BlackBerry, this word acts as synonymous of emails for many of its users, but due to its lacking features it got sideline for some time in the race of best smartphone devices available in the market. However, with the BlackBerry 10, the company has tried to do a comeback in the race as an alternative of Android and iOS. The operating system of the device has been freshly designed from group-up that has built-up on QNX platform, which the BlackBerry acquired. In this article, we will check out detailed specifications of its operating system.
Setup:
The device takes around 2 minutes of time to display its welcome screen, which is quite lots as compare to other available devices. At the same time its OS passes through series of the welcome screens for setting up the device that include Wi-Fi, language, agreement along with various options for sign-up with BlackBerry ID. Next include the screen to enable Location/Diagnostic data followed by the option for software Updates. At last, you will get the tutorial, which will guide you to the main gestures required for navigating your way through the operating system. From here, you can either move back to task home screen/switcher or can simply move to the BlackBerry Hub. The entire process of first boot will take approximately 25 minutes.
Every time the user launch any app, the initial focus first moves to task switcher and later app get launched, which can be quite annoying some time.
Hub & Peek:
Hub is getting considered as center-piece of Blackberry 10 experience, where all the notifications stay and also acts as communication center (a huge message center).
Facebook and Twitter notifications also show up in Hub. However, clicking on the message will not take you to the page of respective app. The email experience is quite good with this device and one cannot expect something more than this. However, little things such as selecting various messages for example take just one tap too many.
Push email over the IMAP accounts also does not appear to be supportive, not for the IDLE support also. The users will surely like the individual control over various email accounting settings that include ability to set different signature for every account mainly handy if the user mix personal and work accounts.
The Hub also has BBM included in it that has attractive option for video chat along with screen sharing support. The home screen of the device has a separate icon for BBM that works on both 2G as well as 3G data plan along with Wi-Fi connectivity.
Peek is a center for the answer of Notification on BlackBerry that is quite nice in its beginning but after some time you will surely look for something more. Overall, we can say that Hub and Peek are easy to use but if we will surely miss the Notification Centre where the users could fall back on when required.
Keyboard:
BlackBerry is very much popular for offering the most easy to use QWERTY keyboard in its devices. And this time also, the keyboard of BB10 is fun to use due to autocomplete options which will pop up every time while typing on the screen. You just have to flick over desired work and OS types it for you with a space. The one of the best part of this OS is that it will learn your typing style once it goes along and due to which the words which are not even native to the user’s language will pop up eventually. The Hinglish users will surely like this feature.
Contacts:
This device pulled in your contracts from Gmail and Outlook.com accounts and at the same time display the individuals from Facebook and Twitter. The OS of this device is knows to figure out that when the same individual was listed in the multiple networks and later linked it to cards.
Installed Apps:
The BlackBerry 10 is available with pre-installed Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare, LinkedIn, Box.net and Dropbox. Most of the users are pretty barebones and appears like wrappers to mobile interface instead of full-fledged apps and it satisfy most of the users with its experience. Its Clock app is also very nice and is quite intuitive way for setting up an alarm and you will also like the Weather app. The users will also like the Calendar app that is very much similar to stock apps from various other platforms. DocsToGo provides basic Excel, Word and PowerPoint editing and viewing.
BlackBerry World:
The manufacturer has claimed around 70,000 apps in the launch day of BlackBerry 10 that you will get while login to BlackBerry World. However, there are many apps which will appear as a number but at the same time you will also get some apps, which will work really well. Gaming is one thing that the BlackBerry is not always associated with but it is quite properly represented over here and the credit for this goes to effort of BlackBerry to get third-party developers.
However, some of the other notable apps from third-party that the users will miss is Skype, Gmail, Google Maps, SkyDrive, Flickr and Instagram.
Browser:
The browser of BlackBerry 10 is updated with WebKit based engine and a support of HTML5. It does decent job rendering sites, which feels bit snappy on BlackBerry Z10. The browser is available with Flash disabled along with prompt to turn it on while visiting website with the Flash elements for first time.
Verdict:
The OS of Blackberry is clearly 1.0 release. There are many rough edges and app ecosystem is not developed with some of the notable absentees of third-party. However, past all of this, users can see platform that has really tried to offer different experience. Since, there are many things a user cannot overlook. In that term, this device competes with the Windows Phone 8 and we can say that the OS appears quite promising option as compare to its already established rivals.
