A Thing of Beauty
Given the diversity (and temperament) of the customers we serve, I don't normally do product plugs. But having just used (not just installed - I said used) Google Maps on my new Blackberry Pearl mobile handset, I have only one thing to say.
The grace with which it works comes close to a religious experience.
Posted on 08:12PM Mar 18, 2007 | Comments[21]
Share this post
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted by Jesse Kuhnert on March 18, 2007 at 08:31 PM PDT #
It would seem now that handheld devices are becoming considerably more powerful, the need to tie oneself to a desk & PC is diminishing. Could it be that the usefullness & useablity of handhelds can displace PC's?
Can't wait for roll out screens, or some other solution to provide more screen realestate for ultraportables / handhelds :)
Peter
Posted by Peter on March 19, 2007 at 04:57 AM PDT #
Posted by mika on March 19, 2007 at 07:13 AM PDT #
Posted by Jay Edwards on March 19, 2007 at 07:44 AM PDT #
There is a lesson in google maps for Sun, I think. Google maps is a really good example of a service provided over the net to people. And it's good mostly not because it's clever but because it actually works: they can get the data to you fast enough for it to be usable, and they can do it all the time. Google are really good at network services.
Now look at a couple of services Sun provide: sunsolve and docs.sun.com. I probably don't need to tell you the problems with them (if I do, then the first hit for "tim bradshaw sunsolve" on google will give you some idea of just some of the problems). These things suck, frankly.
Now, of course, Sun are not in the business of public-facing network services the way google are. But my guess is that you would quite like to be selling stuff to people who are in that business. One of the ways they decide whether to buy Sun's kit/software/services is how well Sun can do this stuff. And the answer at present is "not very well".
Of course, the reason for the grottiness is not anything to do with Solaris, or Sun kit: only a fool would think that. But, well, there are lots of fools. And even for the non-fools, Sun's inability to deliver this stuff does not bode well for their ability to understand and support what their customers are trying to achieve.
I think you need to make these things work better. I know it's not as easy as it looks (I've worked for large e-commerce places and watched the horror from the inside), but it's not *that* hard, and there's a lot of experience doing this stuff out there by now.
Posted by Tim Bradshaw on March 19, 2007 at 09:38 AM PDT #
Posted by Ed Dodds on March 19, 2007 at 10:25 AM PDT #
Posted by Jim H on March 19, 2007 at 11:28 AM PDT #
Posted by Jimmy Lin on March 19, 2007 at 02:16 PM PDT #
Posted by an. on March 19, 2007 at 03:52 PM PDT #
Posted by Mark on March 19, 2007 at 05:31 PM PDT #
Posted by Mark Edwards on March 19, 2007 at 06:35 PM PDT #
Posted by Zoltan Farkas on March 20, 2007 at 09:47 AM PDT #
Posted by Ben Pintilie on March 20, 2007 at 10:18 AM PDT #
as others have mentioned: Welcome to the Google Maps World: I have that on my Palm Treo 650 for more then five months now. And I still love it: Read more...
It's even supposed to run on nearly every Java Enabled Mobile Phone, just go to http://www.google.com/gmm/ from your webbrowser on your mobile phone, and install it directly from there. Very convenient!
Still, I'm curious, are you using Push-Email on the Blackberry, or "Pull Email", as we tend to use inside Sun (for security reasons!)? Or what was the reason to select the BlackBerry as the mobile device of choice?
Matthias
Posted by Matthias Pfützner on March 20, 2007 at 10:37 AM PDT #
Posted by Jim H on March 20, 2007 at 03:35 PM PDT #
Posted by numpty on March 20, 2007 at 05:28 PM PDT #
Posted by Will on March 20, 2007 at 06:16 PM PDT #
Posted by WhatNeedsToBeDone on March 21, 2007 at 11:36 AM PDT #
Posted by Anonymous on March 22, 2007 at 12:24 AM PDT #
Posted by Antoine on March 22, 2007 at 04:21 AM PDT #
Posted by Matt Linden on March 22, 2007 at 07:30 AM PDT #