Are most Blackberries "true" smartphones?

[sledge007]

Here's an interesting article about driving and cell phone use from Alberta, deemed the most distracted drivers in the nation:
Albertans most distracted drivers | Alberta | News | Edmonton Sun
and this one here is proposing that even with a hands free device, you are STILL distracted from driving just by having a telephone conversation while driving:
Alberta proposes distracted driving law
I agree with the whole voice search would be better than type to search being safer and easier, but in the end, once you make your command, and you're driving, you are still taking your eyes off the road to look at the results. I'm just as guilty as the rest of us on this topic.

[Kupe]

Originally Posted by RUSH

I had those features before on my other phone... Not a big deal. A person can live without those.(Especially me)

A person can live without a cell phone too. However, when a phone is described as a smartphone in 2010, there are certain, basic functional capabilities expected of it.

[wushu2004]

Originally Posted by sledge007

Here's an interesting article about driving and cell phone use from Alberta, deemed the most distracted drivers in the nation:
Albertans most distracted drivers | Alberta | News | Edmonton Sun
and this one here is proposing that even with a hands free device, you are STILL distracted from driving just by having a telephone conversation while driving:
Alberta proposes distracted driving law
I agree with the whole voice search would be better than type to search being safer and easier, but in the end, once you make your command, and you're driving, you are still taking your eyes off the road to look at the results. I'm just as guilty as the rest of us on this topic.

What's the difference between having a conversation over the telephone vs talking to a passenger?

[Orion Antares]

Originally Posted by Kupe

A person can live without a cell phone too. However, when a phone is described as a smartphone in 2010, there are certain, basic functional capabilities expected of it.

Yea, like real multitasking which so far only one released smartphone type seems to have gotten right.

So I guess there is technically only one type of "smartphone" in the market right now!

Originally Posted by wushu2004

What's the difference between having a conversation over the telephone vs talking to a passenger?

Some people's brains have difficulty prioritizing their focus. If I carry on a conversation on the phone or with someone in the vehicle that conversation is ALWAYS secondary to paying attention to the road and the vehicles around me and I make sure the person on the other end of the line knows that.

[RUSH]

Originally Posted by Orion Antares

Yea, like real multitasking which so far only one released smartphone type seems to have gotten right.

So I guess there is technically only one type of "smartphone" in the market right now!

You take the word right out of my mouth. Whenever.. they(Other phones)master the art of such elegant multitasking.. then we can refer to them as...

[Kupe]

Originally Posted by Orion Antares

Yea, like real multitasking which so far only one released smartphone type seems to have gotten right.

So I guess there is technically only one type of "smartphone" in the market right now!

Actually you're describing task switching not multitasking. The Pre's task switching is clever and useful, but it's also easily emulated (or improved upon). What it's not is a distinguishing feature in a competitive market.

Multi-tasking management is a whole different beast and webOS is pretty weak in this regard. webOS multi-tasking management is a manual affair requiring the user to thumb through individual cards to determine which ones to close through repetitively flipping up card-after-card to free up memory or stop processes. Sadly, it looks like this manual-only management approach persists in webOS 2.0.

Other smartphone OSes (Android, Windows Mobile, Palm) manage running programs in the background with no user input required, closing dormant/unused/idle programs as necessary to automatically free up memory dynamically. Additionally, these other OSes allows the user to manually manage their background programs if that is their preference. With webOS, you don't get the choice.

Originally Posted by RUSH

You take the word right out of my mouth. Whenever.. they(Other phones)master the art of such elegant multitasking.. then we can refer to them as...

Another novice who can't discern the difference between task switching and multi-tasking... Well, there is a certain elegance to simplicity.

[Orion Antares]

Originally Posted by Kupe

Actually you're describing task switching not multitasking. The Pre's task switching is clever and useful, but it's also easily emulated (or improved upon). What it's not is a distinguishing feature in a competitive market.

Multi-tasking management is a whole different beast and webOS is pretty weak in this regard. webOS multi-tasking management is a manual affair requiring the user to thumb through individual cards to determine which ones to close through repetitively flipping up card-after-card to free up memory or stop processes. Sadly, it looks like this manual-only management approach persists in webOS 2.0.

Other smartphone OSes (Android, Windows Mobile, Palm) manage running programs in the background with no user input required, closing dormant/unused/idle programs as necessary to automatically free up memory dynamically. Additionally, these other OSes allows the user to manually manage their background programs if that is their preference. With webOS, you don't get the choice.

