[Cialug] OT: Best phone for the geek

[Matthew Nuzum]

On Mon, Mar 3, 2008 at 4:25 PM,  <jrnosee at gmail.com> wrote:
> My current cell plan is about up and my wife, by some miracle is telling me
> I *SHOULD* get a PDA phone (she never wants me to spend money on tech).  I
> have never liked GSM when I've tried it so unless someone wants to convince
> me ATT & Tmobile are off my list.  What provider/phone does everyone
> suggest?  I'm looking at the HTC Mogul from Sprint right now on the SERO
> program (1250 min and unlimited txt/data for $49.99/mo).  I'd prefer Windows
> Mobile, since that's what I have now on my regular PDA.

Here's a slightly related note from Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox article
that came in the e-mail today. Jakob is a usability specialist.

> iPHONE USABILITY STUDY
>
> The Swedish usability firm inUse has conducted a competitive usability
> test of the iPhone and 3 traditional phones that are operated by pressing
> buttons and function keys. (Simple through medium-complexity phone
> tasks were tested, ranging from "place a call" to "take a photo and send
> to a person in the address book". No truly high-end mobile tasks were
> tested, such as connecting to an enterprise-level sales force automation
> backend to update a customer's order status.)
>
> The iPhone had the highest usability in the study, in terms of users'
> ability to complete the test tasks. Also, participants' subjective
> preferences were in favor of the iPhone.
>
> The biggest difference between the iPhone and the traditional mobile UI
> devices came from the DIRECT MANIPULATION employed on the iPhone: you
> press the thing you want. In contrast, other phones use INDIRECT
> manipulation where you press various function keys to make things happen
> on the screen.
>
> The difference is similar to that between a graphical user interface (GUI)
> with a mouse and a traditional character-driven UI where you push function
> keys that are divorced from the objects on the screen that they operate
> on.
>
> Thus, I like to say that the iPhone is the "Macintosh" of mobile, because
> it's the first mainstream direct manipulation UI with an interaction style
> similar to a mouse-driven GUI. Other phones are the "DOS" of mobile user
> experience, because they rely on keystrokes.
>
> Of course, what we really need is the "Windows" of mobile: something cheap
> with a boatload of 3rd party applications and the freedom to connect to
> any carrier. (Note that Windows Mobile is not the "Windows of mobile",
> because current phones with this OS use indirect manipulation.)
>



-- 
Matthew Nuzum
newz2000 on freenode