APPLIAN TECHNOLOGIES'
Super Incredible Bundle (SIB)
Part One: QuickLaunch
byChris Martin
Let me start by telling all of you a little about myself and my situation. My name is Chris 'Antikid' Martin, and I am a High School senior at Edgewood High School in Hamilton Ohio.
I now have an HP Jornada 568, which I love. It's a very big step up from the Jornada 548 which was my first PDA. I have been an avid Pocket PC'er since I got my 548 in June of 2001. I use my PPC every single day, whether it's reading an eBook for English, writing my homework down every period, playing a game, or just messing around and finding out new things about my it. I am also a proud Rocketeer, from http://www.PocketRocketFX.com and that's how I landed this review.
I plan on changing my ways a little to incorporate the Applian Super Incredible Bundle (SIB) in my daily life to tell all of you what's up with it. What's good, bad, great, and terrible, what's worth changing, what's just right, and what needs to be tweaked a little, anything. Hopefully it will help you in deciding if the SIB from Applian is for you!
And one thing that might interest some of you, I will be doing this whole review on my pocket pc, with my Stowaway keyboard. All except for the editing and final touches, so it will look different on a pc, and my guess maybe better on a pocket pc, because everything is better when you can do it out of your pocket, right?
I plan on writing at least one review every week, since there are 11 programs in all, 4 games, and 7 apps! Which include: QuickLaunch, Picture Perfect 5.1, Virtual Wallet, Squirmy, RemindMe, RatSplat, QTris, PocketLock, Dial-a-matic, CoolCalc, and Batty. I will be honest, and tell it like it is about how all 11 of these programs work and if they, if any, will work for you.
Here's the layout of my "grading system." The grade will be based on 10 criteria, each worth 10 points. For a grand total of 100 points. Sort of like in school, a 100 point grading scale, with 100 being the highest, and of course a 0 the lowest. And I honestly don't know if I can give any of these a 100 because that would mean the program would be completely flawless, and just be all around perfect. And we all know that there is nothing that is completely flawless. But I really hope that one of these 11 are. I will judge all programs based on the following:
Practicality - This criteria is based on how useful this program is. For example: You wouldn't buy a rubber nail, because it's useless, it's not practical. So I ask myself is this program practical? Is it worth having at all?
Uses - This criteria is based on how many uses the program actually has. For example: eBooks can be both entertaining, and informative. So I ask myself is this really useful? Can I do more than one thing with it?
Learning Curve - This criteria is based on how easy it is to learn to use the program. For example: When you just brought home your new LCD remote, it takes you 2 hours to learn how to use it very well. So I ask myself how long will/did it take for me to know what I'm doing?
Fun - This criteria is based on how fun or entertaining this program is. For example: In some games it can be too hard to win, and that's not fun. So I ask myself am I having fun using this, is this work or play?
Innovation - This criteria is based on how new and innovative this program is. For example: You just spent $500 on your new "state of the art" chair, come to find out, it's just your same old chair with new leather. So I ask myself is this program innovative, or is it just a remake of the same old stuff?
Every Day - This criteria is based on how "every day enabled" this program is. For example: You bought a new suit, a very nice and expensive suit, but you can't wear it everyday, because it just doesn't work. So I ask myself can I use this every day.
Pick Me Up - This criteria is based on how well the program was made. For example: You have a really nice watch, but every time you want to see what time it actually is, you have to push and hold a button for 5 seconds. So I ask myself can I just pick it up, use it, and put it down?
Cost - This criteria is based on how well this program makes buying the bundle worth it, does it hold its own? For example: You just want one Software title, but the stores only have it in bundles for a higher price, are all the other titles included worth buying, or should you go without? So I ask myself is this a cost effective purchase, is it really worth it?
Presentation - This criteria is based on how well the program looks, and how it presents itself to you. For example: You have really great photo editing software, but every time you open it and use it, it actually makes you not want to use it, because it was so poorly put together. So I ask myself how well is this Presented, does everything look good?
Ease of Use - This criteria kind of falls under the Learning Curve criteria, but it's also one of its own. It is based on how easy this program is to use. For example: Every time I try to save my word document, I have to do 5 different things, and it's not easy to remember how, and what to do. So I ask myself how easy is this to use, can I hand it to my friend and tell them to do something, and can they do it?
Application Launcher
This is a neat little apps launcher that you can get for free, even if you don't have the SIB. It works okay generally, but I have been having some trouble with it since I have installed the SIB. It seems that it doesn't always open the other pages that have other programs in them. You can tap, but nothing happens. Not always, though, sometimes it works flawlessly. Other times you will tap on the icon, say for "More Programs", and it will do nothing, except highlight the text.
The same is for "Calculators" and "Games." When it does work and takes you to the other page, you should be able to get back to the "Home" screen by tapping on the "Main" button, but low and behold...NOTHING.
So you have to tap the little house in the tray to get back to the home screen.
I know that it's not that hard to do, but that's not the point, if you buy something, you expect it to work, and properly. And this doesn't. I don't currently know if they are going to fix that, if they know about it or what, but I personally think it should be resolved. Unless for some reason it's just me!
