notification, or would you rather be alerted when one comes in? I know I don't have that much energy to burn.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Keep in mind, not everyone enjoys being tethered to their coveted smartphone as if it were a ball and chain. When I go to watch a movie or something for my own leisure while at home I leave my phone in my bedroom, as I'm sure many other people do as well who get tired of tending to it. Thus its a handy feature at times. Very reminiscent of the blinking light on answering machines in the old days...
Thread related opinion. BB, much like Microsoft has a long way to go in catching up with the integration and functionality of Android and iOS. BB10 demos look gimicky at best showing off UI features that wont sway consumers. If their lucky they can finally get the diehard BB users / holdouts to upgrade from their dinosaur qwerty devices.
^ every app can fully integrate into BB10. not a long way to go at all.
The notification hub alone is more than enough to sway users away from this platform.
Sent from my Lumia 900 using Board Express
UrbanConquest said:
Keep in mind, not everyone enjoys being tethered to their coveted smartphone as if it were a ball and chain. When I go to watch a movie or something for my own leisure while at home I leave my phone in my bedroom, as I'm sure many other people do as well who get tired of tending to it. Thus its a handy feature at times. Very reminiscent of the blinking light on answering machines in the old days...
Thread related opinion. BB, much like Microsoft has a long way to go in catching up with the integration and functionality of Android and iOS. BB10 demos look gimicky at best showing off UI features that wont sway consumers. If their lucky they can finally get the diehard BB users / holdouts to upgrade from their dinosaur qwerty devices.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Your contradiction is funny. You want to walk into a room to see if you have a notification and I want to stay as far away from the electronic leash. I'll take a sound alert any day, at least I can hear it from across my house. You are the one who sounds like they are tethered with a ball and chain.
Being a dinosaur myself, I happen to like physical keyboards. You can't "feel" your way across a virtual kb. Maybe someone will make a Jitterbug smartphone one day.
vetvito said:
^ every app can fully integrate into BB10. not a long way to go at all.
The notification hub alone is more than enough to sway users away from this platform.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What I mean by integration is more geared towards seamless user experiences between desktop (or laptop), tablet, smartphone, and even web based applications. Features and services that create a unified and synchronized ecosystem. Granted all platforms struggle in this regard and all could benefit from further development and refinement. I somehow feel as though Microsoft and Apple have the major advantage by offering BOTH a desktop / laptop and tablet operating system in addition to a smartphone platform.
Canonical understands this with the recent development of Ubuntu for smartphones. They now have a multi-device compatible OS that strives to create a similar experience across all major computing devices.
The biggest dilemma still for a lot of novice users with their smartphones is keeping data, settings preferences, etc synchronized across all their devices without having to spend money on third party applications. These features should be baked into the smartphones stock OS. IMO, Android has great services integration w. gmaps, youtube, etc and iOS is pretty solid in regard to integration with their desktop OS and itunes.
If I wasn't on a contract I'd look at both.
Blackberry has the best push email system. It uses the lowest amount of battery out of any phone, they have a patent that stops anyone else doing push email the same way.
Multitasking is better on BB10, the peek option is handy.
Personally I think Microsoft needs to release a huge 8.5 upgrade in 2013 add lots of things or BB10 is going to slaughter the WP marketshare.
Looneytoon98 said:
Your contradiction is funny. You want to walk into a room to see if you have a notification and I want to stay as far away from the electronic leash. I'll take a sound alert any day, at least I can hear it from across my house. You are the one who sounds like they are tethered with a ball and chain.
Being a dinosaur myself, I happen to like physical keyboards. You can't "feel" your way across a virtual kb. Maybe someone will make a Jitterbug smartphone one day.
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It's not a contradiction. I don't actively interrupt my activities to go check my phone repeatedly when I don't want to be bothered by communication. After all, our smartphones are predominately for...communication. It's about unplugging from technology and constant socializing that these devices tend to overwhelm us with. Which is the whole point of not having the device in your pocket or the same room.
Example, when I'm watching a movie I don't want to have to hear other peoples or my phone(s) go off, worry about spilling a drink on it or damage it in some way, or have an annoying brick bulging in my pocket. I want to be comfortable and uninhibited. Do you get it yet?
