Project Management with Trello
At InGenius we typically have quite a few projects on the go, and a lot of very busy developers.
One of the difficulties we face is project tracking. Making sure that:
- every developer is working on the most pressing items,
- our QA department knows what to focus their testing efforts on, for each build,
- our sales people know when new builds, with new features are coming out.
We’ve tried many tools for keeping track of our projects, including:
- Complicated spreadsheets, with a grid showing each developer, and all projects, saved in a common directory,
- using Yammer.com and asking developers to yammer about what they’re working on,
- Daily meetings, making sure everyone’s focused,
- Online tools like Basecamp.com,
- Using our Wiki to say what developers are up to, and should be doing,
- Whiteboards at each office, with individual developer priorities,
And, none of it worked very well. Developers don’t like meetings, don’t like yammering, don’t like anything that gets in the way of what they should be focused on.
Last fall, we started using Trello.com, a new FREE online product from Fog Creek Software – the same people that build the terrific Fogbugz bug tracking system we use here at InGenius. We’re all thrilled with the results!
Trello is a deceptively simple application. It presents you with a page called a “board”, and the board contains multiple lists.
Each list can have a title, and multiple entries, known as cards. You can drag cards from list to list, and you can re-order lists by dragging them as well.
Cards are the basic unit within Trello. Cards generally move up and down in a list, and from list to list, within a board.
Each card has a title, and when you click on it, it flips over to reveal a description, and a set of notes. People can add comments to a card, assign labels, assign a card to a particular worker, or vote on a card.
At InGenius, we use a similar setup to Fog Creek’s development board – we have a main board for all the development in our company, and have lists for:
- Known Issues,
- Ideas,
- Next Up,
- In Progress,
- Implemented,
- a list for each release.
Items generally move across, from left to right as they progress from ideas, to being implemented, to getting moved to a release.
Using Trello has been a godsend for both the developers and senior staff at InGenius. We can now easily see, in a single view, everything that’s in progress in the company, and can easily move cards around to indicate their priority.
Developers can easily make notes about their progress, which we review in a once-a-week meeting to make sure everyone’s on track. Each card contains a description of the bug or feature. Developers can easily add notes about their progress, and can move a card to the “Implemented” list when they’re done.
And, our QA staff can easily look at the lists for each release, to see which new features have been implemented, so they know where to focus their testing efforts.
Trello has become the focus of our developer meetings, allowing us to keep the meeting to 15-20 minutes and make sure everyone is on the right track.
We’ve learned a few tricks as we’ve used Trello.com:
- Don’t overload Trello with too many items. In our case, we keep the “high level” items in Trello, and leave most of the detail work in FogBugz. The items we track in Trello are generally the things that we’ll highlight in each product release, and major, customer-affecting issues. The balance between Trello and your bug tracking tool is hard to determine.
- make sure that card titles are succinct and descriptive
- Make sure that developers update the cards regularly
- Use labels to show which cards are bugs, and which features have been tested, or need documentation updates,
- Assign cards to developers by dragging developer icons over to a card,
- Use Trello in developer meetings as a focal point, and to show the team how the tool should be used,
- Encourage higher management and sales to use Trello too.
- Have a look at Trello’s development board for ideas and tips – and it’s fun to watch features move across, and out into a release!
Of course, Trello is not yet perfect, but new features are being implemented every week.
Our wish list includes:
- Ability to move lists from board to board,
- Better functionality in the iPhone and iPad applications,
- Better management of company members, and management of which company members are allowed access to a board (this is already much improved)
- Tighter integration with FogBugz
Starting with the basics: terms for newbies
Integrated CRM and telephony programs can be intimidating for the uninitiated. Programs are often full of acronyms and may feel overly technical. The customizable options are exciting for seasoned professionals, but potentially overwhelming to first time users. So what does someone fresh to the field really need to know about CRMs and telephony to get started and to make the programs work well for their business?
The Basics
CRMs: Customer Relationship Management programs
These help document, monitor, and track a company’s interactions, primarily with its customers. The most popular CRMs right now seem to be the web-based programs. There are lots of great CRM programs out there, and we’ll get to those in a later post.
Telephony
A word for a phone system or a bunch of phones networked together. If your office has a phone system with extensions, or if you need to do something like “press 9 for an outside line” then you something about telephony.
