The one with the iPhones…

Well, we decided to go with the iPhone on 1 Nov 2008.  After having them now for about 5 months, I will outline my thoughts and experiences with the new gadget.  I started this post shortly after I got the phone, but I got sucked into “life” so I am catching up on my posts…

The initial comment is of course “wow, the interface is cool”.  The next comment “Now What”?

Well, the first thing I did was set up email.  I have 1 “Exchange” account (Zimbra), and 2 IMAP accounts (Gmail and a Client’s exchange).  I set up the Zimbra account to “Push” and the others poll every 15 Mins.  I really like the scrolling of the email and overall email layout.  It does take a number of gestures to switch from one account to another ( Inbox > Folder > Accounts > Choose account > folder ), not nearly as easy as the Treo (Hit the mail button), but the treo did not handle folders that well anyway.  In the folder view, it displays all folders and sub folders, so scrolling is required, and there does not seem to be any way to “shrink” the levels.  With scrolling as easy as it is, the ability to roll-up folders has not been missed.

Calendar works fine, and even displays multiple calendars in one view.  Does not show delegated (shared) calendars from Zimbra though.

Contacts also works as expected, but I did like the typing shortcuts on the Treo to more rapidly find contacts to call.  There also does not seem to be a “speed dial” but I can call my favorites with 2 clicks of the home button, a swipe (for >8th place), and a tap.  After several thousand calls I have grown accustomed to it so NBD.

Mobile Safari is an outstanding mobile browser, so no major complaints there either.  Gestures are easy and intuitive.  I do burn through the batteries, but I have been using it very heavily.  Will expect more normal use will not require twice-a-day charging.   [ed] Regular use proves that this is a “daily charge” device.

There are a couple of things I don’t like.  First, lack of a native Task application.  Sure, AppStore has a bunch, but AFAIK they don’t sync with my Zimbra tasks.  I am looking at RememberTheMilk.com (RTM), but we would like a more “integrated” solution.  RTM has both an iPhone webapp as well as a Native app, so it integrates well from the iPhone side, but not from the main PIM side.  There are a couple apps that introduce tasks in the AppStore, but do not seem to support categories (KeyTasks for Outlook, TaskData for Exchange).  As it turns out, we looked at both RTM and Toodledo, and liked the sharing features of RTM (Pro = $25/yr) the best.  V uses the RTM iPhone app, I prefer the Todo app’s interface better ($10).

Next thing I did was Jailbreak my phone for many reasons, the main being tethering (phone as modem, using PDANet - $30).  Not as fast as EVDOrevA, but serviceable.  EDGE is really at the edge of usability.  Usual info gathering and SSH sessions work fine, of course email works as long as no big attachments are needed/sent, even RDP in some cases.  3G is usable for much heavier use, but still not the “broadband” one is accustomed to.

Other gains from Jailbraking: Backgrounding (Backgrounder), Notification Icons and recurring alerts (Reminder), FiveIconDock, MailSearch, Local Terminal, SSH/SSHd, and Finder.  I like the plain black WinterBoard theme with transparent/nolabel dock.  Pandora works fine when backgrounded so that overcomes most annoying thing with “streaming” app, the ability to run in the background like the iPod app does.

The ATT service has not been overwhelming.  There has been any number of dropped calls, weak service, and other nonsense that I did not experience with Sprint.  I have been a number of places that had particularly bad service, some with reasonable service.  Without the iPhone, I would’ve kept Sprint.  Apparently, “More Bars in More Places”  just means that you’ll be looking for somewhere to drink since you can’t talk to anybody on your phone.

Do not like iTunes (the app, the online store is ok) at all.  Having to connect to the software via a USB cable, when Wifi (even Bluetooth sync like the Treo) exists is straight backward.  Don’t even get me started on the iTunes “shared” library concept, as well as “media management”.  The iPhone is as much a user endpoint as a PC or Netbook, but it is still relegated to “peripheral” since it cannot function autonomously (without a PC “mother ship” to sync to).

Overall, even without Cut&Paste and the other idioms of the big Apple, along with the not so good ATT service, I still love the device.

This entry was posted on Sun, Mar 29 2009 at 08:40 and is filed under ExRat Progess, John's Ramblings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.