Just a quickie, since this has been reported in many other places, but for the sake of completeness, there's a new firmware for the North AMerican version of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic - firmware v20.2.014 is now available, with many improvements, including (allegedly) a resolution to the 3G reception problems seen in some US cities when the device was launched.
Aha. After my own (on video) mystification over why many quality S60 themes wouldn't work fully on the Nokia 5800 (tabs weren't working in some apps), it seems that theme authors have worked out what's wrong and are patching their productions. Here, PiZero has released new, working versions of Blue Haze, Spyro, DarkStar 09 and Valentine 09. Top stuff.
Continuing our 5800 tutorial series, we take a look at how to use the Nokia 5800's built-in S60 web browser, and we also check out how to install and use the alternative Opera Mini browser on the 5800. S60 is fully-featured, Opera Mini is super-fast, but which is better? There's only one way to find out... read the articles. Also, don't forget you can see a complete listing of all these guides on our 5800 tutorial index page.
Richard Bloor, a new addition to the AAS editorial team, recently talked to Thibaut Rouffineau, from the Symbian Foundation, on a range of topics including the challenges and opportunities in setting-up to support developers, how developers might contribute to the platform and the role of academia in the software industry.
Two weeks on from my initial Top 10, my feature has grown into a veritable Top 20 Freeware for the Nokia 5800 and S60 5th Edition. Four new entries (hey, it's starting to sound like a proper chart...) and some other tweaks and new URLs. Enjoy. It's also worth noting that many S60 3rd Edition apps work fine on the 5800, but this freeware list is specifically for applications that are custom made for touch and the larger screen.
Yes, Ewan's heading off (Twitter feed here) for a three week tour of the USA, taking in social media and gaming events. To try and add a little Symbian spice to proceedings, we insisted he take the Nokia 5800 with him, to really try it out 'on the road'. This is the fourth of his regular video reports, embedded below, letting us know how he's getting on with S60 5th Edition and the 5800. Ewan talks about connectivity, Twitter and TwitPic (using Gravity), plus the delights of using a predictive (virtual) keypad that's twice the size of a regular one.
YouTube has finally, finally, done something about their low-grade 176 by 144 pixel mobile video interface. For Flash Lite 3-compatible phones (which means most S60 phones made in the last couple of years, provided firmware is kept recent), videos are now served up from the mobile YouTube interface in Flash format. Once the video starts playing, you tap to bring it up full screen in Flash Lite's video player. Most significantly, the quality's miles better than the original QCIF version - 480 by 320 pixels for many videos. Screenshots and links below.
Continuing our series of guides for beginners, AAS takes an in-depth look at how to use RSS feeds on the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, and also has a quick mini-tutorial on how to set the home page on the web browser. Don't forget that our entire library of tutorials can be accessed from the AAS 5800 Tutorial Index page.
On Thursday, Rafe Blandford and I were invited to spend a day with a pre-production Samsung Omnia HD, powered by Symbian OS 9.4 and S60 5th Edition (the previous Omnia had been much lower spec and Windows Mobile-powered). Away from trade show crowds and noise, we were able to really explore the Omnia HD in text, photos and video, so watch for this content over the next few weeks. In this feature I look at the device itself, its form factor and obvious interface characteristics.
Yes, Ewan's heading off for a three week tour of the USA (Twitter feed here), taking in social media and gaming events. To try and add a little Symbian spice to proceedings, we insisted he take the Nokia 5800 with him, to really try it out 'on the road'. This is the third of his regular video reports, letting us know how he's getting on with S60 5th Edition and the 5800. Embedded below is part 3 of this series, in which he chats about connectivity, the touch interface generally, the contact bar homescreen and handwriting and T9 text input.
Nokia will be holding a four-hour question and answer event for publishers and developers interested in the upcoming Ovi Store on-phone content shop. The registration link and more details are available below.
Anyone who is personally or professionally involved with podcasts might want to read this All About Symbian guide to creating online podcast directories using RSS feed readers. The addresses of these directories can be added by end users to the Nokia Podcasting application (which comes as standard on all current Nokia S60 devices). As we've previously noted Canada's CBC, the United Kingdom's BBC and America's NPR all have online OPML podcast directories which can be easily accessed through the Podcasting app.
A while ago we asked the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation if they had an online OPML directory of their podcasts. They replied they didn't but would make one, and true to their word it has just gone live. You can now browse and subscribe to all CBC podcasts on your S60 device by adding the directory address http://www.cbc.ca/podcasts.opml to your Podcasting application. We will be publishing a more detailed article about this later, but for the moment see our previous article on how to add directories to the S60 Podcasting application (the link also has the URLs for the BBC and NPR podcast directories). Also see our guide to podcasting on the Nokia 5800.
It's smart, it's fully touch and S60 5th Edition-optimised, and it can help you remember to get icing sugar for your partner while down the supermarket. Now how many other bits of software can do that? Handy Shopper represents the archetypal PDA shopping list manager application, here on Symbian OS, but Ewan's been reviewing it and reckons that the code could form the basis of a pretty 'handy' project manager or to do list system as well...
Yes, Ewan's heading off (Twitter feed here) for a three week tour of the USA, taking in social media and gaming events. To try and add a little Symbian spice to proceedings, we insisted he take the Nokia 5800 with him, to really try it out 'on the road'. This is the second of his regular video reports, letting us know how he's getting on with S60 5th Edition and the 5800. Embedded below is part 2 of this series.
