Thursday, April 11, 2002
Mobius Europe 2002, Journal Day 2
Posted by Jason Dunn in "ARTICLE" @ 11:11 PM
Mobius Europe 2002, Journal Day 2
The morning opened with a presentation by Robbie Wright, the Director of Microsoft EMEA Mobility. He gave us an overview of Microsoft’s mobility focus, .Net, and some facts about the mobility industry. It’s a big playing field: $500 billion dollar industry with both voice and data. The carriers want to see 20+% of that money coming from data, so there’s a big incentive for them to figure out the hardware, software, and services needed to make people want wireless data.
SmartPhone Rocks the House
Next up, we had Eric Eider, Mr. SmartPhone 2002. I made a lot of point-form notes, so you’ll learn something new here…it’s really amazing the subtle elements Microsoft has been able to include in Smartphone 2002.
• The start screen for the Smartphone 2002 is an XML file that defines the data being displayed. The start screen is extensible and 3rd parties can do things with it
• Data on the SIM card is searched when you punch in a number or name
• When a contact is selected, the control pad can be moved left or right, which switches which phone number or email address you’re using
• While inside Inbox, left and right on the control pad moves from message to message
• The email view is set to start two lines down from the top, showing you who it’s from and the date, but none of the other header information. You can press up to get it.
• Inbox processes both SMS and normal email. If you want to send a message to someone with SMS and email, you can select both on the same message
• When doing a voice recording, there’s a large timer that fills the screen – great for knowing when you’ve babbled for too long
• The home screen hosts notifications. The scenario we saw was an entertainment plug-in that received data pushes from a server. When there’s new entertainment news, the home screen indicates that there’s news to be read
• Windows Media Player can’t go full screen or auto rotate the video, but instead plays the video in a small window. Media support is the same as the Pocket PC: WMV, WMA, MP3
• There’s no reset button on the phone. In order to reset the phone (I hope not very often!), you need to pull the battery off. This is similar to other phones on the market now
• WAV files are recorded in standard PCM format so any PC can play them back
• Some OEMs will create devices that have SD support
• Smartphone 2002 devices will all have Flash ROM, and the interesting thing here is that the entire file system is in ROM, just like the BE-300. All your data, your apps, settings – all in ROM.
• The phones will initially ship with around eight languages, all on ROM. The language displayed depends on the SIM. Very cool!
• There’s no backup battery, but since everything is in ROM…
• Inbox subfolder sync is supported, but moving mail from folder to folder on the Smartphone isn’t supported – you need to use the desktop to do this
• When applications are installed, they can be checked for a certificate. If a certificate is not present, the application won’t install. This allows the carrier to control distribution of applications on their device. Although I’d personally dislike having a “locked” device that I couldn’t install whatever they want on it, I can understand why some carriers would want to have this kind of control
Despite all the excellent features on the Smartphone 2002, one of the things that became obvious was that their focus is clearly on making the device an excellent companion to an Exchange server. Some of the best features don’t work with POP3 accounts, so Microsoft is really aiming for a mobile professional that uses Exchange.
Eric wrapped up by showing us Bubblets on the Smartphone 2002 and a pinball game called “The Untouchables” on the Smartphone. It was really cool to see full-motion games in colour on a phone – it’s not something I’ve seen before (you Nokia Communicator users have, but all the phones in Canada are pretty cheesy when it comes to games).
The grand finale was Eric showing a head to head game of darts. Each phone connected via GPRS to a central server, and he was able to compete head to head with another phone. The updates were completely real-time. Very cool!
So many bikes!
During lunch I went with Marlof to the train station to get tickets for the ICE train to get to CeBit. I couldn’t believe how many bikes there were! There had to be 5000 of them in this small square.
After lunch, I had a great talk with Robbie Wright about some of the concerns that small business owners have as it related to Pocket PCs. I was explaining that with broadband connections proliferating, static and semi-static IPs everywhere, a version of ActiveSync that listened on a specific IP address would open up a wealth of possibilities. It was news to him, but he was interested in some of my ranting. ;-)
Oliver Thylmann from infoSync gave a good presentation on mobile data, wireless speeds, and forthcoming technologies.
