In an appropriately 'over the air' day (ref the HTC G1 announcement), Tzer2 looks closely at how divorced S60 is from a desktop computer. In other words, do you need to be tied to a PC or Mac at all these days? The answer is largely 'No'. Tzer2's article will make you think and challenge the way you've viewed Symbian OS and S60 phones up until now.
Read on in the full article.
Incidentally, something I forgot to add to the article:
It's important to be able to use a (smart)phone without a computer partly because most people on the planet don't have access to a PC, but they probably do have access to a mobile phone and its network.
Non-smart phones have spread to practically every community in every country, and smartphones may well do the same thing soon. If smartphones want to go really mainstream they will do this more quickly if they don't require the purchase of a laptop or desktop.
...with laptops like eee at �200 or less and a smartphone Sim Free at often more than that, why struggle with a small screen etc.?
Even laptops are so inexpensive now that they are thought of as as disposable as phones - have a new one every year!
I can't see people dumping their computers for phones yet!
...with laptops like eee at �200 or less and a smartphone Sim Free at often more than that, why struggle with a small screen etc.? I can't see people dumping their computers for phones yet!
Well if you read the article you'll see that phones don't have to have small screens any more. The latest smartphones, even mid-range ones, can be plugged into practically any television set so a phone screen could be 30 inches if you have a telly that size.
As I said in the article, if the TV Out resolution of smartphones is increased to match PCs (which is totally possible as HDTVs are starting to become common) there won't be as much need for a PC.
Combine TV Out with a Bluetooth or USB keyboard and mouse, and a smartphone becomes for all intents and purposes a PC. Smartphones aren't quite there yet, they still lack high definition TV Out and they also lack mouse support, but it would be VERY easy to give smartphones those things if the manufacturers wanted to.
But a phone doesn't have to be a PC, it can be disconnected from a TV and any accessories, and put in your pocket. You certainly can't fit an EEE PC into your pocket, unless you're a circus clown wearing silly trousers. 😊
it would still be nice to have computer that would sync and operate with a smartphone as if they were one.
for instance, i get home and my phone is low on power. i need to charge up but i still need to use my phone. i dock my device and while it's charging, my computer can access my phone's main memory and applications, like send an SMS or read my email. when auto sync is completed, i don't have to worry about that SMS being sent properly because it doesn't show in my sent messages, or being alerted of an email that i've already read from my computer.
on top working as one computer, it would also be great to have a laptop and smart phone to work completely independent of one another but with the same suite of applications, functionalities, files, media, etc.
and how about remote operation at home or on the go, i would like to be able to tell my computer to record a tv show from work, or watch them on my device while streaming, or sync them when i get home without worrying about converting them; play them on the big screen with one touch on the phone, dime the lights along with.
full OS and hardware integration. now that's a dream!
>Download Maps
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>Tip: While in Wi-Fi or good network coverage, browse the maps for an area you're about to visit >that is known to have poor network coverage, i.e. scroll around at near street level, to force Nokia >Maps to download the relevant map tiles. They will then be already preloaded for when you need >them.
There's a better way to download maps to your phone without using a computer.
Go to http://nokiamaps.site666.info , download all the maps you like (they come straight from Nokia's own server), and unzip them to the maps folder on your memory card. File managers like Y-Browser and X-plore come with a zip app of their own, so you can do it all on your phone without touching a computer.
I think the phones based on s60v2 are better equipped to live without a PC nearby, I know of people who've managed their websites all from an n-gage or 6630. I have myself lived with a 6600, 6630 and N70 for an year each without a PC nearby and never felt the need for one.
The use of certificates on s60v3 ruined the game for everyone, making it necessary to have a pc nearby to sign an app before it could be installed on a phone.
Really? Which apps in particular are you missing? I'm curious!
Hardeep1singh wrote:The use of certificates on s60v3 ruined the game for everyone, making it necessary to have a pc nearby to sign an app before it could be installed on a phone.
With applications like Quickoffice v5 for opening and sending attachments and working through my budgets with Excel, and Opera Mini for my web needs, being away from the PC is relatively painless. My work in the film industry keeps me well away from the office most of the time. Usually I leave my N82 at home and rather take my old E61 along as I find my bluetooth keyboard to be a little unwieldy. Multimedia is not really a factor in my day to day life and so there is only my PIM information to back up and store and for this Mobical has proven to be entirely sufficient. I have a bluetooth gps and so Nokia and Google maps have also proven to be sufficient (except for when I am outside of gsm signal areas and Google Maps dont work). The only time I take my laptop out of its bag is when I stay in a hotel and want to watch a movie or play a pc game.
