All About Symbian - News from the Symbian Ecosystem...
Skyfire browser on S60 in beta
Published by Rafe Blandford at 17:34 UTC, July 30th 2008
Skyfire, which aims to give a PC-like browsing experience on your phone, is now available as a limited access beta for S60. Skyfire uses compression and a proxy-based technology to deliver full featured (Flash 9, Quicktime, Java, AJAX) web pages to phones. Their aim is to deliver exactly the same page to your phone that you would see on your PC. We've got 100 instant access beta invitations to give away for our US readers. Read on for more details.
Skyfire works by having a proxy server sit between your browsing and the Internet. When you load a web page you send a request to Skyfire servers. Skyfire uses their proprietary technology, part of which is built on top of Mozilla's Firefox, to load the requested page and then sends it to your phone in a compressed Skyfire format. The Skyfire client running on the phone interprets this format and shows you the web page. A crucial extra compared to other proxy based browsers (e.g. Opera Mini) is the ability to fully interact with a page (e.g. AJAX functions, as used by many Web 2.0 sites).
Skyfire's technology works by running a heavily customised version of Firefox on the Skyfire server which does your browsing for you. Once it has accessed a page, the Skyfire server sends a version of the page to the Skyfire application running on your phone. The server does most of the hard (and resource intensive) work, leaving your phone to do basic rendering, which makes for faster browsing. And because the browser copy running on the server is on a PC it is able to handle almost any web page including those that use technologies like Flash, Java, Quicktime or AJAX. These are areas where traditional mobile browsers are weak. Moreover, the pages will look the same as they do on a PC because effectively you are using a PC browser.
Skyfire first provides an overview of the page you are viewing. You can then choose which area to zoom in on and from there you are able to scroll around the page as you would in any other browser.
Skyfire's home page gives you access to popular web sites. Shown above is an example of how the BBC News home page looks in SkyFire.
You 'zoom in' to read the detail of the page.
Skyfire's approach has advantages and disadvantages. For example, you will not be redirected to a mobile version of the page (e.g. BBC, Facebook) so you should get access to full page content and functions. However pages designed specifically for viewing in mobile browsers do not work well with Skyfire (just as they dont usually work well in a PC browser). This means you'll most likely use Skyfire in conjunction with your existing mobile browser. Physical screen size remains a serious limitation; you have to spend a lot of time scrolling around pages, although Skyfire does provide a 'fit-to-screen' option, to minimise horizontal scrolling.
In practise I found Skyfire to be a little rough around the edges, particularly in terms of usability. However the technology does demonstrate an enormous amount of potential and, to be fair, the current version is an early beta.
The crucial point is that it allows access to web content which was previously inaccessible from a mobile device and this is an impressive achievement. It also provides a more PC-like experience than most mobile Browsers.
Skyfire will be free for the end user and a first formal release should occur later this year.
Instant access to Skyfire Beta
We've got a 100 instant access beta invitations to give away. Please note instant access is only available for USA based readers.
For those living in the USA only: Please visit this page and enter the code 'AAS100' for instant access to beta. You must enter the code or you will go on the beta waiting list.
Video of Skyfire in action
Further screenshots
Skyfire's zoom in function has an adjustable size (1 and 3 as keyboard shortcuts), letting you control how much of the page you see when you zoom in.
This is useful when watching video, as shown here on YouTube, as you can set the zoom in size to be the same as the video viewing portal.
Skyfire is also able to handle AJAX-based web applications such as Gmail, shown above.
This browser looks really nice and it tickles my phone and me to try it out.
I tried to sign up to their beta 2 but later found out that it was only available for US.
Hope they open it up for other people soon.
I read somewhere that the S60 browser hasn't managed to quite keep up with the development of the web, which I do agree upon.
Nokia's handsets are after all advertised as multimedia computers and browsing the web is one of those experiences. Without giving us the full web experience it would be somewhat lacking the functions of a multimedia computer.
Unregistered
OMG! How is Skyfire supposed to scale at the server side? A gmail session with my Firefox browser grows to 63M RAM, so with 1TB of RAM, they should handle nearly 16000 concurrent sessions. Opera Mini transcoded 3.2 billion pages in June (1234/sec), but typical browsing sessions range from 10 to 29 minutes (http://www.mmetrics.com/press/PressR...-smartbrowsing), so if Skykire ever gets as popular as Opera Mini, we're talking 46-135 TB RAM here.
And what about bandwith? Opera Mini is around 1/4 of Norway total Internet data traffic (46MM MB in June), and that without fancy video/AJAX/Flash!
ashu
hi rafe.
If we go by what 'unregistered' says, then its going to reduce the speed of mobile devices significantly. How much of ram does it actually consumes? Will it be feasible for me to test fire this beta on my n 82? I m not in States so i will also have to wait.
Has any one tried running waywework.in on this browser? Its nokia's promo flash 9 for e71. If it opens and works on skyfire then its worth the try i guess.
It seems a bit different than the one of other proxy browsers and explicitly tells that they collect all your usernames, passwords, credit card numbers and other sensitive information and I'm unsure whether they are going to earn a good money from selling your info. The best part is that, they completely trap you from the beginning, starting from your email address and phone number - they can easily build your virtual character in their databases.
ashu
you anyways provide your number and email to receive mails, games from established networks and sites like Handango.
I do not see any trick in this, yes ofcourse, if my credit card details, which i presume happens through a minimum of 128 bit security, now is stored with someone else, i will really be concerned.
But then, isn't it a free ware? are they supposed to make it commercial?
