Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Damn the carrier lock-in! I can't believe that BS. It's like we have an iPhone or something. :mad:

:rolleyes:

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

In the UK and the rest of Europe, we have great network coverage through 3G and high speed data - with reasonably priced plans. Wi-Max remains great for some US cities; but isn't that functional a few steps beyond them. I don't like the idea of being tooled-up with different technology when one device can suffice. It's a question of realistic practicality.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Yup, 12:30 - Clutter, by Matthew Allum (OpenedHand)...

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

:D indeed! If you have Compiz at hand, try the water effect. You can set it in such way that if you click somewhere you get a water/ripple effect. Not very useful normally? Sure however this reminds me of the yellow round which appears in this video. Either one of these (or themeable), is very useful on a touchscreen, because you get feedback from the screen where the device figured you clicked/touched.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

That's true! Also, it's done in a way that is quick (no pause, stutter, or redraw) and doesn't completely occlude the information below it. Simple, but highly useful feedback!

What I find most interesting about the interface in the demo is the fact that although the resolution was constricted (perhaps to something similar to the N800) there was much more 'usable' space due to the simple zooming of the interface. Some of the elements (the pictures) could even be interacted with when zoomed out! In the end, you have a user interface that has comparable (if not more) 'real-estate' than a desktop whilst being easily accessible.

This type of an interface opens the gates for windows of different dimension, floating widgets (zoomed out view), floating controls (zoomed out view), and multiple 'levels' of these 2D window arrangements. Users could customize the zoomed-out background graphics with picture(s), widgets, and controls. Also, not all apps need lay flat. Some of them could be perpendicular to the plane (like pages of a book standing up) to allow a fan-like selection of many elements. Of course, some simple 3D objects on the plane would be fun; like big red 'arcade' style buttons, or draggable dice, or swimming fish (with a refracted water overlay animation) :).

What you end up with is a highly-stylish, highly-customizable, but also highly functional "zoom-top" (coined... lame? har har).

Wow! I would love for the N900 to have an interface like this. A little bit of polish and not only would it look great, but would also serve a great functional benefit.


}:^)~
YARR!

capt'n = new Corrupt()

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

better stability (the boot lock problem!!!)
better screen visibility in sunlight

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

i would like the sketch feature to be more like mspaint or even like that little pc that has intergreated fun into a drawing package. once thats done it's time to invent drawing messaging, txt messaging style and finaly, iis it justt me or dose your notes vanish?

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

So, are you envisioning PictoChat, InkStorm, or something else? In any case, it sounds like something more in the realm of add-on, non-Nokia software.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

somethhing else

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

ow and a really bassic thing, it would be usefull to be able to put a sim card into the tablet rather than having to bluetooth conect to a phone that i only usee as a modem for the tablet, dont tell me, someone has already made a little sim friendly usb type thing that you just plug in to the tablet. well if not go on one of u clever people make one as that has to be my greatest frustration with the nit (nokia's iinternet tablets) normally i calll them nicer things but owwwwwww i have a lot of complaints. positive complaints (normally based around wishing it was a 'pc')

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Oh oh, I have another!
Hardware power off like any other modern computer. That is, holding the button switches off the device instead of waiting for always expecting software to be able to do it. I would honestly consider that a major selling point given the amount of pain and frustration the bizarre lack of it has produced for the N810.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

And do you know what this will do to your file system? :)

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Less pain than yanking the battery out when the system locks up.
Indeed, I miswrote that. By waiting for software to do it, I of course mean when software has completely toppled over and is not going to do it within the current decade.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Even if there are system files on the damaged areas?

The people didn't like much the wifi corruption bug, probably won't like this either.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

at that point, wait a moment and see it reboot itself. unless both init (or whatever) and the kernel har gone belly up (highly unlikely) the lifeguard process will get its time at some point and then it will reboot the tablet.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Yep, that should do. Other than that, an apparently "dead" system is usually the CPU running flat out, and sometimes hitting the home button a few times will eventually produce the list of applications and you can hit the 'x' and kill them/it.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

I think the N900 could have the potential for being a fantastic universal remote for A/V equipment. Since it can connect to the internet, one could imagine companies providing profiles for various remotes, allowing one to store a whole set of remotes in one unit. Since it has a touch screen, the screen could be configured to appear like just about any remote available. You'd just press the button on the screen to stop or pause or play, etc. I suppose it could even learn the commands of generic remotes by monitoring the outputs of these remotes. It has the potential of being a killer app.

