I'm very pleased of reading a 2-parts article by Bryan Rieger. He has done a very good job with a Wordpress plug-in to make his company site, yiibu.mobi, good for mobiles.
Not only he has done a very good analysis of the problem, but also provided for free a Wordpress module called MIRF. Installation instructions are available on the site.
I always run Rescuetime in the background, even though I have to admit I don't check it so often (anymore).
It was interesting to see that the week before the DeviceAtlas 2.0 release my efficiency was very high. See here:
It should be noted that normally during the day I spend some time developing and some time writing specs, talking to colleagues, on the phone and so on, but of course, just before the release it was all about development. :)
Within the DeviceAtlas team, on Monday 29th September, we worked an average of 11 hours and 30 minutes, plus the what the designers worked, that is probably about the same. What a team!!
My first video online is about DeviceAtlas, of course!
Introducing the new DeviceAtlas Data Explorer
The other day I was trying to do some house-cleaning of HTC device names, clones and HTTP request headers for DeviceAtlas.
The result was that I was one step from going crazy. All those devices have names that are almost the same, UAProf or user-agent string refer to slightly different names, different network operators re-brand with *other* different names.
Just to give you an idea, I found a couple of useful sites that talk about HTC devices, platforms, and model names:
Nokia always named their mobile devices with numbers. Most of the times 4 numbers, sometimes 3. In the last few years they started also using letters such as N and E.
Many have tried to find some reasoning behind the numbers, but no real rule was ever found (at least that I know of). Anyway, it looks like Nokia might have run out of numbers. Today, while checking on Forum Nokia I noticed a device that was advertised as new, but did not sound so, to me. A little research on the Forum itself shows that the "new" device is the 3120 classic, but there's also an older 3120! So why is the new one called "classic"? Shouldn't it be called "new" or something?
Well, for all of us (OK, I'm the only one) trying to remember all model names, it's going to be harder now.
PLUG: luckily you'll find both in DeviceAtlas (Nokia 3120 classic and Nokia 3120).
DISCLAIMER: I run DeviceAtlas for dotMobi.
A thread about making the next version of the Java API of WURFL more OO, something that Java developers are certainly fond of, has spun in a thread about licensing.
I think a few developers have been caught by surprise. In short Luca wants to make the new API GPL, instead of the current MPL. It is still not clear which version of GPL and I think it is not yet definitive.
The problem that was raised is, of course, that changing the licence to GPL will compel all developers selling their software based on the WURFL API to open-source it and use the same version of GPL. Luca mentioned how mysql does not have this problem and how big companies like Google can use open-source softwares, but not release back to the community. This is of course a different case from mysql, because the API would be tightly embedded in the software and the licensing issue would affect mostly consultants, not companies doing internal development (like Google, in Luca's example). If you think that WALL might be licensed in the same way, it might be even worse as WALL will certainly be a core part of any mobile application.
There is a solution to this, of course, a dual-licence. Also, special discounts are announced for companies buying consultancy.
I am curious to see how this will end. I hope the community will be able to find a feasible solution that will keep everyone happy.
References:
Last Friday I was in London to speak about DeviceAtlas. My speech was actually called "DeviceAtlas Masterclass", but I did not know exactly what to expect, of course I knew the participants would be developers interested in mobile, but what exactly were they looking for? 1 hour was the scheduled time, I prepared a speech that would take about 40 minutes so that I would leave 20 minutes for discussion. The speech was really an introduction explaining how DeviceAtlas works and why dotMobi decided to create it.
There were about 30 people in the class. Most of them already knew DeviceAtlas and already had their own ideas of what they needed. While the presentation was only an introduction, the outcome was very positive, in fact there has been a lot of interaction, questions and discussion. I think this really turned a speech into a masterclass.
The only real issue during the class is that it was interrupted by a Fire Alarm started. We all walked out and stood in the grass for a few minutes. Then back into the class-rooms and got an extra 15-20 minutes. Luckily the weather was very nice and chatting on the grass has been a pleasant interruption.
We announced DeviceAtlas back in February and promised that Argogroup data would have been included to our repository.
Well that day has arrived, Argogroup brings so many years of experience that I can hardly think of a company in the mobile space that was around when they started. We have already loaded information for almost 800 devices (adding information to existing ones or creating new devices) and we have a few more updates in the pipe.
This addition brings a lot of value to DeviceAtlas as Argogroup has built a huge reputation on their testing platform (Device Master) which makes it a perfect match for DeviceAtlas and dotMobi.
Visit the official DeviceAtlas site now to get the fresh downloads and if you are not a user yet, I think it's a good time to get your developer licence for free. Do not forget you need an account (also free) on dev.mobi, first.
Make sure you note these dates on your calendar. On April 4-5 there will be a very exciting event in London called "Over the Air". We are all mobile mammals (read fans and addicts) and this event is really the place to be: the topics will be anything that has to do with services provided over the air. It will not be limited to browsing, one of the most common topics of dotMobi, there will also be Android, iPhone web apps and native apps, J2ME and more.
If you are in London it's a must, if you are not, it's probably worth to start looking for a flight and a hotel.
I will be talking about DeviceAtlas, of course.
See you there.
I joined dotMobi in June 2007. It's been a big step for me, leaving M:Metrics has been a tough decision, but I felt like it was the right thing to do for me for a number of reasons.
The last 6 months have been incredibly busy and I can assure you I spent more nights up writing software than going out and have fun with friends.
Anyway I think it's been worth, because today we are unvealing a new product called DeviceAtlas. It's a version 1 software, but this is the result of re-starting from scratch with an idea in our minds, developed after the past experiences. We think it's a leap forward and we are very excited about the companies and industry leaders that have decided to join us from day 1.
Take a look at it, play with it, and let us know what you think about it. dotMobi also set up a forum for this on dev.mobi.
Every year there 1 single event that every company in the mobile space wait for. New services are announced, hardware vendors easily announce 5 to 10 new devices each and journalists eagerly look for some groundbreaking news. It's the Mobile World Congress (formerly known as 3GSM).
Well, we want to do the same and I think we are going to make it big. It's going to be that kind of service that if you're a developer and you've been pulling your hair because you can't get something going for a mobile device, you will be very happy to get.
dotMobi has been keen on providing great tools for developers to make sure they would make their life easier. Well DeviceAtlas is no less!
Stay tuned because it's coming and it's running fast!
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