Wap Review

Google's launched a mobile version of Google Calendar. The mobile url is google.com/calendar/m. It's elegantly simple both in ease of use and functionality. The default (and only view) is of one month starting with today. Prev and Next links jump a month back or forward. Of course the mobile and desktop web versions of Google Calendar are always in sync.

The Quick Add feature, which is also part of the desktop web  version of Calendar, is very slick. Google recognizes natural language phrases, like:

"Staff meeting next Monday at 13:00"
"Vacation 9/23 - 9/26" - creates a recurring event.
Or even "Dinner at Mom's on the first Tuesday of every month"

Pretty amazing. There's more on Quick Add here.

Google now has a mobile web version of their Beta Tasks web application.

Tasks is a Google Labs product currently.  Before you can use it on your phone you have to first go into the "standard" (not basic HTML) desktop version of gMail, click on "Settings" and then on the "Labs" tab and enable Tasks.

On the full web, Google Tasks is integrated into Gmail. The mobile version is a stand alone page.  To view it visit gmail.com/tasks (in some regions including Germany it may be necessary to use googlemail.com/tasks.) Using Opera Mini, neither URL worked, Google took  me to a 404 page reading

"The page - www.google.com/tasks - does not exist".

I was able to load mobile Tasks in Opera Mini using the URL: mail.google.com/tasks/m

There are two versions of mobile tasks. iPhones and Android devices get an enhanced one that lets you add, edit, and delete tasks and task lists, as well as mark tasks as completed. Lesser phones see a stripped down Task interface  which is missing the ability to edit or delete tasks although you can view your existing tasks, add new tasks, and mark tasks as completed.

It's too bad that the enhanced version is limited to iPhones and Android. I suspect that other advanced Ajax capable  mobile browsers like S60WebKit and Opera Mobile and maybe even Opera Mini could handle the iPhone version but Google is redirecting those browsers to the basic version.

Google Notebook finally has a mobile version. The mobile Notebook is rather limited, all you can do is view your notes and create a new text note by keying something in. The full web version is much more powerful thanks to Google's Notebook Extensions for FireFox and IE which lets you highlight text on any web page and right click to create an instant note. I'd really like to see Google create a mobile browser application ala Opera Mini with Notebook (and Google Maps, Reader and Bookmark) integration built in.

Update: 15-Jan-2008 - Google has killed Notebook.  At least temporarily users who created notes before 15-Jan-2008 can still use Notebook but new users are out of luck.

Nokia Beta Labs have launched Ovi Calendar 1.6. While there will eventually be an app, Calendar 1.6 is currently available only on the mobile and desktop webs.  The major enhancements in 1.6 are support for multiple calendars and shared calendars. Other features include a To-Do List, Notes and the ability to organize calendar items by category.

I've just discovered Evernote and I think I'll be using this service a lot. It combines online notes, bookmarking, character recognition and a filling system to create a very efficient way to capture and organize your thoughts, observations and all those things you need to remember. There are a couple of versions of Evernote, I'm using the 3.0 beta which is Web (and mobile web) based, although it also has a optional desktop component. I haven't tried the older desktop-only 2.2 version. The 3.0 beta is currently "closed" but that just means who have to request a invitation which can take a few days. The invites seem to be all over the web lately, in fact I have 20 to give out. Leave a comment if you want one.

The way Evernote works is that you send "notes" to Evernote. The notes can be Web pages; snippets of text from a page, email or document; images (especially those containing text) or PDF's. To send notes to Evernote you can use a bookmarklet, email, MMS or Evernote's Mac OS, Windows Mobile, XP or Vista clients. Java ME and iPhone clients are under development. The Windows and Mac desktop applications are complete standalone note management systems that can obtionally synchronize with Evernote on the Web.

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A basic but highly usable note taking mobile web app. PicoNote looks like a good replacement for the discontinued Google Notebook.

The plain text notes can be public or private and are created and viewed using the piconote.com full web site, the mobile site or a Windows only PC application. The desktop version stores notes locally for offline access and synchronizes your notes with the PicoNote cloud for anywhere access and backup. There's also Twitter integration, you can create a note in Twitter by sending a Direct Message to piconote.

The required registration is instant and only requires you to pick a name and password, nothing else is needed not even an email address. Unfortunately you can only register on the full site. I'd really like to see PicoNote enable mobile registration to make it a self contained mobile app.

Springpad is an online organizer app based on linked notepads called "Springpads".  Each Springpad can contain notes, recipes, todo lists and calendar events. Springpads can be linked to other Springpads and can be shared with other Springpad users. Source Tappity

Live Mesh is Microsoft's "cloud" storage and sharing environment.  There are a couple of ways to use Live mesh. The main one is a dowloadable application forWindows Vista or XP or a Mac OS 10.5 or later that runs in the background and synchronizes the files and folders you specify with the Live Mesh web service.Multiple computers can run the Live Mesh application allowing files to be synchronized across computers. Files can also be shared with other Live Mesh users.