A few important terms and features:
VoIP: Voice over Internet Protocol
This means speaking through the internet rather than through phone lines. The most well known VoIP provider is probably Skype, which allows users to download it’s software for free, make calls between web-based Skype users for free, and make calls from web-based Skype users to landlines for reduced prices.
SIP: Session Initiation Protocol
This is a standard internet language for calling via voice and video. I don’t really think it is important for the lay person to understand. It might be important to know whether you are connected to a SIP based service provider.
IP: Internet Protocal
Internet language – or – how information is sent and received over the internet. You may need to know something called your IP Address, which is a string of numbers separated by dots. This is the location of your machine on the internet, just like your home address is the location of your house in the world.
T1
This is a kind of phone line.
Call waiting
The ability of the phone to signal that another call is trying to access your line while you are on a call.
Conference call
A call involving more than two parties.
Screen Pops
This is like caller ID for computers, except that instead of just the number showing up on your phone’s screen, the contact information for the incoming caller “pops” up onto your computer screen. InGenius Connector Plugins can help your CRM “pop” screen identify additional information such as your history of calls with that phone number and notes made about that phone number, in addition to the number itself
Toast Pops
Ha! No really, this is a thing. Actually, it’s the same thing as above, except maybe the ‘pop’ isn’t the whole screen but rather a smaller window that appears from another application. Like toast. Coming out of a toaster. Get it?
CLID or CID: Caller ID
Why don’t we just call this ‘Caller ID,’ which everyone understands? I don’t know. Caller ID means that you can see who is ringing your phone before picking up.
Call Logs
These are records of inbound and outbound calls, or, all of the calls made from your phone. InGenius Connector Plugins will help your CRM log calls and attach records or notes to those calls. This is helpful for remembering each step of the sale or interaction and making sure that tasks do not fall through the cracks.
Cloud Based
When a program is based in the ‘cloud’ it means that there is nothing stored on your hard drive or local server. People appreciate that they do not need to download or install anything onto their computers, and that their data can be accessed from anywhere. Salesforce is known for being a cloud based CRM.
- — -
Things are evolving fast and different stuff is appearing all the time. Are there any other terms that you think are important for beginners? Are there other important features that you use currently, or would like to see in the future?
One Sweet Suite! Mitel Releases Live Content Suite for 5360 IP Phones
It has been a few months since we first mentioned Mitel’s Live Content Suite application, and we are thrilled that the product has finally been released for Mitel 5360 IP phones.
Developed by the InGenius Telephony Software team, this application is truly innovative and forward thinking in the way it embraces personalization and leverages live content.
Live Content Suite has three main parts:
- Live Desktop Portal, a web-based phone programming portal
- Live Blogger, an application for using standard blog tools to deliver custom content to phones
- Live Applications, applications such as LiveTwitter Reader, Live Weather, and Live Flickr that deliver dynamic content to phones
This is just one of the many “Unified Communications 2.0″ applications to come out InGenius and users can expect to see more in the very near future!
Live Content Suite is expected to become available for other Mitel display phone models (5320, 5330, and 5340) in the coming months.
Check out www.livecontentsuite.com to learn more!
InGenius Application Server for SpectraLink Handsets
After just releasing InGenius Connector for General Availability on Asterisk Exchange and unpacking from ITExpo, the InGenius team is packing their bags again to head West to attend the TEAM Polycom event next week in San Diego, CA.
Located in the Applications Beyond Voice Pavilion, booth 504, InGenius will be revealing the InGenius Application Server for Spectralink Wireless Handsets.
This incredibly cool application server offers something for both Spectralink users and Spectralink Application developers. It is shipped with a set-to-set texting application and a corporate directory look-up application, and also has the ability to run multiple applications simultaneously. As an added bonus, InGenius Application Server houses a framework that can be extended to develop or customize applications using commonly available Microsoft .Net development tools.
Whether you are looking to increase company communication and productivity or trying to extend the value of your Spectralink 8020/8030 Wireless telephone offering, InGenius Application Server offers a quality solution that fits current and future business needs. If you are attending TEAM Polycom we would love to give you a demo, stop by booth 504 and say hello!