Another easier to use, and cool feature is the mapping function.
Here you can map any button to anything, yes anything, files, sounds, MP3s, any file you can see in FileExplorer, you can map to.
You can choose icons, and name the button that will open the program, for example, you can map to File Explorer and name it Explorer, and also map to Internet Explorer and name it Internet. There is also a File/Command Line. Which allows you to link to any file, as I mentioned above, to automatically open when you tap the button, which is a very neat and cool feature, like for me, I have the Pocket Word button linked to this review file, so every time I open Word with the QuickLaunch, my file automatically opens and saves me a little time.
You can also create your own icons and it's really easy, all you need is to create a 32x32 gif file and put it in the Program Files/Quicklaunch/icons folder, and viola! Really cool if you like to customize everything on your pocket pc. So you can make a special icon for that special MP3, or that certain Excel file.
Another great and working feature is the task switcher/closer. This works very well and is even better than the built in one on my Jornada, again this may only be me but, when I close notes, I get a "Program not responding" error.
But when I use the QuickLaunch close menu, I get no error.
Same thing with ActiveSync. There is a separate menu for Switch and Close, which is a good thing, but I wish it told you which menu you were in, because you can tap the menu and forget which one you opened and either close the program you were trying to switch to or vice versa. But as I now sit here and take these screens I see that when you're in switch, you see a Desktop selection.
Another little problem is I see 2 Pocket Word tasks that I can close and I know that one is the program and one is the file your editing, but you can't tell which, and when you try to close just one, if it's the Word program itself they both close, and I have found that the program is on the bottom
and it only does that with programs that have files that open in the program itself, which I just realized as well.
Practicality: 8 - This program is practical yes, but when you have other choices that function the same and can be launched when you turn on your pocket pc, it kinda makes it useless. But, if you don't have any other, then this is great, and FREE. Say you have SnoopSoft Dashboard, you get it all right then, as soon as you turn on your PPC all of your programs are right there. With this app launcher you have to launch it in order to launch others, see what I'm saying?
Uses: 8 - This program has more than one use, but like I mentioned, a few of these uses don't work. So that's why it gets an 8 here. A few bug fixes and then this program is on the way to the top!
Learning Curve: 10 - The great menus and self explanatory ways to do things makes this easy to learn, and easy to use in no time.
Fun: 8 - Not really much of a program to judge the fun level on, but hey I've got to do it I guess. 8 because it's not really fun, but it's not all that boring, well bad category for this, sorry:(
Innovation: 7 - Although this has the cool features that other app launchers don't have, it's still not innovative, but the neat features, like making your own icons, give it a boost here.
Every Day: 8 - Well, this does have every day uses and although not great they are there and I must recognize that. I really don't/didn't use it everyday, but you could, and it would work just fine. Especially with some of the neat features, like linking to a file.
Pick Me Up: 6 - The 'pick-me-upability' of this is not so great, like I've said before, launching a launcher is not the best thing to do, the point of these programs is to save you time, and that just takes more time.
Cost: 10 - Well what more can you ask for free? If anything is free, in my book, it's worth it, well some exceptions, but mostly it's always worth it. And this is worth the costly price tag of: $0.00.
Presentation: 10 - The way the icons are lined up and how they are all there is a great thing, I like it and it's easy to see, read, and find what you want. The menus are great, and everything is right there for you.
Ease of Use: 9 - Well, it can get confusing but, not if you know what's up with what's up. I thought it was easy to use and hopefully you will to, and there are the nice help screens that come with it.
Total Score: 84 - Not a bad score. All in all, I would say that this is worth having if you have no other apps launcher. It works well, sometimes, and will get the job done, and for free. I recommend this program for even the people who already have an apps launcher, just because you can always customize this to open your most used files, and so on.
Well, that's it for now, hopefully you enjoyed reading the review, and, it was helpful and informative. After MANY troubles, like losing half of what I had already wrote, and with that a few ideas that I couldn't remember. So, let me tell you that if there is one thing to do every night, that would be BACK UP!!!! I can't stress that enough, because when you don't, or when you forget one time, and then stop altogether, you will realize that a good recent backup is needed, but unfortunately, it will be too late.
I loved writing this review, it was fun, and I learned a lot, and by the way, if you couldn't tell, I've never wrote one before. So hopefully this one was great, and if you guys or girls have any input as to make this better please tell me.
Up next will be Picture Perfect, and let me tell you all now, that I love this program. Hopefully I will have it done a little faster than it took me to do this one. So on an ending note, thank you all again, and thank you Tari for the great site, awesome downloads, and for giving me the opportunity and responsibility to write this review. And I would like to thank Applian for making such good programs, and hopefully with the help of dedicated Pocket PC'ers like all of you and me, we can make them even better.
[ Special Note / Full Disclosure: Applian Technologies, creator of the Super Incredible Bundle (SIB), is one of PocketRocketFX.com's sponsors. Download a free demo from Applian. ]
[ posted: April 2002 ]