There is also a web interface in to the Mesh storage cloud called Live Desktop that can be accessed from any PC. With Live desktop you mahnage the files in your cloud, create folders and upload and download files.

Finally there is the mobile web version of Live Desktop which is actually called "Live Mesh"; It's a basic mobile page that that duplicates most the functionality of the PC version, you can create folders and upload and download load files. For uploading and downloading to work you will need a mobile browser that supports the "browse for file" input tag, like recent Nokia browsers or Opera Mini

Yodlee Money Center is a web based personal finance application. The service, which is free for personal use, is actually an "account aggregator" meaning it lets you view and manage multiple bank and brokerage, credit card, loan and PayPal accounts within a single application. Yodlee can import transactions from hundreds of institutions and when your transactions it automatically assigns each to a category like income, expenses, entertainment, utilities. You can override these categories and setup your own.

Yodlee has Bill Pay too. You can pay bills online from any of your linked credit card accounts and Yodlee can also act as a front end to many bank's bill payment systems.

Budgeting is another Yodlee feature. You set of goals for certain classes of expenditures like entertainment and Yodlee will alert you when get near or exceed your goal. There are budget reports and graphs to help you visualize where all that money went.

Yodlee is the most powerful and feature rich free online money management system I've seen yet. It's not limited to just financial services either. Yodlee can also import and display your gMail, Hotmail or Yahoo Mail, although it just shows a read only view of the subjects of recent mails. To read the full email and reply Yodlee offers a link that automatically logs you into the webmail providers site.

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SmartyPig is a service that combines online banking, money management and social networking.  If that sounds like a weird combination read on.  The basic concept of SmartyPig is to help people save for a specific goal, a vacation, new gadget or even a child's college education.  You link SmartyPig with a bank account and set up specific goals each with a name, goal amount and the date you want to achieve your goal.  SmartyPig determines how much you will need to contribute monthly to reach your goal and, if you approve, automatically withdraws that amount from your linked account every month.  Funds are deposited in an FDIC insured savings account at Iowa's West Bank and currently pay 3.05% interest.

The social networking part of SmartyPig lets you share your goals and the progress toward them with friends and family members who are SmartyPig users.  You control what information you want to share which can be your any combination of your goal amount, amount saved or the  percentage of your goal reached.  Friends can also gift you with funds toward your goal.  There are also widgets available that let you share your goals on your Facebook and MySpace pages and integration with online budgeting sites Mint and Wesable.

When you reach a goal you can withdraw your savings in the form of a Master Card prepaid debt card, gift card from over a dozen participating retailers including Amazon, Best Buy and Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines or by transfering it back to your linked account.  The retailer gift cards offer discounts of "up to 6%" although I could not find a list of specific discounts by retailer.  There are no fees charged for making deposits and withdrawals except deposits funded from a credit card which incur a 2.9% fee..  If your plans change you can cancel a goal and withdraw your funds at anytime without penalty.

Today, SmartyPig launched a mobile site at  m.smartypig.com. You can't register using it but you can track your goals and your friend's goals and make contributions to them.  The mobile site was developed by Brian Fling's new webdesign company pinch/zoom, and uses browser detection and adaptation to optimize the mobile experience for any device from the  iPhone to the embedded browsers of low-end phones.

SmartyPig is an interesting concept. I can see this sort of forced savings plan working well for many people.  Add to that a good interest rate, no fees as long as you avoid making credit card deposits and a kind of friendly way to solicit friends and family, including FaceBook friends to give you money and I can see SmartPig getting pretty popular.  Anyone out there using it? If you are please share your experience in a comment. Source: ubergizmo

Buxfer Buxfer has been in the news lately as one of the first two sites to use Google Gears for Mobile. The other Gears Mobile powered site, online office suite Zoho, only works with Windows Mobile devices. Buxfer is a personal finance and payment service and it supports most phones with a a mobile site and an SMS interface. Of course, only WinMo phones get the advantage of the Buxfer's new offline mode because Google hasn't released Gears Mobile for other platforms yet.

The full web version of Buxfer, which started out a simple service for tracking debts between friends and housemates, has grown into a full featured personal finance application supporting multiple accounts, import from Quicken, MS Money or .csv files, flexible search functions, analytics with graphing and budget management. You can also make payments from within Buxfer using Amazon's new PayPal like Amazon Payments service.

Buxfer's mobile web site is more limited than the full version but still useful. It lets you view account balances and transaction history, post an expense or payment transaction and check if your spending is within your budget. Buxfer can even send an SMS alert when you go over budget. You can sign up for the service on the phone too, something I think every mobile web service should allow.

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Mobile interface to the popular 30boxes.com online calendar application. View and edit your 30boxes calendar and to-do list from your phone. You have to sign up on the 30boxes.net PC site. Nice site but their are a couple of issues. Your login is your email address - hard to type on a phone, an alpha login ID is more mobile friendly. Logging into the mobile site with Opera Mini fails with "Too many redirects".

