So since everybody seems to be equally interested in Clojure and productivity (good!), I just wanted to share my notes on the black berry which helps speed me up.
One of the things which is really important to me is my toolkit - Im committed to always working with the best, most efficient, most supportive tools for the job. Recently I purchased the renowned developers keyboard Das Keyboard, and recently I shipped it back to the supplier. The main reasons were
But one of the tools that I have been the most happy with is my trusty Black Berry so here's a report from the outskirts of BB land.
When I first opened shop I just wanted a good phone which did emails great - I chose the IPhone. After using it for a while both the phone and the company that sells them didn't sit well with me, so I shipped it back. I decided to try the android instead, which was truly a disappointment. The android OS and the quality of the HTC phones could best be described as half-baked. So onwards to Black Berry (after a short stop at Nokia).
If you're a typical corporate consumer you'll buy your Black Berry and your expensive Black Berry dataplan and you'll be happy. If you're like me, you don't want to pay for bloat. When we were setting up our German Conj Labs session we had found a hotel which looked really nice, had all the trimmings, fair pricing etc. But taking a closer look at the paper-work, I noticed that they wanted something like 14€ per day, per attendant for internet access. So we emailed them asking to void that ridicously fee - they wouldn't... so we found another hotel. Its not that we couldn't afford it, its that we wont pay for sillyness - same goes with phones and subscriptions.
The Black Berry dataplan gives you:
But what if I told you, that you could get all of that without a Black Berry dataplan? You can! With the possible exception of BB Messaging, I didn't look into it.
I contacted my phone company to get the details needed for getting the Blackberry online - They said it wasn't possible. Then I got the instructions for a Nokia phone instead and lo and behold, they worked:
Now you're able to browse the web using EDGE, which isn't too bad, though 3G would have been nice, but 3G is impossible since BB doesn't let us configure the proxy settings and so on for the APN. This alone lets you download lots of great apps from various sites around the web.
To get the most out of your browsing I recommend getting Opera Mini. But now for the all important.....
Having push email is an absolute must for me and since the device is capable of it, why shouldn't I have it? Where the Black Berry solution costs you some money, My Funambol is completely free for the first 90 days - After the 90 days are up you have to either become a active/contributing member of the community or switch to another solution. If you stay, its still free, if you change provider it might cost you money, but look through this list of Funambol customers and see what your options are.
Setting up My Funambol is so easy it must be illegal somewhere. Once you've created your account, log in to your main screen:
On the far left you see my email account(s). Here you simply add your account by filling in the server/login details etc and Funambol provides you with a sync url. It also supports synchronizing pictures and events.
On the far right, you have links which you can follow to install the client software on your phone directly from the web. Once the you install the contact synchronization, you get this screen on your phone:
Simply navigate to the item you want to sync and click the mouse button - Almost instantly, your contacts, calendar appointments, notes or whatever will popup in the Web UI - Cool :)
There are a couple of things which My Funambol leaves me wanting, which may or may not be in the pipe
But thats really it, other than that this free app really delivers what you'd expect!
Blackberry + My Funambol lets you reap the benefits of an expensive Blackberry dataplan without paying the costs - beautiful. And the application itself is so well crafted, so easy to use that its inspirational for me as a developer. Go check it out :) My next pet-project will likely be to put Clojure on the Blackberry!
Lau Jensen is the founder and owner of Best In Class a danish consultancy company which specializes in Clojure development.
Lau is also one of the instructors driving the Conj Labs initiative. If you would like to be notified once new blogposts are published, you can follow Lau on Twitter.
