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IM Frustrations

For years now I’ve been standing firm by the pocket pc platform. In countless ways I think it is the way of the future for not only one’s phone, but the one device that we all carry around that does it all. I’m very pleased to say the platform has proven this time and time again. But there’s one grey area that just seems to be left in limbo with the improvements of everything else. This is IM! Back when I upgraded to my Cingular 8125 from my ipaq, I remember having the feeling something was missing. I had this new phone that could do it all, but it just wasn’t able to do it all correct, so I sought out on a search to find that perfect im app.
This was back in the days when agile was still in beta and was free. Aside from the ugly aim app that I had to download from the .uk site, this was pretty much the only option. But it was okay, it was a very good option. As time passed a few more came out, IM+ was around as well and a few other lack luster apps. I do remember paying for IM+ but wasn’t very happy with the UI and the way it worked with the soft keys so I kinda stuck to agile.
Then I got a whole of my 8525 when I came out. So I had this phone that could do it all (lol again) now with 3g included….and I still didn’t have an IM app to my liking. Agile and IM+ really started to look bad. Not to mention these were the days of the sidekicks! As much as I hate those things, one has to admit, they do what they’re supposed to do very well. The thing that really wowed me about the sidekick was its ability to switch to sms messenger for the aim when you’re on the phone. This was pure genius. It allowed you to stay connected while on the phone or not. Well….luckily we had a solution for that. It was called verichat.
Verichat had an option to enter your sms address and it would send you the messages via text if you were to be disconnected from the internet. This was all well and good, even though it worked…it was very slow. Not to mention the UI of the app itself was kinda slow as well…so I often got frustrated. So it’s about a year later and we have a few new comers. Among them are mundu, octrotalk and the latest and greatest palringo.
Once again I find myself paying for apps I’m not entirely happy with (no ones fault but myself.) But the life time membership for mundu wasn’t bad…it was only $11. Mundu has a very clean and welcome UI. Its features are definitely up to snuff, but it’s still missing what I think should be the basics. But overall this is a very good app. Octrotalk is still in beta….and by its rights a very good app. Even though I think the UI could use some polish and it’s still missing the “basics.” Now for my favorite of the bunch….palringo. This one is a almost a entire entity on its own, that just supports IM clients. The UI isn’t as pretty as mundu, but it’s still polished and the feature set is great….especially its support for push to talk and image I’m. But again….the basic.
What are these basics I keep rambling on about? Well…for one…lets start with displaying your contacts buddy icons. It kills me that none of these apps allow me to see my contacts buddy icons…and what’s even more annoying, I can’t set a custom pic for my icon in any app. This is such a huge feature and it needs these developers urgent attention. 2. I’d like to see support for fonts and colors. I should be able to import my favorite font to the phone and set size and color to be displayed to my contact when I’m in a conversation. Mundu touched on this a little but not enough. 3. Being able to read contacts away messages. Mundu and octrotalk does this but palringo does not….this should be a no brainier. 4. Just make it simple to navigate….there should be no reason I should have to take out the stylus. I should be able to scroll my list, start convos, switch between them, set custom away messages send images, so on and so forth with the soft keys.
Im not a developer, but I do know these few improvements shouldn’t be hard to accomplish. These are all standard on all desktop IM programs, other mobile platforms (like the sidekick and the iphone) and even web2 based sites (like meboo.com) And even if they’re difficult to develop….so what! Developers need to stop being lazy and get it done. I don’t care of if I have to pay $50 for the app. What really kills me inside is how the iphone came out, and within a few weeks it had 7 different I’m clients most of which had the basics down pat. Why does it take us 4 years in the ppc community? And we’re still not there yet. Anyone else feel this way? Is anyone out there listening???????

You need to re-format your post because it is not easy to read
What is your problem? Describe in 1 or 2 sentences ...

