PocketPC

Well, I got my hands on a T-Mobile MDA today and I’m impressed with the size and the feel of the phone. I’ve got a T-Mobile Blackberry 7100t (note that the link takes you to a 7105t which has superceded my model). The MDA is a little shorter and a little thicker than my phone (the custom-fit case that I have will just barely accomodate the MDA’s thickness) which means that the form factor is just about perfect. Since the keyboard slides out of the MDA, the screen is much larger than the Blackberry.

Have I decided to buy one yet? No, not yet. The slide-out keyboard seems a little flimsy and it’s a little dated. I need to do a little more research and then make my decision.

I’ve got 3 pieces of software I’m using on my iPAQ hx2495:

For email, I use the free QMail3. No, I don’t read Japanese, I used the Japanese Excite’s translation.

I use Battery Pack Pro from Omega One for shortcuts and to beef up my Today screen capabilities.

I use Pocket Weather from SBSH Mobile Software to get weather reports for various places I’m interested in.

Why did I choose the products I did? Well, for email, it seems that the other applications I tried out either did IMAP poorly or mostly functioned in an offline mode, encouraging me to connect, download headers, disconnect, mark the messages I wanted to read, connect, download bodies, disconnect, mark the messages I wanted to delete or move, connect, synchronize and disconnect. That may’ve been the way to work 10 years ago when connectivity was mostly over dial-up but, nowadays, I’m almost always connected via WiFi, so I wanted something that was closer in operation to usual my desktop client, Thunderbird. QMail3 fills the bill.

For weather, I tried several, including the free ADB Weather Plus from Happy Jack Road. I would’ve been satisfied with the free client but, for some reason it has problems parsing the reports from the National Weather Service.

And Battery Pack Pro … well, I just like it.

All told, this stuff cost me less than $30.

After days of trying to get used to WebIS Mail, I think I’m just gonna give up. In the “old days”, when high speed connectivity wasn’t easily had, offline operation was an absolute must but nowadays, well, that’s just not true. So, I went on a hunt and came up with QMail3. Yes, the page is in Japanese and no, I don’t read Japanese. At the bottom of the page the author has thoughtfully provided links to Babelfish translations of various pages within his site. Go here for a translation.

Yes, it’s a little difficult to figure out what all the bells and whistles mean but it’s not that hard and the client really seems to operate quickly and cleanly.

Anyone know of any other IMAP clients for the PocketPC?

Been hot on the trail of a PocketPC. Picked up the HP iPAQ hx2495 running Windows Mobile 5. The OS is a mixed blessing. It’s the newest but that also means it’s the least supported. Windows Mobile 2003 SE has been around for a while and just about every application out there supports it. WM5 is new and very few apps support it but more are being ported all the time.

Of course, the first thing I looked for was a good IMAP client and I think I’ve settled on WebIS Mail from Web Information Solutions. It’s a little different working with an IMAP client that specifically doesn’t want to stay online but I think I’m getting the hang of it. More later.

Update, Dec 9: OK, maybe WebIS Mail isn’t the right answer. I just can’t get myself used to working offline and, given the state of wireless communication for me, I’m not inclined to learn. I think I’ve found an alternative, though. See the next entry for details.