.FLYINGHEAD PRODUCT REVIEW
.TITLE Meet the Meeples
.AUTHOR Tim Hillebrand
.SUMMARY As a judge for Pocket PC Magazine’s 2004 Software Awards, one of the nominations in the PIM (Personal Information Manager) category Tim Hillebrand had to deal with was Meeple. He found himself a bit baffled with it because it wasn’t like any PIM he’d ever been acquainted with. Find out just what Meeple is and whether or not it’s actually a PIM.
.OTHER
As a judge for Pocket PC Magazine’s 2004 Software Awards, one of the nominations in the PIM (Personal Information Manager) category I had to deal with was Meeple. When I installed it in my PPC (Pocket PC) and summoned it forth the first time, I was a bit baffled, for it was unlike any PIM I’ve ever been acquainted with.
A little quick research told me that it wasn’t a PIM at all, at least not in the traditional sense. What it does is match telephone contacts between two PDAs via infrared.
Scratching my head, I first wondered why it had been put in the PIM category; it wasn’t fair to MobilAir, for it was like comparing persimmons and pomegranates. Meeple belongs in a category of its own, which for now we’ll call Snoopy.
Then curiosity got the best of me. Hey, because I already had it loaded, why not give it a try? Of course , I was also curious about the derivation of the term "Meeple" and what it meant.
For those readers wondering what a Meeple is, I refer you to Figure A.
.FIGPAIR A Meeple pieces from the Carcassonne game.
These are playing pieces called Meeple used in the game Carcassonne. Meeple means "My People." At least, I think this is where the name for this software comes from.
Anyone else have a better idea? I can’t seem to pry it out of the developers, and Handango, the software’s distributor, doesn’t know either.
.BREAK_EMAIL Meeple here to Meeple the Meeple of Meeple’s Meeple.
All right, let’s check out the so-called PIM and see if it works. My first thought was yeah, so what are the chances of other machines already having Meeple installed so that the two units can communicate in Meeplese.
Good news — a Meepled machine can indeed communicate with an unMeepled unit. Apparently Meeplese is some kind of PDA lingua franca.
For this experiment, we’ll need to introduce a bit of terminology to keep things straight. First there will be a "Meepler", which is the PDA that does the "Meepling". Then there is the "Meeplee", which is the device being prodded by the "Meepler".
With that clarification we shall proceed. Unfortunately, I first installed Meeple on my Axim X30, which is a WMSE (Windows Media 2003 Second Edition)) machine.
I received a warning message that the software may not work properly because it was written for an earlier edition. I often get this message, but things usually work anyway. In this case, however, it didn’t, so I gave up after several attempts that left me wondering if it were the operating system or the program that didn’t work.
Undaunted and eager to continue the experiment, I tried beaming the program from the Axim X30 to an iPAQ 4150, which is a Windows Media 2003 machine. It transferred an install.exe program, which I had to run. It installed just fine.
.BEGIN_KEEP
Note to developers — Why can’t there be more programs that you can download into your Pocket PC and install them directly without having to do the whole synchronization process?
.END_KEEP
Now I was prepared to turn the tables using my iPAQ 4150 as the Meepler and the Axim X30 as the Meeplee. I’m happy to report that the Meepler detected the Meeplee right away. Figure B shows Meepler searching for other devices to connect with.
.FIGPAIR B Meepler searches for other devices to Meeple.
Meepler will present a list of discovered devices for you to choose from, like you see in Figure C.
.FIGPAIR C Meepler displays all the Meeplees it found.
When I highlighted the Meeplee on the screen of the Meepler and tapped Connect, both units started Meepling, like Figure D shows, and the little Scotty Dogs started sniffing each other, complete with sound effects.
.FIGPAIR D The Meeples are Meepling.
I love all the sound effects by the way. At this point I thought perhaps a better name for the program may be "Sniffer", but more on names later.
So, now I had determined that a WMSE machine cannot be a Meepler and must be content to be a Meeplee. Only non-WMSEs can be Meeplers. Just to make sure, I brought out my T-Mobile Pocket PC phone, a non-WMSE unit, and tried it as a Meeplee. It worked.
Then I beamed the program over to it and used that unit as a Meepler. It worked. And what a surprise, both units knew exactly the same people. How often can you expect such compatibility? Call the marriage broker.
This was fun. One last effort involved my Axim 3i as both Meepler and Meeplee, which performed admirably in both directions of the Meepling equation.
By the way, if you get the trial version, it will only give you match counts, not content information.
In the interest of elevating this interesting specimen from the Snoopy category, I began thinking of possible applications.
Let’s see, an exclusive club could arm the members and their doorman with Meeple to see if a code phone number matched for entry purposes. A similar arrangement could be made for posh soirees, bank vault entrance, and security clearances of all sorts, including the military.
Instead of Military Intelligence, which some say is an oxymoron, there could be Military Meeplence. Or, you know when you meet someone new, you often play whom do you know? Well, think of the time you’d save if you just lined up the IR ports of your PDAs and let them Meeple like dogs sniffing each others’ rears.
Or what if you were a cop and you had just purloined a Pocket PC from a bad guy and you wanted to know all the other bad guys he knew without having to beat it out of him? Just line up the PDAs with your list of bad guys and quicker than removing red eye from a photo he’d have his matches.
This might be a good place to note that if you want to thwart nosy cops, you can check any contacts that you don’t want matched by Meepling.
What about tuning into your competitor’s PDA while he’s in the loo to see if he’s hustling any of your clients? This could also have good or bad consequences on dates or with mates. I’ll let you apply the soap.
Perhaps we should move Meeple from the Snoopy category to the Check-it-Out category. I have to admit, it’s kinda fun and certainly has some interesting applications, but I can’t quite reconcile it to the PIM grouping.
Maybe if it were renamed, it would have a better chance of fitting in as a PIM. Instead of calling it MEEPLE, how about PIMPLE? And, of course, the acrostic for this new acronym is People In My Pocket PC Listed Elsewhere.
Who knows, you may decide you can’t live without it and will beam it to all your unMeepled friends and colleagues. In that case, we may wish to rename it STEEPLE, which naturally stands for Start Entering Everyone’s PDA Listings Electronically. Uh, maybe Meeple’s a pretty good name after all, but it’s not a PIM.
.RATING 4
I rate Meeple from Mobilair a 4 out of 5. You can grab a copy to try at http://www.handango.com or visit the developer’s site at www.mobilair.net. I predict that once you try it, you’ll probably buy it. Think of the time it will save you. Maybe it best fits into the "Time Savers" category — that’s TS for short, but it’s not a PIM.
Note — I just received a note from the developers of Meeple. They confirmed that the inspiration for the name "Meeple" comes from the game Carcassone, but instead of meaning "My People", they prefer the definition "Meeting People". They also think of their product as being in the category of Social Software.
I told you it wasn’t a PIM.
.BEGIN_SIDEBAR
.H1 Product availability and resources
For more information on Meeple, visit http://www.mobilair.net.
For more information on Handango, visit http://www.handango.com.
For more information on Dell Axims, visit http://www.dell.com/axim.
For more information on HP iPAQs, visit http://welcome.hp.com/country/us/en/prodserv/handheld.html.
For more information on T-mobile products, visit http://www.tmobile.com/.
.END_SIDEBAR
.BIO
