More N95 stunners
For many people, the Nokia N95 remains the best camera phone in the world - here's more evidence, the latest batch of winners from the N95 user group on Flickr - as usual, some stunning work by all.
Recent News - Links of Interest - Page 98
E71 in Smartphones Show 61
Right on schedule (for a change), Smartphones Show 61 is out, with a video version of my hands-on review of the Nokia E71, plus news of an impending change of a name for the show. It's worth pointing out that show 61 was recorded before yesterday's big news, by the way...
Symbian Foundation to be created
The future of Symbian is the the Symbian Foundation. Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and NTT DOCOMO have announced their intent to unite Symbian OS, S60, UIQ and MOAP to create one open mobile software platform. Partnering together with AT&T, LG Electronics, Samsung Electronics, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and Vodafone they plan to establish the Symbian Foundation to extend the appeal of this unified software platform. The platform will be provided under a royalty-free license to all members of the Symbian Foundation.
This moves sees a re-unification of the Symbian OS UIs (S60, UIQ and MOAP-S). While the new platform will use elements of all three UIs the core technology will be derived from S60. A key intention is to provide a complete, consistent and compatible open software platform. More details below.
Nokia buys Plazes
Nokia has snapped up Berlin-based Plazes, an SMS-based location-aware social network. Plazes has been in beta for ages and the developers promise that all their plans will carrry on under the new ownership. Now - I wonder whether Nokia can go the extra mile and add GPS-support to Plazes? (via PhoneBoy)
S60 gains full Money suite
Money management software remains perennially popular and there's now a fully fledged bank account/finance manager for S60 3rd Edition, with the appearance of Flying Money Manager. The developers claim it 'gives you access to your accounts' balances, credit limits, all your payments, deposits and transaction histories'. Flying Money Manager was already available for UIQ 3 smartphones.
S60 magic?
Mobitubia wizard Sittiphol is at it again - amazingly. He's gone from ingenious to magical with his new creation - you'll have to watch the video below the break, but essentially a Nokia N95 appears to be able to extrapolate matter from thin air.... Very Star Trek. Watch and see....
Gomoku surfaces for UIQ 3
Originally written back in March as an exercise project for the Symbian Academy, Gomoku, also known as "Connect Five" or "Pente", is now available for free to anyone with a UIQ 3 smartphone - with full source code if you're that way inclined. The game offers a rather challenging AI to play against - in addition to a mode to play against another human opponent on the same device.
Nokia Map Loader gets its own built-in shop!
Arguably starting to be as much in need of a name change as Sports Tracker, Nokia's Map Loader tool just got a big 2.0 upgrade (though still nominally 'beta') and now includes a built-in web shop for browsing and purchasing voice guidance and real-time navigation functions (plus city guides, etc) all using a credit card rather than having to buy on the device through operator billing. What a good idea. Comments welcome if you've grabbed this and given it a try.
Missing Sync for Symbian now in beta
Missing Sync, a sync tool for Mac OS X, is now available as a beta preview for S60 3rd Edition and UIQ 3 phones. Missing Sync for Symbian can be used to synchronize / copy contacts (Apple Address Book), calendar entries (iCal), photos (iPhoto), videos (Quick Time) and music (iTunes) to and from the phone. The current version is a beta preview and as such should be used with caution.
4 out of 5 Mobiles Offer Good Web Experience
With talk of handset compatibility and the mobile internet going around, dev.mobi's report from earlier this month makes timely reading. Over a period of a few weeks, some 120 handsets were examined on various operators to determine if they had a "proper" Wap 2.0 mobile browser and the screen resolution offered. The results show 82% of handsets are fully mobile capable with a good user experience, and 72% of devices have screens of 240x320 pixels or more.
The N95 no longer 'over-priced geek-fodder'...
Echoing many of my own thoughts in recent months, Nokia Duck has come out with an N95 retrospective, looking at the device (in video, text and pics) with latest firmware with fresh eyes, concluding that "The N95 has metamorphosised from over-priced geek fodder into a reasonably-priced quality product. After a year and a half on the market it's no longer the cutting-edge headline maker it once was, but that glamour has been replaced by competency." Well worth a read.
The Times asks 'Which Is the Best Touchscreen Phone?'
The Times' Testbed section today looks at five touchscreen based rivals to the iPhone (leaving unspoken the idea that the iPhone is the one phone that every other phone must be measured against) and fails to appoint a clear winner - each phone is good at a few tasks, and poor at others - but it certainly points out a loser... the W960i.
This week's N-Gage news roundup
Well, we haven't seen the hoped-for releases of Sims 2 or Pro Series Golf, but there have been one or two N-Gage-related developments this week. Click on the news headline to see a complete rundown.
Nokia Download! on the web - Why?
If you've been watching Nokia Beta Labs, you'll have seen Nokia's attempt to expand Download! into a web shop. All very well and good, but hardly unique and it's ultimately just another place to download commercial demos and a few Nokia utilities from, before side-loading them in from a PC. Why has Nokia bothered, given that they already have a far better distribution system in Download! on each device? Read on for my thoughts...
Google Mobile gets faster
Google has decided to remove the gadgets from its mobile homepage and place them in the separate iGoogle page. This means that weather information and your Gmail summary no longer slow down the homepage. In addition, Google cache's the homepage code on your phone, so provided you bookmark this homepage, then returning to Google Mobile using the bookmark is almost instantaneous. (via Google OS)
