Hacker News Reader

Comment by bri3d | Hacker News Reader

I'm especially shocked this has taken so long because the technology is ancient:

Windows has had a "Use this computer as a Bluetooth Headset" option buried in the Bluetooth preferences for a long time now.

The Address Book in Mac OS 10.0 and 10.1 would also let you send and receive SMSes with compatible phones (no joke):

http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/wireless/2002/11/27/sms.html

And Linux has had a few projects (like nohands) which do the same thing.

View on HN

Sending SMSs from Address Book was a phenomenal feature. A shame that they yanked it years ago. Good to see its return.

I remember that that I could do far more with my Sony Ericsson W800 (and Salling Clicker) than I could with my first iPhone. Dialing numbers from the address book, sending and receiving SMSs while the phone was in my bag/pocket, turning the screen saver on and pausing music if I left the area - and reverting on return. Apart from the UI polish, this was the least impressive part of keynote (at least for me) as those were things I had to give up on.

> Apart from the UI polish

It sounds like you underestimate how hard it is to have "UI polish" implemented just right so that it feels seamless and natural instead of a hack (because honestly we do love to hack but ultimately prefer our prototypes to be implemented first-party, e.g I've been using JACK to stream audio in sync on various devices for years but AirPlay is so much more simple and natural)

I think you misread my comment. Apart from the UI polish, I wasn't impressed --> I was impressed with the UI polish but less so the rest.

I'm aware that implementing this well is a difficult problem and I have utmost respect for those who figure out how to make it feel seamless.

Salling Clicker was the biggest thing I missed in the switch from so-called "dumb phones" to smartphones.

>Windows has had a "Use this computer as a Bluetooth Headset" option buried in the Bluetooth preferences for a long time now.

Depends which Bluetooth stack you have installed on Windows.

True, like every other Bluetooth feature on Windows.

The stack that I know works is the Broadcom / WIDCOMM one.

The fact a user might have to know which Bluetooth stack they have installed is quite telling as to why it never caught on.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com