Two cracking posts on the Symbian blog today about application development and the story behind the applications. Mobbler, the music tracking web service; and Mobilyze, and in-development app to help patients undergoing Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.
Nokia have announced that their Beta Labs are closing the online portion of the Mobile Web Server (MWS) product, launched some two and a half years ago, is closing at the end of this month. By allowing your mobile phone to act as a web server for the content it carried, MWS was an alternative ad-hoc style connectivity option for a number of users. Nokia have stressed that the local parts of the application will continue to work, and are reminding people that not all Beta Lab products have a happy firmware ending.
Escarpod, the third party Open Source podcast gatherer and player, originally written for UIQ and available for S60 in beta form for a while, is now the source of a Contribution Proposal to the main Symbian Foundation code base. Effectively, this means that future Symbian devices should have a podcast client, in the wake of Nokia choosing not to contribute their own proprietary Podcasting application. Read on for links and more information.
In All About Symbian Insight 101 (AAS Podcast 165), we round up the weeks news including updates to Ovi Suite, Samsung's 32 GB microSD card announcement, firmware updates for the 5800, N86, E72 and E75 and the release of Betalab's Gig Finder. We also discuss the UI concept proposal from Nokia for Symbian^4, before Ewan gives us some concluding thoughts on the X6. You can listen to AAS Insight 101 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
Today Symbian made available, via its developer website, a number of documents relating to the Orbit and Direct UI proposals that make up a major part of the changes in Symbian^4. These proposals offer a glimpse of what the Symbian^4 UI may look like and explain some of the key UI layout and design changes. Symbian are looking for the community's feedback, comments and questions about the proposals. Read on for more details and illustrations.
Nokia's Betalabs have another curious little app available. Gig Finder, for S60 5th Edition phones, allows you to build up a profile of bands, and search for gigs that you should like that based on your location (or wherever you feel like searching). While I'd love to know where the data is coming from, and a little bit more explanation on how to tailor the recommendation engine, this could grow into a nice little tool.
As with the Evernote widget yesterday, I think the time has come to start recommending that you consider removing Nokia PC Suite and consider installing Ovi Suite, provided you have a reasonably recent PC. The latter has just been updated to v2.0.2.42 (according to NokNok) and its resource requirements have been steadily coming down from the stratospherics of the early betas. Comments welcome if you're feeling brave - has Ovi Suite come of age now?
A couple of interesting links of interest from the last 24 hours: Samsung has announced the world's first 32GB microSD card, based on 30nm technology (i.e. 0.00000003 metres!), to be in production from next month. Staggering miniaturisation, if you ask me. In other news, Nokia has released a Windows 7-compatible (beta) version of its Nokia Software Update tool, eliminating the need to mess around running the tool in a 'compatibility' mode. About time.
Nokia have released a new firmware for the popular 5800 XpressMusic device. At least on the AAS unit, it's available via the Nokia Software Updater in the PC Suite package, but not yet as an over the air option. Additions to the smartphone's software include kinetic scrolling in menus and a reworked active standby screen to match that found on the 5530.
An Evernote client has been a constant request in the Symbian ecosystem for many months now and, late last year, a Web runtime version turned up, optimised for the Nokia N97 and compatibles. This has been regularly updated and, with version 1.0.70302, released last night in the USA, has reached the point where I can start to recommend it to the wider world. See below for screens, comments and some links.
Last week at CES Nokia showed of Ovi Racing, but they also showed off another game: Bounce Boing Battle. The game has pong-inspired gameplay, with two players bouncing a ball between themselves. However rather than moving a paddle, the player must draw a line for the ball to bounce off. The game, which includes two player support (presumably over Bluetooth), will be available, for free, from Ovi Store in due course. Read on for more.
I want to take a little break away from the major Nokia X6 review I'm doing just now to directly address one of the issues that I'm seeing in the comments both of the X6 review and in other products that are reviewed both here on AAS and on other tech sites: the use of third party software to compensate for a manufacturer's omissions.
S60 has long been without any form of Wikipedia application besides the mobile web site. There are now two applications in early development, but do either of them significantly add to the mobile web site experience? David Gilson has been comparing all three and answers that question in this feature.
Kudos to Jon at tehkseven for a couple of beautifully done 'simple' themes. Just White (in 5th Edition, 3rd Edition and Eseries-tailored versions) and Just Black (again in 5th Edition, 3rd Edition and Eseries versions), the latter with full Ovi icons. Recommended if you just want something clean, clear and efficient.
In All About Symbian Insight 100 (AAS Podcast 164), we first look back at the decade just gone and consider how far we've come, before looking ahead to what will happen in the next decade. Steve brings news of an i8910 firmware update, Ovi Maps Racing and more and the teams answer questions relating to N97 Exchange support and briefly discuss what to expect at MWC You can listen to AAS Insight 100 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