InGenius is attending ITExpo East 2010
InGenius is very happy to be attending ITExpo East in Miami on January 20-23 as members of the Ontario pavilion in Booth 512. We are going to be showing InGenius Connector and all the cool things that it can do to help accelerate and simplify phone communications for those with a Polycom phone, Asterisk switch, BroadSoft Network or Mitel switch.
InGenius Connector has been in beta for the past few months and we are receiving a tremendous response from Polycom sales representatives, Asterisk solution providers, ITSPs and basic end-users about the value and benefits it supplies to them and their customers. Over and over we hear how much people love InGenius Connector and how well it integrates with their Outlook contacts, and Active Directory or LDAP directory. Users just can’t get over the cool Google search functions and how easy the application is to install and use. Once a person starts using InGenius Connector, they really wonder how the ever got along with out it. If you plan on attending ITExpo East please stop by booth 512 and we will be happy to give you a demo of InGenius Connector.
The World is Just One Click Away with InGenius Connector
We are at BroadSoft Connections 2009 and we are very happy to introduce InGenius Connector as a fully supported application for the BroadSoft Network.
Combine the power of the Microsoft®, the power of Google®, and the power of Broadsoft to accelerate and simplify all your phone communications with InGenius Connector. InGenius Connector is a PC application that provides click-to-dial capabilities and incoming caller ID screen pop, with full BroadSoft Directory, Microsoft® Outlook® and Active Directory® or LDAP Directory integration. And, InGenius Connector provides integrated web searches with GoogleMaps® and GoogleSearch® to locate and dial new contacts with just a single click. Integrated optional softphone, same great UI!
If you are at BroadSoft Connections we would be happy to give you a demo. Stop by booth 41 and talk with our CEO Dale Gantous, or our CTO Rich Loen. Click here to see a video of InGenius Connector in action!
Enhanced hotel guest experience with Application Builder for Mitel phones!
Have you ever been to the hotel and needed to rent a car, look for a restaurant, wanted to contact the hotel’s spa, or just needed more towels? Of course you have, but how many times did you have to flip through a huge hotel binder, call the front desk or open your lap top to find what you were looking for? Imagine you go to a hotel and everything you are looking for is already programmed into the hotel’s phone. All you have to do is push a button and menus for car rental businesses, local restaurants, hotel spa services, and housekeeping are all there and waiting to be accessed. Well, this is exactly what InGenius Application Builder was designed to provide! It’s super easy to use and gives you all the amenities you require at the touch of a button. What is really cool about this application is that you can also choose from a variety of languages. If you are in France but don’t speak French, you’ll have no worries if the Mitel phone in the hotel has Application Builder. By the time you get to your room the French phone menu could automatically be switched to English or it could offer you a language menu so that you could choose to have it display English instead of French. This would be a really great application for any hotel wanting to provide their guests with better customer service and a better all round experience.
Apple Store opening in Ottawa!
I received an email from Apple yesterday announcing the grand opening of the Ottawa Apple store!
Hurry down to the Rideau Center at 9:30 am Saturday July 18th for the Grand Opening! Free T-Shirts for the first 1000 people there!
Email from Apple re Apple Store Ottawa
Pogoplug looks pretty cool! Terrabytes of data when you’re on the go!
Looks like Pogoplug is now shipping. It’s a cool $99 device that plugs into your home or office LAN, and has a USB port for a USB Disk drive – or a bunch of USB drives. You access your data through a password protected web page – and can upload or download files. An easy way to make a bunch of data accessible over the Internet – to computers or even your iPhone!
Apparently there is some sort of plug-in architecture where Pogoplug will be extending the functionality of the unit over time.
We are trying to buy one to play with – but shipping charges to Canada being roughly $50, we’re holding off for a bit until we’re on a trip to the US and can get it shipped to our hotel.
Looks pretty cool though – check ‘em out!
Balsamiq Mockups is a great design tool!
A few weeks back I noticed that Alec Saunders had some great things to say about Balsamiq Mockups, a UI design tool that makes it very easy to create mockups of web and PC user interfaces. We had a big web redesign coming up, so I decided to take Balsamiq for a spin…
The app is built using Adobe Air, which means it is cross-platform and works great on both Windows and OS X. Installation is painless on both platforms. And, it really opened my eyes to the power of Adobe Air (I had pretty much thought all it could do was host web pages outside a browser…)
The app is a riot to use. There’s a large ribbon across the top that contains all the UI elements you can use. Drag ‘em onto the canvas, and build a UI in a few minutes.
