" I'm sorry your parts have still not arrived, we had to use a different vendor "

" I'm sorry but company policy doesn't permit me to help you now, you'll have to wait another month till your account clears "

" I'm sorry I can't transfer your money, there is a 24 hour hold period "

" I'm sorry.... "
" I'm sorry.... "
" I'm sorry.... "

blah...blah...blah...

When will companies realize that "Sorry" isn't their "customer" ?

Their customer is the real human being they are dealing with at that very moment, and "Sorry" needs to take a back seat and shut the hell up.

Dealing with service people most times is nothing more than an extension of their broken computer system and lazy business practices.

We live in a world of higher expectations, and constantly hearing "Sorry" is synonymous with "failure", on the companies that fail to support their customers’ simple expectations of being serviced well.

</rant>

Once you gain experience using a variety of tools within any single domain, no matter the platform, a clear differentiating factor begins to emerge.

It's all in the details.

Windows XP versus Windows 7.
Windows Phone/Android versus iPhone.
Visual Studio/XCode versus Eclipse.

They all relatively do the same thing compared to each other.  But it's the little things that push the product/platform/tool past simple mediocrity into its unique professional status.

• Things like the little magnifier bubble for the iPhone.
• The Windows 7 taskbar live preview and window snap.
• Intelligent code completion in Visual Studio/XCode and real-time code checking while you're typing.

Being "good enough" can get you invited to the party.  But being "awesome" makes you the life of the party and gains you a fan base.

And to achieve that, you need to focus on the little things.

If you died tomorrow, would the project that you were involved in be important enough for someone else to pick up out of a desire for its value to the world?

Or would it fall into the pit of irrelevance and be forgotten?

Wouldn't it be nice to know that your hard work during your lifetime had meaning towards a greater goal?  That it wasn't just "a job", or simply about money, but true value and purpose.

I suspect Steve Jobs is proud of this.  Knowing that if he had died due to his illness sometime ago, he would be proud of his contribution in rebuilding Apple into the powerful company that changed the world.

Shouldn't we all be involved in such purposeful work?  In building our dreams that live on past our lifetimes.

What are you building today that matters for tomorrow?

Curious thought.

Apple went to the tablet.  Google went to the TV.

Computing will never be the same, nor will the HTPC scene.

And just like Apple's App store supports the iPad, Googles' Android Market will support their TV.

Hmm.. this sounds familiar for some reason.   ;)

If the implementation is good, then this thing is going to be huge.  We're talking "thermonuclear" huge!

And TV will never be the same again.

That's right.  FREE!

Revitalize that old Windows Mobile device (WM 5.0 and above) and make it work for you as an automated program scheduler.

Use PocketCRON to schedule the running of other apps automatically and empower your Windows Mobile device as your personal robotic assistant.

From controlling Christmas lights to watering your lawn, by reusing your old WM device you renew your investment in it, as well as keep it out of our landfills.

You can download PocketCRON here, and if you end up using it in some cool and innovate way, tell us about it in the forum.

I'm always interested in how creative other people get with my software.

Enjoy!

Programming is hard and incredibly time consuming.

Once you've got the basic language constructs down, the rest of your time then is spent drudging through API frameworks, class libraries, big piles of code and GUI design, and then fighting to integrate all of those methods together with the machine platform you're focused on.

But when you finally manage to write, debug, and test those perfect little functions, they become yours.  A creation out of nothing, born to do your bidding and you own them.

The time and energy you invested into their creation makes it personal.  And letting go of them is hard.  Especially when you've had big plans for that code and now you're forced to abandon it, because you're switching to a new platform that doesn't allow you to take your old code with you.

It reminds me of the time when I finally had to abandon my wonderful DOS graphics library coded and optimized in beautiful X86 Assembler for the demo scene in 1992, to instead transition into full C/C++ and Win32.

I still have that old assembler code library for nostalgic reasons.  But it's long abandoned now and will forever remain just a story with some great memories.

Such is change.

I invent.
I build.
I automate.
I fix things.

And I do this sometimes for money, but mostly because "that's what I do."

What I am, is an enabler.  I use the tools technology provides to enable people around me to live better.

And I'm not alone in this.

“ Try not to become a man of success, rather try to become a man of value. ”

        – Albert Einstein

Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 Series has finally been unveiled and after watching the demos of it perform, it occurred to me that the "phone" component is now truly just another app.

Thanks to Apple, "smartphones" have truly become "app phones."

Leaving the "phone" aspect buried by a mountain of apps and left as a last resort of conversing with someone.

SMS, Twitter, Facebook, email, etc., have surpassed voice calls by many more hours, and will continue to do so.

I view these devices more like mini tablet PDA's.  A blend between a communicator and a generic, media focused, computing device that bridges the gap to a more powerful, cloud based operating system.

The killer apps therefore, are those that best utilize that integration and enhance the mobile human world with added value to the environments around them.

With all this mobility, it looks like we’re going nomadic again.  But I digress.  :)

I have been reflecting on the state of the mobile industry for a while now and where my company, Applied PDA Software, needs to go.

Microsoft's incompetence within the mobile space and their apathy for the Windows Mobile o/s has clearly lost them serious market share.

Most of the other Windows Phone developers have already shifted their focus to include iPhone, Android, and Blackberry development.

While Android and iPhone (+ iPad) too have their own imperfect qualities with respect to their o/s and App stores.  The mind share they encompass within the marketplace is too hard to ignore for any mobile developer.

My current collection of Windows Phone apps will still remain supported with possibly new apps coming in the future.  But the immediate business priority is to now shift towards expanding development into the more dominant mobile platforms.

Have an app idea you would like to see become a reality?
Or maybe want to see one of our Windows Phone apps ported to another platform?

Let me know!  I enjoy feedback and am always willing to listen to other people's ideas.

Watch this site for upcoming future apps to support a variety of mobile platforms and devices.

The future success of any digital media electronics it seems will come in the form of added value that their respective app store will provide.

Mobile phones are only the tip of the iceberg.  HD televisions I predict will be the next big area that the app store model will expand into.

The HTPC (home theater PC) revolution will finally come to fruition in the form of advanced HD TV’s that have all of the computer processing features built into them.

This will allow developers to build widgets and other applications that enhance the televisions’ media features.

Users will simply be able to connect and browse an app store channel from their TV and buy various add-on software from their couch.

From games to screen savers to email, RSS, and the many social sites, the living room laptop and tablet will then be threatened by the new HTPC HD TV.  (try saying that 5 times fast!)

In fact, "television" most probably will become just an app in itself, and the internet will be your PVR.