The new MSN Messenger mobile is amazing.
1. Intuitive and Easy navigation: Right/Left tabs between the conversations. Up/Down navigates buddies and messages.
2. Emoticons
3. Supports sending images.
4. (Amazingly useful) Supports sending Voice Clips. This is probably one of the most wow features about it.
5. Displays information about contacts, including the IM picture.

shaharprish said:
The new MSN Messenger mobile is amazing.
1. Intuitive and Easy navigation: Right/Left tabs between the conversations. Up/Down navigates buddies and messages.
2. Emoticons
3. Supports sending images.
4. (Amazingly useful) Supports sending Voice Clips. This is probably one of the most wow features about it.
5. Displays information about contacts, including the IM picture.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
while this is true. im looking for an all-in-one app. but you are correct...i did enjoy the msn live.

rzanology said:
What really kills me inside is how the iphone came out, and within a few weeks it had 7 different I’m clients most of which had the basics down pat. Why does it take us 4 years in the ppc community? And we’re still not there yet.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My current thoughts exactly. I'm crying inside.
I really hope that people at Palringo will get it "done" and not leave behind a client that will miss the important features. It's really amazing that some companies even charge for their poor inexcusable clients.
I also agree that those avatar images are more important than many would think. Last time i chatted with my ppc, i had three "Timo" persons online. Had to ask which one which was. I've gotten used to just look at the avatar.

I feel the same way! I LOVE having IM on my phone.. but it just seems like no single company can get it right on the PocketPC. I don't understand what the is the problem! My favorite two right now are Octrotalk and Mundu. I tried Palringo, but it lacked a couple critical things for me.
Octrotalk Pros
1. Today plugin that shows status
2. Doesn't crash... ever.. it stays connected for days
3. Fairly simple to change custom status text
Octrotalk Cons
1. No custom status text on the today plugin.. ARGH, so simple, I've requested it three times!
2. No profile pictures, come on... just add them!
3. Having Gtalk be the conduit for the other legacy IM clients still causes problems with my other IM clients like Trillian... I get duplicate contacts often
Mundu Pros
1. Supports profile pictures! Yippee
2. Displays custom status messages next to names on the contact list
3. Supports group conversations across IM mediums! woot!
Mundu Cons
1. No today plugin... I really like that feature in Octrotalk... just make a simple one line plugin that says status and custom message, ie. "Online - Mobile!"
2. No WM5 soft key support, I HATE tapping the screen.. even more so when the interface has a TINY menu bar.
3. Doesn't display the current custom status message for YOURSELF anywhere that I can find.

Also don't forget to read the IM Bible at http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=295677 - it might contain info you aren't aware of.

Menneisyys said:
Also don't forget to read the IM Bible at http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=295677 - it might contain info you aren't aware of.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i'll tell ya what....that disconnecting thing annoyed the hell outtah me. Im gonna try to check off the "always on" connection option in HTCustom and see what happens. I think thats the same reg hack.
But i've been through your post a few times...maybe one too many times.

need help with my fuze experience - by an ex Blackberry user (long)

