411Sync, a Powerful, Flexible Mobile App that’s a Little Rough Around the Edges

location based services




I’ve been playing around with 411Sync an application suite that boasts over 650 different mashups for serving, managing, viewing, alerting and just about every other “ing” you can think of for mobile data.



Among the features supported by 411Sync is the ability to take just about any search query that you’d like repeated regularly and turn it into an RSS Feed that can be easily browsed via your mobile device. You can also set up your 411Sync account to send you SMS messages from your 30Boxes of Google Calendar accounts. You can get directions, maps, movie listings, weather reports, stock prices, and with a little time in the application just about any other sort of data you’d think to query can be made available to you while you’re on the go.



Another cool feature is the ability to forward your SMS Messages to your 411Sync account for permanent secure storage. This allows you to keep all your SMS messages instead of the limited number that can be stored on most mobile devices.



411Sync features both a HTML version for the web and a streamlined WAP site for use on mobile devices. In practice I found that the application performed reliably but that some of the applications were a little confusing to set up and/or use. Although there’s a tremendous about of written support information to help you set things up and effectively use the application, it definately takes some effort to set everything up, especially since it does require a fair bit of reading to figure out how many of the applications work and how to get your own settings entered correctly so that you can take advantage of the functions on your mobile.



If you’re looking for eye candy on your web interface, 411Sync is not for you. The developers have clearly put their energy into the functionality of the application, not the form. So although there’s plenty of the former (and plenty of instructions to help you sort out the many features) the spare blue and white and black interface that is punctuated with gray text here and there is downright drab in comparison to most other Web2.0 applications.



Although this works okay on the web, for mobile devices, and especially advanced mobile devices that can use the fully functional HTML site, it can be hard to read the black text on a blue background and the gray text becomes nearly impossible to see, particularly if you’re rendering fonts down to very small sizes.



Personally I like this application and think that the potential for vast utility is clearly evident. That said, this is still an alpha geek iteration of an application and as such it will require quite a lot of UI massaging to make it user-friendly to the point where the casual mobile user can take advantage of the functionality that 411Sync has on tap. I’m hoping that this is the case and that we’ll soon be seeing updates that make it easier to get started and that will include some examples of how to set up various fuctions as opposed to all the written directions - which although quite well done and very clear - appear daunting when there are page after page of text as you try to get yourself set up on the application.



Another thing that would help is if the folks at 411Sync would invest in some short codes. The phone numbers used to send SMS and request information are not memorable in the least making the application less user-friendly than it needs to be. Another way to improve the friendliness of the application would be to work with another very cool mobile application, Mozes, to create keywords for the various functions, thus mashing up the strengths of both Mozes and 411Sync for the benefit of all their users.



Tiggdo, a site I profiled a few weeks ago has some similar elements and a slightly cleaner interface, however 411Sync’s ability to interface with so many kinds of data and push these out to the phone on demand via SMS or directly through WAP or HTML gives it the edge in overall functionality. All in all I’d recommend this for people that are very proficient in using web applications and mobile data. For everyone else I’d hang in there a little as I’m sure that the team that built this cool application has more suprises up their sleeves and I’m hoping that they’ll consider prioritizing some UI improvements among them.





No Comments