Android versus WinMo - a personal experience

[dishe]

gTen, I hear what you are saying and I WANT to agree with you. But sadly, my experiences have not matched up with what you describe. And I think you've missed my point.

I'm not glued to Microsoft, for the record. I would gladly switch to ANYTHING that worked just as well. I'm also a big fan of open source and standards. However, I'm also willing to admit that sometimes open source does not work as well or offer the same features as the commercial alternatives.
Funny you should mention Funambol, I'm actually very familiar with the product (I've actually got a picture with me and the creator, Fabrizio Capobianca, at a tech conference). SyncML is a great concept. In practice, Exchange just works better and more efficiently. I tried Funambol, I ended up going back to Exchange.

Good call on the un-rar tool, btw! But if you read over my point in the first post, you'll see that I admit most of my gripes are things that will most likely come out sooner or later. But right now, those inconveniences are legitimate for anyone coming from Windows Mobile who used their phones the way I do. There are certain things I've come to expect from my handset, and while Android is catching on extremely fast, its not quite there yet.

[gTen]

Originally Posted by dishe

gTen, I hear what you are saying and I WANT to agree with you. But sadly, my experiences have not matched up with what you describe. And I think you've missed my point.

I'm not glued to Microsoft, for the record. I would gladly switch to ANYTHING that worked just as well. I used Funambol extensively (even had a correspondence with its creator, Fabrizio- I actually have a picture I took with him somewhere... heh). I was a big fan and pushed it everywhere before I gave in and got myself an Exchange server.

My practical experience in the real world has often been the complete opposite of your perfect-world vision. Not all the time, I do love open-source, and have had excellent experiences with some of the resulting products. However, not everything labelled "open source" is magically awesome.
Open Office, for example, had compatibility problems when collaborating with high-profile clients glued to MS Office. One could argue that it was Microsoft in fact who was not adhering to their own standards set forth for the document types. Whatever the case may be, to avoid embarassing situations, I ended up caving in and getting myself Office 07.

I used to sound just like you... I was a fan of Funambol, and pushed it every chance I got... until I noticed I was always making up excuses for everything where I shouldn't have had to. It didn't always push in real time (try explaining that to a Blackberry user) and I had a few bizarre circumstances in which I ended up with duplicate entries and the like which was a headache to resolve. SyncML is great, again, in concept. Exchange? A world of difference. At the risk of sounding like Apple advertising, "it just works".

I agree with you in principle, things should be more open. I don't want to rely on Microsoft. And there SHOULD also be alternatives for the things I mentioned missing in Android. But sometimes there aren't (good call on the unrar tool, though!).

If you read over my point in the first post, you'll see that I admit this stuff will come out sooner or later, so many of my gripes are temporary. But right now, Android is not quite there yet.

Oh I don't disagree that Exchange is a lot simpler then running funambol or other sync clients. Even in my installation of Funambol I had to modify it to my needs to get it to work properly and their documentation is pretty bad...

One problem that happens in open source communities is when open source is done by a profit business they try to keep a difference between the "paid" version and "free" version. Let me use zimbra as an example..their free does not include things like mobile sync and real time backups. In turn this makes a struggle between open source people and the company. (which is why they got crappy mobile sync)

M$ in my opinion is the worst at sticking to standards. But what makes open source apealing is when I have a custom solution I can modify the code myself to make it fit my needs a lot easier on open source platforms.

[mlin]

Originally Posted by gTen

I do not disagree Microsoft's presence, mostly in the business world but the use of Exchange makes me sad. Syncing is part of making all technology work together and those need to have standards and be open source for it to have competition and variety.

Also viewing is free but editing costs $$$..but that aside from the microsoft is not the only one setting standards for documents..many formats exist including PDF, ODF and etc which are commonly used.

There is compatibility with use of 3rd party apps but in general I believe people should migrate off solutions that do not allow flexibility. If Microsoft wants to sell exchange they should open up activesync. But Microsoft tries to get both which is bad for consumers and businesses.

I do not think MS is really the issue. Take a look at the Pre. The way exchange is fully integrated into the device is beautiful; tasks, email, calendars, and contacts all sync very nicely into the native UI. In addition, Palm's layering of contacts, emails, calendars, etc from multiple accounts is revolutionary. I think Android could have incorporated something a little better into the native UI.

