For well over 5 years (probably closer to 10 but I hate admitting that) I have watched the PC Tablet market take shape. The early advantages of the technology in industries like healthcare and pharmaceutical industries (to mention a few) were incredible. However, the technology limitations of battery life, weight and clumsy human interfaces often kept all from admiring the Vista. Even with these limitations, I couldn’t help but to admire the potential. For many years I struggled with my data collection process and note taking procedures. Taking hard copy notes in a meeting has always bothered me since I ultimately wanted to save this information and have it electronically available to me for reference. At first I would grab the yellow pad and have them transcribed. This was way to time and effort consuming and it lost a lot of the content since the right side of my brain is heavier I would loose much of my content since I often draw pictures and schematics during a meeting. Then came the first Palm device. With it’s pen based human interface – this was surely my savoir to my note taking dilemma. After several attempts in meetings to produce valid note taking data, the Palm settled into technology stack as a really good day timer. I even gave Mimeo a shot. Remember these devices? I think they are still available but they would hook up to a whiteboards and allow you to capture the contents of a board and download them to the PC. Again the human interface as well as the entire process of preparing to use the device really slowed it down and took the awe away.
But over the many years of trial and error, the tablet PC kept evolving and getting better and the early adopters of the technology (like Pharmaceutical sales reps) really help to take it to the next level.
One observation and credit that I would like to point out over this journey goes to IBM. I have brought a lot of product from IBM (as well as the others) over the years. My approach with product selection has been to stick with the economies of scale and only deviate from your standards for absolute necessity. While in Pharma the need for a notebook device was imminent and at that time Fujitsu was leading the pack in this territory. All of the manufactures were working on some type of tablet device. That is with the exception of IBM. With the potential of the tablet market exploding, I never understood why IBM held back and did not develop the technology right away. As hide sight would have it I think I now have a better understanding of IBM’s planning and why they held back on the technology. The overall marketplace needed to mature a bit - why get into it now – let the others make the mistakes and learn from them. The risk of not entering the market early on was huge, but I really think the payoff worked since products like Microsoft OneNote (See Microsoft OneNote - Is it the death of the pen and yellow notepad? ) have really helped bridge the gap on the Tablet PC’s value proposition.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Sunday, July 15, 2007
The Vistas of expansion in a Personal Computing Environment
As a technologist, I have come to realize over the years that upgrading one’s personal computing environment is a bitter sweet process. Having to recently go through a replacement of my notebook computer, I couldn’t help but to provide some highlights of the event. With the thousands of computers sold on the market today, I am certainly not a pioneer here, but there are a few observations that I thought were worth posting on the blog that centers around the infamous computer upgrade.
In keeping with the theme of the blog, I’m not going to compare Product A to Product B (although I will comment on a few disappointing challenges and lack of features that I ran across). What I will do is discuss the sociological aspect of the event. I know, this sounds deep but it's really not. So - follow the links below to get the story. The sections can stand on their own if you want to go to a specific point, but I would recommend reviewing all of them since it tells the whole story.
Since all of us must go through this seemingly undesirable process at one point in our lives, I thought it was a worthy blog topic. Actually, according to my estimates the average person has to deal with this undesirable process at least 11 times in their lifetime. That is of course if you don’t count any of the upgrades for your wife, kids or other relatives that were smart enough to pawn it off on you.
For me, buying new technology is like being a kid again. It starts by imagining how wonderful it will be to finally got your first bike and be able to race around with the rest of your friends only; to find that you need to build your skill level a bit before you can keep up with them . As with anything, you need to stop and think - is owning the new toy (or in my case latest technology gadget) as good as the anticipation of owning it). Will I gain the productivity advancements that they claim comes with the purchase? I can’t help but to think about this especially when it comes to Microsoft Vista.
I’ll admit that the marketing campaigns that must have cost the Microsoft millions to produce probably had an effect on me. If they didn’t I most likely would have stayed with XP a bit longer before I made the jump. However, being the technologist that I am, my curiously got the best of me.
Making that decision, I was well aware of what I would be up against. After all, I have already been through 50% of my life expectancy of upgrades. I was ready for the excitement of getting a fresh new technology and all the rewards that are claimed to come with it. On the other side, having to give up a comfort level that was established over much time with my current system (even though it did have its problems) was concerning. Although, I’m not one to coin corny phrases, this is an obvious lead into one; there are always two sides of the coin. In this case the reality of upgrading one’s personal computing environment especially with a new operating system often dulls the anticipation a bit.
