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On Android you can. Could on my Desire HD. Can on my S3.

As a matter fact, BES used to have an issue with setting Out of Office.

I'm no fanboy. I do miss the physical keyboard and long battery life of my BB Curve. The phone was just getting long in the tooth.

75 word per minute world record for thumb typing

An experienced typist on a conventional keyboard might be good for 75-90., the world record is 200+. Few of us will ever remotely approach these speeds, this indicates what's physically possible for humans operating human hands. 10 fingers is faster than 8 fingers and two thumbs.

Which is why serious document production is going to be done on conventional keyboards, not virtual or thumb for the foreseeable future. If I have to type a 66 page document (that was a few months ago) I'm using all my fingers on a physical full-size or close to it keyboard.

heya,

Blackberry devices aren't that much cheaper.

For example, in my work here in Australia, I was told that our BB 9700 handsets were around $740, even after all the carrier discounts from Telstra (we're a very-large IB).

For that sort of money, you can nearly get a iPhone 4, or a Android phone.

For my personal phone, I have a Nexus One, and apart from the lack of a tactile keyboard, it's much nicer to the BB 9700 handset I use. The only drawback is the battery life, which is obviously lower, due to the large screen size. Still, for an office warrior, it's a small price to pay.

Also, RIM has a history of using annoying tricks to try and get you locked into their infrastructure. And simple things, which would normally work fine over say, Wifi, or a normal mobile plan are specifically locked out, simply to try to drive more sales of their other services. Even things like Gmail, Google Maps, MSN, Skype etc. are prevented from using Wifi (the phone has in-built Wifi), simple to drive more BIS/BES sales.

http://www.blackberryforums.com/wifi-hotzone/100809-will-google-maps-work-over-wifi.html

I think their devices are nifty, but their OS is still in the dark ages (6.0 doesn't look to change that), and they're not happy with just selling you very expensive smart-phones, they lock them down to force you to cough up more for "special" services (oftentimes just data through their circuits).

Cheers,
Victor

This is really old news, you've been able to do this in Linux by abstracting the BB through bluetooth for quite some time. Here is a guide I wrote last January (when I had a BB Pearl for 2 weeks), and I've been doing the same process with my Moto Q smartphone for about a year prior to that.

it's a long way to get to it. Start on the main screen and open the Manage Connections app. Scroll down to Wi-Fi options and click. Click on the Blabkberry Key (the one with the little dots on it) and scroll down to and select Wi-Fi Diagnostics Click on the Blackberry Key and select Site Survey. You are there.

http://www.blackberryforums.com/aftermarket-software/139443-looking-netstumbler-type-bb-app.html

Having said that, I now carry a personal BlackBerry phone. It hasn't failed yet but it's not exactly bug free. If you think Microsoft products are poor quality, you should experience what RIM calls "release" software. Nothing that pulling the battery and waiting a few minutes for the thing to reinitialize won't fix, though.

I'll second that. I've found BlackBerry Forums to be invaluable, not only for locating the latest firmware versions (whichever carrier may have them) but also for letting everybody know which ones are flaky as hell and to be avoided.

I replaced a rock-sold stable but physically damaged Pearl 8100 with a brand-new Pearl 8120 and I had to pull the battery from the new phone about four times in the first week. It's stable now, but only after two firmware updates.

Hey Fucking Anonymous Coward, here's a way to grab the information off an encrypted blackberry.

http://www.blackberryforums.com/general-blackberry-discussion/49434-blackberry-forensic-research.html

So much for your "it's so fucking secured ooooooo" nonsense.

And let's not talk about things like bbproxy and other things that opens your inside network completely to attacks. Yes, finally RIM recommends putting your BES inside a DMZ, but that was only after a proof of concept was shown, and how many companies deploy it that way?

And what about things like that pdf vulnerability?

I hate people who read a couple of websites and all of a sudden is a fucking security expert. Moron.

Paraben has renamed PDA Seizure to Device Seizure, and it supports Blackberry forensics acquisition. Also, check out this link at blackberryforums.com that explains the caveats of blackberry forensics and data acquisition.

"BlackBerries do a few things extremely well. (Email, calendar, and... That's about it.) They're not very expandable/flexible."
Really?
Well here are two navigation programs for the Blackberry
http://na.blackberry.com/eng/builtforblackberry/navigation.jsp.
Here is a collection of software for the Blackberry. http://na.blackberry.com/eng/builtforblackberry/
Here is a list of Favorite apps for the Blackberry from blackberry users.
http://www.blackberryforums.com/aftermarket-software/316-updated-blackberry-killer-software-utilities-thread.html
And this is a site for Blackberry Freeware.
http://www.blackberryfreeware.com/
There may be more software for Windows Mobile but the Blackberry seems to do a lot more than just Email and Calendering.
So as you can see using Java doesn't have to cause the downside that claim it does while offering great flexibility in the underlining CPU that native code just will not provide. Seems like Microsoft might even agree. http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/default.aspx Seems like they are moving to .net for mobile devices.

> Why not use the IMAP4 IDLE command?

Great question. As I understand it, Blackberry-style 'push' is a proprietary way (on the client and server) of doing IMAP IDLE, and is less of a power drain (why?). Interestingly, apparently the Blackberry client can support IMAP IDLE if the server is configured correctly.

Would love some more details on this from someone who knows more about how exactly Blackberry-style Push works.

Don't lose hope, brother.

Remember, Word started its dominance in the 90s. It took them nearly 10 years to get to that point. So, don't give up, your work will be rewarded in the afterlife. :)

A quick search found that there is Open Source compettition for the blackberry also (albeit at the protocol level -- maybe at the server level also).

There are also Open Source applications available on the blackberry (and other phones that support J2ME & MIDP).

Also, if you ever run into a corporate project in its early stanges (or even if it is past due and overbudget already) contact your local open source integrator and at the same time call in the big guns: Red Hat, Novell, etc. They may be able to save the project and show how open source companies could have helped solve the problem in the first place.

Don't lose hope, brother.

Remember, Word started its dominance in the 90s. It took them nearly 10 years to get to that point. So, don't give up, your work will be rewarded in the afterlife. :)

A quick search found that there is Open Source compettition for the blackberry also (albeit at the protocol level -- maybe at the server level also).

There are also Open Source applications available on the blackberry (and other phones that support J2ME & MIDP).

Also, if you ever run into a corporate project in its early stanges (or even if it is past due and overbudget already) contact your local open source integrator and at the same time call in the big guns: Red Hat, Novell, etc. They may be able to save the project and show how open source companies could have helped solve the problem in the first place.

I work for a mid-sized CPA firm, and I have to manage our Blackberries. I have had more problems with them than any other handheld. From parts of the address book being completely lost, both on the handheld and in Groupwise, to duplicated calendar entries, to some accounts simply refusing to synchronize. There tech-support is a shame, every time I call I get the same answer, "Delete the RIM folder under application data." We told our Partners not to get them, but they just had to have them because "everyone else has them so they must work" we showed the examples of people having problems with them, but "that must be isolated." Now since they don't work, it must be GroupWise's fault because so-and-so uses Outlook and it works fine. If you look at the Blackberry Forums there are plenty of Outlook users having issues, and deleting the Outlook profile seems to be the fix-all, thats a pain when you consider 4,000 person address books and 2000 calendar entries. Funny though, one Partner decided to go with the Treo, and I have never had to work on it since he got it a year and a half ago.

For Macintosh