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Update from the Front Lines: Palm, Android, and Other Platforms

February 25, 2009 by Marc

Although iPhone, Windows Mobile, and BlackBerry get the most attention around here lately, we keep a close watch on the other mobile platforms. Personally, I think this is an exceptionally exciting time for our industry. The smartphone (which frankly is just an old school PDA with a phone built in) has really come into its own. People really care about these devices, and more and more people feel like they have to have one!

As an example of how much a part of the public conciousness these devices have become, I offer up the latest “cardboard drink cozies” from Starbucks - you know, those little cardboard sleeves that keep you from burning the skin off your hand when you get your drink. Their most recent sleeve has the following statement on it:

The only handheld device you’ll ever need.

This might not seem like a big deal to most folks, but to me it’s huge. Three, even two years ago, when people asked me what I did I’d say “We write software for handheld devices.” The answer was invariably “For handheld what?” Most people didn’t know what the heck a “handheld device” was. But just a few years later, the term is so common place that Starbucks can use it without explanation.

With my long winded intro complete, I’m going to take a few minutes today to talk about these other platforms and share my opinions of them. If you’re interested, read on after the jump!

Palm Is Dead, Long Live Palm!

I’ll start with Palm since they’re getting a lot of press lately. Obviously Palm OS has struggled for the past couple of years. As someone so aptly pointed out on another blog, when Palm announced that they were discounting the OS, they didn’t kill Palm OS - they unplugged the life support. What does that mean for Ilium Software? Well, it probably means you aren’t going to see new versions of our software for Palm OS. Most Palm OS folks have either jumped to the iPhone or are planning to jump to the Pre. As a result, it’ll be a tough case to sell to my bosses that investing in Palm OS makes sense. Whatever we decide, we’ll still sell our Palm OS titles. The Centro is doing pretty well and we don’t want to leave folks hanging.

As for the Pre, I have high hopes for it. Assuming it does well and turns out to be a strong platform for software, there is a good chance we’ll support it. The biggest challenge right now is that there is SO little solid information about it. That might change with the webcast we’re attending this afternoon, but if it doesn’t we’ll be about where we were - a “wait and see and hope for a winner!” stance. Go Palm! In the meantime, when the eWallet Web Companion goes live it may prove a good solution for the Pre.

Android

I love the idea of the Android. Unfortunately, the reality has been a much smaller splash in the market than I would have hoped for. I also have concerns about some of the decisions Google has made on this one. My first concern is their store - I’m all for developer freedom, but apparently I’m the ONLY person in the world who remembers PalmGear. At one point PalmGear had tens of thousands of applications. It was an ocean of apps. You’d do a search and come up with a couple hundred results. Trying to find an app among the clutter of “basement workshop freebies” was nearly impossible. PalmGear fixed this eventually, but if the iTunes AppStore is already looking a little like this with all their restrictions, imagine a store where you remove the floodgates.

My second concern is the openness of the OS. First, OEMs can tweak the OS. That’s pretty cool for the OEM but nightmarish for developers. At Palm’s height they offered similar customization options to OEMs. We had around a dozen Palm devices and had to test every app fully on every device. We also had to buy new devices all the time. And no, emulators don’t help - they never behave exactly like the device. We were constantly fixing “device specific” bugs.

Third, as I understand it, it is relatively easy for an application to muck about with various aspects of the OS and other apps. At one point, on Pocket PC, there were some exceptionally useful applications that I call “interface altering apps”. A popular one was WisBar. Although useful, these apps fundamentally changed the way the controls on the device worked. If they didn’t make the changes properly, software written to work on the OS would run into problems when these apps altered the standard OS behavior. We were constantly explaining “No, our app is working - but your other software changed the device - our software is written for Windows Mobile, not for Windows Mobile Customized by WisBar.” I’m very concerned that Android is a breeding ground for this sort of thing and there is some evidence that this is already happening.

So like the Pre, we’re still in a wait and see mode. Also like the Pre, there is a strong chance that the eWallet Web Companion will serve as a good solution for the Android.

Symbian

I figured I would mention Symbian since we still get asked about it sometimes. The problem with Symbian is that historically, Symbian users don’t actually buy software. That’s kind of a huge show stopper for us. Again, the Web Companion does work on Symbian so for those folks who HAVE to switch over to this platform, hopefully we can give them a viable solution.

So there you have it!

More of my opinions on mobile devices than you probably wanted! Hopefully it will help folks to better understand where we stand on the different platforms, and what to expect in the future!

- Marc

App Store Survey Results

February 23, 2009 by Ellen

Results #1: How You Find Apps

The short version: OK, I’m surprised.

The longer version follows. In case you missed it, last week we posted a survey about how people use the iTunes App Store.

First, a few disclaimers. I doubt this is really a representative group. Or a big enough group to make the responses statistically believeable. My questions weren’t written or organized in such a way that we probably got the best information. You’re welcome to use the information, but it’s at your own risk.

So, with that out of the way, here are some results. I’m going to split these up over a few days, so any given post isn’t too long.

Starting with what was most interesting - and surprising - to me: how you find apps. From the 200+ people who responded:

85% said yes, you do l ook outside iTunes to find, or find out about, available apps. Only about 12% said no to that one. (Click on the graphs to see the bigger versions.)

On the question of how you find new apps, the response was very spread out (and yes, people were allowed to pick more than one option). But the most popular answer - from websites outside iTunes - got under 20%. Ads got least votes: just about 1%. Don’t tell Apple; I love seeing the App Store ads on TV, even though they don’t feature our stuff (I’d go through the ceiling if they did). Power Search, the second lowest response, got just over 3%. Here are the details:

The “other” responses included magazines, RSS feeds, specific site names, and “It’s so un-organized you cant find apps!”. It’s true. I’m hoping to write more about finding apps in the store soon.

