RIM previews new BlackBerry OS, BB10, with advanced 'Flow' feaures

13th November 2012
RIM previews new  BlackBerry OS, BB10, with advanced 'Flow' feaures
RIM's Scott Totzke ( left) and Sunil Lalvani, at the BB10 preview in Bangalore, November 8 2012 ( Photo: India TechOnline/ Anand Parthasarathy)

Bangalore, November 13 2012: Research in Motion, Canada-based makes of the Blackberry are gearing up to launch BB10, a new and entirely reworked version 10 of their operating software as well as a couple of new Blackberry 10 smart phones that will be tailor made to exploit the advanced usability features of the new OS. While the launch itself is expected in end January 2013, RIM has started presenting the BB10 OS and phones to enterprise partners and customers worldwide.
IndiaTechOnline had a sneak preview of the new offerings on the sidelines of the Blackberry Enterprise Forum in Bangalore last week, where Scott Totzke, Senior Vice President, Blackberry Security and Sunil Lalvani, Director (Enterprise Sales) RIM India, shared details of BB10.
Central to BB10 is a new user experience that RIM calls BlackBerry Flow, which means essentially that a variety of content can be pulled in easily and if required placed in layers one on top of the other. Gesture has become a key component enables users to do actions like mail check, in a manner that few smartphones have allowed. A sidebar on the left hand of the screen, displays live notifications -- which are an improvement over the LED alerts familiar to BB owners. All communications drop into a universal box which makes it easy to handle multiple email accounts.
Perhaps most disruptive among BB10 enhancements is the sandboxing of ‘work’ and ‘play’ enviroments -- leaving the user free to toggle easily between them. This means, RIM’s USP for enterprise customers – a secure mail and work environment – can co exist alongside a user’s personal apps and folders. This was in a way an acknowledgement that BYOD – bring your own device – was going to be a fact of corporate life in future, explained Scott. But the ability to maintain separate personal and professional avatars in the BB10 environment was also tacit recognition that 250 million Indians were around 25 years of age, he added.
The other, arguably radical change in RIM’ mobile computing platform offerings this year was the ability to recognize and work with other operating systems like iOS ( Apple) and Android.

In another announcement last week, RIM said BB10 had been granted “FIPS 140-2″. The FIPS – Federal Information Processing Standard – certification provides confidence to security-conscious organizations dealing with sensitive information, that data stored on smartphones running BlackBerry 10 can be properly secured and encrypted. “Achieving FIPS certification for an entirely new platform in a very short period of time, and before launch, is quite remarkable and a testament to the dedication of our security team,” David MacFarlane, Director, Security Certifications at RIM, said in a statement. “BlackBerry 10 will deliver security, a superior user experience, the ability to separately manage corporate and personal data on the same device, and ease of manageability for IT managers in an enterprise or government environment.”
Research in Motion CEO Thorsten Heins said: 'In building BlackBerry 10, we set out to create a truly unique mobile computing experience that constantly adapts to your needs. Our team has been working tirelessly to bring our customers innovative features combined with a best in class browser, a rich application ecosystem, and cutting-edge multimedia capabilities.”