SBSH Facade 2.0 review – An excellent userinterface for Windows Mobile Standard

SBSH Mobile Software has just released SBSH Facade 2.0, an essential application for Windows Mobile Standard that combines personal information management (PIM) and the graphical userinterface (GUI) in a clever way. In this article an overview of SBSH Facade 2.0 will be provided, and some of the key features are emphasized in a short step-by-step review format.

With the release on Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard and the introduction of Sliding Panels the user experience has significantly improved and you get more things done from the homescreen. In this review I will look also at how SBSH Facade builds further upon the Windows Mobile basics, and I will certainly look if and how I can get more things done from the homescreen on my Windows Phone.

    

SBSH Facade 2.0 step-by-step overview

In this section I will go through the SBSH Facade application in a step-by-step sequence, and I hope this will provide you with a good overview of the opportunities this clever application provides.

Let me start with the remark that during the installation process I have selected the “standard” options, so the screenshots you see in the review are the result from an out-of-the-box installation. Personally I do think that SBSH has done some great improvements on the graphical design part with:  (1) a Windows Vista-like background and topbar, (2) New Icons for the counters on the HOME-screen. 

1.   Home

The screenshots above show you the SBSH Facade 2.0 HOME-screen, and I will describe the different building blocks of the HOME-screen with help of the right screenshot in portrait mode. 

“The Home tab provides a single screen display and access to all of your phone’s vital information.”

At first you can see that the Windows Mobile topbar, which shows you the network- and cellular data coverage, is skinned in the same style as the background image and therefor it “integrates” nicely with the SBSH Facade application.

Below the topbar, you can see a slightly darker bar with the text HOME in bold capitals, with on each side another text. On the left- and on the rightside there are arrows, so it won’t be a big surprise that this is the “navigation”-bar to easily move through the SBSH Facade application. It works well on both a d-pad and a joggball, and it is a very natural way of navigating on a Windows Mobile Standard device.

Below the navigation-bar you see the selected profile (on the left) and the operator name (on the right). This information is shown on a slightly different location if you own a Windows Mobile device with a landscape oriented screen.

The next, larger building block of the SBSH Facade homescreen provides an overview of basic information, and has already some cleverness build in. On the right you can see the time (on the first line) and day of the week and date (on the second line). On the left you can see a summary of today’s weather when you have SBSH PocketWeather installed. In other words SBSH has done some excellent development work to integrate SBSH PocketWeather and SBSH Facade, and if I’m informed correctly the right side integrates with SBSH Clock as well.

 The next block shows the text “No alarm set”, but if you do it shows you the time of the alarm and the time due to the alarm you have set. Again this is some basic information you probably want to access from your homescreen.

Below you will see a building block which is dedicated to the device status. It are widgets for (A) E-mail Count, (B) Missed Cals, (C) SMS Count and (D) Voicemail Count. In the screenshot you can see that there are 3 new/unread e-mails. Each of these counters gives you quick, one click access to Pocket Outlook, your Voicemail or Missed Calls screen of the standard Windows phone application.

Finally you see an overview of the upcoming appointments. You can scroll through this appointments by using the left and right command on the d-pad of your device.

Overall summary

Allright this is really a lot of information which is presented to the user on the “HOME” screen within SBSH Facade. Personally I really do like this ammount of information, because it combines the information that is important to you in a clever way.

Let me emphasize on the fact that navigation among the different building blocks is very easy and very natural for Windows Mobile Standard users, and it gives me a similar feeling as the widgets of SPB Mobile Shell 3.5 for Windows Mobile Professional devices. 

 

    

2.   Schedule

The second tab in the navigation bar is called “SCHEDULE” and this provides you a nice overview of appointments, birthdays, and if you like tasks on a daily view in your calendar. Furthermore you can see in the screenshots above that there is again a clever integration with SBSH PocketWeather, and probably not very surprising with SBSH Calendar or Webis Pocket Informant.

 

      

3.   Tasks

I started this review with marking Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard “sliding panels” as reference point for benchmarking SBSH Facade 2.0. One of the major lacks I personally experience in the Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard “sliding panels” is the absense of a tasks-panel. In other words despite that I use tasks to order my personal- and professional life, there is no way to quickly access or manage tasks from the home-screen.

