It is no secret that Microsoft is struggling a bit to keep up with the competition.  With the latest news coming out that they are even further behind on their release cycle for Windows 7, things are looking slightly bleak.

In a mobile PDA market that they once controlled, it seems that more competing solutions are released almost every week.  So far, the only thing keeping them in the mix is a combination of great hardware from companies like HTC, modified touch overlays that try to improve where Mobile 6 fails, and the tight integration to Microsoft Exchange – Microsoft’s Flagship enterprise product.

That last feature, Exchange integration will help them less and less.  For one, other companies have solutions for this (Blackberry, Apple, Palm, and now Google).  They can support the sync and the push email. Number two, Exchange isn’t the only solution anymore for doing wireless sync of calendars and address (and email of course).  This is a core capability of the Google Android platform, which is provided free.

It’s clear that Microsoft’s position isn’t solid, and a new take on their Mobile platform could infuse some needed life into an aging solution.  I think they have the people to make it happen, and watching the revolutions and evolutions others have developed, they have the needed guidance for a direction to take.  Microsoft is no longer in the game of leading the development cycle, rather applying those solutions on their platform.  It’s a not problem, as long as they implement those capabilities well.

Like most iPhone owners this weekend, I was having a blast with the new 2.0 software.  Also as a .Mac user, I have watched the painful Mobile Me transition unfold (well, it still is).  While waiting for the Mobile Me rollercoaster to stop, I spent a lot of time experimenting with or reading about many of the 500 applications now available for iPhone and iPod Touch users.  Interestingly, I noticed one important application not on the list.

While AIM showed up for opening day to provide its users with a chat program, everyone else was absent.  More importantly, no third party developer had a multi-protocol chat client available!  I was very surprised that an iPhone equivalent of Adium or Pidgin wasn’t available.  Of the 500 applications available, I still find myself crawling back to Meebo, to accomplish something I should have a program for.

Oh multi-protocol IM client developers, where art thou?  Please make an app available.  I would happily pay for such a solution.

The day apple released the iPhone, and in the process, provided only minimal support for its own .Mac service – I was perplexed.  What the heck were they thinking?  Every other Apple solution allowed for total syncing of Mail, Contacts, Calendars, Bookmarks, and more.  Why didn’t the iPhone?  In the age of ActiveSync, Blackberry Enterprise, and other solutions offering full sync of at least email, contacts, and calendars it makes no sense.  The iPhone seemed a perfect match for .Mac services, and therefore a point of discontent as a .Mac user.  (I immediately took the opportunity to provide feedback to Apple.)

To me, this was the one big screw up of the iPhone.  The phone is great otherwise.  Why would they not make better integration?

This week’s announcement of “Mobile Me” finally provides an answer. It just happens to be a bit late - a common theme for .Mac.  It seems as though they finally got the details figured out on making all this push and sync stuff working with their own services; something that should have been done long ago.  When Steve Jobs commented during his keynote that they finally “got it right” with .Mac, it seems that even he recognized the blunder.

The question for Apple will now be, is this enough to draw more people to .Mac Mobile Me? I think there is potential, but it may be a hard sell job.  The ability to keep all your messaging and collaboration data in sync on any of your Apple devices (and even Windows now) is huge in my book.  I no longer have to plug my phone into my Mac to sync that stuff.   To finally have a more complete web-based solution to go with it, definitely a plus.  The 20GB of data storage seems a bit meager on the surface.  However, in the context of how iDisk works (local syncing to your desktop), I can see why larger storage could potentially be a nightmare to keep under control.  I still think they could offer at least 40GB, and sweeten the deal.  After all, they are asking $100 a year.

The web hosting is fine, and good that they have already allowed for personal domain names.  However, this piece still seems incomplete.  Why not include DNS hosting for that domain?  Why not let users have email accounts at their personal domain?  I hope that they work on this part of the package.

All in all, Mobile Me looks like it will be a welcome change, and big step forward.  I hope they continue improving it after launch.

I have been an Aperture user since version 1.0, when things were really rough in the world of Apple’s photo editing.  Since then, each update update has been a welcome improvement over the previous.The last update to version 1.5 made for a fairly solid photo editing / management environment.  At that point, I really did not have any complaints, other than I thought tethered shooting would be a great addition.

However, am just a hobbyist, so it is not a necessity for me. When version 2 was announced, I spent plenty of time pouring over the new features and the new interface.  The new simplified interface is a welcome improvement for maximizing the UI space.  This time around, they also threw in tethered shooting!  I haven yet to use the feature, but fear not, I will be using it very soon (in the next couple weeks).

On top of those changes, I was impressed by the detail recovery in highlights, the new vibrance control, and the detail control.  In the end, the feature that most impressed me was the 2.0 version of RAW.  I have actually gone back and re-worked several photos, just because I wanted to see how the new raw conversion would handle those original images.  I was repeatedly impressed.

All those capabilities have rounded out a really nice improvement to the Aperture software.  It is definitely worth the upgrade.