[Noir]

to the OP great points
truly valid and a lot of reasons why I prefer the htc rosie builds - even slower, they give me as a user the well needed balance the stock android lacks
I don't run android often (maybe to keep up with development) but so far, yes i tis incomplete and not ready for prime time. Comparing my android to the moment for example makes me realize the moment is 10,000 years away from our builds, but it also gives us something to aspire to in that the overall speed of the device will be very snappy.
All in all, personal subjectivity varies, but as far as sending an sms or something, android does it well. As far as getting work done, in my experience, it is lackluster. Take it as it were though because your experience in the ever burgeoning battle of balance may be different than mine

[dishe]

Originally Posted by Noir

to the OP great points
truly valid and a lot of reasons why I prefer the htc rosie builds - even slower, they give me as a user the well needed balance the stock android lacks
I don't run android often (maybe to keep up with development) but so far, yes i tis incomplete and not ready for prime time. Comparing my android to the moment for example makes me realize the moment is 10,000 years away from our builds, but it also gives us something to aspire to in that the overall speed of the device will be very snappy.
All in all, personal subjectivity varies, but as far as sending an sms or something, android does it well. As far as getting work done, in my experience, it is lackluster. Take it as it were though because your experience in the ever burgeoning battle of balance may be different than mine

Thing is, I'm referring to Android as an OS in general, not just the still-in-progress port on the Touch Pro 2. The Vogue port is pretty much finished, and just about the same experience you'd get on a pre-installed Android phone.

[gTen]

http://sites.google.com/site/gdocsforandroid/

hey I just bumped into this, its suppose to be GDocs for Android and its free to view and edit Google Doics...haven't tried it myself yet but it does fir your criteria so I figure I'd share.

[x10guy]

What makes this thread a bit unique from other xxx versus yyy threads, is that we are generally speaking about the same phone.

In this case, you don't necessarily have to choose one over the other. Once Android TP2 gets more robust, you can do either.

[gTen]

Originally Posted by x10guy

What makes this thread a bit unique from other xxx versus yyy threads, is that we are generally speaking about the same phone.

In this case, you don't necessarily have to choose one over the other. Once Android TP2 gets more robust, you can do either.

I want ubuntu to have internet via cdma and make phone calls then triple boot >.> lol

Originally Posted by x10guy

What makes this thread a bit unique from other xxx versus yyy threads, is that we are generally speaking about the same phone.

In this case, you don't necessarily have to choose one over the other. Once Android TP2 gets more robust, you can do either.

The other thing that makes this thread different is that we're 2 pages into it and we have yet to start a flame war. It's still a discussion, and a reasoned one at that.

I personally go out and grab the daily builds once a week starting about 3 weeks ago on friday (most recent build) and play with Android over the weekend because I frankly can't take the risk that I won't hear the phone ring or miss a work call during the week (how pathetic is that, huh?). I can't believe the strides that have been made in such a short time and I think it's amazing what's been done. Maybe I'm just too used to WinMo, but I'm really not in love with Home or Home++.

I was also one of the first people to take HP/Compaq up on their promise to fix my iPaq back in the day if I bricked it putting Linux on it and home soldered a serial connector onto my USB cradle so I could flash Linux onto it, so I've been screwing with *nix variants on PDAs for a good 10 years...I like to think I'm open minded when it comes to the OS on my PDA.

I will say that I keep coming back to WinMo. I've tried Palm and just couldn't get used to the interface and the 'difference' between my desktop/laptop and the PDA. I had a Wizard (no, not the HTC Wizard and it's variants but yes I had one of those too) for a time but that was a joke. I had a Handspring which is just a glorified Palm with a compact-flash slot and had the same problem with it.

Compatability, availability of apps, ease of configuration of those apps and customization of the device coupled with a semi-familiar interface have brought me back to WinMo time and time again, warts and all. If I had a Mac at work or home I might feel differently about an iPhone, but I don't, so I don't. Not slamming, not hating, just sayin'.

All of that may change when my contract is up and WP7S (or whatever the acronym for Windows Phone 7 is) has been out for a while and Android has been out for a good couple of years. Here's to a long and fruitful life and people developing like the wind for Android. It can only help, don't see how it can hurt.

[x10guy]

Originally Posted by DarkLight

The other thing that makes this thread different is that we're 2 pages into it and we have yet to start a flame war. It's still a discussion, and a reasoned one at that.
...

Just curious. Why would there be a flame war? It is all personal preferences.