The Skyfire web browser, previously only available in the US and Canada, is now available in the UK, it seems. It's proxy-based (for pre-processing speed) and it runs on virtually any S60 3rd Edition phone. Comments and early reviews welcome. (via p@sco)
Today, Nokia and IBM announced Lotus Notes (which has 140 million licensed users) support for all S60 3rd Edition-based phones. 'Lotus Notes Traveler' can connect to corporate email accounts via Lotus Domino Server, and provides real time access to email, calendar, address book, journal and to-do list data. Availability is December 2008.
UK Publisher Tag Games has been working on a GTA styled mobile game for many months, and now Car Jack Streets is available for download. Given that the Tag founders were part of the original design team for the first Grand Theft Auto, it's no surprise that this is an addictive little mobile game, that makes best use of the smartphone environment. Ewan's full review can be found here.
Epocware have updated their security/reminder application Handy Safe Pro. Allowing you to store passwords, user names, pins and other paraphernalia (and manage them on your device or via an included PC application), this latest version has a recovery operation for accidental deletions, sub folders, and URLs now act as hyperlinks into the Web Browser.
Electronic Arts' football simulator FIFA 2009 is now available on the N-Gage platform. Just open your phone's N-Gage app, go to the Showroom section, select "Options" and then "Update Now" to see it. (It should also become available through the N-Gage website over the next day or two, if you prefer to install games through your computer.) This release is a bit of a surprise, as it had only just been announced a few weeks ago and hadn't even made it into N-Gage.com's upcoming games list. Obviously EA were working on this a long time before they announced it.
Rita El Khoury often seems to come up with discoveries that the rest of us overlook - in this case, it turns out that freeware star cCalc (a scientific calculator) has a big brother, cCalcPro, designed for the landscape screens of the Nokia E61 and E71. Here's Rita's write-up, with screenshots.
Geography enthusiasts rejoice! The long awaited quiz game from Herocraft - the makers of such great titles as Robo, Revival and Stolen in 60 Seconds - has finally arrived to keep the smart player happy for hours to come. Read on for the details.
For those happy to 'open sign' their utilities, note that Swim, the background sync tool for S60, has been updated to v0.41 and, notably, the scheduling problems of earlier versions are gone. In case you hadn't heard of Swim, it syncs your phone to Google or Ovi or GooSync, etc. automatically. And no, we still don't know why this functionality isn't part of S60 itself...
Nokia's Beta development teams do seem to be working in parallel to a degree. With the launch of FriendView, their Chat extension to Contacts has now been updated to BETA 4, adding friend profile pictures on its maps, plus you can also now make calls from that view. There's also comprehensive access point selection (favourite Wi-Fi, preferred GPRS, etc) Which of the two chat/presence systems do you prefer?
A lot of news over on All About N-Gage, with updates to the N-Gage app and new phones added to the platform, sales charts released, a new games announcement, and a couple of very interesting videos published. See below for the relevant links.
You'll remember Tagggit from my AAS video interview with SkyHook? It's a geospatial social networking tool for S60, i.e. it uses SkyHook's databases of urban Wi-Fi hotspots to find your location without GPS and annotate places and activities for others. Tagggit is now available in open beta, so anyone can try it out. See below for lots of screenshots of Tagggit and the official launch press release. Comments welcome after you've given this a try over the weekend?
Nokia Beta Labs today made available a preview of the next version of Share Online, Nokia's media sharing application. Share Online version 4 has an improved upload/download experience which allows asynchronous usage, adds an outbox to make it easier to manage uploads and has improved active standby indicators (including the ability to remove them). The new version is currently only available for the N96, 6210, 6220 and 5320. Read on for screenshots and more details.
The N-Gage platform's client is now available for the Nokia N78 and 6210 Navigator. The easiest way to get it is to visit n-gage.mobi/d (note there's no "www") on your phone's web browser, and select your phone from the list, which lets you download and install the app directly. Alternatively, you can download the app from the official N-Gage website and install using PC Suite. (Other phones compatible with the platform include the 5320 XpressMusic, N79, N81, N81 8GB, N82, N85, N95, N95 8GB and N96.)
FlyingBird Software have been producing native Symbian OS money management software for a while, but they've now knocked out a completely free option: Money Lite, claiming to "help you in tracking your personal expenses, deposits, transfers and other transactions." You can't beat free, of course, but they also have a commercial option for those that need greater functionality.