ICS and the stylus

[Brian Stirling]

I see that ICS is supposed to have native support for a stylus and that peaks my interest. My next phone is likely to be the Galaxy Note which has a stylus but is not, at least at launch, running ICS but I do expect that it will be updated with ICS within 4 months -- say by late January 2012.

What interests me here is the potential of using many of the same pen/stylus aware apps from the Note on other Sammy products like there tablets. In addition to the Note I think I'll snag the Galaxy Tab 7.7 when that becomes available. If the stylus gains a following I can see Autodesk releasing an AutoCAD lite product for it that would greatly benefit from the stylus for pan/zoom and even more for entity selection/manipulation.

My near term dream is to be able to do simple AutoCAD actions (view, print and pull dimensions) from my phone and tablet.


Brian

 

[Fire&Blood]

You sick, sick man. 5.3" screen fetish and a mobile AutoCAD fetish too.
You want the Note so bad, you are already trying to figure out when it will get ICS. I feel you though. But I wouldn't want to be caught in an ebay bidding war with you for the note. I have a feeling you would go all out :biggrin:

 

[Brian Stirling]

No bidding war -- I don't do ebay!

No, the Note is going to come to the USA so it's just a matter of time to pick it up at the going rate.

My thing about AutoCAD is that I've been looking for this day for years and we're just about there. 5.3 inches may still be a little small for any prolonged AutoCAD work but then I never figured to build a large drawing on my phone -- just be nice to be able to call up a drawing, pull dimensions and print. The finger touch method will never be practical for selecting entities to pull dimensions so having a stylus should make that task practical for the first time.

I can also see doing some basic image and video editing on the Note with the larger high resolution screen and the finer selection tool of the stylus should make that practical for the first time. Once again, I can't imagine doing heavy editing of images or video on a phone but there are many times at work where I need to take several or many pictures then email them so being able to shrink the files down and hopefully zip them together would be great.

My thing is ... I want a phone to be able to do useful things and with the new generation of larger phones with higher resolution we are just at the point where once impractical applications are now practical or at least nearly so.

Getting back to the stylus and ICS ... if the stylus turns out to be as useful as I think it will be then having the built in capability with the OS is a great thing. And, if this pans out it will be interesting to see the way Apple attempts to respond. Jobs was famous for ridiculing the stylus but with him gone will they have a change of heart? Hey, they copied pull down notifications from Android so why not the stylus. I'm guessing if they do they'll refer to the system as "iCalligraphy".


Brian

 

[Fire&Blood]

I didn't think you would be able to wait for it to get here, hence I thought you would import it ASAP.

You make valid points. While heavy duty work is reserved for desktop/laptop, at times it's not always heavy duty work that needs to be done, in a sense it's overkill to wait to get to a desktop to do something that could be done on the go and there rises the need for a mobile alternative.

Stylus will prove itself very useful if there is enough drive to find creative way of using them. I mean, a stylus could easily integrate a BT connection, a microphone, camera and an accelerometer, these features combined allow for a number of ways to utilize it.

 

[Brian Stirling]

I didn't think you would be able to wait for it to get here, hence I thought you would import it ASAP.

You make valid points. While heavy duty work is reserved for desktop/laptop, at times it's not always heavy duty work that needs to be done, in a sense it's overkill to wait to get to a desktop to do something that could be done on the go and there rises the need for a mobile alternative.

Stylus will prove itself very useful if there is enough drive to find creative way of using them. I mean, a stylus could easily integrate a BT connection, a microphone, camera and an accelerometer, these features combined allow for a number of ways to utilize it.

I'm not too sure what, if any, electronics is inside the S-pen stylus but if it did have some active electronics with Bluetooth or similar communications you could have the phone alarm you if the stylus wandered too far away from the phone. I kind of doubt that the S-pen has that level of sophistication but, going forward, I can see a device with greater smarts and small battery that gets recharged when stowed in the phone/tablet. Even a small battery could provide days of use on a single charge.

As far as the Note is concerned it looks like they've pushed up the release date for the UK from 11/17 to more like 11/1 so I'd guess the USA release will be more like early December. It also looks like they've reduced the price down to 550 pounds so the USA price should be less than $700 and probably more like $600. Of course, add a good quality 32GB uSD card and you will likely be back around $700.


Brian

 

[poofyhairguy]

No, the Note is going to come to the USA

I must have missed that. Is there a source for that? My dad would like one....

 

[Brian Stirling]

I must have missed that. Is there a source for that? My dad would like one....

There are no carriers in the USA on record as saying they will offer it but there is, apparently, a distributor in Miami (second reference) that may begin selling as early as 10/24. I have my doubts about this date but another 6 weeks into early December would be my "guess" for availability at ATT. Again, if the retail price is not much more than other high end phones I see no reason why ATT would not offer it if Sammy makes it available.

So, I guess we'll know soon if the 10/24 date pans out -- again, I have my doubts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_Note

http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_note-review-651.php


Brian

 

[Pia]

I'm definitely interested. Already went to the store to look at one but it was broken, gotta go back when they get another demo model.
I have about four paper notebooks I carry to various places; the Note might replace all of them if only the stylus is good enough.

 

[hanoverphist]

My thing about AutoCAD is that I've been looking for this day for years and we're just about there. 5.3 inches may still be a little small for any prolonged AutoCAD work but then I never figured to build a large drawing on my phone -- just be nice to be able to call up a drawing, pull dimensions and print. The finger touch method will never be practical for selecting entities to pull dimensions so having a stylus should make that task practical for the first time.

i do that already. i have my drafters print to pdf, host them on the web and view them on my phone while on jobsites. if i need to print, i use the wireless print app to attach to customers or sub contractors printers if they have wireless. i also have the autocad app on my phone if i want to get all techie and adjust stuff. hasnt been too bad so far.