One of the app’s features is a hand-drawn look – which means you can avoid focussing on the nitty gritty details of the design, and instead get the overall layout right. You don’t spend hours wasting time on pixel by pixel spacing, and whether some text should be bold, or a different font. It’s like you’re working with a talented artist who can throw together really great sketches very quickly.
And, the app is smart too. The table layout tool is particularly nice – you just type a few rows of text, and it automatically lays it out in a nice table – and automatically converts things like [ ] into checkboxes. Nice.
The app is keyboard friendly as well. It’s not obvious, but there are plenty of keyboard shortcuts such as typing “/” to get to a text box where you can simply type the name of the UI element you want added to the page.
The developer is extremely responsive to user requests, making extensive use of the GetSatisfaction.com site for user suggestions, soliciting advice for how to implement new features, and responding to any issues.
The app is missing a few things, though enhancements are in progress… The app can’t save “projects” of multiple pages. You have to load each page of your design one at a time (although multiple pages can be viewed in the tabbed interface). You can’t add links or automation to your pages – so clicking on things never actually jumps to the new page (like working with a real paper mockup, you just flip to the next page), and you can’t add your own custom elements to pages. One feature I’d like to see is some UI elements for iPhone applications. Many of these features are in development now.
Balsamiq Mockups is a highly recommended application!
Blog Blazers – How to blog, and what to expect if you do!
Our friend Stephane Grenier has just finished writing a new book “BLOG Blazers” in which he interviews 40 well known bloggers – asking an interesting series of questions of each blogger.
My favorite question: What was your most successful blog post ever? – It’s very interesting to read everyone’s responses to this question, and to remember reading some of those posts in the past.
Stephane has managed to interview some really huge names: Seth Godin, Manolo Blahnik, Jeff Atwood (Coding Horror), DanLyons (Fake Steve Jobs), and Alex Papadimoulis (Daily WTF) – Stephane even manages to interview himself!!!
You can buy the book directly from Stephane, or you can find it on Amazon…
Congratulations Stephane! It’s a great book.
Review: Griffin iTrip AutoPilot
I picked up an Griffin iTrip AutoPilot FM Transmitter
Turns out the device has a few issues:
- Biggest complaint: It absolutely SUCKS at transmitting audio to the FM radio in the car. The signal is WEAK WEAK. And, if you drive for over a mile or two, all of a sudden, the signal is lost as new, more powerful stations come in. Even though the new stations are very far away. Basically, you will hear TONS OF STATIC all day long on this thing.
- Terrible search function – could be European model? It has a built-in search function which is supposed to find an empty channel. It does, but does it poorly. The channels it finds to broadcast on are NOT the default channels used in Canada. It wouldn’t surprise me if Griffin was selling us a European version of the device since we’re in far away Canada, clearly a European country…
- The device doesn’t remember the last channel it was broadcasting on. So, every time I hop in the car, I have to reset it to the station I want to use. Very annoying.
Beware of this device.
UPDATE: I contacted Griffin as suggested in a comment. Explained the issues – and a new iTrip is on its way. They agreed that it appears that Roger’s (The Canadian iPhone carrier) stores are carrying the European version of the iTrip (at least they were when I bought). So, check this out before you buy. I don’t know how to tell the difference, except that the European version finds stations on even numbers, not odd (ie, 106.2, not 106.1), and does not save the transmit frequency when power is lost. Further updates when the new unit arrives. So far, excellent service from Griffin.
UPDATE 2: Received the new device from Griffin, and many of the issues are fixed. The unit now searches better, and remembers the last station it was tuned to. This makes it MUCH more functional. However, I still have problems with the transmit power. I understand it’s transmitting at the maximum allowed power, but something in the design is not working. I’ve tried the device on 3 different cars, and in each I’ve had to hang the iPhone over the rear view mirror by its wire in order to get a consistent usable signal strength. If the device is simply sitting between the front seats in the car, or is on the floor, the radio can’t pick up its signal at all. So, close, but not quite there yet.
Use your Wii controller to create an online whiteboard!
