Spot the Error! (Ordeal Part 3)

iTunes never fails to amaze me:

Besides the infinite amount of error 3259, this "8.2MB of 7.3MB" progress bar shoots through the roof of my patience.

Nevertheless, I was able to play around Safari browser and Youtube during dinner. Those were fun and great pastime, I must say (I was watching "Hipster Olympics" showing the corner of Bedford Ave and North 6th Street, exactly when I was passing there, and that was quite a wonderful feeling). But then, I'd rather look for Windows Mobile alternatives of those softwares before I explode due to the incompetence of iTunes. Windows Media Player, in contrary, had never given me sync errors like those, and it would show me exactly which files are synced.

There are more detrimental flaws than nice details in the iPhone + iTunes combo that leaves me less and less love for it. My fantasy of showing off the phone to friends in Hong Kong is not worth the headaches of sync failures every day.

Four days left with this phone.

The iPhone Activation Ordeal

Since my phone, which could play videos, songs, browse Internet and look up Google Maps, and which had been working like a horse for 3 years, was broken, in the wrath of the deserts sands from Burning Man, I had to buy a new phone today. I miss the convenience of having all my contacts and files sync-ed.

So I bought an iPhone. You know, my company is developing a software for it. And I led that project, in fact.

But if there is anything wrong with the design of the iPhone, it is the activation process. It is an absolute failure.

First of all, I have to close iTunes now because it keeps stealing focus of my windows every minute. I can't type at all.

So here is the story.

Once I opened your pristine box of the iPhone, I took out the phone, the dock, and everything, and I am greeted with no instructions. Ah, yes, it's a touch phone, so the instructions must be on the first page of a pamphlet called "Finger Tips".

And I read the first instruction: Download iTunes. Of course, if you cant wait to turn on your phone (which you need to hold a button somewhere at the top right), you will be greeted with the same instructions as well.

Why iTunes? I have no idea. I thought this is a phone, not a music player. But anyhow, I am forced to download a nearly 50MB file, via my slow broadband connection. That alone took half an hour of waiting.

iTunes itself required the installation of two of the most annoying components: Apple QuickTime and Apple Software Update.

And iTunes itself is a horrible software. Enter Key does not work. After you entered all your details in the iPhone wizard, enter key will not bring you to the next page. The software is very unresponsive as well, compared to Windows Media Player. There is no hierarchy to speak of when browsing your media. The giant list of all my 7000 songs in the Music Library is illogical. It is impossible to scroll through the whole thing. Want Podcasts? Want album artwork? Oops, you need an iTunes Store account. Everything points to an iTunes Store account, actually.

It had been more than an hour since I called AT&T. I checked my AT&T account on their web site, and verified that the rate plan had already been updated, as they wished. However, Apple iTunes still told me that my voice plan is not compatible with their phone, and passed the blame on AT&T. Way to go, Apple. It's totally your fault now and I'm waiting. Worse, you don't even have a proper technical support phone line that I can find easily.

(As of 2:20AM, i.e. 8 hours later, it is still not working. Clearly, the AT&T web site had been updated with the new plan.)

Comparing a Windows Mobile, the setup process of the iPhone is a disaster. For a Windows Mobile, you install Outlook and Windows Mobile Device Center. Outlook, comparing iTunes, is a full-featured PIM. Besides, you don't even need to install all these things if you just want to make a call. The phone will just work when you turn it on. No locks and activation.

I know, Microsoft introduced the concept 'activation' to the mass. Adobe soon followed. And Apple made it ugly.

I am returning the phone next week, if the experience continues to degenerate.

Things Learnt From Making Trillian for iPhone

Phew! The week was quick! The idea of making Trillian work on the iPhone did not come around until two weeks ago, when we are convinced that Trillian Astra may be able to run on the phone.

There are a few engineering challenges concerning the connectivity of a mobile device, and design limits due to the size and processing power of the device. Since the iPhone is designed as a gesamtkunswerk (a total work of art), my main concern is to create a user experience that is as coherent with the iPhone itself as possible, while still retaining a brand identity: something that won't make an iPhone user feel like they are contaminating their dear phone, while keeping Trillian users proud.

Here are some quick things that just come out of my brain in regards of designing applications on iPhone:

1. Ergonomics: After dissecting the iPhone UI, I concluded a very simple rule: Buttons need to be the size of a finger. And it cannot be too close to each other.
2. Metrics: Apple keep sizes of things fairly straightforward, everything is around multiples of 10 pixels, which translates to 1/16 of an inch. A button is usually 40 pixels tall, which is a quarter of an inch.
3. Color: The iPhone interface, in fact, uses very similar hue ranges as Trillian Astra. But then all these are just guessing unless we can actually take screenshots from the phone.
4. Interface Inconsistencies: While reading from the iPhone applications, I realize that their interface is actually not very consistent: Sometimes the bottom is black, sometimes is blue, sometimes it's used as a status bar, sometimes a toolbar. Some screens are black, some screens are white. Nevertheless, it is still pretty tied together because it's intuitive and minimal enough.
5. Font: Apple loves Helvetica on the iPhone. Humanist fonts seem to go out of style when Microsoft begins adopting them in Windows Vista. Surprisingly enough, the phone includes Helvetica's archnemesis, Arial, probably for viewing Google, who is obsessed in the font.
6. CSS Compatibility: Most of the time was spent on getting the perfect CSS. I coded all the HTML using just <DIV>'s for reusability. It was a great experience to code a web page that works for just one browser. Makes you wonder why we should all suffer from browser wars. Safari on iPhone also spots some CSS3 features that other browsers don't have, and I can use them happily with no worries.
7. Testing: You need to have an iPhone to test no matter what. Safari for Windows or Mac may help you verify your stylesheets, but it will not reflect the exact rendering on the iPhone and the way user interacts with the application.

With that said, I have yet to get an iPhone... I know, it's harder to design if I cannot immerse myself into 'knowing' the device I am designing on.