Symbian SQL and new LBS architecture accelerate path to mobile convergence
CTIA Wireless, Las Vegas - March 31, 2008 - Symbian Limited, the market-leader in open operating system for smartphones, today announced Symbian SQL and an advanced Location Based Services (LBS) architecture – two new technologies that herald the next generation of mobile computing by offering dramatic enhancements in the vital areas of mass data handling and LBS.
With analysts predicting smartphone shipments to reach approximately 30% of all mobile phone sales by 20131, and with a third of mobile phones launched on Symbian OS now GPS-enabled, Symbian is pushing the envelope of innovation by including advanced desktop and positioning technologies in its portfolio. Symbian SQL and the new LBS architecture will help Symbian licensees develop handsets that handle very large amounts of data, and which provide users with relevant information based on their current location, in tune with consumer demand.
Mobile phones featuring Symbian’s LBS offering were recently launched in Japan. In Europe, Symbian’s LBS architecture will appear in mobile phones later this year. Symbian SQL will be featured in phones shipping in the second half of 2008 and be available to application developers via a download in Q2 2008.
SQLite, an established open source technology widely used in products such as Mozilla’s Firefox, has been implemented by Symbian to create Symbian SQL, a robust and highly scalable database management system for Symbian OS. Symbian SQL makes retrieving and sorting terabytes of data and multimedia fast and efficient without compromising performance. Application developers can also take advantage of Symbian SQL by using a standard query language when working with databases on Symbian OS, helping to reduce maintenance costs and application footprints. To support the open source community, Symbian is contributing technology improvements back into the SQLite open source project and is a charter member of the SQLite Consortium launched in December 2007.
"When I authored SQLite in 2000, I never imagined that it would one day be used in mobile phones to host databases with millions of searchable entries," said Dr. Richard Hipp, architect and primary author of SQLite. "The advanced design of Symbian OS meshes well with SQLite, resulting in a stable and robust platform for supporting new applications. I look forward to seeing the innovation that Symbian SQL sparks from developers across the world."
Symbian’s LBS architecture offers the most extensive LBS-rich solution of any OS, supporting multiple positioning technologies including A-GPS, network-based and Wi-FI to provide fast and accurate location information. Handset manufacturers do not need to invest separately in developing location support, dramatically reducing the time it takes to create GPS-enabled devices. Developers can cost-effectively target their LBS applications across multiple Symbian OS platforms, including S60, UIQ and MOAP, due to the consistent set of APIs offered by Symbian’s LBS architecture. The architecture enables:
- Tracking by emergency services (as mandated by government legislation in some regions
- Providing the quickest route - getting from A to B as quickly as possible
- Accurate pin-pointing of current location
- Geotagging images and videos – location stamping images and videos
- Finding the location of people in a contacts list
- Locating the nearest services
- Providing proximity alerts when near a specific location