[Clinto]

Hey Crackberry Nation,

So I've been trying to convince my corporate office to upgrade their current BlackBerry Server up to a BB10 Enterprise Server. I have gone to great lenghts to make this happen.
For now they simply refuse. Why you ask? I don't know and I was really bummed out by their decision. The cost appears to be very low and they could also manage Apple and Android devices on it too, so I presented it as a cost saving/good business move for our company.. But no.. They still refuse.. Oh well, I'm sure they have their reasons.

However.. I was told that if I can use 2 Android Apps to connect the Z10 to my corp office and then I will be granted permission to use the Z10.

Sooo.... Does anybody out there who already owns a Z10 know if I can "Port" or "Side Load" a couple of Android Apps over to the Z10 to make it compatible with my corp office? The two Android Apps that I would need to make the connection are: Android App "Touchdown" for managing the email transfer and encryption and the Android App "Mass 360" to remotely wipe the Z10 if need be. That's it.. That's all I need to be able to be rocking a Z10.

Does anybody know if those apps can be ported over? And more importantly.. Anybody know if those apps will function properly once ported over to the Z10??

Thanks A Lot In Advance!!

[bintheredundat]

Clinto,


Good news is I see that touchdown has been ported. Bad news is I haven't tested it for you. Most of the apps on this site have been ported successfully but may not operate 100%.

I use it to sideload my apps. Here's the link to the site and to the touchdown app for the z10.

Goodluck! Hope it works out for you.


http://apps.goodereader.com/playbook...pps/?did=12183

Posted via CB10 on my Z10 Oreo

[adjdudley21]

You have to have the signed key for the app.. and then convert the app to a .bar file.. as far as the fuctionality, i will assume there will be somethings that might not work if it tries to tap into certain parts of the OS, but other than that I dont see why it wouldn't work

[rlsmith999]

1. Touchdown is an ActiveSync client. Is it possible that your corporate admins are not aware that BB10 includes a native ActiveSync client? You might not need Touchdown to meet their requirements. One reason Touchdown exists is that older Android versions had poor native ActiveSync capability.

2. Require Device Encryption is an ActiveSync policy. Many, but not all, ActiveSync clients support Device Encryption. This wikipedia article shows ActiveSync feature/policy support by product. Touchdown is listed, but not BB10. I suspect BB10 supports this ActiveSync policy but couldn't find detailed specifications.
Comparison of Exchange ActiveSync clients - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

3. Remote Wipe is an ActiveSync feature that almost all ActiveSync clients support. I suspect BB10 supports this ActiveSync feature but couldn't find detailed specifications.

Presuming BB10 supports Require Device Encryption and Remote Wipe, your admins should allow your BB10 to connect directly to the Exchange server. If they have device management in place, you will need to supply them with some device identifier (possibly the IMEI) before the Exchange connection will be accepted.

[Sqoon]

What a horrible IT department

Posted via CB10

[Clinto]

What a horrible IT department

Posted via CB10

I know.. But at least they're going to allow me to hook up a Z10 using an alternative method. Now I just need to find out if it'll really work.

[westcoastit]

Hey Crackberry Nation,

So I've been trying to convince my corporate office to upgrade their current BlackBerry Server up to a BB10 Enterprise Server. I have gone to great lenghts to make this happen.
For now they simply refuse. Why you ask? I don't know and I was really bummed out by their decision. The cost appears to be very low and they could also manage Apple and Android devices on it too, so I presented it as a cost saving/good business move for our company.. But no.. They still refuse.. Oh well, I'm sure they have their reasons.

However.. I was told that if I can use 2 Android Apps to connect the Z10 to my corp office and then I will be granted permission to use the Z10.

Sooo.... Does anybody out there who already owns a Z10 know if I can "Port" or "Side Load" a couple of Android Apps over to the Z10 to make it compatible with my corp office? The two Android Apps that I would need to make the connection are: Android App "Touchdown" for managing the email transfer and encryption and the Android App "Mass 360" to remotely wipe the Z10 if need be. That's it.. That's all I need to be able to be rocking a Z10.

Does anybody know if those apps can be ported over? And more importantly.. Anybody know if those apps will function properly once ported over to the Z10??

Thanks A Lot In Advance!!

It's not a cost saving measure if they've already invested in another platform. You're asking them to scrap their investment in time, licensing, and training in order to move to a new platform that offers no significant benefits over the current solution, except that it pleases you. Yes, BES10 is almost certainly a better product than what they are currently using but if they are content with their device management solution as it exists, the advantages BES10 offers are of questionable value.

Plus, because you're making this a personal crusade you're probably just annoying them and they're going to dig in their heels and really resist switching to appease you because that will be seen as someone outside of the IT world knowing more about it than they do. You've mangled the politics of the switch by pushing too hard -- if I remember correctly you went ahead and tried to contact your company's RIM account manager and circumvent the IT department entirely.

