Please Register - November 17th Meeting

[Justin Grammens]

All,
I'm pleased to announce that our November 17th meeting will be sponsored by Verizon Wireless - http://verizonwireless.com

Because of this I will need to get a count of how many people will be attending the meeting so we can plan pizza and drinks accordingly.

PLEASE REGISTER for our meeting at:

http://demolicious.eventbrite.com

Any questions, please let me know. Also, there is still room if you would like to demo. Let me know if you would like to present and verify that I have your name on the list. http://mobiletwincities.com

Thanks,
Justin

[Mark Jenkins]

Justin,

I will not be there. I will be traveling. I should be at the meeting in December.

Mark

Mark Jenkins
Marquis Mobile Solutions, Inc.
+1 (612) 701-2019
www.MarquisMS.com

sent using my BlackBerry using BlackBerry Enterprise Server

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From: mobile-tw...@googlegroups.com <mobile-tw...@googlegroups.com>
To: Mobile Twin Cities <mobile-tw...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sun Nov 08 22:25:00 2009
Subject: [mobile-twin-cities] Please Register - November 17th Meeting

[Jeremy]

As a developer, is there a way to get smart phones for reasonable
prices? In particular, I'm looking at the Droid on Verizon.

I'm on contract with the blackberry, so they want the full ~$550
price. Their plans are targeted to consumers rather than developers.
Ideally, I'd like to get 2 or 3 phones if they were cheap enough so
that we can test interactivity. But at full price, it adds up
quickly, and has to compete with other priorities. But I would think
the carriers and phone makers would want to make it easy for
developers to get the devices - given that we will be promoting the
phone and populating the appstore.

It has parallels in other areas: With software, Microsoft sells MSDN
to developers - it's a cheap way to get almost everything they make.
And with electronic devices (cameras, hardware, etc), some bloggers
get them for free, presumably in exchange for a review. It would
seem entirely reasonable for them to sell 'dev phones' cheap or at cost.

Anyone know of any arrangements like that?

Jeremy

[Breon]

For Android, there are two 'developer phones' available, the ADP1 and
the Google ION. The ADP1 is basically a Dream/G1. The ION is a Magic/
MyTouch. What makes both of these unique, versus their retail
counterparts, is the fact that they are carrier unlocked and ready to
receive custom firmware. However, both phones have limited quantities
floating around. 4000 IONs were given away to the participants of
Google I-O earlier this year...even to the folks that couldn't care
less about Android. There are some floating around on eBay for
$400+. There's one ADP1 on eBay for $51 and 4 days left.

What's great about Android is that the platform is open source and the
source code is readily available on the internet. This pretty much
gave free reign to the devs, hackers, modders and general techies to
flash ANY Android phone with any Android firmware version or even
create their own firmware (search for cyanogen :). There is plenty of
documentation on how to do this on http://www.xda-developers.com/.
The stock Android/HTC kernels are available here http://developer.htc.com/.

All that being said, your best bet it to buy a used G1 or MyTouch,
root it, flash it, develop on it. Not only with this be cheaper for
the device, it will make sure that your app runs fine on an older/
lower spec device. There is no doubt that there are more G1s out
there than any other Android device. Lowest common denominator.

The other option is to use the emulator to the best of your ability,
then create a small test group of local android users or even a larger
group to get a better sample size. I regularly beta test Twidroid and
Foursquare. In the past I tested several other apps.

I really need to write a blog post about testing and testers :)

Cheers,
Breon

[Breon]

Aaaaaannddd...Just as I say it, it becomes official.

ADP2 = ION http://j.mp/1Y5NMu

On Nov 9, 3:17 pm, Jeremy <jer...@greenspringdesign.com> wrote:

[Justin Grammens]

I have the Google Ion (ADP2). It's a nice phone and very durable. A little under powered I would say, as most Android hardware is at this time - short of Droid. But none the less, I have ditched my G1 and have been using this since I got it for free at Google I/O. I love the slim form factor and was able to put in my T-Mobile SIM card and use it as my primary phone. As Breon states, it's basically the myTouch.

Justin

[Justin Grammens]

FINAL REMINDER. Our November Mobile Twin Cities meeting is tomorrow night at 7:30.

If you are still interested in demoing (or are on the homepage and now for some reason can not demo), please contact me.

We still have room for a few more people to demo.

http://mobiletwincities.com

See you there!

Justin