on May 1, 2012
I see signs everywhere that mobility is fundamentally changing the way we live our everyday lives. Think about it for a second; if you have a smartphone, which I bet you do if you are reading this, how many times did you check your email today with your phone? How does that compare with how many times you checked email on your computer? If you are like me, your phone is setting next to you while your at your PC and you use it primarily as a your email client, at least for receiving emails. This is the story that I think will play out over and over for a variety of functions that we have been using the PC to perform for years. The world is about to change, big time, are you ready?
OK, maybe that last statement was a bit over the top, but I want to get your attention. As developers we really need to start thinking about this. We all are going to be impacted by this shift, sooner or later, and I’m in the sooner camp. I just finished up the UC2012 conference and it was great, but mobile was not a big story, yet. I think we all have time, but again, I really believe that smartphones and tablets will one day be the primary way we interact with our PI data. I expect that we will be seeing a lot more in this area. OSIsoft has their plans, but let’s be honest, they can’t do it all. That means that we, the developers and power-users of PI, will need to be part of the solutions and help out. My goal with this blog is to get the conversation going. I hope everyone is ready to have some fun with this topic, because I think this is great stuff and have a lot to talk about. So please speak-up on where you think the mobile world is, especially with data access and specifically PI data access. I talked to a lot of users at the UC that are ready for this to happen, are you?
OK, I hope you can tell that I’m really, really, excited about mobile technology and finally starting my blog on the subject. Thanks for reading.
Lonnie, great to see you blogging on vCampus!
I had a conversation with someone today where we got talking about the giants in the internet world like Facebook, and Google. There seems to be a theme that the "older" social media giants are failing in the mobile world, I mean Facebook's mobile application sucks as does the Google+ app(s) - there is some financial information to back up those statements too I just don't have the links right now. With Facebook, Google, ... you still need a PC/Laptop to get the full, rich experience of their offerings.
On the flip side, you get companies like those that made DrawSomething that have no real web presence just a mobile app that is phenomenally huge and popular.
I just wonder which of those camps value-added applications for the PI system sit in. Probably both with a bias towards desktop/laptop environment - I don't know yet, watching eagerly to see which way it goes. However, I am embracing the mobile application route but it has to be something different from what you can achieve on a traditional application, you know...you don't need your desktop just your phone to use it and get value from it. Anyway, just brain dumping some recent conversations...shame I didn't make the UC to discuss further with you.