Hi Guys,
First thank you all for such a great community. XDA truly "sold" me the HTC fuze...as I was very excited about such an excellent user base. I lurked here for a few days before I bought, and have lurked a few more days while I have played with the phone, so far with very positive experiences...
So here is my question...
I am an ex blackberry user...4 years running. Had the 7290 and the more recent 8800. I liked the phones but were frequently frustrated by things such as lack of home-brew software (or at least lack of software easy to find and well supported), lack of a decent web browser, lack of an attractive UI (albeit theirs was very functional) and lack of 3G (on att at the moment). Now I know that the BB Bold fixed some of this, but to me its the same ole blackberry tricks (do email real well, slack off on the rest), and I was really ready for a highly extensible smart phone.
Enter the HTC fuze...
I love the apps, love the idea of custom ROMS, love that it runs a very common platform (windows mobile, important as some companies write apps that only run on windows mobile), and love the sheer power of the HTC fuze (can easily browse filesystem, look at memory usage...its essentially a very small laptop), but I have one primary complaint...it does all these cool things, but IMO it does NOT do email/messaging/contact management well...and worse, I have not been as impressed with the web browser as I thought I would be (using opera, have not tried IE...also some of this is my fault, I am trying to use fat-client web pages vs mobile web pages, which are faster and just perform better). Now before I get flamed, let me clarify that I am using the Energy Rom 3.0, so some of my griefing may be self inflicted. That being said, here are some specifics of what irritations Ive ran into with messaging/email/contact management...ill list them out categorized in order of importance (can you tell I am an engineer?)
Email
1. No heads up display of new messages on the home screen (have to poke around to the email area to see if you have new messages)
2. Does not enter an @ and . symbol when hitting spacebar key while typing email address in "To:" field (ex-blackberry users will sympathize)
3. I get too many emails for the graphical envelope to be useful...it looks cool, but when I am 30 emails deep i really don't want to have to click menu to get to all messages, just let the mail icon take me right to the goodies please...
4. read/unread/replied messages are not well represented (could be that it is just different that the blackberry feel, but a different color or something would be nice...the standard is bold/yellow/dark is unread and light/white/shadowy is read...and replied as some sort of representation as well
There are a few others but those are the main ones
Messaging
1. Clicking the message, and then immediately beginning to type (as in to reply) will take you to the address book!!, in order to start a new message! It is beyond me why it does not just start entering text as a reply for your current message you are viewing, and this is a huge annoyance!
2. Found this the other day...replying to an MMS message by clicking gives an error (wont deliver) but hitting menu and then reply will then prompt for "MMS or SMS reply?" and the message goes through fine...irritating!
3. Tapping spacebar twice does not place a period, although not capitalizing the first letter in a sentence auto-capitalizes - this is a blackberry feature that is not here and i miss it :'(
4. Once again lack of proper heads up in the home menu....why is the clock giant??? Looks cool but waste of space...I would rather have a breakdown of my messages/emails/missed calls with limited details so I can see whats going on, on my home screen.
5. General slowness when going from the message browsing with the envelopes to the reply, detailed view.
Contact Management
1. Adding a contact is no where near simple...and there are too many "mines" you can accidentally click in the process which will do odd things like add an address book entry with no name in it, or call someone!
2. The "people" tab is useless...i removed it (not really a complaint as I fixed it...but I just don't understand that concept of favorites....that being said my background is in database administration so all data is good data to me, the more the merrier...explains my 500+ contacts, half of which i prob dont need but keep around just in case)
3. Last name first???? Blackberry was always first name last...further more, I entered a business the other day in my contact list, and it put the second part of the business name as the last name, leading to a very odd address book entry...I did not like that bit of assumption on the phones part.
So I guess you could probably sum up all my complaints into 3 things:
1. I am way too used to blackberry shortcuts and having a hard time weening myself off
2. There are 10 ways to do the same things and get to the same places on the phone, and some times a few of those ways are less buggy/intuitive than others...why not just have the best methods enabled only?
3. Too many buttons take you places you did not intend to be...its not one way in one way out of each module (mail, messaging, ect.)...its 5 ways in, 10 ways deeper, uh....im lost, how do I make a phone call? (I'm being facetious of course but you get my drift)
Anyways, I am not trying to slam the phone, it is slick, sexy, and free (refurb through an ATT deal), but I just need some ROM/tweak/psychological suggestions to make it "fit" me better.
Thank you all truly,
Crackberry addict in serious withdrawal