What we REALLY, REALLY need, which is totally technically possible right now, but which Nokia flatly refuses to do (or even respond to any questions about on Forum Nokia whatsoever - and not just my questions, but loads of people's questions over time) is
a.) Bluetooth mouse support in S60. I mean just how hard would it be? Not hard, that's what (and I say that as a software developer). The browser already draws a pointer, for starters. Bluetooth mice exist, the hardware is in place, bluetooth keyboards already talk to any application. Honestly, there is no excuse for not supporting a mouse.
b.) Allow any 3rd party app to access the higher res. TV output mode - you know, the one gallery uses and RealPlayer uses when showing 640 X 480 TV output. Why oh why oh why cannot any app access this?
Both of these seem to be "no comment" subjects on Forum Nokia. If these two things were enabled, you would instantly have a de facto PC in your pocket. This is a small firmware update.
Why are Nokia to absolutely brilliant at bypassing all common sense on certain crucial things? It's not like they make a line of PCs whose market share they're trying to protect!
Really? Which apps in particular are you missing? I'm curious!
I'm not talking about a particular app but the way an app is installed on the phone, I can't just download and install every other s60v3 app i see on the internet anymore, for most of them, I need a PC first to sign them beofre I can install them on my phone.
You still need a PC to write the application, don't you?
No, I'm not a developer, I don't write applications, I'm a user, I download from the internet and install them on my phone. Unfortunately, now the process isn't that simple anymore.
App signing is evil. I atleast know what to, do to install an unsigned app on my phone, a newbie can even get confused with an app signed with an expired certificate, I hope this problem doesn't turn out to be a nail in s60's coffin someday.
hardeepji,
I do agree with you in principle, but app signing is not necessarily evil. What is annoying is symbian signed having to be an unavoidable part of the process, at least as far as s60 is concerned.
When i develop a desktop based web application, sometimes certificate based trust is absolutely necessary. But it is not so much of a pain since i can create my own certificate on my own and get on with it. And when I do this on my laptop, i do not have to involve any of the concerned oems - hp, microsoft or the apache foundation. I need to worry about a "proper" certificate only when I put the app into production.
While this is theoretically possible even on symbian signed, I have been finding out the hard way that it doesnt work out this way in practice. I have been trying to sign a landmark (poi) database manager application that I found on the symbian developer network so that I can use it on my e90. First I tried open signed, but I get some wierd network communication failure message when I hit the send button. Since documentation on the web says that I can sign an app for a single imei without having a publisher id, I decided to go down that route and downloaded the devcertrequest application from symbian signed. Apparently this is supposed to have a checkbox on the second tab of the app for proceeding without a publisher id - only i cant find any checkbox. So I am stuck. Why does symbian have to be involved at all? I just want to run this app on my phone and I cant. Why does the only finally trust cert have to belong to symbian or one of its affiliates?
As far as the article's theme is concerned, I have to say that this is a problem that I do not face on a pc (even on windows, which is a proprietary os). But I face this on my smartphone. So I would not want to depend on my mobile device for everything, no matter how feature rich it is.
P.S. This pain might end the day nokia has a maemo based phone, if ever.
P.S1. I have noticed that anybody who says anything negative about s60 or symbian gets flak on this site these days(I can already see a couple of examples in the comments above), although the whole thing seems to have started as a response to a genuine troll problem. I hope I am spared this time - i really mean whatever I have said above.
Unregistered wrote:a.) Bluetooth mouse support in S60. I mean just how hard would it be? Not hard, that's what (and I say that as a software developer). The browser already draws a pointer, for starters. Bluetooth mice exist, the hardware is in place, bluetooth keyboards already talk to any application. Honestly, there is no excuse for not supporting a mouse.
b.) Allow any 3rd party app to access the higher res. TV output mode - you know, the one gallery uses and RealPlayer uses when showing 640 X 480 TV output. Why oh why oh why cannot any app access this?
Both of these seem to be "no comment" subjects on Forum Nokia. If these two things were enabled, you would instantly have a de facto PC in your pocket. This is a small firmware update.
Why are Nokia to absolutely brilliant at bypassing all common sense on certain crucial things? It's not like they make a line of PCs whose market share they're trying to protect!
I agree, and thats what I have been saying for a long time.
It would make so much sense.
Tzer2 wrote:Incidentally, something I forgot to add to the article:It's important to be able to use a (smart)phone without a computer partly because most people on the planet don't have access to a PC, but they probably do have access to a mobile phone and its network.
Non-smart phones have spread to practically every community in every country, and smartphones may well do the same thing soon. If smartphones want to go really mainstream they will do this more quickly if they don't require the purchase of a laptop or desktop.
Not true. In my opinion, the smartphone, the notebook computer, the PC, the TV, and the entertainment system are getting more and more integrated as we expand contents to multiple devices. Contents expansion was the proliferation of the Internet to computers and it will be the new industry theme that is driving the desire for content and information to be multi-purposed and displayed on many types of devices.
Nokia should work very closely with computer manufacturers and software developers to ensure that contents and information can flow from one device to the other seemlessly.