Actually it sounds like you have confused multitasking with process-management and possibly garbage collection. You also confused task switching methods. Save-stating is a task switching method and so is multitasking. The ability for the tasks' processes to continue to run in the background when it's not the focus is the real basis for multitasking, not the ability to micro-manage process threads at the OS level.

[RUSH]

Originally Posted by Kupe

Actually you're describing task switching not multitasking. The Pre's task switching is clever and useful, but it's also easily emulated (or improved upon). What it's not is a distinguishing feature in a competitive market.

Multi-tasking management is a whole different beast and webOS is pretty weak in this regard. webOS multi-tasking management is a manual affair requiring the user to thumb through individual cards to determine which ones to close through repetitively flipping up card-after-card to free up memory or stop processes. Sadly, it looks like this manual-only management approach persists in webOS 2.0.

Other smartphone OSes (Android, Windows Mobile, Palm) manage running programs in the background with no user input required, closing dormant/unused/idle programs as necessary to automatically free up memory dynamically. Additionally, these other OSes allows the user to manually manage their background programs if that is their preference. With webOS, you don't get the choice.

Another novice who can't discern the difference between task switching and multi-tasking... Well, there is a certain elegance to simplicity.

@ Kupe, Once again you have been misled, and obviously misinform. Please read this and you might learn something about the difference between task switching and multitasking.
(Webos is known to do true multitasking) :-D

Note that task switching is not the same as multitasking. In multitasking, the CPU switches back and forth quickly between programs, giving the appearance that all programs are running simultaneously. In task switching, the CPU does not switch back and forth, but executes only one.

Do take a look at this video, after watching it let me know what you have learn. YouTube - Palm Pre Multitasking.

Regards,

[The Phone Diva]

Originally Posted by sledge007

Here's an interesting article about driving and cell phone use from Alberta, deemed the most distracted drivers in the nation:
Albertans most distracted drivers | Alberta | News | Edmonton Sun
and this one here is proposing that even with a hands free device, you are STILL distracted from driving just by having a telephone conversation while driving:
Alberta proposes distracted driving law
I agree with the whole voice search would be better than type to search being safer and easier, but in the end, once you make your command, and you're driving, you are still taking your eyes off the road to look at the results. I'm just as guilty as the rest of us on this topic.

I actually agree, I often put the phone on silent actually and answer calls later. But if you must talk on the phone, you draw more attention from ticket hungry cops with the phone actually up to your ear. Although sometimes even that isn't enforced around here. But in case they decide to pull you over, IL tickets are too expensive.

[Kupe]

Originally Posted by Orion Antares

Actually it sounds like you have confused multitasking with process-management and possibly garbage collection. You also confused task switching methods. Save-stating is a task switching method and so is multitasking. The ability for the tasks' processes to continue to run in the background when it's not the focus is the real basis for multitasking, not the ability to micro-manage process threads at the OS level.

Originally Posted by RUSH

Note that task switching is not the same as multitasking. In multitasking, the CPU switches back and forth quickly between programs, giving the appearance that all programs are running simultaneously. In task switching, the CPU does not switch back and forth, but executes only one.

An OS either has multi-tasking or it doesn't - there is no "true" distinction in multi-tasking. And yes, the Pre can multi-task. As can the Android. And WM. And the Blackberry. And iOS. All of these OSes allow processes to continue running in the background. All of them (including the Pre) place restrictions on the background processes as to what they can do/not do and which APIs they can access/not access as a background process. All of these OSes can do a save state and all of them can keep a process active in the background. The difference lies in the degree of freedom a developer has to take advantage of the OS and it multi-tasking capability. Android, WM, and webOS are very open to background processes by third party developers. BBOS and iOS not so much unless additional steps are takin to circumvent the core OS.

So, back to my original point: The only thing that sets webOS apart from these other OSes is its native use of the cards analogy ... which is a task-switching/killing (aka managing) methodology. It's the equivalent of Windows desktop use of alt-Tab or Mac OS X's use of Command-Tab. It is not in-and-of-itself multi-tasking, it simply allows you to navigate between currently active processes.

The Pre's multi-tasking is actually relatively simplistic requiring pretty much 100% user interaction to manage its background processes. This accounts, in part, for webOS's inconsistent battery life issues (power hungry background apps) and the TMC problems so prevalent in Pres with smaller memory pools. Other OSes like Android and WM are more powerful and elegant in their management of active processes as the dynamically balance the user's current demand with the user's historic demand for processes already in memory.

