June 2011 was Mobile Month for Urbanesia

Today is the third of July, but let's look at the development of Urbanesia last June. Urbanesia launched two new developments on their services and both associated with mobile application, the first at beginning of June Urbanesia released a beta version of Urbalinesia or UrbanesiaBali application for Android, and last Sunday of June Urbanesia officially released the latest of Urbanesia mobile web.

For the mobile web, the access is useful for users who want to find and view information as well as various reviews of the existing locations in Urbanesia and several other Urbanesia facilities, such as add reviews, add photos, etc.. Previous Urbanesia mobile web can be accessed via http://m.pre.urbanesia.com, their address is now officially turned into http://m.urbanesia.com. Nevertheless, the previous URL can still be used.

Batista Harahap (Tista), CTO of Urbanesia explain some of the developments in Urbanesia mobile web development on Urbanesia blog, a more technical explanation about the latest developments of Urbanesia mobile web, like Urbanesia now is a standalone platform, then the use of OAuth as an authentication mechanism, and some other explanation about under the hood of Urbanesia mobile web, including the use of HTML 5 geo location JavaScript Snippet to estimate the location of the user when accessing Urbanesia mobile web.

When we tried it for a few moment (I use LG Optimus ME) Urbanesia mobile web quite light and has a range of features needed to find a location or place when on the go, one feature that I tried was the ‘the nearest location from here’, unfortunately the option 'near' can’t be changed, although I have been looking from my current location (Bandung).

After this article appeared in the DailySocial Indonesian version, Tista explained to me that during their test, geolocation on Opera Mini browser using HTML5 always return Jakarta as its location. If using another mobile browser, the result would have been different. Urbanesia still trying to maximize the accuracy of the estimated location, they hope in the future will be better.

And i think for the color that separate the menu at the bottom also seems can be more exciting if the link is not only on the text but on all those colors.

One more Urbanesia mobile access which was launched in the early June is an Urbanesia Android application for Bali directory named Urbalinesia or UrbanesiaBali (the name of this application is Urbalinesia but when we get into the application the name change to UrbanesiaBali). I will discuss more on this application. Urbalinesia application is basically an application that contains a directory that is in Urbanesia to areas on Bali, and its currently still in limited beta version.

The most striking and the coolest part for me was the design of the applications display, elements of a patterned dark blue color and the icons making the application very attractive and comfortable to explore, this is an important part for a newly launched applications. The second is how to the data displayed by the application is also quite fun, though it’s not perfect like a long loading time for the application.

Urbalinesia featuring six main menus (after logging in) there’s Recommendation, Bali Directory, Suggest Me, Coupons, Quick Facts (containing a brief explanation of Bali) and Favorites. Bali Directory contains 8 other categories, namely Restaurants, Cafes, Bars, Hotels, Events, Art Gallery, Car Rental, and Attractions. As with any directory in Urbanesia, each category will display the various locations in Bali, for example hotel, besides the name and address, there is also a rating (which some still empty), a profile picture (which is still largely empty as well), then there is an option to make your own favorite places, there is also information for distance. By opening your profile, you can see the map, make a phone over the site you're on or share the site and add images and write reviews.

Back to the main menu, there are two menu choices that intrigue me. The first one is the Suggest Me and the second one is Coupons. Suggest Me will make suggestions to users about the various locations that may keep you interested, the display is quite interesting, you can shift the location of the proposed profile, and at the bottom, you can also choose various categories by sliding it as well.

While Coupons, as the name would provide offers that apply to certain locations (I assume it should be based on location). At the time I tried it, there is only an example of vouchers issued by the team of Urbalinesia developers (could be due to not yet available or you must be in Bali).

During the test on Urbalinesia, the question came across my mind was why isn’t Jakarta or Bandung who have this application, Bali is the town that require directory services, and of course can be very helpful for both tourists and locals, but Urbanesia closely in terms with the city of Jakarta, the look at their main site is also more to the city of Jakarta. Tista also explained that they chose Bali for this app because they want to develop their user base outside of Indonesia and Bali seem to be the right one.

Selina, founder of Urbanesia, also said that Urbalinesia is a code name and the app it self named Urbanesia Bali. This app is a stand alone app, she said that they have meet with Bali hotels association and Persatuan Hotel dan Restoran di Indonesia (union of hotel and restaurant in Indonesia), they like the app because there is lack of 'real directory' in Bali, and Urbalinesia Bali plan to cover that.

In spite of all I said above, I tend to like the look of this Urbalinesia, although a bit slow but I had a good experience using it, it's just the next question is, whether I would choose the design/layout or data (information) behind the application and a quick access from the application.

Urbalinesia is still in limited beta, the development is still ongoing, they plan to release it soon. But to try this application you can go to this link, suggestion and comments can be sent to tista [at] Urbanesia [dot] com.