Android device in a Blackberry form factor

[dunkaroo]

When is this ever going to happen? I'm so tired of all these landscaped hardware keyboards. I want a vertical keyboard! The advantages of which are obvious. Please. Something in the form factor of a Blackberry. Fast, as in 1 Ghz fast! With lots of memory and external storage. Wifi too!

[Ed Hardy]

Surely someone will do this at some point; a tablet shape with a front-facing keyboard fixed in place is one of the most commonly-used designs for smartphones. To be honest, I'm surprised no one has done it yet.

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[Drillbit]

In those pictures of what appears to be an Android prototype, it looks almost exactly like an HTC Snap with a Google Search displayed.

I actually suspect the HTC Snap was originally an Android related project. Then requirements changed and the Snap became a Windows Mobile standard phone.

Since 320x240 has been added as a resolution supported by Android, technically its now possible to create Android qwerty faced devices.

[Drillbit]

One thing I like to add. Its not something people generally know about but Andy Rubin, the creator of Android, was also the creator of Danger-Hiptop-Sidekick. Before Android was bought up by Google, yes, it didn't start inside Google internally, Android was described by insiders as Sidekick 2.0.

Given this background, it explains the T-Mobile connection, why T-Mobile was the first company to use Android, and it was the company that also used the Sidekick. The also explains the connection of Cloud concepts between Android and Sidekick.

Given this background, I would think the earliest or original Android prototypes would have looked not far from the Sidekick; large screen, tablet shape, with a slide out qwerty keyboard. If you think about it, this is how the G1 ended up.

They said the DROID had input from Google and Andy Rubin. Look at the DROID and look at the Sidekick again.

I didn't think Andy Rubin had a vision of Android turning out the iPhonesque tablets HTC ended up making them into, I think Rubin's vision of Android was that of a qwerty phone, either a qwerty faced, or with a slider qwerty.

AT&T canceled three would be Android phones, citing the reason that their specifications had been overtaken by latest developments. The three phones, two were from Motorola and one from HTC. All three had qwertys and 2.8" screens, which was probably the reason for their cancellation (talk is now AT&T interested on a Dell made Android and the HTC Hero). One of the Motorola and the HTC (code named Lancaster) had slider qwerty on the landscape mode. The other Motorola had a qwerty that slides out under in portrait mode like the Palm Pre.

[dunkaroo]

Since 320x240 has been added as a resolution supported by Android, technically its now possible to create Android qwerty faced devices.

Would an Android based OS with a vertical hardware keyboard (ala Blackberry) have to be in 320x240? With all the shortcomings of the Palm Pixi, at least it is 320x400!

[h3lder]

Would an Android based OS with a vertical hardware keyboard (ala Blackberry) have to be in 320x240? With all the shortcomings of the Palm Pixi, at least it is 320x400!

You´re talking about something like the Koogan Agora?
I don't know what happened to that idea.

[h3lder]

Would an Android based OS with a vertical hardware keyboard (ala Blackberry) have to be in 320x240? With all the shortcomings of the Palm Pixi, at least it is 320x400!

Check here: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives...blackberry.php

[Hook]

Check here: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives...blackberry.php

A couple of interesting follow-ups:

http://www.kogan.com.au/blog/2009/ja...ra-be-delayed/

Notice the comments were closed in August with no further input from Kogan.

And here:

http://blogs.smh.com.au/gadgetsonthe..._the_auss.html

Love the conspiracy theory stuff. I suspect that it may have come down to an LCD company produced a prototype but either couldn't keep manufacturing costs down or discovered they couldn't afford the distribution costs... and/or maybe, they just couldn't get out the bugs.

Who knows. But smartphones do not seem to generate a lot of small startups. I suspect there is a reason for that.

[h3lder]

Even with the Agora project going down, surely some other companies must have thought about this form factor.

I have an E63 and I like this front keyboard a lot. It's not better than my late HTC Wizard, but then again, it hasen't flex cable connections to break (wich happened in my case. The only thing I miss in WinMo is the simplicity and functionality of Outlook mobile... but that's for another thread).

I would love to see an Android in Blackberry style. And it could have touch screen. It would be awesome.

[dunkaroo]

I did some snooping around, asking several contacts I have in the industry. There is one and only ONE major reason that the major companies have stayed away from an Android in a Blackberry form factor. And the reason has to do with resolution.

Devices with a vertical keyboard such as Blackberry devices and some WinMo devices either use a stylus, trackball, or a trackpad for navigation. Many business apps use small drop-down menus to navigate through the app. These small menus must be significantly larger in any device such as iPhone, Android, Pre, that uses fingers to navigate instead of a stylus, trackball, or trackpad.

Thus the old 320 (width) x 240 (height) of the old Blackberries doesn't work well on any type of device that uses a finger as a medium to point and click at things. Think about it. Have you ever tried to use any old Palm application using your fingers instead of the stylus. It's impossible. The buttons and things to click on are too small. This is why apps on the iPhone, Palm, and even Android have MUCH bigger buttons. It's because people are using their fingers to click stuff!

As much as I crap on Palm, at least their designers were smart enough to implement the Palm Pixi to have a 320 (width) x 400 (height). So, you end up with more vertical real estate. Since, the device is a finger-operated one, buttons must be much bigger. that's ok, because they made the screen resolution taller. If we want the likes of Samsung, Motorola, HTC, etc. to manufacturer an Android blackberry-esque type of device, then the Android SDK needs to be updated to include some resolutions specifically that have a taller type of resolution similar to the Palm Pixi.