And finally (in the Find apps questions), when asked whether you ever go to an app developer’s site, over 87% of you said yes! Only 10% said no. OK, time to work on our site.

I’ll write about what the rest of the answers were later in the week, as well as some commentary and of course the prize giveaways. Meanwhile, the survey is still open, so if you haven’t taken it yet, please do! This is really an eye-opener for me. And I’m happy to keep posting results, and giving away prizes, as long as more people respond.

And, before I forget, many thanks to everyone who participated, and who posted about the survey.

Update from the Front Lines: Windows Mobile

February 20, 2009 by Marc

Of course my news wouldn’t be complete without some updates on Windows Mobile! Due to some top secret stuff that’s underway I’m afraid that in this area I’m going to be a bit cagier than on other topics. In a nutshell, however, we do have some very cool plans for both Windows desktop and Windows Mobile.

I will say that I’m SUPER excited about Windows Mobile 6.5. Not only are the UI updates very cool, but for the past decade we’ve been begging Microsoft to take applications more seriously. With this new version of the OS they really are. I think the changes are going to be an enormous benefit to users and an equally big benefit to developers.

In fact, that’s one thing the folks at Microsoft have always been quite good about - communicating with us. Sure, every company has their moments, but overall Microsoft does a really good job of providing a good back and forth when we have questions. To see them putting such an emphasis on their Windows Mobile stuff again is really wonderful.

COMING MONDAY:

• Advisory Board Assignment #2: Windows Mobile Ideas
• Update from the Front Lines: Palm, Andriod, and Other Platforms

Update from the Front Lines: iPhone ListPro

February 20, 2009 by Marc

Next up on the news extravaganza is ListPro for iPhone. I know a lot of people are eagerly awaiting this one so I want to make sure to fill you all in as to what is happening, especially since we got so much incredible advice from the advisory board.

So if you’re one of those people who can’t wait to use ListPro on their iPhone, this post is for you. Read on after the jump!

ListPro for iPhone

This is another product that I’m very excited about. I just got a pre-alpha build and I can read (in a rough way) all my favorite lists on the iPhone now! Woo hoo! Originally, we had hired a contractor so that we could release ListPro for iPhone in August of last year. That didn’t work out. After some delays we ended up moving the project back in-house and had to completely reassess how to handle it (remember my blog posts about this?)

Based in large part on the response from you guys in the Advisory Board discussion, we’ve got a NEW, new plan for ListPro and I am very excited about it. I really think you guys are going to like it when it is finally complete. I really can’t say too much about it - when we do that people tend to make notes and run out and copy it - but I WILL say that it won’t be a reader-only app. Now exactly what it WILL do will have to remain a secret for now, but all your existing ListPro lists will work on it.

Timetable for this? Again, I’m thinking Q2-Q3 of this year. It could be soone,r but the desktop side needs some attention as well so I don’t want to underestimate that task. As a result I’m afraid I can’t get much more accurate than this yet.

Update from the Front Lines: Mac eWallet

February 20, 2009 by Marc

It’s been a little while since I last gave folks an overall update about what’s up here at Ilium Software, so I want to take am minute today to do that. I started this as a single post but as always, I got a bit wordy so I’m breaking it up. Some of it I’ll post today, some will go up on Monday.

I have couple of reasons for doing this. First, I’m extremely excited about the future of our industry and our company. There is a lot of very cool stuff to talk about. Second, one of our blog commenters - Henry - gave me some excellent advice yesterday. Based on that I want to offer you guys some news.

First up on the agenda is Mac eWallet. If you want to know more, read on after the jump…

Mac eWallet

Mac eWallet is looking great. We have the basic UI in place and I’ve gotten some VERY positive feedback from our Mac testers. Undo turned out to be a amazingly huge job but it’s coming along nicely. Sync is tricky but at this point I don’t see any reason it won’t do most of what sync does on the desktop. The devil is in the details, however. One of the reasons I had initially believed it would be out sooner is that the initial work went very quickly with clear and visible results. Unfortunately, the detail work (much of which involves making sure it works like it should rather than adding big features) is proving quite challenging.

Another thing that happened is that in the recent past we moved ListPro for iPhone in-house (I’ll talk about that below) which forced us to outsource the Mac work. Fortunately, the guys we have working on it are GREAT - but it has meant that I have to do much more detailed specs than if I handed it off to one of the folks who have been working on eWallet for years. This takes time.

At this point, I’m guessing that it will be ready around June. Yep, that’s a long time - about 6 months later than I’d planned - but I’m trying to give a conservative estimate. Part of my estimate is based on the fact that we are going to test this baby like CRAZY. It’s a VERY complicated app that never existed before on this platform - that means we need to do TONS of testing.

Needless to say we still think Mac is a great platform to write for and eWallet for Mac IS coming out. It’s just taking longer than I’d anticipated.

Password Builder added to eWallet for iPhone

February 16, 2009 by Marc

Hey, everyone! I wanted to let you know that we got word that our latest update to eWallet for iPhone has gone live in the AppStore. eWallet 6.1.4 includes our PassBuilder password generator. Now you can generate passwords for any Hidden (aka: Password) field.

The interface is as easy as ever and the new feature works great! I included a couple screenshots below so you can see how it looks. If you already own eWallet you should get the updated automatically. If you don’t own eWallet yet, what are you waiting for! Get your copy here!