“The Tasks tab lists all your tasks divided by status and time groupings. With Facade tasks tab you can easily review your tasks from your device Home screen.”

SBSH Mobile Software has included a TASKS tab/screen in the SBSH Face 2.0 application, my compliments for that. Despite that the screenshots above show just some sample data I can quickly select a task and by clicking on it a sub-menu is openend with the following options: (1) show notes, (2) view details, (3) open tasks, (4) open calendar, (5) complete, (6) new task, (7) delete, and (8) reload view.

As you can see this is a complete set of actions to manage tasks from within SBSH Facade, without the need to open another application. To summarize this tasks-screen really puts a smile on my face !

 

      

4.  Calendar

The screenshots above show the CALENDAR screen within SBSH Facade 2.0, and it mainly provides a monthly overview of your calandar. You can navigate really fast throught the upcoming months and years. Furthermore this CALENDAR screen perfectly integrates with SBSH Calendar or another PIM application.

 

      

5.  Weather

The WEATHER screen/tab is only included in the “navigation-bar” if you have SBSH PocketWeather installed on your Windows Phone. On the SBSH Facade product page we can read about the SBSH Pocket Weather integration:

“When used along with PocketWeather, weather forecast is added across the Facade displays: (1) Current weather included as part of the Home tab, (2) weather icons and temperature values added to schedule tab and (3) full weather forecast tab is automatically added within Facade!“

 

    

6.  Programs

The final tab of SBSH Facade is a familiar one, the PROGRAMS launcher, which is shown in the screenshots above. If I remember correctly this functionality was already part of the previous SBSH Facade 1.4 version. As you can see the icons of the last used applications is shown, so you can quickly relaunch them from within the PROGRAMS screen of SBSH Facade 2.0.

“Using the Programs tab you can create shortcuts to your favorite applications accessible from your device Home screen. Shortcuts can be customized to your favorite applications, or you can use one of Facade’s pre-defined smart shortcut buttons, counters and meters!“

As you can read above there are even some “custom” commands included by SBSH, for example reload SBSH Facade Homescreen, Rotate screen, Storage information and battery level.

 

Concluding thoughts and wrap-up

Despite that Wikipedia is not a scientific reference, I would like to share the Wikipedia description of the word Facade:

“A facade or façade is generally one side of the exterior of a building, especially the front, but also sometimes the sides and rear. The word comes from the French language, literally meaning “frontage” or “face”.”

However in the case of SBSH Facade it is more than just some exterior beauty, despite the excellent new graphics make it even more eye-catching. SBSH Facade is cleverly connected with the underlying structures that go way beyond the exterior surface.

Tasks management within SBSH Facade 2.0

SBSH Facade  is a true productivity tool that helps you to get more things done from your homescreen in line with the reasoning behind the sliding panels on Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard. But it even extends the functionality of the homescreen by including a TASKS screen and a PROGRAM launcher.

Especially the TASKS screen put a smile on my face, and I hope that in upcoming version we can see more functionality added in this tasks area. Personally I would like to see the  getting-things-done tasks-improvements of the latest Webis Pocket Informant 9 release in future versions SBSH Facade as well.

Integration and personalization

Furthermore I would like to compliment SBSH Mobile Software with the excellent integration of SBSH PocketWeather, SBSH Calendar and SBSH Facade. SBSH Facade also integrates perfectly with PIM applications like Pocket Outlook and Webis Pocket Informant.

“In addition to the special integration, Facade can also host any other Home screen plugin (not only SBSH’s) within Facade tabs, even without special integration!”

My compliments to SBSH Mobile Software for the high level of widgetization, close integration with SBSH software and third party software.

Pricing and availability

You can download a trial version of SBSH Facade 2.0 directly from the SBSH Facade productpage or purchase a full version for a reasonable price of $14,95. If you already own a copy of SBSH Facade 1.x you can upgrade at a +/- 50% discount and get SBSH Facade for onyl $7,95.

 

Overall SBSH Facade  2.0 is a true productivity tool that helps you to get more things done from your homescreen, it cleverly integrates with other software, and gives the end-user the ability to completely personalize and customize SBSH Facade to the end-users’ own needs and preferences. At a reasonable pricepoint you simply can’t go wrong with this high quality application from SBSH Mobile Software.