Though I use my Nexus One for all my mobile needs, I still occasionally have to test things with the iPhone, and I’ve found that switching back is quite frustrating. Everyone touts the usability and user interface of iOS while commenting on how far Android has to go, but I’m definitely willing to take a stand and say iOS has plenty of issues of its own, big and small.

Keyboard
I was extremely used to the iPhone keyboard, so I initially found myself a bit slower, making occasional mistakes on the Nexus One. Now, when I try to use the iPhone keyboard, I am constantly hitting the wrong keys. I think that both keyboards are good, but you certain get used to a specific one. That said, there are some simple features that make the Android keyboard(s) better than iPhone’s. For instance, I keep the sound off on the keyboards I use, so I love the haptic feedback (slight vibration) I get with an Android device and typing on an iPhone feels, well, flat in comparison. I don’t have a sense of pressing any keys. The iPhone keyboard doesn’t even change the appearance of the letters to show if I am typing a capital letter or not. With Android, I’ve tried a few different keyboards, the default, Swype, and my personal favorite, SwiftKey, and I am much faster typing on an Android device.

Email
So here you are, typing an email on an iPhone when you suddenly realize you forgot to include this great picture that you took earlier. There’s no way to attach that image to the email now, whoops! In Android, you would simply press menu, attach, pick the program you want to use to select the file, and then pick the file. Another thing that really surprised me is the inability to configure sounds for email (or many other things for that matter… and why are app-specific settings not in the app they are for?). On my Nexus One, I have a different sound for my work account than for my personal accounts, so I know which account the email is for just from the sound. When the default new email sound plays on an iPhone at work, the half dozen iPhone owners nearby all check their iPhones.

Now opening your app… wait for it…. wait for it….
When I open an app on my N1, it is instantly open; few apps take more than a second to animate in. When I open an app on an iPhone, I get a fancy splash screen and then I get to wait. Well, that’s when the app developer actually bothered to make a splash screen. A lot of the built-in apps don’t have splash screens (Photos, Calendar, Clock, etc.), so you get a partial load and then a slight delay, and then the useful stuff appears. To be fair, as iPhone hardware has slowly improved, this is a bit less of a problem for each new iteration. Still, waiting is frustrating, and it’s even worse on pre-iOS 4 apps that don’t save state.

App Store
I really can’t believe this app is so bad. It’s extremely slow, categories aren’t even in alphabetical order, and it appears to do a screen dump if the phone sleeps for a few minutes. That last one is especially annoying on the dev iPhone that doesn’t have cell access because WiFi turns off after a bit, which means I get the “Cannot Connect to App Store” error message when the phone turns back on instead of simply seeing the page I was just looking at.

Quick access to info
Okay, so maybe some readers came across the previous two issues and thought, “Pssh, this doesn’t affect my speedy iPhone 4.” Perhaps not, but let me ask this: “How long does it take you to check the current date or weather?” Despite the much faster hardware, the OS really slows down the user experience for me. Obviously you can’t use widgets in iOS, but you don’t have to use widgets for these tasks in Android. You can just use the notification bar. The WeatherBug app can keep the current temperature in the notification bar, which you can also slide down for a forecast and to see the current date (standard part of Android). Want to see what that email is about that you just got? Simply slide down the notification bar to view a preview. These are simple tasks that I do a lot, so I don’t like the extra effort that they take on an iPhone.

New version, now go find a computer
The iPhone’s inability to be an independent computing devices was one of the biggest technological turn offs for me when I was considering it. Really, why can’t I get OS updates over the air (even if it’s limited to just WiFi because of the tired “AT&T’s network is overloaded” excuse)? The iTunes umbilical cord is even more annoying for those of us who use Linux as our primary OS.

There’s an app for that…. somewhere
Say a friend sends you a link to a Twitter account that he finds funny. You tap that link and open the browser, it redirects to the mobile version and then you see the content (assuming Twitter is somehow not down). Of course an app would be a better experience, so you have to very carefully copy the username from the URL and then press the home button, scroll to the right a bunch of screens, open your Twitter app, go to the search feature, paste the username, and search. On Android, an app can register to handle URLs, so tapping that link immediately gives you the open to open it in the browser or the Twitter app(s). Similarly, sharing a URL is as simple as long-pressing it, picking share, and then picking the app.

The other stuff
Why don’t the volume buttons control the volume of sound effects while I am playing a game? Why do I have to turn on the phone to check if I missed any emails/phone calls/text messages? Why are the home screens just a dump of the application list? Why do I have to scroll to the top of a web page to enter a new address? I guess the trick is to open the tab selector and close the current tab then pick New Page, but that still seems a bit excessive. There is a lot of value in having some basic buttons for your phone, especially for things that are useful in 99% of apps (back? menu?), and, unlike some iPhone advocates, I find the lack of buttons annoying. Fortunately, Apple is fairly good about enforcing their way of doing things, so apps usually behave in a pretty consistent way, implementing menus and back button in the app in a similar manner at the expense of screen real estate.

In the end, now that I am fully accustomed to my Nexus One, I have to say that I find it much more usable than iPhones. Not only is it more feature-rich, but it is truly a much better user experience for me.

SUBSYSTEM=="usb", SYSFS{idVendor}=="0bb4", MODE="0666"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", SYSFS{idVendor}=="18d1", MODE="0666"

You may need to run sudo reload udev and/or disconnect and reconnect the N1. Check adb devices again and hopefully you’ll see “HT9CSP123456 device” or similar.

If you haven’t heard, the Nexus One (N1) has been released. It’s the newest Android-based phone, built by HTC and being “pushed” by Google. Unfortunately, ordering one has caused trouble for many people, myself included.

Rather than paying $400 for an iPhone via AT&T, I thought getting the $180 N1 would be a great deal, especially since I could switch to T-Mobile and pay just $80 a month for the plan (less expensive than either Verizon or AT&T). Unfortunately, I filled out the form and got the error: “You are not eligible for T-Mobile service at this time.”

Sadly, that’s all the info Google provides, other than comforting me with the option of buying it straight up for $530. I have no idea why I am ineligible. My roommate has a G1 on T-Mobile, so service is available. I have never had a contract with T-Mobile, so it’s not a matter of being an existing or past customer ineligible for upgrade. I’ve checked to make sure I can transfer my phone number, and it’s eligible for transfer. Why am I not eligible?

Update! Success!
I did it again and changed two things, and it worked. I’m not sure which of these two mattered, but here they are in the hope that they’ll help someone else:

1) Per eperor’s suggestion, I asked for a new phone number.

2) I changed my service area to downtown Seattle (where I work) rather than my home address.

This worked for me; good luck to everyone else!