Outline
Taking the jump into new computing territory takes a little planning. Other than the obvious configuration bits and bytes that you need to decide on (See Guidelines for selecting the right Tablet PC); one other consideration that is often overlooked is evaluating your current personal computing environment. That is, understanding what you clearly are trying to achieve by buying a new computer or moving to a newer technology like Vista (See Identifying your commuting environment). In my case, it started out simple. My laptop was about 5 years old and was starting to run into more and more configuration problems that was effecting my work. Since I was staying with a portable, my choice was a Toshiba tablet based system using Windows Vista and Office 2007 (See Can you see the Vista?). For some strange reason I have been curiously patient in buying a tablet PC. This was odd since for many years now I have felt very strongly about the major benefits that tablet based systems can bring. The Tablet PC’s evolution has been slow, but significant developments have helped to bring its computing capabilities more mainstream (See The evolution of tablet computing). With this, it seemed to be the right time for my needs to make the move. More importantly, this supported one of my personal goals that I have had for quite some time of trying to achieve a paperless environment. I’m not sure if I am entirely there yet, but I am certainly closer than I have ever been (See Microsoft OneNote - Is it the death of the pen and yellow notepad?). Tablet computing still has it challenges today and the manufacturers may need to rethink the way they are delivering these systems to the market. More importantly, they need to take a closer look at how people can effectively use them, something I call "the personal integration factor" (See The Personal Integration Factor).
In keeping with the theme of the blog, I’m not going to compare Product A to Product B (although I will comment on a few disappointing challenges and lack of features that I ran across). What I will do is discuss the sociological aspect of the event. I know, this sounds deep but it's really not. So - follow the links below to get the story. The sections can stand on their own if you want to go to a specific point, but I would recommend reviewing all of them since it tells the whole story.
Since all of us must go through this seemingly undesirable process at one point in our lives, I thought it was a worthy blog topic. Actually, according to my estimates the average person has to deal with this undesirable process at least 11 times in their lifetime. That is of course if you don’t count any of the upgrades for your wife, kids or other relatives that were smart enough to pawn it off on you.
For me, buying new technology is like being a kid again. It starts by imagining how wonderful it will be to finally got your first bike and be able to race around with the rest of your friends only; to find that you need to build your skill level a bit before you can keep up with them . As with anything, you need to stop and think - is owning the new toy (or in my case latest technology gadget) as good as the anticipation of owning it). Will I gain the productivity advancements that they claim comes with the purchase? I can’t help but to think about this especially when it comes to Microsoft Vista.
I’ll admit that the marketing campaigns that must have cost the Microsoft millions to produce probably had an effect on me. If they didn’t I most likely would have stayed with XP a bit longer before I made the jump. However, being the technologist that I am, my curiously got the best of me.
Making that decision, I was well aware of what I would be up against. After all, I have already been through 50% of my life expectancy of upgrades. I was ready for the excitement of getting a fresh new technology and all the rewards that are claimed to come with it. On the other side, having to give up a comfort level that was established over much time with my current system (even though it did have its problems) was concerning. Although, I’m not one to coin corny phrases, this is an obvious lead into one; there are always two sides of the coin. In this case the reality of upgrading one’s personal computing environment especially with a new operating system often dulls the anticipation a bit.
Outline
Taking the jump into new computing territory takes a little planning. Other than the obvious configuration bits and bytes that you need to decide on (See Guidelines for selecting the right Tablet PC); one other consideration that is often overlooked is evaluating your current personal computing environment. That is, understanding what you clearly are trying to achieve by buying a new computer or moving to a newer technology like Vista (See Identifying your commuting environment). In my case, it started out simple. My laptop was about 5 years old and was starting to run into more and more configuration problems that was effecting my work. Since I was staying with a portable, my choice was a Toshiba tablet based system using Windows Vista and Office 2007 (See Can you see the Vista?). For some strange reason I have been curiously patient in buying a tablet PC. This was odd since for many years now I have felt very strongly about the major benefits that tablet based systems can bring. The Tablet PC’s evolution has been slow, but significant developments have helped to bring its computing capabilities more mainstream (See The evolution of tablet computing). With this, it seemed to be the right time for my needs to make the move. More importantly, this supported one of my personal goals that I have had for quite some time of trying to achieve a paperless environment. I’m not sure if I am entirely there yet, but I am certainly closer than I have ever been (See Microsoft OneNote - Is it the death of the pen and yellow notepad?). Tablet computing still has it challenges today and the manufacturers may need to rethink the way they are delivering these systems to the market. More importantly, they need to take a closer look at how people can effectively use them, something I call "the personal integration factor" (See The Personal Integration Factor).
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