Audi take Ultra Mobile PC to a new level

Photos courtesy of: The Wolf

A couple of days ago I put up a rather cryptic post regarding 10 girls, one car and the Samsung Q1. So without further delay, but with some constraints still upon me, I would like to shed some more light.

Recently I was contacted by Audi Australia by a rather freshly-migrated sounding German man. His name was Wolf [no surprise there] and his desire was to automate the manner in which Audi records and interacts with leads (names and numbers) from the Motorshow floor. The upcoming Motorshow was to be held in Melbourne, and in a very German like manner Wolf had only given me a matter of days to help him address his problems…all of them.

So after several emails, a couple of meetings and a dinner, Wolf and I became intimately acquainted with Audi’s intentions. For one, they needed to digitize a somewhat prehistoric data entry strategy, and secondly they wanted to utilize the latest technologies, both hard and soft. So I call in the big guns, Samsung and Dr. Neil.

When faced with recommending a product to them I had to consider three important criteria, i.e. resistive touch qualities, battery life and heat. The touch was easy, and if you’ve watched my video on 5 UMPC you’ll know why I chose the Samsung Q1. The second concern, battery life, was not so easy but still addressable via the Samsung Q1; although, I had proposed the Q1B but had that quickly brought back down to earth by Samsung Australia. “It’s not available!’ they rudely proclaimed. The third issue was heat and that too was an obvious decision. (Watch the video).

So the hardware was ticked off but what about the software. One of the prerequisites was that we utilize their German hosted corporate website, and the other was that we give them the ability to input using nothing but the finger. Sounds easy right! Guess again. The TIP (Tablet Input Panel) was too small and other keyboards too big - and full of features not needed. So what did I do? I called upon the best, i.e. Dr. Neil Roodyn and Richard “Tricky” Basset in the United Kingdom. The rest…if you allow me, is history. The application is developed using the latest Microsoft technologies and agile development practices like Microsoft Expression Blend toolkit which produces XAML, a markup language used by the new Windows Presentation Foundation found in Microsoft .NET 3.0.

Tonight all I can do is post some images and allude once more to the entire solution. It’s 11pm here and I need to be on a plane in 6 hours (including sleep) bound for Melbourne. I will video, take photos and describe the entire feat after tomorrows Official release. Until then sleep well…UMPC is a success!

PS. Ther is a counter at the Audi showcase with a massive counter on it...counting down! I wonder what that is all about!