Mobile Computing

The recent leaks of the BB10 outside of the phone is definitely an interesting prospect. One that I am excited about.

If you haven’t seen what I’m talking about, this is it.

Still not much is known really what the hell that is, but still that opens up the discussion of what BlackBerry’s vision of Mobile computing is.

I for one love the idea of something like the Ubuntu Edge. A phone in which you can dock, and it will run a sort of desktop OS. In Ubuntu’s case, that’s their desktop OS. That is probably pretty close to my own idea of a mobile computing platform. Something you can carry around in your pocket, and when connected to a larger display, becomes a computing platform that you could use for work.

 The leaked video gave me a glimpse of hope I have to say, about the future of BlackBerry’s mobile computing platform. What I hope, is that the video isn’t a desktop or tablet OS. What I hope it would be, is the BlackBerry 10 that currently runs on the phone I’m typing this on.

As it stands now,when I plug my BlackBerry 10 device into a larger display, it just mirrors it. And on a larger display, the current UI just doesn’t make sense at all. The buttons are huge, the URL bar in the browser is huge. For games perhaps doesn’t matter as much, but it will still be nice to be able to hide the controls on the larger display and just use the device as a controller.

What I hope the video is showing, is what BlackBerry 10 will transform into when I plug it into a larger display, a keyboard, and mouse. That makes so much more sense to me. It’s an UI that has been optimised for larger displays, and I think it looks really nice, and with bezel gestures similar to Windows 8 tablets, it should work pretty darn well too on touch screen displays

The way I see it, most people use laptops mostly for consumption, with the occasional creation of documents, powerpoints, excel, etc. And a device like this would certainly satisfy their needs or maybe even replace their laptops. For me, I still need to use programs like Photoshop, illustrator, and indesign for work, so my laptop likely isn’t going away anything soon. But still, I think something like this could at least reduce my need of a desktop/laptop when I just need it to accomplish simple tasks.

BUT.

While it’s nice to dream about the future, i think more importantly BlackBerry has continue to improve their BB10 platform for phones first and for most. Even with 10.1MR/10.2 leak, it still leaves much to be desired, particularly with their device with physical keyboard.

I imagine a future where I could connect a Q10 wirelessly to a monitor, and it changes the UI to adapt to the larger display. The Q10 then becomes a trackpad and a keyboard that I can use to control what’s on screen. (Think BlackBerry Bridge on BBOS and PlayBook)

Well, it’s always nice to dream.