An iPhone application called FrontPocket, built by Jacksonville, Florida-based design firm Updatable, launched today. It behaves as a mobile extension to 37signals’ Backpack service, a business organization and data sharing utility.

As any 37signals fan might intuit, a development of this type must be one thing above all: simple and straightforward. The better to conform to the less-is-more ethos maintained by the team behind Backpack and its siblingware. I think it’s safe to say FrontPocket can feel right at home with family.

A closer look at design

The design is almost entirely plain. Only the basic template of features evident in many other iPhone applications are there. Nothing more. As for color, I would say there’s only a half-rainbow thing happening, whereas on the desktop things are a little more festive. We all know how festive data management can be, eh?

Reasonable limitations

Looks aren’t very important here, however. It’s all about information access and seamless management between desktop and mobile environs, which FrontPocket handles fairly aptly. Of course, you can only do so much with the release. You can’t post files, for instance. (You’re using an iPhone, after all.) Lists, pages, calendars, and journal entries are the extent of what the application is capable of building, maneuvering or adding to or subtracting from. But that’s pretty much all you could sensibly ask of the app for the time being, right?

Whether you’re signed up for a payment plan with the browser-based service or maintain a free account, FrontPocket does its thing. Mostly. It is by no means a replacement, functionally speaking, or an equal to its inspiration. And there’s this thing about access you’ll need to be aware of, which is that you’ll have to fork over cash to 37signals each month - $7 or more - to make use of the calendaring service. Yet that is true whether you’re iPhone-enabled or not, so it’s hard to feel disappointment about such a restriction on FrontPocket’s part.

Is it worth it?

So, is it worthwhile? I think yes. There’s enough to get out of the application’s connection to the full-fledged “home service” to make it handy in many circumstances. If you happen to encounter any technical issues with the initial release (an issue was discovered for 1.0, which was pretty hastily corrected in 1.0.1, and the developers expect to issue version 1.1 two weeks hence), any rough patches will presumably be smoothed out in short order.

Quite frankly, if you’re an ardent fan of Backpack, and simply wish you could have some variation of it to keep with you at all times, this application will make your day. I’m 99.9% sure of it.

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“Run on limited resources and you’ll be forced to reckon with constraints…And that’s a good thing. Constraints drive innovation.”

—from Getting Real, by 37Signals

What’s an entrepreneur? It’s someone who, given limited resources and terrible odds, can create something truly great; when life gives you lemons, build a multi-million dollar company.

Productivity app maker 37Signals has become as famous for its philosophy as its products: “Less is More”, went the mantra. From Getting Real, the company’s 2006 manual for the web-dev set: “The answer is less. Do less than your competitors to beat them…Instead of oneupping, try one-downing. Instead of outdoing, try underdoing.” Constraints, goes the thesis, unleash creativity: less money, less people, less time…all these things force creative solutions to problems.

And suddenly startups have less money. Everyone does.

More About Less

The concept isn’t new. You could quote Frank Lloyd Wright: “‘Man built most nobly when limitations were at their greatest.” Or G. K. Chesterton: “There are no rules of architecture for a castle in the clouds.” Or Thomas Huxley: “A man’s worst difficulties begin when he is able to do as he likes.” (There are dozens of these. Read more here.)

Alas, when times are good, sticking to your own advice is hard. 37Signals ignored their own guidance by taking funding in 2006.

Times are no longer good; choice is limited; creativity is key.

Beyond Cloud Castles: What To Do

I’m looking forward, with anticipation, to a new wave of necessity-driven innovation. More specifically, to a laser-sharp focus on business models. Let’s hope to see:

Radically inventive new business models

Reinvention: old business models returning in unexpected places

The next great revenue generator beyond Google’s Adsense / AdWords

Utility over users: a focus on usefulness over scale

This is not an attempt at contrarian positivity in a crisis. Not at all. More simply: the money tree has stopped bearing fruit. Conditions are perfect, then, for entrepreneurship to flourish.

(Image courtesy of macieklew)

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The most recent email to customers from Rackspace, the Texas Web host whose datacenter outage in Dallas downed some of the Web’s most useful websites:

Nov. 12th 11:30PM CST — As of 10:50 p.m. CST, all DFW servers that were proactively powered down earlier this evening, to avoid overheating, have now been powered back up. The Data Center Engineering team has been working to resolve the power issues caused by tonight’s traffic incident. The team is preparing to transfer machines affected by tonight’s power outage from generator power back to utility power. The servers and devices that were affected by the unrelated event over this past weekend will remain on generator power. We anticipate transferring the machines affected this evening back to utility power within the hour and expect the transfer to be non-disruptive to customer environments. We apologize again for the inconvenience these events have caused and have all hands on deck working fanatically to minimize the impact on your business.

