I still remember when I was chairing a kick-off meeting to start a program (university program) and ask a committee to call other who still not arrive. Guess what? he is smiling and show his "muka seposen" ( stupid face) and said " sorry bang, belum topup lagi la" ( sorry brother, no credit to call). Huhuhu! really stupid funny. I was using bloody old nokia 3310 and his was the latest model at that time, O2 XDA. Thinking of my self, with a very expensive PDA, yet cannot make a single phone call. What this kind of people looking for actually. Agree or not, nowadays, a lot of student own a stylish, up-to-date, elegant and expensive mobile phone yet still cannot make a call. Huh, what a pity.
Okay, done for my band intro, but I don't wanna talk about all the human behavior inside the campus by the way, rather just to share on the Operating system that assist each of your mobile to run all the services and application required. Well, either Symbian, or Windows mobile, or even blackberry , all of these OS are running on their own platform, which means they wont have the same table to eat. Then, the question is , which one deliver the best among the best platform for mobile phone?
If we can analyze a little bit further,
" mobiles in 2007 are like computers in 1984"
So is it possible to say that the Computer technology today will be our mobile technology for the next 10 years? Calculating with arithmetic, I thing this is much plausible. Lets have a look on the mobile OS's available in the market.
Windows mobile -Slumpy giant of ignorant
Since 1990`s Microsoft drive well to penetrate into mobile OS market. Start with WinCE, the operating system stand behind windows mobile platform, they scatter into multiple main player. Namely on Handheld PC, PPC,MIRA, PULSAR, PEGASUS, WM5, WM5 media centre and the latest for Windows Mobile 6.2, undoubtedly Microsoft have tones of 'extra power root' to step more further onto this battle. Compare with other rivals, the most and greatest benefit that Microsoft has is that they are owning this mobile OS 'big brother' market, Windows OS. With that, they can easily slot huge requirement on proprietary integration between mobile phone and PC and you can see that is actually what they are doing today. Looking at the Windows mobile software, frankly speaking, if you are one of Microsoft die hard fan (with no fun), or people with anti-challenged IT legacy, or non-unthinkeable people, or even people who don`t really care about IT, it looks similar with application that you have with Windows. So, what is so special about Windows Mobile OS - The answer is none. What WinCE delivered to user is unusable and carshed out platform, which actaully like compressing the windows 95 interface into samll screen feature. It does not perform well even for the WM5.Always hang, slow performance, poor multitasking capability, poor battery life, and what I hate about is I have to use with microsoft`s software, especially Outlook. (Hehehe shuk, wak, syah, syazwan, edi, Jai better you check you phone).Thus, due to continous failure to integrate between microsoft`s fantasy and origami, they decide to come out with Ultra Mobile PC, a new double detached platform with windows NT, but minimized screen.
Apple - OS X new revolution
If you are a die hard fan of ipod or mini ipod, better you change to a new stylish apple product, Iphone (ni tepon kegemaran abu @ aeab). It works similar to Ipod, the only different is that you can make a phone call while you are having all Ipod feature. I would like to say that Iphone is new evolution of mobile phone technology. If Microsoft fail to carry their successful Windows NT technology into their mobile platform, Apple is otherwise. It share the same common from the Mac desktop version, both carry the same NeXT`s Mac/BSD kernel. Iphone is not just a simply standalone hardware device. Like I have said, it is an Ipod, and the main player is iTunes. Integration with iTune provide variety of advantageous in area of sync, software installation , music management, and simplicity. The fastest browsing speed with safari give uses the real experience when bowsing the "mini internet".But, there is some area that apple need to concern about. As I hate the virtual keyboard on PDA`s, same goes to Iphone too. The keys are too close to each other, more often than not you will type in a worng letter. This quite frustrating. Iphone have document editor, but it too simple, even it does not have copy/paste feature. Besides, the speaker also not so loud during phone ringing (need additional ext. sub-woofer to make it works great).
Symbian - Mobile OS leader and still become a leader.
If you talk about symbian OS, then nokia come out, ericsson come out. What is Symbian? Do you know that Symbian is actually a'cousin' of apple and linux?. Symbian evolve from the great great grandfather of OS, UNIX.The difference between symbian, Windows mobile, and Iphone OS X is that it is own by a phone company, nokia and the rest two owned by computer company.is it fair to compare?. It`s primary purpose is to serve the mobile application and here it is right now. This mobile covers around 75.6% of the world mobile population today. What a huge fan. Symbian platform is created based on EPOC architecture, which mainly based on C++ programming language. Differ with others, it run on two nokia platform; S60, and S80 (hahaha..sound like volvo series). . S60 is normally for the nokia smartphone, sony-ericsson PDAs, and used to be on motorola PDA.two major component for S60; security and performance. This platform offers high security level compare with other two and huge memory resources, which drive the application to works faster even in multitasking environment. While S80 will become a legend for communicator community since nokia decide to proceed the new nokia E90 with S6o platform. The only worry about the symbian is that the uncertainty about its future prospect. Whether it will become giant mobile market leader with Nokia or just having the same experience as palm OS.
Blackberry - Mobile Road Runner
This device is very focus. If you own a blackberry and you don`t what is 'push email', then you better re-sale your blackberry to lelong.com.my. Blackberry is well known for being the first wireless device concentrate on email. No one can challenge its excellent service on delivering email. While other phone company too much rely on GPRS, EDGE, 3G and HSDPA, blackberry only need any wirless network. It doesn't matter if you are in Europe, Asia, Canada, or at home, you can reach colleagues and respond to clients in real-time. Receive, read and forward email and attachments—all without lugging around a laptop or hunting for a phone jack.
BlackBerry combines Web browsing, wireless email, text messaging, calendar, contacts, tasks, and phone calls in an easy-to-use, lightweight handheld for virtually all communication needs. View attachments sent in Microsoft® Excel, PowerPoint, and Word; Adobe® Acrobat®; HTML; Corel® and WordPerfect® formats.
Get wireless email and real-time updates to your calendar while on the road. BlackBerry uses push technology, so you don't have to worry about synchronizing. Your BlackBerry receives email and appointments when you have network coverage. Best of all, your data has encryption and password protection.
Palm OS - The end of you jurney
Emm...This device I don`t know much, coz it is dying..heheheh (not much interest on it)
Conclusion
Which one you want to use? It is all up to you...
Psst: Since all other phone company has their own software.What will Samsung and LG do? The other two big mobile phone companies don't have coherent software strategies, as far as I can tell. They specialize in copying others -- Samsung copies Motorola and Nokia, while LG copies Samsung.Heheheheheheh (betul tak jai <---- LG die hard fan).
Nizam (Nik)
Test Engineer
Communication Lab, ITD
