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crossbow posts

Filed under: OS Updates, News, Windows Mobile, Microsoft

Microsoft unveils Windows Mobile 6

Windows Mobile 6.0While details on Windows Mobile 6 (or Crossbow) have been leaking for months now, it looks like Microsoft has officially announced the next generation of its mobile operating system.

Here's some of the new features:
  • There's support for HTML email (using Internet Exlorer Mobile's rendering engine).
  • There's a new Windows Live client for Windows Mobile.
  • Office Mobile is included on the Smartphone version.
  • You can transfer files using Windows Live Messenger.
  • Call history is added to your contacts, so you can see when you last drunk dialed your ex.
  • There's a mobile version of Windows Update that performs a daily check for operating system updates.
Microsoft's also attempted to clear up the confusion surrounding its naming conventions. No more Windows Mobile Smartphone, Pocket PC, and Pocket PC Phone Edition. Now you've got Windows Mobile 6 Standard (Windows Mobile phones without touch-screens), Windows Mobile Professional (phones with touch-screens), and Windows Mobile Classic (no phone). Gee, that should be easier to remember.

Here's a roundup of reviews and first-hand impressions:

Filed under: Windows Mobile, Palm, Commercial

Agendus coming to Windows Mobile


Agendus for Pocket PCIambic has launched a beta for a Pocket PC version of its popular organization program Agendus.

Agendus is a personal information management (PIM) suite for PalmOS that offers a complete replacement for the default calendar, contact, and notes programs. Like most PIM programs, Agendus offers a choice of multiple views, color schemes, and icons for sorting through their data. Along with Datebk, it's one of the more popular PIM suites for Palm.

The Windows Mobile market is currently dominated by Agenda Fusion and Pocket Informant. I'll be curious to see whether there's room for another PIM suite in the Windows Mobile world. There are already a number of also-ran programs vying for third place in the popularity contest. Ulti-Planner is a light-weight PIM program, and Pen Agenda offers a clean look for a low price, but neither gets the kind of attention that Agenda Fusion and Pocket Informant do.

What I think is really a shame is that there's such a large market for 3rd party calendar/contacts/notes programs. Considering these are the functions that most casual PDA users are looking for when they pick up a device, it seems a bit silly that the default features of Windows Mobile PDAs leave so much to be desired. The month and week views in Pocket Outlook's calendar couldn't be much less useful. And it doesn't look like Microsoft has any plans to change much in the next version of Windows Mobile.

Filed under: OS Updates, Windows

A detailed look at Windows Mobile "Crossbow"

Windows Mobile CrossbowThe folks over at Mobile Review have been spending some quality time with a pre-release version of the next version of Windows Mobile, code-named "Crossbow." For the most part, they're not particularly impressed with the feature set of this update, due out in 2007, and they already have their eye on the next version, code-named "Photon." But that won't be out until 2008.

So what has Microsoft changed in Crossbow?

Well, the icons have all been redesigned with a 3D look, and all the sounds have been changed. And those are probably the most notable differences.

Under the hood, devices seem to boot a little faster, and applications are more responsive. Crossbow will still come in two versions, one for Pocket PCs, and another for Smartphones. But Pocket PC users will now have access to Smart Dial 2.0, allowing them to search through their contacts and make phone calls.

The mail client will include support for messages in HTML, and Microsoft has integrated Windows Live Messenger, Live Search, and Live Mail.

Text prediction has also been updates. You can add words to the dictionary, or erase changes made to your dictionary to reset the dictionary to the factory default.

If you have a few hours to kill, I highly recommend checking out the Mobile Review post for a more thorough look at the details and a ton of screenshots.




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So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do. Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game. The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...

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