Rafe
scalability issues - yes I imagine this is a concern, but I would add the skyfire technology is only based on Mozilla tech. Its not really a copy of Firefox on a remote server it is just the easy way to explain the concept... i.e. its probably just the core rendering engine.
kflyer - its a standard disclaimer. You'll see something similar on other e-commerce websites etc. (and indeed other proxy based browsers).
Unregistered
I actually like this browser a lot.
I'm sick of the built-in browser presenting me with tiny mobile versions of google every time I start searching on my opened up E90
kflyer
Ok Rafe, sorry then. I've edited my post now. SkyFire really is a great browser given its functionality, but unfortunately I live outside the U.S. So, no chance to experience it.
Scottbeau
Rafe - do you see a reason to port away from Opera Mini to Skyfire? Is there a big USP so far from being a native app rather than a java app?
It seems a bit different than the one of other proxy browsers and explicitly tells that they collect all your usernames, passwords, credit card numbers and other sensitive information QUOTE]
Quote:
Originally Posted by Rafe
kflyer - its a standard disclaimer. You'll see something similar on other e-commerce websites etc. (and indeed other proxy based browsers).
I still think that sounds bad. Does Opera state they'll collect personal info for using as they see fit?
Their site seems to say:
How does Opera protect my privacy?
Opera does not store any users' private information. Opera generates statistics of the usage of Opera Mini, but these are aggregated numbers and no information can be linked to a single user.
( http://www.operamini.com/help/faq/#privacy )
Unregistered
This one is sucky sucky. You guys dont even know if this app is collecting your personal banking data, huh. Wake up AAS editors.
Unregistered
Quote:
Originally Posted by Unregistered
This one is sucky sucky. You guys dont even know if this app is collecting your personal banking data, huh. Wake up AAS editors.
Whatever Skyfire is or isn't doing, I'd think we could at least try and keep this discussion polite.
mst_dev
I've registered in the early days of Skyfire, but sadly I'm not in the US. I hope that it's available soon because S60 is a non-US popular mobile platform. I think it worth move from the Java-based Opermini to a native browser if it work like they say. Native apps are more powerful and interactive.
Oh dear...you use this? I tried it on the BBC website...what a mess! I tried it on Digg...an even BIGGER mess. I like it's speed and responsiveness. Pages are rendered ligtning quick...but they are rendered beyond wrong!
Tzer2
Quote:
It seems a bit different than the one of other proxy browsers and explicitly tells that they collect all your usernames, passwords, credit card numbers and other sensitive information
I think (not sure, but think) they're talking about people who register on the Skyfire website and subscribe to Skyfire services. The only info they're talking about are what you give them when you're using the site.
To put it into context, here's how that section on privacy actually begins:
When you subscribe to the Browser through the Site or via a mobile device, or if you choose to register and create your own profile webpage on our Site, we will ask you for certain information that can be used to contact or identify you and administer your account (“Personal Information”)
...and then it talks about usernames, card numbers etc.
To me that does sound like a standard disclaimer to only cover information you have supplied to them.
Unregistered
I tried it on my 8gb nokia n95 and I must say the experience is revealing and breathtaking. At beta this thing beats opera mini by a mile. on wifi it loads almost all web pages i visited at least 2x faster. even pages heavy on flash and images, its almost 2x faster than mini. its zoomable and it renders text very well for reading. flash sites work like they do on pc. albeit small, so you may need to zoom in. i tried visiting veoh.com but it couldn't show any videos though. but almost all other sites i visited worked like a charm. for a beta program this is an excellent browser. beats all other browsers i have tried even safari on iphone for speed and layout. only issue currently is when i exit the program it has trouble reconnecting to wifi. some beta issues i guess. this program is absolutely wonderful. I wouldn't mind paying for this one...
N/A
Dear, Unregistered, Do you happen to be employed by Skyfire people or perhaps you are one of its developers or a marketeer or just a troll? Your prolific use of superlatives is a tad suspicious (especially when coming from an anonymoys poster).
Rafe
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scottbeau
Rafe - do you see a reason to port away from Opera Mini to Skyfire? Is there a big USP so far from being a native app rather than a java app?
I'd say its also about being able to use AJAX based sites - something that doesn't work very well with Opera Mini (if at all). The S60 browser is better, but not perfect. Opera is more stable and more polished in UI / UX terms at the moment. Its also less resource intensive. I don't think being Java is a major downside, especially not on FP2 devices where performance is much better.
At the moment the beta is too rough and speed difference not that great in my opinion (esp over cellular connections). However I think it'll make a nice extra tool. I have Opera Mini and Web already and use both. I can see myself adding Skyfire to that list. They're all different approaches to mobile Internet and different people will prefer one over the other. Skyfire does very well on heavy PC based sites, but the question is how often do you browse those on a mobile device. I tend to stick to quick information retrieval on mobile sites - this is as much to do with the speed of the connection. i.e. I want page ina few seconds... anything more than that is bad.
Unregistered
I browse allaboutsymbian and catch most if not all the shows and all. so not. My use of superlatives is an indication of my excitement on the coming of such a good app for symbian and nokia. Its still in beta and may require more fine tuning. Its not quite as smooth as mini or as stable as nokia web. I still like opera mini SSR over skyfire. Overall, I believe skyfire will finally allow end users to fully browse PC sites in its fullness, especially ajax, flash and script heavy sites when it comes. However if you don't visit such sites then mini or web will be just fine...Try the software and see for yourself.
N/A
Good enough and I stand corrected and apologize for being so suspicious. If I were in the US, I'd try it too, after your praise. ;)
Unregistered
INSTANT? It didn't work for me? Anyone get instant accsess?
You can use this widget to send bookmarks or notes for this page to your favourite sharing / bookmarking service. You will need an account at mnay of these services and may need to log in to use them.