Ok, so piece by piece:
Email:
1. For a pop-up for new email messages, go to start>settings>sounds&notifications>notifications. There you can choose messaging: new email message, and select display message on screen. This will give you a pop up at the bottom every time you get a new email. you can do this for all those other events that are in the drop down too.
2. Don't know of anything to do this
3. There should be a inbox button for your i think left soft-key. Two clicks isn't much more than 1
4. Don't know of anything
Messaging:
1. This happens jut because of lag in the system. You have to wait until everything loads up to start typing. Sounds like you need a cooked rom
2. Bug?
3. My phone does what you ask, although I am running 6.5. My settings in input have "enable auto correct" with a check mark next to them. Don't know if this solves the problem in 6.1
4. Regular Today screen. Try something like TouchFlo Detacher, which allows you with the soft key button to easily and quickly switch back and forth between the regular today screen, which would have all that info that you desire, and touchflo. http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=480475
5. Cooked rom, bigger pagepool
Contact Management:
1. Sorry this is just winmo. Contact entry area is not exactly the most finger friendly menu. Try the stylus. I know what you mean, though.
2. Basically the people tab is just for people you call on a daily basis, and it looks cool lol
3. You can change that in the contact's settings where it says "file as"; I like first name first also, so I just changed it so that was the way it is displayed.
Overall Points:
1. It is difficult to go from blackberry to winmo, but everything does have a slight learning curve.
2. Most view this to be the beauty of winmo. You have infinite possibilities, since everyone likes to do things differently. If microsoft wanted to assume that everyone wanted to do everything the same way and that there was one, best, all-powerful way to do things, then they could just merge with apple
3. Lol don't understand this one
Any more questions, I'd be happy to help

thanks
hey,
thanks for the detailed reply. got most of the answers i needed...I am using a cooked rom (energy 3.0) which runs WM 6.5, but it comes with the Manila skin. After doing some research I think I need to ditch that and start from there...any other pointers?

You could try to use the default WM6.5 home plugin instead of TF3D, it may suit your needs better.

[APP][REQUEST] Data entry app request/available

I work at a power plant and carrying around a clipboard to write down logs and numbers is getting old. It's a waste of paper and ink. There are about 12 of us that rotate on a 3 shift rotation and I already convienced 3 of them to use Android phones and one has an iPhone (wouldn't listen, now he regrets).
If I can get them to them to use an app for data logging, maybe my work center will push for Android powered phones in my shop vs the use of late 90's windows mobile PDA's they are trying to get us.
I'm not sure if the app already exist, if not, maybe I'll use my spare time to try and learn to dev one to my taste.
Basically what I want is to have is a spreadsheet type look. If you look at the attched picture, you can get an idea of what my sheets already look like. In the app, if I could just touch a cell and I can input a number, or a menu pops open for auto/on/off/out of service(OOS). Save it/export it and transfer data onto paper log sheets.
Now my ideas are kicking and maybe I'll have to look into making an app. Any ideas? Right now I use gmail compose and just write the numbers which is kind of lame.

Why not use Quick Office mobile and create sheets.
I created an expense sheet on my PC and moved it to my phone and keep track of everything on the go via my phone using Quick Office.
It'd be much easier, I'd assume, I write up a nice looking spreadsheet as apposed to an app..

[Q] Office Mobile fully functional?

Hi guys,
I've searched this forum and haven't found an answer to my question, so I'm gonna post it here. (Hopefully I did the search right and didn't commit the felony of a double post. )
I'm planning on buying a new phone, mainly because my old HTC Charmer (WM 6.1) doesn't support SDHC cards and the maximum of 4GB of the cards I can use with it is just not enough any more.
So far, I've read quite some disappointing details about Windows Phone 7:
- No more "free" apps (by which I mean apps programmed by someone and offered somewhere, now it's the same sh** as with an iPhone or an Android phone)
- No direct USB-sync, which means you have to send your private information to the cloud in order to sync
- No "real" support for SD-Cards (and getting more storage space is the whole da** point here, otherwise I'm quite happy with my Charmer)
So, basically I thought about getting a second hand HTC Touch Pro II running WM 6.5 AND supporting NORMAL SDHC cards (meaning ALL cards which comply with the standard, not just the ones "certified by Microsoft").
But there might be one killer feature which could make me, well, not really forget, but maybe turn a blind eye to WP7's SHAMEFUL flaws: The new Microsoft Office Mobile. Often, I have some Excel spreadsheets which I need for work at different places. This is the only reason I have to take a laptop computer with me, apart from that my phone would be fine.
Office Mobile in WM 6.1 (or 6.5) couldn't display / make use of all the features the Desktop-Version offered (like extremely complicated formulae or spreadsheets and of course macros), and, moreover, after having worked on and saved an Office document on a phone, the features would even have been removed from the file in the conversion process, so the file was useless on the desktop as well.
Thus, I'm asking the following questions (which surprisingly haven't been answered on the net so far, or am I just too stupid to google it right?):
- Is the Office in WM 7 fully functional, meaning you can work on Excel sheets with the most complicated formulae and macros, or, asked more simple, can you do everything you can do with the Desktop version on your phone as well?
- If it doesn't offer everything the desktop versions offers, does it at least keep everything that was there in the original file after you change and save it on your phone? I mean, even if I can't use macros on the Windows Phone, it might still be helpful to open an .xls file on the phone, make a few changes (which don't require macros), save the file on the phone and after putting it back on a desktop computer having the file "unharmed" (meaning except for the small change I made on the phone everything else is as it was)?
Hopefully, I made my point clear enough, if not, I'm happy to answer questions on what it is exactly that I want to know. I think many users here already having a Windows phone will have tried working on Office documents on their phones and I hope those will share their experiences with me.
Many thanks for reading my post and even more thanks for answering.
Peter