Stefan pointed out a really cool you-tube video the other day. Johnny Chung Lee has used a Wii controller to create a multi-point interactive whiteboard. The hardware is really simple. He’s simply created a couple of pens with LEDs at the tips and switches mounted on the side of the pen. He then simply points the Wii controller at a screen where a projector is displaying his PC desktop. The Wii controller connects to the PC using Bluetooth. Johnny has written some code on the PC to tie it all together, and the result is astonishing!
Check it out!
Review: Tiny, awesome Asus eee PC
I recently picked up an Asus eee PC, a tiny wonder of a PC. $399 at www.pccyber.com here in Ottawa.
The eee features:
- 7 inch screen,
- Full keyboard,
- 512Meg of RAM,
- 4Gig silicon hard disk,
- 900 MHz Intel CPU,
- 802.11g wireless
- 10/100 LAN jack
- 2 lbs
- Runs Linux,
- Ships with 40 applications, almost NONE of which I would classify as bloatware,
- 3 USB ports,
- VGA Port,
- Camera!,
- Built-in mic and speakers,
- SD Card reader,
- Can run Windows XP – ships with DVD that includes all necessary drivers.
What’s Great:
- The size. It’s awesomely small and fun.
- The weight. You can carry this everywhere.
- The apps. Great selection (Open office, Firefox, Skype, lots, lots more.)
What Sucks:
- The battery life does not appear to be the 3.5 hours that some people are reporting. I find it lasts about 1.5 hours, under normal use (browsing). So, carry the charger.
- The sleep mode (slamming the lid shut) seems to use WAY too much power. The battery drains way to quickly in this mode. I’m used to my Mac, which I NEVER power down. With the eee, I find I have to shut it down instead of closing the lid. Not too big a deal since it boots in less than 30 seconds.
- The charger is nice and small – but doesn’t appear to have the oomph to charge the machine while it’s in use. If I leave it going, and plugged in – then unplug it from the wall, it’s quite common to see the battery only at 80%. It charges fully when shut down, and plugged in.
- It doesn’t appear to remember wireless LAN’s as well as I’d like. I basically want it to automatically log onto my favorite networks at home and at work. I’m having to select the network manually right now. It appears that there are options that can make this easier, but I haven’t had time to play with that yet.
Let me tell you that this is a really amazing little PC. It’s cute, small, yet usable. I can actually recommend this PC for students, kids, and adults who aren’t married to Windows. The charger is very small (which is good, ’cause you’ll want to carry it with you…). This is a great PC that you can toss in a bag and use at hot-spots, or while travelling. A great backpacker’s PC! My co-worker Jacques dumped his Dell laptop a couple of days after buying his eee!
An ancient phone dialer application – Card Callmaker
Came across this the other day on the blogs… A really old phone dialer application where you kept a box of cards on your desk, pulled out the card, and jammed it in the machine in order to dial the number. Pretty cool and elegant actually, considering the technology of the time…
The first 100 domain names EVER!
Found a list of the first 100 domain names ever registered (here). It’s interesting to see the pickup rate increase from 85 – 87 – 87. And, interesting to see who got in there first. And, what the heck is STARGATE.COM doing there??? Where’s SEX.COM??
