In leaps and bounds, the term 'smartphone' is being bandied about by manufacturers, analysts, journalists, developers and end users across the world. Which would normally be a good thing, except that there are many definitions, all totally different. What exactly defines a smartphone in 2010? What did it used to mean in 2007? Or 2003? With reports regularly quoting the word, it would be good to all agree what the word means, surely?
David Gilson explores the relative benefits of native applications and cloud applications, both from a consumer point of view, and from the point of view of the developers who ultimately supply our applications. Will the cloud replace the traditional app?
As a follow-up to Apple's emergency iPhone 4 press conference yesterday, in which Steve Jobs claimed that all smartphones suffered from similar reception problems when held tightly (and also erroneously quoted Nokias as having "stickers on the back that say 'Don't touch here'"), Nokia has apparently responded with a statement, quoted below.
In all the talk of user interfaces, promises, updated software and hardware, there is one other area that Nokia need to look at. Making the Nokia name one that everyone is the world is happy to be associated with. How can they do that? Here are some thoughts.
Can’t wait to get your hands on a Nokia N8? Why not while away the time before you can lighten you bank balance by creating your dream theme. Carbide.ui Theme Edition 3.0 has been released on the Symbian Foundation website, offering the final version of the tools for creating Symbian^3 device themes.
Opera have announced a new beta version of Opera Mobile for S60 3rd Edition and S60 5th Edition devices. Version 10.1 boasts a new rendering engine (Presto), new graphics library (Vega), and new Javascript engine (Carakan), all of which are also utilised in Opera's desktop browser. The end result is a significant boost in overall performance. Also new is geolocation support, which allows websites to serve up location specific content. The beta can be downloaded from the Opera website (visit m.opera.com/next on your phone).
A Maps Reporter module has been added to the 'More' menu of Nokia's Ovi Maps. It allows users to submit manual reports about errors in the application's mapping and associated meta-data. These errors can range from a missing street or path, whether a street is suitable for walking, to an incorrect speed limit. You will need to be running the latest version of Ovi Maps (3.04) in order to see the Maps Reporter module. Read on for further details and example screenshots.
The popular QWERTY slider E75 has had a firmware update today, to v211.12 (from v210.12), not available over the air for me, but there via Ovi Suite and Nokia Software Update, as a 146MB download. The E75 has User Data Preservation, but backup anyway, just in case, beforehand. The update is mainly bug fixes, listed below.
What's the next step for mobile phone and car integration? One option is Nokia's Terminal Mode technology, which proposes an industry standard for the integration of mobile phones (and their applications) into the car environment. Nokia has developed Terminal Mode in conjunction with CE4A (Consumer Electronics for Automotive) and recently held the Terminal Mode Summit at their Espoo offices in Finland. This gives us a good opportunity to review what Terminal Mode is about and what progress has been made to date. Read on....
The popular misconception about camera phones is that the higher the spec level, the better the photos you'll take. While I'll accept that there is correlation there, another big factor is the skill (or, more accurately, imagination and common sense) of the user. In truth, you don't have to own the current top-rated camera smartphone costing megabucks in order to turn out pleasing photos. Check out the sample photos at the top of this feature - I've got a mini-quiz for you...
With both classic and (ahem) 'pursuit' game modes, Trivial Pursuit in the Ovi Store has been impressing Ewan in terms of sheer playability and implementation - here's our Ovi Gaming review. The only flaws seem to be the relatively low number of possible questions and the lack of true multiplayer action, but hey, isn't this on sale at the moment as well? Run, don't walk around the TP board to the Ovi Store and grab this for the holidays right now.
Last week Qt quietly rolled out the public beta its new developer website, Qt Developer Network, which aims to provide a one-stop portal for Qt developers and consolidate resources that were previously spread across the main Qt website. It also provides a more vendor neutral destination for developers than Forum Nokia, something that could be important in helping drive adoption of the Symbian and MeeGo platforms by manufacturers other than Nokia.
Furtiv, the creators of plugins for Nokia Share Online, have announced (on their blog) a new beta version plugin to upload photos to the popular cloud storage service, Dropbox. This provides the ability for a user to synchronise their files across multiple computers, and so photos uploaded from an S60 phone to Dropbox will be available to every computer a user has Dropbox installed on. Anyone wanting to try out this new plugin just needs to go to http://furtiv.mobi with their S60 browser and select the Dropbox plugin.
Here's some Wednesday coffee break reading: you'll remember Steve Jobs claiming in 2007 that the original iPhone was five years ahead of the competition? Now AT&T's CTO has been bragging that "in the past 3 years, the US has been the clear leader when it comes to phones, design, operating systems and applications." Like a red rag to a bull - top industry analyst Tomi Ahonen here rips into the claims and points out the innovation from Japan and Finland, among others. His metrics also point to the USA now rising to 19th in the world in terms of mobile adoption and technology, now level with, ahem... Portugal. Grab a hot drink and treat yourself!
We've all seen the semi-viral videos, where someone (apparently) knocks up a faux-impressionist masterpiece using nothing more than a smartphone touchscreen. It may be that I simply don't have the talent, but I'm a little sceptical, given the sizes of phone screens. Mind you, with software like HandyPaint, reviewed here for S60 5th Edition and UIQ 3, at least the tools are there to get close to the picture in your imagination. HandyPaint is something of a labour of love and it shows - it's not perfect, but is powerful and still improving.
