Mobility Site » Gil Bouhnick

iPhone vs. Android vs. WinMo vs. WebOS vs. BlackBerry – Fight!

Gil Bouhnick — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 09:24:05 +0000

Few months ago I wrote a provocative post comparing between different smartphones OS.

After getting hammered (pretty nicely I would say) by a lot of Google fans out there (but not only), furious about their little baby not winning the kindergarten contest, and after almost a year has passed, in which many have changed, I’ve decided to try again…

(Oh boy… here we go…)

So what’s different this year? A lot:
Two new significant releases of Android, one new version of iPhone OS, some updates to webOS, one Windows Mobile 6.5, and a lot of features, comparisons, social networks, app stores, devices and more.

(...) Read the rest of iPhone vs. Android vs. WinMo vs. WebOS vs. BlackBerry – Fight! (2,279 words)

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Android Will Bypass iPhone By 2012, Says Gartner.

Gil Bouhnick — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 09:29:02 +0000

From the very beginning we knew Google’s Android is going to be something big. Google, open source, cloud, a long list of devices manufacturers supporting this effort – it cannot go wrong.

The first version did not make us too excited (but made others too excited…) but the “cupcake” version (1.5) was much better, and then came a few really good handsets as well.

Gartner Inc. predicts that the Android will make the highest jump in the next 2 years, surging from 2% market-share today to 14% of the global smartphone market in 2012.

Gartner forecasts that Android will actually rank second globally, behind the Symbian OS, (which by the way will continue to fall from more than 50% to 39%) in 2012.

The reasons, according to Gartner, are Google’s great support for this OS, the range of cloud computing functions, the fact that it’s an open source, and of course the manufacturers behind the OS which according to Gartner are expected to release around 40 Android models in 2010, many of them with the new OS version (code-named Donut).

The Triandroids are coming! (We said it long time ago!)

Another interesting point (which I tend to agree with) is that while iPhone is clearly focused on applications, games, entertainment, and Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, and Symbian are focused on productivity and tasks, the Android has a nice mixture which somehow manages to grab both areas.

The complete Gartner forecast for smartphones in 2012:

- Symbian: 203 million devices sold (39% of the market)
- Android: 76 million units sold (14.5% of the market)
- iPhone: 71.5 million devices in 2012 (13.7% market share)
- Windows Mobile: 66.8 million units sold (12.8% of the market)
- BlackBerry OS: 65.25 million devices (12.5% market share)
- Various Linux devices: 28 million units (5.4% market share)
- Palm’s new webOS: 11 million units (2.1% of the market)

Surprisingly, BlackBerry seems to move down from second place to fifth, while Android will take over the second place by storm (hmm… wrong term… Storm).

Gartner have made their bets (and I’m in), what are yours?

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No Windows Mobile for you! Says Palm.

Gil Bouhnick — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 22:33:01 +0000

Well, that’s it people. Palm/Windows Mobile fans out there – there will be no more Palm devices running Windows Mobile.

For me, those are sad news. Palm Treo 750 was my favorite WinMo phone, and the one I kept for the longest period as well. In addition, I still haven’t managed to put my hands on the latest Palm Treo Pro.

For Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein – all of my problems are not so relevant. In Palm’s earnings call he said that Palm will not develop new devices running Microsoft’s Windows Mobile platform. The company will invest all of its effort on its new WebOS platform.

Palm just announced it’s results for Q1 with $2.8m profit on $68m revenue, making their comeback look solid.

Palm Pre – I’m coming to get you!

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The Truth About The BlackBerry Bold

Gil Bouhnick — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 22:30:37 +0000

Midnight.

The streets are empty.
In this part of town, even the cats are hiding.
You can hear the sounds of the winds, something is coming!

Suddenly a flash!
A red light, indicating just one thing:

‘It’ is here…

(...) Read the rest of The Truth About The BlackBerry Bold (1,346 words)

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BlackBerry Bold vs. iPhone

Gil Bouhnick — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 17:17:02 +0000

(Image taken from The iPhone Blog)

I found an interesting article at PCWorld, comparing between BlackBerry Bold and iPhone 3GS.

The writer is definitely an iPhone fan and seems to criticize most of the BlackBerry features (UI, trackball, mails functionality, keyboard).

I found some interesting points in the article, but I have to admit I do not agree with many of them (I do agree with some). For example, I actually like the BlackBerry emails application, I also love the keyboard, and think that the trackball is great.

I do think that there is no comparison with the iPhone when it comes to user interface and third party applications.

