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What BlackBerry Admins Need to Know About the PlayBook

07.01.2011
The 2011 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is underway in Las Vegas, and Research In Motion's (RIM) upcoming BlackBerry PlayBook tablet PC is without a doubt one of the stars of show. That's largely due to the fact that RIM has never before allowed the public to handle the much-hyped tablet, though it has to a variety of BlackBerry developers, analysts, media and other industry insiders; CES is the first place that gadget geeks got to go "hands-on" with the PlayBook.

The BlackBerry PlayBook is not just for business users; according to RIM representatives on hand at the company's CES BlackBerry booth, the PlayBook is for "anyone who wants or needs to get down to business," consumers and enterprise users alike. But RIM definitely designed the tablet to address the needs of business users'and the IT support staffers who'll manage PlayBook use in the enterprise.

I sat down with RIM's Sr. PlayBook Product Manager Ryan Bidan at CES for specifics on what RIM's tablet means to IT and BlackBerry administrators. The following list includes details on how PlayBook users will access corporate BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) resources and why managing PlayBook tablets will be easier than comparable devices, like Apple's mega-popular iPad. Keep moving for details.

1) BlackBerry PlayBook Doesn't Connect Directly to BES

The PlayBook does not connect directly to a corporate BES, like a BlackBerry smartphone, according to Bidan. Instead, it uses a RIM smartphone as a "BlackBerry Bridge" to access BES mail, calendar, contacts, users' BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) IM clients and more. (Check out a that demonstrates some aspects of the BlackBerry PlayBook/smartphone relationship.)

"The PlayBook is not a managed device," Bidan says.