Firstly,in terms of the functionalities of the excel,I don't think WP7 is suitable for you.
Furthermore,personally I prefer USB drag and drop the documents to my device,maybe you can call me old school.I just find the office useless for me since I don't have sharepoint,I don't want create a dropbox account just to upload my file to cloud and download it to my device again and I don't have a data plan.Therefore,until now, I still didn't use the office app once.
In your situation,I think you need an android phone to handle your job this moment,you can just purchase quick office,docs to go,depends on your personal preference.In addition,the only office app available is just microsoft office,no other choices.furthermore,as you said,you want transfer it back to your desktop unharm,therefore it is good to have drag and drop file transfer function rather than rely on dropbox,upload to the cloud and download on your desktop again.
On the other hand,there is no clear information about the mango updates which add more features to the office.So,I'll would suggest you to go with Android or iOS for this moment.

Thank you for the answer.

No more "free" apps (by which I mean apps programmed by someone and offered somewhere, now it's the same sh** as with an iPhone or an Android phone)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Free, in cost, there are plenty. Free as in not first checked by MS, kinda but no. You can developer unlock your device and sideload apps. However, that being said, MS are pretty good, they're only blocking apps which don't meet quality control standards (which I think is a good thing) or, somewhat contentiously, are "adult". They're not playing the same game as Apple.
I'm confused by you saying Android though. You can easily download and install programs (apk) on your device from any source (you just have to choose that option in the settings).
Office in Mango is improving - specifically:
1. Better support for formulae
2. Skydrive sync
So, yes, formulae can be created and manipulated in Excel, though I wouldn't say it's a replacement for the real Excel. It certainly can't run macros.
Skydrive is still "in the cloud" however, you're automatically registered to the free account by the virtue of having a live id. I still believe we should have USB file transfer but at least this is better than nothing.
Casey

