Catch has turned out to be my favorite app of 2012. When Evernote fell on its face and lost my info and data Catch was there to get me back on track.
I have sketches and drafts for numerous briefs and posts in process at one time. Catch has proven to be a really good tool for doing this work effectively. It has a few bells and whistles that matter and makes Catch an app that deserves a look.
In war its called a inserting a mole or 5th column, in the movie “Social Network” a main character called it “The Little Big Horn” strategy. Google has turned to it as a way to to pull in iPad and iPhone users to Google+ slow starting Google+ service before it becomes a non-starter. They are probably thinking that If it didn’t fly as first planned then you must go where they are.
Google can always snatch up OS dependent Android users as you need but by pre-emptively snaring Apple users Google can establish through an app their brand as cool and in essense beat Apple to the game.
iOS Developers are anxiously awaiting and anticipating the flood of news about to stream out of Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) next week. For the most part they are are hopeful, excited and much more committed to Apple’s iOS than Android developers seem to be about Google’s Android platform. This is vital in the battle for smartphone and tablet dominance in the marketplace. Apps are where the mobility world turns and the development platform with the best hooks and features supporting superior devices have a much better chance to win this highly contested game.
Today March 7, 2012 Apple boldly declared that “we are now in the post PC World!”
That certainly does not mean we should rush right out and trash our once-loved desktop computers or that we should scrap as salvage our trusty laptop computers. It does mean however that mobility has won the day in the form of Smartphones and tablets/slates as the primary tools we should use to do what we do. Just as the era of full-blown applications must now give way to bite-sized apps to help us get things done.
Check out Apple’s new iPad introduction launch video.
More to come:
Thur. 3,8:
I decided I would back off and let all the [undits and hacks get their shots off first. Now that I have marinated on the Apple event and news I can now embark on an opinion.
It seems that Apple decided that “new is good. but that best is better”. They focused on improving the tablet experience in ways that users would notice and appreciate. The new iPad is faster (processor. connectivity), better looking (screen resolution), and more functional. They accomplish it without breaking the apps iOS relies on.
Where did HP fail with WebOS?
I would suggest that they chiefly failed to develop all essential aspects of a smartphone ecosystem.
So, It is not so much the iPhone or iPad devices that Android, RIM and others are actually competing against.
Apple's mistake
Who would have known back in 1984 that Apple would rule the technology roost and have corporations around the planet trying to catch up, keep up or steal the spotlight.
For a company that started the race from the front, it is interesting that Apple is in a lead position they must maintain just to stay in the overcrowded race. At this point Apple has the financial resources, developer talent and the market momentum to remain dominant.
Apple is still trying to deal with the historic times that they made colossal strategic errors by lifting their skirt and enabling and empowering massive competition by inviting Microsoft at first and years later Google into their loop only to give away the long range future and create competitors that would offer Apple’s innovation to the whole computer industry leaving Apple to serve a proprietary marginalized niche. Microsoft’s infamous one year UI deal with Apple back at a time when “DOS was dead” allowed Microsoft to grab up the Mac’s user interface and give birth to windows. The rest is history. One would have hoped that Apple would have learned it’s lesson. Fast forward a few decades, Apple managed to do the impossible by surviving and thriving only to repeat the same mistake with Google both of which I think were the two biggest businesses blunders ever. the rest again is history. Future developments of the iPhone, iPad and MacBook products will finally determine just how this will all play out and shake out. This is an on-going epic story without a clear ending at this point, but my money, as always, is on Apple. If only for their style, design sense and leadership, and definitely not their long-term strategic partnership decisions. If not for those blunders right now Apple should be and would be ruling the digital world.
In the battle for Smartphone supremacy its no longer just about the slickest mobile device. It has eventually come down to the best OS, the most and best Apps (meaning developer base).