So if there's another reason to enter the room where my phone is, it's convenient to be able to just quickly glance over at the device and see a notification light telling you that you have a message.
To each their own as far as preferences go I guess? I can understand if some people don't mind having a phone around all the time and the convenience it gives. But don't call it a worthless feature that Android users are making a fuss about. Gosh maybe their are even people that shower with their phones these days, perhaps Sony employees who have access to the new Sony Xperia waterproof phones that were recently announced?
My phone goes in my pocket when I leave the house. Period.
I think it looks a little too familiar shape wise Some cool features but think it will confuse many non technical users, A very biased opinion from the host who seriously needs to take his tongue out of BBs trousers,
It reminded me a bit of the meego OS on my old N9 with the swiping so not really groundbreaking there, Like everything else it will have its die hard fans
BB10 as far as I have seen it in their presentation doesn't bring too many new things to the table. The keyboard was one thing that was particularly interesting (especially as it allows to mix languages in the text easily). As for "the Hub" - it seems like the people hub in WP with the added benefit of third party app integration. Although - we have already seen something similar in WebOS already. I really hope there are additional filtering capabilities for it (aside from drilling down to the App level). In the demo it looked like the mess the Notification Bar on my GS2 sometimes looks like (e.g. loads of notifications I don't care about so I don't see the stuff that actually interests me).
The minimized view of running Apps is the closest thing to Live Tiles or Widgets but as you can't pin them they die together with the Apps (e.g. 9th opened App closes the least recently used along with it's "tile"). So for "glanceable" information that is quite a deficiency in BB10.
BBM is not as relevant as it used to be. This can also be seen in the fact that they proudly anounced Skype and WhatsApp Support. Those are the Apps used for Video-Chat and Text Messaging nowadays.
As for superior push: either they changed that model (which might rid us of the Blackberry Tax that People had to pay to Operators for supporting Blackberry push) or they royally screwed up it's implementation because in several tests battery life was merely mediocre and in no way superior to the competition.
vetvito said:
^ every app can fully integrate into BB10. not a long way to go at all.
The notification hub alone is more than enough to sway users away from this platform.
Sent from my Lumia 900 using Board Express
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Maybe it's me but, I see no need for a notification hub with Windows phone 7/8. I do like the idea of a blinking light for new email, SMS, txt etc just to pull my phone out and get an idea if it's worth turning on my phone at that second (HTC does some of this).
Live tiles update, notification hubs are for phones that do not have live updates so you can see when you have new messages etc. My live tiles give me updates for everything I need, if I had a notification "hub" I would never use it and I still dont see the demand for it...
Isn't that what live tiles are for (so you dont need a notification hub) ????? If it's not working for you, maybe you need to setup your tiles so you have the important stuff so you can view it all with out scrooling...
About the only thing I think I would like is shortcuts to NFC, Wifi, bluetooth etc but, it's not worth taking up a tile for...
DavidinCT said:
Maybe it's me but, I see no need for a notification hub with Windows phone 7/8. I do like the idea of a blinking light for new email, SMS, txt etc just to pull my phone out and get an idea if it's worth turning on my phone at that second (HTC does some of this).
Live tiles update, notification hubs are for phones that do not have live updates so you can see when you have new messages etc. My live tiles give me updates for everything I need, if I had a notification "hub" I would never use it and I still dont see the demand for it...
Isn't that what live tiles are for (so you dont need a notification hub) ????? If it's not working for you, maybe you need to setup your tiles so you have the important stuff so you can view it all with out scrooling...
About the only thing I think I would like is shortcuts to NFC, Wifi, bluetooth etc but, it's not worth taking up a tile for...
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Phones that don't support live updates? What phone does t?
Polling tiles can not and will never compete with a real notification hub. Every notification in one place trumps scrolling in efficiency.
Sent from my Lumia 900 using Board Express
Android - ecosystem = bbos
Looks like the people hath spoken anyway. BlackBerry now has doubled WP8 for smart phone marketshare since the z10 came out. Sorry guys, better luck next season / WP9.