[Sith_Apprentice]

Android Apps do NOT work with BES10, you might have to set up a VPN connection on your device in order to use them (corporate WiFi may also work).

[joeldf]

Android Apps do NOT work with BES10, you might have to set up a VPN connection on your device in order to use them (corporate WiFi may also work).

According to the OP, they are NOT running BES10 and don't plan to. That's the issue.

[JasW]

1. Touchdown is an ActiveSync client. Is it possible that your corporate admins are not aware that BB10 includes a native ActiveSync client? You might not need Touchdown to meet their requirements. One reason Touchdown exists is that older Android versions had poor native ActiveSync capability.

2. Require Device Encryption is an ActiveSync policy. Many, but not all, ActiveSync clients support Device Encryption. This wikipedia article shows ActiveSync feature/policy support by product. Touchdown is listed, but not BB10. I suspect BB10 supports this ActiveSync policy but couldn't find detailed specifications.
Comparison of Exchange ActiveSync clients - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

3. Remote Wipe is an ActiveSync feature that almost all ActiveSync clients support. I suspect BB10 supports this ActiveSync feature but couldn't find detailed specifications.

Presuming BB10 supports Require Device Encryption and Remote Wipe, your admins should allow your BB10 to connect directly to the Exchange server. If they have device management in place, you will need to supply them with some device identifier (possibly the IMEI) before the Exchange connection will be accepted.

You are assuming the existence of "the Exchange server" at OP's workplace. He doesn't indicate whether his company has one. We don't have one because we use Lotus Notes (and hence have a Domino server instead of an Exchange server). That rules out ActiveSync.

I'm in the same boat pretty much as the OP. Our IT department just finally confirmed that it won't be getting a BES 10 server (to add on to the existing set up of a BES 5.x, a Good Technology server, and the Domino server). At least not for the foreseeable future.

So without either a BES 10 server or an Exchange server, I'm out of luck. I've been holding onto my 9810 since its August 2011 release day, and I'm eligible for an upgrade in less than 3 weeks. I either sit not-so pretty with the 9810 for the unforeseeable future, or I bail on BB.

I'm sure I'm not alone.

[momofteme]

I know absolutely nothing about corporate e-mail. But it seems strikingly obvious to me that BB should have the native capability to connect to any modern corporate e-mail system. I realize the Z10 is not even available here yet, but are we sure that it is not compatible with Domino, or Good? Surely mgmt knows this would be mandatory in the age of BYOD?

[Clinto]

No pushing too hard over here westcoastit. I did indeed put A LOT of effort into getting all of the background details before presenting to my company. And I sincerely appreciate all of the help that I received here in the awesome CrackBerry Community.

I presented all of the details that I learned here at CrackBerry and from BlackBerry in a tactful yet pleasant manner to my I.T. Dept. And it worked. Even though the I.T. manager didn't go for BES 10 as I hoped, he was still willing to provide the alternate method above to hook up the Z10. If I had pushed him, he would have told me to forget the whole thing; but instead he helped me.

I'd call that a win.

[Clinto]

You are assuming the existence of "the Exchange server" at OP's workplace. He doesn't indicate whether his company has one. We don't have one because we use Lotus Notes (and hence have a Domino server instead of an Exchange server). That rules out ActiveSync.

I'm in the same boat pretty much as the OP. Our IT department just finally confirmed that it won't be getting a BES 10 server (to add on to the existing set up of a BES 5.x, a Good Technology server, and the Domino server). At least not for the foreseeable future.

So without either a BES 10 server or an Exchange server, I'm out of luck. I've been holding onto my 9810 since its August 2011 release day, and I'm eligible for an upgrade in less than 3 weeks. I either sit not-so pretty with the 9810 for the unforeseeable future, or I bail on BB.

I'm sure I'm not alone.

Nope, I don't think we are alone here by a long shot JasW.
BlackBerry really needs to figure something out quick to save all of the people out there like us. I would think we're among 100's of thousands or maybe even millions of people world wide that "want" to buy a BB10 phone but instead will be forced out of it due to corporate policy. And that would be a shame for BlackBerry to lose all of those sales due to them being behind the times, especially in the extremely important Enterprise Market which they should be targetting heavily and trying to dominate.

[brmiller1976]

Plus, because you're making this a personal crusade you're probably just annoying them and they're going to dig in their heels and really resist switching to appease you because that will be seen as someone outside of the IT world knowing more about it than they do.

Years ago, I had an IT director at an employer who launched just such a jihad, culminating in him trying to switch off my workgroup's access to the network because we were on Macs and he was "standardizing on Windows NT."

