Guest writer Asri al-Baker: While reading Eldar Murtazin's preview of MOTORiZR Z8, there are some screenshots that made me think "Why does my P990 does not have that cool Home screen?"... It's ironic that a device heavily promoted as a multimedia beast has more business oriented functions than the P990 which Sony Ericsson claims as the ultimate mobile office...

The Home Screen in MOTORIZR Z8 does remind me of a unique feature found in the one and only Symbian smartphone originating from the UK, the (now defunct) Sendo X and its excellent Now! Screen (shown on the right). Any smartphone user could tell that the Z8's Home Screen is far usable than the P990's half cooked Today Screen implementation, known as Activity menu and which even then is one tap away from the actual 'Home' screen.

On the Sony Ericsson P990, this Activity menu is divided into 2 tabs, for info and application shortcuts. Problem is, there's no way to see information at a quick glance without touching the P990. To see appointments, you need to select appointments, to see Todos, you need to select Todos. These extra selections are actually not needed. 

According to Eldar, the Z8's Home Screen supports plug-ins. Users can choose 5 (of 7) of them to be displayed, e.g. Email summary, Call Info, Calendar, Track Info, Settings Item and Profile. Sounds a bit like reading the Sendo X's specification doesn't it?

Wait a minute - Profile?

This is a question I have never been able to answer, ever since the P800 days. Sony Ericsson never includes Profiles in its smartphone offerings but does on feature phones like K800, W810, etc. Do you know why? Beats me...

In my opinion, Profiles (shown left) are a very quick way to change a device's configuration, like its ringtones, themes, wallpaper, and so on. Every time I attend meetings, I need to put my P990 on "Silent Mode" because that's the only choice and sometimes I forgot to switch on the tones 'til a few hours after the meeting is over. It would be great if instead of silent, I can choose a "Discreet" or "Meeting" profile, which will switch back to the previous profile after 2 hours. When will my Sony Ericsson UIQ 3 smartphone be able to do this?

Back to the Home screen (shown on the right). When Sendo went belly up, Motorola bought its R&D Department, including the team that developed the Sendo X (and the ill fated X2). And the first result of this arrangement is the Z8. Looking at the ding-dongs and uncertain clouds around Motorola nowadays, I really hope they can bring more UIQ 3 products to the market. The combination of Motorola's good designers and ex-Sendo engineers would produce more benefits for end users, such as what we see in the Z8's Home Screen. In my opinion, Motorola should have focussed on Symbian OS a long time ago rather than jumping on the Linux and Windows Mobile bandwagon.

On the other hand, UIQ Technology's acquisition by Sony Ericsson is one of the factors that signalled more commitment from all parties related. Sony Ericsson and Motorola are the only manufacturers who have announced their continuous support for UIQ. Sony Ericsson also made the move to open UIQ's stakeholding to others, where they will share developing and improving it, as well as reaping any profit.

Looking ahead, Sony Ericsson's P1 is showing that they can build a usable front screen (with a staggering 15 application shortcuts!). In the meantime, perhaps third party developers can engineer a Today screen that can replace the current one on the P990? Handy Day 2007? Bring it on!

Asri al-Baker, June 2nd 2007