Usability Forum

Posts tagged with "BlackBerry"

Track to the Future

By Eddie Lopez. Tuesday, 16. January 2007, 05:47:56

Artemis, Sidekick, Pearl.. all examples of what David Pogue described as a "Brilliant Idea that Found a Welcome." The Mobile Trackball. I think these "mini-mouses" are great for getting around my mobile's UI, but there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to really create a great user experience.

Treo was topping my list prior to my Pearl purchase due to the excellent combination of Stylus/touchscreen, nice clickable D-Pad and of course Qwerty keyboard. I compromised on the touch screen and tried the trackball and found that it's a comparable solution, but still needs to mature a bit more.

For example, on my BlackBerry's OS, even though the Pearl is the namesake that dares to replace the clickwheel, the UI is still remarkably living in a linear world. I have found only 4 instances where I can move around in 2D space like a mouse.

Get Smart- A first time smart-phone user's initial thoughts

By Eddie Lopez. Wednesday, 10. January 2007, 06:07:48

Smarphone, UI, cellphone, BlackBerry ...

A couple weeks into my first smart phone (BlackBerry Pearl/8100) I decided to take a minute away from reading my pushed mail and syncing my Outlook Calendar while Browsing Opera Mini to formulate some "first impressions" that I've been collecting on my handset throughout these fledgling smartphone toddler days.

I've been debating the full write up, as it's probably only interesting to other BB Pearl users, but then again, even a full year and three months later, the Motorola RAZR post is still getting comments (last was today!):
http://my.opera.com/usability/blog/show.dml/27659

So I might leave a full review for posterity and historic archiving, but I bet I'll land somewhere in between as I begin typing. This will probably be between the minute details of the phone, and the general *usability) point of view. In either case, as regular readers already know, this won't include technical details or call quality or any of the other stuff you can likely get anywhere else in reviews. Generally, this is usability/UI review that focuses on the user experience and UI design.

Even though I may love a product, I still tend to write negative things quite a bit because I think there's room for improvement or discussion, not because I'm knocking the product. That said, I'm very pleased with the BlackBerry 8100. I've found a device that lets me converge where I want my devices to converge and sacrifice where I'm willing to sacrifice. Even after I saw the announcement of the iPhone earlier today, I still stand behind my purchase (for now- I'll wait until I can try out the all touch screen interface- I'd prefer some keys to tap), I just thought I'd share some interface thoughts I had.