I called him out on the carpet at a meeting of the partner group, after noting that I'd not be able to hit budget numbers since my machines would be switched off and we'd not be able to do an end-to-end research workflow with appropriate descriptive statistics. Thus, we'd need to lower quarterly revenue projections for Q2 2000 by about 30%, since switching to NT was such a priority.

I won that argument. The IT guy was shown the door less than three months later.

IT is a utility -- a service to the business. IT may "know more about back end systems" (sometimes), but they sure don't know how content experts do their jobs. IT telling an end user what tools he "needs" or "may use" is like a miner telling an artist which implements he needs to make a painting. Good IT organizations try to adapt to the needs of the user and "get to yes," rather than "assert their expertise" and impose a lack of flexibility on the enterprise.

I often encounter IT support people who think they know how to do my job better than I do. When they reject my technology requests, I simply tell them "fine, you need to build a system for me that meets this list of ten requirements -- and do it by the time I need the system to work, while certifying to my boss (the CEO) that it will work."

If you want to assert "expertise" and that you know my job better than I do, you'd better accept full responsibility for the results of that assertion as well. Otherwise, just deliver me the technology that I, as a subject matter expert, know my team and I need to do our jobs, and get the **** out of our way.

[JasW]

I know absolutely nothing about corporate e-mail. But it seems strikingly obvious to me that BB should have the native capability to connect to any modern corporate e-mail system. I realize the Z10 is not even available here yet, but are we sure that it is not compatible with Domino, or Good? Surely mgmt knows this would be mandatory in the age of BYOD?

That's (inadvertently) rich -- running a BB on Good. Good was set up so non-BBs could be connected to enterprise. It doesn't handle BBs because, of course, BBs have BES. Only now there is a second flavor of BES. So you can't connect a BB to Good, although I imagine that's theoretically possible with a port of the Android Good app. But it'll be a cold day in the innermost circle of you know where before I go that route.

Nope, I don't think we are alone here by a long shot JasW.
BlackBerry really needs to figure something out quick to save all of the people out there like us. I would think we're among 100's of thousands or maybe even millions of people world wide that "want" to buy a BB10 phone but instead will be forced out of it due to corporate policy. And that would be a shame for BlackBerry to lose all of those sales due to them being behind the times, especially in the extremely important Enterprise Market which they should be targetting heavily and trying to dominate.

I'm sure BBRY must have thought about this -- that there were companies that would be reluctant to invest the time and money in a BES 10 server, and that didn't have an Exchange server. I imagine the thinking was that either they had no other choice, or that BB10 would be such a rousing success that the IT departments would come around. But of course they won't come around because no one in these companies is going to buy a Z10 if it can't connect to their work email. Thus, there will be no demand.

In the end, it doesn't matter whose fault it is because I've still been kicked to the curb. For the first time since I started using BlackBerry almost a dozen years ago, I will not be able to upgrade to a new model. The 9810 I have is what the 9800 should have been when it was released in 2010, and even that would have only been an average offering in the 2010 smartphone market. I'm not going to deny myself and hold onto such outdated technology indefinitely in the hope that my IT department (which is, truth be told, in the midst of a firm-wide rollout of Windows 7 and Office 2010) will eventually come around.

Odds are good at this point that I will soon be singing (to paraphrase the old standard) "Bye bye BlackBerry ... BlackBerry bye bye"

[Clinto]

Wow JasW, your firm is just now rolling out Windows 7... Ouch.. Yeah it's going to be awhile before they move up to BES 10. That hurts..

That is seriously a sad story. Especially considering you are a well established "CrackBerry Genius" and bleed CrackBerry Orange. What a shame...

So what phone are you thinking about switching to?

[rlsmith999]

You are assuming the existence of "the Exchange server" at OP's workplace. He doesn't indicate whether his company has one.

His IT department would not have proposed using Touchdown unless they have an Exchange server accessible through ActiveSync. As I stated, Touchdown is an ActiveSync client.

[Tornado99]

My company's mobility team told me no BlackBerry 10 as a Corp offered phone...reason being the advantages not worth the cost (millions) to add to the environment. it's a global biopharma company with ~20k employees. Data security is paramount in the industry so their stance seems surprising. They did say or will likely be allowed as BYOD to connect to Corp exchange servers.
Some gadget loving colleagues told me they would not want it as a single phone soln to carrying 2 phones...one for work another for personal....unless there was a away to have two phone numbers on one device.

So, I'm now carry a company provided iPhone and my own Z10...waiting for approval to connect it to Corp servers as BYOD...then I'll ditch the iPhone.
Cam anyone tell me if BlackBerry Balance will be possible in this setup?



