Anyone who pays attention to technology knows that the E-book world finally started to take off with the release of Amazon's Kindle reader and book store. Since then, not only have competing readers and marketplaces launched, but so have mobile applications for the Kindle platform. Android and iPhone users have long enjoyed being able to synchronise their book collection with their mobile phones. So far though, Symbian has been left out of the party, despite being the largest smartphone platform on Earth. Read on to find out how to help change this.
Skype have just announced a new version of Skype for Symbian, with a revamped user interface and support for Symbian^3 devices. This new version (1.50 build 15) supports the SILK codec for higher quality calls. As part of the user interface update, Skype say they have improved support for larger screens, and made it easier to add contacts and photos, and make status updates. We have also noted the UI has new instant message notification pop-ups. Read on for screenshots and our initial test results.
Friend of All About Symbian, Asri Al Baker from i-symbian.com, has done it again. As mentioned in this week's Insight Podcast, he has just published two more WRT widgets for launching advanced mobile website versions of Google services. This time he has created launchers for GTalk, Google's instant messaging service, and Google Calendar. These come after Asri's other widgets for GMail and Google Reader (which we reported on here and here). The websites utilised by these launchers are the default views found on iOS and Android browsers, but are available to any mobile browser, if you know the right URL's. Read on for screenshots and more.
After a little nagging from readers, I've done an update to my smartphone-choosing Grid, over on its new home at my own domain at stevelitchfield.com. New on the Symbian front are the N8 and C7, new as competition are the HTC Desire HD, Motorola Defy and Dell Streak. More devices going up over the next few weeks as I get more comments and feedback. Just plug in your own preferences and see what comes out as the suggested best smartphone for you.
Nokia Diagnostics is a little suite of on-device tests to help exercise core functionality of your Symbian smartphone and report back. It's a nice idea, driven by Nokia Beta Labs, and has had a big update (to v1.74) today, but only for S60 5th Edition phones (e.g. N97, 5800) - it seems that the S60 3rd Edition version is no longer to be updated. And Symbian^3 phones are also out of luck - so far - a version is promised for these 'soon'.
Those folks at GSM Arena have obviously had too much time on their hands as they've put together all the latest smartphones from the main manufacturers and have tackled another subject close to my heart: screen visibility and contrast in all light conditions. Representing the Symbian world in the round-up are the Nokia C6-01 and N8 and, it's fair to say, both acquit themselves pretty well, with CBD and anti-reflective AMOLED screens respectively.
Well worth bookmarking for late evening reading over a beer or two is Andrew Orlowski's epic two part essay on the history of Symbian from creation in 1998 up to near the present day. Interviewing a number of past employees, admittedly, there's a strong aftertaste of 'these are all the bits that went wrong' and there's little in the way of acknowledgement of success stories, but Orlowski's text is readable and well researched. Here's part one: Dark Star, covering Symbian's creation and here's part two: The battle for Symbian's soul.
Between 9am and 10am GMT tomorrow, November 30th, three designers from Nokia will be answering questions on Twitter about Nokia's design process, with special emphasis on Nokia's C6-01 and C7-00. Questions should have the #NokiaDesign hash-tag to be seen by the guys at Nokia. Searching for that tag (just click the previous link) will allow you to view the conversation. Read on for more details.
Following the news that it would now become a licensing body, the Symbian Foundation has announced that all of its websites will close down on December 17th 2010. After that date, every site under the symbian.org domain, including developer.symbian.org, horizon.symbian.org, ideas.symbian.org and blog.symbian.org, will no longer be online. In addition, it has been said that the Twitter and Facebook accounts for the Symbian Foundation "are also likely to be discontinued". Read on for further details and ramifications.
Nokia's Ovi Suite just got itself a new version number (3.0, albeit in 'beta') and a whole new interface - it now has even larger ambitions in terms of managing your phone's music and maps from your Windows PC, plus there's integration with the Ovi Store itself, with application recommendations. Below are the official changelog, the launch video and relevant links. Comments welcome on how this works out for you!
Kudos to the web programmers and the rest of the team at GSM Arena, who have produced the really rather cool 'Photo Compare Tool'. Essentially they've taken a large number of recent phones and smartphones and shot the same three test photos with each (ISO 12233, Grey and Colour). You can then choose which three phones you'd like to compare using the drop-down pick lists and click any of the offered crops to show the full photo in the main window. Oh heck, just go try it, you'll see what I mean. Curiously, the Symbian-powered camera champions, the Nokia N86, Samsung i8910 and Sony Ericsson Satio aren't represented, but there's still plenty of other Symbian (and Maemo) interest. Full list below.
Nokia has announced it has appointed Jerri DeVard as Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer. A new Marketing and Communication organisation will be formed under the CMO, which will bring together Nokia's Marketing, Brand Management, Communications and select Industry collaboration activities. DeVard will sit on the Nokia Group Executive Board, underlining the seniority and importance of her position, but will report to Niklas Savander, EVP of Nokia's Markets unit.
Earlier this year Nokia, in conjunction with Tim Kring, created and ran a transmedia project, a gaming / story telling event across multiple participation forms. Conspiracy for Good involved play in the real world, over the Internet and on mobile phones. This YouTube video, embedded below, offers a summary of the Conspiracy for Good project. It shows not only the scale of the project, but also gives a good summary of the various games, events and activities involved.
Last week Nokia announced that the Ovi Store had reach the milestone of 3 million downloads a day, an increase of 1 million from the beginning of September. All About Symbian's Ovi Store tracking estimates there have been around 710 million downloads from Ovi Store since June 2009, with half of this total coming in the last 5 months (from July onwards). We estimate that Ovi Store will reach the 1 billion download mark in February 2011. Read on for some further numbers.
Many of us have used Pizero's themes on our S60 phones for years - just published over on the Symbian blog is a short video interview (also embedded below) with the man himself, Michele Cerretta, who was manning the theming kiosk at SEE 2010. Bear with his English, and let his themes speak volumes?