Using the Asus Transformer for Business Instead of Netbook

Hello everyone,
So i thought I would go ahead and chime in with my own experiences and observations of the Asus Transformer (AT). I wanted to write an article that might help others trying to make a decision about replacing their laptop with the AT or maybe asking about a one vs the other. I wanted to stay away from a “VS” conversation and talk more about my experience. The long and short of it, is it depends. I think the AT can augment your business and maybe replace a netbook as a travel computer but i still need my laptop/desktop in the office. However, as you will see I am now using fully when out of the office my AT for all business needs and it works just fine.
Assumptions/Reasons for Buying:
So lets start with the reasons for wanting the AT. I wanted to find a solid replacement for my day to day use of my laptop while out of the office. I wear a number of hats one of which is application development, the other is as a Commercial Real Estate Broker. So needless to say this is for my brokerage business as i am pretty confident that there will be no Visual Studio use on the AT, well with the exception of a remote desktop of some kind. So, that all said what was i looking for? (Lets be honest we all want it ALL right but hey we can settle right?)
1. Email, this was first and foremost. A majority of both my businesses are relying on email as a main form of communication to my clients. Well, i didn't really need a tablet for this my phone handles it just fine, but typing anything longer than a paragraph is tedious , i have big hands and its just not the best experience, that said when i am out of the office most of my email replies are very short and so though i wanted/needed a better way to work with email the phone would have sufficed.
2. Document reading/generation: This one was a sticking point as we all know reading pdfs word docs and such is possible and works well on most devices, again the phone would work, but not for generation. I bought Docs to Go for my phone and it made things better but still no way was i going to get a "Word" experience. I know this is a debate by itself Microsoft "shop" vs opensource etc but lets be real, there is still a majority of the business working world that uses and will continue to use Microsoft office and so we just have to comply. (Yes you will service US Microsoft, resistance is futile)
3. Access to my daily files and work: So i also needed access to all my files and work related information. This was more a business choice than anything, putting information into the cloud, but i also had to think about how i was going to access so i am putting it in as a decision factor.
4. Browser media service: I wanted to be able to browse and access media whether at a clients to show them an article or news clipping or maybe a website etc. I also wanted something for reading surfing while having my morning coffee(We can be all work right?)
5. media entertainment Yes it has to be a "Fun" device to, watch a movie while travelling, or playing a game while waiting on my next appointent so this was on the list though not a major factor, as this gets us into an "apps" war and thats not the focus.
OK so there is more but that covers the major items
Decisions:
So I shopped and shopped borrowed friends ipads and a xoom, I really do like android in a lot of ways, it has its problems but I had an Iphone and was ready for a change. I am not going to bore you with the research but needless to say i chose the AT as my device to put this whole notion of Tablet for business to replace my laptop/netbook for work to the test.
REASONS:
1. Keyboard number UNO i wanted the physical keyboard cant live without it for major typing and work related stuffs. I tried the bluetooth one with the ipad and it wasn't bad, but the extra battery power in the AT was a bit of a topper not to mention all the expansions. ( I do think $150 is a bit much, but in the end, its what makes the Transformer a Transformer right?)
2. Expandability: Up to 64gigs of additional memory i can have a card with all my data a card with movies books music etc this was just too good to pass up. Yes i had already figured out a cloud solution etc but lets face it I wanted the kitchen sink with my device. The HDMI and USB were great additions as well. (A note my laptop took a dump one day and I was able to connect my external mouse keyboard to the AT and easily finish the day and deal with my laptop later)
3. Screen: yes as i mentioned it is going to be a bit of a "Play device" so it needed a great display and i liked this one over the xoom though the galaxy tab 10.1 i compared it next to was sweet and it had a keyboard, but the keyboard had no battery and had a lack of other expansion ports.
4. overall performace: this wasnt really to much of decision factor as all tablets are running tegra 2's for the most part and i wasnt looking at an ipad
THE PURCHASE:
