So…I’m switching back to my little Sony Clie’.  For the PIM functionality.  For now anyway…

The iPhone is nice…don’t get me wrong.  It’s a great phone, even if AT&T isn’t a great carrier…(Hi Tico!).   And its touchscreen interface is a work of engineering art.  Absolutely magnificent.  But Apple seems to be completely clueless when it comes to Personal Information Management software, and why it’s an important part of a ‘smartphone’

• Fifteen months after the iPhone was first introduced and we Still don’t have notepad synchronization.  This is pathetic.  You see complaints about this all over the web and yet Apple seems completely indifferent.  This should have been a no-brainer.  A No Brainer.  But it looks like not only will we not get note synchronization any time soon, but when we do only Leopard users will have it.  On the other hand.  I can sync my Palm notes on my Macs, my Windows boxes (were I to still be using them regularly) and on Linux via any of several methods.  kPilot and jPilot seem to work very well, though setting them up is, Linux like, only easy if you don’t mind dinking around in /dev.
• No native ToDo lists.  Let alone ToDo list synchronization.  Yes…you can get third party ToDo apps.  But Apple’s insistence on keeping third party apps away from the sync mechanism means you can’t sync third party ToDo lists (or third party notepads) directly to your computer.
• Security:  In the Palm you can apply different security levels to individual records in the contact list, the calendar, the notepad and the ToDo list.  This means you don’t have to lock down the entire device, just individual records according to their sensitivity.  A record can be password protected and additionally it can be hidden, which means it doesn’t even show up in the list until you unhide it.  What this meant was, when I was using my Kyocera Smart Phone (which was a Palm device) I didn’t have to lock the phone.  Which meant that whenever I wanted to use it I just flipped it open.  I could use the phone or access any of my unsecured Palm data instantly, without having to key in a password.  But the iPhone won’t let me do that.  It’s security is either all or nothing.  So I have to lock down the entire goddamned phone so my senstive information is kept secure.  Which means every time I want to use the phone I have to enter my password and unlock it, even if all I want to do is make a phone call.
• Categories.  In the Palm I can assign contacts and other data to various categories for sorting purposes.  Can’t do that in Apple’s simplistic contact manager.  The Apple calendar application now allows you to choose between a ‘work’ calendar and a ‘home’ calendar.  Whee!
• Cut and Paste.  Palm’s had it since forever.  The iPhone still doesn’t.  Wait…what..?
• vCards.  The iPhone doesn’t.  People’s jaws still drop when I tell them this.  Amazingly…idiotically…Apple’s MacOS contact manager app does vCards nicely.  So why the hell doesn’t the iPhone? 

My little Sony Clie’ is five year old technology and it runs rings around the iPhone when it comes to basic PIM fucntionality.  There are additionally dozens of little annoyances to the iPhone that are unique to it, and which have not been fixed since its introduction.  Crap like applications that don’t switch into landscape mode although they logically should.  The damn quirky touch-keyboard would be a lot easier to use if it existed in landscape mode more often.  I’ll say this though, fumble-fingering with the iPhone’s touch keyboard has actually made me a hell of a lot faster with the Palm’s stylus keyboard.  I’m still no better then I ever was with Palm’s own quirky ‘graffiti’ text entry…but I’m lot’s better with the stylus now.  Tons better.  It’s like my fingers have achieved a whole new level of dexterity. 

Where the iPhone excels and the Palm doesn’t is as an entertainment device.  But that’s largely because of it’s third party apps.  I have the Pandora app loaded on my iPhone and it is a joy.  I’d never really cared to use the iPhone as a music player until I put Pandora on it.  My iPod is a third generation one with no wireless connectivity.  I often have it on my belt though, because it can hold my entire digital music library and the iPhone can’t.  But with Pandora for the iPhone I can listen to my Pandora stations while working around the house or at work.  I love it. 

I strongly doubt there will ever be a Pandora for Palm devices, although Palm application development isn’t exactly stagnant either.  I can get really nice media players for the Palm that handle many different media formats including even the open source ogg format.  No Apple device I think its safe to say, will ever natively support ogg.  The media industry absolutely hates the open source movement, and Steve is being his usual jackass control freak self about what he’ll let third party developers do on his hardware.

Which is in the end, probably the biggest reason I have now for dumping my iPhone.  I still have until this coming July on my AT&T contract (like everyone else who bought iPhones when they first came out…).  That gives me plenty of time to wait and see what happens with the Google Android platform.  My hunch is by the time my contract is done, Android will have it’s own Pandora and who knows what else.  Maybe even something comparable to the Palm desktop that’ll sync across multiple platforms including Linux.

But for now it’s back to the simple Palm device for my personal data. It’s five year old technology and it beats the pants off of Steve’s reinvention of the telephone.  Nice work there Steve.  I can sync the contact book with the iPhone…awkwardly…by way of vCards.  The iPhone itself doesn’t do vCards, but I can export a vCard from the Palm Desktop to the MacOS contact book and from there to the iPhone.  And back the other way if need be.  But…sheesh…  I don’t really need calendar synchonization on the iPhone if I’m going to be using my Clie’ again.

Now I need to go find a nice belt case for the Clie’…  Since I’m going to be wearing it again probably for the next eight months or so…