The Joel on Software Discussion Group

This is an issue that I have on my mind for a long time, so I wrote it to somebody who works for Nokia. I'm also posting it here:

I've been trying Nokia smartphones. I don't like the 9300 and the 9500 smartphones, so I decided to go for a Series 60 device such as Nokia 6670.

It is very interesting to take a Palm III which was released about 7 years ago and compare the PDA functions with the functions of a modern Nokia Series 60 smartphone.

Most Nokia Series 60 phones have hardware that is far superior to the hardware of the Palm IIIxe. Let’s compare the hardware of the two devices:


Nokia 6670

Released: very recently
CPU: 123 MHz (32-bit ARM-9)
RAM: 8 MB
Screen resolution: 176x208 pixels, 65536 colors
Memory extension: MMC extension card


Palm IIIxe

Released: 7 years ago
CPU: 16 MHz (Motorola 68328 Dragonball)
RAM: 8 MB
Screen resolution: 160x160 pixels, 16 shades of gray
Memory extension: none


So, a Nokia Series 60 phone is more powerful than a Palm IIIxe. Now, let’s compare the software.


TO-DO List. The TO DO list is a basic but very important PDA application. A business person typically has a lot of items on his TO DO list. The items are usually long – for example “Discuss the enhanced engine project with Tim and the board”.

Palm IIIxe: on the Palm IIIxe, the long items will appear word-wrapped on the TO DO list, so the user is able to see the whole TO DO item.

Nokia Series 60: on a Nokia Series 60 phone, the long items will be cut short – for example, the item above will appear like this:

“Discuss the enhanc…”

So for serious use, the Nokia Series 60 TO DO List is almost useless. Also, for some unknown reason Nokia has chosen big fonts for their TO DO List application, so only a few TO DO items are visible.


Notes or Memo. This basic application is also very important for a PDA or smartphone. A busy business person will have a lot of notes.

Palm IIIxe: the first line of every note is considered the title of that note. The notes are shown sorted by title. So if I have a lot of notes, when I’m searching for a note named “Shopping list” I know where to find it – it starts with S, so I know its relative position among the other notes, because the notes are sorted by title. Palm IIIxe also offers a powerful search function.

Nokia Series 60: the notes are sorted by the date they were entered at. If I search for a note called “Shopping list”, or “Shirt size”, I’m plain out of luck – I have to go through every note.

There are many other differences.


What is my point with this comparison?

The Nokia Series 60 phones claim to be “smartphones”. Yet, the Palm IIIxe released 7 years ago is way better than Nokia Series 60 phones because of its software.

The problems that I described are not minor glitches – they are very important usability problems.

So – when will Nokia fix this? Being a developer myself, I estimate that the changes described above and the needed testing amounts to very few work hours.

Yet, the result would be a large leap in usability as a smartphone.


My advice for the Nokia Series 60 phones developers: buy an old Palm III, use it for a month. See in which ways it is better than a Series 60 phone.

Then, when making the next version of Series 60, incorporate some of the changes.

I consider that currently Nokia Series 60 phones do not deserve to be called smartphones. That name will be deserved only after they are at least comparable with the Palm III PDA released 7 years ago.

While I agree with you completely in terms of usability (I have a Palm Tungsten and a Nokia 6670), unfortunately, I think the term smartphone still really means:
"smart... for a phone!" :-(

There are alternate applications in existance.  As a new Series 60 owner I'm actively investigating them.

I don't think series 60 phones are comparable to a Palm because that serie is still more a phone than a palm.

I've seen N7710 with pen and touch screen.
Very similar to a 'Palm concept' and would be relly interested to read what do U think about it.

J

Nokia says that Series 60 phones are smartphones.

For most people, smartphone means a phone which also has the functions of a PDA.

Because the Series 60 phone is a phone, we can't expect it to have all of the functions of a modern PDA. This is why I'm comparing it with a very old PDA - the Palm III released more than 7 years ago.

Still not fair tho' really - I mean that 7 year old Palm is probably still more usable than a new PocketPC :-)

(The Pocket PC has better games tho'...)

Worth trying the P910 from Sony Ericsson.

Worth trying the HP iPAQ 6300, or the O2 XDA III, etc.

My blog: http://www.weblog.ro/insomnia