As we posted earlier this week, Opera has released Opera Mobile 10 in beta form, a full S60-native alternative web browser to the S60 Webkit version. Ewan's been trying it out on some of his favourite sites and here's his illustrated review. Comments welcome. He'll be revisiting Opera Mobile 10 when the app finally comes out of beta.
For compatible devices, the BBC iPlayer widget just got a big update from version 1.6 to version 2.5 (hat tip to Nokia Users). Speed and formatting are much better, and there are improvements in encoding and N97 homescreen widget support. More information, including some screenshots, in the full story.
EyeMags, a service for generating personal content applications for mobile phones, has today added support for S60 5th Edition phones such as the Nokia 5800, Nokia N97 and Sony Ericsson Satio. EyeMags, using a web-based creator, allows anyone to create their own cross platform (JME, iPhone and Symbian) 'snackable' mobile content application containing a mixture of text and pictures. Read on for further details.
At last week's Symbian Exchange and Exposition, Lee Williams (Executive Director of the Symbian Foundation) showed, during the keynote, a concept video of what a future Symbian UI might look like. The video shows a typical use case: accepting an invite to a party via Facebook and, the next day, attending the party. There's a glimpse of a new look homescreen, complete with social web integration, navigation and mapping features enhanced by augmented reality functionality. Read on to view the video and my comments.
It's.... another compendium of interesting links that I really wanted to flag up for attention here. Firstly, the ITU (the telecoms bit of the UN) has joined the American CTIA in agreeing on microUSB as the cable standard for phones for the future. Note that most Symbian-powered phones already use this. Secondly, there's a new, official Symbian Foundation theme (screenshot and d/l link below), which I'm determined to try out. Finally, Symbian's Horizon app-recommendation programme has gone live and is worth bookmarking.
Opera have released a beta version of Opera Mobile for S60 smartphones. Sporting the same user interface as the recently updated Opera Mini, Opera Mobile provides an alternative browser to that built into the majority of handsets, and first impressions on the beta are good. Highlights include an easy to navigate tabbed browsing experience, a number of thumbnails cropping up to aid navigation, and a lot of performance tweaks. Read on for more.
Google's S60 'portal' search utility, 'Google Mobile App' just got itself an update to v2.03(8), bringing voice searching - and it works rather impressively. Bring up the S60 3rd Edition utility in the usual way (e.g. by pressing 'C' on the homescreen) and then press and hold the green call key to speak your search string. Some screenshots, videos and links below.
Tamoggemon Software has just flagged up a new S60 5th Edition scientific graphing calculator, TouchCalc, and we've agreed to put the call out for beta testers - there are a couple of screenshots below to give you an idea. If you've got a science background, a S60 5th Edition device and a little spare time for contributing to a new shareware project, can you drop Tam a line at tamhan@tamoggemon.com ?
With the announcement that Nokia are closing the N-Gage service, Ewan has been looking back at the troubled gaming strategy from Finland, from its launch in 2003 to today's ticket to Dignitas in an Obituary for the Nokia N-Gage (2003-2009). We'll pass on any messages of condolence to Finland you may wish to leave.
In a low key announcement, via the N-Gage blog, comes the news that Nokia plans to shutter its N-Gage gaming service. Nokia say they will 'no longer publish new games for the N-Gage platform'; instead games will be provided via its Ovi Store service. Current N-Gage games can be purchased until September 2010 and the N-Gage website and Arena service (online elements) will be available throughout 2010.
With the Nokia N97 v20 firmware now out for a couple of days and fixing the underlying Sync system issues, I'd been on refresh on Nokia's Mac software site every few hours. It seems that the N97 has now been added to the compatibility list for iSync and that you can now do full iCal and Address Book syncing to the Apple Mac. Go download! I'll be testing this out thoroughly over the next few days...
Epocware just released Handy Phoneguard (for S60), described as "an advanced smartphone protection solution that allows the phone’s data to be locked or completely wiped to prevent unauthorized access and use, as well as sending SMS notifications with the new phone number in case the phone becomes stolen or lost." Screenshots (for 3rd Edition and 5th Edition) and press release extracts below.
Do you remember emTube, one of the first YouTube video clients for S60? Well, it's back (after a fashion), in the form of Open Video Hub, available* for S60 3rd Edition and 5th Edition and with additional support for Daily Motion and Metacafe videos. It's also now Open Source, which is great news. The only catch is that, currently, Open Video Hub needs (*)signing for a user's phone - see the screenshots, press release snippet and links below.
For those who are waiting for DreamConnect to be available for S60 3rd Edition note that the developer has just announced the availability of DreamConnect for S60 3rd Edition FP1 and FP2. Previously, it's only been available for UIQ 2, UIQ 3 and Series 60 5th Edition. There are some screens and info after the break.
S60 3rd Edition users might like to know that there's a new version 2.0 of Nokia's 'Here and Now' concept application available. It has a four-paned interface, with local weather, events, movies and restaurants. It's free and interesting, but note that the data sets aren't necessarily complete in your area and that all functions require clicking through to a mobile web page.
