The Las Vegas edition of VSLive (May 8-11, 2005) will include smart client coverage: “SmartClient Live! - Pragmatic and practical advice on smart client development with VB, C#, and .NET Framework.” There’s no real description of what that really means, but it’s got potential. : )

[via 3Leaf]

I was sitting at Jim Blizzard’s going away party the other night when my phone rang. This was the side of the conversation that the Portland nerds heard:

“Hello?”

“What?”

“Well,why don’t you have any underwear?”

“Put your brother on.”

“Why doesn’t your brother have any underwear?”

“Well, why does he think he doesn’t have any underwear?”

“OK. Put your brother back on.”

“Are you sure you don’t have any underwear?”

“Look in your hand; is there any underwear in it?”

“Then check your other hand.”

“OK, how many pairs of underwear are you wearing?”

“And how many pairs do you need between right now and the time I get home?”

“Good. Bye.”

About halfway through the conversation, the nerds around me could no longer continue their conversations and were laughing openly. Ah, the joys of parenthood…

When I used to teach COM, we would brag about its cross-platform-ness, i.e. it worked across Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows NT 4, etc. So, when I’m talking about Windows alternatives, of course I mean Windows XP, Windows XP Media Center Edition, Windows CE and Windows XP Tablet Edition:

• Windows XP: This is the workhorse of my day and with SP2, it’s even more wonderful than it was before. Love it.

• Windows XP Media Center Edition: The mix of a pleasing 10-foot UI, picture, music and video playback, content and UI extension, PVR, Windows-based expansion and MCE extenders makes this a fabulous media client and server. Love it.

• Windows CE/SmartPhone 2003 Second Edition: The 10-inch UI, the built-in apps and services, the extension apps, the internet access and a set of apps optimized for 9-key + joystick input all make this a fabulous user platform that’s replaced my phone, my mp3 player and even my laptop in some cases. Plus, I can build my own apps! I haven’t felt this way since my first laptop freed me from the tyranny of the desktop. Love, love, love it!

• Windows XP Tablet Edition: I love reading text on this OS. The ClearText, the form factor and the scroll-specific buttons near the screen make it a wonderful reading experience. I also look forward to reviewing articles and book chapters with my tablet. However, I doubt I’ll get to it because I dread picking it up and being faced with all of the text input I’m forced to perform. Unlike the MCE or SP OSes which have been optimized for remote control/keypad input, the tablet is more general purpose and therefore supports far more general purpose applications. This means text input for dialogs and passwords and URLs and all kinds of other things where my poor handwriting is often painful. Of course, handwriting is faster than joystick/keypad input, but because there seems so much more input required in an average tablet session, it seems slower. I with the apps for the tablet were more special-purpose and optimized for stylus-only input. Love it and don’t so much love it.

BTW, I paid $6000 in college for my Mac IIcx that I used to log into the Unix machines in the lab, so I’ve had a full range of computer UI experiences. I do truly love Windows best.

Let me count the ways:

1. Pocket-sized and no bigger than my old dumb phone and tons smaller than tricorder-sized PDAs
2. Synchronized calendar, contacts and inbox every 10 minutes everywhere I go
3. IM and web browsing everywhere I go
4. 512MB miniSD upgrade (for $60), giving me room enough for 300+ minutes of songs/audio books, making the phone a wonderful mp3 player, both for personal use (via the included stereo headphones) and in my car (via a $3 Radio Shack part, the Audio Adapter 274-373)
5. Bluetooth headset, freeing me from untaggling wires all the damn time and letting me answer the phone while it’s still in my pocket
6. Voice tags, letting my dial the phone while it’s still in my pocket
7. Extensible with inexpensive custom apps of all kinds, including ones I can build myself in native or managed code (and a wealth of development information)
8. Backlit ebook for darkened movie theaters during the commercials and the slow bits
9. A quicky flashlight in a pinch
10. Theoretically acts as a modem for my PC to give it an internet connection via my cell phone’s GPRS service, although I haven’t gotten that set up yet : )

That’s not to say that all is well. The following mars the i-mate’s perfection:

1. When the keypad is locked and a notification pops up, the screen remains dark, but the Unlock button turns into the Dismiss button, which dismisses the notification w/o showing it first
2. Notifications can only be snoozed for 5 minutes
3. No WMP10 and WMP9 on the smartphone has terrible playlist management
4. A dearth of web sites targeted at the smart phone. I’ve only found msnbc.com so far. I really miss a decent movie showtime info web site (imdb.com works, but it’s a pain)
5. Cramped screen and keyboard (I’ve heard the Motorola MPx220 flip phone solves this problem)
6. Doesn’t use Wi-Fi when it’s available
7. No FM radio

It’s my understanding that some of these flaws are fixed in the later smartphones (like the Audiovox SMT5600), but even with the issues I mention, I can’t imagine that someone with a cell phone wouldn’t pick a smart one over a dumb one, nor can I imagine that more then a relative few would prefer a PDA to a smart phone. The smart phone represents a perfect storm of form factor, capability and developer tools. Keep your hands and feet inside the ride, boys and girls, it’s going to be a wild ride.

Microsoft’s own Robert Scoble has broken his way into the secular press, with an article in both Fortune (Why There’s No Escaping the Blog) and The Economist (Chief humanising officer). Way to go, Robert!

Scott Hanselman IM’d me this Onion piece and I just had to share it. I don’t want to spoil it with quotes; just read it and tell me if you don’t die laughing.

OK, one quote:

“To Ron’s credit, it was one helluva way to go out,” human resources manager Gail Everts said. “Ron clearly spent a lot of time on that presentation. If the subject matter weren’t so heavy, we’d probably use it to train his replacement.”