Communicator and Nokia’s software problems

I didn’t buy PSP but instead satisfied my instant gadget hunger with Nokia Communicator 9500. I’ve had the system for some 24hrs now.

Pros:
1. Remote email works
2. Calendar sync works as well
3. Keyboard is nice

Cons: the system software sucks big time. Every aspect of it. This is my first communicator but I had tested some earlier models and knew that Symbian is a slow Java-sucker. However, I was really surprised to learn that the Symbian/Java cancer affects the basic phone functionality as well. There is substantial lag with basically any key stroke! Usability suffers.

As I noted, both email and calendar sync now work. These are the most important add-ons (so far) this phone brings to me. However, they are far from perfect. Nokia’s email software is so crappy it doesn’t seem to understand mail box (IMAP) folders. And then there is the basic problem that retrieving email is incredibly slow even when I’m connected through Wifi. In this regard, there is practically no progress from the times when I used Palm VII in the United States. That was in 2000! It seems to take one 10-30 sec “slice” only to check if I have new email. Downloading any new messages takes another slice or two. Naturally those “slices” can double or triple when the connection is through the basic phone network (GPRS). Maybe I can fix this problem somewhat by locating and installing a better email client. At least I need extra security software (communicator has no SSH support) to send some mail.

Sync works, yes, but it is buggy and took 4 hours to install. It was like configuring a PC some 15 years ago. I have a Mac and officially neither Nokia nor Apple provide any help for guys like me. I had to locate, download, install and learn to use a hack. It’s 2005 god damn it! And I’m talking about big companies and their “premium” products… I had to first fool the communicator to eat some extra non-standard software and then edit a script in a secret folder on my Mac. Grazy. Now it kind of works – I only need to press a few extra keys at every sync because the communicator isn’t comfortable with my hack. Still, this is much better than with my old SonyEricsson, which synced out-of-the-box but always messed up times and dates. At least Nokia does the functionality correct.

All in all, I’ve confirmed a fact I sort of knew before. Nokia’s software development is fucked up. Symbian sucks, usability sucks, compatibility sucks. Worse, many of these problems are terminal and cannot be fixed. I can see dead-ends everywhere: Symbian is not intended for real computers where phones are transforming into and obviously Nokia can’t head the development of basic system software intended for real computers. Thus, I’d argue Nokia’s move towards “outsourced” Linux and open source software development is a necessity, not deliberate strategy.