noticed today that the circle on the top right side of the app was not green and i assumed that meant the app got disconnected. maybe because i was on a phone call and the edge connection was on hold. the weird thing is that it never turned back to green. i had to restart the app.


another thing i noticed is that the app was sending log files without me knowing back to simulsays.

Holy cow; this is awesome. Installed it a little bit ago and I've got high hopes for this one.

I'm not sure I'm going to pony up for the $10. 40 msgs/mo is *far* too low for $10. 7 messages per business day would be $35 in overage charges. $45/mo? Meh. Add in evening and weekend personal calls, and it could get pretty ridiculous in a hurry - but that's just my take. I'm on BIS and pay for my own service, so BES users may be more willing to pay for transcription if the rest of their BB's costs are covered.

Some quick thoughts:

In the main screen of the app, clicking on the app should open the context menu. Enter should go directly into the message. A click-hold should also go directly into the message. The way it's setup now breaks somewhat with the rest of the BB UI and it's a little jarring.

The contextual menu should list an option to mark as read/unread, and then there should be options to delete off the phone with or without deletion off the server -- basically the way the mail app works.

Also, the delete key should delete with a confirm, and 'u' should go to the next unplayed voicemail...you get the picture. It'd be nice to be able to purge the attached audio but keep the transcript, perhaps with the option of later re-downloading the audio (if that's technically doable on your end) associated with that transcript.

I love that the LED notification is a faster flash than normal, so it's nice to be able to visually note email vs. voicemail. Having it flash a fast green when the transcription of a recently received message is complete would also be nice - I can already tell I'm going to be tempted to transcript-spot and stare at the phone until it comes in, and this would avoid that. Or, an option could be set to not flash the LED until transcription is complete. (If there are problems with the transcript not arriving, then you could do something to handle with the LED flashing after 5 minutes if transcription fails to avoid missed messages.) Also, being able to set an optional audio cue on the completion of transcription would be useful (I haven't messed with its entry in Profiles, but I'm assuming it sounds when the message arrives - I'll play with that in the morning when ring tones won't bother anyone).

In the main message list, the transcription line is pretty short - any reason not to run it full-width, since it's below the times tamp anyway? That'd give a bigger preview of the message.

It's great that you can send the message as an email - I wish there was a way to optionally include the audio as an attachment. I know I could just set it to send me them as emails, but I'd rather not have to deal with that for the rare case of wanting to send the audio to others. I'm sure there'll be situations where I'll want to just send the voicemail to someone - I can do it from GMail, but it'd be nice to be able to do it from the app, if that's doable without having to get too kludgy.

Just some random thoughts after messing with it for a bit. It looks great, and I'm hoping it'll become really robust as it goes release.

I can't believe no one else has mentioned CallWave either. There is no app to install. You can be notified via SMS or email. With email notification, it includes the "gist" transcription AND attaches the entire voicemail message so you can keep it forever (unlike T-Mobile which deletes voicemail after 30 days).


Sure they do. Mobile Basic is free. It includes the transcription and email notification. Mobile Pro is $9.95/month. This includes voicemail screening (listening in while the message is still being recorded, and being able to interrupt and pick up the call) and "premium support".

So far, because of this program (I believe), I am unable to use BBWeather, and Beyond411, even after uninstalling and hard resetting my pearl.

Next step will be finding an old backup file and wiping it clean. :(

Ive had it installed for about 20 hours now, and it seems to be working fine, the only thing I don't like and im not sure if you can change is when someone calls it says brought to you by simulsays...or whatever it says, I still have the default greeting maybe if I change it it will go away? But right now it sounds way too... "let me try and sell you something" before leaving me a voice mail.

If I login to my Simulscribe account, I can uncheck "Play Tagline". When I do that, a pop up warns:

"Are you sure you want to disable the SimulScribe tagline? Disabling the tagline significantly reduces the accuracy of your transcriptions".

I just tested this by unchecking it and calling myself (and listening to my customized message) and it works fine (i.e. I do not hear the SimulScribe tagline).

I, however, leave it on as I find people speak slower and I do indeed seem to get better transcriptions.

ah, I see, I forgot about the settings on the site part. I am having a problem with the LED now, it wont turn off, I deleted all the messages and tried restarting the application but the led keeps blinking.

just restarted the phone and it was still blinking for a few minutes then stopped.

Ugh, yeah. Same problem here; Opera and MidpSSH (which I use all the time) are both broken, but Beyond411 works fine. Weird.

Anyway, not good.

I am noticing that every day or two, the green circle on the top right turns red (disconnects) and then the app automatically send a log file to simulsays. here is what is says


2007-07-14 14:48:07|CONNECTION_INFO|Connection lost in connection Loop: java.lang.Exception: Network Error: Bad DNS Address
2007-07-14 14:48:07|MISC_ERROR|Fail #5 - reason: Bad DNS Address [class java.io.IOException]
2007-07-14 14:48:07|CONNECTION_INFO|Connection programmatically closed



anyone experiencing lost connections?

Not to mention... this thing is a battery assassin - I had to remove it... as one who needs the most juice I can get for a long day of work and play... the 2 weeks I used SimulSays just proved that it was draining my battery at no less that 25% faster than without it -

Gone

Agreed. But here is a workaround - *IF* you have SimulScribe transcription in addition to SimulSays: Limit Use of SimulSays

I am dissatisfied with this service.

I am now not even getting SMS notification that I have new voicemail. I thought it was odd so I called into the voicemail system and there were 3 calls that I missed.

I'm also getting some javascript error message but I'm not sure if associated with this or something else I downloaded.

In any event, I'm about to pull the trigger and go back to my Tmo voicemail.

Despite my initial enthusiasm, this program and service have not lived up to my expectations. I switched back to my regular TMO voicemail today, deleted the SimulSays application, and deleted my SimulScribe account.

My two main reasons:
- Times were too variable (and often way too long) before I would receive transcriptions.
- The application had frequent connection problems, causing me to miss messages.

yesterday the app circle in the top left was going from green to yellow to red, and none of my vmails went to the software even after a reset and even when the circle is green. this is the first time i have noticed a problem with getting messages. Anyone else notice any other problems in the last day or two?

Same here. If there was a way to get the app to reconnect (you can't even quit the thing) it'd be a little more usable, but it was pretty ridiculous how flaky it was at connecting.

Hope they work this stuff out.

Exactly the same here, when i first got it i loved it, but then i encountered the connection issues, i missed most of my voicemail! If they were to release a new version with better connectivity, i would go right back though.

Nice idea but they need to work the bugs before releasing it!

Ditto for me. There is no notification to the user that SimulSays is having connection problems. Unless and until you go into the SimulSays app, you won't even know that it is not connecting, and if it has not been connecting, for how long it has not connected. I uninstalled the application this past weekend.

That's why they call it beta

Same here, uninstalled it and set up an account on Callwave. Nothing is installed on the berry and so far I've really enjoyed it. Free during beta and supposedly its been in "beta" a long time. Who knows, maybe they'll keep it free! (won't count on it)