Previously: Rackspace outage was third in two days

Source:Valleywag

There are a lot of posts popping up from various Rackspace customers apologizing to their customers and readers for the Web host’s downtime caused by an errant truck. Here is a selection:

37signals

Will be using this situation as both a wake-up call and a learning experience. While our systems are engineered to chug through major failure, this “perfect storm” chain of events beat both our set-up and our data center’s sophisticated back-up systems. We will work hard to further diversify our systems in order to make an future downtime event like this even more rare.

Threadless

As you noticed Threadless took a little nap this evening. Apparently a truck jumped a railing and attacked our data center. I think their may have even been an explosion. I hope so.

Laughing Squid

This is the first time we have had power outage like this in the 9 years that we have been in hosting (8 of which at Rackspace).

And here’s Rackspace’s public response:Rackspace

*crickets*

Ryan Singer, 37 Signals

• the company is known for making software that is easy to use, clear, that people like to use.
• you know when things reach critical mass when you get a lot of bullshit and jargon (referring to all the usability and design talk)
• we talk about clear, fast, easy, fun and good. usability does not mean it is good.
• for us, the interface is the product. Going to take a look at 3 areas that get focused on: screens, flow, language

Screens

• on hitting a screen, focus on what is most important for the user, why they are on the screen and make sure that is easy to find. On the files tab of basecamp there is a lot of information but the main focus is on file icon and file name. Think about what the immediate hit is, see the parts, see the relationships.
• he thinks there should be a ‘weak’ tag, to de emphasise things. so we have strong, normal and weak across the page
• he looks for elements he can use to act as handles, to act as ‘containers’ for the content to organise things - gives context… looks to de-emphasise things when they do not need to catch your eye at the start. add colour to bring attention.
• you use elements to direct attention and to support the content. making things clear and well structures often end up looking good. think about importance and priority and user stuff and it helps on the art side.
• DECIDE WHAT MATTERS…MAKE THAT POP OUT…MAKE EVERYTHING ELSE FADE BACK

Flow

• your screens could be beautiful, but if finding your way through them is horrible, then it is still bad. always need to think about flow and how people will move through the screens.
• think about why people load up an app - it needs to be fast and smooth. you can have a great product but if is not easy to use, then won;t be.
• what do people need to do and make it as easy as possible
• think about making it frictionless - what do most people want to do next and get the app to do it and drive you along

Language

• interface design on copywriting
• speak your users language
• in order for people to use something it has to make sense to them
• talk like a human. think about it being a conversation
• long labels are OK…they are descriptive. instead of ’submit’ what are they actually doing.

In summary

• Be opinionated about everything and decide what matters
• walkthrough processes
• emphasise and de-emphasise
• reduce friction
• clarify your language

Location: Chicago, ILLaunch Date: 1999

In the company’s own words, what is it? We’re a privately-held Chicago-based company committed to building the best web-based software products possible with the least number of features necessary. Our products do less than the competition — intentionally. We’ve been in business since 1999 and love what we do.

We believe most software is too complex. Too many features, too many buttons, too much confusion. We build easy to use web-based products with elegant interfaces and thoughtful features. We’re focused on executing on the basics beautifully.

While our products are mainly built for small businesses and individuals (we call this group the Fortune 5,000,000), companies of all sizes use them every day. From 1 person to teams of 3-5 people to companies of 5000. Everyone loves simple tools that help get the job done and then get out of your way.

Outside quote about company: Farhad Manjo of salon.com said, “Basecamp and Backpack represent the future of software on the Web not just because they’re elegant, easy-to-use programs that will likely make your life better. The two applications are also interesting because they were created in a novel way, using a new programming model that allowed 37 Signals to build each program very quickly, and with very few people. Indeed, this method of creating applications — doing it fast and on a tight budget — might well be called 37 Signal’s animating philosophy, its central mission.”

Features:
* Project management and collaboration (Basecamp)
* Real-time group chat (Campfire)
* Information organizer and calendar (Backpack)
* Simple to-do lists (Ta-da List)
* Collaborative writing (Writeboard)
* Open-source web-app framework (Ruby on Rails)
* Blogging read by over 30,000 a day (Signal vs. Noise)

Management/Directors:
Jason Fried, Founder
David Heinemeier Hansson, Programmer
Ryan Singer, Designer
Sam Stephenson, Programmer
Marcel Molina, Programmer
Matt Linderman, Designer
Jamis Buck, Programmer

Relevant Links:
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_47/b3960428.htm
http://businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_13/b3977005.htm
http://www.businessweek.com/technology/bestof/editorpicks.htm
http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,122928-page,4/article.html