The beautiful, wonderful 02 XDA
Next up, it was Jonathan Santaub from 02 talking about the XDA. 02 has 3.2 billion pounds sterling market capitalization and 15,000 customers. Some point-form notes from his presentation:
• In other markets it won’t be called the XDA
• 650 euros with contract
• Texas Instruments radio chipset dubbed “Ulyseus”
• 02 XDA has a 1500 mAh Li-Ion battery
• 3.5 hours talk time with display on, 150 hours standby, 15 hours PDA usage, 5 hours talk time with screen off
• 12 bit colour (4096 colours)
• It can record voice calls as a WAV file
• 02 XDA has a battery pack that adds roughly 75% extra battery life
• Data retention is 50 hours when battery is dead
• Stereo headphones with hands free talk button
• 02 XDA uses a 2.5 mm jack
• Outlook 2002 should be included in the bundle, but they’re not sure.
• They’re developing a Targus keyboard for the 02 XDA
• Accessories include Serial & USB cables, cradles, leather cases, cigarette lighter power adaptor, mono headset, travel power kit (plugs)
• 02 XDA weights 200 grams
• It will be rolled out in May
I asked about whether or not they’ll have a 64 meg version with 16 bit colour – he said “possibly”. Because the 02 XDA is made by HTC, I asked about whether or not they have a dust problem. He said no, but we’ve heard that before. ;-) I wanted to ask about the speed of SD cards, but I could tell he was getting a little weary of the hardware questions – my hunch is that it’s just as slow as the iPAQ when accessing SD cards.
The 02 XDA we saw was in German, but it had a very interesting Today screen with a menu system that was part of the Today screen. Confused? It’s hard to describe, and my poor photo doesn’t help. There were “zones” that you could click on, and the zone would open a menu. It was quite good, and I hope the developer releases it to the general public (I have a hunch it was an 02 custom project however).
Where are things going?
We ended up with a wrap up presentation by Derek Brown. He talked about the “SmartPhone 2002 Reference Platform” which some people get confused about. The reference platform for the Smartphone 2002 doesn’t reference the looks of the phone (the “plastic”) – it references the ODM business model. Instead of having to partner with the top three vendors, Microsoft is betting that they can find success by helping smaller players accelerate their time to market. A company like Nokia creates the hardware, writes the software, does the testing, builds the phones, markets the product, then sells the phones. That’s a lot of work for one company! Microsoft is hoping that they can create the software platform and a reference design for companies to build off of, making it easier for companies to bring their phones to market. It’s a gamble, but I think it’s a smart gamble.
And that's it! Mobius 2002 was done. Next up CeBIT...
The morning opened with a presentation by Robbie Wright, the Director of Microsoft EMEA Mobility. He gave us an overview of Microsoft’s mobility focus, .Net, and some facts about the mobility industry. It’s a big playing field: $500 billion dollar industry with both voice and data. The carriers want to see 20+% of that money coming from data, so there’s a big incentive for them to figure out the hardware, software, and services needed to make people want wireless data.
SmartPhone Rocks the House
Next up, we had Eric Eider, Mr. SmartPhone 2002. I made a lot of point-form notes, so you’ll learn something new here…it’s really amazing the subtle elements Microsoft has been able to include in Smartphone 2002.
• The start screen for the Smartphone 2002 is an XML file that defines the data being displayed. The start screen is extensible and 3rd parties can do things with it
• Data on the SIM card is searched when you punch in a number or name
• When a contact is selected, the control pad can be moved left or right, which switches which phone number or email address you’re using
• While inside Inbox, left and right on the control pad moves from message to message
• The email view is set to start two lines down from the top, showing you who it’s from and the date, but none of the other header information. You can press up to get it.
• Inbox processes both SMS and normal email. If you want to send a message to someone with SMS and email, you can select both on the same message
• When doing a voice recording, there’s a large timer that fills the screen – great for knowing when you’ve babbled for too long
• The home screen hosts notifications. The scenario we saw was an entertainment plug-in that received data pushes from a server. When there’s new entertainment news, the home screen indicates that there’s news to be read
• Windows Media Player can’t go full screen or auto rotate the video, but instead plays the video in a small window. Media support is the same as the Pocket PC: WMV, WMA, MP3
• There’s no reset button on the phone. In order to reset the phone (I hope not very often!), you need to pull the battery off. This is similar to other phones on the market now
• WAV files are recorded in standard PCM format so any PC can play them back
• Some OEMs will create devices that have SD support
• Smartphone 2002 devices will all have Flash ROM, and the interesting thing here is that the entire file system is in ROM, just like the BE-300. All your data, your apps, settings – all in ROM.
• The phones will initially ship with around eight languages, all on ROM. The language displayed depends on the SIM. Very cool!
