Mobile Device Databases
I’ve just been taking a look at Device Atlas, which in its own words is the “world’s most comprehensive database of mobile device information”. I had high hopes, but unfortunately it appears to be rehash of the kind of information which is readily available, without anything more useful. I appreciate that this database is not designed for my sole delectation, but I surely can’t be alone in wanting to get a list of devices running S60 FP1 which have a camera? Not only does the Device Atlas apparently not allow any sort of search, it doesn’t tell me what operating system a phone runs, what JSRs it has, or allow any kind of user commenting (e.g. “HTTPS is broken on this device”).
My favourite part of the site is in the FAQ, where it says “Can I have a job? Yes, we’re hiring world class staff for the DeviceAtlas project. Call us.” Errr, call who? There’s no phone number. Click on “Contact” on the nav bar at the bottom of the screen. Still no phone number. I presume you’re supposed to call dotMobi (one more click away) rather than Device Atlas, but that’s far from clear. Also in the FAQ, we read that “We intend this to be the single largest, most comprehensive, and accurate device database on the planet”. A worthy goal - but Device Atlas has a long way to go to reach it.
July 25th, 2008 at 8:23 am
Hello,
my name is Andrea Trasatti and I run the DeviceAtlas project at dotMobi. I’m glad you took the time to look at the site and even took the bother to complain about it.
You might have read that in June we opened a test site where you browse with your mobile device, run a few tests (we will add more over time) and report what was working as expected and what did not.
We had MIDP and CLDC information for a while now, but not all JSR’s, that is correct. DeviceAtlas was born to provide an API to embed in your web application, detect a device and provide the proper content. Your needs are slightly different, you want to use the website to get analytics about the devices. We’ve been testing that type of service and here you can see some examples: http://dev.mobi/blog/secret-deviceatlas-feature-analytics .
We work on DeviceAtlas every day and add new features constantly. If you have been in the mobile space long enough you will know that this world moves quickly and there are many things that you need to track and to add regularly if you want to keep up the pace.
I suggest that you keep your high hopes and just us or our blogs on dev.mobi and you will surely see consistent improvements coming regularly.