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After Lewis, BlackBerry also interviewed Nick Fry who is a member of the team too. His interview was about “synergies between the BlackBerry and MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS brands and how to manage a large team in mission critical operation.”

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Source:Inside BB

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Who to follow?

• @NerdBerry
• @Sleepy2009
• @K_mart_

Feel free to Tweet us question’s about the events or post your questions in this article. Everyone that is traveling to BlackBerry Live 2013 and BlackBerry Jam 2013 have a safe and fun trip!

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Eugene can bee seen singing the praises for the devices in a report in ComputerWorld.  He states that the battery life on the BlackBerry is twice of all other devices that they have tested, and he states that he cannot live on a iPhone.  The majority of the devices will be Q10s from what the employees have voiced.

Source:MobileSyrup

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I had been thinking for a while that this interview needed to be done. I wanted to know what was going on in the founder of this site’s head about what he thought about BlackBerry, and the new BlackBerry 10 OS. And the timing is perfect because he has had some time to really experience what it is capable of. So without further adieu, here are my questions for Art Trapp aka @sleepy2009

1. What do you like most about BlackBerry 10?
I would have to say the all around ease of use as well as the OS being so
reliable.

2. What features do you like the most?
Good question I think its the full integration of applications, from cloud
storage to social media.

3. What do you think BB10 could improve/fix?
I think BlackBerry could improve the customization of the general look and
feel. Maybe add the ability to customize the colors of the current OS.

4. What do you like about BB10 that was missing from old BB’s?

Integration as well as speed.

5. As someone who runs a BlackBerry site, what keeps you coming back to
BB? You’ve also owned Android but always have such high praise
for BB.

For me it is a number of things from the BlackBerry community, features
and being always connected. This is how I classify my devices 1)
BlackBerry my go to devices for everything. 2) iPhone ( I have to use it
for work)… 3) Samsung Galaxy S2 a toy to play games nothing more.

6. Do you think BlackBerry has long term viability? (Will it be around in 5
years)
Absolutely!! What a lot of people are missing when they say BlackBerry is
dead is the fact BlackBerry as a whole is thriving. They own several high
end companies like QNX for instants. QNX Operating system powers cars,
nuclear power plants and much more.

7. What is your favorite BlackBerry 10 app?
Umm, that is a hard one… If I had to choose just one I would say BBM. If
I had to pick one that is not native I would pick MLB at Bat 2013.

8. Alternatively, what is your favorite BlackBerry app that hasn’t yet made
it BlackBerry 10?

I would say Ubersocial a great Twitter client. Now you can sideload the
Android port but is is not the same..

9. When did you get your first BB and was it your first smartphone?

Wow that is taking it back! My first BlackBerry was the Curve 8320. It was
not my first smartphone, I was a Windows phone user for a long time before
I found BlackBerry and my life changed forever!

10. Which BB device from the past did you like the most?

I would have to say my trusty Bold 9700. I dropped that device in a bucket
of water only to pull it out and place it in a bag of rice to save it. Let
it sit for 24 hours and boom it works like new!

11. If you could design the latest BlackBerry device, what would you do to
it? (the possibilities are endless, screen size,
memory, color, features etc)

My dream BlackBerry would be a 5in phablet with a quad-core processor 64GB
on board memory and 6GB of ram. Full HD screen,HDMI out and a 16 Megapixel
camera. I could go on for hours about this one.

12. Other than phones and tablets, do you think there is a product
BlackBerry could make that would be marketable?

I think BlackBerry has done just that with the BlackBerry Z10 and Q10. I
would like to see the wireless carriers get behind Blackberry as they do
with Samsung and Apple.

13. Of the BlackBerry events you have attended, what is your most
memorable moment?
Hmm, I would say sitting in the press area waiting for the keynote to
start at BlackBerry World 2012 now BlackBerry Live.

14. What BlackBerry event would you have liked to attended but didn’t get
to?

That is an easy one, the BlackBerry Z10 Launch event in New York.

15. Are you a BlackBerry Fan For Life? (BBFL)

I am a BlackBerry fan for life, without a doubt. I love #TeamBlackBerry!!!

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The first episode focuses on Neil Gaiman and his desire to connect with fans using BB10. You can watch it below.

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BlackBerry 10 is unlike anything that is on the market right now. This can be a blessing and a curse for BlackBerry.  There will be haters that pick up on the fact that it takes some learning but whenever you picked up your first Smartphone you had a bit of trouble navigating  until you got your bearings.