1. 15-Mar-1985 SYMBOLICS.COM
2. 24-Apr-1985 BBN.COM
3. 24-May-1985 THINK.COM
4. 11-Jul-1985 MCC.COM
5. 30-Sep-1985 DEC.COM
6. 07-Nov-1985 NORTHROP.COM
7. 09-Jan-1986 XEROX.COM
8. 17-Jan-1986 SRI.COM
9. 03-Mar-1986 HP.COM
10. 05-Mar-1986 BELLCORE.COM
11. 19-Mar-1986 IBM.COM
12. 19-Mar-1986 SUN.COM
13. 25-Mar-1986 INTEL.COM
14. 25-Mar-1986 TI.COM
15. 25-Apr-1986 ATT.COM
16. 08-May-1986 GMR.COM
17. 08-May-1986 TEK.COM
18. 10-Jul-1986 FMC.COM
19. 10-Jul-1986 UB.COM
20. 05-Aug-1986 BELL-ATL.COM
21. 05-Aug-1986 GE.COM
22. 05-Aug-1986 GREBYN.COM
23. 05-Aug-1986 ISC.COM
24. 05-Aug-1986 NSC.COM
25. 05-Aug-1986 STARGATE.COM
26. 02-Sep-1986 BOEING.COM
27. 18-Sep-1986 ITCORP.COM
28. 29-Sep-1986 SIEMENS.COM
29. 18-Oct-1986 PYRAMID.COM
30. 27-Oct-1986 ALPHACDC.COM
31. 27-Oct-1986 BDM.COM
32. 27-Oct-1986 FLUKE.COM
33. 27-Oct-1986 INMET.COM
34. 27-Oct-1986 KESMAI.COM
35. 7-Oct-1986 MENTOR.COM
36. 7-Oct-1986 NEC.COM
37. 27-Oct-1986 RAY.COM
38. 27-Oct-1986 ROSEMOUNT.COM
39. 27-Oct-1986 VORTEX.COM
40. 05-Nov-1986 ALCOA.COM
41. 05-Nov-1986 GTE.COM
42. 17-Nov-1986 ADOBE.COM
43. 17-Nov-1986 AMD.COM
44. 17-Nov-1986 DAS.COM
45. 17-Nov-1986 DATA-IO.COM
46. 17-Nov-1986 OCTOPUS.COM
47. 17-Nov-1986 PORTAL.COM
48. 17-Nov-1986 TELTONE.COM
49. 11-Dec-1986 3COM.COM
50. 11-Dec-1986 AMDAHL.COM
51. 11-Dec-1986 CCUR.COM
52. 11-Dec-1986 CI.COM
53. 11-Dec-1986 CONVERGENT.COM
54. 11-Dec-1986 DG.COM
55. 11-Dec-1986 PEREGRINE.COM
56. 11-Dec-1986 QUAD.COM
57. 11-Dec-1986 SQ.COM
58. 11-Dec-1986 TANDY.COM
59. 11-Dec-1986 TTI.COM
60. 11-Dec-1986 UNISYS.COM
61. 19-Jan-1987 CGI.COM
62. 19-Jan-1987 CTS.COM
63. 19-Jan-1987 SPDCC.COM
64. 19-Feb-1987 APPLE.COM
65. 04-Mar-1987 NMA.COM
66. 04-Mar-1987 PRIME.COM
67. 04-Apr-1987 PHILIPS.COM
68. 23-Apr-1987 DATACUBE.COM
69. 23-Apr-1987 KAI.COM
70. 23-Apr-1987 TIC.COM
71. 23-Apr-1987 VINE.COM
72. 30-Apr-1987 NCR.COM
73. 14-May-1987 CISCO.COM
74. 14-May-1987 RDL.COM
75. 20-May-1987 SLB.COM
76. 27-May-1987 PARCPLACE.COM
77. 27-May-1987 UTC.COM
78. 26-Jun-1987 IDE.COM
79. 09-Jul-1987 TRW.COM
80. 13-Jul-1987 UNIPRESS.COM
81. 27-Jul-1987 DUPONT.COM
82. 27-Jul-1987 LOCKHEED.COM
83. 28-Jul-1987 ROSETTA.COM
84. 18-Aug-1987 TOAD.COM
85. 31-Aug-1987 QUICK.COM
86. 03-Sep-1987 ALLIED.COM
87. 03-Sep-1987 DSC.COM
88. 03-Sep-1987 SCO.COM
89. 22-Sep-1987 GENE.COM
90. 22-Sep-1987 KCCS.COM
91. 22-Sep-1987 SPECTRA.COM
92. 22-Sep-1987 WLK.COM
93. 30-Sep-1987 MENTAT.COM
94. 14-Oct-1987 WYSE.COM
95. 02-Nov-1987 CFG.COM
96. 09-Nov-1987 MARBLE.COM
97. 16-Nov-1987 CAYMAN.COM
97. 16-Nov-1987 ENTITY.COM
99. 24-Nov-1987 KSR.COM
100. 30-Nov-1987 NYNEXST.COM
iPhone Effects: The iPhone’s influence on the telecom industry
Apple’s iPhone, whether successful or not, will have a huge influence on the telecom industry – changing cellular phones, voice and data bundles, UI / UX, hardware, software, telcos, and even reaching beyond the cellular world – right into mainstream corporate telephony where InGenius plays.
