Blackberry Domino Application Awards

February 21 2007

My colleague Bob noticed this announcement on the Blackberry web site...

Image:Blackberry Domino Application Awards

This challenge is designed for BlackBerry customers that have created their own custom BlackBerry applications utilizing the BlackBerry® Enterprise Solution and accessing a Domino application. Show how your organization has integrated BlackBerry with application systems and demonstrate that having your corporate data wireless makes your mobile workers more productive.
Hey, the prize is a trip for two to a conference in Orlando, how cool!

Details on these awards can be found on the Blackberry website.

After a week and a half with my Pearl, I'm starting to grok the whole Blackberry thing.  Rocky reviewed his Pearl recently as well, so I won't cover the same ground.  My second round of observations:
  • The sound quality of the Pearl as a telephone is excellent.  It's the clearest-sounding phone I've owned.  The speakerphone works well, too.
  • For that matter, the camera takes decent pictures -- first phone I've had where that's the case.  Not throwing away the SLR anytime soon, but it's handy.
  • The UI is mostly intuitive...with the exception of some of the settings/preferences screens, everything else works pretty much the way I would expect.
  • I'm getting used to having my calendar with me at all times again -- it has been so long since I had a device that sync'd calendars, I had gotten used to writing down conference call information on post-it notes.  Glad to leave that bad habit behind.
  • There seem to be a few bugs in the software -- I'm at an almost-current release, and this stuff shouldn't be happening.  I had to take the battery out and reboot once on Monday when I couldn't answer a phone call.  It took about 10 minutes to get it to boot without an error.  I get java exception errors when coming out of lock mode occasionally.
  • There are hundreds of features I haven't even touched yet.

As for the "crackberry" effect, so far, I'm scoring an A- on avoiding it.  I did read a note from my boss during Sunday brunch that pissed me off -- I only looked because I still haven't found the magic setting that turns off the vibrate alert when I get new e-mail and leaves it only for new SMS.  I prefer to leave a phone in vibrate mode for incoming calls, so right now I have no way to distinguish calls from new e-mail.  Gotta fix that.  I've only typed out a few e-mails outgoing on the Pearl, and posted one comment on the blog.  And I've only had my wrist slapped once. :-)

Ed Brill | Chicago, IL USA Category:  Blackberry Pearl  Add/View Comments [20]

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  1. 1  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 2/21/2007 6:22:27 PM

    I'm curious what your boss wrote that pissed you off. ;-)

  1. 2  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 2/21/2007 7:05:47 PM

    It wasn't what he said, it was what was forwarded. :-)

  1. 3  Stephen vanderMerwe http://www.swissre.com | 2/21/2007 8:04:28 PM

    Hello Ed,

    This is unrelated, but I hope you can help with this. I attended Lotusphere in January, but I didn't get a chance to download the presentations before the web site was shut down. I really need to get hold of these. I know that some of the presenters have posted their session presentations, but there are a number of others I need. I have colleagues who are expecting me to provide these at work.

    Best regards,

    Stephen

  1. 4  Bruce Elgort http://www.TakingNotesPodcast.com | 2/21/2007 8:04:50 PM

    Ed - we all have those pictures of you anyways. It's about time your boss saw them too. :-)

  1. 5  Colin Williams  | 2/21/2007 9:34:13 PM

    Blackberries are like Windows PCs - if ya don't reboot them periodically they do strange things.

    Be glad you didn't ever use the first batch of 7100's - you couldn't reply or forward an email without it crashing. In short, firmware updates and BES admins are your friend! :)

  1. 6  Tim Haugen  | 2/22/2007 5:46:12 AM

    The "secret" to different alerts for SMS vs. eMail is "Profiles." Create the set you want for different days/times/situations with the types of alerts you want. Unfortunately, you can't copy an existing one as your starting point for a new one (could in older versions of the software). However, it looks like each "New Profile" is created from "Normal" as a template, so if you start with that one you can get some of that same benefit.

    The other feature that it would be nice to have (but haven't seen or heard of) would be different types of vibrate alerts. For all the simplicity of adding any number of ring tones (including old Lotus add campaigns :-) I'm amazed they haven't come up with some type of varying vibrate, so you could tell phone calls from eMails, etc.