BB10 has gestures which are similar to the gestures on the PlayBook.  Once you learn how to use it, gestures become second nature.

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Source:Inside BlackBerry Blog

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Thanks for joining us today Stephen. Can you tell me about your role at Softchoice?

I’m the Practice Lead for Security at Softchoice, and mobility falls into the security practice – so we manage any security vendor and then all of the mobility centric vendors as well. We resell BlackBerry products and services, including deployments, integration services, and more.

Softchoice recently joined our BlackBerry Technical Preview program – can you share your experience setting up BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10?

So far the feedback that we got from IT was that the deployment of BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 was extremely straightforward, and we know for a fact that it wasn’t very time consuming, so that was a great start. We did have the assistance of a BlackBerry engineer over the phone, but the whole thing only took a couple of hours and that’s including knowledge transfer. Once it was set up we were immediately able to begin provisioning devices.

 

Why get on board and why deploy BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10? Are you expecting to manage BlackBerry 10 devices and BlackBerry PlayBook tablets moving forward at Softchoice?

Absolutely. Our executives are actually all very big BlackBerry fans, and we anticipate that they’re going to want to continue to get the latest and greatest device. A lot of that trickles down, so we have a lot of devout BlackBerry users.

Are you seeing anticipation from Softchoice customers that you get setup with BlackBerry solutions?

I can tell you that my team is very customer focused, so while we manage the business, our real job is to help customers find the right solution. Every time you guys [BlackBerry] make an announcement, all of the competition comes to a halt. We can see it statistically; we actually categorize and classify our customer meetings to track the topics.

Before the announcement of BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 there was a high volume of calls and meetings around “what should we do about mobile device management?” The word is now getting out and those calls and even requests for quotes from BlackBerry competitors have plummeted. I’d put it this way: counting BlackBerry out is like not drinking water because soda has more flavor. It’s absolutely ridiculous. BlackBerry is a force in mobility, and with BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 and gatekeeper for ActiveSync… That’s a game changer. Customers have existing relationships with BlackBerry, and so a simple upgrade that allows them to manage other mobile devices if they need to is a very compelling story.

Many customers that we talk to have been confused. There’s a lot of confusion out there and there are a lot of people trying to capitalize on the confusion, but it’s not really working. Customers have been waiting to execute on their mobility strategy, and they’re now able to do so with BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10. Doing an upgrade is a lot easier than firing up a new unknown solution.

How has your experience been with BlackBerry 10?

So far so good! Immediate reactions are similar for most people – it’s that traditional feeling that you get from most BlackBerry devices, that the hardware is beautiful. There’s really no question there. You pick it up and you think “Wow! It’s solid, it’s pretty, and I want it”. Just like it always has been. We use the story all the time with customers on the topic of BYOD: every time the new BlackBerry would come out, 35% of my fleet would be lost, damaged, or stolen because they want the new one so badly [laughs]. The same thing goes for this device.

My favorite feature is the ability to minimize apps with a gesture, swiping up from the bottom. I’ve been using other mobile platforms for years, and now I find myself trying that swipe up gesture on other platforms because it’s so intuitive and it’s so handy. I just can’t shake it. That’s definitely one of my favorites.

I do like how when you minimize apps they stay as these active frames. It’s nice to have a couple of things on that screen. I’m obsessed with knowing where my battery is at, and I’m obsessed with knowing what the weather is like, so having that is really great.

The Hub is very interesting for sure, having it built right into the device is incredible. Other platforms have an app that integrates a variety of accounts… But it’s kind of hokey and not everything looks the same. You still have to start an app, which is the fundamental difference. With Hub it’s a simple gesture that just takes you to where everything is. If you want to focus on your personal email for example, you can really narrow it down.

The web browser is very strong. In the beta program we didn’t have full access to all of the apps in BlackBerry World since it was pre-launch, and so there are a lot of things that I’ve been doing just in the browser. Everything that I do with my other platforms, I’m actually doing on BlackBerry 10, without apps, and just using the web browser. So far that’s been just as good.

Are you familiar with BlackBerry Balance? What’s your feedback as a mobility professional?

Balance is definitely something that customers are asking for more and more. Two years ago people would ask vaguely for MDM capabilities without knowing what they were asking for. Now, most people have a good idea that basic MDM solutions exist in general, but more so customers are now asking for containerization.