The iPhone’s UI, like all Apple UI’s is just beautiful. It brings a smile to your face when you use it, and if you are watching someone fiddle with it, you’d just have to grab the phone out of their hands and play with it. This is something that doesn’t happen to often these days – the last time I remember grabbing someone’s phone was when my friend Jacques got a Blackberry Pearl. I just HAD to try out that trackball.
The iPhone UI redefines mobile phone UI’s – it’s a complete redesign of every aspect of the UI, adding features that are intuitive, simple, and powerful.
Every mobile manufacturer HAS to have an iPhone by now – the CEO HAS to have stormed into the UI department, slammed the phone down and said “Make our phones work like this!” Which would be followed by a room full of Industrial Designers, UX experts, hardware and software engineers being excited, horrified and terrified at the prospect. I know we are!
The UI requires a ton of in-the-phone back-end infrastructure to make work – the phone needs tons of memory, a great display, a powerful CPU, a graphics library with a ton of 3D effects, and stacks and stacks of other software. This will end up being a fantastic benefit to us normal phone users – as all these software and hardware capabilities become available in phones, EVERY app on the phone will benefit, as well as third-party apps. It’s a great motivator to get decent performance out of our hand-held devices. I can’t wait to browse and use Google Maps on my mobile – at desktop speeds!
And the influence is felt in telcos as well. AT&T had to do a TON of back-end work to support the iPhone. Consider the voicemail application alone! The iPhone has a voicemail client that is very closely tied into the telco’s voicemail system – showing the user a list of voicemails on the phone, with caller ID info for each – and the ability to play voicemails in any order, and even to delete voicemails in any order. This is a HUGE barrier to entry for any telco that wants to support the iPhone – I’m sure Apple has defined an API that all the telcos and their big voicemail providers are busy implementing right now (ANOTHER reason why won’t see the iPhone in Canada any time soon…)
Hopefully the telco’s web sites will be improved as well. I remember how excited I was to get my first camera phone – a Samsung from Bell Canada. Then, I snapped my first photos (before leaving the store even!), and then I discovered the horrid UI on the phone for managing the photos – and the even WORSE UI at Bell for managing photo uploads. It was a complete disaster at Bell – the site was horrible, impossible to navigate, very difficult to download photos or share them, and very very slow. Hopefully the iPhone experience will revolutionize this area as well.
And the influence of the iPhone will extend well beyond mobiles as well. You HAVE to figure that Palm, Microsoft, and every other handheld manufacturer is busy revamping their UI’s – as well as beefing up their hardware capabilities. In a year or two, all handhelds will be much faster, and have much better capabilities – way beyond the normal speed of evolution – as the manufacturers struggle to catch up, and surpass the iPhone.
And, remember that this is only V1.0 of the iPhone. Apple is busy building newer and greater applications as we speak! Of course, the iPhone will transition from the cellular network to your 802.11 wireless network when you’re at home or at work. Of course, we’ll see companies licensed to develop applications for the iPhone – I’m sure Apple is talking to a ton of it’s loyal application vendors, giving them first shot at developing cool iPhone applications. There’s a camera there waiting to be exploited – video conferencing, live VLOGing, live podcasts. And, ebooks, social networking apps, uber presence, and on. I can’t wait!
And, the iPhone is affecting us in the landline phone business as well. We’re working on some awesome home and business phone products now – and our UI designs will certainly be influenced by the iPhone. We’re already pushing the hardware people to add tons more capabilities to the hardware we work with. Our customers expect very fast UI’s, a nice user experience, colour, video, andio, etc, and we’re working to add those daily. It’s a ton of fun in every aspect of the telecom industry right now.
Thanks Apple!
Excellent Blog – and a great guy!
I’ve been an entrepreneur since high school when I was a partner in a mobile DJ company with Mitch over at Sensory Metrics. And, in the business I’m in (software development, engineering and consulting) I run into a ton of people every day.
But every now and then, you run into someone pretty impressive – who shares my ideas and ideals in software engineering and development – and who’s also doing some pretty cool entrepreneurial stuff. Stephane over at FollowSteph.com is one of those guys. He’s built a decent business selling his property management software – an app that is being used by everyone from people who own one property – to cities – to manage tons of sites.
