Mike

No, I'm not going to "play the man" and accuse you of being biased because it says "Microsoft" under your name. < g > IMHO this is a crucial area and we all have opinions and different perceptions that certainly help me a lot.

>>Or just use Transcriber and use the whole screen as the CR area, with the app still fully visible.<<

Yes, this is something I have already raised. Transcriber is currently being evaluated by our "resident computer hater" Dr Katherine Sowden who is an Obstetrician. She finds it slower than the onscreen keyboard or character recognition on the PocketPC, and slower than Graffiti. She also observes "weaknesses" like the difficulty getting email addresses to be accepted cleanly- try Transcriber with jryan@platocis.com and you will see for yourself.

IMHO the "result" of this testing by a doctor carries relevance for a product intended for doctors, despite what you or I may think.

>>Huh? Unless one considers C++ to be a RAD dev environment, I can't see how writing PPC apps in VB can be less rapid than coding Palm apps in CodeWarrior.

I'm not commenting on whether VB or C++ is RAD, I'm passing on what my chaps who are relatively new to the area, have reported back. They find it easy to get going on the Palm, far harder to know where to start on the PocketPC. That may be because there are lots of good books about Palm but far fewer about WindowsCE.

>>Hmm, we may be looking at different dev environments. With the current 3.0 version of the embedded tools, it's relatively painless to create in install package. Are you evaluating the CE toolkit for VS, or the current, dedicated embedded toolkit?<<

The dedicated toolkit, of course. To explain my reference to dll hell, let me quote to you from the pocketpcreadme.htm file that installs with Version 3.0- in the data access section:

<snip>
Before using this SDK, be sure to download the newer ADOCE and related files from this SDK onto your device. The versions of the components in ROM on these devices are slightly out-of-date. Several of the files that need to be downloaded to your device must be registered on the device. To register a component on a device, use the Control Manager in eMbeddded Visual Basic, or use the Regsvrce.exe utility. For information on how to use the Regsvrce.exe utility, see documentation in the eMbedded Visual Basic 3.0 Release Notes.



A list of "slightly out-of-date" dlls that need to be updated first, is not something I want to encounter in the readme file as soon as I start looking at a new OS. Hopefully Microsoft can take this on board as constructive criticism. Who do I report it to?

>>I was a Palm user since the first version. I eventually found it to be limiting in comparison to the CE/PPC. They're great if one just needs an electronic organizer, and if size and battery life are overriding concerns. For my use, the more rich feature set of the PPC is more suitable. Depends on what you're looking for, I suppose.<<

I agree. There is lots of commentary about this in various PDA sites. For me, I'm assessing in terms of acceptability for doctors and how fast we can bring products to market. While I am a doctor myself I have asked a range of my peers to test "what doctors think" to make sure I do not inject my own bias. And I'm enough of a "scientist" to go with what they say if there is an overwhelming consenus.

But I'd still but a Handspring for mayself, preferably a Prism. The biggest reason is probably the expansion pack for the iPAQ that doubles its already relatively large size, preventing it going comfortably in my pocket, or in a suit jacket or white coat pocket.

>>Since I use it to listen to something to and from work on a lot of days, I'd be using something that's as big as my current Casio, so why not just buy the Casio?<<

We've had the Casio in its various incarnations for over a year. Whether a PDA is something one uses to play MPEGs on the way to and from work depends on a lot of factors, I guess, and is not something the doctors are likely to focus on. As you said, it depends what you are looking for. We are looking for something that slips acceptably into a busy male or female professional's pocket and allows us to develop software that makes it worth carrying. In the CE department it had to be the iPAQ. The Casio was and is too big.

>>If one is concerned about size, a PPC isn't what you want anyway.<<

Well, you need a screen of a certain size. Something the size of a cellphone can't carry an acceptable screen for most medical needs IMHO. Not yet, anyway. So it's PocketPC or "wait another year" which is what we decided after the same exercise with PalmV and Casio running CE2.0 last year.

Regards

JR

"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1