Jolla Phone as a business phone - a practical experience
Me and my collague just needed new phones for our (very small) company. He got a Samsung Galaxy S5 - and I went for the Jolla.
What we wanted is to be able to sync/add tasks, contacts, calendars/appointments via Mobile to our server, so everyone with access can view/add/edit. The server runs on Linux with an ERP, CRM, Quality and Project Managment and Owncloud.
Here is our experience (in short) so far:
Galaxy: Price about 300+ Euro -VPN out of the box (we use pptp - which is the most common). -Contacts can easily be added -Tasks can easily be added (already integrated app called tasks (at least the german version calls itself "aufgaben") -Several calendars (caldav) can easily be added and synced
Jolla: - Price about 200+ Euro , Invoice with VAT available through direct contact (although i wonder why an open source company does not use libreoffice or similar ;) ).
And thats pretty much it, as everything else could simply not be tested due to a lack of VPN. (I know - There is a client available through warehouse - but a) this is a not satisfying solution as a basic feature like that really has to be either a native option or be available through the official app store.) b) this is not working for me either Anyway - i knew things like that when i bought the phone. But still this is the most basic feature anyone with a business mobile will use (the thread to vote is easily to find).
Also I tried: - calendars (carddav) can be easily added - but not deleted (just turned off) - no notifications about upcoming/todays calendar entrys
Not featurewise - but: My collague likes the looks of the Jolla much better than the galaxy. Trying out the galaxy - the OS is really a lot less intuitive than Sailfish.
Interesting question because it shows that Jolla has room to better exploit its selling points (respecting user data) into a clear usecase and market, i.e. phones for (small) business users where those features have the most of value. But unfortunately it's not yet there.
Titanium ( 2015-02-28 19:39:26 +0200 )editIf I were to pull Jolla's leg, I'd say that they are too busy thinking about another 'angry bird' edition, than VPN ... :)
sifartech ( 2015-03-01 02:45:58 +0200 )editFrom my perspective it's pretty clear that there's no way I could use the Jolla in its curretn state as a business phone. CalDAV/CardDAV are still in beta stage, the calendar and e-mail applications are very basic, especially the calendar is not trustworthy, system backup is incomplete (calendar missing), native cloud sync is missing, system wide copy-paste still not finished (you can't copy from e-mail and browser).... So yeah, way to make a weather widget for the homescreen, Jolla.
bennypr0fane ( 2015-03-01 14:53:37 +0200 )editI don't care for PPTP and I am very grateful that Jolla does not waste precious engineering time on implementing broken technology that is known to be unfit for the purpose (authentication/encryption). Besides that, I am quite happy with the CardDAV/CalDAV support. What I miss however for professional use is OTR support for XMPP although I agree that all of the available implementations have their individual deficiencies.
nblr ( 2015-03-01 15:57:50 +0200 )editpptp is per se THE standard for vpn every bigger or smaller company i met is using - so theres no way around that. Although vpn should support other protocols to - but its about availability in general.
About the however: Having a "i don't care" rant and then bringing up XMPP or other messengers as professional?? No serious company will use any kind of messenger. Phone and Mails - thats it. Messengers are per se not professional for business contacts - and i never had any business card in my hands stating otherwise. 24/7 availability you don't bring to work.
kaktux ( 2015-03-01 21:10:31 +0200 )edit