theChrisWalker.net

I recently discovered QR codes and how cool they are! Basically it’s a 2-D barcode and can store much more information than your standard bar code.
A QR code is a square of dots in a certain computer-readable pattern, for example there is one to the top-left of this post, encoded with the URL to this post.

Why bother though? Well, they are used mostly in Japan, where mobile phones are generally all Internet-enabled, so on an advert you might have a QR code for a URL where more info can be found. So you whip out your phone, point the in-built camera at the code, and bingo, it takes you to the website. Also you could have a film opening encoded in QR as a calendar event, so when you scan it it puts a reminder in your calendar. Useful no?

On a personal level though, when QR codes are not big in England, why should I care. Well, they are useful for transferring information I want to a phone. For example, I have a bookmarklet on my browser that converts the current page I’m looking at into a QR code (courtesy of the Google Chart API) and open the image in a new tab. Very useful if I find a page and think, “I’ll want to look at that later” I can make the QR scan it with my phone, and the page goes into it’s browser history for my later enjoyment.

For those of you interested the bookmarklet code is (should be all on one line, but for the page width’s sake…):

Try it! (will generate the QR code for this page, but a lot bigger than the one by the title)

You may have noticed that there are QR codes for the permalinks to these posts aswell, so you can easily bookmark them with a capable phone. Another useful function that my phone can do is to display the QR code for a Contact in my address book, so I can easily share that with another QR enabled phone without having to “pair” them with bluetooth, or use Infrared (if the phone still has it!) or text it or whatever. Much more convenient. I just need to find someone else with a QR enabled phone…

So I decided the time had come to get a smartphone. There’s only really two options the way I see it.

In the red corner, the slick-as-you-like, shiny, fashionable, Apple iPhone.

In the blue corner, the open-source, all-your-data-are-belong-to-us, Google G1.

I’ll save the theatrics as you know from the title that I went for the G1. But the pros-cons weighting was a difficult process with many factors. However me being me, the main one and the one that rules them all was price in the end. So lets make this all about the Google G1, and in order to falsely encourage you to thinks it’s great I’ll start with the cons.

Why the iPhone is better.

• One hyphenated word, multi-touch. That’s what makes the iPhone so appealing. The user interface instantly becomes more intuitive and fun to use. (Of cours you can enable the G1 for multi-touch, the device is capable)
• Shinyness: the iPhone is pretty, and you will look pretty using it (YMMV).
• iTunes integration and the App Store. iTunes is not bad, certainly easy to sync your multimedia, and the app store has far more applications than the Android Marketplace (although I suspect this will even out in time)
• Native Video playback, but you need an app from the Marketplace for the G1.

Why the Google G1 is better

• Google Integration: Wow, this is cool. I give it my Google account details when the phone starts up. After about 40 seconds I have my email/calendar/address book all sync on my phone. I obvious need to do some adjustment as I have never used the GMail contacts for phone numbers, so I log on to my PC and create a new contacts group to be sync’d called “Phonebook” and add all the contacts I have phone numbers for. Teh tell my phone to Sync this group and voila! they all appear on my phone, beautiful.
• The Marketplace. I haven’t used the App Store to any great extent not owning an iPhone, but I do like the Marketplace and the way the Apps install. Each one tells you exactly what the program will have access to on your phone and so you can decide if you want your new “alarm clock” to be able to “dial phone numbers” or “enable GPS” or “read and write to your contacts”. Very nice little security feature given that so many people write apps.
• The status bar. The iPhone has a status bar, but the G1 implementation is so smooth, allowing you to “grab” the status bar to reveal more detailed info on each of the notifications. Sounds simple, but it really works and is very user-friendly.
• Full QWERTY keyboard - this might not seem a thing, and iPhone users do love their onscreen keyboard, but I like a real keyboard and the one on the G1 is pretty good.
• Price. The killer, the iPhone is only O2 and the G1 only T-Mobile. The cheapest packages from each one are £35 per month (18 Month Contract) from O2 and £20 per month (18 Month Contract). The phone coasts about the same in each case. So to go O2 would cost an extra £15×18 = £270!

I’ve been with O2 since 1999, but am now on T-Mobile, after an amusing conversation with their “retentions” team:

O2: “So is there a particular reason your leaving O₂?”
Me: “Well, I want a smartphone and the iPhone packages are prohibitively expensive compared to the T-Mobile G1″
O2: “Your PAC code will be with you in about 48 hours.”

That’s after 9 years on O2 contracts. Impressive. In fact the customer service I have recieved from T-mobile so far has been ace, I was speaking to their customer services when the signal went on my phone, and they rang me straight back!

Anyway, enough of Operators, the phone is the point and here’s the bottom line.

The Google G1 isn’t as good as the iPhone in many (if not the majority) of ways, but in some it surpasses it (take the barcode reader app, no where near as usable on the iPhone but excellent on the G1). Also as the first generation of Android phones, it is a remarkable device and by the time my contract is up, there really will be something special available - you mark my words.