For most of my time using Windows Mobile, I’ve preferred an integrated PIM management solution, but lately I’ve been looking to some of the more finger friendly solutions, to solve this information management problem. Most of these I would describe as PIM pods, they focus on a particular aspect of your personal information, and bring a slick look to that particular information.

Well, Phone Genius from Panoramicsoft is a new application from a little known company, [I had never heard of them before], that delivers a Contact/Call management program, that I’ve taken quite a liking to.

It’s a nice package with a great today screen plug-in and lots of smooth animated transitions, as well as an eye pleasing look! Let’s go a little deeper, shall we?

I suppose the first thing to do here is to say, I came across  Phone Genius via our site contact mail, started to have a look and said to myself, this requires further investigation. So I contacted PanoramicSoft [Panoramic Software] to talk about the application, and to get a review copy. Basically I wanted to get an Idea what the company was about and there history, so I’ll let Patrick from PanoramicSoft tell the story

Panoramic Software Inc. is a small company from Vancouver Canada founded about two years ago, although real product development work only started about nine months ago.   Our goal is to create great looking easy to use software that we ourselves want to use.  We currently have been putting a focus on Windows Mobile applications because that’s where our talents and passion lies.  We initially released a couple pickup games (Blackjack and HexeGems), and then brought out a full featured Calculator (Panoramic Calc Pro) that in our opinions is the best one out there.

Phone Genius development started in June of 2008 in between our other contracting projects.  Our goal was to transform Windows Mobile into a far more usable sexier phone that you would be happy to show off to your friends.  We wanted to 1) Integrate and expose more of what Windows Mobile is capable of and 2) Allow a user to do things in less clicks.

So a young company, and a new piece of impressive software, that will develop, and since I’ve been involved with it, There’s been some evolution. I continued my dialogue with Patrick, and within 24 hours I received an altered .cab file that addressed my concerns with the program. Impressed, yes I was!

So I’m going to start from the front, or today screen with Phone Genius, and that means the today screen plug – in. After playing with the today plug – in, I had a thought, this could double as a program launcher with a little tweaking.

The customisable today screen plug – in is a nice feature

Every element , link, in the plug-in is able to be dragged and dropped wherever you like, and it adapts to whatever theme you are running.

But, to the application proper, Phone Genius is a finger friendly contact manager for your windows mobile professional phone. Stating the obvious, I know, but what makes it interesting is the design, ease of use and the great smooth transitions between screens.

Settings

The settings are fairly straight forward and intuitive [meaning you don't really have to think about it, it is obvious and comes naturally], really self explanatory, you can change the colour scheme, and set your preferences for what information you want to see in the program screens, and the  way you want to see it.

Program Elements

We’ve pretty much looked at the face, and nervous system of Phone Genius, so now to the heart, which is a three ventricular number. The bulk of the app is central in it’s management, Contacts

as you can see it is also the central shortcut on the program screen. Select any contact, and you can view all of the details, or call/SMS them with only a two finger tap path.

Favourites of course, is your alternative speed dial, add any contact to favourites by tapping on an unlinked square, selecting a contact from a list, and that contact is assigned to that position.

A simple process, and as quick as the transition between two images on the site when you are scrolling through the page.

Then there’s the history tab

which is self explanatory as well, it tracks the call info for your phone, and allows you to go back to text and or calls that you’ve missed, responded to, or actually accepted.

Data Input

Inputting new contacts, yeah, any information, with any third party program like Phone Genius, quite often takes you to what looks like the Default contact manager for windows mobile, albeit re-branded, and hence, there goes the finger friendly.

I’d really like to see some one take on this problem, it seems out of place in a shell app for your contacts, that is finger friendly, then again FF only to a point.

I’ve gone on about the great transitions and animations, and there are some parts of the application like the incoming and outgoing call screens that are really hard to get screenshots of, cause hey, I don’t know when I’m gonna get a call, so I’m including a video from PanoramicSoft’s site

Another big feature is the international code picker, and a surprising inclusion in my mind. What the inclusion of this international dialling code database in the program allows you to access these codes via search, or conveniently see where you are being called from. Not a completely redundant feature, but I don’t know how many people will really utilise this feature, and it’s still under construction, meaning the Devs didn’t realise how big this might be and how many variables it may include.

Type in 49 on the included keypad and, the world revolves and shows you the information of the dial code

Conclusion

I have to say, I really like Phone Genius, it doesn’t fight my phone/Tilt, it seems to work quite well with it. A lot of what I don’t like about applications like this, is that they work really hard to dress mutton as lamb, and over ride the OS rather than complimenting it. I think that Phone Genius is, not trying to be iPhoneish on WinMo, My contact with the team, says that they are working with Windows mobile now. Not with Windows mobile yet released!

Phone Genius is really worth a look, and I received a new cab file from the team this afternoon, that will surely amp it up another level PanoramicSoft are definitely on the move!

At the moment Phone Genius is available for $US 24.95, and that’s a bit of a put off, I’m sure. Download the trial and see if you want to spend the money!

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