Apple’s iOS 4 started the trend and was the leader until Google’s Android stepped in and began to steal Apple’s thunder and market. In the meantime Smartphone phones with dualcore processors like Motorola’s Atrix and Samsung’s Galaxy S II are providing buyer’s with compelling alternatives and choices. For instance, BlackBerry and Symbian have their supporters and fans while Microsoft Windows Phone 7 is beginning to make a strong showing in a crowed field. the coming Windows 8 codenamed “Mango” promises a different approach with primary functions emdedded in the OS and less dependent on apps as with the others.
Thanks to motivated device manufacturing hardware is advancing by leaps and bounds with display screens getting bigger, better and thinner, front and rear cameras are showing up on newer phones. The biggest frenzy and excitement in the industry is around the growth of App Stores that are literally popping up everywhere and are buldging at the seams with new functions, features and solutions that are driving new buyer markets and developer acceptance.
Add to all this the momentum behind tablets and you have the recipe for a “blood in the streets” battle that will eventually play out over the next few years in which should see vast sea changes in the entire technology ecosystem and drastically change the face of business and education in ways we are only now beginning to witness the extent and effects of.
Your choice of OS needs to made considering a wide range of variables.
It might be useful in these days and times to consider whether your target phone’s OS also supports and extends itself to tablet devices.
I have always said and believed that Apple’s biggest adventage is their huge creative and innovative developer base. Not just their iDevices, AppStore, or iTunes. It is not enough for a company to make a better smartphone than an iPhone they need all the other elements that add up to Apple’s success. It is the collective intellectual brain trust of the Apple developer community that others wish they could have. Microsoft thinks they have found a way to get that. Microsoft, on the verge of the Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference, Microsoft is attempting to wrest away Apple’s greatest asset. Microsoft is releasing an API tool that allows developers to easily map, migrate and contort iPhone applications over to Windows phones.
Microsoft officials have said not to expect mapping for all of the APIs, as the two phone platforms are built on different architectures and user interface.
“For this first round we focused on identifying the one-to-one mapping when it exists. In following versions we’ll expand the scope and anytime the concepts are similar enough, we’ll do our best to provide the appropriate guidance.”
Microsoft is hoping that developers will step up and suggest additional APIs they’d like to see mapped, and is asking developers to submit suggestions. Microsoft also is providing interested developers with a 90-plus page “Windows Phone 7 Guide for iPhone Application Developers” white paper.
In this way Microsoft hopes to dynamically enhance their roster of over 15,000 applications currently available for Windows phone 7
This seems a twist on reverse engineering that has stimulated expensive time-consuming litigation in the past. Sometimes instigated by Microsoft against competitors for similar reasons.
We await and anticipate Apple’s reaction to this aggressive Microsoft move.
Mac OS X Lion
There is a really big cat approaching and footsteps are being heard in the corridors and lurking in the hallways of the whole Mac World. Priviledged users and established reviewers and developers are already busy pounding away on LION and us small folk are putting our ears to the ground trying to understand exactly what will change, what will be better and how Apple plans to integrate or incorporate iOS into Mac OS X. The upcoming sold out WWDC in San Francisco will be the touchstone for getting big clues if not much more.
The features they are putting forward and are ready to brag about are:
For a more detailed preview of features : http://www.apple.com/macosx/lion/
Expected time of arrival Summer 2011
WWDC 2011
3/29 UPDATE: WWDC SOLD OUT IN A MATTER OF HOURS
For at least five hopefully sun-filled San Francisco days Apple developers will clog the streets and stumble through the neighborhoods of San Francisco from June 6th to 10th. on their way downtown to gather at Moscone West for 2011′s SOLD OUT Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, most will come to see “the future of iOS and Mac OS”. There will be more than 100 technical sessions presented by Apple engineers. At WWDC10 Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone 4.. iPhone 5 may be on the agenda and it continues to be broadly speculated that the next iPhone and the future of iOS 5 may indeed be topics high up on the list. Hopefully you’ve got your ticket and flights squared away. We’ll see you here 6/6/11.
If you thought this was a hot ticket, you were right! WWDC 2011 TICKETS ARE BEING SCALPED AND SOLD FOR ROCK SHOW PRICES!