  1. 7  Rob McDonagh http://www.CaptainOblivious.com | 2/22/2007 6:41:50 AM

    @6 In the Profiles, you can choose 1, 2, or 3 "rings" in vibrate mode. I'm trying to use that, though I'm not sure it really helps. I'd rather have more choices, because the difference between a 1 ring vibration and a 2 ring one doesn't usually register with me before I pull the Pearl out of the case.

  1. 8  Flemming Riis  | 2/22/2007 7:37:46 AM

    -I had to take the battery out and reboot once on Monday when I couldn't answer a phone call

    Its blackberry :).

    You are just lucky you arent stuck with a 8700

  1. 9  Rock http://www.lotusgeek.com | 2/22/2007 8:34:36 AM

    @Flemming (8) - what did you mean by "You are lucky you aren't stuck with a 8700"? I don't know if it was just me having the latest updates, nor not loading a ton of extra stuff on it (although I did add quite a few things), or what, but I found my 8700 to be very solid. I never had to reboot it, it performed quite well. The only thing I had to do was turn the radio off and on a couple of times - it seemed to quit downloading emails when I was in an area where it was jumping between signal types (Edge, to GPRS, to gprs, to EDGE - all over and over, up and down). That seemed to confuse the BES server or the blackberry, and I had to turn the radio off and back on, and it would start sending emails again.

    Now my 7100t crashed and locked up all the time - the 8700, however, was great - as is the 8100.

    What problems did you have? Have you contacted RIM about them? If you're getting a ton of crashes, I think you may have something wrong specific to your unit.

    --Rock

  1. 10  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 2/22/2007 9:14:22 AM

    @3 I'll send you mail...some 40-50 of the presentations will end up on developerWorks next month as podcasts, but there is no single repository in the meantime that I am aware of.

  1. 11  Flemming Riis  | 2/22/2007 9:15:24 AM

    -What problems did you have? Have you contacted RIM about them? If you're getting a ton of crashes, I think you may have something wrong specific to your unit.

    Triangle , Java error but it was on the first firmware revisions so was my own fault (well after the updates came)

    As you said later fr

  1. 12  Stephen vanderMerwe http://www.swissre.com | 2/22/2007 12:30:16 PM

    @10 Many thanks, Ed. Your help is appreciated.

  1. 13  Volker Weber http://vowe.net/about | 2/22/2007 1:51:47 PM

    Ed, this is pretty simple. Go to Profiles, select Vibrate, press the menu button, select Edit. Now you can set what vibrates, and what doesn't. Text messages are called SMS. You leave them on vibrate. E-Mails are "messages", you set them to not vibrate. To do that set "Out of holster" to "none". Ignore "in holster" if you don't have one. IIRC you don't subscribe to the american fashion statement of carrying gadgets on your belt. :-)

  1. 14  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 2/22/2007 2:00:24 PM

    @13 ok, did that. Will not get slapped at next brunch. Definitely will not wear the phone, holster or otherwise. ;-)

  1. 15  Mike Robinson http://www.invcs.com | 2/22/2007 2:38:28 PM

    Wow so now is this an extension of the BB support service- if so it's much faster (ouch) :)

  1. 16  Don Rorlach  | 2/23/2007 4:07:30 AM

    Has anyone in the LN blog community ever tried to develop anything on the BB? Any experiences, opinions?

  1. 17  Mike Lazar  | 2/23/2007 7:22:36 AM

    @13 -- Fashion statement? When have Americans every been considered fashionable? We're usually a few years behind the times in terms of fashion. NYC folks would like to think they are fashionable, but they're just less behind than the rest of us. We're all about function over here. The phone on the belt means more comfort, easier access, and far less wear and tear. I'll take a clean, unscratched display with my phone in the hip holster any day over the blurry display caused by hiding it/losing it in my pants or jacket pocket. Would you keep your $200 sunglasses loose in your pocket? Of course not, that scratches the lenses, bends them, breaks them, and renders them useless. Why would you do the same thing to your phone/pda/pim? Now, don't get me started on the average European's aversion to headsets...jam that radiation trap up to your ear! Let's see where that gets you in 30 years.

  1. 18  Charles Robinson http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com | 2/23/2007 8:43:06 AM

    @16 - Bill Buchan has. { Link } Search his site for more info.

  1. 19  James Allen  | 2/27/2007 3:36:49 PM

    @16 - The following page from blackberry.com might give a few apps to try:

    { Link }

    We have rewritten the Emergency Contact List app to use solely LotusScript - drop me an email if your interested.HTH.