Of course, the N900 would have to have a IR port to do this, something the N810 unfortunately lacks....

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Logitech and others already have these.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

True, but an N900 with IR potentially means one less remote lying around the house.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Do not want.

It's better as an add-on. I pointed out that it'd be really neat to have a geek port/slot.. in another thread I'd mentioned maybe a PCIe connector for micro devices in an expansion port? That would probably be the best thing. My old Handsprings and my Palm Tungsten T5 had a built-in IR... I never used it for anything except on the extremely rare occasion of printing to my IR enabled printer. IR ports are very slow for data and to make the signal bright enough for using as a remote controller, you'd use a lot of battery life--this is why you needed an add-on on the Palm computers to do that. I could see myself using an IR port--but I could want to use something else more.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Yup. There's a reason mobile devices that do have IR ports still tend to not be usable as IR remote controls. It's not that you can put the signal into them, it's that the power available to the emitter isn't enough to be useful for that. And, really, that's how it should be. I expect that the impact on the design of the NIT, or any other mobile, to add this would be pretty prohibitive.

I think it makes more sense to ask someone to build a wifi-to-IR gateway device, where you could send signals to the gateway via wifi, and then that device would have a remote-control-quality IR emitter for sending signals to your devices. You could then position that somewhere in your livingroom that was useful.

What might be nice, though, is a typical data exchanging IR emitter/receiver on the NIT. The kind you get on an E61/E61i/E62/E71, so that you could do data synchronization through it with other Nokia devices (not just other NITs). But I doubt we'll see that. And don't say "that's what bluetooth is for". Bluetooth has some issues that make it not a total replacement for IR data syncing.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

But Bluetooth is radio--not line-of-site and so much more convenient to work with. It's faster--oh GOD.. MUCH faster than IR. BT just seems like a much better alternative to using IR.

Can you tell me why? Just really confused. :P

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

In my opinion and experience bluetooth is way better for data transfer between devices than IR can ever be. But IR is the only option if you want to remote control your TV set :) (which my Palm T3 does completely fine btw).

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

A microwave emmiter we ll really be usefull, we don't need a 1000W power ... just enough to maintain a coffee at right temperature.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

I hope they make the N900 bigger, so that a slot thick enough to fit a Poptart could be added to the side. I'd also like some sort of powerful laser or death-ray function -- which would be useful in many situations (of course, if they made the microwave strong enough, that might work too).

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

And so much less secure. Which is often the case with "so much more convenient" -- convenience and security are often mutually exclusive trades.

And, related to that, sensitive work places don't typically ban IR use in the facility ... but they very well may ban bluetooth use.


TA-t3: last I looked at the Palm series, in order to use their IR directly as a remote control, you had to keep it within a few feet of the TV/VCR/etc. because the strength was so low. If you wanted to use it more like a regular remote, you had to put a big attachment on it. Is the T3 a special case or something?

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

I don't know if the T3 is special in any way, but I can use my T3 just fine from the same distance as the regular remote control, the only difference is that I have to be a little bit more accurate when pointing the T3. 5 meters (~15 feet approx.) works fine, if I just point it the right way. I'ved tested with Panasonic TVs by the way (it works equally fine with other people's Panasonics.. to their amazement)

I also know that Palm owners have been using their PDAs to switch off annoying TVs in pubs and the like.. so it's got to work over that distance as well.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

i recall reading recently about a demo of a high speed IR connection. ill see if i can dig up the article.