• There’s no backup battery, but since everything is in ROM…
• Inbox subfolder sync is supported, but moving mail from folder to folder on the Smartphone isn’t supported – you need to use the desktop to do this
• When applications are installed, they can be checked for a certificate. If a certificate is not present, the application won’t install. This allows the carrier to control distribution of applications on their device. Although I’d personally dislike having a “locked” device that I couldn’t install whatever they want on it, I can understand why some carriers would want to have this kind of control
Despite all the excellent features on the Smartphone 2002, one of the things that became obvious was that their focus is clearly on making the device an excellent companion to an Exchange server. Some of the best features don’t work with POP3 accounts, so Microsoft is really aiming for a mobile professional that uses Exchange.
Eric wrapped up by showing us Bubblets on the Smartphone 2002 and a pinball game called “The Untouchables” on the Smartphone. It was really cool to see full-motion games in colour on a phone – it’s not something I’ve seen before (you Nokia Communicator users have, but all the phones in Canada are pretty cheesy when it comes to games).
The grand finale was Eric showing a head to head game of darts. Each phone connected via GPRS to a central server, and he was able to compete head to head with another phone. The updates were completely real-time. Very cool!
So many bikes!
During lunch I went with Marlof to the train station to get tickets for the ICE train to get to CeBit. I couldn’t believe how many bikes there were! There had to be 5000 of them in this small square.
After lunch, I had a great talk with Robbie Wright about some of the concerns that small business owners have as it related to Pocket PCs. I was explaining that with broadband connections proliferating, static and semi-static IPs everywhere, a version of ActiveSync that listened on a specific IP address would open up a wealth of possibilities. It was news to him, but he was interested in some of my ranting. ;-)
Oliver Thylmann from infoSync gave a good presentation on mobile data, wireless speeds, and forthcoming technologies.
The beautiful, wonderful 02 XDA
Next up, it was Jonathan Santaub from 02 talking about the XDA. 02 has 3.2 billion pounds sterling market capitalization and 15,000 customers. Some point-form notes from his presentation:
• In other markets it won’t be called the XDA
• 650 euros with contract
• Texas Instruments radio chipset dubbed “Ulyseus”
• 02 XDA has a 1500 mAh Li-Ion battery
• 3.5 hours talk time with display on, 150 hours standby, 15 hours PDA usage, 5 hours talk time with screen off
• 12 bit colour (4096 colours)
• It can record voice calls as a WAV file
• 02 XDA has a battery pack that adds roughly 75% extra battery life
• Data retention is 50 hours when battery is dead
• Stereo headphones with hands free talk button
• 02 XDA uses a 2.5 mm jack
• Outlook 2002 should be included in the bundle, but they’re not sure.
• They’re developing a Targus keyboard for the 02 XDA
• Accessories include Serial & USB cables, cradles, leather cases, cigarette lighter power adaptor, mono headset, travel power kit (plugs)
• 02 XDA weights 200 grams
• It will be rolled out in May
I asked about whether or not they’ll have a 64 meg version with 16 bit colour – he said “possibly”. Because the 02 XDA is made by HTC, I asked about whether or not they have a dust problem. He said no, but we’ve heard that before. ;-) I wanted to ask about the speed of SD cards, but I could tell he was getting a little weary of the hardware questions – my hunch is that it’s just as slow as the iPAQ when accessing SD cards.
The 02 XDA we saw was in German, but it had a very interesting Today screen with a menu system that was part of the Today screen. Confused? It’s hard to describe, and my poor photo doesn’t help. There were “zones” that you could click on, and the zone would open a menu. It was quite good, and I hope the developer releases it to the general public (I have a hunch it was an 02 custom project however).
Where are things going?
We ended up with a wrap up presentation by Derek Brown. He talked about the “SmartPhone 2002 Reference Platform” which some people get confused about. The reference platform for the Smartphone 2002 doesn’t reference the looks of the phone (the “plastic”) – it references the ODM business model. Instead of having to partner with the top three vendors, Microsoft is betting that they can find success by helping smaller players accelerate their time to market. A company like Nokia creates the hardware, writes the software, does the testing, builds the phones, markets the product, then sells the phones. That’s a lot of work for one company! Microsoft is hoping that they can create the software platform and a reference design for companies to build off of, making it easier for companies to bring their phones to market. It’s a gamble, but I think it’s a smart gamble.
And that's it! Mobius 2002 was done. Next up CeBIT...