An online time tracking tool for professionals who want to keep track of the hours they work on various projects. The mobile edition on 88 Miles is limited to clocking in and out of projects. A free account lets you track up to 40 hours per month with unlimited tracking starting at $5/month. If you're stuck with an old phone or a spendy data plan there's even a wml version.

MyHours is an web based time tracking service were you can track your own or employees times and costs against multiple projects. MyHours is currently in beta and all services are free. There are plans to eventually charge of premium accounts but the site claims that basic personal time tracking will always be free.The mobile version lets you open and close projects and review, edit and delete your entries.

TickedList looks to be a rather powerful free online organizer with mobile and PC web front ends.TickedList has four main modules; ToDo list, memos, expense tracker and shopping list. A "Today" screen shows a summary of items due in the next week.  There's even a "Groups" feature that lets you manage shared tasks.

HTML5 checklist webapp works offline using the local storage API.  Works with Mobile Safari, Android 2.1, N900 MicroB and Mobile Firefox and Palm WebOS.

Mobile edition of the popular "Web 2.0" online to-do list, scheduler/calendar. No mobile registration, register on your PC at www.rememberthemilk.com/signup/

Another online task manager. It's often compared with RememberTheMilk.com (RTM). Both have mobile versions, an essential feature for ToDo applications in my opinion. Strangely though, neither RTM nor Todoist let you signup to use the service from the mobile web site.

Gubb's an online list application that can be used for to-do lists, shopping lists, home inventory or any thing else you want to store in a list with or without do dates. You have to sign up on Gubb's PC site first but other than that the mobile version duplicates all the functionality of the PC one - adding deleting and modifying lists and items.

Free online and mobile shopping list. No registration required to use.  Knotler's PC site at www.knotler.com recognizes the iPhone (only) to deliver a nice mobile formatted html version.  Other mobiles are stuck with the WML version at wap.knoller.com.

Nokia has entered the online collaboration space with a Beta Labs offering called Easy Meet. No, it's not a dating service, it's a collaboration tool that lets you set up online meetings with shared Power Point documents and jpeg and png images, plus chat, meeting notes, voice conference calling (not implemented yet) and attendee presence indicators so that everyone can see who's joined the meeting and who's playing hooky or lost connectivity. Meetings can be add-hoc or scheduled and there's support for scheduling recurring meetings.

This a rather powerful set of features, rivaling pricey enterprise services like MeetingPlace and it's currently free .

Easy Meet is web and mobile web based with the mobile version offering all the features of the full edition. There's also a WRT widget version which I haven't tried. You set up a meeting by visiting easymeet.nokia.com and registering with your PC or mobile browser. Then you can add, delete and edit meetings, invite participants, upload local files or share files stored on Ovi Files. When you invite someone to a meeting they get an email, and optionally a text message. Clicking a link in email or message takes them to the meeting. Participants only need to enter their email address and a name to join a meeting they don't need to register for Easy Meet.

All participants can upload files and can download the files uploaded by others. One file at a time can be "Shared" by the host, meaning it's currently displayed in the web and mobile web interfaces. Meeting notes are kept by one of the participants, designated as the "Scribe", and can be viewed by all participants.

 

I

I have some reservations about the PC browser version's user interface but the the mobile interface is highly usable. The widgets are displayed one at time with tab like buttons along the left side to switch between them. It's simple, usable and intuitive. A shared PowerPoint was accurately displayed and there are forward and back buttons to move through the sides. There's even a "Draw" mode that let's you mark up presentations on the fly. With the N95 I was only able to draw dots but I suspect line drawing is possible with a touch screen phone. My only real gripes with the mobile version are that the layout is fixed at 320px wide and horizontal scrolling is required on my N95 in portrait mode (image left or above); and that the navigation and drawing toolbar covers up part of the shared presentation and can't be hidden (top image).

It's great to see mobile users treated as full and equal participants in meetings. Because the mobile interface is web based it offers at least the promise of cross browser and cross platform compatibility. However, the only supported mobile browser currently is S60 Webkit. I tried using Opera 8.65 on a Nokia N95 and got an unsupported browser message. With the NetFront 3.2 emulator, the error was "Your Browser does not support AJAX!" and with Openwave 7 the the login form's submit button didn't respond to key presses. I did manage to get Easy Meet to load in Opera Mini 4.2, although the layout was a bit messy and most of the links and buttons didn't work. I was able to view a shared PowerPoint and advance through the slides using Opera Mini.

Easy Meet looks like a great collaboration tool, especially once conference calling works. I really hope that Nokia embraces the power of the web interface as the universal client and provides support for using any reasonably modern mobile browser with Easy Meet, not just Nokia ones.

1-Aug-2010: Site is down.