(...) Read the rest of BlackBerry Bold vs. iPhone (227 words)

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Samsung Omnia II Emulator

Gil Bouhnick — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 22:23:25 +0000

Samsung, following the recent trend, has come up with a nice simulator of the new Omnia user interface.

I like those things as it gives a good impression of one of the most important things in an advance mobile device – the user interface experience.

Check our the emulator in here.

First impression: Like in the previous Omnia – loud’s of customizations, but a nicer layout (iPhone style pages, shortcuts, and widgets), nice black theme (also in the standard applications!), more custom apps – and they are looking very good I must say.

OK I Will have 3 of those please…

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Android based phone by… Nokia?

Gil Bouhnick — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 16:21:48 +0000

Can it be that Nokia has finally realized nothing good can happen by sticking with the old Symbian OS and is now looking for other alternatives?

Not sure, but according to this report, Nokia is already working on an Android based smartphone.

The new touchscreen device will be unveiled at the Nokia World conference in September, say industry insiders, as the Finnish handset giant tries to revive its fortunes in the smartphone market.

Hmm, another Android based phone by a leading mobile company. I’ve just read the Sony Ericsson news… Things are definitely working according to Google’s plan to concur the world! err… mobile industry… (they said 18, and I’m still counting)

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Introducing HTC TouchFlo 3D 2.5

Gil Bouhnick — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 20:35:42 +0000

You have probably already seen the news about the new HTC device called the FireStone.

So apparently this device will come with a new version of TouchFlo 3D, newer than the one installed on Diamond II and Touch Pro II.

There are some improvements, in the main tab, in the calendar tab, widgets capabilities, and a new footprint tab which will now become standard.

There are more details in WMPowerUsers, including a cool video demonstration:

It’s nice, even though I must say the Android version of TouchFlo (the Sense…) looks more impressive…

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18 Android Phones This Year!?

Gil Bouhnick — Thu, 28 May 2009 13:55:55 +0000

I heard there will be another ‘Terminator’ movie this year but I definitely wasn’t expecting that:

According to Andy Rubin, speaking at Google I/O there 18 Android based handsets are about to be released this year (in other words – 18 different models in 7 months…)

They will come from 8-9 different manufacturers (we already know of HTC, Samsung and Lenovo), which is a huge number. That is being added to the StrategyAnalytics forecast that Android sales will grow an impressive 900% annually during 2009.

Acording to EngadgetMobile, Rubin clarified the three flavors of Android which break down as follows:

Google-free: Free to download version of Android without Google applications like Gmail or Google Calendar. Access to Android applications is at the whimsical fancy of the manufacturer.
Strings attached: Same as above but manufacturers sign a distribution agreement with Google and pre-install the Google applications. Of Rubin’s possible 20 phones, 12 to 14 fall into this category
The Google Experience: Phones featuring the Google logo with all Google apps installed and includes unrestricted access (neither the carrier nor handset maker can block applications they find objectionable) to the Android market. 5 or 6 of the 20, Android phone mentioned by Rubin will deliver the full Google Experience as god and Sergey designed it.

I warn you this will happen, but you didn’t listen.

I’m telling you: it’s not long before androids will be everywhere, controlling our lives, taking away our freedom!

Run while you can! Save yourselves from those evil machines!

(Or get one…)

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iPhone App: Google Analytics Client

Gil Bouhnick — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:00:25 +0000

We often talk about the huge number of useless iPhone applications like the iFart etc. But lately I managed to find a decent number of real productivity applications.

The one I like the most is Analytics. It’s an iPhone client for Google Analytics, the service that gives every young blogger or site manager a nice overview about how his site is doing.

Statistics about popular posts, number of page-views, unique readers, location of the readers, keywords, a lot of hot stuff, especially if you want to analyze how your site is doing.

(...) Read the rest of iPhone App: Google Analytics Client (88 words)

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AppStore: 1 Billion Downloads in 9 Months

Gil Bouhnick — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 10:17:45 +0000

Following the previous post with the 1 million figure, here’s something with 1 billion!

Few days ago the 1 billionth download from the Apple App Store was done, which means this number was achieved in just nine months.

The total number of applications is 35,000 at the moment (and bare in mind that there are other apps outside the app store), which is definitely an amazing number.

(I tried to see how many of those icons actually exist on my iPhone and found quite a few…)

What about Windows Mobile?

The OS which exists for more than 9 years and had the title of having the largest number of applications has, according to a report that was published few months ago, around 20,000 applications.