[Orion Antares]

Is this a new development for Android, the dynamic balancing of background processes? It certainly didn't seem like it was doing such an elegant job earlier this year.

Actually inconsistent battery issues are more related to radio use, frequent radio polling. So I guess the question would be, which version was historic-based optimization of process management for polling the radios introduced to Android? Also does it actually prevent those processes from polling even when the user might actually want to have them continue in the background but hasn't accessed them in the recent or frequent history?

The TMC errors are more a hardware design flaw by the engineers having underestimated the amount of RAM they should have included to properly support the OS design. It's a classic mistake in embedded design and not related to process management. It could actually be related to applying "desktop" memory management principles to an embedded system design but it's more likely they simply miscalculated the max operational memory they would need for what would be a standard user's "intense" operational level.

[RUSH]

Quote: The TMC errors are more a hardware design flaw by the engineers having underestimated the amount of RAM they should have included to properly support the OS design. It's a classic mistake in embedded design and not related to process management. It could actually be related to applying "desktop" memory management principles to an embedded system design but it's more likely they simply miscalculated the max operational memory they would need for what would be a standard user's "intense" operational level. Quote End:


I love that explanation... I hope this has shed a little light on those who wasn't aware of what had cause the palm pre to have gotten the two many cards error.

[Kupe]

Originally Posted by Orion Antares

Is this a new development for Android, the dynamic balancing of background processes? It certainly didn't seem like it was doing such an elegant job earlier this year.

Actually inconsistent battery issues are more related to radio use, frequent radio polling. So I guess the question would be, which version was historic-based optimization of process management for polling the radios introduced to Android? Also does it actually prevent those processes from polling even when the user might actually want to have them continue in the background but hasn't accessed them in the recent or frequent history?

Check out this Link for the full answer. Additionally, radio polling, except in fringe coverage areas, is hardly as big a battery hog as a CPU chugging away on several background services like file download, push notification monitoring, realtime navigation, music playback, etc.

Originally Posted by Orion Antares

The TMC errors are more a hardware design flaw by the engineers having underestimated the amount of RAM they should have included to properly support the OS design. It's a classic mistake in embedded design and not related to process management. It could actually be related to applying "desktop" memory management principles to an embedded system design but it's more likely they simply miscalculated the max operational memory they would need for what would be a standard user's "intense" operational level.

So what you're saying is the OS developers didn't know how much memory webOS would need, the engineers (in a vacuum?) underestimated the required amount of memory, and the OS developers couldn't modify webOS to account for the smaller amount of memory? Sounds like a poor effort on all counts.

Originally Posted by RUSH

I love that explanation... I hope this has shed a little light on those who wasn't aware of what had cause the palm pre to have gotten the two many cards error.

Yeah that explanation speaks volumes about Palm's ability to design new hardware/software. Which is the same as the simpler explanation everyone already knows: The Pre didn't have enough memory. How are they going to prevent the same thing happening with webOS 2.0 if, as Orion's explanation infers, the hardware engineers never seem to talk to the software engineers? Won't webOS 2.0's added features/capabilities require more memory?

[The Phone Diva]

Does the Pre Plus get TMC errors?

[Kupe]

Originally Posted by The Phone Diva

Does the Pre Plus get TMC errors?

The short answer is yes, but less so than the original Pre. If one replaces the stock kernel with UberKernel, TMC errors are all but eliminated as the phone begins using the storage space as a swap space instead of the phone's executable RAM.

[blackmagic01]

they are smart enough for the people that are buying them. Which though a declining number is a crap load of people.

[The Phone Diva]

I had to get another one due to not receiving email in a timely manner. Primitive looking OS by today's standards for sure, but still quite functional as a smartphone if you need to get business done. The music player is better than I expected. Android is still more functional as an all-around OS due to the many apps, same with iOS 4 obviously. BB App Market seems a bit bare compared to the other 2. I still haven't been able to get my hands on webOS properly other than demo units, so I can't really comment about it.

[morepalm.net]

ihad a blackberry curve for 2 years. They are as dumb as rock and slow as a slug. NEVER BUY ONE!!!

[The Phone Diva]

Unless you need push email and can't seem to get it any other way. Though the Bold or Tour likely would have been better.

At the end of the day, missing email was a sore point.

I would like to go back to Android full time though. I have to figure out something concerning email. BTW, I have 15 apps installed on the Curve, it's not so "dumb" with those.