I am putting this in because well it was an ordeal. I bought from bestbuy and got their 2 year replacement plan. Well i am on my 4th tablet and 3rd keyboard. Now I will be honest i wanted perfection and as was pointed out in a previous thread that just ain't gonna happen so really the first keyboard and tablet were it but i wanted a perfect no leak screen and a non discharging keyboard so back to the BB i went, again and again and again. Ok so now i have a series 60 tablet with a 50 keyboard and it all works, some light leaks but nothing that is earth shattering and doesn't bother me(Ok well it does but i got over it) So for those of you who think i just keep returning etc till its perfect, um take it from me, each one was worse, the second keyboard the space bar stuck, the 3rd keyboard was great, it does discharge but not a bad as the first. The tablet, on the second the light bleed was worse than the first and the 3rd one had huge dead pixel/flaws in the screen now the fourth some light bleed but in my opinion perfect as perfect can be. Moral of the story read the forums there are people here who are super helpful and will get you set straight but also be practical. If the little things really are going to bug you and you feel the need to come to a forum and write a post of Why i am returning my AT then its not for you, i knew the snowball i created with being picky and i got over it.
ONWARD!!!!!
OK THE SETUP APPLICATIONS AND PREP
1. First thing I did prior to buying anything was setup my business info and stuff to be accessible via the web. This required its own set of decisions which i wont get into, maybe a blog post about it later, but i migrated my stuff to google apps. (Hey i am going android so using google apps everything should all work right? it's all google, well sort of i will address it later)
a. Files and storage, i actually chose a combination of google docs and Microsoft live(25gigs of free storage how could i turn that down) I moved all the necessary files to the cloud and i was set
b. All my email addresses were migrated to my google apps and i was set there
c. Contacts moved to Zoho (I am debating this choice good for a later discussion)
2. Tested everything using my laptop and a web browser it all worked fine. I ran for about two weeks while i was doing more research on Android tablets apps etc, and I didn't have any issues.
3. Applications
a. Polaris Office/Docs To Go: I already had the later and the former comes with the AT so i was pretty much set for tablet handling of office docs. Its not a perfect solution by any means and would i like to have office on my tablet YES, do i need it not really. If i REALLY need to generate a word doc with high end formatting etc or i need that complicated cash flows analysis spreadsheet i can usually wait till i am back in the office in front of my computer. Remember this device is for travel/on the go and for THAT these apps are fine. (I am hoping they fix the keyboard issues with Office 365 because that will be IT and you will have it all)
b. Evernote became my note software, I REALLY miss onenote its my favorite office program but alas Android does not have support for it, mobile noter is not that great so migrated to Evernote. Evernote works well just takes a little bit to get used to as i had to change the way i organized my stuff, its different from onenote. (One thing i miss big time is pen input. I looked at the HTC Flyer because i really wanted to have the pen/OneNote experience. I found that this was one of those compromises. If i was still in school or in a job where i had to take copious notes in meetings, i would probably opt for a Tablet PC Fujitsu Q550 comes to mind so i could use pen input.)
c. With everything migrated to Google apps email was a snap put my google apps account info in and BAM its all there. I had already got Zoho synced with my contacts in Apps so they came down as well.
d. Using a combination of gdocs and the docs apps above is fine, though i really think google needs to "Finish" their products they have a habit of starting something putting it out there then never finishing or refine it. Google apps had a chance but with Office 365 available for a dollar more its gonna have troubles unless they step up their game. (We can have a google apps vs office 365 debate somewhere else)
e. To access my skydrive i use Sorami which is working well. The bad part is that i have to drag the file to the asus work on it here then push/send it, not ideal but it works. Quick note on collaboration, one of my sticking points on gdocs is that in order to collaborate on it and get all the functionality you have to convert it to a gdoc, i am not to keen on this as usually the conversion of complicated word docs with lots of formatting is horrible, hence Office 365 maybe the answer with the ability to use web apps and edit things in the native .DOC format. In any case its fine for on the go, and truthfully i don't know about others but my needs for generating complicated or highly formatted documents when i am away from my computer are pretty low.
f. For ZOHO i am limited to their mobile website they have an ios app now but android development is lagging, as it seems to with a lot of things, however i am hopeful they will come up with a native android app. I am still shopping on the CRM front so we'll see this may be a non-issue
That's the basics of apps i have the file explorers and a few games and other stuff but that's the basis of the business stuff.
HOW HAS IT WORKED
Now we get into the dirt of the article how did using the AT as a replacement for my daily out of office use workout. in a word GREAT but here is the skinny
THE GOOD:
1. Weight, wow being able to carry around my portfolio folder to hold documents etc and my AT was fantastic.