If those numbers are true, than the iPhone knocked off nine years of Windows Mobile applications in just nine months. How symbolic.

On the other hand, since there’s no centralized store for Windows Mobile, it may be that there are far more applications and mainly freewares which probably were not counted in the report.

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Looking for a nice theme? Came to the right place!

Gil Bouhnick — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 11:35:10 +0000

Over the past few weeks I’ve been collecting some nice themes for Windows Mobile. Well, mainly for TouchFlo and SPB Mobile Shell, but I believe that for most of us – those are the real WinMo shell alternatives.

I thought it would be a good idea to place some of them in one single post:

We will start with a great looking TF3D themes collection by JAMILU007.

If you like it, head over to this thread or this one and refresh your phone look & feel a little bit.
If you cannot access the site, here are some links to the English version:
Neon Blue Skin Action Screen HERE.
Neon Red Skin Action Screen HERE.
Neon Green Skin Action Screen HERE.
Neon Orange Skin Action Screen HERE.

ChangeSkin is a totally cool themes switcher for SPB Mobile Shell. I’m addicted to Mobile Shell and I usually disable anything else, and now, with ChangeSkin – there’s even a way to completely change the look of it. (author’s site).

(...) Read the rest of Looking for a nice theme? Came to the right place! (159 words)

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One night stand with BlackBerry Storm

Gil Bouhnick — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 08:28:18 +0000

A friend of mine was kind enough to loan me his brand new BlackBerry Storm for the night, which of course, turned it into a long night…

Here’s my impression of it:

The Storm is a beautiful device. I like most of the recent phone designs by RIM, but this one reminded me of the great Touch HD and has a full touch screen which makes it more sexy. This is RIM’s first touch screen device and I assume it was not easy for them to turn their OS UI into a completely finger friendly UI – but the results are quite good.

The Storm offers dual-mode functionality for world-roaming capabilities as well as EV-DO Rev, combined with GPS, a 3.2-megapixel camera, pretty responsive accelerometer and a long list of pre-installed applications, but the real highlight of this phone is the innovative touch screen.

Touch screen:
I love it. It’s different from anything I’ve ever tried so far. Here’s how it feels like:

With a normal capacitive screen, a touch means activation, even if it’s a short touch or a touch by accident. When you touch a button – it’s as if you clicked it.

RIM took the capacitive capabilities, and turned it into tactile feedback, meaning that the touched area gets highlighted (see keyboard image below), but not yet activated (you see where you are but nothing really happens).

(...) Read the rest of One night stand with BlackBerry Storm (895 words)

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Great art work done by using an iPhone drawing app called Brushes.

Gil Bouhnick — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 19:14:08 +0000

I came across Jorge Colombo’s website where he published some of his art work. Amazingly, he has a large collection of drawings he made using an iPhone application called Brushes. You heard it right. The drawings you see below are made with a finger!

Brushes is an iPhone drawing app created by Steve Sprang. I just downloaded it and it seems great indeed, but my best drawing so far was a stupid smiley…

Now back to Jorge Colombo’s work; of course I cannot place all of his amazing work here, so I allowed myself to copy just 3 of them, but believe me, there are more…

So head over to this website to see more of those amazing iPhone finger drawings.

(all images were made by Jorge Colombo)

I had to see if such application exists for Windows Mobile, and managed to find it!

The application is called Vspainter LE v1.75 and it can be downloaded from here (freeware!).

As you can see, the capabilities are not bad as well (that is, assuming you know how to paint)

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Tower Defense games, gymnastics, and one bad addiction

Gil Bouhnick — Sat, 07 Mar 2009 22:00:47 +0000

Today at the gym, while others were doing this:

I was doing this:

(playing…)

I know, it’s not exactly what you are supposed to do in a gym, but I’m addicted.

I’m addicted to tower defense games. Especially Field Runner.

If (like me few weeks ago) you never heard the term Tower Defense before, here’s some Wiki stuff:

“The goal is to try to stop enemies from crossing the map by building towers which shoot at them as they pass. Enemies and towers usually have varied abilities and costs. When an enemy is defeated the player earns money or points, which are used to buy or upgrade towers”.

I see it as a combination of a strategy game (but a very basic one) with some elements of luck and gambling.

The result is a great way to pass the time but also a horrible way to waste important time.

In any event, here’s some of the games I like under this genre:

(...) Read the rest of Tower Defense games, gymnastics, and one bad addiction (537 words)

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