Rob Chartier ~ Contemplation...

Social Networking & Contact Management

Given the fact that we have been at this technology thing for quite a long time now, shouldn’t we have solved something as simple as the most basic need of contact management?  Social networking sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. bring us one step further, but there still is a major need missing. 

The only glimpse of this sort of “feature” would be tools like Fonebook, which essentially scrape your contacts from Facebook and add/update your local address book.  I have it set for daily scraping, which seems sufficient for now. 

Whenever any of my contacts update their personal information it will be scraped down into my address book and updated.  Since I’m using a WM6 device this Address Book is pushed out to that device as well. 

Hopefully Fonebook starts to extend their tool to include event/calendar information as well.

Hey Microsoft, make it easier for us to adopt home.live.com...

Having Google.ca as my home page was a good experience for me, because it was minimal and contained no ads (other than the few google spewed out on occasion).

So my recommendation to Microsoft is to avoid placing ads on a URL where you need to have the greatest adoption for the product line to succeed.

Whats on your Windows Mobile Device?

I have been spending a bit of time in the WM6.1 world with my new HTC Touch Pro device and I must say it’s a great experience.  Once you get into this space you will soon notice a plethora of applications, good, bad and ugly.  So my question to you, is what’s on your device?

Here is my good list:

HTC TouchFlo3D Interface 

non-typical WM Today screen

http://www.htc.com/www/product/touchpro/touchflo-3d.html 

Gotta love it when its raining!

Advanced Config

            Good for quick tweaks to the UI

http://www.touchxperience.com/en/advanced-configuration-tool/downloads.html

HTC Touch Pro branded Dialer and Calculator

            Nice and slick black

            http://forum.xda-developers.com/

CorePlayer

             Great codec support

http://www.coreplayer.com/

Diamond Cubes and Hologram

more for the wow factor – friends and colleagues

http://wmpoweruser.com/?p=1111

http://www.freewarepocketpc.net/ppc-download-diamond-hologram.html

Diamond TF3D Config

            More tweaks..

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=405749

Fake Call

Just in case…

http://www.trinketsoftware.com/FakeCall/

TomTom Mobile

                I still struggle to get the internal GPS on my device to work properly, but when it was up, TomTom was a real nice to have.

                http://www.tomtom.com/products/product.php?ID=260&Category=2&Lid=1

G-Light

                Auto adjust the backlight based on ambient lighting

http://gadgetmix.com/index/?p=1109

MyMobiler

            Great for desktop control, screen shots, etc..

http://lifehacker.com/398304/mymobiler-controls-windows-mobile-from-your-desktop

Live Mesh

Even though its broken right now

I think MSFT’s latest patch broke my account

http://www.wmexperts.com/articles/live_mesh_mobile_client_fixed.html

http://www.mesh.com

Reboot

                Force reboot or shutdown of the device.  It just seems much cleaner to me

Seismo

                Works well with the G-Sensor in my device.  More for the wow-factor though.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=426591

SensorLock

                Great utility to automatically lock and unlock the device, using the G-Sensor

                http://sensorlock.sourceforge.net/

WiFiFoFum2

                If/when my GPS is functional, handy for that time when you just need a wifi connection…

http://www.aspecto-software.com/rw/applications/wififofum/index.html

WorldCard Mobile

                I highly recommended app for business card scanning into your address book.  It works great.

                http://store.penpowerinc.com/mobile.html

On the desktop, be sure to install CeRegEditor from http://ceregeditor.mdsoft.pl/.  A must have for all your device registry tweaking.