Windows Mobile 6: are simple e-mail tasks harder?
Adam Lein thinks so but I’m not sure I agree. In Win Mo 6, he points out that it takes five steps to create a New e-mail message, while in the prior OS, it only took three. There’s an account setting that actually removes one of the five steps bringing it down to four; it was one of the first things I did when I upgraded my T-Mobile Dash.
When all is said and done however, I don’t think this is really a ‘bug’ as Adam suggests. The main cause for the change of new e-mail generation has to do with the left softkey. In WM 5, it used to be ‘New" so you could quickly create a new message. This left softkey was changed to ‘Delete’ in Windows Mobile 6, which makes it now very quick to delete a message. My thought: Microsoft realizes that most people delete e-mail more on their handheld than create new e-mail messages. I don’t see this as a bug, but more as a compromise or change that reflects how most users actually use their device. Give Adam’s well thought out article a read and then tell us what you think.
Personally, I’m thinking an archive button would be better.
Now how about they let the Delete key on my Dash actually delete messages instead of having to use menus at all…..
*sigh*
sometimes I reeeeeaaaally miss Chatter on my treo.
There’s a reason for this. Everytime the Wall Street Journal reviewer Walt Mossberg reviewed a Windows Mobile device versus a blackberry, he would state that the Windows device takes twice as long to carry out common operations, and then give the example of deleting email. By changing this, it will force Mossberg to find another example.
I agree with you Kevin, however, I think that Microsoft could improve on the current situation by making the left softkey user definable. I have always advocated that really personal devices like PDAs ought to be highly tailorable to a person’s preferences.
Take the infamous X button. Microsoft says they won’t force it to close applications because program startups from Flash ROM are slow. Fair enough, but how about letting the user decide on the trade off between a possible slow down in performance by letting them define the behavior of the X button.