Steph and I had a nice talk recently – covering JoelOnSoftware.com, development environments and procedures, daily builds, Story-based development, Subversion, and on and on. Where I’m normally the mentor in such things, I kept having to run over to my PC to make notes about some of the cool technologies Steph was recommending (NSIS, CruiseControl). I even found that one of the reviews of a Help Desk package (HelpSpot) I’ve been considering was written by Steph!
Steph also understands the power of blogging, and has built a respectable following for his blog – following along on his entrepreneurial journey.
Check him out!
Review: Handy Backup
Handy Backup is one of those apps that you install, set up quickly and easily, and then just forget about. The application runs quietly and reliably in the background, doing the backup tasks you have assigned it.
You set the app up by choosing a backup source and destination. The source can be any drive or directory tree, and the destination can be another drive, network share, FTP, ZIP file, CD. You can set up any number of backups, and when you want them to occur.
Then, they just happen.
We’re using this software at work to backup our NAS to a hot backup disk, and to a large USB drive we swap out every day or two.
I’m using it at home to backup my main PC’s contents to a large USB drive.
I’ve tried lots of other backup software – I’ve even owned a data backup and restore company!, but this software is the easiest and most reliable I’ve ever used.
The one problem: It doesn’t work on macs…
Highly recommended.
Sony Reader (PRS-500) Review
While we were down in Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago I picked up a Sony PRS-500 Reader. I’ve been wondering about these for quite some time now – wondering if it can really be used as a replacement for a real book – wondering what its
The reader comes with a cover, and USB cable to connect to a PC, as well as a charger.
What’s good?
It is a really well built, fine piece of electronics.
The screen really is good – you can basically read off this screen just like paper (sort of like reading a magazine printed on non-glossy, pulp type paper. I’ve used it indoors, outdoors, on planes, at night with a book-light, and it’s been easy to read at all times.
It’s NOT backlit – so you have to get into the mindset that this thing really is a replacement for a book. You don’t expect books to be backlit… It works OK with the three models of booklight I’ve tried it with.
The menus and UI are OK. I’d really like some more feedback as to where you are in a book, something more visual than 100/932.
It is really cool to carry around dozens or hundreds of books at once. I tend to flip between reading that I *should* do for work, and reading purely for enjoyment – it’s nice to have a bunch of content with me. It is REALLY nice not to have to lug around hard-cover books!
What Sucks?
The web site and application that you use to load books onto the device really suck. It’s SLOW, poorly designed, and lacking in content. Why don’t people who run sites like this simply sit down in front of Amazon or iTunes and figure out what these people do right, and copy it?
YOU CAN’T BUY BOOKS WITH A CANADIAN CREDIT CARD. This REALLY sucks. I’m faced with getting my friends in the US to load up my account with $$$ – and then sending them money – or trying to get a US credit card, or a single use card or some other contortion. I’m sure there are all kinds of licensing reasons for this, but still, this ain’t no iTunes.
It’s slightly odd the way the screen refreshes. The e-ink that’s used has an extremely slow refresh time, so you can’t do anything really interactive like a mouse cursor. The UI accommodates this quite well.
Update: I tried plugging the reader into my MacBook Pro – the Mac detects it, the reader goes into “USB” mode – but the reader does NOT show up as a device in the file system. You can see the device in the USB Device Tree – but you can’t copy files to or from the device. Rats again Sony.
Tips and Tricks
Right now, there’s a $150 “special” on for the device. You’re allowed to purchase $50 worth of new books, and $100 worth of “classics” – which is 50 public domain type OLD books. This allowed me to load up the device with content – without a US credit card. I just entered a 90210 address…
Update: I’m having a friend in the ‘States sign up on the Connect.Com web site – and send me gift certificates. I think this will be the easiest way to get content into the device from the Sony store.
You can get content from sources such as FictionWise – choose the non-DRM’d content in PDF format and you’re OK. If there’s a choice, choose the largest font size PDF. So, I should be OK for content till I get the credit card business figured out…
I’ll keep using it over the next few months and report back!
Update Aug 31, 2007: I’ve read a number of books using the device now, and I’m still happy with it. It is so nice to not have to read and travel with a heavy book. It works great with booklights for spousal happiness. I still wish I could get newer books through the Sony Connect service…