Re: What would you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

yep, omni-directional radio is a ***** in that respect.

still, one could cover a building in a Faraday cage ;)

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

While we're at it, why can't it use TARDIS Time Lord technology to fit more tech inside the case and maybe a little quantum mechanical black hole time warping to provide processed data before actually doing the heavy processing? It'd be GREAT if we could have a MUCH faster video framerate by grabbing fully rendered frames from a few milliseconds at a time into the future and then the warping can catch up during idle or charging times. ;)

I should see if I can patent that, eh? :P

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Well, given the pre-order price of the Gigabyte M528, which is to be released in 30 days, this is speculation, not a wishlist, per se. (The Gigabyte M528's price will be even lower than $700 USD--$689). I suspect Nokia, if it plans to keep it's price point on the NIT high, rather than dropping it down to a more realistic $250-$300 USD range, will have to implement beefed-up specs to compete with the MIDs, which are starting to come out. Personally, I think they could compete better by keeping their device lighter and less expensive.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

A pipe symbol on the keyboard, please!

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

BlueTooth does the job for me. I don't see why IR is required, and stating 'IR does some things BT doesn't' is a useless remark because it doesn't state what IR does more/better/whatever. The N96 won't contain IR support either. I think IR support on gadgets is on the way out. I use IR to open my garage, and frankly, the distance is too big. With BlueTooth 2 or later it'd work fine over 100 meters which is more than enough time to open the garage before the car is there.

Zooming is awesome. The reason is that, like with fullscreen, the user is able to commit total focus to the application (or part of the application) the user wants to use. Besides being able to zoom in, the ability to zoom out is also useful. The first time I used it was on a WM called 3ddesktop, and I also used 3DWM back in the days. With software rendering though. Using the arrow keys one was able to zoom out from the desktop and zoom in to a different desktop (virtual screen) and continue other applications there. Nowadays, there are many research projects behind us implementing this, and also serious implementations.

Compiz (and QEdje (Evas is faster than Xorg)) provide a lot of interesting features. Like a cube task manager. I already gave some examples of minimizing and maximizing, but there are more examples.

I used Spotlight the other day, and instead of having desklets/screenlets/gadgets/widgets/applets/whateverets on the background on the desktop you bring them to the foreground with Spotlight, plus transparancy. You can see this kind of functionality back in the iPhone. It allows total focus to the specific task the user wants to execute. Also take a look at Expose. You can also see similar (and perhaps better) features like this in Compiz. Imagine using the cube as task switcher on the NIT.

Sun implemented with Looking Glass something similar as Compiz in Java, but AFAICT it never took off. I remember in the demo by Jonathan Schwartz in which he shows RealPlayer with the ability to turn RealPlayer 180 degrees and see the video in mirror mode (left is right, right is left). He also showed the ability to put notes on the back of the application (in that case, RealPlayer). OS X uses the same idea in Spotlight to configure the widgets (if that is what they're called). Every applet has an 'i' on the bottom right. Click on it, the applet turns around, and you can configure it.

If Nokia keeps the NIT simple (hardware-wise) to cut costs then competitors will be able to make a clone more easily. The advantage Nokia will have is experience in open source software development, Qt, Nokia Maps, multimedia integration, and years of experience with mobile phones. If Nokia keeps innovating they can use the previously mentioned advantages to earn more money while staying ahead in the technical sense provided the devices are ahead of the competitors. For this, the hardware has to be top notch, too. Ofcourse such comes with a price. That is normal. But new features are important. For example, a useful innovation in the iPhone 2G was the WiFi location positioning system. If you really want a simple device then you're at the wrong company (except for their phone line, which contains devices from very simple to very advanced). Many clone corporations are able to make a simple device for not many costs. The source for the maemo software is there as well.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

:) I'm glad I'm not the only one who observed this.

My suggestion: replace $/GBP/EUR symbols with one generic symbol (I guess, given tradition and other usage of the symbol the $ would fit well) and use the symbol based on the setted LOCALE. Remove the other two symbols. Allow the user to change the LOCALE just like this is possible right now, and put the other symbols in the input menu. Because, using that menu, you can get a pipe, but its inconvenient if you use the CLI a lot.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

I did in fact, later, give more detail (and I didn't give the detail in the first place because, frankly, I didn't think anyone would need me to elaborate -- I thought it was all pretty trivial information). It's basically that the fact that IR is line of sight, doesn't tend to have "trusted" devices, etc. causes IR to be more secure for exactly the reasons that it is less convenient.