Posted via CB10

[ajst222]

If I knew anything about Android sideloading or Android ports, I would be more than happy to help! . But I hope that your company will allow you to use your Z10

[brmiller1976]

My company's mobility team told me no BlackBerry 10 as a Corp offered phone...reason being the advantages not worth the cost (millions) to add to the environment. it's a global biopharma company with ~20k employees. Data security is paramount in the industry so their stance seems surprising.

Once there's a serious breach, they'll reconsider.

[Tornado99]

Apparently we have had thousands of security issues last year from mobile devices...a guy nearby me got 'busted' for using a non approved device (Samsung Galaxy) on the corporate environment. Told him android was too risky being open source.
I'm in 100% on the z10...when forced to use the corporate iPhone I find myself trying to flick type now!
Home button? What's that?


Posted via CB10

[Sith_Apprentice]

My company's mobility team told me no BlackBerry 10 as a Corp offered phone...reason being the advantages not worth the cost (millions) to add to the environment. it's a global biopharma company with ~20k employees. Data security is paramount in the industry so their stance seems surprising. They did say or will likely be allowed as BYOD to connect to Corp exchange servers.
Some gadget loving colleagues told me they would not want it as a single phone soln to carrying 2 phones...one for work another for personal....unless there was a away to have two phone numbers on one device.

So, I'm now carry a company provided iPhone and my own Z10...waiting for approval to connect it to Corp servers as BYOD...then I'll ditch the iPhone.
Cam anyone tell me if BlackBerry Balance will be possible in this setup?



Posted via CB10

What cost? For 20,000 employees your corporation could easily get all those devices for free. The licensing cost, if you have existing BES, is also free. This leaves spinning up a couple of VMs. Also keep in mind BES 10 is scalable, or will be, up to 10000 devices per server. This could actually present a huge cost savings in addition to the security you need.

Posted via CB10

[JasW]

Wow JasW, your firm is just now rolling out Windows 7... Ouch.. Yeah it's going to be awhile before they move up to BES 10. That hurts..

That is seriously a sad story. Especially considering you are a well established "CrackBerry Genius" and bleed CrackBerry Orange. What a shame...

So what phone are you thinking about switching to?

Yep, we're finally moving on from Windows XP. That is pretty sad, but I understand that it's not all that unusual. In any event, I've been thinking about the S4. I can't go iPhone -- I like to be able to customize (w/o having to jailbreak). I also use my phone as an mp3 player and can't fit all of my music on a 64GB device (like the PlayBook), so the ideal situation of a phone that has 64GB onboard and supports 64GB SD cards points right to something like the S4.

His IT department would not have proposed using Touchdown unless they have an Exchange server accessible through ActiveSync. As I stated, Touchdown is an ActiveSync client.

I did not know that. In fact, I don't know anything about connecting the Z10 via ActiveSync -- a potential connection that is the stock response when ever anyone says their firm doesn't have or won't be getting a BES 10 server. Why would one use a ported Android app to connect the Z10 to ActiveSync if it's supposedly such a simple alternative to connecting via BES 10?

What cost? For 20,000 employees your corporation could easily get all those devices for free. The licensing cost, if you have existing BES, is also free. This leaves spinning up a couple of VMs. Also keep in mind BES 10 is scalable, or will be, up to 10000 devices per server. This could actually present a huge cost savings in addition to the security you need.

Posted via CB10

It's not just money, it's time and training and integrating the new server into the existing set up. At least that's what I was told by our IT department. I would guess that the Good server becomes redundant if the BES 10 server takes over for non-BB devices, which adds another wrinkle.

[Sith_Apprentice]

Yep, we're finally moving on from Windows XP. That is pretty sad, but I understand that it's not all that unusual. In any event, I've been thinking about the S4. I can't go iPhone -- I like to be able to customize (w/o having to jailbreak). I also use my phone as an mp3 player and can't fit all of my music on a 64GB device (like the PlayBook), so the ideal situation of a phone that has 64GB onboard and supports 64GB SD cards points right to something like the S4.



I did not know that. In fact, I don't know anything about connecting the Z10 via ActiveSync -- a potential connection that is the stock response when ever anyone says their firm doesn't have or won't be getting a BES 10 server. Why would one use a ported Android app to connect the Z10 to ActiveSync if it's supposedly such a simple alternative to connecting via BES 10?



It's not just money, it's time and training and integrating the new server into the existing set up. At least that's what I was told by our IT department. I would guess that the Good server becomes redundant if the BES 10 server takes over for non-BB devices, which adds another wrinkle.

RIM will come in and train for free with any sort of decent support contract, and on an account that size they could easily do it for free otherwise as well. Time I can understand, but that should be done with any new software/hardware solution, an evaluation of sorts. And yes, BES10 would replace GOOD (and they should be thankful for that, GOOD is god awful)

[Tornado99]

Thanks for these points..i will look for the right time and place to re engage with our mobility group. I think they are not operating from a fact based position at this time.

Posted via CB10