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  • Smartphone usage

    After reading the thread Forums dying in the Front Desk subforum I figured what I need to say is more a technology issue as opposed to the management of the hawaiithreads itself.

    I have gone through at least 3 smartphones in the last 5 years, the applications I find useful on the device are:
    • Accessing TheBus's HEA web site (bus stop in front of the state capital building as an example stop)
    • Using Google Maps to find out where I am
    • Reading email, maybe sending short messages, but anything longer I am going to use a regular computer
    • Text messaging people who I am trying to meet kind of soon (like in the next 1 or 2 hours)

    Using the device as a phone can get kind of cumbersome if I have to set the speaker off because if I have the device to my ear the microphone on the device doesn't catch what I say.

    Something I noticed in general about smartphones, while the user of the device can get information from the device no matter where they are, but it is kind of hard to submit information using the device if one has to type a lot of stuff or needs to copy and paste stuff from other sources to help make their point.

    I suspect I might add more to the above list or make a list of stuff I don't use on a smartphone.

    If anyone else wants to reply to this thread and write what applications they use or not use on their smartphone please feel free to do so.
    Last edited by helen; June 12, 2019, 10:08 PM. Reason: add more text to the bus stop

  • #2
    Re: Smartphone usage

    Helen, if you're using a smartphone to look at HEA, I strongly recommend instead using one of the TheBus apps instead. While the apps were buggy as heck at first, over the years they became much more reliable. Not more reliable than the HEA website, but just a lot easier to use, with a few features that made it one of my most-used apps.

    The four apps in my dock (that's the bottom row of the screen, which stays in place however many pages of apps you have) are Spotify, Downcast (a podcast manager), Shazam, and Outlook (which I use only for work emails).

    The position of honor, the top-left of my home screen, is saved for Tweetbot, my preferred Twitter client.

    Other apps I use every day are Gmail, FB, Instagram, Major League Baseball's AtBat, Words with Friends, Google, Chrome, Swarm, Tootdon (a Mastodon client), Starbucks, my credit union app, and the Washington Post.

    I don't use it every day, but I have found the Wikipedia app most invaluable in settling disputes, and IMDb for helping me identify actors I'm seeing on the screen but can't name.
    But I'm disturbed! I'm depressed! I'm inadequate! I GOT IT ALL! (George Costanza)
    GrouchyTeacher.com

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    • #3
      Re: Smartphone usage

      I'm a latecomer to cell phones having only picked one up for the first time in 2014 after saying for many years I would never get one. When I started I was on the cheapest plan I could get from Mobi PCS, which was just text and talk.

      In late 2015 I had a heart attack and that stupid phone saved my life as I was out of my house but able to call 911.

      In mid 2016 all of the Mobi PCS users were forced to get new phones as Mobi pulled out of their own service and began to be a MVNO using Sprint and Verizon's infrastructure. That decision rendered all of their locked phones instantly obsolete at a certain cut off date in late August of 2016.

      Needless to say I was angry that such a change was forced upon us.

      So I switched to TMobile.

      Bought a Samsung Galaxy J7 Android phone then and am still using it today.

      So it is a smartphone and I have a love/hate relationship with it.

      Hate it because it is so fragile and I am always worrying about dropping the 60% glass device, getting it wet and for some horrible apps you cannot delete and takes up space on the limited internal memory space. I also hate the fact that some of the apps take up so much space (bloatware) and can only be used on the main memory space.

      Love the many other features such as an extra slot to put in a SD card which I can also run some apps off but not all. The apps themselves range from the useful (Gmail, Chrome, Wikipedia, Google Voice, SmartNews, Sunrise/Sunset, Fotor) to entertaining (YouTube, PlutoTV, Musicolet, TunedIn, Stitcher, Accuradio, Facebook).... and some I wonder why I installed them and in time get rid of.

      Another thing I like about this smartphone, like my previous phone it has a removable battery. So when the darn thing can't charge I can buy a new battery which I recently did. The back cover for the battery is somewhat flimsy and mine is now cracked a bit... so that is a negative.

      One thing for sure, many smartphones are not built to last. For the price you pay for them, I find this most appalling. Think Apple iPhone... in three to five years they want to ice you out of updates and remove valuable features on succeeding models such as the headphone jack which only drives their own revenue stream because most people will just get the expensive airbuds vs. being able to use cheap wired earbuds... Plus the internal battery will die down and without paying a ransom to Apple you can't replace it yourself. Ugh.

      Bad Apple.
      Last edited by mel; June 21, 2019, 04:44 AM.
      I'm still here. Are you?

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      • #4
        Re: Smartphone usage

        I am using Tracfone for the service for my smartphone which is an Android based phone. Been using Tracfone since 2006 (as well as various phones during that time) since the cheapest card you can get is $19.99 for 90 days of service with 60 minutes of air time (I can't remember what amounts you get for the text and data) but the good thing is that the unused amounts can carry over when get the next service card.

        As far as what is on my smartphone screen, the first page contains GMail, Calendar, Google Maps. Chrome, Hangouts and 5 bookmarks to the HEA stops that I tend to use when I commute between home and work. The second page contains 9 bookmarks to HEA stops that I would need to leave to get back home (2 of them would be stops close to the Ward Entertainment Center as examples). The third page consist of 13 bookmarks to the HEA stops that I would tend to use on my way going to usual places.

        The fourth and fifth pages don't contain HEA bookmarks but rather other apps I rarely use.

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