Further, you may find yourself employed somewhere where BT isn't allowed to be used. And where they'll actively scan for its use (not just to counter external adversaries, as the Faraday cage idea would cover, but also from in-building adversaries). In that situation, IR is infinitely MORE convenient than BT ... because BT might cost you a job or security clearance, and IR wont.

But, the basic point is, BT has lots of security vulnerabilities that IR avoids, and therefore has it's own attractive aspect.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Oh, really. IrDA is more secure? How so? I've been able to open the garage of my neighbor using the remote control of my garage. There are devices to put off TVs of other people using a remote control. With BlueTooth, you can at least ut a password on it, and hide your device.

Besides that, one can easily use VPN over BlueTooth to establish a secure connection provided both endpoints support this. The endpoint doesn't have to be a phone. For example, you can use server (VPN) <-> 3G <-> mobile phone <-> BlueTooth <-> NIT (VPN). To transfer files, one could use e.g. GPG.

If your employer bans BT I think they don't want you to use IR either. Too bad. So you abide to the rule(s) by putting your BT chip (or device) off, put it in a Faraday, you use a different device without BT, you get a IrDA addon for your device, you put BT on invisible, or you find a smarter employer.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

When was the last time someone broke into a PDA, or desktop for that matter, and stole files via IR? Doing it with IR requires at least some level of direct access to the system. BT doesn't.

And, I will admit that I don't know specifics on this one, but I know that "hidden" on a wifi network means next to nothing. What does "hidden" on in BT _really_ get you? It keeps out amateurs?

It's my understanding that, just like wifi, if you know what you're doing, you can easily get past bluetooth's rudimentary protections (being hidden, and the other aspects) and get access to its facilities.

With IR, last I checked, you don't trust any device automatically, when something wants to get access to your files, it _has_ to ask. And in order to get that far, it _has_ to establish line of sight with your IR port. In a closed office, or in your pocket, that's pretty difficult with IR. Not difficult at all with BT.

(and, no, not every site that cares about BT cares about IR, for exactly the reasons I'm stating)

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

Your discussion of access control is somewhat ambiguous; I can't tell if you're referring to a user level or a technical level.
Obviously, on a technical level, any device attempting to communicate with a device over any link has to "ask" in some way.

OTOH, if you mean on a user level, you'd have to be ******ed or running ******ed software to "trust any device automatically"; if irda implementations make it impossible to have trusted devices, that's a software detail, and it would be pretty straightforward to permit access automatically.

Line-of-sight is definitely an issue, but it seems rather limited in application, so I can't see the justification for including it in stock hardware. A mini/micro-USB OTG dongle should do handily, I'd think...

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?
 

You have a point there John, but it depends on how the people _use_ BlueTooth (or WiFi).

BlueTooth currently simply has a bad name, but the same can be said about IrDA, RFID or DECT. IrDA and DECT are just less used these days while RFID does receive criticism.

In contrast to e.g. DECT, BlueTooth 2.1 has strong encryption. As soon as someone tries to pair with your BlueTooth device, you will notice.

Even if you don't trust it, you don't have to depend on it. For example, one can easily run a secure AP without using WPA2 + PSK using SSH, AuthPF, IPsec (or VPN), and PF. One can run SSH over 27MC, or GPRS. This is possible with BlueTooth as well (e.g. with PAN). I bet its possible with IrDA as well.

The big advantage of BlueTooth over say WiFi is that it draws a lot less power. You can also use BlueTooth to let multiple devices communicate with each other. You cannot do that with IrDA.

If your BlueTooth device is hidden they have to guess your MAC address in order to talk to you. This is not a trivial task.

And, whether you like it or not, Nokia is actively contributing to BlueTooth via Wibree, WiMedia, and BlueTooth 3 initiatives. So, I'm sorry, IrDA is on the way out.

One thing I sometimes do when I'm bored and sitting in the train is looking around for BlueTooth devices. You can derive the brand and type of someone's phone from this, but also their name. Its funny to walk to Jenny telling her her BlueTooth is on, without her knowing how the hell you figured out her name. This however, is a configuration issue on their side. Perhaps, by default, BlueTooth should be disabled on a device.

BTW, Bruce Schneier wrote an article about why convenience and security are not inherent mutually exclusive.

Re: What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?