2. Access, i had access to all my documents when i needed them when i wanted them. (Let me clarify I know the AT is Wi-Fi so i tether it to my Nexus S 4G when i am not in range of a Wi-Fi hence my statement i can access everything) Yes its true i had that with just my phone but on the 10" screen with a keyboard i felt like i could really work with them when i needed and i could draft from scratch some pretty nice letters etc.
3. Email, yes i know we all have this with our phones but as i noted my hands are big so typing anything of length on the phone is tough for me, the AT made this a snap, take a few minutes between appointments to dock with my keyboard which is in my trunk not only does the pad get a top up, which it didn't need but hey some extra juice nevver hurts for that extra round of Angry Birds, and i can type up all notes etc.
4. Worth noting i did need to make a change to a .NET app for a client i was no where near a pc and this needed fixing now, i used splash top logged into my pc launched studio and made the change, was it horribly slow yes would i want to try and work that way HELL NO but was my client beyond happy and will i get a ton more business from him cause his problem was addressed right away OH YEAH. So i can do the same with office docs etc its not ideal but dang in a pinch there are work around’s.
THE BAD: (This i boil down to i would have been fine had i had a pc)
1. Well obviously programming, I did like having my laptop and being able to sit in a Pete's or something and work on some projects that had been lagging. So not being able to do my development is a bit of a downer, but its all about compromise right.
2. I mentioned earlier pen input. I REALLY like Onenote and I am an advid pen user, i replaced all the notebooks and post its around my desk with a Wacom Tablet and onenote. I did a tremendous amount of research, and business organization in Onenote, so putting this on the table as a “Compromise” was difficult. I downloaded EverNote and started taking notes via typing, and it wasn't so bad. Hence, my decision to make the switch. Again if Office 365 shapes up the way I think it will, i will be back in OneNote in a heartbeat.
SUMMARY
So for me the AT system will accomplish what i need and i think will only get better as android and apps mature. Email, doc reading editing and file creation, file access ebooks movies on and on the device is fabulous. For those thinking of going this direction, here are some thoughts. I look at my purchase of 700 which includes my 2 year replacement with BB and I compare that to what i can get in the PC world. Well the New Fujitsu Q550 i believe is about 700 and that is a full slate pc with about 6 hours battery has the stylus for writting runs office including one note (onenote + stylus = Heaven) there are a few reviews out there and this seems to be a nice challenge in the pc arena, if you want a PC for your work. The AT is not a pc so you have to adjust your thinking and try not to compare it to a netbook or pc thats why this is more of a "How i went about using the AT" rather than a vs because truthfully its not fair to compare apples to oranges. After making some changes to the way i do business i am able to successfully use the AT as a replacement for my day to day operations OUTSIDE the office i still have my PC and still use it. I think that moving forward online services like office 365 and google apps will level the playing field a bit to make comparing tablets to pcs a little closer but right now there are things that my tablet does that a pc is really hard pressed to do. Grab from my bag push a button read a book surf the net watch a video the list goes on. Maybe the new pc tablets will sleep/hibernate better and the gap will get closer I don't know. I miss some PC functions once in a while and with Tablets PC’s coming out as light as the Q550 I think the landscape is going to change, but take a look at your situation and see whats right for you. You can read “VS” articles all day but those are simply peoples observations/opinions. Take a step back and decide what you want and then mold your world to it.
Thats my experience please feel free to comment if we want to use this thread as a building block of Business “how to's” for getting people to undertand that tablets and pcs can live together it doesnt have to be an either or thats great. Maybe share some uses/apps things you do to leverage your AT in the work world.
The Rahl (Heh)

Why not use Splashtop HD to remote into your PC to do programming?

RTbar said:
Why not use Splashtop HD to remote into your PC to do programming?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
He did mention that he did remote desktop to his comp for a quick fix. Its def not ideal, especially for a long time.
If you have your code stored on a Linux box, you could SSH into it and use a terminal-based text edit to do it. Yeah, not the most fun, but it takes less bandwidth/power to do.

i had thought about the linux box but truthfully if i need to program i will grab my laptop. My goal was to use the AT on the business side though i am finding new ways of doing things everyday. Though kind of wondering since i dont NEED an AT shoud i wait on next gen Tegra3. Heh yeah that opens the wholebcan of worms "if i wait ill get the newest and the best" youll never buy anything then butbyou cant help but wonder. Heh I think ifthey had some firm dates on tegra3 i might consider but since there are no firm dates ichosetheAT.