[Customers say,] “We want to be able to segregate work data and personal data so that we can be a little bit more granular. Maybe we can do a proper partial wipe where we really know for sure that the work data is safe.” Things like partial wipes have been available in a lot of MDM solutions, but there’s been nothing to prevent a user from mixing that data up, and as an administrator you would have no visibility into that. It’s simpler administration. Instead of securing and managing the entire device, we’re able to put the work stuff into the work area and we’ll secure and manage that. We couldn’t care less about other email accounts on the device. That level of flexibility is going to be very attractive to a lot of organizations for sure.

Where do you see the partnership between BlackBerry and Softchoice going in the future?

With BlackBerry we think at this point that things are actually going to take off. We’re very enthusiastic about the BlackBerry 10 and BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 launch. We now have the features that customers are looking for; the single management console to manage all platforms, and the gatekeeper feature – that was something we were really waiting for. We can know that no one is connecting to our infrastructure without going through BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10.

BlackBerry 10 devices are devices that consumers are going to like; it’s a slick interface, it’s easy to use, it’s a sexy handset, and you’ve also got things like the camera app with time shift. It’s huge. Features like that will really attract more customers, as well as the video editing functionality. That’s how people communicate today. High definition and editing on a single device is really driving towards that convergence of client computing that people are looking for. There are a lot of cool devices, but to have all of this functionality in a single device is really great.

I’d love nothing more than to just have a single phone that I can carry around and use as my primary computing device. Having the ability to do a lot of that on BlackBerry 10 is very attractive to a lot of people.

Thanks for your time Stephen!

Source:BlackBerry BizBlog

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Made With Marmalade: Nick, you’ve spent a lot of time over the last few months taking part in port-a-thons with RIM, helping developers get their apps onto BlackBerry World using Marmalade. What can you tell us about port-a-thons?
Nick Smith: A port-a-thon is like a 24 to 48-hour marathon online talk show for developers. We have a host taking questions through a live chat window on the site, plus experts who can help answer those questions from developers looking for help with anything to do with getting their apps onto the BlackBerry World store.

MWM: So what are the advantages of taking part in a port-a-thon for developers?
NS: Well, the chance to get tips and tricks directly from engineers like me means that we can help developers to unstick parts of their apps that might take time to figure out on their own. We’ve found this kind of event can really help to speed up the production and deployment of apps. Since we started this programme four months ago we’ve seen over 1,000 apps made with Marmalade delivered to BlackBerry World. Besides that, they really are great fun with plenty of incentives for people to take part, from cash prizes for submitting apps to sweepstakes for trips to the Game Developers’ Conference.

MWM: What was your experience of these port-a-thons?
NS: It’s always great to meet and hang out with members of our development community and show off some of the more fun and interesting features of Marmalade. These port-a-thons have been a great opportunity to do just that, and we’ve seen some great games being developed and approved through them – some users even sent us builds of their games to try out live during the event!

MWM: What effect do you think the port-a-thons have had on app development on BlackBerry?
NS: Having the port-a-thons as a focus has enabled developers to really speed up development and that’s reflected in the number of apps being made with Marmalade and deployed on BlackBerry devices. I think there’s been enormous benefit on all sides: we’ve had the chance to talk to our community and see what they’re using our tools for and our developers get uninterrupted access to our experience during the event.

MWM: Thanks Nick.

Via: Marmalade

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Mobile Link

One of the most welcome features that we are looking forward to that we have knowledge of is the new BlackBerry Hub feature! The awesome unified inbox allows you to quickly see all of your messaging and social application and more application to come with the opening of the BlackBerry Hub API. RIM was in attendance at CES 2013 to not only show off the capabilities of QNX but to show of some of the current features of the up and coming BlackBerry 10 devices:  

• Unified Inbox versus BlackBerry Hub: Similarities – If you are currently using your device’s unified inbox as your base of operations on BlackBerry OS 6 devices and up, I have great news: BlackBerry Hub is still the messaging and communications center for new BlackBerry 10 smartphones, and it’s available in real time.

• Unified Inbox versus BlackBerry Hub: Differences – When Thorsten Heins said “BlackBerry Hub is not just a unified inbox,” he wasn’t kidding. By using BlackBerry Flow to layer open emails, attachments, or BlackBerry apps over the top of the Hub, you can quickly “peek” back as needed to view all the apps you’re currently using. It’s as much about the accessibility of your data as it is the integration of your data.

Let us know what you think of the new BlackBerry 10 Hub and or what other features you would like to see stem from it.

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